Title speaks for itself. Got my free iPhone case in the mail today, per Steve Jobs. Not that I really needed it, but I guess it’s more or less a souvenir of all the shenanigan regarding the “death grip” and the “antenna design flaws” that Apple was facing. Enjoy.
Be sure to watch in HD!
Above is my first attempt at creating something in the new iMovie app for the iPhone. It was shot and edited completely ON the iPhone. This is a testament to the power of the backlit sensor. Although only 5 megapixels (we say that like its VGA), as opposed to it’s rival EVO 8 megapixel.. the quality is superb in low lit situation, both video and still image.
Editing on this phone was a breeze, very responsive and didn’t slow down one bit. Amazingly, it didn’t drain my battery either! The basic necessities are there, and by no means is this a replacement for Final Cut Pro. Overall, I’m thoroughly impressed.
When you’re ready to export, you have 3 options: Medium -360p, Large -540p and HD -720p, all in the .mov QuickTime format. The clip quickly renders and saves to your photo album. The only downside, when exporting directly to YouTube from your Photos on the iPhone, the quality is degraded. In order to maintain quality, I had to sync my phone with iPhoto and export the file from the laptop onto YouTube.com. No biggy, since the sync/file transfer occurs seamlessly.
Tags: app, apple, edit, imovie, imovie app, iPhone 4, iphone4, lowlight | 1 Comment »Other things that I didn’t really touch base on:
Depending on how you use your device, results do vary… however in my case, the EVO’s battery life depleted pretty fast. I would use the device just as I did on the iPhone 1st gen and 3G… I do understand that the battery is removable (and therefore you could possible buy another battery for a second charge) and there are such things as task killers/managers, but one shouldn’t have to take these measures to get a full day’s worth of use. It also comes with the territory of having a large screen to power…however, I believe that there is still room for power management improvement! The touted “true multitasking” is probably the biggest contributor to battery depletion. It is fluid and does a really good job at juggling all your running apps…BUT, this is the very reason why Apple didn’t employ multi-tasking until they came up with a better way of multitasking.
“Apple claims their multitasking will save battery life and resources, unlike the competition. But how?
The reason is simple: This is not 100% true multitasking. Not in the sense that developers define it: All system resources are available to all applications, with the system assuming the role of a traffic controller, giving preference to some tasks and less preference to others as needed.
Free-for-all multitasking will consume way too many resources, especially memory. This will make the system choke, given the limited memory available in these devices. The CPU would also be taxed, and it would deplete the battery life quicker while slowing down applications running on the foreground.
Apple’s method, however, is quite clever: Basically, it allows you to pause applications—like you can pause them in any UNIX-based operating system, while enabling some special services to allow some types of tasks—like receiving calls or playing music—to run on the background.”
Click here to read Gizmodo’s well put explanation in full.
Flash: Having had a phone (iPhone) that didn’t support Flash and then owning one that did (Evo), I now see why Apple thinks it’s unnecessary. a) Flash, at best, loaded very slowly b) When it came to ads, side-bar Advertisements loaded well (how annoying) c) touch interface and Flash… not very applicable.
Apple: Better battery performance, the battery is about two-thirds of the phone’s innards. Just the perfect size, not too small, not enormously big in your hand. The OS seems consistent across the board. Retina Display. SUPER CLEAR.
Small things on the EVO: No native screen capture, no native notepad, only the power button wakes the screen. Volume rocker does not wake the screen…and lastly, for such a large screen, the spacebar in the keypad was very small. My sentences would.look.like.this.,hitting.the.period.instead. of spacebar.
Tags: 4g, android, apple, att, evo, evo 4g, htc, iphone, iphone4, spring | 2 Comments »Got mine in the mail this morning!
EDIT: Here’s the real McCoy
So, I haven’t been in the market for a cell phone for a good while… ever since I got my hands on the 1st gen and 3rd gen (3G) iPhone. Every phone that has come out since then, I’ve completely ignored. Simply put, the iPhone catered to all my telecom needs plus more. I was so satisfied, I was never made curious the slightest bit to look at other phones in the market, until recently.
HTC has made 2 handsets that have peaked my interest. The Nexus One and the HTC HD2. Hardware specs on both phones have caught my attention, as they both are running at 1GHz. People! Some computers don’t even run at that speed (including yours! jk.) Form factor and hardware are very sleek. Most especially on the HTC HD2, the screen is 4.3 inches, roughly 1 inch bigger than the iPhone. In terms of phones…relatively speaking, that’s a big difference in size– It’s HUGE! It’s also thin as a pencil, which is quite impressive!
The only thing that has me in a bind is the Operating Systems on both of the phones. Nexus One- I’ve never used Android, and my first (biased) impression of it reads, “iPhone’s ugly cousin”. Despite that biased and naive notion, I’m pretty sure it’s solid. I have faith in Google and what they do. So with that said, I think I could become aquatinted with the Android OS. Secondly, on the HTC HD2, it is loaded with WindowsMobile 6.5 (which is a completely horrible step backwards into 1999). According to reports that I’ve read, the phone will not be loaded nor support Windows Mobile 7.0 (please inform me if this is incorrect). In attempt to offset the lameless of WinMo 6.5, HTC has developed what’s called “HTC Sense”, a User Interface (UI) to run ontop of windows to give it a more user friendly and sleek interface. I tried it out myself at the T-Mobile store, and although it was pretty to the eyes, it felt (operated) a bit clunky, trying harder than it should. Despite the awesome hardware specs, the HTC HD2 looks to be stuck in a OS time warp. I toyed with the idea that, if I could possibly get accustomed to the Android OS, then I could maybe port that OS onto the HTC HD2? Reading forums, it looks like this idea is also not yet possible (again, please inform me if you know otherwise!).
As I interacted with my iPhone all day, I would look at it and realize how much cleaner the phone is as a whole compared to anything out there… The platform is very solid. The UI is well uniformed. The Apps are top notch. The touch screen is superior to any other phone on the market…but performance has just slowed down. A bigger screen would be nice. A faster processor would also be nice. At the end of the day, I keep torturing myself with the idea of compromise. Do I keep the slow hardware with excellent OS and software? Do I upgrade to sweet hardware specs with a shoddy OS?
All this contemplating and I find this: iPhone 4G announcement TOMORROW, was this just coincidence , or did the Apple heavens descend upon me providing me ultimate salvation, leading me not into temptation? Just as I was on the verge of leaving the iPhone in all of it’s glory, el Jobs comes in on a white horse to deliver the good news. If the rumors are correct, then this iPhone 4.0 and iPhone HD look pretty promising…
What are your thoughts. What are your suggestions? To those who have used any of the mentioned devices and/or Operating Systems… give me some insight! Thanks!
Tags: 0, 4, 4g, apple, cell phone, google, htc, htc hd2, iphone, nexus, nexus one, phone | No Comments »Disclaimer: All bias aside and trying to speak from a non-Apple Fanboy point of view.
Okay, so the age long question of “What’s it for?” will soon be answered. We look at the device and fail to think outside the box. We look at it and only interpret “oh okay, so it’s an eReader.” or “oh, it’s like a laptop..but not?!”. Lastly, we’ve all said it… “OH, it’s a GIANT iPod Touch/iPhone!” with a mocking smirk…But the funny thing about that, in the same breathe should be the very reason to be excited about it’s release.
When the iPhone first came out, we were limited to the very few NATIVE apps, no app store, no games, no nothing:
To say none the least, we were satisfied with that, naive to the fact that our minds were about to be blown with the endless possibilities of function via the App Store and Jailbraking. Since the release of the App Store in a later firmware, people have used this…phone for everything.
Now pause. think. consider. “What if I took this UI (User Interface) and made it 4 times bigger?!” Considering the size of the iPhone and how easy and fun it has become to interact with the apps STYLUS free, in a multi-touch dimension… what kind of possibilities will make itself evident in an environment with much more screen real estate?!
Put the two together. infinite development of more apps + huge multi-touch screen =
SOMETHING LIKE THIS:
DJ equipment has always been evolving more and more into the digital realm: Turntables> CDJ’s> Final Scratch and Serato>iPod decks> etc. There is no substitute for the real deal, but in an age where digital is slowly becoming industry standard, this comes the closest to merging the two together.
* I could probably get away with using the digital turntable decks, but for sure I’d want a physical cross fader.
This isn’t the sole reason why you should be excited for the iPad, but a mere example of what could and is coming. Don’t let this example limit or narrow your thinking of what this device is for. Just remember the times when you looked at your iPhone/iPod Touch and thought “if only this screen was bigger, I could…” while at work, at home, etc.
Keep in mind, this is the same company that made the mouse available to the consumer in the late 70′s and early 80′s. Before that, it was strictly keyboard–how archaic. Multi-touch + huge screen is a good thing.
Stretch your mind and get ready for things to change.
Tags: app, apple, apps, ipad, iphone, multitouch, touch | No Comments »