Posts by cambsukguy

Re: nice phone but

Are you sure about glance?

I had a 920, which has an IPS display (like iPhone, rather than AMOLED).

This meant that the display used more power but still glance worked (I used peek to minimise the overall battery drain and was never bothered).

My 1020 has AMOLED and glance works and is more efficient (because it only powers the pixels required).

Since the 930 has an AMOLED (it does, doesn't it?), surely glance works, unless it is because it is an HD screen and Nokia simply need to add the code to cope - in which case, it will arrive in short order.

Glance is a very useful feature which makes a good battery life even better. I am astounded that Android or Samsung at least don't add a rip-off of it but I haven't seen one anywhere. Some show-through cleverness from HTC is hardly the same thing since it lights up the whole display.

Re: Meh, Apple has them beat.

Nah, just roll it or fold it.

Re: Thankyou MS

It wasn't installed automatically, why should it uninstall automatically?

It certainly will uninstall via the control panel app so why is this a problem?

Re: smart dialling

I have had a winphone for 3 years and just checked that (it's true). Except that I have never once needed to do it.

If I make a typo tapping in a number (a rare occurrence in itself), I correct it using the delete. I do this on word processors (or here) simply because it is quicker, even with real cursor keys let alone a press-and-hold technique to move the cursor.

Almost all the time I am dialling an actual number, I have copy-pasted it from a web page or something.

Still, if you do it a lot, there must be some use case for it, although I would probably automate it somehow and not use a phone perhaps.

Re: Another crack in the dyke

It's taking a very, very long time for this crack to build up.

If it is such an obvious choice then I am flabbergasted as to why these vast corporations, which exist solely to give money to their owners don't all switch over.

How many would it take to prove it works, 10?, 20?

I have worked at many Blue chips, most, if not all, used Windows everywhere. I often developed on Linux but had a Windows laptop right there as well (to do everything else). In some places the Apple laptops supplied for *nix use had had Windows installed on them on top of OS X - most were not even dual boot.

So, why don't some of Sony, Samsung, BA, etc. do it?

Is it because there are not enough people capable enough to look after their systems? Not so, apparently, they would need fewer, thus saving even more money.

is it because they are afraid it would not work? Well, if these other people did it, why can't we?

Interesting that the citations are for non-corporate entities, saving money for the public not for shareholders.

Is it because they just couldn't manage the retraining etc? Apparently not, the replacements are all similar (how interesting it was to see a Start-like button on Ubuntu - no doubt disappeared now).

Is it because the software wouldn't work? Apparently not, it does everything one wishes, apart from stupid things that one shouldn't do anyway, like ActiveX or something.

Is it because they have weird apps that don't exist elsewhere? Maybe, but everyone? hardly. Keep a few old Windows systems around until the need disappears, as it surely must.

So, apathy? They change and restructure and acquire and revamp endlessly in an attempt to get ever richer so I doubt that would stop them.

Presumably Google prove that this is possible and Google are very, very successful and very, very rich so why is their success not sufficient reason to switch systems starting tomorrow?

So, what is the reason that a story whereby some outfit decides not to use MS somewhere in the world is big enough news to actually publish it here?

And, I believe the jury maybe still be out on Munich and it is definitely out on Tamil Nadu for some considerable time.

Re: The real difference

and so does MS. Nokia spent a huge amount of money on research. It isn't always obviously useful, aside from a 41MP camera and some other nice things.

MS's research entity often publishes information that allows others to proceed in that direction.

One of the reasons I have always disliked Apple is the paucity of original research they do, polishing someone else's ideas and making money. Nice for them and their shareholders, fine for the folks buying their shiny stuff.

But, none of this could happen if the original work, in this case, the discovery/invention of Graphene itself (in the UK, impressive stuff) and the extra effort of folks like those at Nokia/MS/Samsung no doubt. Added to that, the ARM-based kit (also UK), Gorilla Glass (thanks Pilkington).

I mean, seriously, what technology have Apple researched/invented that is inside any of their devices - I recall that the fingerprint scanner was gained by purchase from elsewhere?

The end result of everyone doing what Apple do is that little or no progress would occur, just incremental development. Hmm, I knew there was reason all their recent devices were the same.

Re: Microsoft FAIL

unlike Siri, which I see in use all the time, or not.

The amount of people I see driving with a phone against their ear (or held at a jaunty angle as a fashion accessory) suggests that their assistant tech is not easy to use or doesn't work well.

The many folks that drive while staring at their laps, texting for sure, will slow any road fatality decline that other mechanisms strive to gain.

The simple Tell-Me thing on WP works well enough for driving, texts are read interactively with the ability to add and adjust responses (or call or not respond).

If, like someone here said, calling by name is dodgy because that person has a foreign-sounding name, I use the family name instead or both parts, that invariably fixes it. I don't have hundreds of phone numbers stored so it is rarely an issue. Saying a name slightly wrongly to get it to work is still much better than faffing illegally with the actual device to select someone.

Still, some of the speech conversions can be hilarious, although, at other times it is very good.

Re: Typical.

Got mine for just over 300 quid, supposedly used but, in fact, having factory stickers and original factory software (requiring two update cycles to get to Black).

Hard to leave a 920 but I had a willing recipient and was gagging for the camera, also nice to get the AMOLED screen.

Besides, 41MP beats 20MP even if the pixels are larger, the sensor probably won't be.

Re: Never, ever buy one of those: they are notoriously unreliable...

As I have said here previously, their TVs are poor in design and reliability, anecdotal evidence of two purchases, different types, LCD and Plasma, different sizes, 60 and 32. One was a dead loss with no repair possible even with 4 different boards replaced (almost certainly the screen connector according to a TV guy). The other, replacement MB needed, fortunately cheaper on eBay second-hand but otherwise 250 quid.

Waiting up to 10s for the input selector to display something is crackers. Stopping playback of a TV show just because the recording has stopped is barking.

My original TiVo with 16MB RAM could do more (albeit only up to 720) and responded with alacrity apart from the reordering of season passes (in which I assume the swap space went nuts and affected performance 1000-fold).

I wish TiVo wasn't a monthly service at a high price.

Re: knackered battery

Get a phone which doesn't drain the battery in a normal day then. I have two-year-old phones with perfectly usable batteries which had hardly ever dropped below 40 or 50% or so during the day.

Long day ahead travelling or otherwise knowing the battery will die?, take a backup pack. Sure, they are bigger than a spare battery but they charge more things and have larger capacity and can be shared with others.

I am not against removables per se obviously, but it wouldn't stop me buying a particular phone - especially as there are benefits to solid construction - and the fact that it is just not that hard to open my phone to replace the battery anyway.

Re: I saw a Surface...

In actuality, Apples are far more common in TV and movie land than in real life simply because the creators of same often use Apple gear, it is good gear and it looks nice and rice is rarely the object in movies or TV, looking good is paramount (see what I did there?).

On a point of fact about product placement, Shonda Rhimes, who writes Grey's Anatomy decided she wanted tech in her show for some reason and selected the Surface for her docs. She has a lot of control over the show. One doesn't see a whole lot of action on them, they mostly just view X-rays, MRIs and the like but they seem to work just fine.

The Bones episode where she discusses the merits of the auto-parking Toyota something she is driving was cringe-making compared to the occasional call taken on a Lumia.

Microsoft may appear to want to be cool but they have never had specific strategy to try to be so. This is reflected by someone like Bill Gates who would rather make a phone charger that works with urine or a solar toilet - about as far from cool as it is possible to get. Of course, the fact that I think that that is cool makes me an outsider obviously - but then I think WinPhones are much, much cooler than the alternatives.

Re: Oh joy!!

It's because the toy is popular, not because it is fit-for-purpose.

Obviously, if you add a keyboard and a mouse it gets closer to usable for laptop-type things.

This Office is supposed to make it usable without either. Perhaps it does, to a larger extent than the previous offerings anyway - Surface Office is properly usable only with keyboard/mouse, which happily come easily with the touch cover.

But, it is entirely possible to view and make (small) edits even just using my phone, any Office is better than no Office. Obviously other viewers must be able to do this because people send Word docs and Excel SSs all over the place but I feel happier sending the document on knowing it is not broken in some way.

Re: except

Given the rather large likelihood of having a computer, especially a laptop, with an HDMI, I don't think counting the cost of the computer is sensible.

Given that the computer is almost certainly on most of the time you are at home watching TV, counting the (minimal) cost of electricity for a laptop is also not sensible - my TV uses three times the power at least. Fan noise, not a great deal these days but I assume we are not talking Home theatre, Dobly Digital super movies in any case, Blu-ray would be the case otherwise, never bother myself as my town is equipped with a cinema.

And, a connected laptop (cable, £7.50, 10m, works perfectly) does everything, perfectly, in a little window if I want, at the same time as using the computer. I don't have to browse using a phone, I can use a large laptop screen, have the show on TV and use the laptop at the same time.

And all you require is a TV with HDMI, not a big ask.

Still, as people say £30, hardly a big deal, useful for a kids bedroom, or indeed one's own bedroom if you have a bedroom TV and your tablet doesn't have HDMI out or you don't want to connect it.

The phone probably isn't running BT4.0/1 which supports BT LE (Low Energy).

If it did, BT devices should be able to stay 'attached' with very little power use indeed, days for sure.

Check for an update if it is Android, maybe they have a BT LE one for your hardware.

Re: The plural of anecdote is data. ;)

>Did you have to plug the disc in?

yes, once.

>Do you have an extra lump on your phone?

What is an extra lump? A 1020 has a bump for sure. Helps me to keep hold of the phone - besides, a small lump is worth it for good pics. A 925 is lump-less should one desire great pics and no lump.

>Is the inductive charger much more expensive and much less ubiquitous than an iPhone charging lead?

First inductive charger was free, got another for work for £15 pounds. Ridiculously worth it. Don't care if it is ubiquitous - I have one. I can also plug the phone like regular folk using the much-more-ubiquitous micro-usb should the need arise - which it rarely does.

Given the number of people that break their charging socket by knocking/dropping the phone while charging, the wireless charging system also adds a protection against it.

But, of course, you never broke yours so that use case is not needed, just like your house's fire insurance.

>You can't secure against stupidity

Not really true. Those of us that have written software for end users constantly have to ensure nothing stupid is allowed to happen.

If the server software had a setup system that ensured that the default system was bulletproof (probably because no-one could ever do anything with it) and then only allowed changes that are safe, the end result would be safe.

If the system allowed (for instance) weak passwords to be used, then the system is flawed.

Perhaps people log on as root and just play with files instead of using some supervisor system that ensures you don't do something idiotic, even accidentally?

Re: Surface with lte

>I can already use surface pro with LTE by using my mobile wifi.

Unless providers will offer us another SIM on the same contract using the same data plan for a no-hassle system then this is by far the best way to do it for most people.

Even then, if I was so employed, I would simply stick a SIM in another phone, like my N900 and run it as a WiFi hotspot or, even simpler, use a MiFi device. These have the advantage that's multiple people can use them at the same time. You could even charge it using the Surface when needed because it has a full-size USB port!

Re: Hope the Messages auto delete

Presumably, they are saved to the cloud where they can be accessed by every individual conversation dated in groups in some, marginally clever way in the same place as your contacts for easy integration and emails and stuff.

Oh, it is iOS not WP, forget it, carry on, though I don't know how.

Re: runtime

>I have a surface pro, and I certainly dont get 7h of video playback - it constantly requires me to charge it up after a couple of hours reading web pages such as this one.

Then it's broken and you should tell them. They sent me a new Surface (RT) when it stopped charging (having previously sent me a free replacement charger). I didn't even have to ship the old one back until after I got the new one. Obviously, they take a credit card number just in case.

When I say they, I assume you bought it from the website like I did. If not, they probably still offer the same support.

I agree about the pricing mentioned elsewhere, accessories seem expensive to me (so are Apple and Nokia accessories it seems to me) but the service is tip-top.

OTOH, if you listen to planet rock say, using their app that works very well (on my platform at least better than TuneIn), you are indeed at the mercy of other peoples' choices, like Alice Cooper for instance. Still, what does he know, same with those other music professionals.

It means I get to hear bands and songs I wouldn't otherwise hear, the ads are not wonderful of course but not too intrusive since I don't listen for long periods as a rule.

More importantly, it uses no data so saves having a large data allowance, is available in the car and at home. Also on one's person with an actual radio I guess.

The above applies to other music genres too I imagine although they don't get Alice.

And, there is Nokia Mixmusic, which is free, ad-free, allows downloading over WiFi for off-line listening elsewhere, is curated, selects music based on your library, allows favourites etc. and following bands, tells you about upcoming gigs/releases for those bands.

All-in-all, I never get why people pay for music streaming, both in actual cost and not-really-hidden data costs.

Still, nowt as queer as folk.

Re: Brilliant

Restore has miraculously 'repaired' more than one machine screwed up in some unknown way and gained me plaudits along the way.

The downside being of course, that I have to do it again in future.

Still, less and less often - whatever folks here say about bloat-ware and dodgy OSs.

Re: Farming is a business.

not to mention using less pesticide

Re: Productivity... or not

Used OO, on Unbuntu 12 a year ago or so. One day I couldn't even open a simple Word doc sent from within the same org. not just failed to open but crashed the app each and every time.

There is a reason large orgs don't use free software, it is too expensive.

Re: For some reason...

texting, unlimited or otherwise is for use in your home area, for text (or pictures if you are rich and/or stupid).

OTT services such as Skype, WhatsApp etc. work for free even if the other party is in another country or roaming area.

They also varyingly have the ability to make calls, including Video calls for free and send pictures, for free.

This is why they are popular and useful, there are lots and lots of people in the world who want to talk/chat/see people in another country.

Personally, I use WhatsApp because others do but it doesn't have a laptop or tablet app whereas Skype does. Skype also lets you call real phones, which can be useful indeed.

The obvious, non-storage-capacity related benefit is that I can access my CV or OneNote thingys like WiFi codes etc. when I am not at home rather than leaving my laptop on 24/7 and using remote access (remote access is unavailable to many, many people because of their OS, routers, knowledge etc.)

Other benefits exist like near-total automated recovery after failure/replacement of phone/tablet and zero (monetary) cost.

Apart from that, no benefit at all.

They can look at my data if they want, as long as they don't delete it.

If they do, my laptop has the same image locally, automatically in sync, appearing as part of the file system - brilliant.

worked well for MS, they gave something like two years notice that thier truly geriatric OS would be no-longer supported (for free).

Still, trillions (possibly gazillions) of people did not know this and are desperate now because they will lose protection or have to find an upgrade path that doesn't crap out their in-house creaky specialised apps.

I must admit, with hindsight, a previous patch should have installed a App (what we used to call a program) whose sole purpose was to pop up a message that said "Please note: This operating system's support mechanism will expire on 04/14 - please ensure that you are able to upgrade before time...and so on"

I never saw one and I did occasionally boot my old XP laptop to loan/test or use a Win7-unsupported Canoscan thing.

Re: Why would anyone want to?

Can't read between the lines?

"I ran a Windows Phone app and it wasn't slick and sleek like people say, not buying another".

The idea is to ensure no-one mistakes that crappy non-sliding, menu-at-the-top garbage for a WP app.

Re: Smart, but useless

I looked at some texts I typed the other day and their timestamps. I reckoned I was doing 30 words/min.

Given that I can't type, was mostly using one hand and therefore one thumb with the occasional extra finger, this is pretty good.

Of course, I only type one or two letters of almost every word, the predictive list that appears, and which is scrollable, means few misspelled words, noticeable auto-correct (in case it is wrong) and far more readable texts (they are spelled, spaced and capitalised correctly on-th-whole).

I did smile at the thought that the author didn't want to change phones because of the porting of all his data even though it was the same OS.

I started with a Factory reset Lumia 920, logged onto the WP website and pushed all my apps at the same time, about 100. Text messages, app settings, email accounts (linked as before) almost everything re-appeared. Only the front screen layout required setting. All of this is baked-in, switchable-off (if you must) and basically fool-proof.

I can't believe the most popular system doesn't have this by default to aid the uninitiated. I presume there is an app for it but, no doubt, given the vast array of Androids, many, many differences would have to be catered for.

Re: Make it free

Have to agree, why the fuck do people search through all that shit in the start menus when you can just tap a couple of letters?

One hardly needs to know where anything is.

I am not sure people realise that it also searches emails and files (INSIDE THEM for gods sake), everything (except the web, which Win8.1 does making it even better). It even will search TIFFs using OCR FFS (if you turn on the feature since this is definitely a specialist requirement).

Presumably people go to mail and type search in the box - wow, amazing, so last decade.

Re: Bay Trail Goodness

Suitable for the uninitiated is true for an iPad but also suitable for a surface, or possibly this device, more so in fact.

The difference with a Surface RT is as previous posters have noted, the knowledge that they won't be installing anything dangerous. iPads are probably less so mainly because of these in-app purchase type things rather than actual malware.

But, WinRT and Win8 proper have real users with control given to administrators such that where they surf etc. is controlled and limited as required. Time using apps, the computer, everything. And, while this may exist on an iPad (I have never looked), it isn't there by default upon account creation using one, single checkbox as it was when I added accounts for my kids on a Surface.

But, unlike a full Win8 machine or tablet, the RT could be left for them to do pretty much anything they want and it will hardly ever need a look-see (three months so far for my kids one).

As far as I know, an iPad can surf p0rn straight out of the box and therefore needs attention immediately from someone knowledgeable to ensure it is used correctly - I dread to think what many kids see on their open smartphones because their parents/guardians just hand it over unprotected.

And, a shill is someone taking a cut or getting paid, since I am neither, I must be someone with a simply different opinion, sorry about that.