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Review: Nikon Coolpix P600

Posted in Products with tags on December 7, 2014 by itnerd

This week, Nikon was kind enough to provide me with the Coolpix P600 which is a compact camera with the ability to be run in a variety of automatic and pre-programmed modes which makes it easy to use. Alternately there is a manual mode that allows you to tweak the camera to your needs. Before I get to how well it takes pictures, let me tour you around the Coolpix P600:

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It’s a very compact body that has a pop up flash that comes in handy.

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On the side, it has a HDMI and USB port that’s covered by a rubber flap. You can use the HDMI port to play pictures and videos from the camera onto your TV.

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All the controls are centralized on the right hand side of the body. The LCD (which is very clear and bright by the way.. Though it does attract finger prints and is not touch sensitive) has a trick to it:

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It flips out and it swivels. That way you can protect the LCD by folding it into the body or use it like this. Also, you’ll note this rather eye catching red color that my test unit came in. If that’s too much for you, it does come in black. I should also note that the camera is really, really light.

Now some of the features of the Coolpix 600 that really stood out to me were:

  • 16.1 MP Image Quality
  • 60x optical zoom
  • WiFi capability
  • Vibration Reduction image stabilisation system
  • 1080P Video

To test all of this out, I went to my usual location for taking photos which is Pearson Airport in Toronto.

First, let me speak about the WiFi capability because it’s not what you think. The use case for a camera having WiFi is to allow it to connect wireless to your iOS or Android device which is runs an app called Wireless Mobile Utility which is available for iOS and Android. Once you activate WiFi on the camera and find the camera in the same manner that you would find an access point or WiFi router, you can then remotely control the camera (which while there is a slight lag, it does work), see the pictures that are on the camera, and pull them onto the phone so you can Instagram them or post them to Facebook for example. You can also see the battery life of the camera and use your phone’s GPS sensor to geotag pictures. While all of this worked as advertised when I tested it with my iPhone 5s, the camera and phone randomly disconnected twice during my testing at Pearson Airport forcing me to reconnect them. I have no explanation as to why nor could I reproduce anywhere else. So I have to assume but I cannot prove that the environment around Pearson Airport was somehow responsible for this behavior.

Now let me get to the image quality. First, here’s a picture in auto mode. Click the image to see it in full resolution:

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The fact that this camera has a 60X optical zoom allowed me to take a couple of really great shots. Here are a couple of examples. Click the images to see them in full resolution: 

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The Coolpix P600 has the ability to shoot full-resolution stills at up to 7 frames per second simply by pressing and holding the shutter. There is also a slower burst mode, called Continuous L, in which the frame rate drops to 1fps, but you can capture up to 30 full-resolution photos at the Large quality setting. However, you cannot use the flash in either of these settings which limits how useful this feature is. That limitation didn’t come into play for me while I was at Pearson Airport as I was taking pictures in daylight and was about to use the ability to 7 frames per second just fine.

Now over to the video capabilities. I have two videos for your review. Both could have used the wind reduction feature that this camera has but I didn’t turn on. But they will still give you a good idea of what the Coolpix P600 can do. Make sure you set the videos to full screen and 1080p.

As long as you have a large enough memory card, this camera can easily double as a video camera and will will get good results.

Low light and night shots are something that you may have to figure out what settings work best for you. I had to turn off the flash but leave it in auto mode to get these shots. Click the images to see them in full resolution:

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Finally, the battery life is outstanding. I took over 150 shots and I had just under 3/4 battery battery life left. That fits in with Nikon’s claim of 330 pictures from a single charge. If you’re someone who needs a camera that will take pictures all day and beyond. The Coolpix P600 is the one for you. On a related note, the charger that charges the removable battery supports 100 – 240 volts (Though you cannot plug it into anything other than a North American outlet. That will force you to acquire an adapter if you travel overseas), or you can plug into your computer to charge the battery via USB.

Gripes? The only one that I could come up with is that it doesn’t support the RAW format. That means for advanced users, they don’t get the option to shoot an image that is minimally processed for use in Photoshop or Aperture. The filpside to that point is that those who care about this will likely go looking for a digital SLR.

Nikon lists the Coolpix P600 for $449.95 Canadian. It’s at a nice price point between digital SLRs and very basic point and shoot digital cameras. That makes sense seeing as it’s aimed at the intermediate user who has grown out of basic point and shoot digital cameras, but isn’t ready or willing to make the jump to an digital SLR. If that’s you, then you should check out the Nikon Coolpix 600 at your local camera store.

 

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Review: Late 2014 Apple Mac Mini

Posted in Products with tags on December 3, 2014 by itnerd

This past weekend, I was hired to do a swap of a mix of various Apple Mac models to the new Mac Mini which rolled out recently. Now this Mac Mini had not been touched by Apple in some time, so it was a relief when Apple finally upgraded them. However, you’ll have to be on your toes if you want to buy one.

The first reason that you’ll need to be on your toes is that the RAM is not upgradeable. That’s right, the computer that was incredibly easy to upgrade now has RAM that is soldered to the logic board. That means that you not only will pay more for 8 or 16 GB of RAM that you should have to pay, but you can’t buy it with say 8GB now and upgrade later when prices drop. That is a complete #fail in my mind. My advice? Buy it with 16GB of RAM because if you don’t you’ll be sorry later.

The next reason that you’ll need to be on your toes is the processor. The good news is that the Mac Mini is using a Intel Haswell series i5 processor. The bad news is that you only get dual core options this time around rather than having dual core and quad core options that the previous generation had. Not only that, the version of the Haswell processor that Apple elected to use is SLOWER in some ways than the Ivy Bridge series of processors that were in the last generation, Mac Rumors ran a story on this a while ago that highlighted this fact with detailed comparisons of this Mac Mini and the previous Mac Mini. What all of this means is that for general purpose computing, word processing, surfing the net, etc., they’re fine. But if you want to do anything that requires processing power, you should look elsewhere. Now one could correctly argue that the target users of the Mac Mini won’t care, and I will admit that there is truth to that. However, the Mac Mini if you outfitted it right could give you a relatively quick computer at a low price if you were a quasi power user. That option is now gone.

But it’s not all bad. Apple actually did make some improvements in this version of the Mac Mini. They include:

  • They now include the Intel HD 5000 or Iris 5100 GPUs which are significantly faster than what used to be in the Mac Mini
  • 802.11ac Wi-Fi
  • Thunderbolt 2 ports (at the expense of FireWire I will note)
  • PCIe-based flash storage as an option which makes storage ultra fast

The key improvement that was made was the price has dropped. The Mac Mini now starts at $549 Canadian which is a good price. But I have a hard time recommending the Mac Mini to anyone other than an entry level user. That’s a shame as the Mac Mini used to be a cheap way to get decent amounts of power onto your desk while having options to upgrade. Now, it’s just a cheap computer with no ability to upgrade and it’s now lacking in power. Apple may wish to rethink that, and quickly.

 

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Review: BlackBerry Passport

Posted in Products with tags on December 2, 2014 by itnerd

I’ll cut to the chase and give you my verdict up front and then tell you why I feel this way. The BlackBerry Passport is an odd smartphone. But it’s an odd smartphone that is a winner in my eyes. If you can get past the fact that it’s a weird shape and size, you need to take a look at it. Quite simply, the BlackBerry Passport has replaced the Z30 as my favorite BlackBerry.

Now, here’s why I feel that way.

First there’s the screen. It’s a 4.5-inch square display that’s 30 percent wider than an average 5-inch phone. The logic is that you will have more real estate to read e-mails and work on documents. That’s 100 percent true. I found that text didn’t have to wrap or get cut off because of how wide the screen is. Text and documents also looked much better in my opinion as well. I will demonstrate this by showing you the same e-mail on both the Passport and my iPhone 5S:

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The screen has a resolution of 1,400 x 1,400 which equates to a pixel density of 453 ppi. Image quality is good and it was generally visible in all lighting conditions. The screen was also prone to fingerprints so you’ll need to keep a microfiber cloth handy.

In terms of physical connections, you get a 3.5mm headphone jack and power button on the top, with a micro-USB/micro-HDMI port and stereo speakers on the bottom. The right side features volume up/down buttons separated by a convenience key used for BlackBerry Assistant and media play/pause.

Now over to the keyboard. Now in the interest of full disclosure, I was a long time (as in from 2001) BlackBerry user until I switched to the iPhone a couple of years ago. Thus I have an affinity for physical keyboards. This one is unique by BlackBerry standards. The three-row keyboard doubles as a touch-sensitive trackpad that adds gestures to your ability to type. Not only that, but as you type, any additional keys that you might need such as numbers or symbols will appear above the physical keyboard. This does take some getting used to. But after a couple of days, you’ll have it figured out. Now I do have a could of gripes when it comes to the keyboard. The space bar is on the small side. But that’s minor. The other gripe is that typing is strictly a two handed affair. If you want one handed typing, you might want to consider the upcoming BlackBerry Classic. But neither of those stops me from saying that the keyboard is a winner.

Now let me move to the elephant in the room. BlackBerry OS 10.3. Now, I’ll say right up front that the list of native apps isn’t as big as Android or iOS. But as far as I am concerned, that’s a non-factor. Besides, if this is really a factor for you, there are 300,000 native apps in their App Store and you can use Android apps as well along with having access to the Amazon App Store. But in any case, what is a factor is that it is still the most intuitive mobile OS out there. Features such as the BlackBerry Hub and extremely intuitive gesture set are now joined by the BlackBerry Assistant. The latter creates a Siri like interface to do whatever you need to do via voice. Now it won’t learn your every habit the way Google Now does, nor will it Shazam songs. But I’m fine with that. Another thing I was fine with was BlackBerry Blend which shows the world that Apple isn’t the only company that can integrate your smartphone with your other devices. Simply download an app on your MacBook, Windows machine, Android and iOS tablet and once your devices are connected, you’ll be able to use them to manage and move files back and forth, send and receive messages (BBM, email and text) remotely, access your contacts and calendar and view movies stored locally on your BlackBerry. You’ll note the degree of cross platform compatibility that BlackBerry brings to the table. That’s one advantage that BlackBerry has over iOS/OS X and its Continuity feature which doesn’t work with anything other than Apple products.

The Passport is fast and it can owe that speed to a 2.2GHz quad-core processor and 3GB of RAM. There is ZERO as in ZIP, NONE, NADA lag in this device. Usually when I test a device, I can usually get it to trip up if I push it hard enough, and that’s harder than 99% of the population would ever push their smartphones. But that wasn’t the case here with the Passport. That’s pretty impressive and it should give the Samsungs and Apples of the world something to think about. It also comes with a healthy 32GB of storage out of the box and it has a MicroSD card slot to add up to 128GB of storage. Data connectivity comes in the form of the following:

  • LTE
  • 802.11 A/B/G/N/AC
  • Bluetooth 4.0
  • NFC
  • FM Radio

Now onto the camera. It’s a 13MP shooter with optical image stabilization that allows the user some degree of control and it supports HDR. It also shoots 1080p video up to 60 frames a second. So to test this, I headed out to Pearson Airport in Toronto and got these shots. Click on them to see them in full resolution:

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Some notes:

  • I went to a holiday party and wanted to take some photos in a low light situation. However my iPhone 5s and my wife’s iPhone 5 would not take acceptable pictures. However the BlackBerry Passport took high quality photos without any issue.
  • The autofocus function on this camera is as quick as the LG G3 and Samsung Galaxy S5. And I do mean quick. Any picture I took was sharp and detailed.

If you want a camera to take stills in any situation, this is it.

Now the video. Set it to full screen and 720p:

One handy feature that you’ll want to take advantage of is the ability to shoot stills and video at the same time. For me, that worked flawlessly.

Battery life absolutely rocks on this device. I went for 2 and a half days on a single charge. That is beyond impressive, though I will note that the battery is non-removable. Another thing that is impressive is the sound quality. It sounds great when I was using it as a phone and it has four microphones which allows your voice to be reproduced with impressive clarity. What’s also impressive is the price. Unlocked direct from BlackBerry, it’s $699 Canadian. But the Passport is also carried by Bell, Rogers, SaskTel, and Telus. If you’re an existing BlackBerry user, it’s a no brainer to upgrade to the Passport. But if you’re in the market for a smartphone of any description, you’d be doing yourself a dis-service by not looking at the Passport. BlackBerry has hit a home run with this phone and I fully expect the Passport to give the company a lot of attention.

 

 

 

 

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Review: Motorola Moto 360

Posted in Products with tags on December 1, 2014 by itnerd

Smart watches are an emerging piece of tech. Right now as far as I am concerned, the best smart watch out there for Android fans is the Motorola Moto 360 which was served up to me by Telus. I like the Moto 360 for a number of reasons. First it actually looks very good:

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It is elegant and though it’s a bit big for my tastes, it fits on my wrist. The metal case and the leather strap that is clearly a quality one helps with that. But what really makes the Moto 360 work is the 1.65-inch display that protrudes ever so slightly from its round shell. It runs almost completely edge to edge, encircled by only the smallest of bezels. The display has terrific viewing angles, and is easily viewable outdoors. If you do look closely, you’ll see that some images can look a bit jagged, but I seriously doubt that anyone would complain. Another reason why I like the Moto 360 is that it is waterproof and dustproof to the level of the IP67 standard. For someone like me who does sports outdoors, that’s very welcome.

The Moto 360 works  with all Android smartphones that run Android 4.3 Jelly Bean and up. iOS and anyone else is out of luck, not that this is a shock. But broad compatibility is a good thing as it scoops up a significant amount of the Android community. In terms of how you can use the Moto 360, your emails, texts, calls, tweets, weather information and the like pops up the screen. In many cases, there’s also an easy way to respond without ever taking your phone out of your pocket. You can also perform basic Google searches, set reminders, take notes, and get quick directions to the nearest Starbucks. Google Now even works. Though I do feel like a bit of a dork talking into my watch. You also get a heart rate monitor and a pedometer inside the Moto 360. But when I compared it to the heart rate monitor that I use while exercising and a pedometer that I had lying around, neither seemed accurate. I’m not sure why as similar experiments with other devices have not shown a wide variance of any sort. Strange. Having said that, every function worked perfectly and was easy to use. One feature that I really liked was the array of faces that are available. You can really customize the Moto 360 any way you want to suit your needs or feelings.

Battery life matched what Motorola says which is that you’ll get a day out of the batter. That’s very good as anything less would make it useless. When it’s time to charge, you can charge it using a cool black wireless dock that the Moto 360 slots into sideways. The only thing that I would say on that front is heavy usage is likely to result in you getting less than a day of usage.

The Moto 360 is $279.99 at Telus. For now, as long as you have an Android phone, this is the best smart watch out there. I wonder if I feel the same way when the Apple Watch eventually ships? We’ll have to wait and see.

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Review: Parallels Desktop 10

Posted in Products with tags on November 29, 2014 by itnerd

Frequent readers of this blog will know that I depend on Parallels Desktop to run Windows and LINUX virtual machines on my MacBook Pro. Thus upgrading to Parallels Desktop 10 was guaranteed. The install was painless. Thus I’m able to move along to the new features in this release:

  • You can place Windows apps on the Mac Launchpad or Dock
  • You can use new features in Mac OS X Yosemite straight out of a Windows environment. For example, you can answer your iPhone in your Windows virtual machine. You can also use Handoff to and from your iOS devices, or use AirDrop. Notification center is also implemented as well.

I tested all of these in my Windows 7 and Windows 8 virtual machines and they all worked perfectly. I also didn’t notice any hit to performance at all. That’s very good.

Speaking of performance, the company claims that battery life is 30 percent better on portable Macs. I could not quantify if it was 30%, but my battery life was longer while running Windows 7 than it typically is. It also promises faster overall performance and I can confirm that is the case. My virtual machines were faster when I started apps and used them. But strangely, that is not borne out in using the Windows Experience Index. Starting with Windows Vista:

  • Parallels Desktop 9: 5.0
  • Parallels Desktop 10: 5.0

This is what I got with Windows 7:

  • Parallels Desktop 9: 5.1
  • Parallels Desktop 10: 5.3

Not earth shattering by any means.

Now when I dug into this, I discovered that Parallels Desktop 10 has a wizard that helps you to optimize your virtual machines to get the best performance out of them regardless of what you do. Simply choose whether you’re using them for games, general office apps, design, or software development, and the app does the rest. Though, I found that I did have to tweak the memory settings to increase the amount of memory that each virtual machine had access to. For example, the Windows Vista and Windows 7 virtual machines were set to 1GB or RAM. I changed that to 4GB as I have 16GB of RAM in my MacBook Pro to play with. I then re-ran the Windows Experience tests and got these results:

  • Windows Vista: 5.7
  • Windows 7: 6.0

The take home message is that you’ll get a bit of a speed boost simply by installing Parallels Desktop 10. However, to get the most out of it, you should let it tweak your settings and you’ll get much more of a speed boost. But make sure to check its handiwork.

Parallels Desktop is $80 or $50 a upgrade if you are a previous user. If you need to run Windows apps on your Mac, it’s the only game in town as far as I am concerned.

 

 

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Review: Ello

Posted in Products with tags on November 16, 2014 by itnerd

Ello is a new social network that has a bunch of things going for it. Most notably the fact that it is ad free and doesn’t sell your data to third parties. It’s an interesting social networking platform that is in beta and is only accessible via an invite from an Ello member. I was fortunate enough to get an invite which gave me the ability to look at Ello.

The first thing I noticed about Ello is that it’s pretty stark:

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This is the exact opposite to Facebook which can be insanely busy in terms of the look and feel. This is likely deliberate as Ello really wants to contrast themselves against Facebook.

Several elements of Ello’s design are smart:

  • Your profile photo shows up within a circle, and you can follow other users by dragging their circular icons into either a “friends” or “noise” category, and recategorize them at any time.
  • You can view a feed of updates from either category, with the “noise” one sporting a somewhat compressed, Tumblr-esque layout that makes it easier to glance at many posts at once.

One thing that really annoyed me was that it was really easy to delete a friend’s comment on one of your posts by clicking a tiny gray “x” next to the comment. But other than that, it was easy for me to figure out how Ello works. One thing to note is that Ello curates content so that you can find really interesting content.

Downsides? First, it’s a beta. So you can expect that there will be bugs and oddities. Second, the fact that it’s an invitation only means that the user base is likely small. The third thing is how Ello will pay for all this while still keeping out ads. They do say that it will soon offer “special features” that users can pay “a small amount” to get. It will be interesting to see what those are and if users will pay for them.

If you do get an invite for Ello, I’d say it’s worth trying out. I think as more people join Ello, it might be an interesting place to be. I’ll be keeping an eye on Ello.

 

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Review: iStat Menus 5

Posted in Products with tags on November 13, 2014 by itnerd

I’m the type of person who likes to know exactly what’s going on with my Mac at all times. Such as which apps are using bandwidth or CPU power. Or the health of my battery and hard drive. Normally, I have to work pretty hard to get this info as it’s buried in things like Apple’s Activity Monitor or Disk Utility. But I’ve discovered a far easier way to get this info. I installed a copy of iStat Menus 5. The premise of iStat Menus 5 is simple. It places a series of icons in your menu bar that can be clicked to reveal dropdowns with information. You can customize this to get the info you want and it covers a variety of areas such as CPU, battery usage, graphic card usage and the like.

Installing it is pretty simple. Download the app and open it up. It will offer to install itself and then you can customize from there. It took me twenty minutes to get the info that I was interested in set up because there are so many options available to display. Here’s a list of what you have access to:

  • CPU — You get 7 display modes and multiple core support. You can also see the GPU that is in use on multi-GPU computers and see how its performing.
  • Memory — You get 4 display modes including page ins/outs and swap usage display.
  • Disks — You 6 display modes and SMART monitoring for internal hard disks.
  • Network — Monitor current and total bandwidth, peak bandwidth, IP addresses, and the ability to hide network connections you don’t want to see.
  • Temps — Monitor the temperature of your Mac. You get 2 display modes and the ability to hide sensors you don’t want to see.
  • Fans — Monitor and alter the fan speeds in your Mac.
  • Bluetooth — Control Bluetooth status plus monitor the battery level of your Apple wireless keyboard or mouse.
  • Date & Time — Date and time in your menubar. This includes a world clock display that  lets you see the time in multiple locations around the world.

I’d strongly recommend that you spend some time seeing what you have access to and don’t be afraid to play around with the setup. Once it is set up, this is what it looks like on your menu bar:

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You can see that I don’t use all the features that I listed above, but there’s more than enough info there for me and most other people. One of the things that I did was that I got rid of some of the duplicate items that OS X provides. For example I got rid of the battery icon as iStat Menus provides a much more informative one. Not only that, the array of things that it monitors is extensive. For example, you can see the status if individual temperature sensors in your Mac as well as get historical data on pretty much anything. This way if you’re trying to diagnose an issue, you can figure out when the issue might have started or zero in on when and under what conditions an issue might be manifesting itself. If however you need to use one of the Apple supplied tools, you do get quck and easy access to Apple’s Activity Monitor, Console, Terminal, System Profiler, and System Preferences.

Here’s the best part. This app is $16 which is a small price to pay to get access to all sorts of info. Now you could say that iStat Menus 5 is an app that will likely only appeal to power users and those who are really curious about how their Mac works. But I would argue that it would also be useful to someone who’s trying to diagnose an issue that is hardware or software related. That way they may be able to avoid a trip to the Genius Bar by identifying the cause. Or you can bring proof that specific components are failing which will make that Genius Bar appointment much more productive. If that’s you, I say that you should look into getting a copy of iStat Menus 5. The company offers a 14 day trial and I think you’ll be buying it long before the 14 days are up.

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Review: Western Digital Black 2.5″ Laptop Hard Drive

Posted in Products with tags on November 12, 2014 by itnerd

Because of my recent run of bad luck with hard drives in my MacBook Pro, I decided to replace the most recent one that failed with a third party drive rather than use an Apple supplied drive. After some research, I decided on the Western Digital Black hard drive. The Black line of hard drives from Western Digital are their highest performing models as they run at 7200 RPM and they feature a 16 MB cache to speed things along. Now 16MB doesn’t sound like a lot, but it works. My MacBook Pro boots in under 45 seconds versus 1:30 for the 5400 RPM hard drive that was in there previously. Applications also start noticeably faster which is good as well. One thing that I did notice is that in a very quiet room, you can hear the drive if you’re right next to the notebook. Now that doesn’t bother me and I am pretty sure that you will not find it objectionable. But I thought I would mention it. Another thing to note is that all this extra power doesn’t seem to affect battery life. I did a couple of rundown tests and I noted a 11 minute difference in battery life versus what I noted with the drive that my MacBook Pro came with. In either case, I got at least 6 hours of battery life which is good as it would really suck if increasing your performance meant sacrificing battery life.

The drive itself is thin. It’s only 9.5 mm high which means it should fit into most laptops including ultra-portable ones. You can tell that Western Digital thought out the design of the drive because when you flip the drive over, everything is tucked away on the other side of the main circuit board. This will keep the surface mount components safe. In terms of mounting, you can use the four mounting points on the bottom of the drive, or the four mounting points on the sides of the drive. I needed to use the latter, but it’s great that you have that level of flexibility at your disposal. Another thoughtful touch comes from inside the drive. According to Western Digital, the recording head never touches the disk media. That means that your data is better protected and the drive is more robust from the rigors of transport. Seeing that I travel a fair amount, I’ll be able to put that to the test. Having said that, if your drive does go bad, Western Digital offers up a 5 year warranty which is unusual as three years is the general standard for warranty periods. Having said that, Western Digital does have an excellent reliability reputation and their drives have been the ones that I have recommended to my customers for some time now. Thus I’m fairly confident that I will not have to take advantage of their warranty.

Now the model I got was the WD5000BPKX which uses a SATA 6 Gb/s interface to transfer data to and from the drive. You can also get it in a SATA 3 Gb/s variant. The choice depends on what your laptop will support. It also comes in capacities from 160GB all the way up to 750GB. I chose 500GB as that’s all the storage I needed. In my case, the drive was under $60 before taxes which is a great price for a drive these days. But if I did want to go up to 750GB, it was only $10 more. That’s still a great price. From my perspective, if you want to upgrade the hard drive in your notebook, the Western Digital Black hard drive should be your first choice. It’s fast without affecting your battery life too much, and comes with a great warranty. Plus Western Digital has a great reputation when it comes to reliability. All of this means that you cannot lose if you choose this drive to be in your notebook.

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Review: Asus Memo Pad 8 (ME181C)

Posted in Products with tags on November 6, 2014 by itnerd

Given the last few Apple events, you’d be forgiven if you think that the only tablets out there come from Apple. But Asus is a legitimate player in this market and the Memo Pad 8 is a good example of this. The ASUS MeMO Pad 8 features a nice design. The tablet has rounded corners and a matte-plastic, soft-touch finish over a subtle criss-cross pattern. It’s easy to hold, but if you want to hold it with one hand, you might have a problem if you have small hands. Asus sent me a review unit in black, but shoppers looking for a little color can choose from white, purple and gold as well. One thing I really like is fingerprints on the back don’t exist. However you will see fingerprints are on the screen. Speaking of the screen, it’s a 8-inch, 1280 x 800 IPS display with LED backlighting, providing wide viewing angles and a wonderfully bright screen.

In terms of specs, you get the following:

  • 1.33 GHz Intel Atom CPU
  • 1GB of RAM
  • 16 GB of flash storage expandable to 64GB via MicroSD
  • Android KitKat 4.4
  • 802.11 B/G/N
  • Bluetooth 4.0

The Memo Pad 8 brings a combination of Android KitKat 4.4 and a custom skin by Asus called ZenUI. Android basics such as swiping down from the top for notifications are still there, but ZenUI features a modern graphic design and the ability to quickly move between a customized list of quick settings and the notifications tab. It works very well. Performance is pretty good as well. I couldn’t get it to trip up over itself which means that you’ll be happy using this tablet every day.

The MeMO Pad 8 features a 5MP rear-camera and a 2MP front-shooter. The 5MP camera can also capture 1080p, 30 fps video. Now to test the rear camera, I headed to Pearson Airport in Toronto. First, here’s the still picture. Click to see it in full resolution:

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The quality is not bad. Now here’s the video. Set it to full screen and 1080p:

The video quality isn’t bad. Though it did have autofocus issues. Also the microphone was overwhelmed by the slight breeze.

Battery life is outstanding. Asus says you should get about 9 hours. I got 10 when I tested it by surfing and playing YouTube videos. That’s one thing that may make you want to run out to get this tablet. Another thing that may make you want to get this tablet is the price. It’s $299 CDN or $200 US. That’s a great price for what you get. One thing to consider is that Asus makes a 7″ Memo Pad with the same specs that goes for about $50 less money. If it were me, I’d spring for the Memo Pad 8 as it’s only a nominal price difference that’s very much worth it. The Memo Pad 8 is very much worth checking out if you’re in the market for an Android tablet.

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Review: Samsung Galaxy Note 4

Posted in Products with tags , on November 6, 2014 by itnerd

Telus has hooked me up with Samsung’s newest “phablet” the Galaxy Note 4. Now I’ve always been dubious of the whole “phablet” craze, but Samsung sells a whole lot of them. So it proves that I shouldn’t be in their marketing department. One of the things that sets the Note 4 from the rest is the addition of a stylus. It makes using the Galaxy Note 4 way more useful than most. But I am getting ahead of myself. Let me start with the physical aspects of the phone. The backing is slightly more textured. One thing I really liked is the fact that the Galaxy Note 4 is free of the cheesy faux stitching that was found on previous Samsung phones. The straight sides are comfortable to grasp and easy to hold onto. You can easily find physical buttons with your fingertips. In terms of size, it’s pretty much the same physical size of the iPhone 6 Plus. Fingerprints are minimal on the screen and non-existant on the case. The screen is a 5.7-inch display that is 2,650 x 1,440p quad HD AMOLED display. It’s clear and sharp and I would consider the screen to be right up there with the LG G3 and the iPhone 6 Plus.

In terms of specs, here’s what Samsung has brought to the table:

  • 2.7 Ghz Quad Core Processor
  • 3GB RAM
  • 32GB internal memory expandable to 64GB via MicroSD
  • LTE Connectivity
  • Android KitKat 4.4 with Samsung TouchWiz
  • dual-band 802.11a/b/g/n/ac
  • Bluetooth 4.1 LE

The Note 4 is one of the most powerful devices on the market. It felt quicker than pretty much anything that I’ve tested recently and I think that the Note 4 will likely keep that title of “fastest Android  phone” for months to come. You get Android KitKat 4.4 and you get Samsung’s TouchWiz UI which makes the Galaxy Note 4 easy to use. There’s a new S-pen which is roughly twice as sensitive to pressure as the last one, capable of registering over 2,000 levels of sensitivity instead of 1,000. You still get features like Air Command and a ton of other features that make it useful in everyday use. It comes with the same software setup as the Galaxy S5. In terms of LTE speed on the Telus network, the Galaxy Note 4, put up some impressive numbers. I got 41.58 downstream and 15.18 upstream on average when I tested the phone using the Speediest.net app.

When it comes to the camera, you get a 16MP shooter in the rear with optical image stabilization, which is a first in any Samsung Galaxy smartphone. The front camera is a 3.7MP shooter for those selfies that you want to take. The rear camera also does 4K video and can be highly adjusted to suit your needs. That required a trip to Pearson Airport in Toronto to take some pictures. First here’s a still that you can click on to see at full resolution:

20141102_140823

The quality is quite good. But check out the video which was shot in 4K video:

The video is also quite good, but if you want to shoot at 4K resolution, you’ll need a MicroSD card. One thing I should note is the microphone. It was sensitive enough to pick up my breathing.

Battery life is a strength of this phone. I got almost two days of usage out of this phone. That’s impressive. Telus is offering the Galaxy Note 4 for $300 on a 2 year term or for $800 outright. That makes it a great value when compared to the iPhone 6 Plus. Taking into account the speed, battery life, camera, and the fact it comes with a pen, you have to take a serious look at the Samsung Galaxy Note 4. Take a good hard look at it if you are looking for a “phablet.”

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