Jun 29
Here are a nice collection of simple Excel files to do our various calculations and as a look up information,
- Tax Calculator
- Indian Trains
- Unit Converter
- World Time
Jun 23
After my previous post on HTC Touch Viva , I got few more time to play with htc’s touted Touch Flo experience. To cut the chase short, I will say this it makes the Windows Mobile experience a much nicer one to say the least. To my understanding the Touch Flo 2D interface is a shell to customize the windows mobile OS underneath and it gives a good account of itself, as soon as i switched to the default windows interface I was confused and even getting some basic things done became a pain.
The HomeScreen with its weather screen, message screen,photo contacts, program shortcuts, gallery access, media player access makes it much easier to use and also much more touch friendly. The message screen displays the most current message but a nice scroll bar enables us to scroll through the other messages from the home screen itself. The photo contacts enables us to keep our most frequent callers on the homescreen and with a option to sms them included. The program shortcut screen is a great way to place shortcuts to access our most often used app.
And one more example is the screenshot which I have shown, giving a easy finger touch friendly access to some main phone functions.
Going by this, Touch Flo 3D in HTC’s Hi-end devices should be a treat to work with provided the hardware has enough oomph to power it up.
Jun 18
When my friend who previously owned a Nokia 5800 suddenly downgraded to a HTC Touch Viva I was surprised (his 5800 seemed riddled with software and display problems). But he is not a power user so he was happy enough to get a Viva. But mind you is hardware and software wise very much similar to HTC Touch (which I posted about few months ago).
Retailing at aroung 13,500 bucks (280$) its almost 2000 bucks cheaper than HTC’s own Touch. Built in a glossy gun metal gray plastic it is slightly slightly bulky when compared to Touch, but very acceptable for a smartphone. When I played around it for few minutes, I was surprised to see its almost or much faster than Touch (might be its only few days old) and it carried a 8GB micro SD card but the file manager and phone’s general operation seemed very fluid.
If you want to know more about its capabilities you can read my post on HTC Touch here.
Jun 12
In the last few days I played with what you may call as poor man’s iPhone namely the Samsung Star (S5230) and LG Cookie (KP500). I was only able to play with both the phones a few minutes and these are only my first impressions.
Samsung Star : The phone was compact and very nice to hold. I was impressed by its array of widgets on the home screen, especially by the ability even to drag and drop even the operator name to the side. The touch was easy to use and responsive and the themes provided gave a personal touch. Even the fonts changed according to the theme was a nice touch. Music quality was excellent and the ability to browse the picture gallery by tilting the phone on either sides was cool. From what I heard from the phone’s owner the battery seems very good for a touch screen phone. More in coming days maybe 
LG Cookie : The phone is more “Hip” looking in its finish with the side “red” trimming. The phone’s UI is based on the earlier Viewty and I found the response to the touch action sluggish. The favorites menu on the menu screen is a easy way to place often accessed apps and there is a task manager to see the running apps. But from what I’ve read on the net it seems phone wont support more than 2 apps to run at the same time. The dice game was a nice way to demo the motion based gaming feature. And the accelerometer provided a way to access the qwerty keyboard when in the messaging window. I will try to get more info as soon as possible.
With 3 Megapixel camera and multimedia player with microSD card slot and with common functions like email, html browser and document viewer and priced at Rs. 9,500/- these 2 phones are worthy to have a look for the casual and not so casual users without having to break their bank account.
Loading ...