New global phone: Droid Razr

Entering a new era in my smart phone ownership. 4G along with the global access that I need for work.

I just got issued a new Motorola Droid Razr for work. This is a welcome upgrade to my weathered and road weary Droid 2 Global.

I opted to forego the Apple iPhone 4s (which many of my colleagues picked) for the Droid as I wanted to finally get up to 4G speeds. Especially since the contract term for the phones at work are 2 years, I did not want to be holstered to an essentially already 2 year old platform.

So far I am not disappointed in the phone. Compared to the Gingerbread Android OS the new Ice Cream Sandwich OS is already a great improvement. the OS is responsive and intuitive as I expected from the Android system. Not to mention that with the Dual Core processor, I have much less lagginess in basic operation.

The phone is amazingly thin and light weight. Even in it's case (a silicon model ordered for me as part of the "package" our office decided on).





Plusses

• Bigger screen (4.3 inch)
• 4G speeds
• Higher resolution
• dual processors
• more RAM
• More battery life (allegedly)
• 
  

Minuses

• shipped without SD card upgrade (only 8 GB onboard)
• no QWERTY slideout keyboard
• No removable-swappable battery (but hopefully longer battery life)

Already this phone is a little off the cutting edge. As Motorola just released the newest generation of line of phones. the Razr M, a soon to be released RAZR HD, and RAZR HD MAXX. But it seems that besides OS and processor versions the RAZR and the newer lines are still highly comparable, and I don't yet feel too  much phone envy. 

Taking the phone on the first road trip this coming week, so we will see just how well it performs in the field. But to date I am pleased with the phone, and glad I opted out of the iPhone.

Mechanical Turk Work: A little experiment

Registered recently to work as a mechanical turk for Amazon. Will post here progress and supply feedback. don't know what I am in for. Other than getting paid to wile away the hours on the internet.

So far the interface is a bit of a pain. The list of available HITs (human intelligence tasks) is not very friendly. Keeps resetting to the top of the list after viewing then rejecting tasks from later pages. Does not recall tasks that have already been performed (for which you are no longer eligible in some cases).

But to date I have earned $1.60.  Almost as much as my blog.....

Review: ZAGG smartbuds

Of recent tech purchases the ones I get the most use of are my ZAGGsparq and ZAGG SmartBuds.

The  ZAGGsparq is a battery back-up that allows me to recharge my USB powered devices. Most often my 6 O'clock brick (Motorola DROID Global ) could potentially leave me without the needed web access and GPS I might need on my travels. But with the ZAGGsparq I am able to fully recharge my phone in just under an hour. What is the big deal about that you might ask? Well how about doing that while not having to stay tethered to a car or wall outlet.

The 6000 mAh battery within the  ZAGGsparq allows me to merely pull out a micro USB cord from my pocket plug it between the  ZAGGsparq  and my phone and bring the battery up to full all while potentially on the move. Walking, riding, skiing, canoeing, or any other mode of transport. While in Europe for my frequent business travels I am able to universally charge my phone without having to carry around much more than the  ZAGGsparq  and one cable. I carry two cables a USB mini, with a mini-micro adapter plus my iPod cable.

A number of times I have helped out my coworkers and felly traveler by charging up their iPhones and other devices while on the move. If you have ever truly relied on your phone while traveling you know how important this is.

The  ZAGG SmartBuds have been equally important. Their simple but elegant design solve the problem posed by many of the in-ear Phone headsets; "How do I keep from yanking the buds out of my ears constantly?  and How do I keep them handy when I am not listening or talking?"

The  ZAGG SmartBuds have a long enough cord to leave the device in my pocket while walking and keeping the head phone cord looped around my neck when not in use.

This design always leaves me wondering how nobody else ever thought of it first. Now it is simple enough to use the PTT (push to talk) button which allows for phone answering while hooked up to my phone, or to pause and play my music wen hooked up to my Apple iPod nano 16 GB Blue (4th Generation) [Previous Model]. Though I suppose it is hte same if you have 6th Generation nano  or  an Apple iPod touch.

the $100 dollars I spent for my ZAGGsparq and the $50 for the  ZAGG SmartBuds, was money well spent.  Actually, I did get mine on special when they ran this special. Which may or may not be active at the moment. But it was enough to convince be to buy another set later.

Limited time offer from ZAGG.com: Get free ZAGGsmartbuds when you buy a ZAGGsparq!

XCom Global MiFi: Review after "practical" use

During the meetings today, I ran some short tests to the effectiveness of the MiFi wireless access point we rented from XCom. This post for example I create using the connection created by the device, and try to upload some pictures and see how well it works.

speed tests with connection via HSPA

http://www.speedtest.net/result/1458749570.png

this image uploaded in about 4-5 seconds during this test 0.5 MB

larger resolution images:

15-17 seconds for this higher resolution 1.3 MB

I dare not at this time try to stream a video (i should be paying attention)....
and see if location in the room finds me access to the 3g network which is not consistent in this area of Italy.

Cannot make any complaints about the Device or the service (it is not XCom issue that the Italian ether is not friendly for a 3G signal during my trip).

Likes:

• relative ease: ordered online, shipped to office, flew to Italy and Bang on the internet
• no surprises: Flat rate for the daily internet hook-up
• Multiple users on single wireless connection and rate-plan
• reasonable price of occasional short trips, with my amount of travel I might be better off getting a local flat rate SIM

Dislikes:

• Battery life (could use for about 2-3 hours on single charge, supplied back up battery is helpful. but in Foreign land where converters and power is a premium might be nice to last longer, or ship with a USB-micro cable so I could charge on the fly with my Zagg Sparq2.0
• shipping costs if booked less than 10 days in advance
• Italian SIM did not work in cities where I had connecting flights (Netherlands) may have been my fault, for not indicating that I needed a roaming SIM

Overall I have to say that for the occasional traveler this could be listed among the essentials, especially as US mobile providers clamp down on roaming Data charges. Nobody has All-You-Can-Eat global any more.

Xcom Global is a winner

XCom Global: Mobile Hotspot review (pre-trip)

For an upcoming trip, I along with 5 colleagues will be traveling to Italy for a Corporate Sales Meeting. With all  our sales people out of the office, this could be damaging for our ability to respond to software licensing concerns, sales issues, and general business. To minimize any potential fallout from falling off the grid for a few days we rented a Wireless Hotpot from XCom global.

What arrives from XCom

Once you order the device from the companies website you will receive (a few day prior to the start of the trip)  the contents shown above and a carry case in the mail. They use a standard mi-fi by Novatel with a pre-installed SIM for the country we plan to travel to, in this case Italy.

Rates quoted start at $14.95 per day for "unlimited data" XCom does not mention any variable speed throttling but we will have to see.

To use the Access Point we should be able to find the device from the WiFi finder of any of our laptops and smart phones up to 5 Devices at a time.

Once connected the first browser window brings you straight to the admin page and Login window. After keying in the Login you can connect to the internet via the MiFi.


Another option is to buy your own device and use a prepaid or Flat rate SIM card from Whichever European country you like.

Zagg Sparq2.0 initial thoughts

Last month I mentioned that I was going to order the Zagg Sparq2.0 emergency battery charger for my own personal use. I unpacked my own this past weekend and charged it Saturday night. The instructions ask for a 7-9 hour initial charge and i followed those instructions.

After the over-night charge I left the Sparq unused for three days to see if the battery leached power the way some negative reviewers had said it would. Today (Tuesday) was the first shot at using. My own Droid2 had run its battery down to just over 15% (the point where i get reminders to charge). I plugged the unit in to the MicroUSB cord and my phone. 55 minutes later my phone was upto 70% and the Sparq showed all 4 LEDs (effectively fully charged).



Later, my colleague plugged in his Android Phone. He charged his up from about 20% to 85% in just over and hour leaving my Sparq with 2 LEDs lit. Supposedly at a 50% reserve. So far, so good. I will use only the Sparq2.0 over the next day or so to provide my phone charge to see if I can get the 4 charges from it the the manufacturer promises. But I am impressed so far.

At this point a must have for all business travelers who use smart phones.

Global communication: Smart phones, data plans, etc

This post today is coming to you from the Air France lounge in Dusseldorf, where normally there is NO WiFi access for free (Pay as you go from Vodafone) or some pitifully unstable walk up terminals (usually crash every time you get 3/4 of the thing you try to accomplish on the terminal complete.

Nope, no more. Today I am posting this using my Motorola DROID 2 Global Android Phone, from Verizon Wireless with my Global Data plan.

How? you may ask. Tethering which is usually blocked by Verizon. Since they want to sell you the Novatel MiFi 2200 Mobile Wi-Fi Modem (Verizon Wireless). But it is possible instead to use your own Android Phone with data plan to accomplish the same thing.

First get yourself a phone that is Global Data ready. I chose the Verizon Droid2. Android OS and Fully Rooted (which means I ran a simple app on it that gives me super user capability--jail breaking).

Second make sure you have the Verizon Global Data plan. Verizon is one of the few cell carriers that sells a All-you-can-eat data plan that is truly All-you-can-eat. No limits (at least so far).

Next install the Android App. "Wireless Tether" this app lets you connect to your phone wia secure WPA or WEP connection to use the data that your phone down loads.

Simple as that.

The Birth of a Word: TED Talk 2011

TED talks are amazing places to watch, hear, learn, and discover some of the most amazing things. From Deb Roy's presentation on the Birth of a word it is tricky to force oneself to get over the technological tricks they had to invent to perform this research (video correcting 10+ fisheye video feeds into a near 3D representation of Deb  Roys home that can allow us to follow him, his wife, their son and the nanny through their house for a few years) to discover the patterns in that lead to the successful emergence of word use.



Had to watch this a couple of times before I could let the point of it, sink past my utter amazement as to HOW they parsed it, to what they found. The 120 Terabytes of data, the linking of the various feeds into a single cohesive (and virtually 3D) time space environment. And get where it was going.

The space time tracking of movement in the video to find the feeds where they could locate his sons specific word use. the ability to get audio transcripts from disparate video sources into a coherent "stream" of communication. This turns into different methods of tracing the communication threads throughout our society and our social structures.

Not sure what it all means yet, but to quote Deb Roy and son.   "wow"

Don't Talk with your Mouth full: Technopark Zurich Brownbag lunch presentation

I have been invited to make a presentation at the Zurich Technopark. Apparently the Self-Proclaimed-Die-Expert and Techni-ho is a "world renowned" expert on Technical Evangelism.

I will be presenting on the theme:

Selling innovation/change

Technical Evangelism by the numbers

The basic theme of the presentation will be a return to one of my earlier concepts; and attempt to quantify the amount of resistance that people have to new ideas:

I doubt that any of the 3 people who read this blog will necessarily be in the Zurich Area this week (the presentation is Thursday the 20th of January, 2011 at 12:30). But if I cared whether or not people listened or read what I do, this blog would not exist. 

I will consider posting the entire presentation after the debut on Thursday.

Droid2 Global by Verizon: thoughts and review

I just got the new Droid2 Global by Moto for Verizon (not just got it. I already took it out for a 8000 mile trip to EU and Switzerland and back).

I have to say that so far I am VERY VERY happy with the performance of the phone. For starters I should mention that my previous phone was TERRIBLE (BB 8830 World Edition). The old phone was about as advanced as a set of tin cans connected with string compared to the Droid2.

Not gonna run down some kind of over the top Cnet type benchmark for you but here is what I like:

• sync with MS Exchange server from work was seemless (mail, contacts, and Calenders)
• Wifi
• GPS (with navigation by google maps)
• Touchscreen
• Slide-out keyboard
• overall communication options (phone good, VOIP using Fring, IM using GoogleTalk, SMS-oip using GoogleVoice, social stalking using Facebook/twitter/LinkedIn)

no issues getting data overseas (once i turned it on) and everything else has been simple. Not using it too much for games (Angry Birds), or music or Movies. But using it a personal communication hub has been perfect.

more as I use it more....

Business Travel and organization

Keeping track of you travel itineraries while on the go can be very complex. Carrying about printouts of hotel confirmations, flight information, transportation requirements and other trip essentials can be downright frustrating and risky. After all, losing those pieces of paper leaves you at the mercy of the hotel, airline, and can put in arrears in a hurry.

Lately I have been using two different business travel tools, WorldMate Live and TripIt.

Each has mobile applications that assist in keeping track of itineraries. Merely email your official itinerary from any number of air carriers, hotels, or travel agents and your itinerary automatically updates. Once the itinerary is loaded you will be able to view your travel plans via the mobile application or any web browser.

http://www.worldmate.com/blackberry/
http://www.tripit.com/uhp/blackberry

From the mobile app you can quickly find:

• Dates and times of flights and hotels bookings
• confirmation numbers (as long as they were included in your confirmation letter
• accommodation names
• Maps (based on addresses included in confirmations

For the most part they both provide the promised itinerary details, well and serve their need. So it comes down to the other value-adds.

In this I prefer the Worldmate Mobile for its:

• currency converter (3 currencies simultaneously)
• world clock (4 cities at a time)
• weather look-up
• hotel booking (direct from hotels.com)

TripIt is a little quicker with the loading of new itineraries, and has more social networking plug-ins (if you care), and an online calender that Outlook or other iCal or *.ics feed readers. This means that you automatically get the itinerary added to your Calendaring application. Pretty handy.

Maybe in a few thousand more miles I will have a better read on which is better, but for now they each have their merits, Worldmate on my BB and TripIt on the web.

What it's like to own an Apple product - The Oatmeal

What it's like to own an Apple product - The Oatmeal

The Oatmeal once again hits the nail on the head, such a clear lens on the world is the OATMEAL.

alternate reality 1977: we are not time travelers

the art of alex varanese - alt/1977: we are not time travelers see the rest

Cool pics of what it would have looked like if the tech of the current era was inserted into the style of the '70's