It’s been really wet and dull weather for ages in my part of the world. But yesterday, the sun appeared in full blossom.
With brightness set on auto, and the sun beaming on to the Note 4 screen, I watched as the brightness level got cranked up high as well as contrast changes. This made the screen visible in direct sunlight and was rather impressive. As the contrast gets altered the screen colours do look a little odd too.
It’s that time of year when winter fast approaches. In fact, some parts of the world have already had snow. And it’s also that time of the year that you might be wearing gloves. And how annoying is it with a touchscreen phone to keep having to have to take off your gloves to operate your phone. Some phones have a mode that increases the screen sensitivity like the Note 4, so you can operate the screen with your gloves on, but in that mode battery is draining slightly faster. There is a solution. You can buy gloves that work natively with your touch screen devices.
A company called Touchscreen Gloves got in touch with me to explain about their own range of gloves. Touchscreen Gloves is a family run UK company offering a range of gloves.
I was sent two styles of gloves, the classic version and their new grip style. Let’s look firstly at the classic.
The Classic style feature special conductive thread (made from real silver) in all 10 fingers of both hands, giving you the freedom to text, pinch and swipe using any finger (or thumb) without taking your gloves off. The conductive material in these TouchAbility gloves is barely visible as it is interwoven between the regular threads. They are made of a soft and warm melange material for comfort and stretch. Available in camel, charcoal and grey colour, and 2 sizes – medium and large. The label of the gloves reveals the content as acrylic 61%, spandex 8%, pvc dots 23%, elastic 4% and conductive yarn 4%. The gloves are surprisingly thin and operated all my tablets and phones perfectly. Close up shot of the glove below.
If you want a glove with more grip than the classic glove, Touchscreen Gloves have just launched their new Grip range. I got a sample from the very first batch. Unfortunately, it had a few issues with lose threads appearing.
I have been informed this is being rectified. The Grip style offer integrated palm grips to help you keep hold of your mobile device without worrying about it slipping out of your gloved hands. Close up of glove.
The Grip gloves feature conductive tips in all 5 fingers of each hand, and are 50% thicker than most knitted gloves to provide extra warmth in even the coldest weather. They also feature non-slip PVC dots on the palms for added grip, and a soft and luxurious inner knapping for enhanced comfort. The touch sensitive tips are black, so are barely visible on the black and navy blue gloves, and provide a unique and stylish contrasting colour on the red gloves. Available in 3 colours black, red and navy blue, and 3 sizes. The label reveals that the glove is made of acrylic 75%, silver yarn 12%, spandex 10% and elastic 3%.
As the Classic and Grip gloves are Touchscreen Gloves own manufactured range of gloves, they are also priced reasonably too. The Classic are £12.99 and Grip £9.99. However, if you use the discount code “GAV10” you will get 10% off. The code expires 31st December 2014, and should be entered at checkout. Just in case you’re wondering I do not earn a penny from any sales. This is just a benefit/saving for you if you order a pair of Touchscreen Gloves.
First up the Gear S is very comfortable to wear. Second battery life is good enough for nearly 2 days or at least one full day. As I mentioned there is the cradle that acts as a portable battery pack to recharge the Gear S.
So I set off walking for nearly an hour and told the Gear S I was walking. As I walked my heart rate was visible when I checked along with other information like time taken and calories. As I haven’t got a micro sim for the Note 4 it wasn’t able to track my GPS movements. So this is what my results from the walk produced back on the Note 4. I need to establish if I need a certain setup with the Gear S.
This is then included in my S Health main page as below.
It’s 4pm on Sunday as I type this. The Gear S battery is at 75%.
I still think the cradle is a nightmare to remove versus other options but I do believe from what I’ve seen the Gear S is more accomplished than one thinks.
Just going back to the Note 4 sim and Gear S nano sim. This is what I understand so far.
You leave your house without your Note 4. The Gear S will disconnect its bluetooth connection to the Note 4. After a few minutes the Gear S does the following –
– It connects to the mobile network using its own nano sim
– It also sends a signal back to the Note 4 which initiates call forwarding and also sends all the notifications received on the Note 4 directly to the Gear S.
All this is achieved by signing into your Samsung account to get the remote access working.
Now if this happens correctly then that is very clever.
So I’m working on the NotePro tablet and managing the Samsung Note 4 at the same time using the Samsung SideSync 3 app.
Great feature.
These are my first day observations with the Samsung Gear S.
Out of the box I loved the bold and size of the Gear S. Mark my words it is massive, really massive but I personally think that is a selling point and style point alone which I really like.
I have set up the Gear S with my Note 4 and tested most of the functions. I am pleased to report the battery ended day 1 at 44%. The battery cradle also acts as a power pack so if you are away for a couple of days you can snap on the cradle and it will charge the Gear S. However, compared to the LG G Watch, the battery cradle is a PITA to attach and detach. The LG G Watch has a magnetic base that just pinged together as easy as ABC with its magnets.
The curve of the Gear S is lovely. The screen is responsive and all the functions work as advertised. I inserted a nano sim and made a few phone calls without using the Note 4. First up, the loudspeaker of the Gear S is not loud enough for my ears, so a bluetooth headset will be needed.
I wanted to test the in built music player so I moved my music across from the Note 4 to the watch using the Gear Manager on the Note 4. This process is done via bluetooth and take ages. Next problem is the music quality is just average via bluetooth headphones. In my mind it is not really worth the aggravation of using the Gear S as an mp3 player unless you really wanted to. S Voice worked fine. Notifications seem to work fine, but only after the second software update. Before that I don’t think I was getting any notifications.
Clock faces. There are some great clock faces, but in my mind not enough decent ones to choose from. I wish it was possible to change the background colour on some of these. I need to explore the situation of the nano sim and micro sim of the Note 4. Apparently, according to Carphone Warehouse it is possible to get a duplicate sim with your same number for the watch.
As I have owned the original Gear, Gear 2 and Gear Fit the Gear S held no surprises. It all worked as advertised.
More next week plus my thoughts on the Gear S and Note 4 combination and whether these devices are worth their mustard. Plus my views versus smart watches like Pebble and LG G Watch which I have both owned.
I have run out of time today, so just a quick note to say this is by far the most useful and pleasurable tablet I have owned. I am really pleased I sold my iPad Air to buy this. In fact the money raised by selling the iPad Air was £5 more than the NotePro cost to buy from Expansys who have a special price at the moment. Details http://www.expansys.com/s.aspx?search=samsung%20note%2012.2 .
Happy days.
So the Gear S has arrived. It is being charged now along with the Note 4 before I have a play. My first impressions of the Gear S is wow. I love the monstrous size. My wife burst out laughing. Said it looked like a prison tag and asked when my visiting hours were up.
So what do you think?
Screen showing the Gear S playing music with Bluetooth stereo headphones.
The Nexus 9 review embargoes have been lifted and a number of tech sites have published their reviews.
Below is a summary of the main reviews from across the web –
Via – http://www.engadget.com/2014/11/03/google-nexus-9-review/?ncid=rss_truncated
PROS -Android 5.0 Lollipop runs like a dream,Material Design face-lift is warm, welcoming,K1 chipset is plenty powerful, despite benchmark oddities
CONS -Screen is solid, not jaw-dropping, BoomSound speakers not as good as M8’s, No expandable memory
Via – http://www.androidpolice.com/2014/11/03/nexus-9-review-a-little-better-on-paper-than-in-practice/
The Good –
Display: I love the 4:3 form factor, and the display itself is very nice. Great colors, what looks to be solid white balance, good brightness, and excellent viewing angles. I can find no real important faults with it.
Android L: Is pretty, adds tons of new features (many of which are quite useful), and beautiful animations throughout the OS. Easily the most mature and thoroughly styled Android has ever looked. It looks great on the Nexus 9.
Fast: The Nexus 9 is, in most situations where linear performance is the primary concern, very quick. Its single-thread benchmark results put it even ahead of Apple’s new iPad Air 2, so that K1 isn’t a slouch.
Front-facing speakers: I don’t really need to extol the virtues of front-facing speakers. They’re obvious.
Software support: OTA updates from Google mean you’ll be the first to get the latest version of Android, of course, with all the good and bad things that entails.
The Not So Good
Battery life: 9.5 hours of Wi-Fi browsing is, as far as my review unit is concerned, a fantasy. Like, there’s just no way. I’m getting half that.
Performance: It’s unpredictable. The Nexus 9 is fast, but it’s twitchy. Apps will randomly take longer to load than normal, longer than I would expect – it doesn’t feel fully optimized. That, or only having two cores is causing issues.
Build quality: It does not feel like a $400 tablet should feel. Not only is it fairly heavy for its size, the plastic back seems to have the same issues the Nexus 5’s did – it deforms under pressure, snaps, and creaks. It is not nice. Also, it’s a finger oil magnet.
Design: I’m sorry, but in my subjective opinion, the Nexus 9 is not a pretty tablet. It is decidedly generic, and not in a cool, stealthy way. It’s boring and drab. The press shots do it too much justice.
Price: All things considered, I find $400 ($480 for 32GB) hard to stomach for a 16GB tablet of this caliber. That’s generation one iPad Air money.
AndroidCentral.com – went on record to say they only got their device on Wednesday and they will spend more time with it so they can write a proper review. That makes sense to me!
Reading a number of reviews last night echoed the findings of the views printed above. Some loved it, some questioned its strengths and others were not blown away. Either way it is a direct take on Apple’s iPad space with a 4:3 aspect ratio but it does not beat the iPad Air at all.
So far I have covered off all the wonderful aspects of the Shield tablet. But I have also discovered a number of bugs and issues as below.
Nvidia Shield Tablet issues
1. Wifi Connectivity – I have noticed the range is not as powerful as my other devices. A recent OTA software update has improved matters.
2. Remote Streaming – Doesn’t work unless using an Ethernet Adapter. Wifi signal too week to stream. I have not experienced this myself, but some users have. Unfortunately, my PC is too old and does not have the minimum specs for streaming.
3. Cracks Edges on Case – Hairline cracks in all 4 corners of device. Case creaking and splitting. There are pages and pages on many forums about this. Again, I have not had this issue. But it Is worth highlighting it. Apparently Nvidia changed the manufacturing plastic bonding process with the newer LTE 32gb. However, users with this newer model have also experienced the shell suffering hair line cracks. More than likely caused by excessive heat whilst gaming at full throttle for hours at a time. The only good news is Nvidia does seem to be exchanging people’s devices. I should point out that if you get a crack, it doesn’t affect anything. Just cosmetic.
4. Poor Battery Life – 2 to 3 hours max when gaming. 5 hours otherwise. No quick charging. I have done battery tests and the gaming battery life is poor.
5. Bluetooth Controller Connectivity – Interference with 2.4GHz signal and inability to connect to certain devices.
6. OTG USB Charging and Ethernet Adapter – Not able to use a USB splitter for both the Ethernet Adapter and Charging at the same time. Not a feature advertised by Nvidia but would have been useful due to short battery life.
7. Mushy Power Button and Volume Rocker. I find these difficult to operate. Fortunately the Smart Cover turns the device on and off , and the wireless controller has volume controls.
8. Brightness Fluctuations with Screen. Auto brightness control is too aggressive and changes brightness too often.
9. Folders. I have created folders on the home screen. But apps keep vanishing out of them. Maybe I have too many apps in the folders? But then it allows me to place them inside to start off with.
Every device I have owned has issues including the Nvidia Shield tablet. However, despite all the above I am keeping this over my iPad. The Shield has flaws but it also has charm and lots of functionality that makes it a keeper.
Tomorrow I have the penultimate post on the Nvidia Shield tablet. This is the critical post covering every bug and concern and issue.
It’s a “cracking ” post so don’t miss it. The title is cryptic. And it might surprise you.
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