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Nokia N97

By Mike Skuse in Reader

Posted in Phones, n97, Software, Technology, Internet, Uncategorized on September 10, 2009 at 10:17 am

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I’ve said in the past that my n95 is my favourite gadget, however that is old news - step aside n95, the n97 is in town. The decision for me to get it was easy - its fantastic, from the qwerty keyboard that takes a bit of getting used to, to the touch screen and the browser. I’ve had the phone for a little while and whilst there are a few little issues these will almost certainly get sorted in future firmware versions (an update is due this month which will feature kinetic scrolling on all menu’s). For me the keyboard is one of the best features, I haven’t fully tested my typing speeds compared to the n95 but I’m fairly sure they’ve improved - without predictive text and the hassle of turning it on / off for words that are or aren’t in the dictionary.

I think biggest issue has to be the low amount of memory - when a couple of applications are running it reduces the amount left free to a level whereby error messages hinder usage. however this isn’t always an issue and can be resolved with a cleanup of items left in the browsers history, I also hear that it will be resolved by the firmware update due this month.

The browser on the n97 is another plus point for me, to be able to touch and move around the pages more naturally than on the N95 is brilliant and the loading time of web pages is much lower too.

Applications that make the most of the n97’s touch screen are currently in limited numbers but I hope that over time some more brilliant apps will be released - the Facebook widget is fantastic whilst its working and not crashing.

Overall I’m very glad that I got the n97 and hopefully I’ll get a video done demoing some of my favourite features soon.

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My Best Gadget ~

By Mike Skuse in Reader

Posted in N95, Phones, Software, Technology on April 2, 2009 at 11:21 pm

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I was just thinking to myself which of my reasonable collection of toys would be my best gadget and I found it easy to choose – my Nokia N95 8GB, it has now replaced a good few things in my day to day belongings but also replaced things that were even just for now and then.

Ironically I hardly make any phone calls on it at all but from the moment I get up till the moment I go to bed it typically is used for a good proportion of the day, On my way to work I use it to listen to the radio, whilst it isn’t a DAB radio or anything fancy and the reception tends to get a bit weak due to the fact I’m listening to Radio 1 rather than a local station I really like the convenience that it provides, from then I use it throughout the day for the obvious texts but also for keeping up to date on all my emails most of which I’ll admit are from play.com, ebuyer and the like but the Nokia Email client is a great addition to the phone, combined with Gmail IMAP it gives almost instant updates on emails.
Its also great for browsing the net, whilst the mobile network isn’t quite up to providing a lot of full websites it can cope with a few Googles now and then and more than copes with Facebook which is a joy to use on the phone on the bus etc.

Onto what it has practically replace – My camera, a while back my camera was a great tool, I’ve taken a lot of pictures on it over the last year but it has sadly been replaced by my trusty phone with its 5mp camera, its convenient and has a good enough quality to get me right through an evening out socialising and I don’t have to take multiple gadgets everywhere!.

Finally a function that whilst I don’t use very often I still enjoy a lot – the GPS, its a bit of a cheek of Nokia to charge for extra mapping facilities like directions within the Nokia Maps software but I get by using Google Maps just fine, especially useful for making sure the taxi you’re in is going in the right direction!
And that is why I think my Nokia N95 is easily my best gadget and well worth the money I spent on it!

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Windows 7

By Mike Skuse in Reader

Posted in Windows 7, Software, Internet on February 26, 2009 at 10:52 am

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Yes! I am still using windows 7, admittedly not on my Laptop anymore as it died on me so I went back to just plain Vista but on my main pc at home it’s still going strong and as good as ever. I’m a bit disappointed with Google Chromes compatibility – the ability to drag the maximised window from one monitor to another seems very buggy within it – presumably due to the customised title bar and tabs? But overall I still love Windows 7 – The ability to drag maximised windows from one monitor to another is still a great use to me and I’m enjoying the flexibility and ease of use its giving me rather than previously having to double click the title bar to restore down and then drag it over and then maximise it again, the process is much more user friendly now. I’m also finding that Windows 7 works a lot quicker and file transfer processes and fails a lot less than Vista, on top of this Windows 7 gives me accurate predicted times of completion and doesn’t crash explorer like Vista occasionally did.

In other news Google Chrome is another piece of brilliance I’m still enjoying, I’ve been using it as my main browser since its release all that time ago and I still enjoy it. The ability to search a website from the address bar by typing part of the site name in, pressing tab then the query is brilliant – it only works for sites you’ve previously visited and if they are compatible (e.g. Youtube) and the options also appear on the new tab page on the right. The browser itself I find is also rather speedy to start up and to use which is a plus.

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Fennec

By Mike Skuse in Reader

Posted in N95, OQO, Software, Internet on November 2, 2008 at 10:49 am

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Mozilla Fennec LogoThe Fennec Fox is

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A week and a bit of my OQO

By Mike Skuse in Reader

Posted in OQO, Software, Internet on September 9, 2008 at 9:15 am

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My first week with my OQO has been brilliant, to start off I shall list what I

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The OQO Model 01+

By Mike Skuse in Reader

Posted in OQO, Software, Technology on August 30, 2008 at 3:33 pm

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Yesterday Expansys had a deal on the OQO Model 01+ whilst the model is a few years old I couldn

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Firmware upgrades worry me

By Mike Skuse in Reader

Posted in Phones, Software, e65, Technology, Internet on August 8, 2008 at 3:58 pm

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Yesterday (admittedly almost today as it was at 11pm-ish) I updated my Nokia E65 to the latest firmware version, now this was released ages ago but I never installed it on my phone as I didn

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Download Firefox … please!

By Mike Skuse in Reader

Posted in Software, Technology, windows, Internet on June 17, 2008 at 8:44 pm

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As some people may know Firefox is just the best browser on earth and right now they are trying to get a world record

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Cheap Multi-touch Pad Part 2

By Mike Skuse in Reader

Posted in Fun, Software, Technology, Internet on June 1, 2008 at 7:40 pm

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A little while ago I made this blog - here

And I can confirm that I have managed to make it! - demonstrated below, I had to have the lights off as it works by finding fingers locations based on light and the way it shows when touching the glass. The video is low quality as it was filmed on my normal camera (Kodak V1003) because my camcorder was in the box being used for the whole thingymabob.

Thanks to the creater at: http://ssandler.wordpress.com/mtmini/

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How are they still around?

By Mike Skuse in Reader

Posted in Software, Technology, Internet on May 25, 2008 at 1:22 pm

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To start off I

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