source: TechFresh
Showing posts with label Mobile. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Mobile. Show all posts
Thursday, July 21, 2011
Schenker XIRIOS W710 Mobile Workstation
source: TechFresh
Monday, June 20, 2011
LG 200 (Virgin Mobile)
The LG 200 is an inexpensive slab phone with a full QWERTY keyboard. It's not as bare bones as it looks, as it comes with a Web browser, Google Maps, and Bluetooth. Those features make it a decent, if unremarkable, candidate for a budget texting phone. But Virgin Mobile's comprehensive array of inexpensive prepaid options is the real story here.
Design, Call Quality, and payLo Plans
The LG 200 measures 4.5 by 2.3 by 0.5 inches (HWD) and weighs 3.6 ounces. It is made of a mixture of matte and glossy black plastics. The tight-cut lines and finished edges keep the phone from feeling excessively cheap, which is good. The vertically-oriented, 2.2-inch screen is unusual in this form factor; it works okay, but there's wasted black space on the left and right side as a result. The display itself offers a relatively low 176-by-220-pixel resolution, as well as poor viewing angles and contrast; colors nearly reversed themselves whenever I titled the handset a few degrees in any direction. Beneath the screen, six function keys bracket a raised, five-way control pad. The four-row QWERTY keyboard was exceptionally comfortable, with raised, well-sized keys that offer a medium amount of click and balanced resistance.
The LG 200 is a single-band, 2G 1xRTT (1900 MHz) device which runs on Sprint's physical network. Voice quality was decent, if not spectacular, with a slightly muffled tone in the earpiece. You can really crank the volume with this one, so watch your ears. Callers had no trouble understanding me through the microphone. Reception was fine.
Calls sounded clear through an Aliph Jawbone Icon Bluetooth headset ($99, 4 stars), though pairing it took too many keypresses. Voice dialing worked over Bluetooth, but only part of the way. Each time, I had to look at the screen and choose the correct option from a choice of several, which means you can't use it while driving. The speakerphone was exceptionally loud and clear. Virgin Mobile didn't give us enough prepaid credit on our loaner phone to test the battery, but the phone wasn't lasting unusually long in our tests.
The LG 200 is one of Virgin Mobile's payLo phones. That means you can get 1500 minutes, 500 texts, and 10MB of data for $30 per month, without signing a contract. While the data amount is paltry, the rest makes it a screaming deal, given that Virgin Mobile works on Sprint's regular nationwide network. You can also get 400 minutes for $20 per month, or 90 days of service that dings you 20 cents per minute. You can also buy additional texts, Web access, and ringtones with $10, $20, and $30 Top-Up cards.
Apps, Multimedia, and Conclusions
There's not much here in terms of apps, but the LG 200 is a serviceable messaging device. It has a combination Java-based e-mail and IM client that hooks into Yahoo, AOL, Windows Live, and Gmail, plus IMAP and POP3 accounts, but not Google Talk. Text messages are threaded.
The main menu consists of 12 icons arranged in a grid pattern. The Opera Mini Web browser is slow, but it'll get you to your Webmail. You can choose from a basic array of games, ringtones, and wallpapers from Virgin Mobile's online portal. The LG 200 lacks music and video players, so the non-standard 2.5mm headphone jack on top is for mono wired hands-free earbuds only.
The VGA (0.3-megapixel) camera is as worthless now as it was in 2004 when they first began appearing on cell phones. Amusingly, Virgin Mobile trumpets this as a "high-resolution" camera, when in fact it is the absolute lowest resolution cell phone camera ever sold in any volume. There's 15MB of free internal storage, but no microSD card slot; you can only transfer pictures by sending them as picture messages. You won't want to, though, as images only take up about a quarter of the average laptop screen.
Used within its limitations, the LG 200 is a fine texting phone that can save you bucketloads of cash over the next few years. If you don't need a full keyboard, we'd recommend the Samsung Mantra SPH-M340 ($19.99, 3 stars) or the LG Flare LX165 ($19.99, 3 stars), both of which offer improved voice quality and more durable flip form factors for less cash. Both also give you access to the same inexpensive payLo plans.
PCMag
Tuesday, May 17, 2011
Mobile Spy v5 enables parents, employers smartphone access
Retina-X Studios has updated their Mobile Spy 5.0 smartphone monitoring software to include the Mobile Spy Live Control Panel, which can grab screenshots from the user's smartphone (iOS, Android or Blackberry) as well as a map of its current location, updated every 90 seconds. The program also logs SMS text messages, call information, GPS locations, photos taken and other activities, and the latest version adds silent SMS commands for monitoring and recovering a child's or employee's smartphone as well as the option to have activity logs e-mailed to administrators.
"Silent" SMS commands that the software can execute include sending back GPS location, SIM card information, locking or unlocking the phone as well as a remote data-wipe operation. A version of the program can also work with Symbian OS or Windows Mobile devices. After any activity is logged, the information is silently uploaded to the administrator's private online account, which can be checked from any web browser without further access to the phone.
Apple's iOS devices must be jailbroken prior to installing the software, as Mobile Spy has not been approved by Apple and is not available through the App Store. It also does not work on iPad 2s at present, and the Live Control Panel is not available for iPad (either version) at all.
For Android devices running v2 or later, the software can be installed on any non-AT&T Android device without restriction (Mobile Spy 4.0 can support Android v1.5 and v1.6). AT&T is currently blocking third-party apps from being installed, so Mobile Spy does not work on devices using AT&T's network.
Blackberry devices running versions 4 or 5 of the Blackberry OS can also use Mobile Spy, but cannot capture web URLs visited at the present time. The software also requires that any device being monitored have GPS and an internet connection via Wi-Fi or data plan for continuous monitoring.
Mobile Spy 5.0 is available on a subscription basis, billed in quarterly instalments of $50, or semi-annual payments of $70 or a flat annual rate of $100.
Thursday, May 5, 2011
LG Flare LX165 (Virgin Mobile)
The LG Flare offers good voice quality, Bluetooth, and a lightweight design. If you've got another device for listening to music and snapping photos—say, an iPod touch ($229, 5 stars)—then the LG Flare is a decent way to spend as little as possible on whatever occasional voice calls you need to make or receive. It's a poor choice for a primary cell phone, though, for several reasons.
Design, Call Quality, and Battery Issues
Let's start with the basics. The LG Flare measures 3.5 by 1.9 by 0.8 inches (HWD) and weighs 2.7 ounces. It's made of a mixture of glossy and matte black plastics, and manages to avoid looking or feeling cheap. As with most flip phones, you get two LCDs: an external, 1.1-inch, 96-by-64-pixel screen, and an internal, 1.8-inch, 128-by-160-pixel display. Both are color, although the external one is a dim, passive-matrix LCD.
Seven function keys surround a squarish, five-way control pad. On the home screen, each of the control pad directions offer additional shortcuts to various apps like many other phones, but LG actually labels them on the control pad, which is helpful. The brightly backlit numeric keypad offers soft-touch, raised keys. They're a little stiff, but fine for dialing numbers and texting (the latter providing you don't mind T9, as opposed to a real QWERTY keyboard).
The LG Flare is a single-band, 2G 1xRTT (1900 MHz) device which runs on Sprint's physical network. Voice quality was fine overall, with a bright, if somewhat scratchy sounding tone in the earpiece. There was little background hiss. Callers said I sounded clear as well, and RF reception was fine.
Bluetooth pairing is a total mess. LG split it up into two menus—Tools and Settings—and requires many extra steps and key presses. At least the Flare has Bluetooth, though; the LG 101 ($9.99, 2 stars) omits it entirely. Calls sounded clear through an Aliph Jawbone Icon Bluetooth headset ($99, 4 stars). Voice dialing works over Bluetooth, but only with preset contact names; you can't dial arbitrary numbers. The speakerphone went surprisingly loud, although it distorted considerably.
Battery life was terrible at just 2 hours and 23 minutes of talk time. That's awful. But given the Flare's prepaid leanings and several days of actual standby time, it may not be a deal-breaker for an occasional-use phone. Oddly, the Flare uses a proprietary charging connector that I thought had disappeared several years ago. Be careful not to lose the bundled AC adapter, especially since you'll need it so often.
Plans, Apps, and Conclusions
Virgin Mobile's payLo plans for the LG Flare are quite inexpensive. A 1500-minute, one-month plan that includes 500 text messages and a paltry 10MB of Web access costs $30. You can also get a 400-minute plan for $20, or pay 10 cents per minute and 15 cents per text message. You activate the phone via a serial number, either through the phone (if you're topping off an existing number) or through Virgin Mobile's Web site (if you're starting from scratch). We wish each plan didn't expire after one month, but otherwise, they're solid deals.
The Flare's main menu consists of nine icons arranged in a grid pattern. You can send texts and picture messages, but text messages aren't threaded. The sluggish OpenWave browser loads WAP pages slowly. They're readable in a pinch if you want to check the latest news or sports scores, but that's about it; I couldn't get Facebook's WAP page to load without server errors. You can buy ringtones, wallpapers, and basic games from the browser-based VirginXL portal. LG and Virgin Mobile claim the Flare has GPS, but I couldn't find navigation or even basic mapping apps. You can check or top up your account from the phone, though using Virgin Mobile's Web site on a PC was much faster.
Multimedia functionality is non-existent. There's no camera, camcorder, music player, video player, or memory card slot. There's just 7MB of free internal memory, which I suppose is enough to store a few extra ringtones if they're not too long. The non-standard 2.5mm headphone jack only works with mono, wired earbuds.
As a phone for occasional calls and texting, the LG Flare gets the job done. I'd probably choose it over the LG 101, thanks to the Flare's superior voice quality and Bluetooth compatibility, even if the Bluetooth here is unnecessarily fussy to set up. The Samsung Mantra SPH-M340 (3 stars, $19.99) is pretty similar; it adds longer battery life, a cheap camera, and looks a bit different. It's otherwise functionally equivalent to the Flare, but gets a better rating because of its adequate battery life. Our Editors' Choice on Virgin Mobile remains the LG Rumor Touch ($99, 4 stars), which requires a regular monthly plan. But if you have the extra cash, it adds a QWERTY keyboard, touch screen, and music and video players, and is far more suited to being your primary cell phone.
Benchmarks
Continuous talk time: 2 hours 23 minutes
PCmag.com
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)