Posts by cambsukguy

Google's Nexus 5: Best smartphone bang for your buck. There, we said it

Re: Hangouts for SMS

Not much can hold a candle to the N8, except the 808, N9 (in some cases), 920, 925, and 1020 obviously. And yes, all seen and compared in one way or another.

I see lousy phone pictures and wonder why people would pay the huge sums of money they do for inferior pictures, I presume Instagram was invented to obscure this simple fact.

Still, my 920 pictures looks so appalling next to the 1020 pictures, when super-zoomed at least, that I suppose almost everyone is using a crappy phone camera now.

Apple will FAIL in corporate land 'because IT managers hate iPads'

Re: "End users seem to love the idea of having an IPAD"

Used a surface Pro the other day at the Gadget Show Live, was happy to download DOTA2, fast as hell, small and slick compared to a laptop, has HDMI for docking and various other nifty things. The flat keyboard was okay for a non-typist like me, not for coding etc. but a definite improvement over the on-screen keyboard and at no appreciable cost to carry.

I actually bought an RT tablet for half the price (also thinner and lighter etc.) because the person I bought it for has no real need for a fully fledged PC to have with them always.

A smartphone covers 99% of my needs so I still don't have a tablet.

'It's a joke!' ... Bill Gates slams Mark Zuckerberg's web-for-the-poor dream

Re: The thing about Gates

Yeah, the American way... We don't need no steenkin' government, just let me keep all my money and I will spend it the way I see fit.

Except, the US has an huge military, a free education system and even, shock horror, a last-resort health system. They also have Federally insured banks, flood prevention, the National Guard, the EPA, the CDC, the FDA (no Thalidimide in the USA thanks to them).

Individuals are generally utterly selfish bastards wen it comes to spending their money, Europeans generally know this, the further north you go the more obvious it is. But even Americans (well, a reasonable proportion of them) think the government needs to do some stuff.

BG is attacking problems western governments are unwilling to face and side-stepped past them if necessary,working with NGOs and similar organisations to try and overcome difficult or intractable issues.

I, for one am glad he stole your money, he is definitely using better than you would have. I also think all the windows licences I have bought with my hard-earned over the many, many years were not that bad value, certainly cheaper than paying for Apple kit and certainly worth the effort to avoid Linux (which I use a lot professionally and yes, I know it is a reliable OS, blah, blah, blah).

It would be nice if BG could do one of his 'lunches' with MZ, like he did with Warren Buffet. This might convert MZ into someone who zealously attacks something like contraception, overpopulation (I know, sometimes the same thing) rather than "The next billion fb users".

Speaking to people who have had Malaria three or more times, it is hard to imagine how tough it makes their lives, people are affected for their entire life by debilitating diseases, they can affect mental capabilities as well as making people physically weaker and shorter-lived.

Helping more people lead longer, healthier lives in the developing world doesn't worsen the population problem, it improves it, along with a better GDP etc. from fewer resources being used to support people who are would otherwise be able to contribute.

Successful eradication of Polio in the face of people hell-bent on preventing it would be a huge accomplishment, obviously with the aid of others but a significant contribution none-the-less.

It would be deserving of a Nobel even, possibly the Peace prize. Obama could then hand him a Medal of Freedom, which would make BG blush I imagine.

Why people would revere Jobs for 'inventing amazing devices' staggers me and revering people solely because they made astounding amounts of money makes me shudder.

'Tablet' no longer means 'iPad': Apple share PLUMMETS below 30%

Re: Peak Apple

True, I saw Everest a couple of weeks ago, looked fine, getting higher by a tiny amount I read.

Still prefer surface, may have fewer apps but I wanted the person I bought it for to use it for actual schoolwork using office etc. while being able to see Skype, fb messages at the same time on the same screen not to mention plugging stuff into the proper USB, the list is endless but pointless to Apple lovers I guess. And apps like iPlayer are simply not required, things like that and Netflix just work in the browser.

This is the so-called rubbish, slow, useless surface 1 btw. Having used it, I cannot see the rubbish at all. The build is solid and feels premium. It is not blisteringly fast but then it doesn't have a core i7 in it.

oops, slight digression I suppose...

Windows Phone market share hits double digits in UK and France

Since my son will also have a Lumia and a Surface, when it arrives, I suppose I had better pass his fb details on since, presumably, they will be the least popular kids on the block.

Or, since the kidz couldn't care less and have even less loyalty, no-one will give a crap and they may even look at his phone and say, ooh! I want one, mine just has this stupid grid of icons and keeps breaking when I drop it.

Haha, I worked for Samsung on their phones, using Linux. Hilarious comment and completely stupid.

Re: You know what's weird?

That is directly related to the low presence of Nokia smartphones, growing but low, as the people-who-know-some-simple-maths detailed earlier.

Flashy metal-cased smartphones drop calls more easily. Smartphones can actually have better antennae in size and location etc. if they wish (they are bigger after all). They do suffer having a more noisy electronic environment to operate in - they often run an IP stack and transfer data during a call for instance, my 8210 rarely did that and never at 3G speeds.

However, HD audio and noise-cancellation means I have better, clearer conversations in far worse (audio) noise environments and, while call-drops still happen (as they always did), the overall experience is better (as it bloody well ought to be).

So, get a better phone if you don't like the one you have and stop assuming all smartphones are as rubbish as yours - that is one the reasons iPhones sell so well after all - somebody keeps telling them they are the best and they believe it - 'it just works', tosh - they are just adequate smartphones with poor call performance that look nice and have a stupendous amount of apps.

Re: Here we go again

All three of my Lumias have been Black (and still are I suppose).

Harder to spot, still lovely to hold though.

Re: Doing well?

They might switch if, like me, they wanted better battery life and/or a better camera.

To me, having slightly fewer apps (I mean in variation obviously, not raw quantity - or quality for that matter) is less important than having a day out and trying to use a phone on 10% battery instead of 50% or 60% and being worry free.

Then, looking at the pictures I have taken and not wishing I had pocketed a compact camera instead.

Then remembering that all those not-spots meaning maps often don't work or are painfully slow or use up my data allowance meaning I have to have a high data package instead of a tiny 500MB one, thus saving me loadsamoney every month.

Oh wait... there are loads of reasons I switched regardless of the fact that I prefer WP to use as well!

Win, Win (geddit?)

HTC staring down the barrel of a US sales ban after Nokia's patent coup

Re: Shitting hell - someone actually managed to patent

perhaps... "I'm not sure on what course..."

Still a valid argument, the improvement in call quality I now have with my friend having switched from Samsung to Nokia is marked. And she lives in a city with so-called complete coverage.

Nokia's downfall might be partly attributed to the fact that phone calls are so much less important these days - any device can manage to send a text.

Nokia Lumia 1020: It's an imaging BEAST... and it makes calls too

Re: I wonder how this compares

The best camera is the one you have with you. One may as well carry a compact zoom around as carry those lenses. They are clever (and presumably drain the battery like crazy if you keep them ready to shoot) but ultimately no-one will have them in their pocket all the time.

Weird, my experience of the Midlands was always sensible folk that understood the value of money. Maybe that precludes the 1020 being popular but the 5xx, 6xx, 7xx and even 8xx - all better value than anything but Landfill Android - all updated and looked after for reasonable periods and all with excellent Nokia call quality and build.

I shall have to update my views unless my next trip there tells me otherwise.

Re: Review requests

This video might suit..

The comparison starting at 5:50 or thereabouts is good, the HTC has OIS also so there are enough TLAs in that sentence.

The zoomed image at 6:24 basically says it all but it is interesting none-the-less.

There is no point at all comparing a phone against the 4S - it is so appalling as to be pointless - the 5S may be worth a shot (haha), the same outfit that made the video above do make a comparison video for that that device too.

And, so you know, unless they decided to go around and hobble all the capabilities compared to my 920 and my friends' 925, the BT is easily good for 10m - I wander about cleaning etc. with BT headphones while my phone is on the table top, dropout occurs but only when walls and the 10m distance limit would expect it to. Headphones use A2DP which has highish data rates and stresses BT reasonably. It also supports BT4.0 giving 24mbs as well as BT Low Energy (as does the 9xx series with the Amber update).

And, just in case you wonder why your friends HTC has a crappy BT range, look at the case. What makes it attractive is also a radio opaque material, especially for BT. Still, as long as it looks nice, who needs phones calls, BT or WiFi to work, not to mention GPS?

All the radios work very nicely on my 920, GPS can lock in 5 or fewer seconds if I have a data connection, often faster when on WiFi and often just as quickly even if I am driving. Phone calls, especially noise cancellation is excellent, I would expect nothing less.

And as for the Samsung, well, I did ask my other Note2-owning friend to show me her maps and GPS stuff so I could make a fair comparison but after waiting for her to turn on the GPS ('cause of the battery drain), then wait for the signal for more than a minute ('cause we were indoors) and then wait for the pixelated nightmare of Google maps to load when the GPS dot finally appeared ('cause of the poor signal reception area), well, I had my answer, mine took a few seconds and the map was already present and correct at any zoom level - not to mention that it would have been so even if I had been out of data range or, indeed, roaming in another country altogether.

Nokia Lumia 625: Quality budget 4G phone ... but where's UK's budget 4G?

yes, but the 920 is also 4G

Didn't see one below 250 at Amazon but that is still an amazing price for that phone; would buy it immediately if I hadn't bought one immediately they were released.

Still, could always spend more on a 1020 and pass the 920 to a deserving offspring. Would have to pry the 800 out of his hands first though - nice, nice phone in the hand that one.

Windows Phone overtakes Apple's market share ... in India

Re: Trolls

And how could 3rd or even 2nd place make them control anything? Especially when 2nd place is so far behind 1st place still.

I suspect one ought to worry about the system in 1st place more and be glad that there IS a choice for people not wanting ad-phones where designers of any kind appear to never have been employed.

I still feel terrible about owning a Samsung 'smart' TV, appalling software and the reliability is crap too.

Is it a bird? Is it a plane? Is it ... Win Phone 8? No, it's APPLE'S iOS 7

Re: I feel like I have a stylish, niche product that sets me apart from the herd.

My friend just bought a 925, it is beautiful indeed. And - because my 920 still hasn't received the upgrade for the Pro Camera app to work - makes me envious indeed.

Obviously, having an indestructible, wireless charging, 2nd best, soon-to-be 3rd best camera is still cool as hell and drooling after the 1020 will keep me sane.

It's hysterical that people think having Instagram matters more than having a camera that takes good pictures - pitiful. Come to think of it, that must be the reason they designed Instagram in the first place.

Not to mention that the N900 used translucent pop-ups in exactly the same way - for focus.

WP throws everything away and puts the "Yes or No" type boxes on their own screen - I prefer it, it is not a desktop, pop-ups are pointless; you can't leave them and go do something else on the same screen like you can on a desktop.

Still, nice to see that they realise making buttons from text - thus avoiding having to have a button in the first place - is a good idea. I wonder if the texts tilts and distorts upon pressing giving the very nice feedback it does on WP, lawsuit waiting to happen if so.

And, by the way, you don't really have to indicate that text is a button on WP, almost anything that logically could be a button IS. In a text conversation? Press the persons name at the top, bingo, contact card. Accent colour is used to good effect where highlighting a button is useful.

Even with the occasional "Oh, wow, didn't realise that was a button" moment, it is way nicer to use than a desktop grid-of-icons motif - obviously not a Win8 desktop but all the other static ones.

As for the swiping left and right, I like the guided indicator menus, greyed out but visible that informs you what awaits in that direction (which you can also tap rather than swipe to).

If they copied enough of them I would drag their asses into court on general principle if I were MS, simply to prevent them suing me after-the-fact for copying their "more-popular" interface techniques.

Microsoft puts something hard and sensitive in your pocket

Re: Military grade security = horrible to deal with ?

Where do you travel?

I got the train to London the other day, off-peak, ordinary folks. The girl sitting next to me happily tapping away on a Lumia 620, long discussion ensued about better text prediction and app operation compared to her previous phone.

I see Lumias all the time, possibly because I recognise them; just because you don't doesn't mean they don't exist.

And, by the way, it doesn't matter if there aren't that many, individual units don't require others to work. As long as Nokia make better phones with better cameras and better call quality, I will buy them - the OS is the icing on the cake - Nokia's Maemo/Meego N900/N9 (had both) were just simply not as good as WP overall, especially app coverage.

Obviously, this assumes MS won't drop the OS (or the phones for that matter); current trends suggest they won't. if they did, I could survive Android (unless BB was miraculously ascendant) or hope that Jolla got somewhere (even more unlikely).

But, a nice new Lumia 1020 will mean I have a great phone (and stupendous camera) for a good while yet.

Shall I buy it in yellow so you recognise it as a Lumia!?

Nokia's 41Mp Lumia 1020 'launches' in UK - but hoi polloi must wait

Re: Megapixels are not everything

Since it creates one final pixel value from 7 actual pixels for the final delivered picture then pixel is 7 times larger unless you zoom in and reduce it accordingly.

The actual sensor is large but obviously not gigantic.

The point is that it takes good pictures, *for a phone*.

OTOH, my 920 takes better low-light pics than all the compacts, DSLRs and phones that were trying to take shots at night of fountains and lit up buildings when I was on a trip recently.

This is simply a consequence of having OIS of course but none-the-less, it slaughters those without it, or a tripod, in such conditions that require above maybe 1/10s exposure, which I find quite often occurs, more if you realise you *can* now just snap the picture of that lit-up building and have it look better than the actual eyesight view - extraordinary, anyone with a Nokia 92x will tell you.

Re: Only one problem

All the same, it was interesting to watch a (BBC gadget thing) review where they used both phones. Pathetic review, stupid even, but it did show the Sony camera app crashing - not very comforting at all.

On the four WinPhones I have/had or use, apps have crashed (duh!) but never the camera app.

Not to mention the ridiculously cool Nokia Pro Camera app.

As for quality, carrying around a massive lens in order to produce 'good' pictures means you may as well have a dedicated Super-compact with you - the battery will last longer ensuring the camera is always available.

But, that's the whole point isn't it?, the best camera is the one you have with you. I don't believe for a minute that the Sony users will have the lens with them, all the time, paired and talking (over WiFi) all the time ready for shooting, woe betide their battery if they try. The Nokia has a massive clip-on battery/phone grip making it even easier to ensure you have a working unit at any given time.

The Nokia is patently a better smartphone camera solution and IMHO a vastly better phone. At least I come from the standpoint of having used iPhones, Androids, Maemo/Meego (I had an N900 and an N9), S40 and S60.

Since they are also tougher and better looking the choice ain't hard.

I think the increasing market share (11%? or so in only 2 years, closer to 1 year really) in the UK and various other obviously discerning countries suggests others agree with me, at least on the OS.

Kudos, however, for Sony water-proofiness, although I think it is done in the scary, block-up-the-holes-and-hope method. I would much prefer the soak-everything-in-hydrophobic-super-iridium-stuff method, far less scary - next gen or two I guess. Still, would like that in my phone too.

iPhone 5S: Apple, you're BORING us to DEATH (And you too, Samsung)

Re: From the X Labs

hmm...

1. Nokia make good enough hardware, their designs are beautiful and often interesting, as least subjectively to me.

2. WP is updated very well, from MS and from Nokia. A pretty consistent system I think. For an IOS user, the system is similar for apps and is considerably less fragmented than Android. There are almost no apps that will not run on a WP8 phone and these are not presented in any case.

3. Xbox music is very good apparently, even ha a new-fangled radio station thingy now. Personally, I buy almost nothing as I own a lot of music from when one had to and Nokia supply free music online from a ridiculous number of personalised radio stations in any case. Since they also allow you to download the music for offline use, I haven't worked out the purpose of purchase yet.

4. Not an expert on this, I use a computer with folders (called directories by some) and dropped all the music I wanted onto the phone via the file system. My phone presents this to me as Songs, Artists, Genre and some other categorisations such as favourites and a Playlist concept - none of which I use because I select play all with shuffle since I just skip one if it is not quite right at that moment.

There is a way to listen to small sections of songs and then buy that music on the phone. I don't know where it goes but I presume it happily is mingled into the music one has (note to self, must buy a track and see what happens). I presume, like apps, the knowledge that you own it is kept in the cloud so that it is never lost.

Your iPhone 5, like the few previous models, uses an elegant metal case in order to be lighter and slimmer.

However, since it is a cellphone (there is a clue is in the name), it requires a full-duplex radio to work.

Since Mr Ive is not a RF engineer and is far, far more important in Apple than the RF engineers, their no-doubt-continuous whining about the impact the case would have on reception was ignored.

Hence Antenna-gate and the ongoing crapness of iPhone reception. even Jon Stewart, a no tech knowledge whatsoever American TV show host wondered aloud "Why don't phones work as phones?". he has an iPhone obviously as a rather large proportion of our cousins across the pond do apparently - no judgement.

OTOH, Nokia, that company that failed because the phones were not pretty enough until too late, made RF systems that worked (and still work) beautifully.

Their cases are almost all made of monoblock polycarbonate, RF transparent and tough as hell. But, not as pretty (perhaps, I like them and it does allow more colours etc.).

When Nokia decided to introduce the (very nice looking indeed) 925, I was distinctly worried by the all-metal-case aspect of he design. Silly me, Nokia's RF engineers incorporated the metal shell into the antenna design and improved the reception if anything.

This is all a result of R&D spending, while often wasted (I saw some of it), it produces staggering things like a 41MP camera unit with OIS in a stupidly small 10MM package and makes a Xenon flash work in a slimmer phone but defies physics (or something).

And yes, without even checking, I know the 1020 will make phone calls well. I also know that when I tell people I am in a train station or noisy pub, they will say "I can't hear anything else" because the noise cancelling hardware (and software perhaps) is also brilliant.

Then I can take a picture of the pub (or train station) without a flash using that OIS to prove I am where I say I am, phew!

Apple’s iOS 64-bit iUpgrade: Don't expect a 2x performance leap

You obviously never recompiled 32-bit code to 64-bit. Sloppy coding is rife, the "Make it work, then make it good" mantra is valid, have used it myself, but time constraints of business ("fix the bugs first") then cause one to not have the "make it good" stage resulting in bloated code with repeated sections doing the same thing or very slightly differently.

The code size will increase a lot and all those silly loops using 'int' even though they only loop 0 - 100 say, will slow down and take up more space (native code is Objective C I believe so 'int' seems likely).

Yeah, 170,000 apps should not cause any trouble

Given that WP8 can run in 512MB reasonably, and perfectly in 1GB - the merest perturbation on rare occasions, presumably while some swap takes place - I hardly see the need for the so-called step up.

The Lumia 1020 has 2GB but I suspect that is because of the requirement for processing, using a separate GPU, of the giant images down to 7MP. I imagine there will be extra for normal use (all of it presumably when not taking pictures). The upshot is that maybe, instead of 6 apps resting/tombstoned/background, it may be 10 or more. Personally, I don't want to flick through too many because just restarting the app is often easier.

Given the (very) well documented issues with 64-bit code, I think that it would be a hard-sell to consumers to just say "It's got 64 instead of 32, gotta be better", hmmm, sounds like an advert that just could work now.

I doubt it will be a visible improvement, hilarious if it is indeed slower for 3rd party apps - which, after all, is apparently the whole point of buying IOS over WP (wot, no Instagram? - Jeez!), what with the aforementioned paucity of apps on WP8 (what? Only 10 RDP app and 30 facebook apps, Oh No!).

My guess is that the 64-OS speed improvement (I assume) will mitigate and leave the result of no difference, iPhones work well in terms of fluid operation AFAIK so is improvement actually needed? it's not like they put more pixels on the screen or the camera sensor to draw/read is it?

'Silent' staff stood by as £100m BBC IT project tanked – DG

Interviewed for this project more than once

Each time as a contractor, each time for something slightly different, each time an awful interview, non-technical types asking non-technical questions about my background.

I got the feeling they wanted people of their sort, ironic really, I am basically a communist compared to most contractors - perfect for the BBC apparently - but didn't go to the right schools I suppose.

Ah well, wasn't keen on commuting to Londinium anyway.

Jolla's first Sailfish phone preorders 'fully booked'

Re: Nokia submarines

Given that 90% of the non-fanbois/fandroid (ie remotely reasonable) complaints about WinPhone is the lack of apps (or, for some reason the lack of Instagram), then I suspect that Jolla and any other ecosystem will suffer.

I switched from an N900 to WP so I could keep using Nokia because the hardware and call quality was much more important to me than slavishly using a particular OS. The N900 had/has severe call limitations (caused by Linux/dbus ultimately) despite being an amazing phone is many other respects.

Like IE/Chrome and (probably) Safari, browsers do what almost everyone needs. Most phone OS's do everything almost everyone needs if they have a reasonable app store.

However, just using a Nokia 925 or 920 with a the Nokia Pro Camera App tells you all you need to know about how superior Nokia is in the camera department - not to mention the incredible 1020. This app will not be available on a Jolla phone, you will get a passable snapper at best. Having seen the useless pictures an iPhone 4 produces recently, I am staggered people can stand to have one - I would be so embarrassed to show the pics to people.

Since I have also noticed how superior the actual phone call performance is compared to an S2 of an acquaintance as well as the very noticeable robustness and better looks (at least to me), Nokia is where I start, features/capabilities first - OS comes second.

Having said that, WP is brilliant, the Nokia additions are superb and the OS is fluid, slick, stable, battery sipping and completely up-to-par for me, the need to have a bash prompt and X-server is just not high enough for me to use the N900.

And, when I travel abroad next week, I will have full mapping and driving directions, almost exactly like at home but without the need for online data access - how anyone can stand to have a phone that basically doesn't have maps anywhere but in their home region amazes me, not to mention the continuous waiting for the damn things to load up and de-pixelate whenever the signal is a bit dodgy, pathetic.

Re: Antti Saarnio

Almost all Finnish names bring a smile to ones face, as my facebooky feedy thing reminds me. Working there (yes, for Nokia, on Meego - with a beautiful N9 for a, sadly, very short time), I was constantly amused by the names.

Fine people, most survived the purge and prospered, joining outfits like the Jolla one (or Suunto, Salomon, Fiskars, Rovio (Angry Birds), accenture and Tata) . Don't feel worried for them, they live in one the of the best countries in the world for education as well as many other good-life metrics.

YouTube Wars: Microsoft cries foul as Windows Phone app pulled again

Re: Why do they need a Youtube app?

Indeed, exactly the same happens on WinPhone. I have a YT app (metrotube) - don't know if it is HTML5, it is very slick, plays the videos in portrait in the 'web' page or full screen as required - the only one I have seen to do so. It also allows video downloading.

Since it also uses WP's swiping to excellent effect, I use it when I specifically want to see a video - mostly movie trailers, HISHE and CollegeHumor.

'Hand of Thief' banking Trojan reaches for Linux – for only $2K

Re: At last, Linux is being treated as a mainstream OS.

Why? Does that happen to anyone whose account is deleted? or was s/he known to have been employed by someone to troll and was discovered?

Web ad giant (Google) pops Adwords into Maps for iOS and Android

Google maps cost money

Simply because they are almost always used when not in wireless coverage. Hardly anyone downloads al the maps they will need in advance - never even seen someone do it.

The upshot is therefor that data plans are bigger than they would otherwise need to be, "unlimited is recommended"

Since I see the difference between 21 pounds month for a free phone and reasonable data (500MB say) and all-you-can-eat or similar at 27, 30 or whatever pounds per month and I know that it isn't web pages that make the extra required, it is such things as maps, which gobble insane amounts of data (and slow everything up).

Obviously, they are also crap abroad (how does anyone STAND being without maps when abroad - just when they are most needed?).

So, unless you are a big mobile Netflix/youtube user that needs huge data allowance anyway, you are paying for your free mapping.

The hilarious thing is, I can also use Google maps if I want, usually only the street view, when absolutely required of course - extremely data intensive that it is.

Re: Adverts on maps?

Just like Nokia ones, which also tell you where you are, allow searching, routing etc., even on foot. They even have maps for indoors like airports and shopping centres, very handy and totally better than a paper map.

Dead trees are a backup for when the phone is severely compromised and there is a real risk, like when hiking - when OS maps can literally be a life-saver. And yes, I also use OS maps on my phone, pre-loading or getting some coverage in the hills is usually fine and the location/direction is great in low vis.

Lost phone? Google's got an app for that, coming this month

I wish my phone did that, oh wait...

It has from the first Lumia, also present on my latest Lumia. It only allows location, ringing, locking, backup, wiping and regular automatic location updates (just in case you will use find my phone later - and no, I don't give a shit if the NSA knows where I am). It even posts a location when the power is low in case the battery dies and you still want to find your phone. It is also free and baked-in. Still, it would be better to have it on a phone that requires constant protection from attack, allows easy override when it is stolen and will probably break at the first drop. I guess I am stuck with my bad-ass camera and tough phone with better call quality, sigh.

Fanbois smash iPhone 5s much sooner than iPhone 3s ... but WHY?

Re: Nokia!

Watch the phone buzz video of a Nokia 920 being used to hammer in a nail with the centre of the Gorilla glass screen and you will change your mind. Not all Gorilla glass phones are the same - the curvature on the Nokia is very high at the edges which adds significant strength. He also drops it, drives over it, throws it in the air 25 feet and hits it with a piece of 2x4 like a baseball - a long way too - the glass is still unbroken (the phone stopped responding for some reason at the baseball stage).

Not quite like the guy at work who put his new S3 in a new case, which it promptly fell out of onto a floor in his house and cracked the (Gorilla glass) screen in several places. Still, as a Samsung owner, simply said, "yay, the phone still works - these Samsungs are great, just needs a new glass". People really do fall for the hype.

Verizon offers Motorola mobe with 48-HOUR battery life

I charge my phone every day like most smartphone owners, the only difference is that it often has 50 or 60 pc battery remaining and says "1 day xx hours usage remaining...". I never disable Bluetooth, I use it for music and car use far too often to even have a shortcut. Still, it has no effect that I can discover on battery life. I never turn off the WiFi, far too useful to come home or arrive where I use a known WiFi and have it on immediately. Luckily, it also has minimal effect on battery life - might even help since downloads and browsing is noticeably faster. I *did* disable the "Look for WiFi networks all the time and connect if we know the password in our NSA database" option, definitely helps with battery life but more importantly doesn't keep saying "Hey, there is a WiFi network around here you could use!".

I use 3G not 4G or 2G (which would save battery for sure). My battery is 2000mAH, which is not tiny for sure. My view is that the reason it lasts well is that Windows Phone is efficient and tombstones apps unless explicity allowed to run. It also schedules updates/widget/tile type things at the same time and not too often. And since I can wirelessly charge my phone while I am in the shower and get a boost, I often go out in the evening with 70 or 80 pc battery without fiddling with cables - just wish I could justify more charging pads.

So, an Android that could possibly get 2 days, whohoo, big deal - buy a Nokia 720 and get 3 days normal usage as standard instead.

Nokia wrings Lumia bling fling, but feature-mobes ding stings

Re: My left testicle...

Watch the phone buff video where a guy hammers a nail into wood using the centre of a Nokia 920 screen, followed by throwing 20 feet into the air onto tarmac and then hitting it like a baseball (with the same piece if 2x4 I think). Obviously, there is an iPhone video along similar lines, no baseball bat though, no nail either - the screen is already broken (albeit functional) following the standard drop test.

And, having seen a work colleague have to replace his S3 screen because it broke falling off a table onto carpet and the countless iPhones I see in the wild with busted screens I would sooner have a Nokia any day. And I am more than happy with WP8, had Maemo, very cool phone, awesome capability but nowhere near as slick and nothing like the battery life I see of 2 days. Android seems serviceable, albeit like the wild west with a million differing versions/forks/ports and whatnots. No other standard phone even comes close to the 920 as far as durability, not to mention the camera, soon to be bettered by...hmmm, another Nokia!

Can't wait!

Pure boffinry: We peek inside Nokia's miracle cameraphone

Re: It is a marvel of modern technology...

Don't buy it then - some of us love a start screen that does something useful and doesn't drain the battery.

Re: Details forthe devil

As someone with a 920 that talks to a Samsung S2 regularly, I can assure you the sound quality of Nokias is far superior - I have had to give the person a old Nokia that I can call for the longer calls. It might be the so-called noise-cancelling on Jelly Bean - which apparently can only be disabled once the call is connected - but it sounds like Darth Vader most of the time. Noise cancellation works beautifully on my WP, people don't even realise I am leaving a noisy cinema or bar or on the train.

And, the camera, well, happy to have the best low-light, stabilised camera on any current phone be superseded by an even more amazing camera - obviously from Nokia too. Apple could never innovate something like it - or the audio system, all there hardware is mediocre, behind-the-times, perfect for the US/uninformed market basically.

Samsung takes mobile net traffic crown from Apple

What's more, when I drag a tab away from a chrome window, I get a little copy and have to guess how to place it, IE shows the full window and places better. I also found it easy to make the search/address box very small and share it with the tabs space so I get more real estate without using F11, Could not do it on Chrome so it is not intuitive (or even possible for all I know).

All this IE bashing is pathetic, my IE10 on my Nokia 920 beat a Note II in the sunspider benchmark, much to the annoyance of the owner who ran it several more times and used different browsers desperately trying to beat it. It may have been a close run thing but they just couldn't accept it ("But mine is the best!, it's a Samsung, I've got more Ghz and more RAM, mine is bigger").

That Microsoft-Nokia merger you've been predicting? It's no go

Re: Microsoft was said to be leery of Nokia's weak position in the smartphone market

There are plenty of companies 'competing' with Samsung in Android, they even produce better 'phones IMO (HTC One X for instance, Experia perhaps). However, Samsung are absolutely slaughtering them in the market, they have a enormous budget to push their products and a massive world-wide presence.

Nokia would be an also-ran in Android, even though I would buy Nokia because it would be a better 'phone with a better camera and better design and, most importantly, maps that work everywhere without a data connection. Unfortunately, the most 'phones are sold by the largest advertisers using the biggest posters etc. otherwise, why would people accept arriving in Paris and finding they have barely any way to see where they are, where to go or how to get there? all of which work on a Nokia almost as if you were in your home network. I have also actually made 'phone calls to Samsung devices; the call quality is shocking, truly awful; the noise-cancellation software is garbage and has to be turned off on a call-by-call basis (Jelly bean on an S2 in my case).

Luckily, I love WP, I love the battery lasting all day and into the night easily, I love the slick interface. I love it being non-app centred, swipe-based, concentrating on relating disparate information like interaction with people by whatever mechanism all in one place. If I liked instagram, I could use one of the many, many, apps that produce pictures to post on Facebook that look like that were taken with a crappy old 'phone. The predictive text input is the best I have seen.

I have used all the others, except BB10, which looks good from this distance and would get my attention in the unlikely event WP disappeared (rather than just getting better all the time). My iOS experience is limited (and includes iPads) but I would avoid them solely on the basis of the price let alone poor phone calls, old fashioned app-centric interface coupled with a UI that even Apple are discarding to make it more like WP.

Nokia tries its luck with a sub-£150 Win Phone 8: The Lumia 620

Re: One question

The 7.8 update adds that, at least on Nokia's.