Black Friday is upon us shortly and with the knowledge and experience of staying up all night in lines and malls, I have a few tips for the newbies among us. Even if you’re used to staying on lines or staying up all night, some folks get irked when they are being towed around by a slow shopper. Don’t worry, TheBlueDot is here for you in your time of need. No, we don’t have some time machine or magical device that will just deliver all the items you need for the holidays. But we do have a few tips and tricks for those not used to the stress of late night shopping and slow tow shoppers.
Nov 23
Nov 01
The results are in, some later than others and to some surprised gasps Apple is not number 1 this 3rd quarter. Although that shouldn’t be that big of a surprise since their Apple 4 was beginning to age compared to how quickly they released newer editions in the past, which will change this 4th quarter. Anyway, it seems two companies have sprung ahead of the fruit logo giant, HTC and Samsung. HTC, though late to the survey party, has beaten both Samsung and Apple pretty badly, shipping upwards of 5.7 Million smart phones this quarter. Which is pretty impressive when you take a look at the second placer, Samsung, with 4.9 million and Apple trailing in third at 4.6 million. Engadget has some more interesting information on this very subject.
Does this mean anything significant? Yes and no. Yes, because HTC phones are of great quality, especially their incredible line and samsung’s phones are well known for their clear and crisp screens on their Galaxy lines. The numbers speak for themselves in what the customer wants. No, because the iPhone 4s will change up that number right quick, and now that Nokia has some major Windows phones coming out, they may come running up to one the top spots. Not to mention the holiday season is obviously a busy time for any and all electronics.
We here at TheBlueDot actually have plenty of HTC, Samsung and iPhones for sale at www.thebluedot.net or you can trade in your old and used phones at www.thebluedot.net/tradein
Oct 28
Windows phones have been having a rough ride lately. It’s safe to say that most people choose iPhones, Androids or even Blackberrys over them. That’s not to say they weren’t good, they just weren’t as good as everyone else. But all of that is about to change. With the Mango release, all windows phones function much much better, and now Nokia has shown off what’s next. That’s right, much like Motorola was Googles phone company of choice with major advancements, Nokia is Windows phone company of choice. The Lumia series looks slick, fast and fashionable, more fashionable then droids anyway, maybe even iPhones. Most of the phones seem to come in different colors which really make the screen pop.
Oct 21
The past couple weeks we have seen a spike in iPhone 4 trade ins and we just want to assure you all that we will beat competitors offers! Even if you don’t have an iphone 4, we take trade ins of all iPhones, from the iPhone 3g, to the very first iPhone! the iPhone 4s is a huge hit, and we want to help you get the cash to put towards your iPhone upgrade. We also know that not everyone has an iPhone so I want to double assure you all that the “beat competitors offers” is true for ALL trade ins. Used Droids, Used Blackberrys and Used Windows phones all get the same treatment as any other major trade in.
Oct 12
RIM, British Tabloids and Sony are taking center stage recently and it isn’t the kind of attention any of them want. RIM had much of their Blackberry network shutdown, TWICE, in European, Africa and Middle Eastern countries. Sony has been hacked over and over again. Then we have News Corp. tabloids caught red handed in despicable phone hacking cases. These kind of things happen, and it isn’t unheard of for it to happen occasionally (minus the phone hacking thing). But this past year has shown more and more of these kind of tech disasters that no company wants to see more than once, if ever.
Oct 05
So the apple conference came and went. No word on the iPhone 5 yet, but apple did officially announce the iPhone 4S, an improved iPhone 4 that may just be worth the upgrade. So what are these major improvements to an already popular iPhone edition? Voice. It seems the next generation of smart phones are really pushing voice control and the iPhone 4S touts Siri, an advance voice recognition software. In the testing room many people got to try out this new software and one of the first things many people tried to do was slip it up. The folks over at Engadget.com asked it weird requests “We tried to psych it out with a bunch of random requests, including the history of Chester, Vermont (a lovely town) and the best Ramen places in San Francisco. Siri never faltered, never missed a beat.”
Google may have had the first step into the future of Near Frequency Technology, but Apple now has their foot out the door with advance voice controls. No matter what people threw at the new Siri software it seemed to keep up with them almost every time. Voice control may seem like a minor thing until you try it out, I get slight chills every time I am able to control movies on my Xbox 360 via the Kinect voice controls like characters did with their computer on Star Trek. But voice controls aren’t the only thing the new iPhone 4S is packing!
The iPhone 4S has quite the hardware, like the apple A5 dual-core processor, making menu navigation and app start ups appear much quicker. Not only does the iPhone have a new processor, it also has a new camera. The iPhone 4 had a 5MP camera with 720p video capture. The new iPhone 4S has a 8MP camera and 1080p video capture. When being tried out in the test rooms, it appeared the camera had better resolution, but it was difficult to tell if it was better at capturing images. The room was, apparently, inadequate for testing such a thing, so we will have to wait for hands on reviews of the camera to find out if it has improved in capturing as well. The battery has taken a bit of a downgrade, though that can be blamed on the new hardware. In standby, the iPhone 4S lasts about 200 hours, which is 100 less than the iPhone 4. Depending on what you do for a living, and how often you charge your phone, this may be an issue.
Already, people are beginning to trade in their iPhone 4′s for the upcoming iPhone 4S, even though the iPhone 5 may be just around the corner. The new iPhone 4S will retail from $199 for the 16GB model, to $399 for the 64GB model. If you’re looking to update to the iPhone 4S and want to get rid of your iPhone 4, you can trade in your old iPhone 4 with us at TheBlueDot.net
