Mobile phones & tablets thread

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Originally Posted by henners88

I opened a bottle of lager with my phone the other day.

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That's nice. Don't expect the iPhone 5 to do much more than that either. :p

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Originally Posted by CaptainRaiden

What's the product/model name for this 60 pound tablet? I have a friend coming over from the UK soon, maybe I can order it via Amazon UK and he can bring it over.

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Here you go:

Fineslate T01 7" MULTITOUCH tablet, with Capacitive: Amazon.co.uk: Electronics

My bad, it was £69, I forgot that I used a £10 voucher towards it, but even so it's a bargain. It arrived today (next day, despite me only paying for economy!) and I've stuck it on charge and powered it up to check it works, but can't do much else as it's a prezzie.

First impressions: it's surprisingly solidly built, the screen is bright and clear although obviously not particularly great resolution. Judging by the power-up noise the built in speaker is pretty dire but then to be fair I don't know of any tablet with decent onboard sound. There's a micro-SD slot at the bottom, as well as mini-HDMI and USB ports.

Like I said, I'm not expecting miracles at that price, but it seems like it'll be perfect for browsing and light recreational gaming. I'll let you know in the next few weeks how it fares in real life testing. :)


PS, the courier's just emailed to say my S3 is on a van wending its way towards me :D :up:

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Originally Posted by Dave B

Here you go:

Fineslate T01 7" MULTITOUCH tablet, with Capacitive: Amazon.co.uk: Electronics

My bad, it was £69, I forgot that I used a £10 voucher towards it, but even so it's a bargain. It arrived today (next day, despite me only paying for economy!) and I've stuck it on charge and powered it up to check it works, but can't do much else as it's a prezzie.

First impressions: it's surprisingly solidly built, the screen is bright and clear although obviously not particularly great resolution. Judging by the power-up noise the built in speaker is pretty dire but then to be fair I don't know of any tablet with decent onboard sound. There's a micro-SD slot at the bottom, as well as mini-HDMI and USB ports.

Like I said, I'm not expecting miracles at that price, but it seems like it'll be perfect for browsing and light recreational gaming. I'll let you know in the next few weeks how it fares in real life testing. :)

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Looks good! I read some Amazon reviews and they're all positive, but I'll wait for your more unbiased, hands-on review. No hurry, I've got ample time, and I'm gonna do a bit of my own research too. It's surprisingly packed for only about 70 pounds. It seems to be JUST the thing I was looking for. Cheap, runs Android ICS, lets my non-techy parents view photos from their camera, and keep in touch via Skype. They're always at home, so battery life is no issue either. Perfecto. Thanks Dave.

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Originally Posted by Dave B

PS, the courier's just emailed to say my S3 is on a van wending its way towards me :D :up:

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Congrats! :up: Don't forget to get the free 50 GB on Dropbox and the Eurosport free account.

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Originally Posted by henners88

I must admit when I come to upgrade I doubt I'll admit here what I go for. If I go for the S3 I'll probably hear that I made the best choice because the iPhone was crap anyway which I won't apreciate because my wife is getting it and I'll share her excitement. If I go for the iPhone I won't want to be put on a downer if I am happy with my choice. Nothing worse than that IMO :\

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Why would you care what other people think? Do people's opinion matter this much to you? I'll buy a pink shirt if I really like it, no matter how much everyone else tells me that it looks fruity as hell. :p

I'm not ashamed to buy a 70 pound cheap tablet even for myself, when my friends have iPads and Galaxy tabs. I bought the blue Galaxy S3 even though everyone from here, the media and the annoying shop assistant told me the white one is better.

There'll be always detractors bashing everything. Who cares? Just buy what you like and enjoy. ;)

I've just blown all the money I would have spent on an iPhone on a bicycle instead, Apple were too slow :p

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Originally Posted by henners88

I was just suggesting I 'may' be inclined not to discuss it here in the immediate aftermath as not to have people pulling apart my choice.

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Even if they do that, why care?

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Originally Posted by CaptainRaiden

Personally I feel it's a big step up from the older 2.3, especially in the way multitasking or media streaming is so much better and smoother than any other phone, particularly the under specced Apple phones. If you'd bothered to try these yourselves or look it up, ICS would seem much more attractive than it does to you right now.

You can resize your widgets, which is so handy when you're trying to cram 3 or 4 widgets on the same home screen as per your convenience. I don't have to open several apps to get my data or even swipe to another home screen. I get all my info fetched on the same screen. I can play pause my music, read news, latest tweets and change my network settings all on one screen. This makes it highly customizable.

Google Maps is so much better integrated with the OS that it's hands down the best GPS experience I've had, better than even standalone GPS devices.

It handles higher resolution media much smoother, as I just experienced playing a movie on a 42 inch screen through my phone using an HDMI adapter. Although this is where the phone's hardware matters more, and so the Galaxy S3 handles it better.

I use Chrome on the PC, laptop and also on the Galaxy S3 and have synced them through my gmail account. Once I press the sync button on the Chrome app on my phone, all the web pages currently open on my PC AND Laptop are brought onto my phone as respective tabs under their computer names, and it saves them for later use, which is an amazingly convenient feature and a huge timesaver especially if you are in a hurry. Also, it remembers all those pages until the next time you sync it. So, you can open all the pages on your PC, sync them with your phone and shut down the PC and go on a vacation. All those tabs will be at your fingertips every time you open Chrome on your phone.

For a better rundown of other features, I believe these links should suffice:

10 sweetest features of Android 4.0 Ice Cream Sandwich - Technolog on NBCNews.com

http://mashable.com/2012/05/03/andro...ndwich-vs-ios/

Things have gotten even better with 4.1 jelly bean, and I agree with the people who say that whatever they have seen of iOS6 or used of it in beta looks underwhelming compared to Android's latest offering.

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The resizing of more widgets is handy, but to be honest I don't see the changes in the other features. My daughter has one of the older iPods and side by side the video on both is great. As I said, I remain unimpressed after all the hype.

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Originally Posted by airshifter

The resizing of more widgets is handy, but to be honest I don't see the changes in the other features. My daughter has one of the older iPods and side by side the video on both is great. As I said, I remain unimpressed after all the hype.

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To each their own in this case then. For me, the widget resizing, maps and Chrome syncing are impressive and very handy features, especially the Chrome syncing helps out a lot for the line of work I am in. Chrome for ICS is also the fastest web browser I have used on any handheld device, and I have tried them all.

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Originally Posted by henners88

Going back to this I have read positive and negative reviews/opinions on both iOS 6 and Android Jellybean. Having watched demo's of Jellybean on YouTube I can't say I was jumping for joy or in awe at the features it offered but it wasn't bad either. Its very different and I'm sure you will love it regardless of what others think but that works for any consumer with a preference. I would be happy with it on a phone, like I have adapted to all other versions over the past 3 years. Gizmodo are a good source because their writers tend to have very different opinions regarding both OS's and they don't stick to one theme. Some are very pro Android, some pro Apple and some impartial on both. iOS 6 and its breakdown of features hasn't worried me or given me the opinion its worse than Androids offering, but then again I'm not looking for the faults in it either. I saw a review where a guy had Jellybean on a Nexus or something like that, and all I knew was it looked very different from my phone. I'm no salesman and wouldn't recommend it over another OS I hadn't used however.

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I wasn't jumping with joy for ICS or JB either. They are both nice OS'. I don't have a problem with iOS 5 or 6 either, it works well too. Android just fits my needs better.

I prefer Android and its devices more for their versatility and for letting me do things that Apple restricts, for ex. customizing and rooting (which you call hacking henners). :D IMO you should be able to do whatever you want with a device bought from your money, and Android lets me do that, lets me make my phone truly how I want it, without any major complications. There is a whole world of possibilities out there with a rooted phone.

I also understand many people could give a flying rat's behind about all these things and prefer something which works and is simple. I don't have a problem with these people. One of my friends owns about 6 latest Apple products. I don't go to his house and question him about it. It's not my business what he does with his money.

But if someone asked for my opinion about a mobile OS, or there's a discussion about it somewhere, such as on a public forum, I would recommend Android. :)

[youtube]fHkhp6BwnGo[/youtube]

I found this video of Google Now from Android 4.1 JB in action. Even though voice rec currently is far away from what the companies would have you believe, this is hands down the best in the business right now.

I tried most of these on my Galaxy S3's S-voice and Siri on a friend's iPhone 4S. Both of them obviously crap. They were nowhere near the accuracy and speed of Google Now. Surprisingly though S-voice faired better than Siri, getting a lot of them right.