Amber and the end of an era

t was actually quite surprising to read that Microsoft bought the Nokia phones business, but these things happen and we can only speculate about the reasons. Perhaps this was the plan from the beginning, rebuild Nokia phones, and transfer it to Microsoft when the product is ready. Now it is ready, a complete line of Lumia devices, from low end to the high end 1020 super camera phone. Market share is increasing and profit is around the corner. This kind of radical moves have been seen before as Nokia dumped consumer electronics to concentrate only on mobile phones in the 1990j’s.

Now Windows Phone and Lumia is still great, that does not change, and only the future can tell whether Microsoft is able to use this new asset wisely , please consumers and make profit.

Now what about the Amber update, actually it did something great, it extended battery life nearly three times, at the moment I get nearly three full days from one charge, from the previous less than one day. It also put in some new features, Camera Pro, a clock you can use without opening your phone and other features. But I think most of the Amber update is not directly visible, but did a great deal to improve the phone.

The update itself takes a long time, several hours, not minutes, and just leave your phone untouched, I had mine plugged to the charger to be on the safe side and went for lunch. It looked dead for a long time, showing just the empty battery sign, but in the end it started an entirely new life. I am very pleased with Amber.

 

Photo with Lumia 920, end of summer 2013

More hours from your Nokia Lumia

Battery drain is a problem on all smartphones, there is a lot of advice to improve this, but most “tricks” have only marginal effect. One major energy consumer is the cellular data 83G) network. Using 3G data transfer the Lumia warms up, and as heat is energy, this is a major loss. Using WIFI (WLAN) the energy loss is much less, and the phone hardly warms at all. So by installing for example the Cellular Data Switch App, available for free from Marketplace it is easy to switch 3G data off and use only WLAN. There is a separate App for WLAN. Actually it would be nice to have one App to do both.

By switching cellular data off, and use it only when necessary it is possible to get a battery life on 48 hours, using 3G data I get only 24 hours.

 

 

 

 

 

 

WP 8 and W 8

IT seems to me now that the Windows Phone 8 is working very well, applications are readily available and the Store concept works fine. Many free quality Apps are available.  Power consumption is still a problem, the charging pad would actually be a good idea.  Actually these smartphones can be rather dangerous, if you would need an ambulance in a remote area it could just be out of power.  A solar power charger would be handy when back packing. I also use frequently the power save option, with the advanced setting "untill next charge". This will help a lot.

The Windows 8 operating system for my Laptop (Aspire V5) has still some flaws. For example the issue reported by many, the lack of a START button in the old fashioned basic Windows screen. It is rather clumsy to use the right swipe or the keyboard button. Also many applications still lack the functionality of Windows 8, and will run only in the basic window, for example Google Earth, Chrome and many others. Microsoft Office 2013 however, works fine, however, the amount of W8 Apps in the Store is still lagging.  I disabled the irritating touch keyboard, for instructions go to http://superuser.com/questions/488322/permanently-remove-disable-touch-keyboard-in-windows-8-taskbar

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Windows 8 and SkyDrive

I have started to build my own Windows system, with my Lumia 920 and an Acer Windows 8 touchscreen laptop.  It actually works very nice, using your Microsoft Live account on both devices and the SkyDrive cloud storage. The only part I am still missing is a Windows 8 tablet. My iPad is rather useless in this configuration

There are of course still a lot of issues with Windows 8, for example the Peoples App does not seem to be able to import Avatars from your Windows Phone, but from Facebook it is no problem. It would also be great to be able to synchronize an Exchange calendar on your office computer. I guess these features will not be too far away, as many people have mentioned these shortcomings.

The use of cloud storage feels still a bit difficult to me, and I would not use it for sensitive data, as the user has no knowledge on the use and security of ones files. I liked Dropbox for its simplicity, but am now moving towards sole use of SkyDrive for reasons of compatibility. 

Microsoft OneNote file synchronized on phone and laptop

Anssi Vanjoki was right after all!

Anssi Vanjoki former head of Nokia mobile devices, predicted that smartphones would replace system cameras, and many so called analysts thought it to be a good joke. But today I think he was quite right, I have a number of digital pocket cameras and a Canon EOS system camera. And actually nobody in my family uses the pocket cameras anymore. Though they might have more Mega pixels, they are still lying around unused. The pictures I make with my Lumia 920 are superb, video is crystal clear and even in low light results are great. And due to the build in GPS are images are georeferenced, so you always know where they were taken. This is of great help for professional use, lecturing etc. To carry around a big camera in a city is cumbersome and actually is an invitation for thieves. The only use for a big camera is for quality nature photography. For most other use the smartphone is always ready and with you, you can upload the images directly to Facebook or any other social platform. The Lumia can upload automatically to Skydrive, a feature which is sometimes useful for backup use.

Vanjoki’s prediction became reality, and proves that analysts are too often wrong. 

Improved Navibation on Lumia

WP 8 Nokia Maps and Navigation

Nokia Maps changed name to Here Maps and Here Drive Beta. There are new features, and improvements. Positioning seems to be improved, and is much faster and has higher accuracy. Places of interested stored in Maps can now be used in Drive. Maps has now the possibility of indoor navigation, for example floor plans of airports, including plans for the different floors in a building. Over 4600 buildings are available at present. 

Improvements I would like include the possibility to show geotagged images on the map, satellite visibility and accuracy information (GPS, Glonass). 

Nokia Lumia WP 8 series phones have integrated GPS and GLONASS positioning, but can we use it?

The Lumia 820, 822 and 920 use the GLONASS enabled Qualcomm GPS chip. However, it seems that the navigation software is not using this option. Recently Samsung made an application available to enable GLONASS on their Windows Phones (Mango version), the app is called High Fidelity Position, and can be used by other navigation applications to improve accuracy.

So, it seems that we have to wait for Nokia or somebody else to produce GLONASS enabled navigation software.  Let’s hope it comes soon, because at the moment we can not use the full potential of our phones.

AT the moment there is a host of Windows Phone 8 navigation and mapping software, and improved positioning would be much appreciated in urban environments with high buildings reducing satellite visibility.

An interesting WP App is the ESRI ArcGIS mapping software, enabling you to collect data, share with groups, or view online maps and imagery on your phone.

ArcGIS WP 8 App

Lumia920, improving battery life

I have used my Lumia  920 for some weeks, abroad and in Finland. Battery life was a problem, but now it seems that by switching off the GPS I get roughly two days on one charge, under normal use. The GPS is draining the battery even if you are not using Maps or Navigation.  I also disabled as many background processes as possible, only using Battery Widget and Weather View. I also use only the Facebook App, not the integrated version, but I am not sure about the effect on battery drain. Whats up could also be an issue; I configured my email account to synchronize only once an hour. With these settings I can use the phone for two days, using a full recharge cycle.

Using the GPS abroad works better than my Symbian E7, which needs an external Bluetooth module to fix (or you have to wait for half an hour). The Lumia 920 works without internet connection, although it sometimes fell back to the position of GSM towers, due to poor sky visibility.  However, it functioned well, and also the offline navigation worked as well as one can expect.

Some suggestions for improvements; I would like to have an App to monitor the GPS behavior, I do not know if it is using GPS, Glonass, or both, this would be important to check functionality.  Actually we do not know whether the phone is actually using Glonass or not.

Another App I would like to have is a Tile to switch the GPS on and off, like the ones used for WLAN or Bluetooth. Actually this GPS-switch is available, it has been added to Connectivity Shortcuts App.

Another way to improve battery life is to switch to 2G network, this is likely using less power, and will be useful when traveling, as the phone will constantly try to switch between 2G, 3G and 4G.