Category Archives: Mobile Devices

Category containing all posts that relate to mobile devices.

Vodafone joins the iPhone club in the UK

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Well after news recently arrived that Orange was gaining the iPhone later this year, there’s been more information.

Vodafone has apparently also managed to organise a deal to sell the iPhone. They won’t be as quick as Orange to get it, with news going round that they will have it sometime early next year. Orange have said that they aim to have it in stores “before Christmas”.

However, it does mean that iPhone sales in the UK will probably rocket up as it becomes available on three providers.

I think Vodafone was beginning to worry that they were going to be missing out. If O2 and Orange had the iPhone, T-Mobile and Vodafone would be the only large network providers not to have the iPhone. Now, T-Mobile will soon be merging with Orange, so Vodafone will be left out on the iPhone.

Information still demonstrates that the iPhone is still in high demand, so it would be a big miss out for Vodafone to loose the iPhone.

Well, I’m looking forward to seeing this on the market. It will definitely bring on a nice price war!

Orange gets the iPhone

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It has been announced today that Orange will get the iPhone 3G and 3GS in the UK, after Apple reaches a deal with a further company. This means that O2 will no longer be the only UK provider of the iPhone.

Orange is saying that it will hopefully have the iPhone in its stores before Christmas, which will hopefully boost their sales quite dramatically. It will also hopefully mean that prices for the iPhone will fall as a price war initialises.

Personally I think it is great news that we finally have a second operator in the UK to provide the iPhone. I am not a great fan of O2 (mainly because their 3G and HSDPA coverage is pretty dreadful) and am glad to see that Orange are going to be taking a share in UK iPhone profits.

Bring on the price war!

iTunes 9 Review – A definite improvement

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As most of you will already know, the Apple conference on the 9th of September brought a lot of news to iPod users. As well as the new iPod Nano and “new” iPod Touch (I can’t say it’s new, all they’ve done is made a bigger size), Apple also released the new iTunes 9. Sadly I wasn’t able to get it right away as I’m going through small problems with internet bandwidth, which also explains why I haven’t been able to post reviews on the new iPod Touch/iPhone firmware yet – don’t worry I will get round to it as soon as I get my unlimited bandwidth back which, as far as I know, should be next week.

Anyway, as for the new iTunes, I am surprised to say that I’m actually very impressed with the new release. The new features aren’t ground breaking, but the new performance upgrades have finally arrived.

The new iTunes packs new features such as Home Sharing, which allows you to share your music between other computers in your home, and a brand new redesigned iTunes Store. Both of which work very well. I haven’t checked out the Home Sharing yet but from what I’ve read online it looks very good. The new iTunes Store is certainly very tidy and works very efficiently and I much prefer it over the previous version.

But I’m happiest about the much smoother performance. The load-up time has improved dramatically and actually browsing through the application is much more speedy.

What used to be a misery is now much easier to use and much less time consuming. I still don’t think iTunes is brilliant, but the new version has definitely made syncing my iPod much less of a chore.

Well done Apple, this is a big improvement.

If you’d like to download the new version, open up iTunes and click Check for Updates in the Help menu. Otherwise, you can head over to apple.com and download a copy from there for free.

Spotify app launched on iPhone/iPod Touch App Store, at last!

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Just some quick news for any Spotify lovers:

The Spotify app has now arrived on the app store, so you can head straight over there and download it.

Bare in mind you’ll need to be a full premium user to be able to make any use of the app, which will cost you a tenner a month!

Oh and the other thing to bare in mind is that apparently it won’t play music in the background which is a bit of a newsense, so close the app and you’re music will stop playing. Hopefully that will be fixed in an update before too long.

Otherwise, go ahead and try it out. Sadly, I’m not a Spotify premium member (for now) so I won’t be able to review it, but if you’ve got any opinions on it feel free to throw in a comment!

3 (Three) “Mi-Fi” looks very interesting…

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If you’re a big reader of the news from the rather large tech world, you may well be aware that UK mobile operator 3 (Three) are planning to launch a very cool new level of mobile internet.

They are dubbing it Mi-FI, but it is basically your own battery powered router for your 3 mobile broadband package.

It is [apparently] very simple to use – you just slot some batteries in, together with your 3 mobile broadband SIM, and then switch it on. From what GEEK! understands, it will then find the nearest internet connection from available GPRS, EDGE, 3G, and HSDPA connections in your area. As soon as it can connect to a network mast, it will start firing out a Wi-Fi connection that all of your Wi-Fi enabled devices can connect to.

The device itself will be available over the internet from September 17th and will be in 3 stores across the country from September 18th.

As for pricing, see below (quoted from ISP Review)

•‘Broadband 5GB 1 month’ is a one month contract which includes 5GB of data for just £15 a month. With this deal the wireless modem costs just £69.99.
•For an upfront charge of £99.99, Mobile Wi-Fi will also be available as a ‘Ready to Go’ kit. The deal includes a wireless modem and 3GB worth of data which can be used over a 3 month period. After the data has been used up, the modem can be used on a Pay As You Go basis.

So there you have it – looks exciting in my opinion. I wouldn’t say it was brilliant value, but if you’re a frequent user of mobile internet it is probably well worth the cost. I’m looking forward to seeing it in 3 stores.