May 11

Google’s Android in favor of iPhone

By alexngross Interesting Phone Stuff, Phones In The News No Comments »

The official results are in, and the first quarter sales figures for 2010 are significantly in favor of Google’s Android smart phone. The war has waged for quite some time between Apple’s iPhone–with apps that pale in comparison to the amount of hype backing it up–and Google’s Android which has dedicated its operating system to various phone models and carriers across the board.

The iPhone, as many of you know, is paired only with AT&T service–and while Apple pushes its weight around the market, it rests firmly in the corner where only AT&T users and Mac Geeks dwell.

AT&T is big–really big. But Verizon is much bigger. You know those “coverage maps” you see in all the ‘Verizon VS AT&T‘ commercials? Those attempt to illustrate a whopping 92.8% of Verizon’s customers enjoying a relatively limitless wireless coverage zone.

iPhone’s biggest claim to fame is the App Store, featuring obscene numbers of user and professionally created applications for just about everything you’d ever want to do–from grocery shopping, to making fart-noises on the bus. The Google Android is gaining speed, however. They’re up to a healthy 50,000 applications and counting–and I believe they’ve even hosted their own fart-noise apps, so…good news there!

Because of Verizon’s dominant network, they have become a huge sponsor of Google’s Android–providing them with lots of advertising and marketing funds.

The last–and probably most important–factor that pushes the Android ahead is the pricing. Where the average price for a smart phone in 2010 is around $150, the top-tier iPhones can be as pricey as $299. Because Google has the freedom to pick and choose its carriers and hosts models in varying price ranges, they have the potential to dominate every market.

The Android’s sales have outfoxed the iPhone, but not by much. With the first quarter percentages for the Android being 28%, and the iPhone’s being 21%, it is still a close race…but it is still only a race for 2nd place.

It should be no surprise that the Blackberry is still king of the smart phones with a first quarter sales rate of 36 percent. Across the board, new and refurbished Blackberrys make a huge impact on smart phone sales. They are efficient, inexpensive, and part of the largest networks in the country.

So, for now, Blackberry watches as Google and Apple duke it out–but there’s a lot more time left in 2010–and something tells me that the iPad won’t be the last tech gadget people are talking about this year.

–Alex

TheBlueDot.net

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Apr 20

Cell Security in the New Business Age

By Chase Buckner Interesting Phone Stuff, Phones In The News No Comments »

It seems like a lifetime since the casual–though clumsy–portable or cellular phone generation switched to Smart Phones. Everyone from the average citizen to the global corporate CEO utilizes a small pocket device for practically every aspect of their lives. But how secure are your Smart Phone interactions?

Many new and refurbished Smart Phones are equipped with some kind of rudimentary security device and it seems that most people are either comfortable with that, or simply feel that browsing the web from a phone is more secure than from their PC. Have they been lulled into a false sense of security, or are Smart Phones worthy of all of our faith?

According to Cellphone.org, the Apple iPhone lacks some basic but critical features when it comes to overall security. It’s operating system can be compromised due to corrupted downloads, it lacks over-air updates, and it has relatively no device encryption.

Windows Mobile phones covers a majority of basic security requirements for corporate and personal use along with the iPhone‘s full VPN support.

RIM Blackberry phones offer better consumer coverage; solid security, traffic routing, and almost flawless encryption. But how do Blackberrys hold up to the Android and Symbian?

Both the Android and Symbian phones have a very open nature when it comes to third party access; however, installed software is “theoretically unable” to do any major damage to the device without being traced to the source.

Android and Symbian users are asked permission to utilize certain protected features–and anyone who accesses these features do so with a protected private key.

If you want the ultimate in Smart Phone protection, however, be prepared to pay for it. The Sectera Edge (sold for about $3350) offers military-grade encryption and was offered to President Obama as the alternative for ditching his Blackberry.

But what does all of this mean? Well, other than the old “if it’s good enough for the President, it’s good enough for me” argument, new and refurbished Blackberrys seem to have the highest rated and most user-friendly security aspects amongst Smart Phones.

No matter what device you choose, you should always be wary of your phone’s security settings and overall management. Proper routine maintenance of your technology is crucial to a happy and long-lasting relationship with whichever device you choose. So, remember to choose your Smart Phone wisely, but also take care of it–after all–it takes care of you.

–Alex G. (The Blue Dot)

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Jan 13

Google Releases Nexus One and Their Online Store

By Chase Buckner Cell Phone Reviews, Interesting Phone Stuff, Phones In The News 2 Comments »

nexus_one_list_ars-thumb-640xauto-10960Well the rumors proved true even in regards to the name of the new Google Phone – The Nexus One. Google fans are overwhelmingly excited about the Nexus one but even more excited about what the Google Store means for the new and refurbished cell phone industry.

The Nexus One is running the newest Android 2.1 software and comes with all of the awesome, pre-loaded apps like: Search, Maps, Gmail, YouTube and Google Talk, and additional goodies like Maps Navigation and Google Voice. Its processor is insanely fast, it’s got a five-megapixel camera, and it shoots video as well. The Nexus one also has a really cool new feature, which is a voice-enabled keyboard for any text field. This means you don’t have to type at all anymore. Searching for a YouTube video? Just tell your phone what video you are looking for, and the Nexus One will type the search for you. It works the same for composing texts and emails. You can find more specs for the Nexus One here.

The craziest part of the Nexus One announcement is that it’s for sale at Google’s new web store as unlocked. For the first time ever in the US, you can purchase an unlocked phone from the manufacturer’s website and then pick the phone plan you want from any of the carriers that support the phone. Google’s store could seriously shake the pillars of what is the current mobile phone market in the US. It will be interesting to see how long companies like AT&T play along.

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Dec 16

Rumors of the new Google Phone Seem True

By Chase Buckner Phones In The News No Comments »

google-phone-coryobrien-twitterIt seems that the rumors about Google releasing a new Android phone (like the Motorola Droid) are true. Word on the street is that Google gave a number of its employees a sample of their new Nexus One, a name will not likely be the official name when it is released.

The Nexus One is rumored to be the first cell phone to run on Anroid 2.1. It is also supposed to be a little shallower in depth than the iPhone and posses a larger touch screen. Most exciting to me, is that it seems fairly certain that the Nexus One will be sold directly from Google as an unlocked cell phone, so you will be able to use it on T-Mobile or AT&T.

If the rumors are true, and day-by-day it seems clearer that they are, the new Google Phone should be released in January. Whether or not it will be fabled “iPhone killer” remains uncertain, but I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again: if anyone has a shot at taking down Apple, it’s Google.

For more on the new Google Phone, visit Engadget or The New York Times.

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Dec 15

Google Goggles Review

By Chase Buckner Cell Phone Reviews, Interesting Phone Stuff, Phones In The News 4 Comments »

goggles_landmarkGoogle never ceases to blow my mind with what we will soon be able to do from our new and refurbished cell phones. Google has recently released Google Goggles (currently available for only Android phones like the Motorola Droid), which allows you to use the camera on your cell phone to perform Google searches.

All you have to do is open Google Goggles, point at the building, book, business card, painting, etc., snap a picture, and the Google search results appear. It gets even better when you use it with local businesses. Just open Goggles, point your camera at the business and without even having to take the picture, Goggles will display the name of the business, which you can tap for more information like contact info and reviews. There is a nice little video on the Google Goggles page, where you can get more information about Goggles.

There has been some backlash about Goggles, however, as Google has been working to incorporate face recognition into Goggles. Face recognition means you could literally point your camera phone at someone walking by and if there is information about that person online, the search results for them would pop up. I admit, I’m not sure if this feature is scary or cool. Maybe scary cool.

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Nov 27

Google’s Search by Voice Times Square Campaign

By Chase Buckner Phones In The News 3 Comments »

droid-1Googles newest ad campaign for the Motorola Droid is really big – as in tall. Google has rented ad space on the Reuters Sign and the NASDAQ sign in Times Square, NY between 12:30-2:00pm and 6:30-8:00pm. The screens display how their newly improved Search by Voice feature, which now comes with all Android devices such as the Motorola Droid, works.

Search by voice allows you to search for business information, like you would do via Google, without having to enter text. You just say the name of the business you are looking for, and the Google search results for that business show up. The Times Square campaign allows anyone to dial 888-376-4336, use the Search by Voice system, and then watch as their Google search results are displayed on one of the two digital signs.

The Search by Voice feature seems like a nice system, but I’m not really convinced that typing the name of the business that I need information about is really that difficult. I mean you have to look at the screen to read the search results anyway, so typing the information in eliminates the need to raise and lower that phone to your head, which you would need to do to use Search by Voice (nitpicking, I know). I’m just surprised that Google is proud enough of the feature to drop so much money on this type of campaign.

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Nov 13

Photoshop for Android Mobile Phones Review

By Chase Buckner Uncategorized 4 Comments »

Photoshop AppAdobe has recently released a free Photoshop App for mobile phones running Google’s Android software such as the new Motorola Droid. This is one of the coolest apps that I’ve seen released in a while, especially as the amount of megapixels in cell phone cameras continue to rise (the Droid comes with a legit 5 megapixel camera).

Photoshop for Android devices makes it incredibly easy to perform edits to photos on your smartphone and then upload them when you’re finished. When you open up a photo in your photo gallery, you are given the option to edit the photo. With a click, the photo opens in Photoshop, and you’re ready to start editing. At the top of the edit mode screen, there are three icons: crop, image correction and color effects, and soft focus. Under the crop icon, you can choose to crop, straighten, rotate, or flip the photo. If you click on the image correction and color effects icon, you have the ability to change the exposure, saturation, tint, or to make the photo black and white. The degree of these changes all depends on how far you slide your finger on the exposure, saturation, etc. scale. The soft focus button allows you to adjust the amount of “soft focus” that you wish to apply to the photo.Photoshop2

One of the nicest features of Photoshop for Android is that it has both an “undo” and a “redo” button, so you can make edits without fear of not being able to undo them.

Once you’ve finished editing your photos, you can upload them from your Android mobile phone directly to the Photoshop.com account, which comes free with 2GB (roughly 1,500 pictures) of storage for all Android devices. The photoshop.com account makes it easy to share photos online and is a good way to back up the photos on your mobile phone. You can even add captions before uploading. Android also has the ability to upload a large amount of photos even if the Photoshop app is not running, meaning you can be doing other things on your phone while photos are uploading to your Photoshop.com account. You can find a video demonstration of the Photoshop app for Android devices here.

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