I’ve always tried to carry a pad of some kind. Some of you may already know of my penchant for writing the occasional blog post in long hand first.
Well, for the ‘Epic Summer of Travel‘ (as I’ve taken to calling it), I’ve decided to take the plunge with my first ever Moleskine.
Taking notes, drawing pictures and collecting keepsakes, this book is now my friend and guide. So If blog posts start appearing over the coming weeks that seem a little out of date, now you know why.
I’m currently on part two of the five part Lucozade Energy Challenge social media gig and as you might’ve guessed from my last post, I’m having an awesome time.
On the way here I had to fly via Chicago; an amazing city (from what I saw of it coming into land) and one that I wish I could’ve stayed longer in. Not least because as soon as I touched down no less than three differentmobilegeeks were in touch to let me know about the Mobile Camp that was happening just down town from Chicago International, and I was invited! Unfortunately I only had an hour between my connections though so alas, it was never meant to be
Sad times. However, on the flight itself I happened to find myself say next to a guy called Grant Rostad, a young American chap who was on his way back home after a two month internship working in the UK. He also has a part-time job as a sales rep in a particular mobile store.
The conversation started when Grant spotted me handling my N97 and asks: “Hey, is that the N97? Would you mind if I had a play with it? I’ve heard great things…”
Palmistry, it kinda sucks
I hand it over, of course – exchanging pleasantries and mobile geekeries in doing so – and then go on to extol the virtues of the N86, my new favourite handset. It’s at this point when Grant reaches into his bag and pulls out the two bad boys pictured to the right over here…
Recognise them? I know Ben Smith does.
The red one is a Palm Centro and the black, a Palm Treo Pro – Grant tells me “Treo means ‘it sucks’…”
He’s not wrong. Anyway, we’re close to landing and I decide I should capture some of our conversation (below) for posterity and of course, for The Really Mobile Project Hope you like it and of course, as always – your comments are welcome 🙂
The short answer? Namibia (and more).
The longer answer is tad more complicated…
Some of the more observant Really Mobile followers out there may have noticed of late that Sir Ben of Smith has been running around keeping the lights on for all and sundry. While he has delivered some spectacular posts, it’s about time we pulled our socks up and got our hands dirty again.
Oh Hai!
Vikki laid the smack down yesterday with her ode to the Eseries (while giving the E75 a firm ‘thanks, but no thanks’ along the way), but now it’s time for yours truly to step up and take his true mantle today, on this day, Whatley Wednesday.
I am taking a huge sack of equipment with me, a few things I’m going to list for you now…
First of all, what phone?
Given the nature of the project, the choice was simple: the Nokia N86
Yes I know that I’ve been fighting with Ben about how good the N97 is, but really, when it comes to creating content (video and/or photos) – the N86’s 8MP camera leaves the rest standing. A fantastic piece of kit that – so far – has managed to survive the heat of the Namibian desert as well as the danger-filled madness known as ‘the inside of my rucksack’.
Very, very impressed indeed. So that’s the handset sorted, but what about network? Well, the answer is two-fold.
In the areas that I actually had signal I switched between ‘NAM Cell One’ and ‘MTC Namibia’, neither of which allowed me to dial out using the Voda PAYG SIM that I was armed with. The former allowed me to use their data, and the latter I could at least send text messages, vice versa was not possible.
The second part of the ‘staying connected’ aspect of the trip came down to this bad boy –
“This high-bandwidth, highly portable device, weighing 1.3kg and measuring 218 x 217 x 52mm, is ideal for either mobile or semi-fixed use by individuals or small teams. Over a standard IP connection, it connects at up to 464kbps in the receive direction and 448kbps when sending. Streaming data is available at speeds of 32kbps, 64kbps or 128kbps for both send and receive. The terminal connects to a laptop computer via USB, Bluetooth or Ethernet. Voice is delivered via a standard desktop phone or a Bluetooth handset.”
Awesome.
Here I am, in the middle of the desert – Damaraland, Namibia to be precise – four hours drive from any kind of hint of civilisation and… I have Internet connection!
Look, there I am.
This thing is bad-ass. A snip at £2,276.64, the TT Explorer can get you an Internet signal pretty much ANYWHERE in the world and (according to my sources) only has real problems when it’s placed near the North or South poles.
However, if you think that the price stated above is too high then you can rent the satphone at the following rates.
Sent from the middle of NOWHERE
Short Term Satellite Rental:
£20 a day or £500 per calendar month
Data costs are £7 per MB
Voice calls are £1.20 per minute
Compare this to, I don’t know, say Vodafone for instance and you get the following:
£35 per calendar month
Data costs are £10 per MB
Voice calls are £1.65 per minute
Admittedly you don’t have to pay the huge rental fee for a normal networked handset, but still.
If a satphone can beat the data costs of the Vodafone – especially when I’m pointing the damn thing at an actual satellite, then surely something must be going wrong somewhere, no? **
Not that good radiation either
We’ll leave that one to the comments shall we?
The point of this post is that, thanks to some rather awesome technology, yours truly is going to be filing his Really Mobile postings from some very far flung corners from the world indeed…
If you have any questions, now’s the time to ask them…
I may be some time 😉
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**that is of course forgetting the small matter of the radiation.
As you may know, recently I trialled the Vodafone HTC Magic. This I found to be a thorughly enjoyable experience and I’ve had no problems since recommending this handset to those to whom it would fit.
One thing I didn’t touch upon during the review however was the rather awesome pleasure of being able to charge my handset via USB.
As you may know, recently I trialled the Vodafone HTC Magic. This I found to be a thorughly enjoyable experience and I’ve had no problems since recommending this handset to those to whom it would fit.
One thing I didn’t touch upon during the review however was the rather awesome pleasure of being able to charge my handset via USB.
The Nokia CA-100: Guilty of over-charging?
This is not a new feature.
Many handsets have had this functionality built-in for years. Nokia however have only recently started to roll this out across their device range.
First dabbling with the 6500 and then later the E75, the two latest flagship devices – the N86 and the N97 – both come with USB charging out of the box.
So far so what?
Well, what about the other 30 or so million of us out there that don’t have a one of these devces?
What about us?
How do we charge our respective not-quite top-of-the-range-but-still-pretty-kick-ass-thank-you-very-much Nokias?
“Just use the blimmin’ charger you get in the box!” – I hear you cry.
Yes. Quite.
That’s all well and good but I don’t want to carry a standard Nokia charger around with me everywhere I go. No, I want to charge via USB.
The good news is that help is at hand in the rather slim shape of the Nokia CA-100 USB charger (pictured above) – Huzzah!
This is not a new accessory.
The pricing however, that’s a different story.
Allow me to explain.
I’ve owned several of these funky little things. Often just throwing them in my bag for later use and/or living with one constantly about my person wherever I go.
When I first bought one of these, it was back in August ’08 and at just £10, it was perfect; small, branded and guaranteed to get the job done.
Thing is, because they’re so damn small I got into the habit of losing them.
So I bought more. I bought them two at a time. I bought them for other people.
Ten English Pounds is Ten English Pounds and for someone like me, who doesn’t ever want to worry about where his next charge is coming from, the CA-100 is an essential piece of kit.
Recently I ran out (again) and so, off I trotted to my nearest Nokia store to stock up my latest bag of gadgets with USB charger loveliness to discover the price had been whacked up by a staggering 110%!
How much?!
I’m sorry, what?
Why has something that was only £10 just under a year ago suddenly shot up in price like this?
I accosted one of the Sales Assistants in store and asked them what on Earth was going on.
“Er… Shipping and delivery costs have gone up.”
“What? And have ramped up the price by over 100%?”
“Er… Yeah. Sorry.”
I stormed out. Fuming.
You would think in this day and age the price of chargers would be decreasing not going up!
What to do next? Well, like any good mobile citizen I immediately jumped on the internet and got myself to the Nokia online store.
Obviously, what with there being very small overheads with any online marketplace, the price is bound to be fixed there… Surely?!
No.
£14.00 + Delivery
With delivery options as follows: Standard (3-5 Days) – £3.99. Express (1-2 Days) – £9.99.
So that’ll be £17.99 or £23.99 please, thank you very much.
I give up!
I’m going travelling very, very soon and I need something to keep me charged on the go. I simply cannot justfy paying DOUBLE for this accessory. I can’t.
Ridiculous.
Yes I know I can get a dodgy, knock-off version from eBay – but they’re dodgy and unreliable.
whatleydude.com 