Monthly Archives: April 2013

Nexus 7 Test Drive Part 3

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battery life
Here is the final part of the test drive.
Day 5
 
Went to use the Nexus this morning and I had put it on charge overnight so it should be full again. Unplugged it and switched it on and everything OK. Used it for a few hours on and off, in between laptop usage etc. Then glanced at the battery symbol to see it was very low. Brought down the info and it indeed was at 31%. I then thought through all I had done and thought there must have be a battery issue. Sorry it wasn’t the Nexus fault it was mine. I realised I had indeed plugged it in overnight, but had not pushed the connector in until it clicked into the Nexus. So it had not been on charge at all. DOH!
Anyhow back to the unit and all its uses. Today I played with it and pushed it to switch between Apps and Surf the net and my usual Facebook and social media feeds for checking. I read and answered emails on it and did it falter? No, it just kept producing the same high level of performance.
I intend tomorrow to take a screen shot of the battery in the evening after the unit has been used during the day, just to prove to you that it does live up to the praise I am heaping upon it.
I have also asked two contacts of mine, one who is an IT Guru and super GEEK and another who is a discerning architect. Both have the Nexus 7 and I simply asked what are your thoughts. They both heaped praise on it. One stating that he uses it more than his laptop now. The other said very fast Internet surfing. No complaints, even his kids use it and think it its brilliant. So it’s not just me that is experiencing this performance.
 
I will report tomorrow and sum up my overall opinion of the Nexus 7.
I bet you can’t wait.
 
Day 6
 
Used tablet most of the day today. External locations connecting to networks easily and fast. Tried screen tester programme to see graphics and speed. All I can say is it doesn’t phase this unit at all.
I will miss this tablet when giving it back and can easily see myself getting one of my own.
Just to round things up and to prove the battery usage I have attached a photo screenshot of the battery at the end of day 5.
 
To summarise
 
This has been a great test drive and I can only recommend all aspects of the Nexus 7. It has not let me down no matter what I have thrown at it. Even moving from a 10 inch to a 7 inch has not phased me due to the excellent resolution.
The cost of this unit is also excellent and the apps available through the play store are just amazing.
How would I rate it? 9 out of 10. I had to drop one point just to seem fair.
Hope you found this useful, let me know your thoughts.

Nexus 7 Test Drive Part 2

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Google nexus 7

Here is the much anticipated part two of my journey with the Nexus 7 tablet test drive.

Day 3

Not using it today as fixed to my desk, however went down to switch it on and take a photo and it would not switch on. Did some Googling and found that this happens and holding the power button is the only way to get it to come on. So held the power button in for 30 to 40 secs and she came to life. Put her on charge just in case.
Will check later today. That’s not a good feature though, is there a problem here with the Nexus 7, the only one I have found so far, but could be major.
Have been using the Nexus since around 5pm and no problems to report. 10pm at night and battery is still 73%. This is exceptional. Read a few chapters of a book today using it at lunchtime and it was very easy to read and battery not really affected.
Overall day 3 and still very impressed. More positives than negatives. Exceptional for the money they are asking for this unit, £159 for 16Gb at time of going to print. And fast and very responsive. I think one of the main things that impresses me is the responsiveness of the screen to touch. The latest jelly bean keyboard using a form of swipe is amazing. Using it to type this. Well see you again on day 4.

Day 4

Sorry guys it’s been a quieter day today. All has gone well. I am to be honest finding it difficult to find negatives with this unit. One maybe the lack of camera on the rear of the unit. It might be handy having one. However, it is not something I am missing, so this might be a personal choice.
Other than that I can’t find any other negatives. Battery has been Perfect all day and I have used it a lot this evening to check Facebook and the Internet about various topics. At end of day Battery was still showing 28%. I am putting it on charge anyway as I intend to use it a lot tomorrow. I can’t seem to phase this unit. It handles all my important apps, such as email, two separate email clients and 3 accounts. Internet browsing using Chrome. Social media packages such as Facebook, Hootsuite and LinkedIn.

No, there has so far only been the one occasion when it did not start and had to have the power button held in. Other than that it has been exceptional. The weight is right, the size is right and the speed and responsiveness is perfect. Most of all the battery life is the best I have experienced on a tablet computer.

Well, I will see you on Day 5 and 6, we will see how things go.

You can also get a 32Gb version of the unit for £199 at time of going to press.

See you again soon.

 

Nexus 7 Test Drive Part 1

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Google nexus 7

Yes I know I am late in this as everyone and their mother seems to have done a review already on the nexus 7. But there is nothing like actually test driving something for yourself to be able to give a honest review and tell your followers all the good things and bad things.

So here I go, I have been given a Nexus 7 to test drive for a few weeks and see if I can adapt from using a 10 inch screen down to a 7 inch. To be honest I thought this would be a major problem and one of my first points to raise in a review, however here is what I am finding so far. You decide: –

Day 1

1. Smaller size. (Positive) (198.5 x 120 x 10.45 mm)
2. Good resolution (Positive) (7” 1280×800 (216ppi))
3. Fast (Positive) (NVIDIA® Tegra® 3 quad-core processor)
4. Stable (Positive) (Android 4.2 (Jelly Bean))
5. Easy to use (Positive)
6. Easy to handle (Positive)
7. Lighter to carry around (Positive)  (340g (WiFi Only))
8. Need a case that stands by itself as opposed to flexible case. (Negative)
9. Smaller screen size not an issue as I thought it would be (Positive)
10. Battery life so far very good, day one (Positive) (4,325 mAh battery)
11. Connection very fast to networks and internet. (Positive) (Wi-Fi 802.11 b/g/n)

9.30pm day one and battery is still 65%. Have used it a reasonable amount so very good battery usage. Liking it a lot. The screen size does not seem to be an issue and I have adapted very easily to the 7 inch factor. The resolution is amazing of course and this certainly helps.(7” 1280×800 (216ppi))
Struggling to find real negatives with this.

Day 2

Used it on and off today. Battery still 75% at 8pm at night.
Connected to a number of different networks and all went well. Still no problems with anything. Read material on it today and screen was OK with reading in a number of different lighting conditions. The real benefit was it fitted into my inside pocket of my jacket, my 10 inch can’t do this I am afraid.
Negatives today, none to report so far.
Did not charge overnight will see tomorrow how battery is and how long it lasts.
56% when I shut it down at 11.45pm

Will report as the test drive progresses and see what else I find, so far no real negatives to report, but I am sure there must be some. I suppose it would be good to try a Wi-Fi and data package Nexus, maybe next time.

Watch this space and see how this develops.

Which tablet device do you have and why have you chosen it? What rings your bells when you think of such a device?

Ian Thomson

Founder/Senior Trainer/Consultant

IT Turning Point

Bombardment …….

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information overloadThis post is more of a rant, and a look at how things have changed over the last few years.

I have been in and around the wonderful and ever changing world of IT, and all things geek, for over 13 years now – and have seen and experienced many changes in how information is delivered and handled.

Recently, I suddenly realised that I was getting bombarded with information from all sides. Not only that, but pressures had increased almost in proportion to the information streams. Let me give you an example of what I mean.

It is not so long ago that I remember thinking, “Wouldn’t it be great to get my emails sent to my phone so that I can deal with them at any time”. Now of course I have what I wished for, and have three email accounts feeding to my smart phone. I also have social media messages rattling through my phone, as well as tweets, re-tweets, Facebook and Google+ updates that keep rolling in.

Of course, the physical number of hours in my day have proportionally increased to handle this new and exciting stream of constant interaction … wait a minute – no they haven’t! I simply find myself working outside what I would consider normal working hours in order to keep all these areas active.

What has all this meant? For starters, it has driven information delivery in such a way that you can know about something before you see it on the news or in a paper. It has also unfortunately increased peoples expectation of instant responses to emails, messages etc. – which only leads to a heightened stress factor.

As a result, prioritising then becomes even more of a necessity. This helps you or I cope when handling the huge volume of data, but often offends someone at the other end who feels we have not given a timely answer to their very social approach.

Hence, my title for this rant … sorry post … Bombardment.

How do you manage your interactions with today’s Technology and communication?

I am considering buying a pigeon coup and going back to pigeon post.

Let me know.

Augmented Reality

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augmented realityYou may, or may not, have heard the term Augmented Reality being used. In fact, you may have even experienced it without knowing it as Augmented Reality.

So what is Augmented Reality?

To put it simply: Augmented Reality is taking what your natural eyes can see, and then adding something to it, ie. Augmenting it. It can be found on modern smart phones via apps that will create extra content on top of what the phone camera sees. Google maps can do this for you, adding information about your current locale – for example it can show you nearby restaurants, landmarks etc.

This all sounds amazing! When can we have more of this?

Well Google, among other tech companies, have made the decision to take this further and are developing a product they call Google Glasses. You wear them just like normal spectacles, and they have a small screen that sits in front of one eye. This screen can feed you info based on what a small camera built into the glasses is seeing, which is the same as what your actual eyes are seeing.

Over the last few months the announcement of this technology has led to campaigns such as the Stop the Cyborgs Campaign. This has been setup by people who have privacy concerns about this new technology. People have even gone as far as creating spoof videos of people using them to find out private details about others – they see this technology as a breach of privacy. (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8UjcqCx1Bvg)

So can we use Augmented Reality safely?

Augmented Reality is already here, and people have been using it successfully in industry and other areas to enhance their working practices for quite some time. So yes, it can definitely be used safely.

Another clever use I have discovered is an Augmented Reality business card. If you point your phone camera at the card, it produces a 3D image of the person along with all their relevant details. A similar use of this technique was a picture of a car that had an accompanying phone application. When you downloaded the application and pointed the phone at the picture of a car, a 3D model of the car would appear. This could then be viewed from all angles, and even zoomed into to see the car in more detail.

These are both innovative and clever uses of this technology, and I can see how they will benefit us long term.

Should we be worried?

I for one prefer to consider the positives over the negatives, and when balanced up the glasses are only pulling the info already available on the World Wide Web. If you put all your info on the web, then people can find it with a phone, tablet, computer or glasses – it exists in the public domain. I actually get quite worried at how relaxed some people are with their use of social media, especially how much they willingly share about themselves. If we limit what we post online, then there will be less out there to be found.

For business use I can only see positive aspects, as this will make accessing data so much easier – allowing for smarter thinking and decision making processes. For example: if I was wandering around a construction site, saw something questionable, and needed to see the architect’s drawings immediately. I could simply ask for them and they would appear in my line of view, right in front of the part of the building that I am looking at. In manufacture, I could be walking around a plant and then need to see some important info, again I ask and it appears right there in front of my line of view.

Conclusion

I don’t really have a complete conclusion for this post, as this is still a developing technology. We can, as a population, decide to use this in a smart way, or conversely, we can use it in not so smart ways – only history will tell us which way we went.

What are your thoughts?

Ian Thomson
Founder/Senior Trainer/Consultant
IT Turning Point