Who says patents don’t matter. Well they sure do, and after Samsung took a battering in the courts from Apple, it has shored up its patents across a number of different areas, and as a consequence in 2012 received the most patents, and in turn took it to the top of the world leaderboard.

The only gripe I have with patents is that they hinder progress and are rewarded for things that should never have been allowed to be patented.

Last night Carphonewarehouse released the pricing for the sim free S4 at £629.95. Surely that was a typo but it appears judging by the pricing being released by other retailers like Amazon, that this is for real.

In fact, Amazon currently have the 16gb in Black at £629 and the white at £699. Also there is no details of the promised 32/64gb versions by Samsung. This is disappointing news.

Update – via twitter Samsung and Carphonewarehouse responded.

Samsung said they provide a RRP only to their retailers. They had no further information on the 32/64gb versions.

I asked Carphonewarehouse why they were committing day light robbery charging £630 and compared the price to a 64gb iPhone 5. I also asked about the larger S4 memory models. This was the useless response received.

@gavinfabiani Here’s our blog about what’s new on the S4 – http://t.co/SZ2dbRlFaA Thanks.

So all Carphonewarehouse provided was a note on the features which I knew, and completely side stepped answering the actual questions.

In fact if you want a fairer price Clove Technology are selling it less than amazon, Carphonewarehouse and others.

The Samsung Galaxy S4 is available for pre-orders starting Thursday from the Carphonewarehouse. In order to entice buyers to reserve the flagship phone a good month in advance, the first 2,000 people who pre-order the handset will receive a free Samsung Galaxy 2 7.0 tablet. Also, those who reserve the phone from Carphonewarehouse will receive a free accessory pack which includes a Samsung Galaxy S4 screen protector, case and car charger, which the retailer says is valued at £64.97. The tablet is valued at £150.

However the sim free price being offered is £630 for the 16gb version. That is daylight robbery.

Also what happened to the 32gb and 64gb variants.

Tomorrow is the start of the Easter weekend in the UK, ending with a Bank Holiday on Monday.

Consequently news will be much slower as I take a little break from my blog. However, do tune in on 1st April for 2 exclusives news items.

The Audio Technica ATH-AD900x arrived several weeks ago. In this time I have had many hours listening to these and have come away really pleased with them. As the hours listening to them have increased they have improved too. For the review I have done comparisons with my Sennheiser HD558’s , Sony MDR-1R and Bose AE2i. To be honest only the Sennheiser HD558 come close to the AD900x in sound comparison. In fact they are fairly close except in a few areas that I will detail below. My source equipment is an iPod Classic and Fiio E12 with the bass boost left on. I have tried to use a wide genre of music too. Anyway off to the technical blurb first.

The ATH-AD900x feature large 53 mm drivers exclusively designed for theseheadphones, with rare-earth magnets and Audio-Technica’s copper-clad aluminum-wire (CCAW) voice coil technology for superior audio reproduction with an extremely wide 5 Hz – 35,000 Hz frequency response. The ATH-AD900x offers an immersive listening experience with clear, natural vocal and instrumental reproduction, a smooth tonal balance, precise imaging and superlative dynamic range. The imaging and soundstage are exceptional but this was not as obvious until over 100 hours of use.

Also the headphones offer a uniquely comfortable fit thanks to their generously cushioned ear pads, lightweight honeycomb aluminum casing and 3D Wing Support Housing, which adjusts itself perfectly to each wearer. I must say the 3D Wing Support seemed fragile at first and also weird that I didn’t have anything to adjust. It just sat suspended on your head. I have an issue with headphone clamping pressure, but these with their fit can be worn indefinitely. So comfortable.

I recently got the Sony MDR-1R. The packaging and presentation of these cans are a “wow” moment when you open the box. Luxury presentation in a hard box, 2 x headphone cables one with iPod controls and a clever bag which has two section, one for the cans and is lined in soft material, and the other part for the cable. By contrast the AD900x came in a cardboard box arrangement, all packaged well, and with a headphone adapter for full size gear. But the AD900x do feel plastic and fragile, not that there are probably fragile but because they don’t feel as strong as the Sony or even the HD558. However, the music reproduction is worth the fragileness.

So on to the sound experience. And that what I will call it. An experience. I will explain various different tracks in a minute, but I can summarise the sound as huge dynamic soundstage, precision staging of instruments and voices, and full of attack. They work just as well with jazz, classical, rock or most genres to be honest. But bare in mind they are open cans so whatever you are listening too will be heard by others in your room. But jazz, blues and classical just explode in to life with these cans.

So the first track up is –

Katie Melua – When You Taught Me How To Dance – Katie voice is bright and clear, warm too and the guitar is detailed and smooth too. A cracking track

Sugarland – Find The Beat Again – a bright and open sound, full of speed and attack. Maybe a little too much treble but the energy of the track is superb.

Jools Holland & Paul Weller – September in the Rain – a lovely bass beat, with all the instruments laid out in front, behind and to your sides too. Toe tapping stuff. The male voice is deep and rich too.

Wycliffe Gordon – Back Home again in Indiana – the headphones just shine with these. All the brass instruments are so well separated. The AD900x have great speed too.

Shania Twain – Ka-Ching – good separation and voices. Fast speed with this track. Shania’s voices keeps going in a positive way.

Wagner – Der Ring Des Nibelungen – Die Walkure – A perfect track for these cans. Soundstage and instruments are so well presented and spaced. Plenty of depth too.

A do find with popish music the treble brightness is a little over the top at times, but it makes these cans special with classical and jazz. Compared to the HD558, these cans can work really well with all genres, whereas I found the HD558 are better with jazz, female vocal and classical. If I could only choose one can, it would be the AD900x. Compared to the Sony MDR-1R there is no brightness, just total precision but a more closed in sound stage, and sometimes sterile too. However, having both in my collection is great to have the variety.

I was out shopping on Saturday and saw a really good offer on the Lumia 620.

I’ve always wanted to give windows mobile a go and I must admit I am somewhat impressed.

Positives so far. This phone cost £130. And its crazy value. Lovely screen, very powerful quality sound from the headphone jack, free Nokia music streaming, and I love its quirkyness.

The negatives. Apps. Its missing some but some apps actually look better. The games suffer the most more than the apps. I actually prefer some of the apps on the Nokia over android and iOS.

The positives. Includes MS Office, Xbox Gaming Centre, 5 mp camera, optional micro USB card, Nokia Maps and Navigation, Skype Video Calls, Live tiles, Nokia City Lens, Bing Search and NFC.

If you would like to know anything specific let me know.

More updates tomorrow.

I like simple competitions where the chances of winning are reasonable.

To win the case below all you have to do if drop me a line on twitter @gavinfabiani and tell me why you should be the winner.

Draw will take place next Friday morning by 9am.

The decision of the judge, myself, is final.

The below is a leaked screen shot from what looks like a cleaner and more refreshing look at the Play Store. Hopefully to wont be long before this update gets pushed to all those using android.

It’s bad news for us Brits. Samsung is only using a 1.9GHz quad-core processor which will work better with the U.K.’s forthcoming 4G LTE networks.

Yesterday I hit a stumbling block and something that has incensed me.

The Note 2 cannot be used with a micro sd card properly. You are told you can expand the memory using one but this is a lie. It can only be used for photos and music you transfer there from iTunes or another source. The Note 2 sold by Three has 16gb memory of which about 12gb is free.

So all apps, movies and music you purchase get saved in to the pathetic 12gb internal memory. Gone is the option to move apps to the micro sd card. Third party solutions don’t work and rooting voids your warranty and doesn’t work either. And why should I need to do this after spending over £500 on a phone.

Apparently this is a jelly bean premium suite feature. Even worse still is that when you link your Dropbox account to the phone it creates a cache. Mine was 4gb. So I ran out of memory and didn’t have all my apps on the device either.

So what should have been a simple return and refund to the Three Store was a stressful affair. First I was told they only do exchanges and no refunds and I would have to call customer services to get a refund agreed. Customer services told me it was the stores problem. So I exercised my legal rights and told the store they had mis sold the phone as the memory is not expandable. After a call back 5 mins later they agreed to do a full refund. Very illegal tactics stating the cant do refunds in the first place!

Now had this been Apple, the refund process would have been easy and painless.

Anyway despite the memory issue the Note 2 was amazing. In the meantime I’m back to my boring but reliable iPhone 5. Now the dilemma on finding something else.