Category: Android

Lloyds Bank mobile app switched off for root users

Got yourself a bank account with Lloyds? Keep getting sold stuff in their “account reviews” that you don’t need or want? Paying a monthly fee for some additional extras and a breakdown service that’d probably cost you less if you went direct? Welcome my friends. If you’ve ticked …

Moto G 4G – £149 at Amazon

Just the other day we saw the Moto G 4G at Tesco for £139. It looks to be out of stock now. So, if you can’t find one in your local store or don’t want to go to the bother of unlocking it, head over to Amazon when …

One Plus One to get Android L within 90 Days

HTC recently announced that they would bring One M7 and M8 owners an update to Android L very soon after Google have finished it. Today OnePlus havevalso announced a similar timeframe for their elusive One handset. In their official forum, Mike — one of the official staff member …

New Samsung tablets launch on Three today

Samsung recently announced 2 brand new tablets to go on sale, one with an 8.4 inch screen and the other with a larger 10.5 inch screen. Both pack a super high resolution of 2560 x 1600 pixels, making it really sharp. These go under the brand of ‘Samsung …

Moto G 4G going cheap..ey?

If you want a cheap Android phone you’ll probably have the Moto G on your shortlist. The 4G version is now available but it’s a tad more expensive than the 3G model. It’s not by much, but if you’re on a budget, a few quid can mean a …

Lost your phone? Who needs GPS location when you have your mouth?

Yes, that headline confused me too, but back in the day when we only had a few dozen TV channels instead of a few thousand, we located things without GPS. Back then, when people lost their keys, they could buy a little gadget, which I’ll call a “doo-hickey”, …

LG G3 variants seem to be incoming

The LG G3 is the talk about town at the moment, people can finally start to buy it and make up their own minds whether it’s the phone of the year. I’ve currently got mine and the review will be coming very soon, but it seems like some …

LG G watch shipping early

If you were lucky enough to order your LG G Watch from MobileFun rather than Google Play directly then you could be receiving a little present through the post in the next day or so a little ahead of schedule. It was set to be released on July …

Samsung Galaxy S5 mini announced

As expected, a smaller version of the Samsung Galaxy S5 has been announced today. It features a 4.5″ HD (720×1280) pixel Super AMOLED screen and a quad core 1.4GHz CPU with Android KitKat, so it’s no slouch. Around back there’s an 8 megapixel camera with autofocus and a …

Samsung announce new models

Samsung have announced 4 new members of the Galaxy range of smartphones. They’re all aimed at the mid to low end of the market. The models are the Galaxy Core II, Galaxy Star 2, Galaxy Ace 4 and the Galaxy Young 2 (we’re not sure why the Core uses …

Moto G 4G version, just £139

While you’re down at the local Tesco getting that “special cream” and a sneaky bottle of wine, why not take a look at the new 4G version of the Moto G. Right now at Tesco they’re asking just £139 for this handset on Pay As You Go, which …

Pressy the Android Button – app and hardware review

Pressy, the Almighty Android Button, is a great example of a successful Kickstarter campaign. It was one of those simple ideas that really caught peoples imagination and the aimed for project goal of $40,000 was obliterated!  On the close date of 14th October 2013 the total raised was …

HTC Desire 816 Review

This handset has a lot of the features I’ve seen on the HTC One M8. I mean sure, if you fire up the camera you won’t have the Zoe camera option, or the Pan 360 setting, or that rather clever “Dual capture” options, but you still get those …

Amazon dishing out selected paid-for apps for free

Well, not a great deal we can say on this one. There’s 29 top apps available this Friday and Saturday (27th and 28th June) on Amazon which are normally paid-for apps. Apps include Sonic the Hedgehog 2, Card Wars Adventure, Office Suite Professional and all of these below …

Nexus 5 to come in yellow?

The LG Nexus 5 was released back in October last year and has become a firm favourite with the team in part due to its cheap price. It originally came in just black and white, before red was added to the line-up earlier this year. Now Google seem to be …

Motorola post brief hands on video of the Moto 360

Android Wear is all over the place at the moment and Motorola have posted a brief hands on video of it. Unfortunately you can’t buy one yet. Official Moto 360 Demo at Google I/O: http://youtu.be/vFi-QpuZfXs

£99 G Watch with a G3 purchase at Three

Google announced availability of the new LG G Watch last night in San Francisco with pre-orders live right now. It costs £159 here in the UK, and the device will ship on the 4th July. This is a great price for what looks to be an exciting smart …

Google I/O: Android L released

In the opening keynote speech of Google I/O, Sundar Pichai was gracious enough to drop a few breadcrumbs about the next release of Android (Lemon Meringue? Liquorice?) before it has actually been launched. Apparently this hasn’t been done since the first time they launched an open version of …

LG G Watch also available from Mobile Fun

On Google Play it may be, but you can also get this new wearable from Mobile Fun too It’s available for order at £159 and stock will be arriving at the end of next week for delivery to customers on 7th July. If you want to get a …

Archos enters the Connected Home scene

The Connected Home is the ability to connect to various devices in your house. For example, cameras, movement sensors, temperature sensors which can then be controlled remotely. Archos are the latest company to get involved in the connected home scene and are offering up a range of products. At the …

Google I/O: Security and wearables, Sir?

We know that “Bouncer” has long been a go-to tool for Google to scan apps coming into and already on the Play Store and your phone. Sundar Pichai came to bring the noise at the I/O keynote. First and definitely not least, security patches are going to be …

You can now buy those fancy Android Wear watches

Last night a lot happened in the Google camp, possibly the most exciting being the announcement that two new Android Wear SmartWatches would be available to order pretty soon. Well last night they appeared on the Google Play Store devices section and you can order either the LG …

Samsung Gear Live announced. Buy one now

It wasn’t long ago that we had 1.2GHz CPU’s in laptops (in fact, I think this one I’m using right now has one). Now our smart watches have them. This is the Samsung Gear Live, powered by Android Wear. It has a 1.63″ Super AMOLED (320×320) screen and …

LG announce the G Watch.. again

As part of the Google I/O event last night, Google announced some new additions to the Android Wear range. This, the LG G Watch, was one of them. It’s a device we’ve actually already seen and the company announced that they were .. err.. working on it back in March. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0k3KLjVUzF4 …

Expansys also off-loading the Moto G 4G

Yesterday the people at Phones 4u told us that they had a little early exclusive on the new 4G version of the Moto G. However, we’ve also found that Expansys are kicking them out for the almost same amount SIM-free. Front-up £159.99 and you can have it from …

A mystery Motorola phone seems to keep leaking out

The Motorola Moto X and G are great little devices, with the latest Moto E also offering an even cheaper option. But now there seems to be another variant the Motorola Victara, which seems from the leaked images to be a Verizon version of the Moto E. There …

Get the Moto G 4G right now

You’ve hopefully read our Moto G review and, if you’re gunning for the new 4G version, you’ll probably want to know that it’ll be coming rather soon indeed. However, what you might not know is that you can actually get one today as Phones 4u seem to have …

Google Nexus 7 by Asus – 32GB going cheap

It’s the original Asus-made tablet from 2012, but for £99.99 you’re getting a 1.2GHz quad-core CPU, 1GB RAM and this one has 32GB of storage. Oh, and you get the latest version of Android t’boot. Pop down to your local Argos and you can pick one of these …

ZTE launch the 4G-capable Blade Vec

Available from July 2014 in several countries including Sweden, Norway, Denmark and Finland, this is the Blade Vec 4G. It’ll be rolling out to more countries shortly after and has a quad-core 1.2GHz CPU with a 5″ HD 1280×720 screen, 13 megapixel rear camera with auto-focus and LED …

A week with… The HTC One M8

  I’ve used the HTC One M8 for a week now. It’s been my primary phone, so it’s had to put up with my daily abuse. As a heavy smartphone user, that’s no small ask. First up, I’m an existing Android owner, so out of the box I …

Nokia X2 launched

Bang on schedule, the Android-esque Nokia X2 has been announced. It has a 4.3″ WVGA (800×480) screen, dual- core 1.2 GHz CPU, 5 megapixel camera with LED flash and 1GB RAM with 4GB storage and a microSD card slot. Microsoft… Sorry, Nokia are throwing in 15GB of online …

Aviate Launcher by Yahoo is now available

Aviate started out last year as one of those alternative Android launchers that aimed to predict what apps you use at different times of the day and offer those to you along with weather and location based info. Last year Aviate was available as an invite only app …

Nokia X2 on the way. Leaked images appear

Will the new Nokia X2 be powered by the new Microsoft Android-esque OS? Or will Windows Phone actually appear on this particular one? You may remember the first X Series handsets that we saw in Barcelona and, later on this morning, we’ll see the newest addition to the …

Google Glass lands in the UK

Google Glass has been available in America for a little while now to developers as long as you are happy to spend $1500 on the Explorer option. Now Google have announced that customers in the UK are able to get them too. It’s available for the small (well …

Samsung Galaxy FA appears again, this time in “glowing gold”

Another shot of the Galaxy F has popped up today, courtesy of the usual place. This, apparently, is a new colour but the details behind this are still quite sketchy. It will, according to rumours, have a metal back, a 5.25″ QHD display, Snapdragon 805 processor, 3GB RAM, …

LG G3 launching on Three UK 26th June

LG have started sending out press devices of the new LG G3 so that sites can get reviews up, and that means the general public should also be able to purchase one shortly. We heard lots of talk that the G3 will launch in the UK on the …

Remote kill order initialised!

Thought that might get your attention 😉 Imagine the scene, you are on a bus /train/aeroplane/horse drawn cart or other mode of transport. You are minding your own business and get off without a care in the world. A while later you go to get your phone and …

ZTE and Virgin Media launch the Blade L2 and Kis 3

Fancy getting the ZTE Kis 3? It is £49.99 with Virgin Media and £59.99 when bought at Argos. For that you get a handset running Android 4.4 with a 4″ WVGA (480×800) screen and a 1.2 GHz Dual Core CPU. The device also has a 3 megapixel camera,1400 …

Get a Tesco Hudl for £59

As you know here at Coolsmartphone we love to bringing cracking deals and bargains. The latest that we have found is on the Tesco Hudl tablet. We’ve already written a rather spiffing Hudl review and it was already cheap, but now the thing is down to an almost …