Real Gadget Reviews

Sony Ericsson W910

2012-12-30T12:24:00.000-07:00

The Sony Ericsson W910 is an older device, having been released in 2007, but it still packs quite a punch. The messaging device has a 2.4 inch display with a 240x320 resolution, but that's really all you need. There's barely an internal storage with only 40MB, but it is expandable with Sony's proprietary M2 memory stick. The device also has 3G connectivity, so you might be able to do some browsing now and then. You also get a 2MP back facing and even a front facing camera. Talk time on the device is up to 9 hours, which is pretty good for a phone like this. It's a simple device, but it's features are really way ahead of its time. User review below.

"I have a Sony Ericsson W910i multimedia phone, I got it way back in the year 2010, this was my first and an expensive cell it cost me around 400 USD at that time. Although I was out of money but I managed to get it because at that time it was ruling the Indian market. Also my cell that is my W910i was also awarded the world’s best phone in the multimedia category. The key features of my cell are unique, like it is a walkman phone that means its sound quality is unmatchable, it created a bench mark for all other leading companies, like Samsung, Apple, and lots more. W910i is java supported it is where it fails but not completely because the user interface of this gadget is so friendly that you are not going to believe that this is a java supported system instead you will say it’s not possible. Another key feature is its connectivity, it supports wi-fi, gprs, cdma and some more typical words that I don’t know but it connects superbly to the web. It supports 3g and 2g simultaneously, and hence it is a hybrid, let me explain it to you what hybrid means, it is a special program that helps you to use any of the 2g or 3g network at the same time. Now, some facts about its camera quality, it has a front camera and a rear camera, the rear one is of 2 mega pixels and the front is VGA, you might would think that what quality of pics would a 2M.P camera give, but wait if you are thinking like this then let me tell you the its camera beats the 5MP camera of Nokia X2. The front camera is for video calling only. But you can capture stills in an ongoing call. This is the point where i too found it disgusting that why they have not provided the capturing features here too but whatever it may be. But actually its beauty comes from its slider look, when it slides out, the dynamics flow through your heart and brain, it looks so awesome with its slider open and a big screen, embedded side multimedia keys, and many more beautiful things. For game lovers this phone is a jackpot, you can play a lots of strategy games, racing games, fighting games that are pre loaded. It can store unlimited sms in its inbox, so you don’t need to delete sms's from your inbox to receive new ones. It can be used for receiving e-mails, you can create an e-mail account in the phone itself and can manage your mails instantly. now at the end let me tell you about its battery life. It has a standby time of 3 days and 4 hours and a talktime of around 9 hours that means you can talk 9 hours continuously. And its charging takes only 2.4 hours to get charged fully. its internal memory is about 56MB and it expandable memory is 4GB and that’s less .But even then overall it is a nice, friendly phone. And i love my cell very much and I will keep it with me forever."

Huawei Pillar

2012-12-30T12:16:00.002-07:00

The Huawei Pillar is a simple messaging device for Cricket. It doesn't really feature anything other than a 2 inch low resolution display. The device does have a basic browser and VGA camera, and the battery will get you 4 hours and 30 minutes of talk time. We've included a user review below.

"The Huawei Pillar is an affordable and quick solution when in need of a new cell phone. It has some really good features for a lower end cell phone. It features a QWERTY key design for ease while text messaging, internet access, and a slim design for carrying around in your pocket. Unfortunately it has many flaws, but that’s what you get for a $30 cell phone. The screen is easy susceptible to scuffs and scratches, the back casing can slide off while pulling it out of ones pocket as it has nothing latching it to the rest of the phone. The screen is incredibly small, so it can be hard to read anything you might be accessing on the internet, including social networking sites such as Facebook. The phone has limited access to email sites, and if you have a service other than Yahoo, it is hard to pull up your e-mail. The phone itself does not have a very loud earpiece. You generally have to put the phone on speaker mode in order to hear the person you are talking to, and you are limited to how loud you can turn up the volume. The memory of the phone can only hold up to 500 text messages before you need to clear out the memory so you can receive new messages. Set at the highest quality of pixilation the camera is incredibly subpar compared to other models of phones. It is also a phone you have to be incredibly careful with. Dropping can cause the keys to pop out of the casing, and while they can be set back in, it can cause lag when you using the keys that you have had to set back in. The music player is incredibly easy to access and manage. You are able to load songs directly from your home computer to the phone, allowing you to create your own playlists or use whatever songs as a ringtone, or text message tone. It also has a slot for you to put in an micro SD card so you can have more memory to store images, and pictures. One of the best features is the alarm clock, which notifies you of how much time you have until it goes off. The phone itself retains a decent charge, only having to be plugged in every few days. When texting, if you go over your allotted 150 characters, the phone will switch from MMS mode to SMS mode automatically, allowing you to send longer messages. The contacts section allows you to place VIP’s on people you talk to frequently, and allows you to find those people faster than scrolling through your whole phone book. All of these things considered, the Huawei Pillar would not be recommended as a long term cell phone. It is great as a backup in case something were to happen to the current phone you are using, and you needed something quick and affordable in a short amount of time."

LG T-Mobile myTouch

2012-12-30T12:04:00.002-07:00

LG's attempt at the myTouch was a lower-end device, which is really what the myTouch has become. The device has a 3.8 inch display with a resolution of 480x800, and it is AMOLED. The device does support dual channel HSDPA on T-Mobile's network, so you'll get some blazing fast 42Mbps speeds. Unfortunately the device only has a 1 GHz processor and 512 MB of ram, so you might not be able to get much use from those speeds. Hit up the user review below and share your own comments too.

"I have had my LG E739 "MY Touch" for about 6 months now and I feel its a perfect time for me to review it as I have had a sufficient amount of time to really understand all the positives and negatives of this phone. Considering the LG MY Touch is my first smart phone, my expectations weren't as high as say an IPhone user. Right off the bat, I loved the ease of navigation as well as the preloaded apps that made it super easy to setup to my liking. Down the line I did realize that the only two things that really bothered me was the camera quality and lack of compatibility for multiple languages. The camera has no flash capability, so the shot and lighting has to be just right in order to get a decent picture. The digital zoom on the camera is not so great either, I recommend when taking a picture, get close to the object rather than trying to use the zoom feature because it will come out too grainy. It doesn't bother me too much though because I know that its a phone first, camera second (or third, or fourth, depending on ones priority) but if you're really into taking good quality photos then this might not be for you. With the language issue, I really wish it came with Arabic text equipped. The texts I can do without, because if I really needed to text in Arabic I found an app to aid with that. The main annoyance is when I browse through websites with Arabic text, and the words are just jumbled up and it takes a while to read even one sentence and then I quickly lose interest and just continue what I read trying to read on my PC. Again, its a phone first, but with the expectations we have in technology today, I was a little disappointed to say the least. I would say that if I wasn't under a 2 year contract and was short on cash I probably would've returned the My Touch and just gotten an IPhone, but when I calm down, I just learn to appreciate the features it does offer and what an amazing resource this phone can be in times of need. I do also feel though that the it could be a little faster as response times go, and this was after taking a look and feel of friends and family's Iphone's. The phone can hang sometimes if you have too many apps running, but it does offer an application manager where you can stop the processes of apps you are currently not using so that it can improve response and performance times for the apps that are being utilized. At the end of the day it gets the job done. I don't use the phone for many social media outlets, mostly talking, texts, and the occasional game. I don't think I would repurchase the same brand when it does come time for me to upgrade, but I will have had a great run with this phone."

T-Mobile myTouch 2 by Huawei

2012-12-29T22:36:00.003-07:00

The T-Mobile myTouch used to be the highest-end Android device that you could get, but that's no longer true. Despite the fact, the myTouch is still a great low end device. The myTouch 2, made by Huawei, runs Android 2.3 Gingerbread, so it's not the newest thing ever, but it'll still get the job done. The 4 inch display only has a resolution of 480x800, but the phone does have 1 GB of ram and a 1.3 GHz processor, so it shouldn't be too slow. 4 GB of storage are also on board, as well as a front facing camera and a rear facing 5 MP shooter. Battery life is pretty bad a only 6 hours and 10 minutes of talk time. All in all, the specs aren't too good, but if you can find this phone for the right price, go for it. We've included a user review below, but feel free to share your own thoughts in the comments.

"My current cell phone is the T-Mobile myTouch by Huawei. I would say that the phone is a very average smartphone, but it is certainly acceptable for daily use. It runs on Android, so it is customizable as far as downloading apps goes. Having downloaded many apps ranging from ones like Yelp to Instagram, I have not had any compatibility issues with the current versions on the phone. Browsing on it is nothing special, but I have not run into any problems with running dolphin browser on it. Of course having access to the Android market gives other options for browsers besides the basic browser that comes on the phone. There are times when the phone can be laggy, and I run into this problem mostly when opening up text threads, especially ones that have a high number of messages. In fact, this has crashed the texting program and even made it necessary to restart the phone multiple times back-to-back. It might help to delete messages in a high-count thread, but who wants to do that? The camera is what is expected for a phone in this price range. However, that means there are things missing and the user desires just a little more. In sunny conditions outside, the camera takes some great photos. They are clear, bright, and overall satisfy what a smartphone camera these days should yield. Although great, a more expensive phone with a camera will likely outperform it in size of pictures as well as in other more detailed aspects. The biggest problem with the camera is using it in any conditions that are not outside and sunny, whether that is indoor and lit or outdoor and cloudy. Pictures suddenly become very dull, blurry, and inadequate. Pictures can often turn out too dark to even be useful. The phone is not popular enough for companies to invest a lot in good accessories. This is unfortunate especially with respect to cases and screen protectors. Screen protectors will have to be cut to fit the T-Mobile myTouch. Cases are incredibly cheap and ultimately are too flimsy. In fact, they make it harder to handle the phone because they do not fit snug. That is certainly a shame, because the phone, although slim and fairly light, does not have a good grip to it. The back is a cheap piece of plastic that works, but even after great care and zero drops has accumulated a number of visible wear marks. If considering this phone, expect that the poor grip and lack of accessories will result in dropping it within the first few months of use, which will likely result in a cracked screen or a completely unusable cell phone. The memory is expandable, but if you are the type of person that would want to do a lot of music listening or movie watching, you’d be better served spending more money on a better phone. Overall the phone is great for a normal user. It is possibly simple enough for new smartphone users or older generation users. The T-Mobile myTouch will allow listening to Pandora via Wi-Fi, constant texting, and checking Twitter and Instagram throughout the day on one charge. It is not the best phone out there, but it will do for the cheap price."

LG 420G

2012-12-29T21:21:00.000-07:00

The LG 420G flip phone, yes, we said it, flip phone, is a device with about as few features you could imaging, but sometimes all you really need is calling and messaging, and if that's the case, then this is the phone for you. It does have a 1.3 MP camera and is supposedly mobile web capable, but that is about all you get aside from basic calling and messaging features. Below we've included a user review, but hit us up in the comments and tell us what you think.

"This is the phone I have I have had for about two years. It is a Trac phone LG 420 G, it is a good phone. The style is clam shell, which is what I wanted because I don’t really like the touch screen type because of the fragility of the thing and the phones that are straight with no cover which was the first cell phone that I ever had and I was constantly making what I and other call “pocket calls”. This phone I have now has been through the ringer, and I do mean ringer. I washed it one time and dried it out and the thing still works fine. It stores many pictures I think 100 or so, my girlfriend and another at work all of us have this same LG 420 Trac phone and one day realized that hey look at this we all have the LG the irony was we three were the markdown team for the store. This phone is rugged, I am an outdoors man and have had it in some pretty harsh climates. From blistering heat in the upper 90’s to exstream cold in the teens, so I know that this is the phone for me. I have had no problems connection to other parties whether it be long distance across the states from east to west or across town, the reception is great. When I got the phone I got it on sale for ten dollars, yes ten. Now here’s the really really good thing about it. When reup on my minutes I get double so for sixty I get one hundred and twenty. Now that good service, and I switched from a similar phone to this phone and wanted to keep my same number. No problem, I called Trac phone and they put it right through. I had to get a new sim card at the time and they sent it right away. I use the text feature quite alot which take only thirty seconds a text message so I can extend one hundred and twenty minutes for aloooong time. In fact I got a card for Christmas and had forgot about the extra sixty minutes and was like look honey they gave me an extra sixty minutes. As I was reminded about the double time I was pleased that I had this phone and there's not too much more I could ask from it. I work setting up rock and roll shows and theater and have recorded some of the music from the loud rock and roll and it done a real good job at that too. O and another thing is that it charges quick in about thirty minutes and will hold the charge for days at a time. Depending on use of course. It has a power saving mode which I usually keep it on most of the time. But even when I have it full on It stays charged up for a pretty long time. So all in all it was a good buy and has lasted for a couple of years now and I don’t plan on buying another anytime soon. I can’t speak for all of the Trac phones but this one is tops in my book."

Nokia Lumia 900

2012-12-29T21:14:00.003-07:00

The Nokia Lumia 900 is an older Windows Phone 7.5 device (though you can probably expect it to get the 7.8 upgrade). Despite being of the older generation of Windows Phone devices, it still packs quite a punch. It's also one of the best designed devices we've seen in a while. It the US the device is available on AT&T's LTE network, which is blazing fast. The phone has a 4.3 inch display, but sadly the resolution is only 480x800. Corning Gorilla Glass was also used by Nokia this time, making the Lumia 900 a fairly durable device. Aside from that the device has 512 MB of ram and 16GB of storage. Though 512 MB of ram may seem like very little, Windows Phone manages it very efficiently and you will barely ever notice any lag. The CPU is a 1.4 GHz, also more than sufficient for Windows Phone, and you get the rest of the standard features such as WiFi 802.11n, a 8MP back facing and 1.3 MP front facing camera, and GPS. Battery life is okay with 7 hours of talk time. Below we've included a user review, but feel free to share your own thoughts in the comments.

"I am currently using a Nokia Lumia 900. The actual hardware of the phone itself is fantastic. The matte black finish looks great and doesn't really pick up any fingerprints which it quite nice compared to the many glossy phones on the market currently. The Lumia is also deceptively comfortable, the phone itself is somewhat blocky and has an almost monolithic look to it but sits well in the hand and is quite comfy to hold. The weight of the phone strikes a nice balance that is neither heavy nor cheap feeling. The main problem with the phone is the operating system. The phone runs Windows Phone 7, which has already been made outdated by Windows Phone 8 less than a year after the phone's release. The main functions of the phone, such as calling and texting function as intended but are largely run of the mill. The OS actually looks quite nice, Microsoft's inclusion of what they call "Live Tiles" makes the home screen feel lively. I would even say that the majority of the problems don't fall solely on Microsoft. The App Marketplace on the phone is absolutely awful, there are barely any apps and the ones that are on there are largely of a low quality. A lot of apps that are used daily by people on iOS or the Android platform are missing, and there is a general feeling of uncaring in the apps that are available on the store. Compared to iOS the app selection is laughable, and even compared to Android which doesn't feature as robust of a selection as iOS, Windows Phone is simply lacking. The one interesting thing that the Windows Phone platform allows is integration with Xbox Live, allowing owners to get achievements while playing games on the phone. What should have been a really great added feature actually ends up hurting the apps even more as a result. In order for games to use Xbox Live features, they have to be submitted into a whole different section of the store with different submission restrictions. In the end it makes me more weary about the other games on the platform, not only because I can't earn achievements on them, but because this walled garden mentality makes me question what level of quality the game has to be for it to not be a Xbox Live compatible game. The Nokia Lumia 900 is absolutely let down buy the software that runs on it. The hardware itself is actually quite amazing, and is actually one of the better looking and feeling phones that I have used in quite a while, rivaling even Apple products in its look and feel. The selection of apps is dreadful, especially with games in particular which is an area that Apple has really come into its own on the iOS platform. At every turn I really wanted to like the Lumia 900 but the operating system just wouldn't let me. So in the end Nokia delivered a beautiful piece of hardware that Microsoft managed to pretty much fail to capitalize on right out of the gate."

Apple iPhone 5

2012-12-29T16:13:00.001-07:00

There aren't all that many differences between the iPhone 5 and its predecessor, the 4S. The main difference is that the iPhone 5 features 4G LTE, which is blazing fast, if I do say so myself. Also a difference that most people will notices, the screen size has been increased and is now 4 inches. With the iPhone 4S, many people were having issues with the glass back breaking, so with the iPhone 5, Apple decided to take care of this and made the back aluminum. Some other minor differences are that the ram has been increased to 1 GB and the processor is slightly faster, as well as the graphics. Other than that, everything is essentially the same. Read some user reviews below and feel free to add your own in the comments.

"I recently purchased the iPhone 5 by Apple. The iPhone 5 is slimmer than its previous versions. The difference in weight is significant and noteworthy. By being slimmer and lighter it makes it easier to take photos or type with a single hand. Therefore, I am able to text/search on the go without having to stop what I am doing. The exterior of the iPhone 5 is very sleek and sharp looking. I chose the black version of the phone because I felt as though it looked better with the black screen background but the white is nice as well. Besides being slimmer and lighter weight, this iPhone has a larger screen which makes video viewing so much more pleasurable. I find myself watching videos on the iPhone 5 much more frequently than with my previous device. One big "con" was the switch to the Lightening power connector. What is positive about the Lightening connector is that it is small, sleek, and easy to use since there is no need to fidget with which side plugs in face up (it works on either side). What is negative is that no other wires that i had previously purchased works with my phone, I have to carry more wires to work since I have other Apple devices that do not use the Lightening connector, also getting these connectors made for the iPhone 5 can be a tedious tasks. In terms of processing speeds, the iPhone 5 is extremely fast. I use many applications and I never feel as though my phone gets stuck on any screen or slow in any way. You can also see that the processor is super fast when taking pictures. I can continuously take picture after picture without having any lag in between shots. This is great when trying to capture moments quickly. A feature that still needs some work in my opinion is Siri. There are many instances where I speak extremely clearly and no matter how many times I try, Siri gets it wrong. I get a much better response when voice searching in my Google searches. Another feature of the phone and updated iOS 6 software was the Passport feature. I have yet been able to utilize this in any productive way. It seems to be a little pointless to me but I just may be missing the point of Passport completely. Instead, I just download the apps that better suit my needs. The App Store that is available for the iPhone 5 is superb. There are so many different applications from entertaining, social, to productive that the phone can keep you occupied all day. The iPhone 5 has become an integral tool in my life, it makes my life easier. It allows me to stay in touch with friends from all over the world by using the various communications apps available. I am able to remain up to date with news, traffic, weather all in the palm of my hand. It is an extremely reliable product that does not freeze or slow down, which was my biggest gripe with all of my previous cell phones. I know that anything I need to get done or find out, I can do so at any time. The availability of LTE on the iPhone 5 makes a significant difference on app performance and internet searching. I get faster results consistently. Overall, it is a sleek phone that is super fast, that works all the time and makes my life easier!"

"I currently own the iPhone 5 the 16GB Black/slate model by Apple. I love this phone so much, and it’s probably the best phone I’ve purchased in a while. I’ve owned both the Blackberry Curve and Android Evo in the past, and none of those compare to the iPhone 5. The iPhone 5 has made many changes from its previous models, starting with the screen size. While Apple didn’t change much about the screen resolution from the iPhone 4s to the iPhone 5, the new longer screen adds to the ease of use and handling of the phone. As a female even I thought the previous models of the iPhone were too small. The phone is also very light in the hands, and much lighter than previous models. I have the black iPhone 5 model, which is a slate metal like color and is very good looking to the eyes. But I must warn you please be aware when purchasing the black color iPhone 5 because it’s prone to scratches if it’s dropped. I think it scratches easily because it is made out a metal type material, so you might want to also purchase a case along with it. The operating system the iPhone 5 comes with is iOS 6 and it is very good also. One is always aware of the possible bugs a new phone OS can come with. But I have yet to encounter any bugs with the new operating system. I love the notification bar, and the ability to tweet directly from the notification bar. They have also made some changes to Siri, which is Apple’s automated voice command. She now seems more reliable and efficient, also providing quick responses to questions. One feature apple is trying to implement is the Cloud. Which is a storage feature if you want to be able to access your pictures, music, and movies from multiple devices. Multiple apple devices I should add. I am an owner of a Mac, iPad, and iPhone so it works for me. But if you don’t own multiple Apple devices, the cloud on your iPhone is pointless. The camera on the iPhone 5 is also amazing. Just like previous models the iPhone 5 offers a 8 megapixel HD camera and the pictures are truly HD. The video feature also offers HD video and now on the iPhone 5 you can record a video and take a picture while you are recording a video, so you never miss a moment. Also another feature the iPhone 5 offers is the panoramic picture feature. This feature allows you to take a picture of something wide, such as a long group of people without having to tell them to move in. It’s really an amazing feature, but it’s not easily accessed. You must hit the options button when you’re in the camera to access it. Also like I mentioned in the previous paragraph you about the cloud, the camera utilizes this feature called photo stream. So every time you take a picture it’s saved twice, once in your camera roll and the other is your photo stream so you can access your picture from other Apple devices."

Samsung Galaxy SIII

2012-12-29T15:47:00.002-07:00

The Galaxy SIII is probably the best Android device on the market as of now, though it has some competition with Google's new Nexus 4. The device has some of the best specifications for an Android device that you can get at the moment, and user reviews for this phone are phenomenal. The device features LTE on several major US carriers, T-Mobile being excluded (though you do get dual channel HSDPA with 42 Mbps speeds on T-Mobile). The device has a 4.8 inch 720p display, which is great because some manufacturers just give you those huge displays without actually improving the resolution much. Corning Gorilla Glass 2 is also featured, so you won't have to worry about buying a screen protector for this on. The device does have TouchWiz installed, which is mostly a negative. Some good things about this, though, are that you get that you get S-voice and Smart Stay eye tracking, which keeps your screen on while you are looking at it. You get various quantities of internal storage on this one, though it is expandable. The device features 2 GB of ram, so you won't be seeing any lag on this sucker. As mentioned previously, you do get HSDPA+ with 21Mbps down, as well as LTE on some models, and on T-Mobile you get dual channel HSDPA with 42Mbps down (in case you were wondering, the T-Mobile version is the T999). Needless to say, the device also includes WiFi 802.11n. The camera has been notably upgraded to an 8MP shooter with 1080p video recording, as well as a front facing camera with 720p video recording. The processor is decent, a 1.5 GHz dual core, though Google's Nexus 4 does beat it with a quad core. Surprisingly, their benchmark scores are very similar. The Galaxy SIII does upgrade all the way to Jelly Bean, and will likely continue to get upgraded for a while. You get 10 hours of talk time with the battery, which is quite a bit considering the gigantic screen. Below we've included some user reviews, but feel free to share your own experiences in the comments.

"Towards the end of summer I bought the Galaxy SIII, and I have to say that I absolutely love the phone. Prior to the purchase I was still using the original Motorola Droid. I had been using it for about two and a half years. While the Motorola Droid was a great phone, and I was pleased with it for a long time, I started having problems with it towards the end of my two year contract. It started to have technical problems, such as the phone not unlocking, or the browser constantly freezing up. The technical problems, and software problems, coupled with the fact that new applications have such high requirements now, really made it feel like I was being limited in what I could do, and I probably was. When my contract ended earlier this year, and the Samsung Galaxy SIII came up for preorder I immediately jumped on it. I got the phone sometime towards the end of summer, and despite all the hype, I was still extremely impressed with it. Firstly, the speed of it is out of this world. Apps run smoothly, and I can run multiple apps without any problems. There is a wide range of apps for it, and I have yet to run into any app that the phone cannot run. I am even able to watch movies while texting, and despite it being a drain on the batteries I haven’t experienced any lag at all. The interface is easy to use, and highly customizable. The resolution is brilliant, HD looks perfect on it; YouTube, Vimeo, etc. It also comes with so many cool features, like the S-Voice, which is like the iPhone’s Siri. Although when it comes to the S- Voice, I find that I would rather use Google’s voice search than it, Google’s is a bit more effective, and the voice sounds better, smoother. One of the best things about the SIII is the many different ways I can interact with the phone, I can talk to it, and I can swipe the screen to take screenshots, and one of my absolute favorites is where I can tap the top of the phone and it automatically scrolls up to the top of any page that I am viewing, great for long threads. Physically the phone is lightweight, and thin, but also has a huge screen. I would have to say that the size of the screen was what awed me when I first received it. Prior to the SIII I thought the Motorola Droid was a decent sized phone, but the size of the SIII just dwarfs it, and many others. Just the size of the screen is almost bigger than my droid. I really like the weight of it as it doesn’t feel heavy at all, and despite being bigger, is lighter than some other smaller phones. My Droid feels like a brick compared to it. The only downside to the SIII physically is the battery panel. Instead of having a hard plastic or metal plate, it’s a snap on rubber cover. Although it isn’t so bad, it feels kind of flimsy and I worry about breaking it whenever I have to take the cover off. Also it being so lightweight makes me handle it with a little more care, and definitely made me pick up a case for it as soon as I got it. The camera for the phone is out of this world. I got the phone shortly before I went on a trip to Hawaii, and as with any trips one of the things that people do is take pictures, so I had plenty of opportunities to test out the SIII’s camera. It is amazing. The shutter speed is amazing; I can take a picture in less than a second. There are a ton of awesome features, such as burst shot which is when the phone takes anywhere from 8 to 20 shots in a row, and you can pick which shot you like best, or keep them all. My favorite camera feature would be the Panorama shot. It takes several shots, and pastes them together to form one gigantic photo; it was a godsend in Hawaii. The quality of the pictures is amazing as well, almost every picture I take I am more than satisfied with, even macro shots which I take a lot of. Finally, though this might not be specific to the SIII, I am under Verizon and the 4G speed is amazing. It is noticeably faster than 3G the moment you use it, and even though I have WIFI I never bothered to tether it to my WIFI as it is fast enough already. Pages load almost instantly for me, and I can download most apps in less than 10 seconds. I really was impressed with the speed when I tether my laptop to the SIII. The speed is almost as good as my homes connection, and I have FIOS at home. I don’t have any problems with Skype, or downloading stuff when I tether, so it’s great for when I’m traveling. Especially since Verizon has service in a lot of places in the US. So all in all I love the Samsung Galaxy SIII, and haven’t really considered getting any other phone, even though the Galaxy Note II looks pretty amazing as well. I paid $250 for the SIII, and although that’s a bit steep I have no regrets, as it is an amazing device."

"Right now I currently own the Samsung Galaxy SIII. I've two of these phones over a period of one year now, and overall I feel it is a decent phone. There are a few things that I find very irritating though. The camera takes very good quality pictures, however, the speed of taking a picture is very long. It makes it hard to capture an "in the moment" picture, because by the time the shutter is activated, the moment has already passed. I do love the front facing camera though, and my three year old daughter loves it to. We often sit together and take pictures of ourselves. I really wish it had a flash. While the pictures are typically good quality, you can't get a decent picture if its dark. Also, the flashlight applications do not work very well on this phone. They only light up the screen, which isn't enough light to really do anything. Another issue I have had with this phone is that sometimes when I am trying to send a message, or make a call, the phone "backs" its way to the home screen. Meaning, I can push the button for my contacts or messages, and I can see it reverse its way back to the home screen. When this happens, in order for me to make a call or send a message, I have to restart my phone. I find this highly aggravating when I'm in a hurry to send a text or make a call. This has been an issue with both phones. I found that Samsung Galaxy S is pretty durable. The cover I use with it was just a flimsy gel cover. There was one situation where I put the phone on top of my car and drove off. I didn't find it until the next day after it had rained, and it was laying in a puddle. After replacing the battery, it still worked. The battery life seems like it is pretty good. I can go about 2 days without charging it if I don't use it very often. The phone also freezes up randomly when I am using certain applications. I can almost guarantee if I am playing certain games for longer than 15 minutes that my phone will freeze up and I will have to take the battery out and restart my phone. I have already went through 2 SD cards, although I am not sure if this is a problem with the phone or the cards. But there has been two occasions that my phone has not recognized my SD card, or randomly says that the SD card has been damaged or the phone is unable to read it. On a more positive note, the screen is very large, and I love that. The phone also is pretty smooth and quick when it is working properly. There typically doesn't seem to be much lag. I like the design of the phone. I think it's very sleek and elegant looking. Overall, on the days that my phone is NOT reversing back to the home screen when I'm trying to make a call, I'd recommend the Samsung Galaxy SIII to all of my friends. But on those days (probably twice a week) that I've had to restart my phone due to this issue, I definitely wouldn't suggest anyone buy this phone."

"I have been using the Galaxy SIII for a year. The Galaxy SIII works great and does everything that I need it to do. My previous smart phone caused only headaches whenever I went to use it, whether it was by making a call, sending a text or accessing the internet. When I was in the market for a new phone I wanted a phone that was easy to use, had access to all the cool and useful tools and was cool to have. I decided to purchase a Galaxy SIII Android. I love Androids for their access to both free and cheap apps, the speed and agility in using the internet and the design of the phone. I love free apps and my Galaxy SIII has a plethora of free apps that I have ready access to. I have downloaded apps for Navigation, Journal Writing, Agendas, Games, Backgrounds and many more. I particularly love the Navigation App. I do not have to purchase a GPS because my phone is my GPS. I have used my Navigation App to travel to places like New York, Iowa and Louisiana. One of the main reasons that I purchased the Galaxy SIII is the ease and speed of accessing the internet. The smart phone that I had previously owned was notoriously slow at accessing the internet. Essentially I was paying a large data fee for data that I could not access half of the time. Every day some of the things that I do on the internet include reading the daily news articles, checking and updating my Facebook account, checking my email, reading books on my Kindle app and simply searching the internet for useless as well as useful knowledge. The design of the Galaxy SIII was also important in my decision to purchase the phone. I particularly liked the large screen. I like to take photographs using my phone. The large screen makes it easier to see what I am snapping a picture of. The large screen also makes playing games easier. Angry Birds would be hard to see on a phone with a small screen, the birds are small enough to begin with. The large screen also adds to the backgrounds that I have downloaded. It is much nicer to be able to see what the background that I downloaded actually is rather than imagine what it is. On my previous phone my screen was so small that sometimes I could not tell what I was looking at and had to guess. The Galaxy SIII is a smart phone choice for anyone looking to purchase a phone in the Android market. It is a good phone overall. The Galaxy SIII has a sleek design and a large screen, easy and quick access to the best apps currently available and good tools. The tools that come standard on the phone like the camera, calendar, the large amount of storage space and much more make this phone an excellent value. I would definitely recommend anyone who is looking for an Android to purchase a Galaxy SIII."

"This has been dubbed the so-called, “iPhone Killer,” and based on my experiences with the phone the nickname is well deserved. Lets start with the processing speed of the phone. The Galaxy S3 comes with an older version of the android operating system but can easily be upgraded to android jellybean. The phone is blazing fast. Incredibly smooth page-to-page navigation and apps load instantaneously. One little criticism I had with it is the scrolling performance in browsers. It just not that precise based on my experiences with other phones and that is just a shame. As for the graphics and display, let me just be short and say it is beautiful. The colors are just plain amazing. Every color comes to life on the screen. I am a person who does not enjoy watching movies or shows on the phone but this Samsung Galaxy S3 has changed all that. The screen is very large and the colors are so vibrant and smooth that I have started to watch shows on the phone. I like to do YouTube tests on the phone as well to test just how hi-def the screen is. Let me tell you the display can handle any video YouTube has to offer. One of the biggest things I look for in a phone is battery life. This phone has disappointed me in that department. The battery runs out relatively quickly so keep your charger with you. You can buy an hour or two by lowering the brightness and by using a few other power save options but it still isn’t enough. If you are attached to your phone like I am then like I said earlier, keep your charger wherever you go because you will be surprised to see what little battery you have left when you use it for a whole day. The camera is an essential feature for phones nowadays and the Samsung Galaxy S3’s camera does not disappoint. The phone has an 8MP camera and the pictures it takes are flat out awesome. Not only that but it take pictures so quickly! You can press the take picture button like crazy and it will handle it with the greatest of ease. The video’s it takes are also just as amazing. And it also has a really cool feature: you can take high-resolution pictures from the video recorded to get that perfect shot. It really is incredible. Overall, the phone lives up to the hype. This phone has been great to me and I would recommend it to anyone. I used to be an iphone guy and just wanted something refreshing this time and the Galaxy S3 has changed the game for me. I love how the phone looks and the performance is superb. The only problem like I said was battery life, and buying a better battery or keeping your charger on you can combat that. So if you are on the fence on what phone to get, look no further my friend because the Galaxy S3 is the phone you have been searching for."

Samsung Infuse 4G

2012-12-29T15:32:00.002-07:00

The Samsung Infuse 4G is just your regular Android device, or should I say it used to be. The phone is quite old, being released in May of 2011, but it will still probably serve most people okay. The device features a large 4.5 inch display, but sadly the resolution is only 480x800. The glass on the display is Corning Gorilla Glass. 16 GB of internal storage will serve most users just fine, though there is a microSD card slot for storage expansion. The device also features HSDPA+ with speeds up to 21 Mbps, though unfortunately there is no dual channel support for T-Mobile users and LTE is also not present. WiFi 802.11n is also included, though that is probably needless to mention. The device upgrades up to Android 2.3 Gingerbread, so you won't be getting all of the latest and greatest new features of Android, but the device will still work fine. The processor is average for an Android 2.3 device, being a 1.2 GHz Cortex A8. Battery life is actually pretty good for an Android device, being rated at 8 hours of talk time, though realistically it likely won't be that much. Feel free to read the user review below, and add your own opinion in the comments section.

"The cell phone I currently use is the Samsung Infuse, and I switched to this phone after using the iPhone. I like the bigger screen of the Infuse, and I also prefer the Android over being tied to iTunes with my former phone. The actual call sound quality is good, and I like louder volume range of the Infuse. Ringtones and notification tones are easy to get, and I have a wide range of the ones available to me for download to use on my phone through Zedge. Music is easily added to the phone and I like the ability to create playlists on the Infuse. The camera and video feature is adequate and I find the features easy to figure out. I like the 2nd camera that lets me use Skype video calling with my phone. There are plenty of apps available, and I was actually pleasantly surprised at the number of apps out there for the Android. I use Netflix on my phone and the video and sound quality is good for a phone. Maybe I use my phone a lot, but I find that the battery requires charging a lot. I do listen to internet radio quite a bit and often use my phone for internet and email, so I am sure that is most of the problem with the battery. It most likely is me and my heavy use of the phone and not the battery. Texting is easy with the phone, and texting groups of people, sending photos, and forwarding texts is fairly straightforward. The keyboard is easy to use, but it did take me a couple days to get the “feel” of typing on the keys. The vocabulary will let me add words and names easily to its memory, which is a handy feature. I like it that the screen rotation can be so easily turned off and on, and I also like the task manager that lets me close out of applications I am not using. I have also used the GPS, but I find that really drains the battery if I do not have it plugged into my car charger. I have my work e-mail and calendar set up on my phone and I find this extremely convenient. It helps me keep up with my high volume e-mail when I am not at work. One of the phone’s features I use a lot is the timer feature. I do a lot of cooking and baking, and I find I do not even need kitchen timers. Another feature of the phone that I use a lot is the alarm clock feature, and it’s convenient to set different alarms for different days of the week. One drawback of my phone is that I find it freezes up and requires a restart too often, in my opinion. Usually once a week or more it locks up at random times and I need to turn it off. Occasionally when I do this, it totally saps the battery for no apparent reason. I can have a nearly-full charge, and will find the battery in the red zone when the phone comes back on. Not sure why it does this, but it has never gotten any worse, so I am okay with it until I decide to upgrade. Overall, the Samsung Infuse has served me well."

Apple iPhone 4S

2012-12-29T15:25:00.001-07:00

By now we all really know what the iPhone is about, and the experience itself doesn't really change all that much from version to version of the device. The iPhone 4S is notable in that it features the revolutionary Retina display, as well as the fact that the camera has been improved to an 8MP. The external design is also notably different with a glass back. Siri is also included, and other than that everything else is pretty much the same. 3G speeds have also been improved slightly, and Apple has decided to market this as "4G." Feel free to read the included user reviews below and add your own opinion in the comments.

"I am a very proud owner of Apple's iPhone 4S. I really enjoy this phone and everything that it has to offer. One of the things that I like the most is that I can have just about everything I need at my fingertips; I have all my contacts, my music, pictures, videos. It is very easy get and keep all of this very organized. It also links me to social media sites like Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram. It even allows me to play games like Bike Race or Temple Run. I never really played games on my phone before getting an iPhone because I thought it was boring but on the iPhone 4S you can play with and against friends which makes it much more fun. This phone can keep me connected and entertained. I work a lot with photography and video so the fact that that Apple's iPhone 4S has a top of the line camera lens both on the back of the camera and on the front, as well as an extremely clear screen help me take and edit my pictures and videos with ease. The screen is great because it is very important to be able to see all of the details. One of the only cons that I can think of in regards to this phone is that the screen seems to be very breakable, I have not had this happen personally but I know a lot of people who have the infamous spider web. So in order to protect my screen I have to use a large case, which adds bulk to the very streamlined phone. I wish that it were more durable in this respect. The battery life on this phone is phenomenal, it can last up to 7 hours if you are not connected to the Internet but even if you are connected to the Internet it lasts a long time. Not only does it last a long time, but also it charges very quickly as well. In addition to having my iPhone, I also have a Macbook Pro and the two have the ability to sync seamlessly. I have the ability to manage all of my music, contacts, calendars, and pictures on either device and see the changes on the other. This was something that no other phone on the market was able to offer. I also really love how easy it is to use. From the moment I picked it up I felt as if I had been using it for years. The home button brings you to the home screen from where ever you are, the volume controls are easily within reach on the side, and the charging port and headphone jack are easily accessible. One of the other cool features right on the side of the phone is the ability to put it in silent mode without having to go through any of the menus. Lastly, I think that this would be a great phone for just about anyone. It is very user friendly; it opens up a whole world of apps and music that you can play. It is one of the cool products to use. I have never met anyone that regretted his or her purchase of Apple’s iPhone 4S."

Samsung Intercept

2012-12-29T15:18:00.001-07:00

The Samsung Intercept is an older CDMA device on Sprint and Virgin Mobile with specifications that aren’t for a power user, but will do just fine for someone looking for a basic messaging device. The phone has a 3.2 inch screen with a low 240×400 resolution. Quite honestly, the display on this phone is atrocious. Luckily, there is a slide out hardware keyboard. The phone does have WiFi 802.11g and EVDO Rev.0, which aren’t the fastest technologies, but will have to do. The camera is a measly 3.15 megapixel shooter and the Android version on this device only goes up to 2.2 Froyo, which is practically obsolete at this point. Battery life also isn’t that great with a talk time of 5 hours and 30 minutes. From a specifications standpoint, the phone doesn’t look that great, but feel free to read the user review below and add your own opinion in the comments.

"I have had my Samsung Intercept for a little over a year now with Virgin Mobile. The Intercept is my first smart phone that I have owned so far. When I first got it I was very excited about all the features it possessed. It was a slider phone with a QWERTY keyboard and also touch screen. I loved the keyboard and it is easy to use and also because I do not like typing on a touch screen, plus the slide out makes it more like a typewriter and easier for me to type and text. The bad thing about it is that the volume control is right under the keyboard, so everytime I am texting it turns the volume down and is almost impossible to text without hitting the volume control button which is very annoying. I have had to replace this phone 3 times so far in less than a year’s time, luckily it was still under warranty each time. The phones would freeze up all the time, or turn off by themselves constantly. The new Intercept would work fine for a few months, then it would do the same as the others that were replaced. This phone has not been very dependable in the fact of it always functioning properly. I have to take the battery out of it occasionally when it freezes up and have had to do factory reset a few times also. It also will turn itself off when I plug it into the charger and reboot itself back on. The phone lock will sometimes get stuck and it takes a few times to input the code to get the phone to unlock. This phone was not cheap either, so that is why I keep putting up with all it’s flaws, would like to at least get my money’s worth out of it. The camera worked great at first. Now, sometimes when I take a picture it will freeze and not save the picture. I have missed out on a few once in a lifetime shots of things due to this camera defect. As far as ringtones with this phone, you can set a different downloaded ringtone for calls with your contacts, but it will not allow you to have different ringtones for text message contacts. This is a feature I do not like either. This phone has blue tooth, internet, high-end multimedia features, and some pre-loaded apps including Google Play.I would not advise picking this phone to anyone in the long run. This phone has way too many glitches and problems that come along with owning it. This phone has caused me much frustration and I am planning on getting a different one as soon as it is feasible."

Samsung Restore

2012-12-29T15:17:00.002-07:00

Samsung's Restore, or M575 (model number for Virgin Mobile) is a basic messaging device without many other features. The M575 is available on Virgin Mobile, but the device also goes by the name "Samsung Restore" and model number M570 on several other carriers. The device's basic specifications are a slide out QWERTY keyboard and a 2.6 inch display with a resolution of 240x320. For a messaging device that is all you will really need. It's a cheap phone, so you can't really expect much else. The device does have EVDO Rev.0, so if you are really in a bind you'll be able to do some basic web browsing. A 2 megapixel camera is also on board, though quality likely won't be good enough for viewing photos on anything but the phone itself. GPS is also a feature of the M575, though considering it isn't a smartphone, it's doubtful what you would use the GPS for. Battery life is decent at 6 hours, though for a phone that does as little as this one, one would expect the battery to get you a little further. We've included a user review below, but feel free to post your own in the comments.

"My Samsung M575 is great. The slider function is great and it helps typing texts. Last phone I had was a candy bar phone from Motorola. I don't know how I managed to type texts on that thing. It was hard on the fingers, especially the thumbs. My phone is specially made for Virgin Mobile. This phone has it's downside as a chip keeps falling out when I push the slider in or out. I push it back in occasionally when I want to push the keyboard in or out. The causes me to worry about the overall functionality of the phone. In addition, it is easy to put your fingers where the single meets your phone. This will really cause distortion in your current phone call. This is not easy to locate. I frequently have distorted conversations due to this. I really like the slider feature and the keyboard on this phone. It makes it easier to type texts. Additionally I like that they keys are bigger than a candy bar phone. It is a relief! Additionally it makes it easier to read the web and check email when you can read vertically. It leaves for more reading space. I love that the text is bigger. My phone is low cost. I consider the Samsung M575 a step below an Android or iPhone. It is a lot less money with most of the same browsing features. My phone did only cost $30 when I bought it on ebay. It was a little more than I bargained for, but I wasn’t about to spend $100 to $200 on a smart phone. I just want a simple phone to talk, text and occasionally search the web on the go. I do need to check my email from time to time on the go and the Samsung M575 allows me to do this. I would highly recommend this phone to anyone searching for a bargain and good web connectivity."

LG Octane

2012-12-29T15:15:00.001-07:00

The LG Octane is probably one of the best examples of a "feature" phone still on the market, and is a good fit for someone who doesn't need or want a smart phone or the pricey data plans that come with them. The downside to this phone is quite obvious: it is not a smart phone. There is very little software to speak of available. What is available for it is limited to the carrier's online marketplace, Verizon in the case of this particular model. However, if all you are looking for is a phone that makes and receives calls and texts (including picture and sound files) without the bells and whistles; feature phones are still a good choice. The LG Octane forgoes the touch screen approach for a front ten-key panel and nav buttons. The phone flips open to reveal a full QWERTY keyboard for texting, a 2.6" screen for viewing pictures and video, and speakers for speakerphone functionality and MP3 or WMA playback. The 3.2 Megapixel built-in camera takes passable photos and video; but the video quality pales in comparison to some of the more expensive counterparts. The phone has pretty much all the features you would expect from a non-smart phone. Bluetooth 2.1 means connecting to your car or headset should be no problem, but it also includes a headset jack. The external MicroSD slot (always a bonus) means that your photos and songs can be easily transferred to your computer and back without installing the Verizon software. The phone uses a standard USB cable for data transfer and charging, and includes a wall charger. There's also some nice features you might not expect. The phone has a web browser built-in, but don't expect Flash to work. The contact list lets you attach pictures to contacts, giving you a photo caller-id. Voice commands are available, but I've never been able to get them to work quite right, having the standard problem of the recognition software confusing names, especially homophones and unique spellings. As for the phone itself; at 4 ounces, it's light enough to carry in a jeans pocket without dragging down your pants, and at 4 1/4 by 2 1/4 inches when folded, it should be an easy fit. The face buttons feature an auto-lock that works most of the time; though holding the 0 key can cause the phone to unlock accidentally. After about 18 months of use, the outer screen is a bit scuffed up, but still visible; and if you do a lot of texting, you'll probably be using the protected inner screen more anyway. The battery life of the Octane is good, but will depend on your use case. Turning on the Bluetooth radio will sap the battery more quickly; but you should still be getting a full 18+ hours of standby time. This particular model has been phased out of Verizon's lineup. If you can get a hold of one for around the $50 range, I'd thoroughly recommend picking it up over the more recent Cosmos 2 unless you prefer the slide-out keyboard to a clam-shell. Overall, the LG Octane remains a solid entry in the dwindling feature phone market.

BandWidth; The Speed Test App For Windows Phone

2011-12-11T00:51:00.000-07:00

For some reason a Speedtest.net app for Windows Phone has not yet been published, but there is an alternative available. The application is called BandWidth, and is a fairly basic speed test app. There is a very large amount of servers to test your speed to, and you are able to select from a list of all of the servers within up to a 1000 mile radius of you. The actual speed test will give you information about the latency of your connection, the download speed, and the upload speed.

BandWidth for Windows Phone also allows you to change to size of the file used for the test, and the file sizes range from 2 MB to 17 MB. Additionally, the Windows Phone speed test app records all of the speed tests that you have done and allows you to brag about them to your favorite social networks. You can also see all of your results on a map, showing what speeds you got to which server.

In my opinion, the BandWidth app for Windows Phone is pretty good, but could be better. It works for testing your speed, but it also lags a lot at times. It is also difficult to see your speed at real time as it is only shown on a tiny bar which sometimes freezes. For now, this app will work fine for testing your speed, but lets hope that a Speedtest.net app comes out for Windows Phone soon as they seem to be some of the best speed test apps.

ORB For Windows Phone; An Incredibly Addicting Game

2011-12-11T00:44:00.000-07:00

There are many games available for Windows Phone, ORB being one of them. ORB is a game where you control a ball through a field of tiles, some of which are missing. Your goal is to navigate the ball through the tiles and away from the missing ones for as long as you can. If you fall into one of the spots where there is no tile, you lose. Also, as you roll over the tiles, they disappear, and the tiles at the bottom of the screen also disappear as your ball moves, making it necessary for you to go at a fairly rapid pace. There are also various special tiles that will either make you go left or right, make you go faster, make you fly for a short period of time, and more.

The Windows Phone game is very addicting and very fun. It is available in both a free and a paid version ($1.29), the only difference being that the free version is add supported. I would definitely encourage you to get this game, so everyone head on over to the Windows Phone Marketplace and get ORB or ORB Free.

Internet Sharing on Windows Phone

2011-12-11T00:34:00.000-07:00

Microsoft has also introduced internet sharing in Windows Phone 7.5 (Mango). Of course, this feature is carrier dependent and most carriers will choose to block it, but it is still a very nice feature to have. Most Windows Phone have either already gotten the update that enables this feature or will be getting it sometime in the near future, but let me explain to you how it works. Also, keep in mind that your carrier may have disabled this feature on your device.

The only method of internet sharing on Windows Phone is by creating a mobile hotspot with your Windows Phone device. This is a fairly easy process; all you have to do is go into settings; internet sharing, and then set up your hostpot. Your hostpot can either have WPA2 encryption, or can be open. Up to five devices can connect to the hotspot at a time, and all of the data will simply go over your cellular connection. For now there is no way to tether via Bluetooth or USB.

Now, let's talk a little bit about internet sharing on T-Mobile. T-Mobile is a really nice carrier because they tend to disable as little features on their devices as possible. Luckily for me, internet sharing was one of the features that they decided not to disable on the HTC HD7. Though T-Mobile offers an internet sharing add-on for your rate plan, they also allow you to use internet sharing without having this add on. I do not believe that there is a charge for this if you already have a data plan, but I cannot say anything for sure. For now it seems like T-Mobile has simply been really nice in enabling internet sharing for free. Let's hope that it lasts.

Multitasking on Windows Phone

2011-12-11T00:20:00.000-07:00

Multitasking on Windows Phone is confusing. When you are in an app, you can hold down the back button on the phone and you will be presented with an array of several cards. For some of you have have used WebOS, this may look a little familiar. The cards that are presented to you at this screen are all of the apps that you previously had open. It doesn't matter how you exited out of them; whether you simply clicked the home button, locked your device, or whatever. These apps are in a 'frozen' state. They aren't actually running, but they are saved in the memory and will usually resume quite quickly if you click on them.

Most apps that are running in the background on Windows Phone aren't actually running, except for a few exceptions that Microsoft has made. Music apps such as Pandora, Slacker Radio, Spotify, and more will actually play your music in the background, as opposed to how other apps will behave in the background. Let's say you have a game, but then you exit out of it and go to the home screen. If you hold the back button and go back to the game, it will resume right where you left off, as if it were paused. This means that the application wasn't actually running in the background, it was just 'sleeping'.

Another confusing thing about multitasking with Windows Phone is that you can't actually control which apps you want to keep running; it will always be the most recent ones. If you want to keep a game open but you go to ten other apps, your game will most likely no longer be running. This makes it very difficult to control which apps you actually run in the background.

Windows Phone gives you the appearance of multitasking without actually giving you multitasking, which may be a good or a bad thing. One one side of the issue, this method of multitasking is the thing that makes Windows Phone so smooth. My HTC HD7 never freezes up or lags, and this may be the reason why. On the other hand, not having true multitasking can be a downer in some situations.

To understand multitasking on Windows Phone, you really have to experience it for yourself. It works, but it isn't what you would expect. Also, multitasking is only available on Windows Phone 7.5 (Mango) and above.

Tiles; What Are They?

2011-12-11T00:08:00.000-07:00

If you've ever used Android you are probably used to having widgets and icons on your home screen, and if you have an iPhone you just have icons. Well, Windows Phone is entirely different. The Windows Phone home screen is made up of an array of 'live tiles'. These tiles are in between widgets and icons. They can take you to applications, but they can also show you information at a glance like widgets can on Android. Some cases in which this is seen and can be useful is with weather apps, which will show you the current temperature, and also with social networking apps, which will show you any notifications that you may have. Of course, not all apps have live tiles, so you should read the description of the application if you are really interested. Live tiles update in the background, but if you have too many updating, they will drain your battery fairly quickly.

Personally, I love the live tiles. If I just need to check how many Facebook notifications, messages, or missed calls I have, I can simply look at the home screen without having to open any apps. It is also really easy for me to get to any apps, as the home screen is very responsive, smooth, and fast. In fact, you will almost never see any lag in Windows Phone. Although most of the devices only have 512 MB of RAM, they never lag the way that Windows Phone handles the applications, or at least this is the case with my HTC HD7.

I believe that this new style of home screen is very revolutionary, modern, and usable. It is really easy to navigate and makes the entire experience of using the phone much better. It takes some getting used to, especially if you have never used a Windows Phone device before, but once you get used to the tiles you will never go back.

Just Got My Windows Phone

2011-12-10T23:42:00.000-07:00

I just got my Windows Phone, and it is pretty amazing. First, let's start with a little bit of my background. My first smartphone operating system was Symbian, and let's admit it; Symbian is pretty bad. After that I used several BlackBerry devices for awhile, after which I was on Android for a very short amount of time. Then we arrive at the present.

Why did I choose Windows Phone? Well, for one, it looks really cool. I like trying new things, and I felt like taking a chance and going for a Windows Phone. Since I am on T-Mobile, I didn't really have that many options for Windows Phone. I chose the HTC HD7 over the HTC Radar 4G mainly because of the larger screen. The specifications of the two devices aren't that different, so I went with my gut instinct and went with the HTC HD7.

My first impression; Windows Phone is an entirely new experience. You can't compare Windows Phone to any other smartphone experience because it was built from the ground up as an entirely new platform. If you have ever used an iPhone or an Android device, or any other smartphone for that matter, Windows Phone will be a completely new experience for you. For now, I love Windows Phone, but we'll just have to wait and see what happens next.

PNY Customer Service Experience; Horrible!

2011-07-27T00:25:00.001-06:00

I purchased an 8 GB PNY SDHC card a couple of years ago, and I was pretty happy with it. It was a class 4, and I had tested it with some flash memory benchmarking software, and it didn’t live up to its name, as you can see in the benchmark below. It should be at least 4 MB/s for each test below in both read and write speed. That was my first disappointment, but I was still fine with the card. My real problems came when the plastic on the connector pins started to chip off. At first I thought that it would not be a problem, but it turns out that plastic is sensed by most SD card readers, which use it to determine whether or not there is an SD card inserted. This meant that my SD card was practically useless. Luckily, the card had a lifetime warranty, so I decided to call PNY and ask for a replacement. I called at about noon on a Tuesday, at which time most companies are usually working. I was talking to a machine for about ten minutes, and was then told that I would be called back. I waited a couple of days, and then I was, and was told that I was not eligible for a replacement if there was physical damage. This was completely unacceptable for me. I mean, it was their fault that they built a card which breaks after less than two years. I have had many other SD cards, and they have survived for much longer than this one. I was on the phone for about fifteen minutes, with no progress. I decided that I would just give up on it and buy another card, on that was not PNY. My experience with PNY was completely unacceptable. First I had to wait two days to actually talk to someone, and then they didn’t honor their lifetime warranty.

Anyway, I ended up buying another card, the Transcend TS16GSDHC10E 16 GB class 10 card. Benchmarks are below, and I am very happy with the card. It also has a lifetime warranty, and I am hoping that I will not have to use it. If I do, I hope that it is actually honored. Overall, I am very disappointed with PNY and will never buy one of their products again, and I am very happy with the benchmarks, performance, reliability, and more of my new Transcend card.

PNY Benchmark

Transcend Benchmark

Kodak Easyshare Max Z990 Review; Well Featured, But Falls Behind on Performance

2011-07-27T00:11:00.000-06:00

So, as you may already know, I recently purchased a Kodak EasyShare Max Z990 camera. It had pretty great features including a 12 megapixel BSI-CMOS sensor, 30x optical zoom, 1080p video recording, full manual settings, and a variety of other features. I really liked the camera on paper; I mean, it has better features than any other camera in the same price range. I received the camera, and it worked great upon light inspection. Picture quality was amazing and I really liked the features. The only problem was that the camera was slow. It would randomly freeze and become unresponsive, and I had absolutely no idea why. I tried replacing my SD card with a class 10 card, but that did not help. I even got a replacement hoping that it was just my unit having issues, but that still did not fix it, so I decided to return the camera. It took great low-light photos, amazing video with stereo audio, and had pretty much anything that you could ask for in this class of camera. The only problem was that it was slow, which caused me to miss a lot of shots while I was waiting for it to become responsive again. Since I returned the camera, I didn’t even have time to do a full review. All I can tell you is that the camera takes great pictures and videos, has great features, and sells for a pretty good price, but it’s *really* slow, and causes you to miss a lot of good shots. I don’t think that the features make up for that, and I think that I will be purchasing another camera, so expect that review soon. P.S. It won’t be a Kodak, because when a brand fails on me once, I don’t consider that brand again.

I Returned It; My Kodak EasyShare Max Z990

2011-07-27T00:08:00.000-06:00

You may have read the blog post that I transferred from Tumbr, talking about my new camera, the Kodak Z990. Well, if you haven’t, let me just tell you that I was having a lot of issues with it being slow and unresponsive, and this was unacceptable for me. I decided to return it, and now I am looking for a better camera. If you have any suggestions, please let me know in the comments below.

My Less Than Perfect HP Customer Service Experience

2011-07-27T00:06:00.000-06:00

So, let me first of all explain what has happened. I purchased an HP G42-415DX a while back as one of my main computers (I will post a review of it on the blog shortly). It worked great, except for a couple of flaws that I will mention in the review. About a week ago, which is about three months since I purchased the computer, it started to freeze. I thought that maybe it was just a glitch or something and that restarting the computer would fix it, but that was not the case. It turns out that the hard drive had failed, and I needed to get it replaced. I decided to run some diagnostics tests before contacting HP and I ran a hard drive test which failed. Then I decided to contact HP and see what they could do for me, as the laptop was still in warranty.

I contacted them via chat for the first time, and they told me that I should run the hard drive test again. I ran it and got a failure ID, but then they told me that I had to run the test via the BIOS. Until now I had been running the tests via the HP diagnostics software. I was fine with running the test via the BIOS, so I did. It turned out that the BIOS tests would take about an hour and a half, so the HP agent told me that I should contact HP once it was finished. I waited for the test to finish, but I did not get an error code. I thought that this was strange, but I decided to contact HP again and ask them what was going on. They told me to run the test again, but this was really unacceptable for me, so I told them that the test was not resulting in an error code. They put me on hold and told me that I would need to replace the hard drive. I was fine with this, and asked them what my options were. They told me that they could ship me a new hard drive and that I could replace it, and I didn’t think that this was a very good option for me because I didn’t want to be liable if anything ended up happening.

Now, I am pretty much a nerd and know my way around computers, so changing a hard drive isn’t really a very big deal for me. I guess that I just couldn’t believe that HP was making other customers change their own hard drives. I don’t know what I had against it that much, I guess I didn’t really like the idea. I asked them if there were any other options, and they said that I could send in my computer for repair, but that it would take about a month to get it back to me. This was unacceptable, as I use this computer every day and I don’t really think that I could go without a computer for a month. I asked them if it would be possible to just get a replacement computer, but they said that they don’t offer that. Then, somehow, someone from HP told me that it would be necessary to replace the motherboard, and I have no idea why they said that. I didn’t know what was going on, and then they told me that they would transfer me. Then they transferred me and the agent told me that I did not need to replace the motherboard, just the hard drive, and that the agent whom I had talked to was wrong. I was getting really confused and decided to agree on replacing the hard drive myself.

Anyway, I was on the phone with them for about four hours, which is completely unacceptable. Also, the line quality was terrible with all of the representatives except for one, which led me to believe that it was on their end. I was transferred numerous times and I don’t really think that any of the agents knew what to do.

Once I received the hard drive I replaced it. It turned about being surprisingly easy to replace it. They even sent me a 7200 RPM hard drive to replace the 5400 RPM one. That was good, even though it was refurbished. The hard drive worked fine and I was able to recover my files, although it was extremely difficult. My computer would freeze after a couple of minutes of use, so I had to recover my files in parts. I ended up getting everything back to normal, but the reason why I am writing this article is because of my horrible experience with HP customer service. I mean, it should not take four hours to get a new hard drive for a computer, and they should really get some better repair options than having the customer repair their own hard drive.

Would You Publish 12 Years of Your Text Messages in A Book?

2011-07-26T23:55:00.000-06:00

Would you publish twelve years of your life in a book for anyone and everyone to read? Well, that’s what Tracey Moberly has done. Her book, Text Me Up!, takes over 60,000 text messages that she has sent and received throughout her life and weaves them into a narrative about her life. It is supposed to be an autobiography of her life, but a fairly unorthodox one. The book is 336 pages of text messages, illustrations, and narratives about Tracey Moberly’s life. It also includes commentary about the text message conversations. It isn’t just filled with threads of text messages, they are selected and composed in a way that is supposed to make them interesting. I can’t even imagine how she would have saved all of these text messages, or how they can be interesting enough to publish into a book. Even if I did send or receive an interesting text message, I probably wouldn’t want to publish it for the entire world to see. I can’t even imagine how this woman finds all these people to text, I mean, 60,000 text messages?! Apparently, the book also includes text messages from celebrities. Well, in case you find this sort of thing interesting, I encourage you to buy Text Me Up! and comment on it, because I certainly don’t think I would find it interesting to read over 300 pages of someone else’s text messages. The book is available now.

Jawbone's Up Bracelet Will Track Everything Your Body Does, And Tell You What You're Doing Wrong

2011-07-26T23:52:00.001-06:00

Most of us know Jawbone as a Bluetooth headset and speaker manufacturer, but it looks like they are trying to expand out of that industry. Their newest idea doesn’t relate to the audio industry at all; The Jawbone Up bracelet is a bracelet, as its name suggests, which tracks your sleep patterns, activity, and eating habits and then charts them and makes them available on a smartphone app. Also, the Up, when used in conjunction with your smartphone will provide “nudges,” which will be tips to help you live healthier. Unlike many of Jawbone’s other products, the Up won’t connect via Bluetooth, but rather via a wire. The information that the Up records will presumably allow you to see which of your daily habits are negatively affecting your health, and hopefully you will want to change them. The Jawbone Up bracelet works with an accelerometer to monitor your body 24/7, and is supposed to “make it social and make it fun.” I don’t really see what people’s fascination with tweeting how much they weigh is, but apparently the Jawbone Up is only supposed to make your health status public if you want it to. Otherwise you can just observe how unhealthy or healthy you are and keep it private. There aren’t very many details on the Jawbone Up available now, but we hope that more will be released soon. The device should be released “soon,” which we believe means withing this year, and will be “affordably” priced. It will also be available in a range of colors and won’t attract unnecessary attention. So, what do you think about the Jawbone Up?