Category: General
Many of you were knocked offline in the large O2 failure which began on Wednesday. The problem wasn’t confined to any particular region and many were left without data, calls or text for almost 24 hours. Many have mentioned a failure with a “core part” of the network, …
Well most people will be waking up this morning to the news that Ebuyer and Google either are, or will shortly be dispatching Google’s new Flagship Nexus device, the Nexus 7 tablet, running Jelly Bean 4.1 OS. Let’s just run through the key specs of Google’s newest device: …
Fresh today from Rovio Mobile comes a brand new game, Amazing Alex. This whiz kid has a boundless imagination and a houseful of fun toys that can turn anything into an adventure! From cleaning up his room to battling cardboard robots in his backyard, Alex creates amazing chain …
Norton by Symantec have drawn our attention to the fact that they have identified a new malware posted to the official Google Play market. Masquerading as two popular games titles, Super Mario Bros and GTA 3 Moscow City, they were posted to Google Play on June 24 and since then have …
On O2? Got a network problem? You’re not the only one. Mo Bhayat emailed us this afternoon to tell us that he’d lost his connection on his O2 phone. We checked the O2 Status Page but got …err… this… ..looks like there’s a bit of an issue. Mo …
The Carphone Warehouse Summer Sale started today and it looks rather good – much better than the O2 “secret” sale earlier this week! Highlights of the sale include the HTC Desire C for £99, the Motorola XOOM 2 Media Edition from £199 and various contract deals (Galaxy S3 …
Take an Android phone or tablet with a powerful Tegra 3 CPU, 1GB of RAM and a HDMI outout. Now, take out the expensive high-resolution capacitive screen, the camera, the Bluetooth, GSM radio kit and battery. You’re left with something which costs a lot less to build. Put …
Something strange seems to have happened in our house recently. My wife has the HTC Desire S. She loves it, and she’s broken it more times than I can remember (insurance is a must). A few months ago she came to the end of her contract, but she’s …
Another ultra-cheap Android device is about to hit the market, this time from ZTE. The ZTE Kis will sell for less than £50 on Virgin Media from today and has a 3.5″ HVGA 480×320 screen. Powered by an 800MHz CPU, the phone runs Android 2.3 and has Bluetooth …
Yes folks, now you can Hangout with your friends and catch up on your streams on the iPad. Google have released an update for the iOS Google+ app which is now optimised for the popular Apple tablet and it includes Retina Support. With Full iPad support, you can …
Earlier in the week I received a mobile phone to review. This isn’t unusual, but what I found on it was. There was a definite “pre-owned” feel to it. No, it wasn’t scratched. It wasn’t damaged in any way. Instead it had stacks of data on it. Someone …
Motorola announced today a new budget Android device coming in the next few weeks, they say that the device will be available by the end of July on T-Mobile, here in the UK at a very respectful £99.99. Are you looking for your first Android device and have …
Not a day goes by without any of us using the internet, somewhere along the line this has to be paid for. Whether you are paying your isp for the internet at home or whether you pay your mobile provider for internet, or even heaven forbid you pay …
Now many of you out there may have heard of Nokia and their much heralded N9. The N9 was the first, and only, smartphone to run Meego; a pleasant little OS which was widely described as a ‘breath of fresh air’ when it was shown off last year. …
In what could be seen as a surprise move the ban on the sales of Google’s flagship Galaxy Nexus handset has been overturned by the appeals court. No reason has been given for the overturning however Apple have until Thursday to appeal. The full trial is due to …
I’ve been on the lookout for a case for my iPad 2 that looked good, didn’t add too much bulk or weight and would stop the back from getting scratched when I put it down on my wooden table. I’ve been using the Gear4 IceBox Edge for the …
A couple of weeks ago we reported on a possible case of an exploding Samsung Galaxy SIII. It had been claimed by a user in Ireland that his S3 exploded whilst on his in-car charger. Appearing on Samsung’s global blog are details of how they contracted an independent investigator (Fire …
Whilst many smartphones now come with in-ear headphones and on-board technology to make your tunes sound better, there’s still a certain amount of disappointment when you use the external speaker on your phone for playing music. Sound quality is also a bit pants when using the external speaker …
Okay, it’s not cool, it’s not smart, but the Doro PhoneEasy 610 is a phone at least! A phone which deserves a mention because of what it achieves by not being cool or smart. Why am I reviewing a feature phone? Despite his age, my elderly father has …
Reports coming from Bloomberg indicate that Amazon could be about to enter the mobile handset market and are said to be in the process of acquiring patents to protect themselves from possible litigation. The Chinese mobile manufacturer Foxconn is reported to be working with Amazon on the device. There is …
Overnight we’ve implemented some speed enhancements and back-end processing to the site which should greatly improve page rendering speed. If you do notice any weirdness, please let me know via the contact form, especially if you notice pages jumping from the mobile version of the site to the …
One feature that has been available on Google Maps in the US for a while is “Maps Indoors”. This feature gives the user an indoor floor plan of certain locations. The good news is that this is now available for selected locations here in the UK, no update …
If you’re a regular reader, and not one of those naughty people who just pop by without even offering a cup of tea, you’ll know about the WiFi rollout across the Tube in London. As we reported previously, they’ve worked to push out the service these last few …
Madfinger the developer behind great games Samurai Vengeance and Shadowgun have released their latest which is a zombie shooting type game. There is a brief back story to it, but I quickly jumped past that and started shooting zombies. As with all of Madfinger games they are Tegra …
In recent years we’ve seen a shift in the way that mobile devices are used in the workplace. Previously you may have had a Blackberry or Microsoft Pocket PC dropped on your desk. Things were locked down, secure and managed. Now, with the advent of “Bring Your Own …
Do you find that you get bored during your commute, in the evenings or those wet weekends waiting for the new week to start. Hazard Creation have come up with a neat little game that can kill a few hours here and there. The app is simple. My …
Boot2Gecko has been one of Mozilla’s top priorities lately as they rush to get their HTML5 based OS off the ground and into the turbulent mobile world as soon as possible. So far Mozilla has done a good job getting companies on board, they’ve already got; Deutsche Telekom, …
Lawsuits, appeals, injunctions, import bans. Today Apple have won a ban on the Galaxy Nexus in the USA and it now looks like Google will be supporting Samsung to get it overturned. Meanwhile, the new Google Nexus Tablet is apparently infringing patents held by Nokia. The patent scraps …
Hey, you lovely reader. Have you had a listen to our Podcast ? If not, it’s definitely worth listening too. Each week our team get together to discuss the weekly happenings. Right now we’re on episode 3 but you can get all of the podcasts here and there’s …
Sure, we’ve never heard of “TechPro” either, but £12.99 for a Class 10 microSD card? That’s gotta be worth a gamble, right? Link – Amazon
So you fancy a bit of jelly bean action, eh? Funny how that sentance would have got you sectioned last week.. Anyhow the lovely people at Expansys have the “flagship” Google phone, the Galaxy Nexus at a rather impressive £319-99 with free shipping. Jelly bean will be officially …
Google has given the security of its Face Unlock feature a bit of careful consideration in the upcoming Android 4.1 Jelly Bean release of Android. The feature was introduced with the dawn of ICS as a way to unlock your phone through face recognition, but shortly after it’s …
Now, don’t mis-read that headline. There’s more than three people with the ICS / Android 4.0 update, we’re talking about the mobile network “Three”. They’ve announced that their Xperia S customers can.. err.. “proactively download the Android Ice Cream Sandwich update”. What this basically means is that you …
5000 jobs are set to be axed by Blackberry maker RIM as the company announced a $518m (£334m) net loss in the three months to June 2nd. This, when compared to the $695m profit made in the same period last year, shows how the tide has turned. Sales …
For those of you who have a HP Touchpad, the Open webOS project came one step closer to fruition this week. The Open webOS team have released a package for the Touchpad that allows users to “learn how the TouchPad works, modify your TouchPad experience and then apply …
Well that didn’t take long. Although Android 4.1 will officially be coming in July as an OTA update for existing devices, those wizards over at XDA already have the stock version released yesterday at Google IO available to download and flash to your device. If you know how …
There have been some strange motorsport sponsorship deals over the years. Who’d have thought the clothing company Benetton would have a team, for example, and if I told you ten years ago that a soft drinks manufacturer would have a championship winning team, you’d have looked at me …
Let’s be honest. Look at your phone. Did you get a good deal? Many people choose their phone based on a monthly budget, and want the phone for nothing up-front. For many it’s typical to pay around £36 a month for two years, but you can find yourself …
As regulars visitors will know we here at Coolsmartphone are supporters of 4G Britain, Everything Everywhere’s campaign to increase awareness of the consumer and business benefits that faster, more reliable fourth generation mobile services will bring to the UK. A very good example of these benefits can be see …
If you are involved in the development of apps or games then we want to hear from you. Regardless of platform, be it Android, Blackberry, iOS, Symbian or Windows Phone. We’d like you the developers to come to our forums and post details about your products. We can …
