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Whoops, I Bought An iPad Air (32GB, Space Grey)

By TechnologyNo Comments
Lit Up Reindeer I’ve been toying with the idea of getting a tablet for a while now. I wanted something I can access Facebook on, use to listen to Music and watch Films/TV Boxsets on while being in the living room with the cats.

When I saw the previous generation Kindle Fire for £99 on Amazon’s website, I wasn’t sure whether this was a Christmas offer or Black Friday offer. I wasn’t even sure if the Kindle tablet would be what I wanted. But at that price, I had to look into it.

So during my visit to Manchester Christmas Market (see Getting Into The Festive Spirit: Manchester Christmas Market) my friend and I nipped into Currys PC World to have a look at the Kindle.

I was looking at the newest Kindle the Fire HDX and the screen was just seven inches. So on the one hand the Kindle was cheap, but on the other hand the screen was far too small for what I wanted to use it for.

Undecided on cost or screen size, I spoke with my friend about it and then to mum. With some persuasion from mum, I decided to buy the much more expensive iPad Air (32GB in Space Grey). Whoops! Here are some obligatory photos:

iPad Air - Box New iPad Air - Case Boxed New
iPad Air - Cover Green iPad Air - Home Screen
iPad Air - Back

The reasons I bought the iPad Air were: bigger screen, compatible with my other Apple Products (iMac & iPhone 5), really light, great hardware specs (including better camera than most other tablets) and a massive range of Apps via the App Store.

I also splashed out on a cover. A cover, just covers the front of the iPad (the screen), costs £35, comes in a range of colours and is perfect for using the iPad at home. Whereas a case, covers the entire iPad (front & back), costs £65, comes in a range of colours and is ideal if you’re planning on taking the iPad out and about. Be careful when buying, as their package design is very similar.

I’ve had my iPad for a few weeks now, so I thought I’d give you my first impressions of some of the Pros and Cons:

Pros Cons
  • Light-weight, feels lighter than the average book.
  • Great Battery Life.
  • Charges really quick.
  • Compatible with my iPhone 5 charger and USB charging.
  • Like the Space Grey effect, reminds me of the Star Trek pads.
  • Easy to set up & use.
  • Always on, quick to check Facebook, Twitter and other social media.
  • Great Apps available on the App Store.
  • iPad specific Apps, to make the most out of the iPad Air.
  • Made for media consumption, whether it be: Music, films, TV Boxsets or ebooks.
  • Now comes with free Pages, Numbers, iPhoto, iMovie and Garage Band.
  • It just works. No crashes at all (so far), not even Apps.
  • Silent operation – no sound of cooling fan.
  • Reasonable speaker sound quality.
  • iMessage & FaceTime.
  • Can be backed up through iTunes or iCloud.
  • Updates Apps Automatically.
  • Has Siri.
  • Find My iPhone – Works for iPad, so you can detect where it is if its ever stolen.
  • iPad as a device is expensive.
  • Doesn’t come with headphones.
  • Would literately be a blank canvas without the Apps on the App Store.
  • Covers are expensive at £35. Cases are extortionately priced at £65.
  • Made for media consumption – Feels difficult and slow to create things on the iPad.
  • Inhibits creativity and makes it less likely that you’ll spend your time creating something.
  • Pages, Numbers, iPhoto, iMovie and Garage Band are all designed to help you be creative, but each takes up an awful lot of disk space.
  • iTunes doesn’t accept .avi files, so most of my movies can’t be played on the iPad. Have found a work around which I shall be blogging about soon, it’s just frustrating because I shouldn’t have to do this.
  • No way to access my wireless hard drive.
  • Doesn’t seem to want to link to my iMac through WiFi.
  • Missing the biometric security, the finger print scanner the iPhone 5S has.

One or two of the Cons might just be things I haven’t worked out how to do on the iPad yet. If you know how to do something that I’ve put on my Cons list, feel free to leave a comment.

The iPad Air 32GB Space Grey is available to buy on Amazon, on the Apple Store Online or on your local high street (at various retail outlets).

Write soon,

Antony

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Thursday 12 December 2013

Iphone Essentials: Accessories & Apps

By TechnologyNo Comments

I’ve had my baby (my Iphone4 32GB Black) now for just over a month so I thought I’d share some Iphone Essentials. First the accessories.

Accessories
I’m always on the move so my essential accessories are the DURAGADGET Suction Car Windscreen Mount,1.2m Iphone Ipod to Audio system Aux socket cable and a cover.

The DURAGADGET Suction Car Windscreen Mount allows you to put your Iphone in a holder and mount it on your windscreen or dashboard. It comes with a in car charger so no need to buy one of those, but it is difficult to assemble when it arrives. No instructions were provided and it took several of us to suss out how it works. My advice pull the back really hard after taking the screw out. It needs to be noted as well, that the Iphone wont fit if it has a case on.

The 1.2m Iphone Ipod to Audio system Aux socket cable is an essential to plug in to your in car CD player, if your car doesn’t have an iphone connector.

I couldn’t find a cover online that was reasonably priced and that seemed durable. Instead I headed down to my local market and picked one up. Covers are an essential as Iphone’s get scratched easily.

Apps
There are thousands upon thousands of Apps out there, but some good and some not. So here’s my fav apps by type:

Blogging

  • WordPress
    Good Points: Excellent for uploading media and writing shorter blog posts.
    Bad Points: Unable to delete local drafts.

Music

  • Moodagent
    Good Points: Organises and plays your music based on the mood setting you choose.
    Bad Points: Doesn’t catergories all music, particularly if your itunes library has some “Unknown Albums”
  • Shazam (Free)
    Good Points: Listens to music through the speaker and tells you what it is, even provides a link to itunes.
    Bad Points: Can only listen to 5 songs per month in the free version, full version very expensive.
  • Gaydio Radio
    Good Points: Allows you to listen to gaydio radio on your phone.
    Bad Points: Only works if connected to the internet via wi-fi.
  • Galaxy Radio
    Good Points: Allows you to listen to a whole host of radios on your phone.
    Bad Points: Only works if connected to the internet via wi-fi.

News

  • The Guardian
    Good Points: Get the latest news including photos. Lots of customisation – the app can bring up the latest stories in their catergories.
    Bad Points: When it updates you have to edit your settings again.
  • BBC News
    Good Points: Displays news including photo and video. A button can be clicked to see BBC News live video streaming.
    Bad Points: BBC News is too internationally based news for me.
  • Pink News
    Good Points: Gay related headlines and news from Pink News.
    Bad Points: Too much advertising.
  • Metro UK
    Good Points: View the Metro Uk paper free via the app.
    Bad Points: None in my experience.
  • Manchester Evening News
    Good Points: Local news for my area.
    Bad Points: None in my experience

Weather

  • Met Office
    Good Points: Finds your nearest weather station and gives weather for the week, with weather at specific times on the day. Lots of graphical data such as uk maps. Also states if there is an official met office weather warning.
    Bad Points: None in my experience.

Reference

  • Google
    Good Points: Can use it to search Google internet. Links to other apps (such as Youtube, Docs, GMail, etc.).
    Bad Points: More likely to use the search bar for Google searches in Safari.
  • Dictionary
    Good Points: Searches for spellings and meanings on Dictionary.com.
    Bad Points: None in my experience.
  • Free Translator
    Good Points: Translates text from one language to another.
    Bad Points: Need to be connected to the internet, doesn’t speak the translation so you know how to say it.
  • Google Earth
    Good Points: can see maps and birds eye view, highlights key listings for businesses.
    Bad Points: more likely to use the maps app that comes with the iphone.

Games

  • Civilization Revolutions
    Good Points: Turn based strategy game, lots of features.
    Bad Points: Very expensive for what it is, only allows you to save/play one game.
  • The Secret of Grisly Manor
    Good Points: A great puzzle solving game.
    Bad Points: Short, once completed can’t really be played again – however worth the money. Rubbish story line.
  • Empire Story
    Good Points: A roman-style city. Brilliant graphics.
    Bad Points: You produce products in order to make money, if you don’t check back shortly after they’re done they “spoil” even things like armor.
  • Pocket Ants
    Good Points: Enjoy squashing ants with stones, freezing them with a freeze ray and much more. Game cheap.
    Bad Points: The game doesn’t really have a point.
  • Plasma Globe
    Good Points: Relaxing plasma ball, if you click start becomes a game.
    Bad Points: Gets boring after a while.
  • Geared
    Good Points: Highly addictive. All you have to do is make the gears turn the blue gears, not as easy at it sounds! Brilliant tutorial on the first few levels. A total of 80 levels. Social – you can play it with friends all telling the person with the phone where they think the cogs should go! FREE.
    Bad Points: None found.

Entertainment

  • Youtube
    Good Points: Watch videos on the phone. Comes installed.
    Bad Points: Mostly requires wi-fi connection.
  • TVGuide.co.uk
    Good Points: See what’s on TV now and next as well as an grid of the entire day with the ability to see listings for an entire week.
    Bad Points: Advertising.
  • Movies by Flixster
    Good Points: Cinema listings with it finding your nearest cinemas. Watch videos and read about films including reviews.
    Bad Points: None in my experience.
  • Cineworld
    Good Points: See film listings and order.
    Bad Points: Only useful if your going to a cineworld cinemas.

Pagan

  • Star Walk
    Good Points: See the stars live, all named including constellations. Zooming in and out and moving around the globe. Good to see your star sign and what influences are in it for astrology. Cheap as well!
    Bad Points: None in my experience.
  • Liber Umbrarum et Lux
    Good Points: Lots of information, intended to be a journal as well, allowing you to add your own entries. Free.
    Bad Points: Lack of images, difficult to find your own entries and impossible to delete theirs.
  • Pagan Gods
    Good Points: Some nice images, cheap.
    Bad Points: Although cheap, not worth the price. Some images of poor quality and the app store page only shows the handful of beautiful images there are. Only a small amount of information about the gods and goddesses and some clear inaccuracies.

Shopping

  • ASDA
    Good Points: Can send in details of receipts to see if you could of got the shopping cheaper at Tesco, Sainsbury’s, Morrisons and Waitrose. You can also find local stores.
    Bad Points: Doesn’t compare some items and you can only submit receipts 24 hours after shopping.
  • RedLaser
    Good Points: Scan a barcode using your camera on your iphone to find cheaper prices online. Seems to work well on DVD’s, CD’s, Laptops, etc. so you can see the best price online. Free.
    Bad Points: Doesn’t work on the majority of groceries and doesn’t search supermarkets.
  • Amazon UK
    Good Points: See your wish list, recommendations for you, search for products, order products and track your order. Free.
    Bad Points: None.
  • Ebay UK
    Good Points: Watch items, see the status of items your buying and selling. Place bids. Free.
    Bad Points: Only useful if you use ebay.
  • Argos
    Good Points: Can shop and reserve to collect in store. Can find stores. Free.
    Bad Points: Takes a while to load, only useful if you shop at Argos.

Travel

  • NavFree
    Good Points: Free sat nav. Seems to work as well as other popular brands but free.
    Bad Points: Only useful if you have a dashboard or windscreen mount.
  • thetrainline.com
    Good Points: Can find the next train home, plan journeys. Even buy tickets – although I haven’t tried this feature.
    Bad Points: None.

Other

  • Dragon Dictation
    Good Points: Free. Tap a button and say what you want to type. Then it types it for you. You can then send the text as SMS, email, facebook, etc.
    Bad Points: It occasionally misses words or gets words wrong.

As with most technology there are constantly new apps in development and apps being updated. As and when I find new apps I like I’ll occasionally write a blog post keeping you up to date.

Write soon,

Antony

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Saturday 8 January 2011
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