The Smartphone Thread

[Joshison 1]

Got an extended battery for Xmas on my Bionic, has almost doubled its life. A lot could be due to the new update .901 too.

[JR Boucicaut 3802]

RIM drops Balsillie and Lazaridis and promote COO

http://www.theverge.com/2012/1/22/2726445/rim-jim-balsillie-and-mike-lazaridis-to-step-down-coo-thorsten-heins

[Joshison 1]

RIM needs some innovation.

[ktang 34]

I think RIM also needs more agile development, production and manufacturing.

This is an interesting article about why Apple went overseas with production and manufacturing - see the part about the middle-of-the-night production change in the factory.

http://www.nytimes.com/2012/01/22/business/apple-america-and-a-squeezed-middle-class.html?_r=1&pagewanted=all%3Fsrc%3Dtp&smid=fb-share

[JR Boucicaut 3802]

Nothing to see at RIM...Heins was a COO - in charge of product dev. If there were to be any change, he could've done it.

Their ship has sailed. iOS and Android have bridged the gap between consumer and business devices.

[shafted 6]

anyone here got the Samsung Galaxy Note? seen a few people using and looks cool, but afraid it could be too big to carry around in the pocket? How is the battery life on this thing?

[Joshison 1]

Haven't seen it in person, looks fairly big though. http://www.engadget.com/2012/01/30/samsung-galaxy-note-att/#continued

[camhockey16 5]

samsung is usually a pretty safe bet - personally i'm waiting for the samsung galaxy SIII though

[RiSeOnFiRe 0]

I just used my Galaxy Nexus (and Google Wallet) to buy some stuff at 7-11. The guy at the counter was so freaked out haha. It was great.

[dangle 0]

I just used my Galaxy Nexus (and Google Wallet) to buy some stuff at 7-11. The guy at the counter was so freaked out haha. It was great.

My mind is blown.... What is this you speak of?

Going to have to google this

[noodle3872 40]

The Nexus is awesome with Android 4.0. My buddy has one and I've played with it for hours. I'm up to renew in June and I hope the Galaxy S II X with 4.0 as standard OS is out by then. I'd go with the Nexus but I need the expandable memory of the Galaxy.

[goaliemanshark 6]

My mind is blown.... What is this you speak of?

Going to have to google this

Google google wallet... By google. Hah!

[RiSeOnFiRe 0]

My mind is blown.... What is this you speak of?

Going to have to google this

Some credit cards have this tech. where u can just tap the card on the special pad instead of swiping. The card has a NFC chip (near-field-communication). Well the Galaxy Nexus has that same chip. You can use it to make transactions (only Master-card supported at the moment, but you can simply link whatever card to a virtual pre-paid card in the Google Wallet App and transfer money to that.

If someone else has a GNex, you can also use it to quickly transfer whatever your doing on your phone to theirs. Just put the phones back to back, and if you're playing a sick game they want, a button will pop up on your phone that says 'Beam', once clicked the other persons phone will go to the market screen with that app, or a web-page you were looking at, or a youtube video... whatever. It really is a great feature and will become a lot more practical as more phones get it, and more stores offer the tap-to-pay service.

[JR Boucicaut 3802]

Beaming isn't new tech, my Treo 600 did it 6 years ago.

[wrangler 157]

As did Palm Pilots.

[JR Boucicaut 3802]

As did Palm Pilots.

Uh huh...I just didn't want to go back THAT far. :)

[wrangler 157]

Ouch.

[goaliemanshark 6]

Well the Palm machines used IR. Google wallet and credit cards uses RFID (Radio Frequency Identification).

It's a cool idea, but i don't think it's going to take off. I hope it does though!

[Chadd 916]

The TI graphing calculators did the IR thing back when I was in high school. We used to send test answers back and forth with them. I'm avoiding the RFID thing as much as possible until I see how bad the privacy problems are.

[camhockey16 5]

I'm avoiding the RFID thing as much as possible until I see how bad the privacy problems are.

This

Experts have been warning of the security problems of RFID for years, but the manufacturers ignored the warnings. I know for credit cards you can buy sleeves that will block the signal - but there aren't many options for a cell phone yet. I'm sure there are thieves that have made devices that they walk around in public and can skim information from people's cards. Hope it never happens to me.

[RiSeOnFiRe 0]

Beaming isn't new tech, my Treo 600 did it 6 years ago.

haha Mission Flyweight of the tech world eh?

And as far as security goes, I would never hook up my credit card to the thing. But I would keep 20 bucks on the pre-paid one for emergencies.

[willharris7 4]

After having my iPhone for over half a year now, i figured out why I love it. Simply the App Store, I love all of the different apps that aren't available on android or windows. Now if i could get HTC sense UI and the Apple App Store on one phone, I would be so happy. (A physical QWERTY keyboard would be nice too )

[shafted 6]

looking to buy a really cheap android tablet, any recommendations? mostly will be used to play some games or watch videos.

[Chadd 916]

Be careful, some of the really cheap ones are junk. I have one of the old 1.0 tablets and it's pretty much useless. I like my Samsung android phone and would probably go with one of their tablets. First thing to do is to decide on what form factor (size) you want and then go from there.

[RadioGaGa 162]

The Browser in my Samsung Galaxy S keeps crashing. I open it and it only stays open for a few seconds...goes black and I get the "Application failure" message and a Force Close option. Anyone else experiencing problems. I haven't run any updates or looked into it deeper yet. Figured I'd start here as someone usually has an answer.