Smart Phones

[Griffin NoName]

So yesterday I went to look at Smart phones in my "providers" high st. shop and got persuaded to buy a Sony Experia Miro. I was due a phone upgrade so I thought it should have been free as they always used to be if you stayed on your "plan". But they said not. I could change plan (more expensive than current) and have the phone free or pay for the phone and stay on current plan. So I paid. But then I thought, is this just the salesman giving me a yarn. So, today, I phoned "upgrades" which is how I have upgraded my phones before....... and I ended up with still paying for the phone, still on the same price plan, but with more free minutes and data (no data before)..... apparrently according to reviews the phone has poor screen quality (low pixels) but is otherwise good, and is over hundred ££££s cheaper than similar with better screen quality. So, I will open the box and see if I find the screen quality too poor, as I now have a good deal.

I estimate I will have paid off the cost of the phone by the cheaper tarrif in 2 years so ......... it hasn't cost me anything........... errumm except I could have stayed with my current phone for free........... but one has to trick oneself. 

[Opsa]

Indeed one does. I suppose I'm going to have to trick myself when this old cell phone finally croaks.

[Sibling DavidH]

My mobile is still a stone-age job: no camera, e-mail or any such stuff.  But it was very cheap, it's pay-as-you-go, and nobody's going to steal it.

I will say, I wouldn't mind a camera; Wendy's is quite useful.

[Darlica]

Good luck with your new toy!  

Personally I prefer Samsung, I'm very happy with my Galaxy SII I bought in sept 2011. The scary thing is that it holds so many functions that I'll be lost without it...  
My mother who turned 70 this summer decided she wanted a smart phone after seeing mine and trying some functions on it. I got her a Samsung Galaxy Ace, now she's a bit like a teenager, that phone never leaves her side!   She has bombarded me with pictures and SMS messages since she got that phone, because finally she find those functions easy to use.

Lindorm has two Sony Ericsson Experia Ray phones (one private and one for work) which works fine for him.

[Griffin NoName]

I preferred ( a lot) the Samsung I saw in the shop but it did not have front facing camera which I use a lot to take pictures of myself (saves going to the photo booth every time I need a passport sized photo which keeps happening...... driver licence renew, bus pass renew, etc etc - parking badge,,,, etc etc). I don't have a seperate camera. And also withough a front facing camera you can't do video calls. So that's why I went for the Sony which has my required camera functions........... compromise. Can't afford/justify spending an extra £100 ir more to get a Samsung with the camera stuff.

I still haven't opened the box with the new phone yet. :roll:

If the screen display is really too bad, I will have to think again. But since I've never had a smart phone, I may not realise how bad it is :LoL:

All I really want the smart aspects for is my weekly online shop if my laptop breaks down

[Griffin NoName]

After looking at it for two days, I have finally opened the box with my Smart Phone and put it on charge. I have located the User Guide online (which can obviously be downloaded onto the phone, but since one wants to be looking at the phone features when using a guide this is pretty stupid) and downloaded it to my laptop, being very cross that my Kindle would not download the file format (of course I can now convert it to Kindle Speak). Thhe user guide is massive. It will take me weeks and weeks to read it all..... is there anything a Smart phone cannot do, I ask myself. This particular phone is moderated for social networking (do not ask why I chose this !) and will bleep a blue light if anything happens on FaceBreak or Twiitish, as if I want to know, will my 250MB data per month be enough? or would I need to pay for more? if I use that function. I am glad I reserved a whole day to opening the box. One day Smart phones will set themselves up etc. Like how the hell do I know which of about 25 different power saving options I need?

[Bob in a quantum-state-of-faith]

Do not forget that most providers have a 30 day change-of-mind policy, if you find out you really hate it.  Some go to 60 or 90 days-- check with yours to be sure.

Just in case.

 

[Griffin NoName]

I don't really hate it. I have spent a lot of time customising it. There are some things I am surprised Andriod does not do which my old non-smart phone can do........... but of course it can do wonderful things which my old phone can't do. I have discovered a yen for widgets. I have a nice weather one, which shows weather, temperature, clouds, sun (which turns a dull yellow after dark which I think is a pretence at being a moon), all for my exact location (as typed in - I have turned off GPS to avoid being inundated with stuff localised for me that I don't want......... although I may well use it for maps when I get lost in the car...... so will then get inundated with stuff for wherever I get lost) and it even gives next few days forecast too. I have another widget for news, from unknown provenance but topics same as BBC TV news tonight. My third and final widget for now, is one that allows me to switch off "data" so that there's no risk of being charged for data happening without me knowing, also swicthes of wi-fi (to save battery), etc etc. The beauty of these are they are a scroll and a click away from "home", so no need to go through menus. There are other widgets pre-installed in the same way which are nice........... like one that gives me a music player to play stuff from my SD card to which it defaulted without me having to set it - nice - also a scroll and a click. Similar one for My pictures. I haven't really explored apps yet. They tend to use data, so I need to be careful, though apparently one can set data options for each app. though I have not discovered how. My "touch" screen abilities are improving slightly, though I still find I have to use a stylus when I get desperate.

The deciding factor may be the web pages. I browsed to the TFM and couldn't read it, but it wasn't the mobile version. I should try that next time. I have autofit turned on but it didn't seem to do it. The screen is small, for sure. Other "m" web pages are ok, but I am not sure how one is supposed to stick to "m" pages for more than a few preset favourites. Bit of a mystery. If unable to browse comfortably it's a very expensive toy.

[Bob in a quantum-state-of-faith]

Sounds like you are having fun-- you remind me of me, when I first got my venerable G1 (one of the earliest commercial Android phones available).

As for browsing?  There is a version of Opera that fits on Android-- check the market.  Firefox too.  And, naturally, Chrome.  The default browser is based on that, but more limited in customizing (the browser, not the phone).  You might wish to play with these to see-- there are also quite a number of replacement browsers that the desktop world has never heard of, Boat being one I used for awhile, and liked well enough (such as it was--purported to be simple, and it was). 

After my last factory reset?  I decided to >only< re-install that which I actually used.  As I had a nice Titanium Backup of all the previous proggies, I didn't even need to re-download, if I didn't want.  I ended up using the basic browser, and never re-added the others.  It works more or less, well enough for my modest phone/tablet browsing.

If I really started using phone/tablet browsing again, I'd need to customize it up a bit-- mostly, changing what happens when I click on a link-- I want it to always open a new tab, never to take away the current page.  Alas, I cannot find that setting in the default browser, and know the work-around (a long-press which opens the context-dialog, and choose "open in new tab").   

I'm happy for you with your new toy-- I think you'll come to like it very much, and later, wonder how you ever got along without internet-everywhere. 

[Griffin NoName]

Sounds like you are having fun-- you remind me of me, when I first got my venerable G1 (one of the earliest commercial Android phones available).


I'm happy for you with your new toy-- I think you'll come to like it very much, and later, wonder how you ever got along without internet-everywhere.  

I am already wondering that. I have already decided to try Opera as it compresses data and uses up much less of the monthly "data" allowance. I am a bit concerned about staying within my budget. An alternative (or even additionally) would be to use Onavo - an Israeli server- which compresses data - all data from the phone provider gets routed to Onavo instead of the phone, gets compressed, then travels onwards to the phone, which means all data gets compressed not just we data. Drawbacks of Onavo, can slow stuff down, although one review said it speeds things up ?, plus they have ALL one's info/usage/data etc - tho' they swear not to use it or pass it on...... I guess some people wouldn't trust an Israeli server

I have played a bit more with the pre-installed web browser. Nothing fits on the screen - or gets autofitted - so zoom in and scroll are a necessity, except the FB and Google web pages seem to fit and are readable.

EDIT

Just checked my provider's records of my usage up to about 2 am - data = 92.465 Kb - much less than I thought - also they have actually given me 500 MB rather than 250 MB in the package.......... since I don't reckon on using the devise as kids do.... I reckon I'll be fine with that.

[Bob in a quantum-state-of-faith]

It's amazing how little data you need, if you keep the settings on "request mobile data", especially as how FLASH doesn't work (there's good and bad about that).

On the other hand, my tablet is strictly WiFi, so I have changed that setting-- it also has a 10" screen, so the desktop is still readable for the most part. 

I do find I double-tap alot (which resets & centers the web page, allegedly) to get the screen right.  And yeah, I scroll both horizontally & vertically to read stuff.   I kinda wish there was a way to inhibit all images, until they are clicked on-- I think FireFox has that, with an add-on, as I used to use that back in the day.

There are several programs & widgets which purport to monitor your data usage, and red-flag you at a set point.  I've always had unlimited via either T-Mobile (the original G1) and now with Virgin (runs on Sprint network).  Yes, after a certain amount (which seems to vary depending on some magical-mystery formula) I get throttled back to slow-speed.  But I've never hit it even once on my phone, after 2 or 3 years (I think).

[Sibling Zono (anon1mat0)]

Grif, If you are at home most of the time, just leave wifi on and that will take care of your data limits. Both my mom and my wife have only 200MB a month and they don't go over because they only use it for the GPS maps, email sync, and the occasional webpage. About the screen resolution, I somehow suspect that a higher resolution would make it harder to read (smaller pixels, smaller fonts). Up to this moment I haven't seen a smart phone with a 'too low' resolution, but reviewers may say so because the dreaded iphone used to have a slightly higher resolution screen, which would matter if you were an eagle... 

As for the mobile version of the forum, this is how the imode looks like just loaded from my phone (Samsung Galaxy Relay if you must know):


Illegible but if you pinch:


(both pictures from my old G2 )

[Griffin NoName]

Thanks Zone. Mine looks no worse as long as I don't zoom to fit the web page to screen. I'm only 300+ x 400+ pixels so the quality is not too good on ordinary web pages, but if I go to mobile pages, it's much much better and I don't think with my eyesight I'd notice anything being better. And yes I've been leaving wi-fi on. Except for a while when it was off during sleep, a setting I need to change to on during sleep, given that one has no control over apps doing data in or out behind the scenes as it were. On a side note, I am rather appalled at the "permissions" one has to agree to for apps. And I just learnt what a "side load" is - aaargh! more language.

My phone has inbuilt data usage but I might get MyDataManager which looks better and is very popular (free, googlestore). I don't think we have unlimited data any more over here. I am more than happy with my 500 MB anyway so wouldn't pay the huge price such a plan would cost. Bargaining got me a much better deal than is being offered to new customers. I learnt a long time ago it was worth bargaining with cell phone providers. When I sold my house 2 moves ago, I bargained the estate agents down from 2% to 1% of the sale price; my son was in the next room, and was listening (I didn't know); when the estate agent left my son came in really shocked and clearly saw a side of me he didn't know (he was impressed). Generally we don't do much bargaining in the UK. I once got a wandering seller in a huge Italian market in Rome to give me a necklace for nothing by bargaining him down to zero .

[Aggie]

I once got a wandering seller in a huge Italian market in Rome to give me a necklace for nothing by bargaining him down to zero .

Did you start by telling him to pay you to take it? 

[Griffin NoName]

I once got a wandering seller in a huge Italian market in Rome to give me a necklace for nothing by bargaining him down to zero .

Did you start by telling him to pay you to take it? 

No. Shame I didn't think of that.

I just kept saying "I don't want it". Eventually he was begging me to take it. Eventually I couldn't cope with his pleas any longer. It was all most odd.