Category: General
If you’re like me you probably spend more time with your phone than with any other person. My phone is my alarm clock, my personal assistant and my exercise coach all in one. But there’s a reason why most people wouldn’t consider it a friend, it looks nothing …
Want broadband at home? Mine is from EE and the fibre broadband connectivity has been OK. Sadly I can’t say the same about the home phone service, which was completely broken for well over a month. Anyhoo, now Vodafone are getting in on the action with broadband and …
Remember my Google Cardboard review? If I’m honest that headset did, eventually, fall apart. Mostly because of my bad construction. However, on a recent holiday my son went on a new type of ride which featured an Oculus Rift, as you can see above. It’s a gadget which …
Over the years we’ve seen a number of MVNO’s here in the UK attempting to give you something for nothing but, each and every time, they’ve failed. First we tried Ovivo, then we tried Samba Mobile but both went pop fairly quickly and customers were left without service. …
Huawei released their new flagship phablet last month – The Huawei Mate S. I was lucky enough to attend the launch event and got a hold of one of the devices. I have been using it over the last few weeks to see how good it was, and …
Clove has opened up their preorders on those two new fantastic Lumia devices that we saw the other day. Yes, of course, I am talking about the Lumia 950 and 950XL. Both Lumia 950 and 950 XL pre-orders are now up and available. They don’t yet have the estimated …
Smartwatches are starting to diversify. Each manufacturer is trying to carve out their niche in the market, and the Zing Smartwatch aims to provide a fashionable, modern, and fun approach to the wearable market. Let’s get Social The Zing is an activity tracker designed for the social generation. …
Have you got a Nexus 6, 5 , 7, 9, or Nexus Player? If you have, it looks like now is the time for mashing the “check for updates” button. It appears that the latest version of Android is being sent out as an OTA update to those …
Heard about the new Microsoft launches yesterday? Sure, there was a new fitness band and a few new handsets, but it’s those high-powered handsets and the tricks they can do that matter. Microsoft, on the current Windows Phone platform, has a problem. No matter how you dress it …
Seriously. Is it not Friday yet? This week isn’t dragging at all. So anyway. I got an email which is probably from the PR team at Sbizzy but it was was made to look like a “fan” of the service who just wanted to tell us about it. …
Android security is once again in the news for all the wrong reasons after the latest round of vulnerabilities have made international press. The background problem is that Android is supported on multiple platforms via a wide range of manufacturers from Samsung to HTC, and all those in-between. …
You have to question the logic behind this one. I mean, were the Vodafone executives on a country break when they decided that remote pubs should get better coverage? If you’re on Vodafone and you don’t get much signal indoors, get yourself a Sure Signal box. After hooking …
Do you have a really big house and experience coverage problems from your WiFi unit? Well, invite me round. I’ll quite happily drink your beer and then fall asleep in one of your many bedrooms. You big show-off. If you’d rather not be out of range (and have …
I can feel things slipping now. First this site covered Microsoft smartphones, then Android, Apple and perhaps a few accessories. Now we’re getting all manner of connected gadgets. This particular pitch is from an operation called Response Electronics, who want you to know about all their rather clever …
Here is something a little different. Symetium, which is a Swedish based company, are looking to crowdfund their latest smartphone to get it market. It has been designed to remove the lines between mobile and desktop devices. This is being done by delivering desktop-class performance in a form …
I’m old enough to remember a time when there weren’t a great deal of mobile phones. I also remember a time when a “smartphone” had never been heard of. What made me think of all this was when I met an old college friend. We sat down, drank …
Whilst perusing my favourite deals site earlier today, I spied this link which will take you into the land of Keith Lemon. No seriously though, head to Carphone Warehouse and you will find that they’re taking pre-orders for the Nexus 5X. Not only that, but they are cheaper …
Today Amazon started delivering their new tablet models to customers who had pre-ordered in the UK. I received my £49 Amazon Fire 7″ (2015), and this is my unboxing. Yes, you did read that correctly, it’s just £49. Specifications: quad-core processor and 1GB RAM 7″ 1024×600 display 8GB …
I’ve said this a few times before, but we really are starting to get some new and interesting things in the ‘ole Coolsmartphone inbox now. Today it’s this little magic water reminder thing (that’s my description anyway). It straps onto a water bottle and reminds you to drink …
Recently you may have noticed that our commenting system has changed somewhat. The new system allows you to add your comments much more easily than before and adds a newsfeed too. However, we’re having a number of issues with it. We’ve tried over the last few weeks to …
Yup, 4G just got cheap. OK, so you’re not going to get bleeding-edge technology throughout the whole smartphone at this price, but £50 will get you Android 5.1 (Lollipop) and a 5 megapixel rear shooter. Other specifications include a strong-facing 2 megapixel camera, quad-core CPU running at 1GHz, …
The Chocolate factory went all-in on one of their more interesting annual events. The speakers were tight, and the announcements flew by. We were expecting two Nexuses and boy did Google deliver. First up, there was the Nexus 5X. This was the second 5 inch phone made by …
It’s no secret that Blackberry’s hardware and build quality are second to none, but as of late the manufacturer has lost its “mojo” and sales continue to falter. This has been blamed on Blackberry’s own OS (Now at Blackberry OS 10.3.2), recent devices like the Blackberry Passport won …
Today China’s official certification database — TENAA, passed a previously unannounced HTC branded handset from HTC. It’s believed to be the HTC One M9e, a scaled-down model of the standard M9. M9e Specs Aluminium unibody. 5-inch Full HD display as per the M9. 2.2GHz octa-core Helio X10 processor. …
It’s well-rumoured that Microsoft have a new handset or two just over the horizon, namely the Lumia 950 and the 950 XL. It’s believed these will be shown to the world at the beginning of next month at an event in New York. Well, on Forever Nokia Latinoamérica’s Facebook, they …
As you know, this weekend people will be rushing out to get the iPhone 6s and 6s Plus. It went on sale yesterday so here is a rundown of the offers, pricing and additional value added extras available on the various UK networks. Vodafone If you decide to …
If you’re inside and don’t have much coverage, a WiFi hotspot could be your saviour. Provided you’re a Vodafone user and you’re using the correct phone, the network will soon be letting you make calls via WiFi. The system, which launches in the autumn, will be accessible on …
A minor bug-bear for us Brits can be the fact that we have to force technology to speak to us in proper English. If you use Word, you’ll need to fiddle around to switch it to “English UK” and we have to put up with devices called “Honor” …
Ofcom, the British telecoms regulator, has revealed it is about to increase the fees it draws from the UK’s network providers. Ofcom charge a rate for using the mobile airwaves, but they’re now cranking up the costs by almost a factor of three. Currently it draws £64.4m in fees …
Boosting your battery back up is a daily task. Here we have a charger from aLLreLi. It’s ideal for travellers as there’s a stack of slot-in interchangeable plugs in the box. Here in the UK I’m obviously using the UK adapter, but you get the EU plug, Australian …
Traditionally most of us have the expectation that watches are a certain shape – circular. For a while, smartwatches struggled to accommodate this traditional shape until relatively recently when a few Android Wear devices with round faces started to make an appearance. Pebble was an early entry into the …
Put this one squarely into the ‘First World Issues’ box. Just picture the scene: you’re on the way to work or on your lunch break, you don’t have long to get back to the office but you absolutely, desperately, madly need a skinny mocha choca latte frappe with …
Remember FreedomPop? After other networks tried and failed to offer completely free mobile plans, FreedomPop said in May that they’d be heading to the UK to offer free and paid-for SIM-only tariffs. However, with a launch date of “summer” we were getting more than a little worried when …
Locking your house is something you still do with a key. However, when you’re locking your car you’ll probably zap it with a clever fob. Why, then, don’t we have something similar for our homes? Yale, those people who’ve been making locks and keys for quite some time, …
Garmin really don’t you to just go out and buy one of those GoPro cameras. They know a lot of people will, so they’re trying everything to get you to .. errmm.. not. Their new Garmin VIRB XE has something extra. It’s called “G-Metrix”, which adds information into …
Last years Nexus 6 was the first Nexus handset to have a maximum storage capacity of 64 GB. Before that, the maximum storage space that Google offered in a Nexus device was a measly 32 GB. As apps grow in size, (I remember when I though that 12 …
The ability to remotely control the various gadgets in your home is becoming commonplace. From controlling your DVR from the other side of the world, to perhaps setting your heating to automatically come on when you leave work – there doesn’t seem to be much you can’t control from your smartphone. The …
It looks like the wait is over. Google have sent out invites for their ‘Google Event’ on September 29th, at 9 a.m. PT (Pacific Time – that’s 5 p.m for us folks in Blighty and CSP Towers). We are expected to finally get a good look at the …
Some of the items we get to review area quite complicated. They need research and a fairly wordy write-up. This, on the other hand, not so much. The Suaoki car charger is everything you’d expect it to be out of the box. It’s portable, easy to use and …
4 port USB wall charger. My night time ritual goes something like this.. Put the cat out Lock the doors Make sure all the windows are closed Walk around the house looking like Mr T from the A-Team with a multitude of charger leads and plugs round my …
