Editorial

New phone buying tips

In our digital age, it’s unlikely you know anyone who doesn’t own a mobile phone. Even your Nan has been pushed into carrying one, regardless of whether she actually uses it or not.

With the market booming how can you haggle the best deal for yourself when the mobile giants no longer need to give you the hard sell on the latest handset?

The key to unlocking an Aladdin’s Cave of unique offers and upgrades is loyalty. Customer loyalty, or retention, is the Holy Grail for networks. The competition is longer about getting customers but simply about holding onto them.

Your power lies in your ability to switch contracts if the grass looks greener elsewhere.

With that in mind, be brave, start playing hard ball and get to grips with our top tips on how to get the most out of your network provider.

Why I JailBreak My iDevice

There are numerous reasons why I JailBreak my iDevice, but the first thing people say is ‘oh you just want free apps’. Whilst this is achievable when your iDevice has been JailBroken, its not the reason I do, but I’ll go on to that shortly.

I’ve been JailBreaking my iDevices for a few years and with every new iPhone or OS Update, the first thing I do is ensure there is a JailBreak method.

Even with the latest iOS Update 4.3.3 released this week, the JailBreak tools were available to download in a matter of days.

JailBreaking your iDevice is different from unlocking your iDevice. In short, JailBreaking allows you to install applications and system modifications Apple do not want you to use. Unlocking your iPhone allows you to use a SIM Card and Network of your choice, even if the iPhone is locked to a specific network. For me, all of my iDevices have been officially unlocked so this is not an area of ‘iDevice Hacking’ I have looked in to.

Does Android violate Linux GPL?

According to some heavy hitting IP experts Google’s Android operating system may in fact violate the GPL (General Public License) terms of the Linux kernel that it is based upon. This is a massive claim and if it has any legs could be far worse than the wrangle between Oracle and Google over their Java usage.

No Linux lawsuit has been filed yet, and there’s nothing to say that it would be for sure but it’s potentially disastrous for Android.

The Linux kernel is open source and freely available, however there are strict licensing terms relating to its usage. For example, if you use and alter the open source Linux kernel you must also offer your software under the same open source agreement as the original work.

According to NoSoftwarePatents campaign founder Florian Mueller:

"Google copied 2.5 megabytes of code from more than 700 Linux kernel header files with a homemade program that drops source code comments and some other elements, and daringly claims (in a notice at the start of each generated file) that the extracted material constitutes ‘no copyrightable information,’"

Via FOSS Patents he writes:

To eliminate the risk of a collapse of the Android ecosystem and navigate around copyleft, the misappropriated Linux code would have to be replaced. The only real viable alternative is a library called glibc (GNU C library). That library is the industry standard and is used by Android’s major mobile Linux competitors, MeeGo and WebOS.

This could be a huge shakeup to the Android platform. Watch this space!

Posted by: Matt

BlackBerry 9780 keyboard stutter

I tweeted about this a few weeks ago and was surprised by the number of other 9780 owners that replied to me saying they had the same issue. I am of course talking about the apparent problem with the BlackBerry Bold 9780 where the keyboard keys periodically ‘stutter’.

On my 9780 this affects almost all of the keys on the keyboard. When typing I frequently end up with letters appearing more than once despite pressing the letter only once. This is particularly noticeable when there are double letters in a word and can then result in either 3 or 4 instead of two letters appearing.

A search on the web seems to reveal that this is a relatively common hardware issue that requires RIM to replace the phone. One suggestion is that it depends upon where the phone has been made as the 9780 is manufactured in more than one place. My 9780 was manufactured in Hungary. Does that fit with anyone else?

The image cap. above is an un-simulated example of the problem.

Posted by: Matt

Next generation handheld’s: 3DS vs NGP

Gaming heavyweights Nintendo and Sony are set to go head to head once again in the handheld market with their respective follow-ups to the Nintendo DS and the PlayStation Portable (PSP), both of which are currently due to hit the shelves this year.

Nintendo has the first-to-market advantage as its new 3DS console is set to be released on March 25th, whereas Sony’s new machine, currently dubbed ‘Next Generation Portable’ or NGP, is pencilled in for release at some point during the fourth quarter of 2011.

The 3DS looks set to build on the remarkable success of the Nintendo DS with a number of new additions, chief of which is the inclusion of a display capable of producing 3D graphical effects without the need for the user to wear special glasses. The 3DS’ bottom screen retains the touchscreen technology used to such great effect in its predecessor, while the two cameras introduced in the DSi model also make it over to the 3DS. Further new features include an analogue input ‘nub’, which will allow enhanced control over in-game characters, and both an accelerometer and a gyroscope to allow developers to build motion control into their games.

iPad 2 specification?

Over the past few weeks there have been lots of new ‘stories’ about the forthcoming iPad 2. Some of these stories make sense whereas others seem downright silly.

The consensus is that Apple will announce the iPad 2 at some point in February or March and that it’ll go on sale some time during March or April. I’m hoping that it will go on sale just before my next trip to the US.

I’ve been considering the various iPad 2 rumours we’ve seen and thought it would be good to have a look at some of them and to consider which are the most realistic.

Enable multitasking gestures on iOS 4.3 for iPad

There are hundreds of sites with a tutorial on how to enable the new multitasking gesture features on the iPad with iOS 4.3 Beta 1/2 but almost all of the ones I came across are either incomplete, inaccurate or downright wrong. I assume that someone posted a tutorial on day one and the rest of the web did a simple copy/paste for their own how-to.

It is actually a very simple process:

SSD bypass for a Netbook

With Christmas coming, I decided to give my netbook a present – performance upgrade in the form of a 64 GB SSD hard-drive from OCZ. Was it a practical gift or just an expression of love for the undeperforming cutie?

Remember when Apple charged an arm and a leg and a kidney for a 64GB solid-state drive in the original MacBook Air? Fortunately, those days are gone. With SSD drives prices in a slow free-fall, a very decent drive can be had for less than £100 pounds.

That still wasn’t the case a year ago when I purchased my Toshiba NB200 10Z. A great netbook with superb battery life but limitations of netbook-grade hardware were sometimes too annoying. Having maxed out RAM already, transplanting the hard drive was the only performance upgrade left.

I do confess, though. The final impetus in my decision-making were the new MacBook Air’s benchmarks – supposedly underpowered machine achieved surprisingly good results. I know, it uses different solid-state storage technology, but it convinced me that the upgrade would be beneficial.

Future Android Tablets… from the future

With Christmas over Google have managed to push their 2.3 Nexus S out the door, with specs not as high as one was expecting brings us to the point were we can examine the future of Android. Whilst many will no doubt be a little disappointed at the specs of the Nexus S it has brought hope to this happy blogger. Nexus S will get Android 3.0, without a doubt. Therefore Android 3.0 will not require as much in the was of hardware as some had believed. The likelihood of getting an upgrade to 2.3 and 3.0 for a current device has never looked brighter, depending on your manufacturer of course.

However, you might have held off buying an Android flavoured tablet and if so then read on to see what will be coming in the next few months.