Russian President, Vladimir Putin, has now signed a law due to come into force in November banning technologies which allow users access to banned websites. These sites are on a list which has been created by the Russian government and extends to virtual private networks (VPN’s) and proxies. …

It’s Friday. Friday at last. Last night, whilst randomly looking for a YouTube video (and I’ll be honest, I was trying to find some Leslie Chow clips because I’m a bit bonkers), an advert appeared before the video. You know the sort, it’s one of the many YouTube …

It’s definitely been a substantial amount of time since we last wrote about a Sharp smartphone on here. (I think this 2014 post was the last one). Today though, we hear that the Sharp Aquos S1 and S2 have leaked, and yet again we’ve got the phrase “bezel-less”. …

If you saw my earlier story, you’ll know that I’m having a bit of an epiphany. Why, just why are we paying nearly £800 for the likes of the Samsung Galaxy S8 + ? It’s a bucket-load of money, and whichever way you look at it, the top …

This little gadget is going to be ideal if you have a big hi-fi or speaker system which doesn’t have Bluetooth capability. Likewise, it’s going to be ideal if you’ve got a TV or another non-Bluetooth device and you want to push the output to a Bluetooth speaker. …

Newsflash. I have a problem. Once upon a time we’d get budget, network-branded phones delivered to the Coolsmartphone HQ and they would be.. for want of a better word.. crap. Now they’re not. They’re really not, and when I see someone walking around with a “big name” budget …

All is quiet, nothing is stirring, not even a mouse and you shout “Alexa, is my door locked?”. No this isn’t the beginning of a weird Internet of Things horror movie but the introduction to Yale’s Keyfree Connected and Keyless Connected Smart Locks in conjunction with Samsung’s SmartThings. To …

Following on from my Venturer Saturn Pro 10 review, I’m now moving on to review the latest budget tablet from RCA/Ventruer the Mercury 7L. As it is currently priced at £49.99, the Mercury 7L is a direct competitor to the Amazon Fire tablet (which I take with me …

Headphones, as you’ll have no doubt noticed if you go to an electrical retailer, can cost a truck load of cash. On a recent trip to Currys I spotted a pair for £449. That’s almost as much as most smartphones. Here, for £199.99 from Selfridges (yeah, a bit …

I’m kinda lucky. I don’t need too much help getting to sleep as I’m properly worn out by the time I hit the sack. However, for those who want a bit of help getting to sleep and having a more peaceful kip, the new Nox Smart Sleep Light …

You want a case, but you also want a selfie stick. What to do eh? Just how are you going to take those arty shots and simultaneously annoy everyone in the surrounding area without that selfie stick? What you need, flower, is a Stikbox. It’s a world first …

We’ve covered this already here at Coolsmartphone but now we’re lucky enough to borrow one to review. For $79.99, this is a pet activity monitor with in-built GPS, WiFi and a SIM card so that you can see where your pet is, live. Oh, and get this, it …

Yes people, I’m learning the Daily Mail-style of click-bait again, in the vein hope that we’ll have enough advertising revenue to pay for the servers this month (sadly, ad-blocking is killing our revenue). OK, long story short. Imagine you want to create a Portable Gaming System. Something running …

If you’re used to talking to someone called “Alexa” in your kitchen, then you might also be talking to her on the move too. A new update for HTC U11 owners, provided you’ve got the latest software, means that the Alexa voice assistant can now sit inside your …

OK, let me set out my stall first. This, the Smart E8, isn’t going to be faster than the likes of the new Samsung Galaxy S8 or the HTC U11. Likewise, it’s not going to have as much on-board memory or storage. But… but.. it’s not over £600. …

There’s a lot said about the HTC U11. Some have called it a “return to form” or perhaps the greatest HTC handset for many years. Me? Well, I don’t totally agree, but I do need to explain why. I’m already impressed by the existing HTC U Play and …

It was an interesting idea. A camera, without a viewfinder, that you randomly carried around (probably with your camera-packing-phone) and generally pointed in roughly the right direction of whatever you wanted to film. We reviewed the HTC Re a couple of years back but now it’s vanished from …

With invites going out for a Samsung launch on August 23rd in New York, we’re seeing leaked information already landing in our mailbox. Not only that, but EE tweeted this which, let’s be honest, would be a bonkers thing to do if you weren’t going to be putting …

A trading update? That’s normally quite a dry document and not one we’d feature here on Coolsmartphone, but the latest one from Vodafone has a number of pretty interesting points. Amongst mentions of “Q1 organic service revenue” and “acceleration in AMAP”, it also shows that data traffic has …

In an effort to stop people fiddling where their phones whilst driving, the people from the Western Cape Government have taken a slightly different approach. A recent advert appears to have lifted a number of CCTV images showing a phone-relate accidents. There’s people falling into ponds, walking into …