Disaster ( nearly...)

Again I note that I haven't been very attentive to my blog... Too bad since I have received some e-mails from readers that actually found my writing interesting and had told me that they would follow it. Sorry about that - sometimes reality dictates what you can spend your time on.

Why the dramatic headline, you might ask? Actually it isn't as bad as could be assumed. My iPhone 3G is broken. And I couldn't find the receipt. And the one year warranty would run out January 6th. Luckily I had had a previous warranty exchange and the receipt from that had all the serials, IMEI numbers, purchase dates and stuff. So I could submit the phone for a repair/exchange.

What had happened to the phone then? Well, the 30-pin connector only gave a decent connection on about 2 cables out of 6 for syncing or charging and even those could easily be disconnected. Either had the 30-pin connector become loose or simply been worn out. I cleaned the connection but no change. In the process I also discovered that a small crack had started to develop in the plastic in one of the corners at the connector. Off to the mall with what documents that I had and submit it for service at the Swedish equivalent to AT&T -Telia. In Sweden, as in most European countries, we have no Apple Stores. They accepted the phone without any problem - in fact they were very friendly. It would probably take about 10 working days before I got it back and according to the sales rep I would receive a brand new phone.

So now I'm "stuck" with a Nokia E71 as my main phone and a 5th gen iPod Nano 8GB for music and video. The E71 isn't a bad phone - far from it. It has a whopping 1500 mAh battery which seems to go on forever compared to the iPhone, it multi tasks, it has a physical keyboard, camera with auto focus and decent video capabilities. But - the screen is really tiny, it doesn't sync with iTunes on my MacBook particularly well (hardly actually), the company Outlook mail service requires manual synch (not the phones fault though...), the quality of 3rd party applications is in many cases questionable even though they are always more expensive than their iPhone counterparts, the native Facebook application is medieval compared to the one on the iPhone and you can't control the music player with the button on the headset. And the call log still stinks - I can't see what phone number a particular caller used if he has more than one number in my phone book. The built in mail message client for SMS and e-mail is ancient compared to the iPhone and the browser isn't much better - slow and lots of redraws during rendering.

Apart from that I'm still impressed with the build quality and the size of the unit.

This is my second day the second time of being without an iPhone since October 2007 when I bought my original iPhone in NYC. So far I've had the following issues: The E71 has a 2.5 mm head phone connector, the car has a 3.5 mm plug - no joy using the E71 as a music player in the car. The TomTom maps of the E71 are ancient (surprisingly how much the streets are changing over a couple of years...)

Well, that's about all for the moment. I intend to keep this blog updated with my observations while the iPhone is being repaired.

An update

Ok, what about a short update about everything mobile. Let's start with the quickest one. My Nokia E71 finally received a firmware update, 300.xxx.yyy - thank you for that Nokia, what took you so long? The camera software gave some improved quality which was fine. There were some new applications installed like a Youtube client and some other additions and improvements but no major changes. Overall, nothing that made me change my opinion about what phone to use as my main handset. At the moment the E71 is on the shelf with no SIM card and turned off.

I bought the Nokia N95 for slightly over two years ago and the battery showed very clear signs of being worn out and loosing charge very rapidly even under very slight use. The battery door had also been broken. I found a web shop and bought a 3rd party 900mAh battery and a complete new back side for the N95, now in black instead of the original sand colored. At the moment the N95 is almost looking as new and the black back side is a great improvement. The battery capacity is also as good as new, the original battery being a 950mAh which is 50mAh more than the new battery, but I doubt that I will ever notice the difference. Currently I have my private SIM card in the N95. I've also bought a new wired headset for the N95 with controls for the musicplayer, replacing the original headset shipped with the phone which had been broken.

The iPhone 3G receives a thorough workout every day. Facebook, Twitter, e-mail, texting, Navigon, calender, browsing the web, playing games and listening to music, podcasts, and audio books. So far I haven't even considered changing away from using the iPhone as my primary phone. I'm quite satisfied with it.

[Posted with iBlogger from my iPhone]

Best phone!(?)

Hi Everyone,

Long time no see! Well since last it hasn't happened a lot. But I think I have reached a final (?) decision about which phone should be my main phone. For the time being at least.

I've looked into specifications, stand by times, functionality, applications, games, synching and many other smaller details when it comes to choosing between a Nokia S60 phone and an iPhone 3G. When looking solely at specifications both the N95 and the E71 are superior to the iPhone in many areas. Ever tried running a Twitter application in the background on the iPhone? Right, it isn't possible (if you don't jailbreak it). Works perfectly on the Nokias, in theory at least...

Why only in theory? Well there is one small problem - available RAM. When Symbian OS runs out of available RAM for running programs the OS takes a good look at what unused applications can be terminated to free up RAM so you can load that big website without problem. And what do yo know? suddenly you have no Twitter application running in the background - but you aren't told and the only way to check is to load up the application list. Something you don't do at a regular basis. The same goes for any application that you'd like to have up and running like Location Tagger and Podcasting. This is mainly a problem for Nokia S60 devices with limited amount of RAM, e.g. the N95 with 64 MB RAM. The E71 with 128 MB RAM doesn't suffer from this kinds of problem at the same rate.

In this era of social networking any platform that hasn't got a native Twitter and Facebook client is in my point of view somewhat inferior to those that have. Symbian has several great Twitter applications but no Facebook application. You must use the mobile website equivalent version, which in my opinion doesn't provide the same level of user experience, it's simply too slow and awkward to use in my opinion. The iPhone has several Twitter clients, many of them free, a native Facebook app, LinkedIn (really needs an update), and Yammer just to mention a few.

Shooting video and photos the N95 is still the winner - 'nuff said. Even with the latest firmware upgrade the E71 is still not performing that much better than the iPhone 3G with OS 3.x. Before the firmware 300.x.x update of the E71 the photo quality was really miserable - even when using the autofocus. If you concentrate on holding the iPhone absolutely still when releasing the shutter button the photos are now really sharp, clear and well balanced - especially if you avoid having direct light shining in the camera. The 3.0 update really made a difference here. If you don't need to shoot video or a photo in low light conditions the results of the iPhone camera are actually quite acceptable in my opinion.

Gaming, well not much to say there that hasn't already been said. The iPhone is truly a great gaming platform with an ever increasing catalog of low priced high quality games in every category. Sid Meyers Civilization, Bejeweld, PinBall Dreams, Sims 3 - I can make the list go on and on. Comparing that with the Nokia N-Gage platform - nah, I don't think I'll go down that route. Just let me say that simple Java reworks for the S60 platform doesn't compare that well with native applications on the iPhone.

When we are discussing the Office side of things the iPhone loses a bit. The built in support is only for viewing documents that has been mailed as attachments to the iPhone. Comparing that with the E71 that has built in editors for MS Office documents and can handle them through the regular file system. There are applications for editing Office documents in the iPhone AppStore but they still are a bit clunky in some areas even though it is a safe bet to say that they will improve over time. At this point in time - the iPhone is clearly inferior to the E71 if you have the need to edit and create Office documents.

So to conclude:

Nokia N95

I've really tried to like this phone, and believe me when I say that I do - under certain circumstances. It's a great phone for vacations and parties when the great camera/video really takes good photos. When it comes to playing music and videos, well, let me put it this way: If you have been accustomed to the iPhone/iTunes environment with it's simplicity in synching podcasts, music, applications and video, everything else is a bit kludgy in my opinion. Synching the N95 works, no doubt about that, but Apple's solution does it that much better. Playing games should be great, but it isn't. Why? Take a look at the D-Pad. Look at the keys o the left and to the right of the D-Pad. Imagine playing an action packed game where timing is essential. Ooops I hit the multimedia menu button instead of the D-Pad left. I do it, my kids do it, and when you have done it a couple of times you just grow tired of it and quits playing.

When discussing the keyboard of the N95: The keys are quite good to press with good tactile feedback. But they are clicking, a lot, especially on the right side where the slider is a bit loose as well and contributes with some more clicking. I've checked that with Nokia and they claim that the slider is within acceptable limits. The standby time isn't that great either. Listening to music, surfing, downloading some Podcasts, making some phone calls, working in the calender, well if you last a day you are really lucky. My N95 has the habit of once in a while run down the battery from a full charge to complete emptiness within a couple of hours. And that is with no special applications loaded in the background and just lying around at the usual places in the house. I have a background from using Treo's for quite some years and being used to a full qwerty keyboard and then starting to use T9 is a constant source of irritation even if you use predictive text input. One other sore area is the lack of decent support of HTML e-mail. The built in Message application handles those as attachments so you'll have to open them via the webbrowser. This is soo 1990. Nokia provides a new HTML based e-mail application in beta but it defeats the purpose of having all messages handled by one application. Clumsy solution. Integrate HTML support and push out an improved version of the Messaging application with the next firmware update.

E71

The E71 is a different phone in some areas compared to the N95. There are more RAM, it's more solidly built, has a qwerty keyboard, great standby time, and a smaller form factor. On the downside we have a smaller screen, crappy camera and no multimedia buttons, neither on the device nor on the headset. It is a beautiful device which will run forever with it's gigantic 1500 mAh battery but having to access the media player applications directly to pause the music/film when you need to talk to someone isn't to my liking. The small screen makes it a bit hard to watch films, especially if it is subtitled. As a business unit - and a BlackBerry killer - it's the given choice of the three but it still lacks from many of the same areas as the N95 when compared to the iPhone. Actually the qwerty keyboard is at times the worst point of the phone. Try to enter a phone number from your memory when driving. It is close to impossible to hit the right keys. I know - I've tried - and yes, it's legal to drive and use a phone at the same time in Sweden. When texting, answering an e-mail or editing a document - it's a great improvement over the N95. Depending on your preferences the keyboard could even be better than the touch screen keyboard of the iPhone. The E71 has basically the same Messaging application as the N95 with no integrated HTML support which just plainly sucks. The omission of threaded text messages is also unbelievable. Handspring introduced that in the Treo 600 years ago.

iPhone 3G

When purely looking at the specifications the iPhone 3G is inferior to both the N95 and the E71 in many areas. Due to that I've tried to switch over to any of those devices as my main mobile unit, but within a day or two, I've switched back the SIM cards and started to use the iPhone again. Why? The camera is inferior, mainly lacking auto focus, the standby time is as bad as the N95, it has no ability to run applications in the background, has no integrated Todo. Many actions requires a lot of tapping around, e.g. new calender or address entry. But in two important areas it shines brighter than any other smartphone. The overall user experience is just hands down the best there is, the UI just makes you happy when using it. The second area is the iTunes AppStore. The simplicity, the low prices, and the extremely large selection of applications in almost every imaginable area enables you to make the iPhone into exactly the type of device you want. And the best of all - not a single Java application with sluggish performance and non-intuitive UI anywhere to be seen.

The touch screen keyboard can be a dog to use at times but as you use it you'll probably have a better experience. You'll still have to look at the keyboard when typing but the benefits of having a really large screen available when not needing the keyboard makes up for that several times over. When you have watched at a full length movie e.g. during a flight you won't mind. If you do use the iPhone for looking at movies or listening to music/audiobooks/podcasts for an extend period of time it is recommended that you buy some kind of external rechargeable battery pack if you intend to be able to use the phone when you are done. That large screen does consume a rather large amount of power...

The large screen is also the source of one potentially severe problem with iPhone as all to many has found out. It doesn't like being dropped on a floor. The glass surface tends to crack. Most often you can still use the iPhone, but it doesn't look good and it will cost you to have it changed if (when?) it happens so be careful!

Conclusion

So in spite of being inferior in some areas and in spite of my efforts of trying to like the N95 I always ends with switching back to the iPhone - I can't help it, I have really tried not to. The overall benefits of the iPhone makes it - for me at least - the best smartphone I have used so far. The good things really outshines the few areas that might be a problem.

Ovi App Store - broken by design???

As you know I have two Symbian phones, an E71 and a N95. Of course I was very intrigued when Nokia opened the Ovi App store for Symbian S60 phones. At last one, good place to look for, buy, and download applications for the Symbian S60 phones. I started to use the web client but it wasn't that nice to use. I managed to get the Ovi App Store client for the E71 but couldn't find the same application for the N95 wherever I looked. I even created a second account for the N95 to circumvent any problems related to "two devices - one account". Nope, I still haven't found any native Ove App store client. I'm quite sure that Nokia would release a client for the S60R3 platform in portrait mode, but I can't find any whatever I do to try and find one. In any case, I shouldn't be forced to go hunting for it, if it isn't the client you are accessing the Ovi App store from a Nokia smart phone the App Store should present you the Ovi App store client application as the first suggested download.

I had used the Gravity Twitter client for a while during the free test period and was seriously thinking of buying it which I did as my first buy on the E71. A couple a days ago the E71 developed a serious problem where I found out that the only way to remedy it was to reset the device by reinstalling the latest firmware (200.x.y in Sweden - where is the 210.x.y version with the improved camera software Nokia???). After I reinstalled the firmware I accessed the Ovi account on the E71 to re-download the Ovi App Store application, Gravity Twitter client and the Skyfire web browser. I couldn't!!! They where there under the headline "My Download History" but I couldn't re-download them. It says Installed, but the only way to get it back on the device is to actually buy it again. I tried to re-download the Ovi Store App, but the got an "Item unavailable" message. I like to be proven wrong here, but I googled around a bit on the problem and sadly, I found out that I wasn't alone.

In contrast I have four iPhones in my family, they are all using the same iTunes store account and I have downloaded some of the applications to more than one phone. No problem to do that. Reinstalled an iPhone - not a problem, just reinstall the applications and you are fine to go.

Sorry Nokia, until you enable the possibility to re-download any previous purchase made in the Ovi App Store, I won't buy, not even download any free app at all! If there is an application that I really like, I will contact the developer directly.

Until then, I'll stick with the iTunes app store!

Part 1: Gaming

Ok, it's been a while since the last update and the posts where I intended to compare the Nokia E71 and the iPhone 3G. Sorry for that but I'll try to amend that.

I don't know how in how many parts I'll do the comparison yet. Most likely I'll make them up as they come to my mind. First up is gaming. Don't get me wrong here, gaming is not the main use of my devices - but still a quite important one. Playing a good quality game while waiting at an airport, waiting for the kids, or just to kill off a few moments when you just don't feel like always being productive is rather nice.

If I've made this comparison a year ago it would have been between a 1st generation jailbroken iPhone running OS 1.x and some simple game and the Nokia N95. A comparison that the N95 had won quite easily. But since Apple introduced the Appstore and OS 2 last summer, the scenario has changed drastically.

I've downloaded some apps through Nokias N-Gage and played the included ones. I've also downloaded free games and bought quite a few games from the Appstore to my iPhone. The gaming experience on the Symbian can't be compared with the iPhone. Compare driving a car using the d-pad on the Nokia and the accelerometer in the iPhone. The iPhone wins hands down. The quality of the games on the iPhone platform is miles higher than the games on the Symbian platform, not to mention the diversity of the games and the simplicity of using the appstore. Nokias Ovi store shows some promises but has yet to be released. The pricing is yet another factor. There are many free 'Lite' games in the iPhone Appstore but also the full featured games are quite unexpensive as well, ranging from $1 to $10-15 if they are really expensive. The N-Gage games I think is about $20. Yoy can pay a couple of bucks just for trying out a game but $20 makes you think a couple of times before hitting the buy button.

I've played Fieldrunners, Bejeweld 2, Pinball Dreams, Top Gun, and many others. Most are very good games and some are quite extraordinary so. Of course I've bought some real lemons but most has been playable providing swift and fluent gameplay with beautiful graphics. The Symbian games has been enjoyable too but none has so far made me come back again and again.

As a gaming device the iPhone beats both the E71 and the N95. It probably gives Sony PSP and Nintendo DS a run for their money as well. My kids are using their 1st gen iPhone's for playing games not their Nintendo DS's. The price of the games makes my happy too.

[Posted with iBlogger from my iPhone]

Mobile Phone Usage

As I promised I will begin my series of Nokia E71 v.s. iPhone 3G comparison articles by describing how I'm using a cell phone.

To begin with - I use the phone at work. The SIM card in my "main" phone is provided by my employer. If I call within the company I call for free, numbers outside the company isn't very cheap and we are using a special number prefix for making private calls. We have an unlimited dataplan for a fixed price and texting is the same price internally or externally. And since I'm in Sweden I don't have to pay for receiving calls.

Currently I'm engaged in an assignment where all my collegues are in the U.K., the U.S., Poland and other countries. Phone calls are made through a IP based softphone through my company Laptop so I rarely makes any calls or much texting on the phone. Due to the differences in time zones I do spend quite a lot of time reading and answering e-mails from my collegues in Europe and U.S. particularly during late afternoons and evenings. I also have my private e-mail accounts set up in my phone since the I have fixed price on data.

I listen to quite a few podcast channels through iTunes. I have some smart filters set up that creates an automatic playlist with all the unplayed podcasts. When I have listened at them through an iPod or iPhone they disappear from the playlist (and computer) automagically. I also watch movies and listen on music or audio books.

I also likes to read e-books from ereader.com, play an occasional game or three. I spend some time reading twenty something websites several times and blogs several times each day and update my Twitter micro blog as well as this blog.

I also needs to have my calender synched with my company Exchange on a regular basis. I shoot an occasional picture that I like either import to iPhoto or upload to a picture site, so the quility of the camera is important.

Overall this put special demands on screen, battery, keyboard, sound, synching, handling, and so on. I will look at different functions that I use daily and how they match the phones cababilities so stay tuned if you find this interesting.

Nokia E71 v.s. iPhone 3G

I've had the Nokia E71 since December 2008 and the iPhone 3G since January 2009 (the original iPhone since October 2007).

They are both great devices and I've used them both as my main phone at work and private. They have different strengths and weaknesses so I haven't been able to decide which device that's THE phone to use. In this blog I will publish a number of articles where I compare the two devices from different standpoints and compare their specifications and functionality. It could be cameras, pim, e-mail, web, media, keyboards, display, app stores, and so on. I don't know yet the exact structure and comparisons I will write but naturally they will be concentrated on stuff that matters to me. Perhaps I will start by writing a short presentation of me, what kind of work and private use I need from a phone. Stay tuned.

[Posted with iBlogger from my iPhone]

iPhone battery life improved

Finally I found what ate my iPhone battery for lunch. It was the Push function of Exchange. Turned it off and set it to fetch at a 15 minute intervall - battery life back to (iPhone) normal. Still far from the capacity of the Nokia E71 though. Apparently there is a bug in firmware version 2.2.1 in the Exchange push function that consumes the battery at an alarming rate since there are several pages on the 'net describing exactly this problem.

[Posted with iBlogger from my iPhone]

iPhone battery life

I had iPhone OS 2.2 on my original iPhone 3G. I had it replaced on warranty due to a crack in the casing by the bottom contact. The new iPhone I received as a replacement had OS 2.2.1. I didn't thought much about it but the battery life has been really really bad. It could be that the battery of the new iPhone has to be 'run in' to provide maximum capacity. I hope it will. Yesterday I started out with about 75% charge at about 1 p.m., didn't do much at all during the day and night. It was down to 20% by 11 p.m. and when I woke up by 8.30. (hey - it's a long weekend) it whas completely dead. There are indeed room for improvements. I'm starting to throw longing looks at my E71.

[Posted with iBlogger from my iPhone]

Change of main device

Alright, time to change from Nokia E71 to iPhone 3G as my main device. Large screen v.s. small screen, virtual keyboard v.s. physical keyboard, mail only corporate Exchange connectivity v.s. adequate corporate Exchange connectivity, great iTunes integration v.s. no iTunes integration, limited background execution v.s. (almost) unlimited background execution.

The list can be made longer, but those are the main issues that come to my mind directly. Well, lets try it out for a while and we'll see what happens.

Mobile Blogging from here.

[Posted with iBlogger from my iPhone]

Cracking MacBook

My two year old white MacBook cracked in several places about a year ago. Apple had the case replaced under warranty. Now, new cracks has developed in the lid and close to the hand rest - of course it is out of warranty. . .

But to my delight - Apple has decided to have free a replacement/repair programme of the MacBooks with these cracks regardless of warranty status. I just bought a new battery since the original battery had swelled out of proportions. With the new case - the machine will probably look like new! To bad the repair will likely take a week or two. Now I just have to call Applecare.

Testing a new blogg client

I found this client to use for adding new contents to a multitude of different blogs, Googles Blogger being one of them. Interestingly enough the same client on the Nokia E7¹doesn't have the same capabilities. You can only add an entry if you add a picture - strange. I will need to find a better blog client on the Nokia.

However on the iPhone the Shozu client seems to be a rather nice appliction. I'll see if it will make me add information to my blog a bit more often than I have done so far.