htc

March Of The Droids 2015

Last weekend was March Of The Droids 2015. I attended the event representing Skyscanner, had a great time and met many awesome similarly minded Android enthusiasts.
James Bricknell introducing me to the stage. Photo credit: Julie Wills
Thanks to everyone who attended, including Huawei with Honor, HTC and ASUS.

Another March Of The Droids is over, may the suspense and trepidation before the announcement of the 2016 event be great!

All About Android 203: Wow What a Huawei Watch

This week, while in Barcelona for Mobile World Congress, I was a guest on All About Android to talk about what is happening in the world of Android.

Thanks to Jason and Ron for having me on the show and to my colleagues who facilitated my participation from the apartment in Barcelona.

Did you find our Huawei Watch meltdown funny? You weren't alone: the good people at TWiT.tv made a TWiT Bit out of it.

You can vote for my app in the Arena (Cat Simulator) until Tuesday March 10th here too.

HTC Wildfire S - Inexpensive Sense [Review]

I've been using the HTC Wildfire S as my main phone for most of the last few months. The small smartphone is HTC's follow up to the incredibly successful Wildfire, and the improvements on its predecessor are impressive. Android Gingerbread and HTC Sense are a delight in this small package.

It is difficult to review the Wildfire S and ignore its predecessor, the original Wildfire. Compared to the original HTC Wildfire, the HTC Wildfire S is smaller, has shed the optical trackball and gained a slightly faster processor, a higher resolution screen and a bit of polish. The Wildfire S feels good to hold, and I like the semi rubberised back, it gives you a sense of confidence while holding the phone.

The 5 Megapixel camera is as good as, if not better than the original Wildfire's for still images. As a former HTC Desire user it is a small step down, but in the sub £200 handset market segment I think it is second to none. On the downside the video recording is not great. Resolution of videos maxes out at 640x480 resolution, probably due to the slow chipset on the device. It would have been nice to have 720p recording.
An example of picture taken with the Wildfire S
HTC Sense on top of Android Gingerbread (2.3) maximises the possible efficiencies that can be obtained with the 600 MHz processor while still delivering plenty of HTC's eye candy UI. I hate to imagine how clunky Sense would be like on top of Android FroYo (2.2) or Eclair (2.1)... As a Vanilla Android UI user (even on the HTC Desire) HTC Sense (version 2.1 on the Wildfire S) takes a little bit of getting used to. For someone who hasn't used Android before it would be easy to get used to and simple to live with.

Battery life is pretty good with the standard battery that comes with the device. Due to the fact that I am a "Power User" of Android devices, I invested in a high capacity extra battery for the Wildfire S so that I could get through overnight trips and holidays. It is fairly easy to find reasonably priced extra batteries for less than £10 on eBay. I also picked up a cheap screen protector and gel case for less than £5.

Internal storage on the Wildfire S is fairly limited (512MB), but thanks to the version of Android it is running (2.3 Gingerbread) it is pretty easy to transfer your extra applications to the memory card (through Settings => Applications => Manage Applications). The Wildfire S also comes with a 2GB MicroSD card and will accept larger capacity ones up to 32GB.

Angry Birds (the Litmus test of smartphones nowadays...) runs smoothly and looks great on the 320x480 display. Multitouch and responsiveness are excellent.
If you like tinkering with Android smartphones and loading custom ROMs, the HTC Wildfire S may not be for you. HTC have made it incredibly difficult to root the device and change the bootloader. I hope the clever crowd at MoDaCo and XDA Developers manage to get the device rooted and get CyanogenMod running on it one day.

The Wildfire S is an exellent value for money smartphone that will no doubt be very successful. It may not be for the ROM hackers and uber geeks, but it is the sort of smartphone the average smartphone user will find simple and useful and probably get a couple of years use out of without being too frustrated.

As usual, feel free to leave comments and/or questions either here or on the MoDaCo forum here.

Orange Monte Carlo - BAP [Pre Review]

I've had an Orange Monte Carlo for a couple of weeks now. The ZTE made follow up to the Orange San Francisco (ZTE Blade) is a ZTE Skate under its glossy fingerprint magnet finish. My affectionate name for the Orange Monte Carlo is BAP. BAP is an acronym which stands for Big Ass Phone.
The Orange Monte Carlo. BAP.

To give people an idea of what a BAP (Big Ass Phone) the Orange Monte Carlo is, with its 4.3" capacitive display, I took some photos of it with other devices. A full review of the BAP will be on todoleo.com soon. Here are the photos:
Orange Monte Carlo next to HTC Desire.
The Orange Monte Carlo next to a Nokia 1100.
Orange Monte Carlo next to an HTC Wildfire S.
Orange Monte Carlo next to Samsung Galaxy Pro.
Orange Monte Carlo next to a Royal Wedding Phone.
Orange Monte Carlo next to a HP Palm Pre 2.
Orange Monte Carlo next to a Nokia E71.
This post is a follow up to my original thread in MoDaCo Forums. As often happens, the excellent community at MoDaCo Forums is working hard on getting the most out of the Orange Monte Carlo (ZTE Skate) and a method for rooting the device as well as an early custom ROM kitchen are already available. Thanks to Paul and everyone involved in the MoDaCo community!

As usual, feel free to leave comments and/or questions below or on the MoDaCo Forums. I'm already bracing myself for intense criticism of my photography, lighting and @fatoldgingercat fluff in the photos. Just to let you know, I took the pictures, wrote and published this blog post while in and before getting out of bed this morning.

Oh, and if you liked this article, please also Google +1 it as well.

INQ Cloud Touch [Review]

As many regular readers of this blog know, I'm a big fan of budget Android devices. Google's Android OS is an open source operating system that manufacturers (and users) can modify to their liking and adapt to needs and/or devices. Many of you may have heard of or seen HTC Sense, HTC's take on Android's UI, or Motorla's Motoblur, or Samsung's TouchWiz. In a similar fashion to how these major players in the smartphone market skinned and adapted Android for their smartphones, INQ did so to create a new Android experience on the INQ Cloud Touch.



The INQ Cloud Touch is a relatively inexpensive Android smartphone which has social media and the mobile internet at its core. Facebook passes from being an application (and/or web app) to an integral part of the device. People who use/live on Facebook will feel right at home with the INQ Cloud Touch as it is probably more of a "Facebook Phone" than the HTC Cha Cha or the HTC Salsa in my opinion.
The Main Homescreen - Facebook Rules!
The main homescreen of the INQ Cloud Touch is comprised of a group of custom Facebook widgets: a large Facebook News Feed (browsable) and above it a widget of your favourite Facebook contacts, one of your integrated Facebook and Google Calendar, one for your Facebook notifications and one for Facebook Places (Facebook's answer to Foursquare and/or Google Places). At the bottom of the homescreen there is a static dock that appears on the other homescreens you can slide through. The other homescreens are customisable but come pre-populated out of the box with a Spotify widget and the most popular pre-installed apps (Twitter, Windows Live Messenger, Facebook Messaging, Youtube, GMail).

Facebook is not the only service that INQ wove into the DNA of the INQ Cloud Touch. I was pleasantly surprised to find Spotify as the default media player on the INQ Cloud touch. As well as playing media files stored locally you can also stream your Spotify playlists if you have a Spotify Premium account.
Spotify Playing TWiG (local file)
Plugging my favourite headphones into the INQ Cloud Touch wasn't a problem as the device has a standard 3.5 mm headphone jack. In the funky box you also get a very iLike white set of headphones with microphone. I definitely liked the headphones that come with the INQ Cloud Touch as they are earplug style ones. They even come with size adapters for the plugs!
The INQ Headphones Bundled With The Cloud Touch
Sadly I can't afford Spotify Premium at the moment, so all my cheesy Spotify playlists have been there in the Spotify media player reminding me of their existence (and teasing me as well as tempting me to subscribe to Spotify Premium).
Tempting, oh so tempting. Spotify Premium Needed!
Battery life was pretty good on the device. In my day to day use it lasted long enough to get me through the average day. Mainly I use the device for social networking (Google Plus, Facebook and Twitter), Email (GMail), IM (GTalk) and as an mp3 player for listening to podcasts while I walk to work. Managing battery life was easy with the power and service monitor launched by the dedicated button on the left hand side of the phone.
The Power Control Screen (Launched by Info button)
As well as everything that comes set up and ready to go on the INQ Cloud Touch, it is an Android phone, so installing your favourite apps and games from the Marketplace is easy peasy. Angry Birds played smoothly and was entertaining on the INQ Cloud Touch. I must admit that I have almost stopped using Facebook and reduced my usage of Identica and Twitter since the launch of the Google Plus field test. As well as the Google Search widget, I installed the Google Plus widget and a few more apps such as Foursquare. Performance of all these apps was great and I didn't really have any problems with them.

I have now been using the INQ Cloud Touch for more than two weeks as my primary smartphone and have not really had the want (or need) for anything more powerful (or expensive) than the Cloud Touch apart from in the camera department.
The shiny red back of the INQ Cloud Touch with 5MP camera.
On the shiny red back of the INQ Cloud Touch there is a 5 Mega Pixel snapper (without flash of any kind). I didn't like the results of the camera and the lack of flash for it is definitely a negative point. The nightclub frequenting iPhone or Blackberry user (who Frank Meehan mentioned...) wouldn't be able to take very good pictures if they were to upgrade to an INQ Cloud Touch. Sharing and sending the pictures would be extremely easy with whichever service you please. Google Plus Instant worked a dream with the pictures taken, but sadly not many were worth sharing.
A Picture of @fatoldgingercat taken in optimal light conditions with the INQ Cloud Touch
Here's the geeky technical paragraph of the review you can skip if tech specs don't rock your boat: the INQ Cloud Touch runs on a 600 MHz processor, which is pretty smooth and responsive on Android 2.2. The crisp 480x320 screen is encased in solid feeling plastic and the chin at the bottom of the screen has three buttons (Menu, INQ Home and Back). The smartphone comes with a 4GB MicroSD card and you can expand the storage on the INQ Cloud touch up to 32 GB (I tested it with my card and it worked fine). The smartphone is a quad-band GSM device so it will happily work in the US of A on GSM networks too, and it also does HSDPA (3.5G for us Europeans, 4G for Yank marketers...). The speaker on the back and speakerphone performance are excellent. The INQ Cloud Touch is available in red (as my review unit is), white and black.

Right then, time to wrap up this long review with some sort of conclusion. I have been a fan of INQ since my experience with the INQ Mini 3G. I liked using the INQ Cloud Touch and enjoyed using it as my main smartphone. Battery life was good, performance was good and once I got used to INQ's UI I forgot I was reviewing a phone most of the time. If you are a Facebook addict or someone who is afraid of technology but are used to Facebook, this is definitely the phone for you. The INQ Cloud touch is easy peasy to use and a fantastic first smartphone. It is affordable, fashion conscious and powerful enough to last a while. I'll be sad to send the INQ Cloud Touch back.

Quick disclaimer: the INQ Cloud Touch I have been using is a review unit provided to me on loan by the friendly people at INQ. I received no payment for this review and remained as impartial as any INQ fan can when reviewing their products. Leo Laporte vs Mike Arrington moment averted...

Find out more about the INQ Cloud touch here.

As usual, feel free to leave comments and/or questions. If you liked this review please Google +1.

ComScore's snapshot of UK Smartphone Users [May 2011]

Interesting data from Comscore regarding smartphone use in the UK.


"In May 2011, 42 percent of UK mobile consumers used a smartphone compared to only 27 percent a year ago."


Yes, charts and bar graphs make it easier to visualise. Who ate all the pie charts...?

Not only is it interesting to see that more people in the UK are using smartphones, but I think that the growth rate of the platforms is interesting: year on year Nokia's Symbian is down 10%, Apple's iOS is up 46% and Google's Android is up a staggering 634%. If those year on year growth rates are applied to the three months since that survey was completed (in May 2011) it is safe to say that Apple's iOS platform has been toppled as the market leader by Google's Android platform by now (End of July 2011).


RIM, maker of Blackberry smartphones and software, recently announced that it was cutting 2000 jobs in autumn 2011. Analysts are disappointed with the company's growth. The Comscore data indicates that in the UK things aren't that bad with a 59% year on year growth.


Well, I am smiling at the fact that the Android platform is doing so well. As most readers of this blog will already know, I'm and Android fanboy. (Consider this a sort of disclaimer)


Here's a link to the Comscore source.


As usual, feel free to leave comments and/or questions. If you feel like it please Google +1 the post too.

What is MIUI? [Android ROM]

I have often asked myself the question "What is MIUI?" when reading mentions of it in forums such as XDA Developers and MoDaCo. This morning I decided to investigate and noticed the answer to my question had been very close to me for a while.
My MIUI Homescreen on my HTC Desire
MIUI is a CyanogenMod based Android distribution (ROM) with emphasis on creating and implementing a different user interface paradigm from the standard Android one. If you are already using CyanogenMod and/or have ROM Manager installed on your Android device, you may be able to download and install MIUI from ROM Manager. That is the way I installed MIUI on my HTC Desire this morning.
MIUI in the "Download ROM" section of ROM Manager.
Here are some more pictures of the MIUI homescreen with my choice of layout of widgets and apps. The MIUI launcher does not have an app drawer and as you should be able to tell looks like Apple's iOS user interface. The MIUI user interface does keep the classic Android notification pulldown bar, and has its own framework of fonts, colours and UI frames.

MIUI lockscreen. Very sleek!
The version of MIUI I am using at the moment is 1.7.15 which is based on Android 2.3.4. Performance is good, and I'm won over by the shiny and responsive interface. Well done and thank you to all those involved in the development and distribution of this fantastic ROM.

As usual, feel free to leave comments and/or questions and Google +1 at the end of the post!

HTC Wildfire vs HTC Wildfire S [photos]

Today I got a brand new HTC Wildfire S. I will be writing a full review of the device after I get back from holiday in a fortnight.


Here are a few snaps of my black HTC Wildfire S next to Candice's HTC Wildfire.
The HTC Wildfire S is slightly smaller than the older HTC Wildfire, but has a higher resolution screen (320 x 480 pixels vs 240x320 pixels). The camera and processor are the same, while the Android version is 2.3 Gingerbread vs 2.2 FroYo.


Feel free to ask any questions you would like answered in the full review.

Three MiFi - Freedom Is Easy

Last week I travelled from Edinburgh to Prestwick Airport by means of public transport. Along the way I took my trusty Asus EEE PC 900A netbook a Three UK MiFi as well as the rest of the luggage I was taking to Italy for my spring holiday.
On a train, using my netbbok and MiFi
My netbook is currently running a beta release of Ubuntu 11.04 Natty Narwhal. This version of Ubuntu has drivers built in to use all the most popular mobile broadband dongles and usually there is no need to load additional software to use them. I have tested my netbook with my Three UK mobile broadband dongle and with my T-Mobile one (both are made by ZTE but run on different chipsets).

For this trip, I was not going to be taking any dongles to connect to mobile broadband though. Recently I won a competition organised by Three UK and was sent a Three MiFi device. The MiFi is a portable WiFi hotspot, that lets up to five WiFi devices connect to mobile broadband through it.

The MiFi is great if you are travelling and using a netbook on the go. Rather than have a dongle sticking out of the side of your netbook, you can have the MiFi in a pocket and use WiFi to connect to the internet through it. I can think of three main advantages of this:

  • Not having a dongle sticking out of the side of your netbook reduces the risk of accidentally damaging both your netbook and/or dongle. Think about it - if your netbook were to slip/fall or lean on the dongle, leverage could damage both the dongle and the netbook's usb port. (I have had this happen to me once... RIP Acer Aspire One ZG5)
  • Using a MiFi your netbook's bettery life should be better. This is because your netbook is not powering the USB device that is connecting to the mobile broadband, you are just using WiFi. The MiFi is powered by its own internal battery, and recharges using a standard Micro-USB connector. This is useful to me because both my mobile phones use the same charger format, so when away (as I am now) I only need to take one charger with me for three devices.
  • You can connect up to five devices to the MiFi at once. I did connect more than one device while sitting in the Costa coffee bar in Glasgow Central Station. Both my netbook and my HTC Desire were using the MiFi while I was using Gwibber and downloading a podcast to listen to on my flight. I didn't really perceive any slower network connection while doing so.
Having a hot chocolate, using the MiFi and netbook as well as my HTC Desire.
When I got my first broadband dongle and was using it on Linux (at the time Ubuntu 9.04 and Mint) I had to add drivers and go through a long set up process to make it work properly. This was usually quite a hassle, but was made  relatively easy for me thanks to posts by Liam Green-Hughes on his blog. Those days seem to be gone with Ubuntu 11.04 as dongle support is much better. To tell the truth I wish that back in the day I had had a MiFi. Messing around in terminal windows and adding repositories was fun, but a MiFi would have made life so much easier.
MiFi
I used the MiFi for most of the trip while I was in the UK (on buses, trains, in stations and airports) and had no problems with reception along the way.  I was happily able to use my netbook and still had enough battery life to watch a couple of episodes of Mostly Photo on the flight.


I'm currently in Italy enjoying the spring weather and time with my family.

Just a quick disclosure at the end of the post: I did not pay for my Three UK MiFi device or the mobile broadband sim card with 12 Gb of data on it. This was my competition prize and I was not remunerated by Three UK or any other entity for writing this post. Hopefully this disclaimer avoids any Mike Arrington incidents...

Please feel free to leave questions/comments. Any feedback is appreciated!

Launcher 7 For Android

One of the great things about Google's Android operating system for smartphones is that it is an open platform. To explain this simply, if you don't like anything or you just feel like it, you can change it. This applies from the simple appearance to core functionality and applications.
One of the components of Android is an application called "Launcher" that deals with the main user interface and look and feel of the homescreen and application drawer. The most common launcher layout is usually a horizontal homescreen you can scroll through where shortcuts and widgets can be added and a vertical scrolling application drawer. This is the user interface that has been in use since the first Android device released to the general public in 2008, the G1.
A Classic Android Homescreen

An Android Application Drawer
When Android smartphone manufacturers personalise the Android operating system, they often change the launcher or replace it with a new one, usually with added functionality and sometimes changing the user interface. Most manufacturers only change things slightly and add extra functionality (such as HTC with their Sense user interface, Motorola with MotoBlur and Samsung with TouchWiz). This helps them differentiate and brand their products.
HTC Sense Homescreen
Samsung's TouchWiz Homescreen


Motorola's MotoBlur Homescreen
The Android developer community has also developed many different launcher applications that replace the ones that come preloaded on phones. Often they are variations on the same user interface offering easier theming (changing colours, backgrounds, icons), less usage of memory and processor power (my favourite is Zeam Launcher), or completely different user interface and functionality (such as SlideScreen).
Zeam Launcher's Homescreen
Slidescreen's Homescreen
For the last few days I have been using a new launcher that imitates the Windows Phone 7 operating system's user interface called Launcher 7. At launch, Windows Phone 7 was not customisable in any way by manufacturers as far as the user interface was concerned. It has a tiled, minimalistic but functional user interface. Launcher 7 is easy to download from the Android Market and install on your device. Once it is installed just hit the Home button and you are usually given an option to choose which launcher to use: the one that was in use up until now or Launcher 7.
Launcher 7 Homescreen

Launcher 7 Application Drawer
I enjoy the sense of humor of the author of this launcher because he has replaced icons on tiles such as the Internet Explorer one with a Google Chrome one, and the Windows Marketplace with the Android Market. Launcher 7 is extremely functional (as is the UI of Windows Phone 7), and runs very, very smoothly on my HTC Desire. It does get easier to operate once you are used to it, and it is fun to confuse other phone geeks with by making them think you are running Windows Phone 7 on your Android device.

There are a large number of settings that are personalisable, such as adding tiles, changing the tiles colours and how icons appear on the tiles. You can also choose to hide the Android status bar to have a full screen experience.
Launcher 7 Settings Menu
Launcher 7 is available to download from the Android Market, and is fun to play around with. Try it out and see how you like it. You may decide to stick with it, or maybe even change your mobile device for a Windows Phone 7 one... I'm definitely not going to do that unless someone gives me one for free! (wink, wink, nudge, nudge Nokia!)


Feel free to post comments/questions!