Category: Reviews

One of my other hobbies, apart from writing for this fantastic site, is flying drones. These are also known as unmanned aerial vehicles or UAV’s. My current setup is able to hold a GoPro camera on a 3 axis gimbal which gives excellent super smooth clear footage. The drone …

Your phone will no doubt have all your tunes on it, but when you get in your car there’s just a few methods of getting those tunes pumping out of the powerful speakers in your car. First, you could perhaps use one of those FM transmitters. They’re usually …

The time has come to put Sony’s finest under a microscope and to see what you are getting when you plonk down £610* on the counter. We know that the camera is meant to be the best thing since they made the camera obscura back in the early …

I’m terrible with the whole car mount / phone holder situation. I get to my car, open the door, then throw my wallet and phone onto the passenger seat. If the phone is lucky, it’ll be plugged in and will perhaps reach the destination without sliding off the …

Meizu is a brand not particularly well known here in the UK. Leigh recently reviewed the Meizu M1 Note, and I have been using a Meizu M2 Note for a few months now. This is my review of the Meizu M2 Note, a device purchased from Shenzhen Chigon …

Monitoring a phone might sound like a slightly strange idea, especially when people talk of “spy software”. However, there’s perfectly legitimate reasons for doing it, such as keeping an eye on your kids. XNSPY, which is available for both Android and iPhone, will let you know where your …

Here is a game very close to my heart, as it combines smartphones and tablets with heavy metal! TeamRock are usually known for the Internet radio station and collection of music magazines from Metal Hammer, Classic Rock to Prog, covering every genre of rock music. Now they have …

  The Boomtube speaker is definitely larger than the majority of units we get here at Coolsmartphone, although it does pack a 4″ subwoofer and looks like a proper piece of camping equipment. Inside there’s actually a few speakers, including a “horn” which kicks out 2W and the …

Some times a little bit of style goes along way in the consumer tech industry, and the new Executive Power Bank from Kit certainly has plenty of style but does it have the substance to go with it?   Styled to look like an iDevice, the Power Bank …

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MtSGcPZLSA4 Dan Counsell is the man who brought us Realmac Software, an amazing software company out of England that currently makes RapidWeaver, Clear, and Typed.com. This time around he decided to create a personal project: a game available for iOS, Mac, and Apple TV. I took the iPhone version …

A bit of history first, and perhaps a personal viewpoint from myself. Back in 2002 I handled my first HTC smartphone. It was branded up as an Orange SPV and it kick-started this entire website. HTC had a meteoric rise in the years following, releasing phones under their …

Filofax is a well-known brand name associated with traditional paper-based diaries and personal organisers. Filofax products were always high-quality but there may be a natural assumption that their target audience shrank due to electronic portable replacements. But in order to remain relevant, Filofax have diversified into tech cases. …

You’ve really got to mention the price in the introductory paragraph for this particular device. For just £50 on Vodafone Pay As You Go it’s insanely cheap. Some of you probably pay more than that per month on a contract. This is the Vodafone Smart speed 6, a …

Good Points: Well made and lightweight. Ability to transfer data and charge devices. Solves the issue of of small number of USB inputs in your laptop. Plug and play no drivers needed. Bad Points: Not a powered hub. Short cable to plug into computer. Design: Made out of high …

That time of year has come. It’s the time that all geeks look forward to every year. It is, of course, upgrade time. Those of you who are frequent readers will no doubt be aware that I am currently using the Xperia Z3 as my daily driver. Although I …

Hmm.. The Honor 7. I’m sure someone told me this was a “mid-range” handset. It was almost as if they didn’t want me to get to excited about it. Let’s have a look at the specs first then.. Screen – 5.2″ 1080×1920 (424 ppi) CPU – HiSilicon Kirin …

Following a quick demo from the team at Vodafone on their new Call+ features, I thought it would be useful to do a short write up before a full review in the coming weeks (should the loaner phone arrive soon). If you aren’t familiar with Call+, it’s a …

Let’s just get this right out in the open from the off… I’m not a runner… so having been sent through the Inateck sweat-proof running waist pack belt with expanding pockets, I thought this wasn’t the product for me, but I found it was. It certainly didn’t turn me in …

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 …

Cases are ten a penny these days so it takes something special to make them stand out. First impressions count, even if we’re always told not to judge a book by its cover! The STM Dux case for the first generation iPad Air is marketed on the basis …

We have a couple more devices for turning what was once a cigarette lighter into a rather nicer USB charging point. The cigarette lighter, which you may see now called a power point in your car, can be used to charge your portable device. However, with lots of …

I’ve had the opportunity to test several KitSound devices over the past year and generally I’ve always come away with a positive impression. I listen to a lot of music and a good pair of headphones is important to me, so how will the KitSound Manhattan headphones compare …

There’s a raft of 7″ tablets out there. Just have a look down your local supermarket and you’ll see a stack of them. Here we’ve got the Acer Icon is One 7. Around back, a very grippy rear panel which has a rather funky pattern on it. The …

Bluetooth headsets. There’s lots of them out there and you’ll usually notice that they’re usually bulkier than normal headsets, especially around the ears. A lot also have a cable attaching the two. Here, the D900 headsets from Syllable arrive in a rather clever box which doubles as a …

Well isn’t this a beautiful looking thing? Everytime I show this to somebody there is an audible “wow”. You could perhaps put the slowest, cheapest CPU and memory in here and people would still be amazed by looks alone. I have the gold version here from giffgaff and, …

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 …

James reviewed the handset in May but I wanted to add my own throughts because, at the end of the day, this is a phone which costs less than £350 SIM free. You can get it for less than that on Amazon and you can pay buttons per …

With the public release of iOS 9, everyone is eager to take advantage of the new features it has to offer: News, Proactivity, Search. But as the press picked up on during the summer, iOS 9 has also allowed for the creation of content blocker apps. These work …

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 …

Running out of power on our expensive smartphones is something that we have sadly grown to expect. Battery packs and mobile charges do help this situation, but you have to remember to keep charging THEM too. This is a very different sort of battery pack. It’ll will charge …

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 …

I always tend to start these articles by saying, “we get a lot of Bluetooth speakers”. We do. We really do. This one is a bit different, because it’s got some additional talents. It’s also a rather nice LED light. The people behind this tell me that – …

Technology doesn’t have to be be dull, in fact it can become a fashionable accessory to your life, a little extension of your personality or just great to look at. A great example of a company trying to inject a little style into a our technology packed world …

Think HTC and you’ll invariably think of the HTC One handsets. They’re beautiful. They’re well-built and they’re feature-rich. However, they’re also pretty expensive, so what about those who want a taste of HTC but don’t quite have the cash? The Desire 626 is a device I’ve had as …

Something I have been seeing across the industry right now is an emergence of lots of low price flagship challengers. These come from various sources, with the most prominent of these being China. Now, the inherent problem with buying from China is what then happens when it goes …

Those of you who read the site regularly will no doubt be aware that I have had a couple of Ubuntu devices (including the Bq Aquarius E5) come through over the last few months to review. Now we have another one, and this is the daddy of them all. …

Have you got a small child? If so you will be most likely aware that they have an uncanny tendency to get ill from time to time. Now ,like any good parent, we’ve got a digital thermometer. However, like any good self respecting toddler my son despises the …

It has been just less than a couple of years since Motorola launched the original Moto G, and now the third iteration of Motorola’s successful device is with us. I recently live-blogged the announcement event for the 3rd generation Moto G, the Moto X Play and Moto X …

This aren’t your usual Bluetooth speakers. You can’t carry them around in your pocket for a starter – they’re just too big. The box alone weighs in at 7KG when it arrives, so these are definitely home speakers which will take up space on a table, cupboard or …

It has been a while since I mentioned the Pebble Time. To be honest this is intentional. I had an issue with the first one they gave me, which was resolved by a replacement (more on that later). Now that I have had some time to use it in the …