The latest on smartphones (and other gadgets)

The HTC HD2 remains one of the favourities for fiddling with. The phone launched in late 2009 as a WinMo device, with world beating hardware specs. I think it was the first 1GHz device at the time, as well as having the biggest screen at 4.3inches. Now, a year and a half later, its hardware capabilities are still very good.

Now, if you want to make your HD2 sing with the latest version of Android, namely 2.3 aka Gingerbread (Android 3.0 is out I know but is for tablets), then read on. The modding community has been working on various Android incarnations for the HD2, many of which I have experimented with, but for the first time now I think the state of the art is good enough to be used on a permanent basis. Forget about WinMo. With Android Gingerbread your HD2 will be as good, if not better, than the new HTC Desire HD. The latter is essentially an Android remake of the HD2, but runs Android 2.2 only, ha ha.

Take a deep breath and then follow these steps:

1. Backup and format the sd card in your phone.

2. Install Hard SPL (SPL3) a custom bootloader available on XDA. HSPL is required to update the radio and flash custom ROMs to the phone. It is safe to install and can be uninstalled by rerunning the program setup file.

3. Next update to a new radio. Radios and installation instructions can be found at XDA. Be sure to use a compatible version. 2.15.50.14 is a good one.

4. Install MAGLDR bootloader. MAGLDR serves as a second bootloader, which runs after HSPL, and can be used to Flash Nandroid ROMs to the HD2. Download MAGLDR from the forums at XDA.

5. To install Gingerbread on the HD2 first download any of the recent Gingerbread Nandroid ROMs from the XDA HD2 Android NAND Development forum to a PC and extract it. I recommend NexusHD2-Gingerbread V2.5 [Android2.3.3][Kernel: tytung_r8.3].Then perform a soft reset while holding down the power off button until the MAGLDR boot menu appears. Select the “USB Flasher” option and connect the HD2 to a PC using a USB cable. Once the USB connection is established run the Android installer EXE file that came with the NAND ROM to complete the installation.

And there you have it. You are now running Android Gingerbread, recently released by Google for use on the Google Nexus S. RIP Windows Mobile.

You will have to tweak some of the phone settings to get the best battery life. I use the following:

1. SetCPU changes the phone’s CPU clock speed automatically. Get the paid version from the Android Market. If you live in a country that has not yet been enabled by Google for paid apps, check this post of mine on how to enable paid apps. Pay with your credit card. Otherwise google the free version.

2. Ultimate Juice Defender, also available from the Market in paid and free guises, will switch various juice sucking features off and on, e.g. data connection, wifi.

3. Reduce the number of accounts that sync automatically, under Settings -> Accounts, or even disable automatic background sync if you are happy to manually sync your emails.

4. Set the radio to 2g only under Settings -> Mobile Networks

5. Don’t use a live wallpaper

If you have been following my blog you know that I have not posted in a long time. Partly because I got a bit bored with what was happening in the mobile world. In addition I have been using an iPhone 4 and that is so good that I started thinking we should simply all use iPhones. Why bother using anything else? There is no Android phone available today that really matches let alone surpasses, the iPhone. But that was yesterday. Today is a new day. Today is my first day with the new Nokia E7.

Yes, I know Symbian is not nearly as good as iOS or Android, and yes I know I have slagged off the N8 in previous posts. But man the E7 is an awesome piece of hardware. Forget about Apple, forget about HTC, forget about Samsung, forget about Motorola, forget about SonyE. Those okes build boring phones. Nokia’s hardware design rules. The hardware is so good that it makes up for the software. And I don’t know what Nokia has done to achieve it, but Symbian runs and feels better on the E7 than the N8.

I bought mine at Incredible Connection (yes it is freely available in SA) and as soon as the sales person removed the phone from its box, I desired it. It is large and sleek and shiny in an understated classy way thanks to the aluminium casing. The edges are round and smooth, which makes a welcome change from the sharp iPhone 4 edges. The 4 inch screen, an AMOLED capacitive touch screen with Nokia’s ClearBlack technology, is beautifully bright with deep colours, and the 4 inch size hits the sweet spot for me. The 3-5 inches of the N8 is too small for me, ditto for the iPhone’s screen. You can get a 4.3 inch screen on some Androids these days but that results in too big a phone for my liking. 4 inches is perfect. You will notice the difference when you read a PDF using the bundled Adobe PDF reader. On the E7 you can read a page without having to scroll from left to right, while on the N8 the smaller screen size means you have to zoom and scroll, which makes it a very frustrating experience.

The E7 has 5 stylish buttons, the usual power button on the top, a volume rocker switch on the right, the menu key on the front face, a camera button and the screen lock slider button on the left. The slider button has gained cool features. You can associate specific phone functions with the switch, and if you slide and hold it down for a second or so, the phone’s camera flash light turns on and you can use the phone as a flashlight. Pretty cool.

The camera is flush with the phone, unlike the N8′s one which sticks out. It is an 8MP affair, versus the N8′s 12MP, but 8MP is still industry leading compared with the iPhone and most Androids out there, which tend to use 5MP. The E7 takes good pictures, having a flash is great, and the dedicated camera button is the cherry on top. I see there is some photo and video editing software on the phone also.

When you have finished drooling over the beautifully crafted exterior of the E7, slide it open. Maybe slide is not the right expression, it more likes, jumps open. The screen mechanism is spring loaded and the screen opens up at an angle. The mechanism feels very well made and solid. So does the keyboard it reveals. Nokia has outdone themselves with this keyboard. It is large with 4 rows and well spaced keys. It even has arrow buttons to move the cursor around with. Typing on this phone is joy, and yes I know you can type fast on the iPhone, but you do not, can not, get the physical tactile pleasure offered up by the E7′s keyboard.

And then there is the HDMI output. Very cool. Lets you plug your phone into your TV and play movies from your phone directly on your TV. Of course it is a drag having to copy the movie on to the phone first, so Nokia equipped this phone (and the N8) with USB-on-the-go technology. So don’t copy the movie on to the phone, simply stick a USB memory stick containing the movie into the phone and off you go. When I tried the HDMI movie playing business on the N8 I wasn’t that impressed as the N8 didn’t support enough video formats to my liking, e.g. it couldn’t handle XViD (which my Samsung Galaxy S could by the way). Hopefully the E7′s can do better.

Some other cool hardware features on the E7 include a SIM card slot in the side, non-removable battery, no back panel to slide off, compass, accelerometer, and of course it is a quad band phone, which means it will work pretty much everywhere in the world, even in the US. And of course as you would expect, call quality is good.

Ok, so I guess I can’t ignore the elephant in the room any longer. I have to say something about the software on the phone. As you probably know Nokia has ditched Symbian as its top-end OS in favour of Windows Phone 7, and you can see why. Don’t get me wrong, Symbian is not a bad phone OS – it even has proper multi-tasking – but the interface is old and clunky compared with iOS and Android. And there are few apps, a situation that will worsen now that Nokia has ditched Symbian. For example using the iPhone I can control my Crestron home automation system using an app from Crestron, I can control all the TVs in my house using an app called Plugplayer which connects DLNA compatible media sources to media players. The list goes on. Try finding similar apps that will run on the Nokia. Good luck.

I can’t wait for Nokia to bring out an E7 running Microsoft Windows Phone 7. It will be fantastic. In the meantime, I am using the Symbian E7. I will run the Crestron and Plugplayer apps on my iPad and use my iPhone as an iPod.

So anyway my new Motorola Droid Pro arrived just over a week ago. My initial impressions were a mixed bag. I liked the relatively low weight, when compared with my HTC G2/Desire Z, and liked not having to flip the phone into landscape mode in order to type on the keyboard, but wasn’t impressed by the screen, which apart from being as small as the screen on the Palm Pre, was not as bright and clear as I expected. The keys were also surprisingly difficult to type on. They are small and have ridges that are unlike other keypads I have experienced. Guess this will get better as I get used to the phone.

I wasn’t surprised when the phone prompted me for a code to unlock it. My supplier, CA-Cellular, warned me that the phone was locked to Verizon, and that they will email me the unlock code. When the code arrived a day later, I was however surprised when entering it failed to unlock the phone. A few email exchanges later I received another code from my supplier, which also didn’t work. I then bought my own unlock codes through Swiftunlocks, but knew I had a problem when these guys sent me the same two codes I had received from my supplier previously. With the aid of Google I soon discovered that the anal suits at Verizon have implemented a sophisticated locking mechanism that changes the lock codes continuously over the air. So apparently the only way to get the code is to phone Verizon and ask pretty please. Except they won’t give it to you if you are not a Verizon customer, which of course I am not, living in South Africa. So I had to send my phone back to my supplier, and am now waiting to see if they succeed in unlocking it. It has been more than a week, so am getting worried…

Don’t know about you, but I think these restrictive business practices are really irritating, out of sync with customer sentiments, and am convinced that they don’t result in the outcomes the providers are seeking. Why lock the phone to your network? If the customer wants to buy a contract from a particular network he will. And a willing customer is the best kind. You know why I don’t have an iPhone 4? Because once I have replaced my normal sim with a micro sim, it makes it that much harder to use another phone again. Apple clearly went the micro sim route as a way to lock in their customers. This kind of strategy can work in the short term, and possibly even for a long time, but at some point it will back fire. Look at Egypt. Mubarak’s customers have had enough of being locked into a single party dictatorship, even if it has been benevolent to a degree. They want freedom of choice of their service provide aka government. Take note Verizon, and Apple. Upshot of all this is that I am still using my HTC G2, and am still happy with it. I know I have called it boring in a previous post, but it is a good phone. Excellent keyboard, fast processor, Android 2.2. Everything works well on it, except that it loses cellphone signal from time to time in places where other phones don’t.

So you want to buy an iPhone4 but don’t want to go through the hassle of a sim swap? Or you want to move your sim from your iPhone4 to another phone? Then a microSIM cutter and adaptors are what you need. Reason being that Apple has very cleverly introduced a smaller sim card called the microsim with the iPhone4 and the iPad. This makes it just that bit more inconvenient to switch from your iPhone to a competitor’s phone. But with the microsim adaptors, which I received included with my cutter product, the problem is solved. I picked mine up for around ZAR200 on BidorBuy .

Thanks to my trusty on-line mobile phone retailer Ca-Cellular I have the new Blackberry 9800 aka Torch in my hands. It is AT&T branded but that is the price you have to pay to be the first Torch owner in South Africa. Actually I bought two Torches. Gave one to my wife who is now completely in love with the device. She moved from a Blackberry Curve to the Torch, which is like moving from chalk to cheese. She loves the combination of large(ish) touchscreen, usual blackberry keyboard, and slicker new OS. I am somewhat more jaded and critical, having used the latest high-end Android devices and iPhone 4. But even I am taken with the device, which strikes a nice balance between touchscreen and keyboard. The new OS works well with both, making it easy and smooth to use whichever interface you want. Web browsing is also much improved, and the Torch has a proper Youtube client, not as good as on the iPhone or Android, but nearly. I quite like the new notification system and home page, and the integration with Twitter and Facebook is very good. Even though the OS is new, Blackberry users will be instantly at home, as the new UI is very similar to the old one. And the Blackberry’s bread and butter – email and messenger – work as well as it always has.

The device looks great and feels great in my hand. The spring-loaded slide mechanism works well also, making one handed use of the Torch a pleasure.

My only real complaint is the speed. It is not that the device is slow, but it is not snappy.

Will people queue for hours to get their hands on this device? No, but if you are a Blackberry fan you will love it. O, and if you are going to upgrade from your existing Blackberry to the Torch, make sure you download and install the latest version of Blackberry Desktop Manager on your pc. It will move all the data from your old Blackberry to the new one – contacts, emails, text messages, pictures, videos, wifi settings, everything.

If you haven’t yet guessed a number of the N8′s box, then you can use the following clue from Nokia RSA to help you: the correct box number is the sum of the N8 features. Click here to enter the competition

I suspect you can calculate the sum of the N8′s features from this text below:

Looking at some of the comments already made about this cutting edge handset, reviewers have found that the Symbian ^3 platform is the perfect fit to power the many demands on the device – and when paired with Nokia’s fresh, new UI, Nokia N8 users will discover that the device fits their mobile lifestyle like none other, supporting on-the-go activities ranging from social networking to visual multitasking.

And there’s much more going on above the platform – the Nokia N8 brings leading imaging capabilities with a 12MP Carl Zeiss optics and Xenon flash, High Definition (HD) viewing and sharing with Dolby Digital Plus surround sound and a Web TV application delivering TV programs, news and entertainment.
The N8 weighs a light and portable 135 grams and has 16 GB of memory. It also comes loaded with our FREE Ovi Maps walk and drive voice-guided navigation, Nokia Messaging and 6-months subscription to Ovi Music Unlimited (previously Comes with Music) Services. Please remember we will be holding another seven Nokia N8 giveaway competitions over the next seven weeks so make sure you come back to us next week to see if you have won. If not you will have a chance to win in our next N8 device competition giveaway held weekly so watch this space!

The Android Market is not available in all countries (yet). South Africa is one of the countries still left out in the cold. As a result SA Android users (HTC Magic, Dream, Hero, Desire, SonyEricsson X10, etcetera) can get only free apps from the Market. Some of the paid apps are available outside of the Market, usually by going directly to the developer, but some developers do not have payment mechanisms outside the Market. Enter the MarketEnabler. This clever bit of code fakes your rooted Android phone’s location (as seen by the Market). I have tried it on my HD2 running Android 2.2 and it worked. The Market now thinks my phone is on T-Mobile in the US and is happy to show me paid apps and let me buy them using my visa. Priceless.

Download MarketEnabler here (free of charge of course): http://code.google.com/p/market-enabler/

It has been four months since I got my Milestone/Droid, and I am still using it daily, well most days. It is not as if I haven’t played with other phones over the past four months, but I keep going back to the Milestone. It is just such a good all-round performer, with a large, beautiful, capacitive touch screen, fast processor, Android 2.1, and best of all a large qwerty keyboard. And Motorola has been good in providing regular firmware updates over the air. Only yesterday they announced that the Milestone will be getting Android 2.2 shortly. The Google Nexus One is the only other phone that has received the latest Android update to date.

My favourite Android apps used on the Milestone are ChompSMS, Twitdroid, WordPress (with which I update my blog directly from my phone), Scan2PDF (with which I can scan a document using the camera to PDF) and best of all Touchdown by Nitrodesk with which I sync my corporate emails, calendar, tasks and contacts. Touchdown syncs with pretty much any ExchangeServer, but I use it to sync with my company’s Lotus Notes server via Lotus Notes Traveler.

I saw the first local mention of the Milestone in the Sunday Times over the weekend, so South African consumers should be able to get a Milestone on contract soon. Go get one, you won’t be disappointed.

Alastair says the Palm Pre/Pixie Plus will be in SA within weeks. Iti Distributors (I think) is bringing them into the country officially. I would like to know who they are going to market the phones, and are they going to supply them to the local mobile network operators which can make them available on airtime contract upgrades. Let me know if you hear anything more Alastair.

Check this graph from Business Insider. Tells a story doesn’t it. RIM has been steadily increasing its smartphone market share in the US, mainly by expanding into the consumer market. I have been seeing this strategy here in South Africa as well, with multi-coloured Blackberries heavily advertised on TV and print media, clearly targeting non-business users. The fixed-price surf-all-you-can subscription is a good strategy that is winning many new users.

The graph also shows how badly Microsoft needs Windows Phone 7. Apple has had a strong run but have leveled off recently, maybe because people are waiting for the next OS release. Google’s Android going the right direction also. I guess Symbian has yet to break into the US market, but what can be said about Palm? Or more importantly what can Palm do to reverse the trend? WebOS is excellent, but I think Palm needs better hardware, it needs a killer device. In the meantime it needs to push the Pre/Pixie through as many networks as possible, in as many countries as possible, it needs to spend aggressively on advertising, and of course it needs to open its app store to everyone, not just to US users.

I thought I saw Mark Benford, played by Joseph Fiennes, use a Palm Pre in this week’s episode of Flashforward. Couldn’t be sure as the phone was not displayed prominently enough. Anyone else see it?