Android Upgrade is Still a Joke

So the news is that this year the new Morotrola G6 family of phones will be upgraded to Android P later this year.

I call bollocks.

I’m still waiting for Android O on my G5 S+, and I’m not holding my breath.

Meanwhile, my Lumia 550 and 950 are still being upgraded with minor tweaks (i.e. more than just security updates, despite the OS being in support mode), or at least they would be if I’d turned them on in the last year.

I don’t miss Windows Mobile as much these days as I get used to Android again, but some things are still a definite step back.

And less choice for the consumer is a good thing, right?/

IFTTT

I was just skimming over the Pocket Lint review of the Ring Video Doorbell (my thoughts on the Ring Video Doorbell Pro and Stick Up Cam coming soon) when I noticed they mentioned Ring+ will interface directly with the Belkin WeMo products. That could be worth investigating…

Also of note though is the integration of both Ring and Hue with the IFTTT service.

I’ve known about IFTTT for years, but it never interested me as I’ve never really been able to think of where I’d use it. This integration directly with Ring may be interesting, and additionally WeMo devices are also supported by IFTTT, but looking over the range of devices being sold on Amazon I can’t say there’s anything other than a few simple power sockets that interest me… and then they are only of mild interest… until you factor in the price (£29.99 up apparently) at which point I lose interest entirely.

Still, I may well have a look at IFTTT and see if it can do anything interesting for me.

It’s also interesting to see that the reviewer questions the battery life of his doorbell too. Whilst my doorbell is wired in, my Stick Up Cam has only been running for a little over two days and has already used 20% of its battery apparently. Hopefully the battery just needs to go through a few recharge/discharge cycles to settle down, either way it’s not looking like a good start. This is one of the reasons I’m holding back on my thoughts for now.

Back on the Upgrade Cycle

 

Once upon a time it was normal for me to upgrade a computer every two years, alternating between my desktop and laptop. As time and circumstances changed, this has fluctuated in recent years. My dates may be a little out here, but in recent years my updates have followed a cycle similar to this:

·        2006 – Convertible (tablet) HP

·        2009 – New desktop PC

·        2010 – New laptop (Acer Aspire)

·        2013 – Surface Pro 2 (October)

So I should be about due for another upgrade, right?

Well the thing is apart from the small screen size I absolutely still love my Surface Pro 2. It’s powerful enough for most of the tasks I throw at it (with the exception of video rendering, which can never be fast enough) it’s lightweight, the pen is awesome, etc. Sure there are plenty of things that were improved in subsequent models, but overall I loved the package. The point is whilst a newer model would be great and provide incremental performance gains, day to day the SP2 is still a fine device.

Apart from the fact that it started producing a lot of noise from the internal fan, and the replacement cost Microsoft quoted me was close to £600.

Dammit.

So whilst the machine is capable enough, I find I can’t use it outside the house without fear of deafening everyone around me. Essentially the SP2 has been kept safely indoors for the last several months.

I took to using my work supplied Dell laptop. A heavy clunky beast, strangely sluggish (for a mid-range machine) with less than stellar battery life. The additional weight meant that more often than not I’d just stick to using my phone and consuming media rather than creating anything.

This was all a little frustrating. My main single part of my commute to work is a 55+ minute train journey between Colchester and London totalling a little shy of two hours where I could potentially be doing something useful… even if only occasionally.

So I started looking around for my next machine. Here was a part of my wish list:

·        Something that sits on my lap better than the kickstand of the Surface Pro machines.

·        More memory, at least 16Gb. If I’m going to use this thing for work I’d like to have that stuff running in a VM and well away from my main system.

·        More storage. The 256Gb SSD of the Pro 2 was slightly constraining (you learn to live with these things), but again having the work VM would require a sizable chunk of storage for duplicate installations such as Office.

·        Bigger screen. The Pro 2 screen is beautiful to watch HD films on, but for using Visual Studio it’s quite restrictive.

·        Pen input would be nice. I used to use this extensively, although not so much in recent months. Having it there as an option is only a bonus though at it’s very useful when you do need it.

·        Touch screen. Once you start using a touch screen it can be really compelling for certain situations, and for mobile development it really gives an edge.

·        Decent trackpad. I guess I never notice this very often with the Pro 2 keyboard as I tend to either have it in tablet mode during travelling (due to that lapability issue) or connected to a mouse when sat at a desk. But on the occasions I do try to use it the touchpad experience on the Surface Pro 2 keyboard only just sufficies.

·        Something not too heavy. One of the reasons I upgraded from the Acer to the Surface was because the Acer was often being left at home due to its weight.

There were other considerations too, but these were the main things on my list.

So what to buy?

After liking my Surface Pro 2 so much and with the noted wish list, the natural contender was a Surface Book. I’ve been looking at these beautiful machines since they were announced and had they arrived on these shores around the same time as the US release I’d probably have snapped one up almost instantly (after all I got my Pro 2 on launch day).

But I’ve got three children now and that price was just too much. Looking at the 512Gb model it had everything I wanted… but at what cost. As for the model with 1Tb of storage….

Then I started looking at the Dell XPS 15. And the more I looked the more I liked:

·        Large (15 inch) 4K touchscreen.

·        Up to 32Gb memory, double the maximum currently available on the Surface Book.

·        1Tb storage with aforementioned 32Gb memory was cheaper than the 512Gb/16Mb Surface Book.

·        Faster than a Surface Book.

·        Better graphics than a Surface Book (that surprised me!)

·        Very good trackpad.

·        More ports, 2 USB 3.0 and one Thunderbolt (also HDMI and full size SD card slot)

·        Much cheaper!

Of course there were downsides too:

·        Heavier than a Surface Book

·        No pen support

·        Worse battery life than the Surface Book.

·        Supplied with Windows 10 Home only, no option to upgrade to Pro (really Dell?!!)

·        Windows install contains a little Dell Crapware (I’m looking at you McAfee) as opposed to the ‘Signature’ installation of a Surface Book.

This was going to be a hard choice… or at least I thought so.

When it came down to it the compromises of the XPS 15 seemed more than acceptable against the advantages, and the machine looked to be a little more future proof too with the additional RAM and storage I could get for the cheaper price.

I love the form factor of the Surface Book, but the Surface Pro 2 is still working should I need to do any Pen development (although I won’t be taking it to any meetings!!!)

So I ordered the Dell. Despite the order status stating the machine wouldn’t arrive for 4 weeks it actually arrived in a little over 2 weeks, not the instant gratification you hope for but not too shoddy either.

The machine actually arrived a couple of weeks ago, but I’ve been on holiday much of the time since then so I’ve only had limited time with it so far. The first thing I did was upgrade the OS to Windows 10 Pro (fortunately I had a spare key) and force installed the anniversary update (1607).

I’ve not reset the machine down to a clean state now, I figured I’d see how I get on with McAfee and the Dell software installed for a while (can I last the first year) and performance seems to be good, but I can’t help wondering how much better it could be if I did this. Start-up times in particular are acceptable, buy not as good as I’d imagined. Also there’s a strange bug where I need to restart the device after initial power on due to the ShellExperienceHost service becoming unstable.

I’ve set up a VM for work and assigned it 16Gb of memory and 4 of the total 8 processor cores, and whilst I’m yet to push it, this also seems very responsive and should be faster than the work supplied laptop without bringing the rest of the system to its knees.

That 4K screen is lovely, but frankly after the WOW moment on seeing the Surface Pro 2 screen all those years ago, it’s clearly better but incrementally so. I’ve not done anything to push it yet, with the exception of the 4K videos shot on my Lumia 950 XL, and these really do look impressive, but that’s expected isn’t it? Perhaps OLED will be my next WOW! Moment?

One bad side is that the screen is such a high resolution that some Desktop applications don’t scale properly. Surprisingly Outlook 2016 (yes, the very latest patched version) has the occasional dialog box that appears corrupt. If Microsoft can’t get its house in order it’s no wonder third party apps also fail in this situation.

The laptop is heavier than I’d like, but I’ve got used to this to some extent from carting around my work supplied laptop. Either way it’s not ideal, but at the moment I can live with it.

The keyboard, despite reviews and my pre-purchase concerns, seems OK. It’s not the best I’ve ever used, but it’s nearer the top than the bottom. I’m getting on fine with it and as I get more used to it it naturally becomes more comfortable. But then that would be the case with all but the worst keyboards out there.

Surprisingly, even in Desktop mode I used the touch on the Surface more than I’m currently doing with the XPS. I suspect there’s something wired in my brain that says Laptop = no touch, despite the fact I owned a convertible (that was closer to a laptop) back in the Vista days. Partly that may be down to the touchpad though. I’ve never used an Apple touchpad which are supposed to be the gold standard, but this is certainly the best I’ve used, and the ability to scroll using two fingers has meant that I don’t need to reach out to the screen as often as I used to. However, I still do tap the screen on occasion and would definitely choose to have touch available rather than not, that’s no contest.

One other thing I noticed quite quickly is that the matte silver back of the lid seemed to start getting scuffed almost from the first time I put the laptop into my bag. I quickly purchased a sleeve to keep the machine protected during transit so that was £30 I hadn’t counted on, but it does “complete the package” and looks quite smart.

So that’s my initial impressions of the new kit. Not perfect (weight, battery life) but I’m very pleased so far. I guess time will tell how I feel going forward. Overall though, No regrets. I think I made a good decision for my needs.

Nokia Tablet

So Paul Thurrott and others have confirmed that Nokia is getting ready to announce a 10.1″ Windows RT tablet. It’s going to be a high specification with a quad core Qualcomm 8974 processor, 1920 x 1080 resolution screen, etc.

That is great news, except for one caveat: The expected price is going to be $499, or about £322 in the UK, plus taxes on top I’d imagine, so we’re looking in the region of £386, although I expect £399 to be the minimum headline price.

Nokia/Microsoft, you have a problem here. Since a picture is worth a thousand words, I’ll let a recent mailshot from Ebuyer explain:

So while I absolutely love Windows RT, I can’t see myself advising many to buy this new Nokia device. Yes the Nexus screen is smaller at 7 inches versus the RT 10.1 inch display, but is higher resolution at 1200 x 1920. Also the Nexus doesn’t have Microsoft Office, but most people won’t care.

Also the app selection on Android is far bigger than on Windows RT.

I actually feel the app situation is a bit of a red herring, as almost all the major app categories are covered by RT, and a lot of Android apps are dross, but many are very fine programs indeed.

In favour of the Nokia is also the fact that RT is much more secure than Android.

So it’s an interesting release, but I can’t help feeling the price is going to put off many prospective purchasers, which is a shame.

What we really need is some RT devices @ seven or eight inches to rival the price of the Nexus or Kindle Fire devices. These will, I believe, add credibility to the higher prices of these larger RT devices.

It’s no good having premium devices if there are no standard equivalents against which they can be compared.

Unless of course you’re the only player in town, like Apple was three years ago.

Those days have gone.