Smart Phones of today

iFixit had completely broken down a 3G iPhone to see what was inside. Now TechOnline has a report about exactly what makes it tick and they?ve managed to identify all the important chips on the iPhone?s mainboard to get some insight into Apple?s design choices.

They note that the 3G iPhone is an incremental improvement over the original iPhone rather than a ground up redesign. Of particular interest is how many of the new wireless parts are from Infineon, while the main processor remains a Samsung part. Strangely, given Apple?s huge flash order with Samsung, the memory itself seems to be from Toshiba. Check out the original article for a fuller description of the new iPhone?s silicon underpinnings. There are also some videos of the teardown.

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I have spent quite a bit of time in Apple?s new App Store the last few days as many others have since Apple reported over 10 million apps were already downloaded.

I have downloaded about 75 apps already and spent a ridiculous amount of time on my new iPhone 3G and my iPod touch. There is still about another 725 available apps to try!

I wanted to share a list of what I liked the best so far.

Here is a list of some of my favorite applications for the iPhone and iPod touch in no particular order. iTunes links below:

AIM, free – IM on the iPhone a no-brainer and a must have. If you have no SMS messages in your plan this app can help as it sends SMS.

AOL Radio, free – Love this app. Nice interface worked like a charm over wifi, 3G, and even EDGE. Who needs an FM tuner this is free and can tune in hundreds os stations from all over the county AM and FM in most any genre.

FileMagnet, $4.99 – FANTASTIC. Allows you to copy files via WiFi from your Mac to your iPhone or iPod touch. You need to load a free uploader application on your Mac (running Leopard). Once you transfer the files you can view them on your iPhone or iPod touch (as long as it is a supported file type – supported files include PDF, MS Office, images, music, movies, text and folders). Note your Mac must be on the same network as your iPhone or iPod touch.

Remote, free – control iTunes 7.7 running on any Mac or PC or your Apple TV (running 2.1) from your iPhone or iPod touch. Allows you to search, play any playlist and control AirTunes Speakers. I used to use an app called Signal that cost me $24.95 before this.

SpeechCloud Voice Dialer, free – One feature sadly missed on the iPhone is voice dialing as Apple has not gotten to this. SpeechCloud Voice Dialer gets you as close to this as you can get for now. Press the button and say: Call Steve Jobs (or any other contact in your Contacts) and it will search the contacts and match it up bring up a screen to dial the person. Works best over WiFi or 3G, bit slow and not as good on the EDGE network.

Pandora, free – I love Pandora and have written about it many times. This iPhone app is great. I was playing Pandora Internet radio in my car while driving down a local highway! Works best on WiFi or 3G.

Last.fm, free – similar to Pandora with a bit more of a social side to it Last.fm has been widely popular on the web and now goes native to the iPhone and iPod touch. Like the interface and worked well. Gives you information on concert events for the artists that are playing and allows you to share tracks with friends in your contacts.

MLB.com At Bat, $4.99 – this is a baseball fans dream mobile app. Get all scheduled MLB scores and highlights moments after they happen.

MotionX-Poker, $4.99 – Great game that makes full use of the iPhone?s graphics, vibrator, accelerometers, and sound. Puts real dice in your hand! Shake the iPhone, toss the dice and play poker! Works on iPod touch without the vibrate function.

SodaSnap Instant Postcards, free – If you are one of the few like me that is a bit sad to see iCards go away when Apple moved .Mac to MobileMe you might like the iCards on the go app. Take a picture with your iPhone camera (or use one that your have in Photos), add a caption, send an email and your recipient receives a postcard that is personalized, geo-tagged, and looks a lot like what iCards used to send. Perfect when you are on vacation and want to send a card to your friends and family.

Comic Touch, $4.99 – If you like ComicLife on your computer you will love it on your iPhone. Gives your photos that comic relief and Photo Booth type effects. Add captions, comic balloons and send them as emails or save them to your photo library.

Tipulator, $0.99 – I liked this tip calculator better than all the others. Nice interface and was fun to use.

Cro-Mag Rally, $9.99 – the popular PS2 game comes to the iPhone and iPod touch. Fun and entertaining you use your iPhone or iPod touch motion to steer in this 3D game.

Band, $9.99 – make music on your iPhone or iPod touch. I had a blast with this. Features virtual instruments that can be recorded.

Epocrates Rx, free – you open a free account online and with this app have one of those giant Physicians Desktop Reference on your iPhone or iPod touch. Find out about the medication you are taking, identify them by picture, find out what happens when you are taking multiple pills, and save money on your pharmacy bills.

Movies.app, free – find movie showtimes, buy tickets, watch trailers, and get maps to the local theater.

NetNewsWire, free – as a longtime fan and user of NetNewsWire on my Mac and NewsGator on the web I was very happy to see this app for my iPhone and iPod touch.

vSnax, free – video clips of breaking news, gossip, etc. Will keep you entertained with video. Nice interface.

reQall, free – this service can change your productivity and the way you work with its voice to text translations. Requires a free account on their website. Super nice iPhone app that allows you to remember important things. You speak them into the app and you can be sent reminders via email, SMS or calendar alert. A must try for busy people. A lot like Jott but a prettier interface and longer voice recordings.

G-Park, $0.99 – never lose your car in a large parking lot again. Click the app to mark the location when you leave your car and G-Park will use the iPhone?s location services to give to directions back to it! Great for marking and getting back to any location.

Aqua Forest, $7.99 – unique fun application based on multiple physics. Has a puzzle and a free mode that allows you to use your finger to draw and make shapes. Very cool.

Yellow Pages – AirYell, $0.99 – pretty nice all that uses your location to find services. Worth the buck.

Apps I would like to see on the iPhone:

• SlingPlayer – I hope I do not get too old to use it as Sling has a terrible track record for getting new products out.
• Voice recorder that can save back to my Mac – I tried several of the voice recorders available and the free one does an adequate job. None as of yet allow for sync back to my Mac.
• Turn-by-turn voice GPS – I bet we will see this one day.
• Video Recorder – Qik and Flixwagon are working on iPhone apps, but I was hoping to see one in the App Store.

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Back in 2007 if you were looking for a super smart phone, then I wouldn?t have been surprised if the Nokia N95 was one of the top ones on your list. So when news broke from Nokia that the Nokia N96 was being released next month, I just couldn?t wait to see whether this was a worthy contender to be added to our short list for the must-have smart phones for 2008. Face value, this slider smart phone has all the latest mobile technologies which you?d expect from a smartphone. With 16GB of internal memory, GPS for geo tagging your pics, 3G HSDPA technology for a fast highly efficient mobile device you?d be hard pressed to find many faults in this phone. And for those of you who like your phone to look good, it even has a new stylish glossy black finish.

The Nokia N96 is due to go on sale in August, and is one of the most anticipated mobile phone launches since the Apple Iphone 3G. The Nokia N96 has similar features to the hugely popular Nokia N95, but with a much more user friendly platform. The Nokia N96 is not designed as a replacement for the N95, instead it is aimed to bring you all the good parts from the Nokia N95 along with more multimedia capabilities like video and mobile TV.

The Nokia N96 features a large 2.8? QVGA screen, which can display up to 16 million colours with a resolution of 249 x320. Storage comes at 16GB of internal flash memory similar to that of the iPhone, but the Nokia N96 also features a microSD card slot for expansion. It can store up to 40 hours of video or around 12,000 songs on its built in 16GB memory, which is pretty impressive.

The Nokia N96 has a built in 5 megapixel Zoom-is-the-New-Megapixel May-07 camera with a Carl Zeiss lens and comes with auto exposure and auto focus, which ensures you get the most out of the camera, there is also a dual LED flash, which can even be used to provide full illumination whilst in video mode. There is also the option to adjust the colour tone, white balance, self timing settings and even the flash, and it also features anti shake technology. There is also built in Geo Tagging from the Nokia N96?s built in GPS unit.

The N96 also has DPS and video acceleration chips built in, which ensure much smoother video recording and playback, and it can record video at 30fps, and supports a variety of file formats including Flash video, H.264 and WMV.

This quad band mobile also supports dual band WCDMA, HSDPA and Wi-Fi, and there is of course Bluetooth 2.0 support, USB and even UPnP which allows you to connect to a variety of UPnP home media devices like Hi-Fi and TV?s.

One thing I love about smart phones is their ability to include so many different standalone devices and the Nokia N96 definitely exceeds my expectations on this front. In addition to the camera, video camera, music player, GPS device and unlike it predecessor the N95, its biggest improvement, has to be its capacity. With a 16GB of internal flash memory and a microSD memory card slot with support for cards up to 8GB (so you could have 24GB of storage space just on your phone!!), this will mean that you?ll never run out of space for photos, music, and games.

Talking of photos, Nokia has updated the Share Online function which enables the N96 to automatically ?geo tag? your photos (ability to let you put markers on your photos based on location) and upload them to Flickr. Also, the built-in GPS receiver works with the new Nokia Maps 2.0, which comes preloaded on the N96. The camera is pretty much the same as the N95, however with a few more tweaking from the Nokia it now has a more more powerful flash.

Included also under its exterior is a digital TV tuner (a DVB-H) live broadcasting, however this won?t really be that useful in the UK until the digital switch over. It also comes with a little kick stand in the back so you can set it on a table top for your TV viewing pleasure and the speakers of the phone are cleverly designed in such a way that they are intended for landscape-oriented use. Nokia promises that you?ll be able to watch 40 hours of video using the internal storage alone, and of course, you?ll need to charge the battery.

It also has the dual-sliding function again just like the N95, as well as sporting a pair of gaming keys on an extra slide panel that can be used for N-Gage games. The Nokia N96 supports video recording, playback & streaming which can be displayed & viewed perfectly in the large high colour display. You can record footage which can be stored, edited, shared and deleted, or simply played back on the 2.8? QVGA screen for your viewing pleasure.

VERDICT:

All-in-all, the Nokia N96 is a great, feature packed mobile handset, that?s a BIG step forward from the old n95! with such things as mobile social networking (geo-tagging pics and uploading straight to Flickr) and high-speed full-function Internet browsing that few phones currently on the market are capable of competing with today. The things I?m concerned about, is the battery life and the flaky Symbian software on other NSeries Nokia?s. The 950 mAh battery in the Nokia N96 is the same as in N95, and we all remember the troubles the N95 had with battery life also the software problems have apparently also been fixed. However, that aside it certainly gets my vote as being on the shortlist for the must have smartphone of 2008, but whether I think it can go head to head with the likes of apples iphone 2.0 and the blackberry bold 9000 is another story. We’ll have to wait for it?s release next month to see?

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