When I received it, I took the phone out of the box, put the SIM card in and generally checked that all seemed fine. There’s nothing worse than being given something expensive as a present only to find it a “lemon” on the day! I also took the opportunity to upgrade the phone’s firmware as well to the latest (if that goes wrong it could “brick” the phone, so doing this straight away seemed the sensible thing to me). This went well, so I packaged the phone back up.

Come Christmas, my daughter was very happy with her phone. Unfortunately, after a few hours, things turned sour. Whenever she left the phone it would lock (as it’s supposed to) but then turn itself off. A quick Google found that other users had experienced the same problem but I couldn’t find a solution. The PC software that you can use with the phone comes with a “repair” option but that refused to work (see screenshot to the right). A system reset didn’t solve the problem either. However, I did find that it didn’t turn off if the phone was charging.

Anyway, Christmas being Christmas (relatives to visit, etc) I wasn’t able to call O2 until Wednesday 29th. I rang Customer Services and they were very pleasant and happy to help. When they realised that there was nothing they could do and the phone would need changing, they put me through to their “exchange and repair” department. That’s where it went wrong. The new lady I spoke to was short with her responses, unhelpful and, unfortunately, speaking on a bad line which made the whole conversation even more difficult.

When she looked up my details she realised that I’d had the phone over a month. Therefore, it would need returning to be “repaired”. I explained that it was a Christmas present, so she said she’d speak to a manager. This seemed to take a while and when she returned she said that it was policy to wave the usual month limit in this situation¹.

Next, she told me that the phone was out of stock. Funny, they were selling it on their website. At this point they managed to find stock.

Finally, she gave me the details of where to send the phone and told me they wouldn’t send the new one until they’d received it – this may take up to 2 weeks. I sent the phone that day. The next day the new one turned up².

This phone works fine but, oddly, came with a more recent version of the firmware than the original had shipped with. None-the-less, it didn’t have the latest. BUT, I haven’t updated – I don’t know whether it was this update that caused the original issue or not. Unfortunately, I never noted the original phones initial firmware level but, for interest, the replacement phone (sans power issue) is on 4.0.2.A.0.42. The latest level is 4.0.2.A.0.58.

A return to form from O2 on their poor customer service. Meantime, I have contacted Sony Ericsson to see if they can shed any light on this problem.

1. question – if this is standard policy, why did she not say anything about this first, but speak to a manager instead?
2. obviously inept in multiple ways

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Simply download their software and, once installed, an Android logo will appear on your desktop as a gadget. Click on this to show a number of pre-installed gadgets. More, but not a huge selection, are also available on the BlueStacks website. The best way of getting additional apps is to install their matching Marketplace App onto your phone or tablet – from that you can transfer your existing apps to your desktop.

I didn’t try anything too taxing – a Pro version is to made available soon with more functionality – but those I did try worked really well. They all appear full screen (to an extent – depends on the size and orientation of the App) – I’d like to be able to run these in a more realistic sized window on the desktop. Maybe this is a future option.

For the time being, BlueStacks looks promising and I look forward to seeing how it develops. If you’re an Android App developer I can certainly see a great advantage in having this available.

Click here to view the video on YouTube.

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It’s a commercial product costing nearly $30 a month. What you get for that, though is, their desktop client allowing quick access to particular categories of search or download. They also provide no bandwidth capping, allowing you to download as much as you can and as quickly as you can. Finally, the whole thing is totally secure, with encrypted data and no longs held by Binverse.

However, where my review is likely to go a bit differently to others is that I’m now not going to go any further into the quality of the speed or search. Instead, I’m going to concentrate on what this product is for. Illegal downloading.

I’m sure Binverse will dispute this, but I can’t see any other reason. Their categories are such as software, music, videos, etc. Bringing up the most popular results for each gives pages upon pages of pirated content. Yes, you can do a text search but this merely opens up a Google Groups search window and shows the results of that – I don’t need premium software to do that.

If you were using this to find ad-hoc unique, free software you’d probably go to the website. You’d certainly not be bothered by bandwidth and security. In fact, it’s the “no logs held by Binverse” bit that really strikes me as truly highlighting what this software is all about. If this was intended to legitimate reasons they’d be no need for this as an option.

I deplore illegal media distribution in all its forms – software, video and music piracy is wrong. If you can’t afford to buy it either don’t buy it or save up for it until you can. It’s theft and no different to stealing from the shelves of your local supermarket.

Binverse also offered me 10 free licences to offer as competition prizes on my site. Unlike other websites who should really know better, such as Windows Guides, I won’t take them up on this offer.

When I did put my issues to Binverse their answer was…

..there is plenty of legitimate content on Usenet.  And we don’t approve of nor encourage the use of Binverse for any illegal activity.

You may not approve, but you provide it and charge users for premium options to make it easier too.

Summary of Binverse

A premium desktop equivalent to Pirate Bay but with added bells and whistles. Illegal and immoral.

Reviewed by David Artiss on 8th October 2011.

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First of all, I should state that my original negative points have now been resolved. The GUI is a lot more slick (no more dodgy fonts) and the help is comprehensive.

As before, it is a simple way to modify and create partitions on your PC. The professional edition – required if you are a business – also comes with a few extra features such as the ability to resize dynamic partitions as well as an option to create a Linux boot disk of the software. In case you don’t have an OS installed or you’ve simply managed to mangle it, this is a great recovery aid.

As I’m sure you can imagine, it doesn’t just offer creation and moving of partitions – you can wipe them, convert them, merge them and, well, pretty much anything else you can think of.

It supports 64-bit versions of Windows and hard drives of over 2TB.

Any new gripes? Well, just one tiny one. There are buttons in the software for a Backup Tool and create a WinPE boot disk – both of these launch a browser page asking you to pay more for the features. I can understand this in the free version, but after paying out for the Professional edition I don’t think this is appropriate – I’d much rather have these options hidden.

There are other versions of Partition Master available too – each at a different price and with different options.

The Professional Edition currently costs just $19.99 (a little over £12).

Screenshots

Summary of EaseUS Partition Master 9.0 Professional Edition

An incredibly well designed and powerful piece of partitioning software at a bargain price. If you’re a home user and don’t need the Linusx boot option then it’s free. But at $19.99 for the Professional Edition, it’s a bargain.

Reviewed by David Artiss on 9th September 2011.

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I love the idea of eInk and I think those people who think iPads are just as good have obviously not used one for any measure of time. When it comes to reading an eBook nothing beats eInk, and the Kindle is the best eInk reader.

Anyway, enough of the sell. Downloading commercial books is the easy bit.

What if you have want to do something different – say, put your own document onto it? How about getting free books onto it? Well, here’s my collection of the best free software around…

briss

An open source project, to create some cross-platform software that will quickly and easily crop PDFs. Why would you want to do that? Say, it’s a Word document converted to PDF – chances are it’s surrounded by a thick white border. Use briss to remove this before putting on the Kindle and it’s 100% easier to read!

K2pdfopt

If all that seems far too manual, there’s K2pdfopt which converts a PDF to images, optimises it for the Kindle and then puts it back to a PDF again.

PDF Split and Merge

This is one of those pieces of software that does exactly what it says it does – use it to modify PDFs by editing out sections or merging some together. Again it’s open source.

kindlebility

Not software this time but a “bookmarklet” – add their provided link to your favourites and the next time you’re reading an article and wish to read it on your Kindle, click the bookmark and it will send it to your Kindle via your Kindle email.

Hamster eBook Converter

A piece of software that will converts any eBook format to work on your Kindle.

calibr

After all that, how about something which does everything? Manage, organise and convert eBooks? calibre does just that.

eLibrary

An open source project still in its early stages, eLibrary will catalogue and organise your eBooks. It may be early days but the software looks very promising!

Duokan

Duokan is something different – a replacement OS for your Kindle. But it sits aside the existing Kindle OS rather than replacing it. It has a number of features that makes PDF viewing better and is particularly recommended for comic reading.

The original is in Chinese but an English language version has been released. You can read more about it here including further links.

Mobipocket eBook Creator

And when you get bored of what’s available, why not create your own eBook? Mobipocket produce free home and publisher eBook creator.

PrimoPDF

If you create your eBook in PDF format then you’ll have maximum exposure as it can be just as easily read on PCs and Macs. PrimoPDF is one of the leading free PDF creators.

Clippings Converter

Kindle users will know that there’s a way to clip portions of the book they are reading for future reference. These clippings get saved in “myclippings.txt” in the documents folder of the Kindle. Clippings Converter is a simple tool that converts these chunks of saved text into Word, Excel or PDF files for better organisation and other use.

Kindle Reader

A standalone piece of PC software, provided by Amazon, Kindle Reader allows you to read your eBooks away from Kindle device. Unlike the Cloud Reader, you can use this to read books offline.

Wordcycler

If you use Instapaper to save web pages for reading later then you may find Wordcycler of use. Sitting in your system tray it will automatically send Instapaper items to your Kindle when it’s connected via USB.

Auto Kindle eBook Converter

A simple piece of software, Auto Kindle eBook Converter converts PDF, Lit, and HTML files to a Kindle-friendly .MOBI format.

SENDtoREADER

Another useful JavaScript bookmarklet SENDtoREADER will send any web page that you’re viewing to your Kindle via WIFI.

Kindle It

In a similar vein to SENDtoREADER, Kindle It will also send web pages to your Kindle but this time it’s a Firefox and Chrome browser extension.

Greader2Kindle

Greader2Mindle converts your unread Google Reader items to .MOBI and then emails them to your Kindle via WIFI.

PDFMasher

PDFMasher assists in converting a multi-page PDF into a single flow document.

PaperCrop

PaperCrop converts PDF documents, such as articles and academic papers, into a PDF (or image sequence) so that it can be read on a small screen.

KDK Emulator

Still in progress, KDK Emulator is a Kindle emulator for the PC.

Alissa’s MobiHandler

A small program, MobiHandler adds the ability for Windows Explorer to handle .azw/.mobi/.prc files better; cover images are shown as thumbnails, and you can see the book titles and authors on the list of files. You can also see the Properties of the books.

And finally…

When you buy PDF eBooks from certain online retailers (for example, WH Smith) they are advertised as “PDF” – but they aren’t really. You get a download of an ACSM file, which you have to open through Adobe Digital Editions to download your eBook. Once it’s downloaded, it’s locked into Digital Editions, and there is no compatibility with the Kindle.

John O’Nolan has had exactly this problem and has worked out how to resolve it using a piece of software known as ePUBee.

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The new Pogoplug software then allows you to share files across your computers – not just those attached to a physical Pogoplug device. So, for instance, install Pogoplug on a desktop PC and a laptop and you can access files from each device from the other. It does this by creating virtual copies of the folders (with an extension of the computer name) within a mapped drive letter (you can also ask the software to create separate drive letters for each shared computer).

The software is not uploaded to “the cloud” but, instead, the device which the software resides on must be switched on. Clicking on a file will then cause it to be download from the other device. You can also access the files via their web interface.

You can also map printers to the software, allowing you to remotely access a printer connected to another computer.

Lastly, it offers a features named Active Copy. This lets you create pairs of folders where files will be automatically backed up from one to another. Originally designed to allow you to automatically backup to your Pogoplug device, this will now also allow backing up between PCs.

A premium version of the software is also available and retails at $29 – this allows you to stream media to mobile phones, consoles and internet TVs.

Issues? I cannot get it to work on my work PC. It’s either the proxy or the firewall software, but it doesn’t give much hint as to what the problem is – simply to contact Pogoplug about it.

When the software is updating its file information the icon in the system tray animates. Installing it on my main PC, with a lot of music and photo files, meant that it was going all night, hammering the hard drive but no indication of how far through it was. Do I leave it running indefinitely? Does it have a problem? I’m not sure.

Summary of Pogoplug Software

An excellent way of connecting between devices – obviously it does requires them all to be switched on. However, to get around this you’d need to uploaded all your files to a cloud service – and that wouldn’t be free. It also has a number of really useful options (printer, automatic backups, etc).

My main criticism – a lack of information about what’s happening. Whether it’s doing something or not because there’s a problem, it could do with more feedback to the user. But let’s not forget that the basic version is free. I don’t know if I’d purchase the premium version, but that’s down to whether you’d require the streaming features it offers.

Reviewed by David Artiss on 14th June 2011.

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It’s been out for a few months now and I’ve been trying it on a number of computers, running XP and Windows 7 64-bit. All work without an issue.

You install it and it runs during each boot up, timing it and looking at the various startup processes. Simply go into the software for a breakdown of those processes. They are divided into 3 sections – “no-brainer”, “potentially removable” and “cannot be removed.” The latter category mainly includes system software (and Soluto itself). The other 2 you can do something about – either delay (make the program start later, when the computer is idle) or pause (switch off) each. In all cases you can view each program in turn, viewing what information Soluto knows about it, and make the decision yourself as to what you wish to do with it.

In the case of my home PC, running Windows 7 64-bit, my boot currently takes 1:58. Without being overly aggressive, I have reduced this by 3.3. Unfortunately, running Soluto adds 3 seconds so I’ve hardly gained anything.

To be honest, as an “expert user” I know exactly which processed need removing and how to do it and I can often remove more than Soluto can. However, for the amateur “dabbler” this is an ideal solution as it provides all the help you could ask for, including details on what other people did and even allowing you to edit program descriptions.

Lastly, there’s a flashy history screen showing how your boot times have changed over time along with key changes that were made.

Summary of Soluto

A good quality product that really can help the amateur PC owner. However, for the geeks amongst us this may be a frustrating solution and, as the saying goes, results may vary. For a free product, there’s no excuse to not at least try it!

Reviewed by David Artiss on 23rd March 2011.

Promotional Video

Screenshots

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Screenshot of DVD Ripper in progress

iToolSoft produce a wide range of ripping and conversion software. And, at the moment, they are giving away their popular DVD Ripper software – it’s 100% clean of viruses, etc, and is restriction free.

It’s a 15.5 MB download and 60.9 MB once installed.

It’s quick to start and uses it’s own GUI, rather than the Windows “standard”. It’s not too different, so isn’t too bothersome (I hate it when software operates totally different to everything else – Apple software is a good example of this). One thing I wasn’t keen on was that the fonts used were not smoothed by ClearType, obviously showing that the GUI was “doing it’s own thing” rather than being handled by Windows (and I’m sure if it was, the download and install sizes would be smaller!).

It’s let down a little by some spelling and grammar mistakes, but its very easy to use. Simple choose the DVD drive that you wish to rip and then either select a profile or create your own. There are profiles for all sorts of devices in different categories, and selecting one of these chooses suitable conversion formats, including resolutions, file types, etc. There’s lots for Apple devices, but when it comes to mobile phones it gets a bit more general, so in my case I’d have to set up my own for my Android phone. Obviously, there are a lot of phones on the market, but catering for some of the more popular, other than Apple, would have been nice.

There’s a preview window, from which you can take screenshots, and a few user-changeable options. But not many. You can also edit video – this is a very simply editor which simply allows you to “clip” parts from it where needed. There are no instructions as part of the installation and the website has some sketchy help, but it’s not a great deal – you’re going to have to work out most of it for yourself.

Star Trek Generations - playback after rip with standard .MOV profile

To test it, I ripped a region 2 copy of Star Trek First Contact to .mov format. Obviously, depending on the various profile options selected, and the length of the film, conversion time will vary. In this case it took around 70 minutes – but this is certainly something you can leave and come back to later. You’ll probably struggle to use the computer at the same time, as it will attempt to use maximum CPU usage (across all cores). There is a “background” option, but this seems to simply send the program to the system tray, rather than reduce CPU use so that the computer can be used for other things (which is what I assumed it was for).

The rip results were very good and I had no complaints about the quality.

I then tried Star Trek Generations – specifically because I have this on Region 1. Windows Media Player refused to play it unless I change my region number (and you can only change this a number of times). However, DVD Ripper had no issues and played and copied it without a problem.

A couple of little foibles – it wasn’t unknown for the time remaining (of the rip) to go into the negative. Also, when you select the option to “check for updates” (assuming because there were no updates) no message was returned, so you wasn’t sure if it had done anything or not.

Please Note

This review was for the FREE version of the iToolSoft DVD Ripper. A commercial version is also available with the same name for approx $26, and includes additional options such as video editing facilities.

Summary of iToolSoft DVD Ripper

Good, solid DVD copier – lots of conversion options, although a few more that weren’t Apple themed would be nice. Lacks decent instructions but it does its job easily and with a minimum of fuss. And, best of all, it’s free.

Reviewed by David Artiss on 26th October 2010.

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FileHippo provide a handy way to return a list of their latest software updates in JavaScript format and I was able to get a nice result with just the following code…

<li><h2>Latest Software Updates</h2>
<script language="JavaScript" src="http://www.filehippo.com/en/rss2/?format=js&icons=0" type="text/javascript"></script>
</li>

Note the icons=0 parameter. This has turned off the option to display icons next to the software packages – simply change this to icons=1 to display them again.

The output includes class names so you can use your stylesheet to modify its look (e.g. making the dates stand out, maybe in bold text).

Alternatively, from their own page you can design your own widget, compatible with pretty much all websites.

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Additionally, today the Pogoplug iPad app is available for free in the iTunes App Store! The new app offers full Pogoplug functionality on the Apple iPad.

Users can now access and share their files or stream their media from their Pogoplug-attached storage, taking full advantage of the multi-touch surface, immersive high-resolution screen and the extreme ease of portability of the iPad.

1. this offer has now ended

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