The Apple Watch – is this the company’s mid-life crisis?

This week saw the official launch of Apple’s new Watch. It won’t be long now until you’ll be seeing people walking along the street staring at their wrists in consternation, rather than into the rectangular glow of their phones. Wearables are the future, and Apple is about to make it happen.

But I’m a little concerned about this.

The keynote address from Tim Cook that released the Watch into the world felt somewhat stale and lacking in excitement. Many of the features had already been announced, and it was only the poorly judged decision to show Christie Turlington Burns parading around her shiny new digital timepiece while visiting a poverty stricken part of Africa, that was new. In fairness Ms Burns was training for a marathon that will raise money to alleviate the poverty and help young women safely deliver their babies, but the juxtaposition of a luxury device whose cost could pay for the medicines sorely lacking in the facilities was an odd one.

And in many ways that’s the problem with the Watch. It’s a confusing device.

On one hand it’s an exciting new territory for Apple, where it is not only competing with the Android Wear devices that launched last year, but also with established watch makers that have status and history which even eclipses that of this Californian upstart. Apple’s weight in the technology world and the widespread popularity of the iPhone also means that the Watch could finally usher in the age of wearables that’s been tantalisingly close for a few years now.

But conversely there was something missing from the launch, and the buzz since then in the media has been focussed around the new super-thin MacBook that was also revealed at the event. Apple’s videos were more obsessed with the metals than the actual usefulness of the product, and the heartbeat thing just looks like the kind of daft feature that Samsung usually cram into their products. Now, before I go any further, let me be clear that I like Smartwatches. I’ve used a couple in the past, and am sporting a Sony Smartwatch 3 while I type this. They are, of course, a luxury product (after all they’re merely a remote display for your phone) but the convenience offered by a simple glance at the wrist is a lot of fun, plus actually useful when you’re out and about, cooking, or otherwise dexterously challenged. Up until now though I’ve always enjoyed them as an idea, but spending up to £200 on one just felt like an ostentatious step too far. After all, that’s a fair chunk of the price of a new phone. Now the Apple Watch has entered the fray and it’s prices are, well, a bit silly.

Although the base Sports models (which features the exact same technology as the more expensive versions) starts at £299, the normal dress Watch is around £500, and the Edition range starts at £8000 and goes up to a frankly ridiculous £13,500. A solid gold, multi-thousand pound watch, that will be out of date in a couple of years? Is that…cool?

I’ve used Macs for years and loved them. There are two iPads in our house at the moment and I can’t see them being replaced by any rival products in the future. I don’t use an iPhone any more, just because they’re too expensive and I prefer the direction Android is going. In short, I like Apple stuff. It’s a little disconcerting then that the Watch, which is the first new product category that has been developed and introduced under Tim Cook’s tenure, feels, well, a very middle-aged product. By that I don’t mean that it arrives heralded by minstrels and adorned with a leather codpiece. Rather that it’s the slightly tacky but thinks it’s cool kind of device that costs too much.

I’m sure it will sell bucket loads, Apple stuff always does, but is this the first chink in the company’s armour to appear in a long time? Is the self-satisfied gloating over it’s cost the sign that Cook and Co have lost touch with the general populace and now only make things for super-models who want to time their jogs? To be fair Apple stuff has always been pricey, but the Macs, iPhones, and even iPads had powerful features that made them useful in their own right. The Watch is a companion device to an iPhone that can pretty much only tell the time when separated from its pocket brain, and only while its battery remains intact.

I really don’t know how to feel about the Watch. Is it innovative or indulgent? A glimpse of the future, or the sign of a company beginning to believe its own hype?

I guess only time will tell.

What do you think about the Apple Watch? Do you want one? Let me know in the comments. 

I Saw That Years Ago Podcast: Ep 19 – Saturn 3

Far out in space Farrah Fawcett and Kirk Douglas do battle with Harvey Keitel’s lust robot!

Journey with our histograviewers to Saturn 3.

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Click here to check out the latest episode!

Netropolitan – Facebook without the peasants.

Wouldn’t it be nice to have a private space online? One where you could meet with friends, share photographs, trivial and important news, vintage wine tips, and yacht parking secrets, all the while knowing that you were safe from the inane ramblings of the lower classes? Well, today is your lucky day.

Meet Netropolitan the new social network for, and I quote, people who have ‘more money than time’, and quite possibly sense.

For a miserly $6000 joining fee you can enjoy the exclusive surroundings of a web browser, while rubbing shoulders with others from your social standing. That’s of course if they can find a moment in their busy schedules. An additional $3000 is also required to polish the fonts and ensure that no interlopers make it past the outer courtyards. Figgis! Release the hounds!

Ok, I’m making fun. Rich people with exclusive websites does feel like a fairly easy point of derision…but, actually, there is some sense in this idea.

Of course my non-richness riles against any such creation, but for a while now I’ve wondered how much better Facebook would be if it offered a paid membership? For many things the social network behemoth is fine – keeping up with friends, being distracted by stupid questionnaires, solving world problems by signing an online petition, etc… –  but due to the fact that it’s free, Facebook has no reservations in buggering up the user experience in order to rake in some heavy cash. This is achieved through constant adverts or recommendations in your stream, which is already ruined by the never ending desire it has to show you stuff from two or three months ago.

If we paid, then maybe we could get the old, simpler Facebook back? You remember. The one where chronology was respected and the only threat to your sanity was Farmville. The question is what kind of price do you put on privacy and an ad free life? £5 a month? £15? Android apps often come in two versions, one with ads, and a paid version without, so the concept works in principle.

The real problem with this scenario is that we’re actually worth more to Facebook than our money. Advertisers will pay more than most of us would fork out, as our data is far more valuable to them. When we like things our friends post, it tells them our preferences. When we list things we want, or places we want to visit, more intelligent data gets added to the pile of who were are as individuals. Essentially we’re selling ourselves off, one click at a time.

You could try Twitter, Tumbler, Google+, or some young upstart, but they all cater to different markets, or have nobody on them. The thing is, Facebook built a bloody good service, and that’s why we’re there. So now, due to the critical mass of friends and family that make it their daily hangout, we’re kind of stuck. Facebook has the people, they don’t want our money, and we all spend lots of time on the site regardless of whatever insane user interface obstacle course they devise to test our resolve.

Well, that just sucks.

I feel the stirring of a revolution in my loins. That, or I need a more comfortable chair. No, revolution it is. So, what say you all? Shall we create a new utopia, free from the oppressive forces of billion dollar corporations? Where your life belongs to you, and you’re free to post as many cat pictures as you want without fear of it being attached to your permanent record. A holy sanctuary of free speech and expression. And no bloody invites to ever, ever, play stupid agricultural-based games that will slowly put you in the poor house.

Then come with me, my merry band of digital adventurers, as we forge a new frontier here on the Living with the Future social space. Sign up now….only £100!

Wait….no, it’s a bargain.

Seriously.

Bugger.

Hmmm, I wonder what’s on Facebook?

Review : Samsung Galaxy S4

If there’s one handset that challenges the iPhone’s dominance on the minds of customers, then it has to be the Samsung Galaxy S4.

Sure, the HTC One is well loved, Sony has found form again with the new Xperia range, and Google’s Nexus 5 offers simply the best value for money of any top tier unit, but in sheer volume of sales the S4 has got them beat.

Released in the summer of 2013, the S4 is packed to the gills with bespoke features that Samsung has somehow crammed into the elegantly thin frame. In many ways it’s a strong iteration of the wildly successful S3. The screen is marginally bigger at around 5 inches, and while this does feel large and somewhat cumbersome in the initial hours, the glass acreage soon becomes a comfortable place to interact with the device.

In fact the first thing you notice is just how much of the phone is screen. The side bezels are minuscule and the lower portion of the unit where the home and two softkey buttons live is also small. This does cause a few issues as you need to readjust the position of the handset quite often to be able to hit the back button. Over the first few days I found that I touched it by accident with part of my hand pretty regularly, which became something of an annoyance. Putting a case on the unit (which I would have done anyway, as phones are expensive and get dropped a lot) instantly solved the problem by shielding my fleshy thumb from the button. After that I found the S4 a very enjoyable experience.

All that gorilla glass gives you a portal to the internet that makes watching Youtube videos and playing games a far more enjoyable past-time than it is on my iPhone. The colours are rich, text definition crisp, and the handset is very fast in pretty much any task. The size also makes reading books, articles, or general web browsing far more enticing than on lower-res or inch-challenged rivals. Over the two weeks with the device I definitely found myself using the S4 more for these sort of things than my old iPhone 4S. Actually, going back to my little stalwart after testing bigger phones can often be a little disconcerting. I adjust in a day or two and then it’s business as usual. But after the S4 my iPhone now has the permanent feeling of being too small for many of the things I want to do. I realised that I never really fire up my Kindle, Pulse, or Youtube apps on the iPhone, instead saving it for my iPad. With the S4 this wasn’t the case. Interesting.

CAMERA

One of the main reasons for my love affair with my 4S is the amazing camera. The camera on the S4 is very decent, producing photos that look rich and sharp. It also comes with a multitude of modes that can turn a normal shot into a GIF, multi-exposure image, or (bizarrely) put an image of the taker in the corner. In practice they can be a bit hit and miss. The multiple exposure setting is a kind of action shot, meant really for high speed action. The thing is if you move too quickly then it can’t quite catch the moment, too slowly and you end up blurry. When it gets things right though, the results are quite fun.

Here’s a couple of examples of what can be achieved quickly with just the in-built modes.

The typical user will probably play about with these modes when they first get the device, then set them aside and stick with the excellent auto mode. Which would be no bad thing.

Here’s a couple of standard shots that show off the camera in normal use.

FINAL THOUGHTS

In the end, for most of us, all we want from a phone is that it’s easy to use, fast, takes cool pictures, and has a good screen. The S4 delivers on all these demands, and stacks a lot of extras on top. There are a number of special features such as eye tracking, and touchless control, but these all felt a bit clunky and pointless. Then there are the elaborate, but again in many cases superfluous although admittedly fun, camera modes. All of this takes up space on the storage and would be a big downside if it weren’t for the fact that Samsung includes a micro SD card slot so you can cheaply expand your internal space. Not many manufacturers do this any more, so it really is an important feature to note, especially if you want to carry your music or video collection around on your phone.

The S4 also has a removable battery, so you can replace it when the phone gets older, or carry a spare if you’re a heavy user. You might not need one though because I was very impressed with the normal day-to-day battery life, rarely finding myself below 20% when it was time to go to bed.

I wasn’t convinced about big phones until my recent experience with the Nexus 4. The Galaxy S4 has taken that curiosity and turned it into a full blown love. It’s hard now to go back to the iPhone, knowing that out there somewhere is an S4. Yes it’s plastic, but so is the new iPhone 5C. Yes it’s big, but it’s also slim and light, so this becomes an advantage. Yes it’s Android, but that’s another major plus these days. The S4 is simply an excellent phone that’s great to use, and the screen is lovely. In truth, this was the hardest one so far to send back.

Review: The Nokia Lumia 1020

While Apple and Samsung battle it out for the hearts and minds of mobile users across the world, Nokia has taken a different path in recent years. Mainly this was because of an exclusive deal with Microsoft for the Finish giant to use the Windows Phone OS on its hardware. To some this has been a huge mistake, as the Lumia range is well regarded but often overlooked due to the unpopular Windows platform. Supporters counter this with the arguments that Windows Phone is innovative, stylish, and more than capable for most users. Whatever your standpoint the truth of the matter is that Nokia hasn’t done so well and was recently bought by Microsoft, which pretty much ensures that it will become the sole hardware for Windows Phone from now on.

Actually, that’s not entirely true. In the past few months Nokia has released the Lumia 520 and 620, which have gone on to become very popular at the budget end of the market, showing that there might be life in the OS yet. The Lumia 1020 I have here today though resides at the other end of the scale, where the competition is much tougher and customers’ expectation are obviously a lot higher.

The 1020 follows on from the similarly designed Lumia 920 (are you seeing a pattern here?) that always caught the eye thanks to its sharp looks, but caused wide-eyed surprise at its brick like weight. The new unit addresses that issue and does so even after incorporating a 41mp camera into the chassis. No mean feat that. This high power snapper needs a bit of room for all those megapixels, which manifests in a slightly bulbous back. At first glance it might seem bulky, but it’s smaller in the hand than you’d expect, and in some ways the camera bulge acts as a ridge to help when holding the device in one hand.

The overall unit though does feel thicker than say the HTC One or Samsung S4, both of which have larger screen sizes than the 4.5″ sported on the Nokia. This means that general one-handed operation is a little cumbersome, with the extra girth just making things difficult at times.  On Android you can side step the physical size issue by grouping your favourite apps together in folders located near to where you grip the handset, but Windows Phone doesn’t yet offer this useful option, so more often than not the 1020 becomes a two-hand phone for getting things done.

As you can see from the images Nokia fears not the use of colour. The 1020 blazes in the sunlight with its bright yellow body, of which I am mostly unashamedly a fan. Of course if holding this kind of device up to your face in public makes you feel squeamish then you could opt for the red or black options that are also available. Build quality, as you would expect from Nokia, is excellent. The body is solid, the screen is bright and responsive, while call quality is as good as any of the 1020’s rivals. Nokia also includes a suite of apps that definitely add to the Windows Phone experience. Various map, car navigation, and camera apps enhance the ability of the 1020 no end, which is good because the app store is still bereft of many names that most people would expect to see.

It’s safe to say that this is the optimum way to see Windows Phone 8, so if you don’t like this then you won’t find a better example anywhere else. Which is a shame, because it really didn’t take long for me to find myself bored of the 1020, and pining for my old iPhone 4S with its tiny screen and fading battery. Windows Phone 8 just feels…awkward. Apps can be slow to load, transitions between pages is delayed by the animations (although iOS 7 is now guilty of this too), and it takes a while before anything feels like it’s at your fingertips. It’s not bad or unreliable, just a different approach to design, but not one that tends to float my boat in any way. That’s not to say someone else won’t find it rather spiffy. At a recent work event I was stopped by a waiter when he saw me produce the 1020. He shared excitedly about his own 920 and how much he loved the OS. When I talked to him about why, it was clear that the design choices were ones that connected with him in some way. Of course he’d paid for his device, so the praises felt more genuine than my moans, as he had something to lose if the phone was disappointing.

Of course the camera is where the 1020 really shines. In various modes the device proved impressive, with light balance constantly making the best of shots, and colours remaining neutral rather than the saturation tricks that other manufacturers use as a default to charm the eye. One of the main advantages of the 1020 is that you can shoot an image from a distance, then zoom in when cropping on your PC. This resolution is so high that the image retains its details where others would descend into a noisy mess. Here are a few examples to show what it can do.

And here it is zoomed in.

Here’s a dark room with contrasting colours and images to focus on. It also features one of the built-in filters.

This was taken on an overcast day, just as the light was beginning to fade.

In the end the 1020 is an excellent camera, and a quite mediocre mobile phone. This could be acceptable for many, but the asking price puts it actually just above the iPhone on several carriers. For that kind of money it doesn’t hold up as good value. The iPhone has a very, very good camera, maybe 85% the capacity of the 1020, but also has 100% of the iPhone app and OS experience. The Nokia/Microsoft package really doesn’t compete with this, and when compared to the S4, HTC One and the hotly anticipated Nexus 5, it fares no better. If you love Windows Phone 8 then here you go, fill your boots. But if you’re undecided I suggest you look elsewhere.

 

Review: Revisiting The Samsung Galaxy S3

While the Samsung Galaxy S4 is currently top of the heap in the Android world, it’s worth noting that the previous incarnation – the S3 – is still available from most carriers, and at very impressive prices. The technology may be a over a year old, but that doesn’t mean it should be forgotten just because of the shiny things that have arrived since. There’s plenty of life yet in the old faithful, especially if you want a few more notes in your pocket at the end of each month.

Much has been made of the plastic construction on Samsung phones – although maybe that will be less discussed now that Apple has joined the polycarbonate revolution with the iPhone 5C – but I have to say that the S3 doesn’t feel cheap at all. In fact in the pebble blue colour that adorns this review unit the handset looked and felt just like metal for the most part. In many ways the construction argument is somewhat distorted, as most of us will put our expensive new handsets in a case almost immediately, and keep them there for the duration of our contracts. From that perspective all that really matters then is whether the screen looks good and the apps work quickly. On both counts the S3 is still a great phone.

The 4.8″ Super AMOLED display beams with colour and crisp images, showing off its 720p capabilities particularly well when viewing videos or reading news-feeds, where the text is sharp and clear. Navigating through the various home-screens on the Samsung Touchwiz interface is snappy and responsive, with the older components still holding up strongly. In fact with the latest 4.3 Jelly Bean version of Android announced to be released for the S3 in November its conceivable that the device might actually get faster in the coming months. Now there’s something you don’t see in technology very often.

The S3 comes with two options for internal storage 16 or 32GB, but Samsung is one of the last holdouts in the Micro-SD card slot stakes, with one included on the S3 that can add up to a further 64GB of storage to your handset by the simple addition of a card. That means you can keep all your music on your device without ever having to worry about it affecting performance or requiring careful management of which apps you keep installed. This is a good thing, especially if you don’t have access to unlimited internet connections that allow you to stream your media.

One area where Android phones often fall down with alarming regularity is in the camera department. The S3 though, dodges this particular bullet thanks to a very decent 8MP shooter that produces pleasing, colourful, and detailed results. Here’s a few examples of images I was able to capture while out and about with the S3.

If I was being picky then I’d have to say that the button arrangement on the S3, and therefore on the S4, lacks the comfortable user friendliness of the software keys on the Nexus 4, mainly due to the large physical home button that the Samsung devices use. Of course this has never hurt the iPhone, and for many an actual button will the preferable to a virtual one.  Touchwiz is also a love it or loathe it kind of UI, and Judging by the hilarious amount of these units that have sold it’s pretty clear that many, many people love it. I’m just not really one of them. It’s not bad at all, but having seen the stock Android vision for the OS, it’s hard to go back to a proprietary version without feeling that you’ve lost something valuable. Of course these are minor gripes, and ones that I’m sure I would attune to if I used the S3 for a longer period of time.

In short, if you want a really solid, capable, top-tier phone then the S3 will do everything you want and at a price that will go down easier than most in these difficult times. Yes it’s the older model, yes it doesn’t have as many whizz-bang features as the new S4 or come in gold like the iPhone 5S, but at the end of the day it will still have some battery life left after you’ve listened to your music collection, taken some great photographs, wandered the halls of Youtube, and maybe even made the occasional call or two. Now that to me is what technology is all about.

Review: The Sony Xperia SP

Mid-range Android phones can be a bit hit and miss. While they offer a cost-effective entry point to the world of smartphones, some I’ve come across could actually put you off using a touchscreen for years to come.

Thankfully the Sony Xperia SP isn’t one of those, in fact it’s quite the opposite.

When you first handle the device it comes as a pleasant alternative to the many flagship phones that are presumably designed to be ultra slippy, maybe in an attempt to sell you expensive replacements when the unit hurls itself from your grasp the moment it detects concrete below. The Xperia SP has a far more industrial feel, with rugged edges (not sharp), a prominent, side-mounted power button, and general solidity that means you can wield it without a case and not spend every moment waiting for the inevitable tinkle of shattering gorilla glass.

This is impressive as the phone comes complete with a fair amount of glass thanks to the 4.6″ screen.  The display is clear and bright, with the 720p resolution offering a very respectable reading experience for any blogs, news-feeds, or websites you may care to visit. Video playback is smooth and looks crisp too.

Using the screen to navigate is (for the most part) trouble free, with the touch response being alert and accurate. There are the occasional lags when moving between pages and apps, but this could be down to Android as much as the phone itself. The version running on the SP is 4.1 Jelly Bean, so it makes sense that an upgrade to the butter-enhanced 4.2 would ease some of the minor issues.

Storage is pretty standard for this price range – internal 8GB, RAM 1GB – but there is the increasingly rare sight of a micro SD card slot available on the SP. So if you want an additional 32GB to fill up with songs and videos then just pop one in and you’re good to go.

If there’s one downside to the SP then it’s, as is all too often the case on Android, the camera. While it can produce some decent results, the focus is slow, not entirely accurate at times, and the majority of images that emerged during my testing lacked any kind of sparkle. It’s usable in an emergency, but you definitely wouldn’t want to have to rely upon it for anything important. I’ve included a few shots below so you can judge for yourself.

 

Overall the SP is a likeable handset that’s comfortable to use, solidly built, and actually looks pretty cool. One aesthetic that I really enjoyed, which probably says more about me than the phone, is the clear plastic edge on the bottom of the unit that flashes different colours to signify messages, missed calls, emails, etc. Such a simple idea, but one that adds to the charm of the phone.

Sony’s software is a little business like for my taste, with fonts and icons looking somewhat staid, but Android’s real strength comes to the fore here and within a few minutes you can add a new launcher that transforms the UI. With this done the SP proved a highly usable, dependable, and fun unit to have in my pocket.

If you’re looking for a low to mid-range unit – and don’t take many pictures – then the SP would be an excellent candidate to add to your ‘ones to try’ list.

 

 

Review – Living with the HTC One

The Android platform has come on leaps and bounds in recent years, but if there’s one area were it lags behind iOS, and even Windows Phone, it’s that the premium handsets often don’t feel all that…premium.

Samsung devices may dominate the landscape, but they are hardly ever regarded as beautifully designed or manufactured, often the opposite.

It was a big deal then when HTC unveiled the One, and in doing so raised the stakes for all Android devices that will have to follow in its, rather large, footsteps.

‘Be gone plastic!’ Cried the HTC designers. ‘Welcome aluminium!’ and thus it was.

There’s no denying the workmanship and quality that the One represents. From the gorgeously bright and detailed 4.7″ 1080p display, to the surprisingly effective twin, front facing, Boomsound speakers, you can see how much thought has gone into the design of this flagship handset. The camera boasts ultrapixels rather than mega ones (fancy), and produces pleasing results, especially when using the Zoe mode which shoots short videos from which you can select the best frames to make still images. All very clever.

It is an utter mystery to me then why I just never really fell for the One.

Build quality? No. This is a series piece of kit

Performance? Not at all. The phone is very speedy.

Feel? Well…maybe this is where it begins to fall away for me.

A few months back I wrote about how the Nexus 4 had initially felt too big and cumbersome, until one morning it just clicked. This never happened with the One. In fact I think the Nexus 4 is partly to blame.  In the hand the Nexus 4 was slightly shorter and possibly wider, albeit by a very tiny margin. The One though seems just too tall. Possibly the speaker at the top is the culprit, but the sound really is terrific (I’d say this is one of the best devices I’ve ever encountered for listening to podcasts on) so you wouldn’t want to take one away. But the real problem for me was that after spending time with stock Android on the Nexus, anything else seems a bit…clumsy.

The navigation on the HTC One is via a back button on the left and a home button on the right of the front panel. In the middle is a large HTC logo that does nothing except hamper the neat three button system that stock Android employs. This shouldn’t matter too much, but it does, it really does.

On a big handset you don’t want to be moving the device around in your hand any more than you already have to, but the arrangement of buttons made this inevitable. Plus I kept hitting the HTC logo by accident, which no doubt illustrates my inability to learn new tricks (old dog and all that) but i’m sure won’t make me unique.

HTC Sense also complicates things by proving less intuitive than stock and offering not much in the way of advantages for the perceived obfuscation.

 

Now I realise that I am almost certainly in the minority with these qualms. The One has garnered very impressive reviews all across the tech press, and certainly the quality of the handset is worthy of the accolades. But for me I just can’t get excited. I really wanted to love this device. I’m a fan of HTC, Android is growing on me at a frightening rate, and my old iPhone is beginning to lurch, so a replacement is in order. After using the Samsung Galaxy S3 and S4 I was left cold, so the One was my great hope. Now, although there is nothing wrong with this phone, it just doesn’t seem to suit my particular (possibly odd) tastes either.

Maybe I’m just cheap. The Nexus 4 was reduced to £200 the other day and my eyes are definitely turning back to it, with only the prospect of a lower cost iPhone causing me to pause.

For many the One will be exactly the thing they’re looking for. Indeed if you want a larger screen, quality materials, and excellent sound then it ticks all the boxes. Those of us with a hankering for something smaller, or purer in the Android stakes, can also take heart that there are other offerings out in the world to meet our more diminutive needs.

 

 

 

Living the Google Life – Day 10 : The Nexus 4

It’s been a little over a week now since I swapped all of my Apple gear for the current Google alternatives. On the whole it’s been a fascinating experiment as I’m learning how I actually use devices and services.

The Nexus 10, Samsung’s iPad rival, has been a challenge, partly due to the wider, shorter construction which feels less comfortable to use, but mainly the lack of tablet optimised apps that Android currently offers. This might not be the whole story though as I’ve found myself using the Nexus 4 for many of the jobs that a tablet was previously employed. Could it be that having a bigger screen on my phone means that I don’t need a tablet as much as before? Curious…

The first time I held the Nexus 4 in my hand I thought…Crikey! This is a big phone. Coming from the diminutive lines of the iPhone 4S, the N4 seemed like a canoe in comparison. Holding it up to my face felt odd, silly even, and not being able to accomplish many common tasks with one hand took some getting used to. I’ll have to admit that throughout the first week I was seriously doubtful of the size and shape of the phone.

Then an odd thing happened.

On Monday morning, while going about my normal blog reading, podcast listening, article researching routine I realised  that the N4 had suddenly become normal. No decision to stoically endure the vaste expanse of gorilla glass had taken place, my hands hadn’t been charmed by the songs from WhooVille and grown two sizes that day, instead I’d simply gotten used to it. Even more mysterious still, returning to my iPhone quickly revealed that the up till now perfect screen looked…well, cramped. What kind of sorcery is this?

Part of the mental adjustment was not being an idiot on purpose. You see as a creature of habit I tend to keep all my app icons in the same locations when moving between handsets. This invariably means that Gmail, Facebook, Twitter and such things are on the left side of the screen so that I can, being left handed, access them all with my thumb. Now the Nexus 4 has its power button on the right hand side, so without thinking I started holding it in my right hand (so I could actually reach the button), and then found that tapping any of my daily icons was quite difficult. The problem initially appeared that the screen was just too big, but after realising what I was doing I moved the icons and, of course, suddenly I could navigate the phone with one hand again. I wonder how many other daft things I’m doing in life that I could fix with a little thinking?

The stock Android 4.2.2 Jelly Bean OS runs very smoothly on the device and I have to say that in the week and a half that I’ve been using the Nexus 4 there hasn’t been a single error message or app that stopped responding. A nice change from the older iterations I used before. All of the apps I wanted where in the store, with the sad exception of the excellent Downcast podcasting app, which I use everyday on my iOS devices. I did try a few others but none of them really felt as friendly as Downcast, and in the end I returned to my previous app of choice Podkicker, which does the job well and is easy to use.

Otherwise it was pretty much business as usual in smartphone land. My emails flowing gracefully into the Gmail app – which it should be noted looks and works a lot better here than it does on my iPhone. Calendars synched without issue, phone calls where loud, clear, and didn’t drop, while texting and browsing were transformed thanks to the swype style functions that Android offers on its keyboards. On my iPhone I have to type all the words in a traditional fashion letter by letter. Its fine because the iPhone keyboard is very accurate.  On Android I can quickly drag my finger over the various letters and the phone will decipher my scribblings into words, with impressive accuracy. It’s great! Writing long emails is now a fun game as I see how fast I can move my finger. This is undoubtedly one of the things I will miss most when I return to iOS.

Another impressive feature is the amount of services I can send files to. On iOS it tends to be a limited set of apps that I can either choose files from or send them to. Dropbox if you’re lucky, Camera Roll, Gallery, and iCloud are the regular offerings. Android opens this up much wider with Skydrive, Google Drive, Amazon, Dropbox, Bluetooth and several other often appearing in the options. I like this freer attitude to file access and still find Apple’s implementation rather crude and proprietary.

Even the camera on the Nexus 4 is good. I had heard rumours that it wasn’t up to much, but in use I haven’t seen this at all. Whereas it’s not quite as easy to use as the iPhone (size again), the result I achieved were the equal of its Apple counterpart, which was something that genuinely surprised me. In a good way.

An impressive camera makes the Nexus 4 a complete package.

After my initial concerns I have to admit that the Nexus 4 has gotten under my skin. Where once it was enormous, now it’s a handy screen size. The apps I want are pretty much all there, and the camera would make a transition from the excellent 4S feel like you weren’t losing out in any way. When you then consider the cost of buying a Nexus 4  –£279 in the Google Play store for the 16GB model off-contract model – it really does become a hugely compelling device. I can’t think of a better value-for-money phone out there that is anywhere near as good as this one.

Will I be switching? I don’t know…it’s still a big decision, but one that the Nexus 4 makes a lot less frightening.

Review – Living With the HTC 8X

Windows Phone 8 has been having a hard time cracking the stranglehold that iOS and Android have on customers at the moment. The Nokia Lumia phones have caught the eye with their bright colours and pretty, big icons, but the fact that they weigh the same as a VW Beetle probably hasn’t aided their adoption. HTC though have a much slimmer offering for those who fancy their digital bread buttered Windows side up.

The 8X is the champion set to battle it out among the Finnish heavyweights and from the outset you can see that the design ethos is very different. Whereas the Lumias feel sturdy and fat in the hand, the 8X is light, very thin, and far more of an elegant approach. It isn’t all smiles though as the flush buttons can be tricky to find and holding the unit in your hands sometimes feels a little uncomfortable due to the subtly sharp edges of the slight design.

The software itself is probably the area that will decide whether you like the phone or not. Windows 8 Phone is very pretty, and the fonts used in the apps are beautiful, but after a while the novelty wears off and you realise that it just seem to take more user selections to get things done than feels necessary. Many of the built in apps are fine for light use and the range is slowly growing to include more mainstream favourites, but when compared to Android or iOS the functionality seems restricted by the absence of high quality applications. The phone does integrate well with other Microsoft software, and the Skydrive app is as useful as ever for storing and sharing files online. A continuing area of concern though is Microsoft’s inability to get developers interested in its mobile platform. In these days of app centric customers this could be damaging in the long run to the success of the OS. One advantage that Windows 8 phone offers is that all the handsets I’ve used that run it are fast and smooth due to the singular implementation of the software – something that isn’t generally true on Android. At the moment Windows Phone 8 does feel like the poor cousin of the other main mobile platforms, but Microsoft is an immense company and has far too much artillery to be counted out easily.

Otherwise the 8X offers a reasonable camera, all day battery life, and a rather fetching purple livery. Performance is snappy and the 8X does catch the occasional eye when you’re out and about due to its unique appearance. With Windows Phone 8 not yet drawing the crowds it also means that you can pick one of these up rather cheaply (we’ve seen them go for £150 barely used through online retailers like http://www.smartfonestore.com).  As long as you’re happy with the currently limited nature of the platform, then the HTC 8X is a smartphone that’s dependable, cool, and will run Facebook, Twitter, while gathering your emails without fuss. Pretty much what most people need, without the big bills to match.