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« June 2010 | Main | September 2010 »
Oh boy, this sort of thing really fills me with confidence:
Even better though, there's no Cancel button (aka "Just Say No")... It's like the worst kind of software registration dialog:
"Please may we spam you with daily special offers and sell your details on to a slavering army of evil third-parties, some of whom have wings and fangs?
Yes | Remind me again in 30 days"
I seem to be one among many thousands of "fandroids" hotly anticipating the release of Samsung's Galaxy Tab, their Froyo-powered answer to the ipad. And yet these just-grabbed screenshots, from Chinese website ifanr.com, left me rather underwhelmed, and hoping that they really are just badly photoshopped mock-ups, as a couple of slightly bemused commenters over here suggested.
Their suspicions were well justified: the edges of the device are raggedy in places; the charger/data plug looks exactly like Apple's 30-pin connector; the on-screen keyboard isn't Swype, and lacks a microphone/voice-to-text button; and the browser looks suspiciously Safari-esque (meaning either Samsung are paying unusual homage to Apple, or [looking less likely now] the browser is Safari, photoshopped in). One commenter in the link also suggested that the on-screen keyboard looks ipad-like, but to be fair it looked every bit the Android keyboard to me.
It's easy to see why anyone might think the photos are a hasty Gimp job combining a cheap Android clone-pad with "Samsung" pasted onto an Apple connector. But on top of all that, it just doesn't look like a super-sized Galaxy S, as an "A-pad to an Android phone is as an ipad to an iPhone" device surely should.
But for all of that, this brand-new official teaser video on Samsung's own website suggests that the photos are genuine. At the very least, the uninspiring case is the real thing. Dang, it's just a bit too minimalist, just lacking that "must-have" design flair, its heavy lines lumbering sleepily through the video's whizzy effects, like the worst X-Factor contestant growling off-key through a 1970s music video.
With talk of the Tab's resolution being a web-unfriendly 1024x600 (though that's semi-educated guesswork until concrete details are announced by Samsung) - it could be worth waiting to see what other Android tablets start to appear towards the end of the year... and there's a zombie hoard of them waiting in the alleys, just itching to eat the ipad's brains for breakfast.
Well, okay, a next-next-gen device is always just around the next street-corner, but in this case, for those of us wanting a truly sublime experience in our overgrown gadget world, it might just pay to wait a little longer.
When you first unboxed your new Android phone, if your initial thoughts were typical of most, they probably went something like this:
"Ooh, what a snug and shiny box it ships in... and what a desirable curvaceous phone... The UI is soo snappy and 'swipey-feely' and lovely... OMG, apps!! Must... download... everything... I can't bring myself to exit the marketplace, somebody STOP me! ... Oh, better plug the charger in... Ooh, location-based ferret-burger locator, who woulda thought? ... Actually, you know, the battery life is really a bit naff..."
Having installed probably most of the estimated 80,000 apps available, many of which will use battery-sapping features such as GPS and wi-fi, you may well find yourself searching for a mains socket or a USB connection rather frequently. Even with the default, out-of-the-shiny-box configuration, you might well find that you need to recharge more than once a day (depending on your phone).
Luckily, there are some immediate, and pretty straightforward, steps you can take to extend your Android phone's battery life. HowToGeek have put together a decent checklist to this end. Some of it's obvious - switch off GPS and wireless, of course - but there are some surprises in there too; e.g. use Android's built-in battery usage screen to find out exactly which apps have been sapping your juice. Another useful tip is to reduce the screen's brightness, and reduce the frequency with which certain apps poll for data updates.
It's also well worth putting the Powerwidget on your home screen, so you can quickly switch wireless/bluetooth/network services on and off without burrowing into the settings each time.
For the full battery-saving checklist, head over to the Geek.
