Category: General
Despite it being law for a number of years, people are still continuing to use their phone whilst driving. The RAC has released some rather worrying statistics from a recently commissioned survey. There’s been an increase in drivers owning up to using a handheld mobile phone – from …
Just recently I had to admit to something. Somebody asked me to scan a document at work and email it. I was confronted by a very hi-tech printer, plumbed into our network and equipped with a keypad to navigate around the control panel. After a lot of random …
The grand-master of the phone leakers, Evan Blass, has just dropped this little nugget on Twitter. It’s the new Galaxy S8 from Samsung.. When I say “it”, there’s actually going to be two phones. Gone are the navigation buttons you’ve grown used to in previous Samsung Galaxy handsets …
Remember some time ago we brought you the news that finally, Netflix was allowing customers to download some of their content and store it to the device? The good news is that the latest update to the media streaming app allows content to be stored on the SD …
Available from Amazon US for $49.99, this definitely isn’t one of those speakers you pop into your coat pocket. Measuring in ay 25.15 x 11.18 x 13.21 cm it’s definitely got some “meat” to it, and I mean that in a good way. Up top, four touch-control keys …
BT is a very strong company. They’re a household name and there’s more than a million small investors in it. However, they’ve lost over 20% in their shares in just one day. It caught those investors seriously off-guard. The reasons? Yes, there’s more than one. You may know …
Christmas seems to have just flown by, and somehow we’re just days away from February. During the festive season, as part of the regular “works Christmas do”, I got to go to the Zulu Sundance party at the NEC in Birmingham. It was definitely different, and you’re met …
Apps. The ones I download are mostly free because, deep down in my heart, I’m tighter than a gnats backside. How do these apps make money then? How do the developers get paid? How do those big TV advertisements appear on TV if we never actually click “Buy” …
OK. Slightly off-topic today, but the regular readers will no doubt be aware that I film a lot of our product reviews in my car. As an example, my SanDisk iXpand overview or this FM transmitter review. I was even doing this some 10 years ago in glorious …
I like the sound of this little doo-hickey. Just strap it to your bike and it’ll provide a simple guide to your destination. An arrow shows you the direction you need to be heading and below it’ll show how many miles remain. You can then make the best …
In my opinion it’s one of the best phones to have been announced last year. Now it’s available on the high street for the buying public. Three and Huawei have just announced that the Mate 9 is going on sale in some of the Three stores and also …
My wife has the Samsung Galaxy S7 edge and, quite frankly, I’m surprised that it’s still in one piece. You may remember what happened with her Samsung Galaxy S5, and the plastic construction seemed to cope with the constant drops very well. So, if you’ve had a look …
My brain works in strange ways. Last night, as is usual, I put my phone into “Airplane mode” before going to sleep. It’s a little habit I’ve fallen into because, deep down, I don’t trust that “silent mode” won’t silent my morning alarm too. So, I put it …
At Christmas my nephew had a drone. Just a few days later it seemingly latched onto another signal and, whilst he was flying it across a large local park, it decided to fly in one particular direction – never to be seen again. Part of me can understand …
OK, you know the deal. You get a call from a withheld number and you ignore it. It could be one of the many PPI calls, it could be one of those ambulance-chasing claims companies. It could, however, be a call from your doctor or a call from …
Before I mention the iD Mobile plans, I know that Sky are now running their mobile network too (which sits on O2) and they’re very eager to be mentioned here. For Sky customers, it might be worth checking out (head to sky.com/mobile). Sky keep emailing me to let …
OK, not quite free. You’ll have to pay postage. However, if you want a personal skin on your Sky remote control or your phone, just put FREESKIN in during the checkout process on the Wrappz website. Apple, HTC, Google, Nokia and other skins are available so you should …
Yes, bike lights. Welcome to the never-ending list of stuff that we’re reviewing here on Coolsmartphone. I’m hoping that we’ll have some sports cars in next. These are LED lights. Back when I was a kid I’d have a huge battery in each of my bike lights and …
In a way I’m not overly happy that a service like this exists, or has to exist. The NHS here in the UK is crumbling. There’s many reasons for it, and we could argue about them all day, but fact is – it’s broken. We’re now in a …
Over the last few days I’ve been faffing about with the voice-controlled Amazon Echo Dot. It’s got an invisible lady inside called “Alexa” which will do your bidding. The device itself is a magical disc-shaped unit which will wake up and then answer your questions. It’ll also play …
Over three years ago now we reviewed these Hyundai sunglasses. They had a “hidden” camera up front which meant that you could secretly record “stuff”. I tried it on a summers evening whilst cycling and the results were a little low-quality and bumpy. However, fast forward to CES …
Think your microSD card is big enough? Think again. Over in Las Vegas, SanDisk have just revealed their new 256GB Ultra microSD card. It boasts transfer speeds of up to 95MB/s and you can have the additional storage it provides presented as preferred or adoptable storage on Android. …
Christmas is over for yet another year but, over the New Year too, you’ll probably be keeping in touch with friends and relatives. The modern way to do this, even for those who aren’t technically familiar, is via a video call. On Android you’ll probably be using Skype …
Have a quick look on the “Whois” for this site and you’ll see the following … Creation Date: 2003-02-14 08:44:29 Yes, in February it’ll have been 14 years since I bought the coolsmartphone.com domain name. Now, while I’m having a quick trip down memory lane, does anyone remember …
A short time ago we reported that Cyanogen as a company would be shedding considerable staff. They were also closing buildings with some of the team moving to a single location. The new CEO, Lior Tal, announced the company would cutting ties with co-founder Steve Kondik too. Now Cyanogen …
Back in March at the Gadget Show Live event, I got to meet the Gamevice team where they introduced me to their Gamevice Live adapter for the iPad. At the time, they didn’t have an adapter for the iPad Air until the past couple of months. The adapter …
Having a security camera on your house can be a good and bad thing. Sure, you can keep an eye on things, but it’s also a sign that you want to keep something protected, and thieves might target your house because it’s got cameras hanging off it. So …
Yes, the crazy festive season hasn’t even finished and already the next crazy festive season is already gearing up, with Boxing Day sales kicking off online and on emails already. Vodafone have mailed to tell us about their biggest-ever winter sale, which starts today and finishes at the …
Yesterday we mentioned the new high-speed internet which has arrived in Hebron, courtesy of Three UK. The network gave away free “Home-Fi” routers to residents so that they could at last get the fast broadband they’ve long needed. We didn’t know at the time what make the routers …
You may have noticed a bit of a “theme” developing on Coolsmartphone this week, and it’s all to do with movie watching. Yes, you can watch TV and sports events too, but there’s a definite battle going on for your eyeballs right now. If you pay for cable …
My wife currently works as a customer service assistant in a local town. While she was working last week, she could hear a commotion outside in the street. A member of the public came running into to her office, screaming for help and requesting a fire extinguisher stating …
So. I’m not totally sure where to begin with this one. I’ll sum it up in one sentence if I can. It’s a camera that you stick fairly low down on your wall that will let you video call your dog. Yeah. Not only that, but if you …
When I first started writing about smartphones, I never dreamt that they would change our lives in quite the manner that they have. Yes, the smartphone. It’s now become the device of choice. Smartwatches aren’t proving to be as popular as thought, PC’s and laptops are appearing in …
Back in the “old days” we used to have photos on film. We then sent them off to get processed and we’d get them back on nice paper and we’d put them into albums. Now, we have smartphones and we have our photos stored either in a “cloud” …
Unless you’re trying to use the M6 Toll, a lot of places will now let you pay for stuff using your phone. With 1 in 5 payments now made via contactless, it seems to be the future. Transactions of up to £30 can be “tapped” and won’t need …
Remember about three years ago when retail giant Amazon announced that it was going to deliver your parcels by air, using drones? Oh how we giggled. Well, that day has just drawn a step closer. Following a trial in Cambridge, the company has completed the first Amazon Prime …
Our smartphones are like our own personal assistants. They help remind us of the things we usually forget. They help us record beautiful memories we experience every single day. And of course, they help us get in touch and stay connected with our loved ones. Your smartphone helps …
These guys at a great little startup from here in the UK. Their product came after a trip to a farm and a little boy became lost. Staff at the farm were searching for the parents, and the parents were searching for their son. Colleen, the founder of …
Every now and again, a press release will be sent to Coolsmartphone Towers and we will all cheer! Well, today I was the one cheering with the launch of Wireless versions of the Seattle on-ear headphones from Urbanista. We covered the wired version earlier this year, and they …
It’s the season to be jolly, but not everyone gets to be at home with their family. If you’re in a different country, whether it be because of work, holiday or you just don’t like your family very much, you’ll probably be huddled around a WiFi access point …
