Category: General
Samsung pay, which is the company’s mobile payment system, is reportedly coming to the United Kingdom, China and Spain in the first quarter of 2016. Currently only limited to a number of handsets, Samsung Pay, has not been as big as Apple Pay to date. However, one way …
A new Sky box (which will probably cost the customer a lot) has been announced which lets you watch and stream content on your TV or to several portable devices. As an example, you could watch I’m a celeb in the living room, pick up your tablet and …
Think, for a minute, about how we used to make phone calls. Back before mobile phones you’d have to hunt out a phone box and hope that your pocket contains lots of change. If you didn’t have enough cash, your phone conversation would usually end up being fairly …
My little boy loves YouTube: he particularly loves watching people playing Lego video games. But I’m constantly worried he might come across something inappropriate for him. Seven months ago, I thought my prayers had been answered when YouTube announced its YouTube kids app. However (unsurprisingly, yet again) unfortunately …
Figures released by Gartner make for yet more uncomfortable reading if you are involved in Windows Phone. The share of the smartphone market has now dropped to just 1.7%. The figures are for Q3 and compare to a 3% share from the same period a year ago. According …
Remember our hands-on with the new Xperia Z5 range? If you want the Sony Xperia Z5 Premium, it’s now available to buy from Vodafone here. It’s powered by Android 5.1 with Marshmallow on the horizon. It has a Qualcomm MSM8994 Snapdragon 810 CPU – that’s quad-core 1.5 GHz …
After raising a serious truck-load of cash on Indiegogo, TrackR was born. It’s a small, coin-shaped device which you can attach to your keys, stick in your wallet or put on your handbag. Working with an app, it shows you where your things are and also works in …
When you see someone filming with their smartphone, name the thing that annoys you more than anything. It’s probably this… https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Bt9zSfinwFA Filming stuff the wrong way around. It’s criminal. Worst of all is when someone starts filming in portrait and then turns the phone 90 degrees whilst it’s …
While I’m not a firm favourite of the idea of yet another day dedicated to spending money, we’ve got to admit that HotUKDeals (HUKD) has continually saved us some dosh on the things we were already going to have to splash out cash on more than one occasion. …
Following a rather mad advertising campaign, Deezer have a little gift for Three customers. Their paid-for service normally costs £9.99 for the ad-free, high-quality, off-line-listening version. That monthly subscription also lets you import your dodgy MP3’s that “fell off the internet” and delivers unlimited mobile listening. However, if …
Remember Google Play All Access, Mountain Views Competitor to Spotify and Apple Music? Remember that since Google never ever releases just one version of a product, as it always seems to want to compete against itself, that it brought out YouTube Music key? It went one step further …
This week I am attending The Big Android BBQ Europe in Amsterdam. Today I am blogging live from the Code Kitchen where some very clever people are engaging in code challenges. The Big Android BBQ has been a two day Android focused conference. Opened with a Keynote delivered …
We’ve published many reviews and have taken a look at various mobile chargers. Battery life is highly important to phone users, so you can either carry around a big battery as a mobile charger or just keep yourself near to a car or wall charger. It’s a bit …
It wasn’t that long ago we had to be dependent on the headphones and ear buds that came in the box with our phones. Thankfully that has all changed with fantastic features for music lovers on phones, and the ability to use any headphones we want. Step in …
An alarm system, fitted, can cost you around £500. However, for £249 you could try this Myfox Home Alarm and set it up yourself. It’s got bags of extra goodies for us smartphone lovers. It’ll work with Nest too, because this has a key fob and smartphone app …
Here in the UK our keyboards are slightly different. Indeed, if you travel around the world a bit you’ll notice that keyboard layouts differ depending which country you’re in. Differences between national keyboard layouts are mostly the placements of symbols on the character keys. Between the UK and …
One of my other hobbies, apart from writing for this fantastic site, is flying drones. These are also known as unmanned aerial vehicles or UAV’s. My current setup is able to hold a GoPro camera on a 3 axis gimbal which gives excellent super smooth clear footage. The drone …
Modern cars tend to have a lot of sound proofing, especially if you’re driving one of those diesel cars. It’s to reduce engine noise, but despite how nice your tyres might be, there’s still road noise to deal with. Ford have been thinking of new ways to sort …
First it was Bendgate, now it’s Crackgate. More supposed tales of woe to hound the new Nexus 6P flagship. Some users are reporting that the Corning Gorilla Glass 4 panel that sits in front of/protects the camera is spontaneously cracking. It appears that this piece of glass isn’t …
I’m terrible with the whole car mount / phone holder situation. I get to my car, open the door, then throw my wallet and phone onto the passenger seat. If the phone is lucky, it’ll be plugged in and will perhaps reach the destination without sliding off the …
For those of you that listen to the Coolsmartphone Podcast, you have probably picked up on the less than subtle suggestion that I’m somewhat of an Apple fan boy. Guilty as Charged. I’ve been an iPhone user for a long time, and no device in the past has …
Throwing things away is, generally, bad. Having a rechargable battery is also better than getting yourself a “normal” one which you’ll end up throwing in the bin. So, it’s with some initial apprehension that I bring you this mobeego charger. It costs $2.50, which is about £1.66, and …
You’ll no doubt be aware of the situation out in Egypt at the moment. As we write, the amount of repatriation flights were a lot less than hoped, and many British holidaymakers are still out there. O2 are trying to do their bit to help … (We are) …
EE slipped an interesting little nugget into their recent press release. We almost missed it, but if you check this page on their website you can sign up for a new product called EE Pet Pal. The company tell us that it’s … A new connected device that …
We are quite fond of Huawei here at Coolsmartphone. We also have a soft spot for Honor. Now what is these companies have in common? Well, there are several things. One is the daddy brand and the other the offspring, they use the same design language etc. The …
If I look deep, deep down into my blackened heart – a heart broken by embargoed information, PR spin and endless emails about Kickstarter campaigns – I’d say that this is just a PR stunt dreamt up by Orchard Pig Cider. I don’t even like cider. I like …
Apps like WhatsApp and iMessage are great because they have a level of encryption which cannot be “sniffed” or decrypted. Indeed, if you drink lots of tea and have a read of the Apple security guide, it clearly states the following… Now – according to The Telegraph, this …
This one was sent to us by Peter. Thanks fella. Don’t forget, you can send in your tips to us right here. To be honest we’re not totally sure if this is a marketing stunt or a real, actual service. It’s a miniature ambulance that comes to your …
It’s coming up to Christmas – apparently there are only seven weeks left until the day. Because of this, here at Coolsmartphone Towers, we are getting lots of emails about Christmas gifts. This one stuck out for me as it looked pretty cool (I posted a story about …
Some times a little bit of style goes along way in the consumer tech industry, and the new Executive Power Bank from Kit certainly has plenty of style but does it have the substance to go with it? Styled to look like an iDevice, the Power Bank …
Mobile gaming is the future. As smartphones and tablets become more powerful day by day, more and more people get hooked by mobile games. For the first time this year, worldwide revenue from mobile gaming will surpass that of console gaming. It is, no doubt, surprising that Nintendo, …
As we get towards the festive season you’ll see us cranking up the number of reviews and gift ideas, all ready for those presents around the Christmas tree. Also, as you may have noticed this last week, we’ve had more traffic than usual and it’s resulted in the …
What? Another article about EE? Twice in one day. I think they’re going to have to send me more chocolate. Today they’ve launched some new international call packs and add-ons. Both pay-monthly and SIM-only customers can get these and they’ll let you make calls abroad from the UK …
Hmm.. that title was a little promotional wasn’t it? Almost as if I’m trying to sell it. Honestly, it’s got absolutely nothing to do with the free EE contracts that our entire housing estate enjoys. * If your contract just isn’t enough, have a look at a new …
Did anyone else notice that Motorola had released a new phone in the USA over the last few days? Well they did and it was called the Droid Turbo 2. Now Motorola have decided that we UK buyers are also worthy of such a powerful device too, albeit …
OnePlus have been busy as of late and have just launched the OnePlus 2. They have just closed off the reservation list and are busy sending invites out to the millions of people who had registered. Not only that, but there’s flash sales to appease the masses of …
I had the familiar ping of my inbox this morning as I awoke. In amongst all the usual detritus I had an email from our friends at Expansys. It seems that they have managed to secure some stock of the Nexus 5X. The are carrying the 32GB version …
BT & EE are joining hands to put all our media and comunication consumption in one place. Although the Three & O2 deal was not allowed as they were giants in the same field and would land up reducing customer choice, this merger is not thought to be …
If you’ve ever wanted to completely destroy your data allowance and find out how fast your mobile network is, you could download the Ookla Speedtest or browse to Speedtest.net. It will, if you do it enough, give you a rough idea of just how quick your connection is. …
Not something we usually consider as mobile phone owners, is that question of “Where did my application come from? What platforms does it use?” Both questions tie into: “What permissions does my applications require?” Sadly we rarely think of any of these questions, therefore we put our trust …
