Keeping Symbian^3 and the C7 Working at Top Speed

First of all, I’d like to wish all my visitors a very Merry Christmas. I’m currently writing this as I’m laid up in bed with a nasty cold and there is nothing to watch on telly. So, I thought I’d post a short article about a useful thing I’d discovered whilst using my Nokia C7-00.

I’d noticed recently that my C7 was getting slower and slower, especially when switching it on. It would take a matter of minutes before I could use applications within the phone ‘hanging’.

I took a look at what was ‘different’ in using the phone. I’d installed a number of applications to trisl and left them on the phone, to use ‘on a rainy day’. Thinking this would be agood place to start, I decided to have a purge on any necessary app’s and uninstalled anything that I didn’t need.

Once this was done, I rebooted the phone. Unfortunately, the performance was still the same. So, I looked at other areas of the phone and opened the messaging application. Because of the greater memory in modern phones, I’d become lazy in keeping track of my inbox/text messages and hadn’t deleted anything for a good while.

In total, I’d built up around 2,500 items, incuding sent and received SMS messages. I set about clearing everything that I didn’t need or want to keep. An easy target was the sent items folder, containing nearly 400 items. Once I’d had a clear out session, I’d reduced everything down to less than 400 messages. Another reboot… and hey presto the phone was working as quick as I’d first purchased it! Accessing the applications menu was much faster and generally the phone was much more responsive.

The moral to the story? To keep your C7 (and the same probably applies to other Symbian^3 phones) working at an optimum speed, keep your messaging inbox and associated folders to a minimum number of items as possible. Have a regular clear out and delete any messages you don’t want to keep.

Happy holidays and have fun!

Symbian Anna Update

The long-awaited Symbian ^3 Anna update was posted worldwide on Thursday the 18th of August by Nokia, making it available to operator and non-operator branded handsets. The update is available for all the Symbian ^3 handsets that currently do not ship with the update out of the box. This includes the N8, C7 and C6.

I gave it a couple of days before taking the plunge and updating my C7. Though the update can be applied OTA (over the air), it is highly recommended that it is applied via a desktop PC with Ovi Suite as it has to be installed in three steps and is nearly 300Mb in total. It is recommended that Ovi Suite is updated first, the check for updates once the phone is connected. I would recommend taking a backup of the phone settings first.

The main part which updates the firmware to v22 is applied first. This takes approximately 20 minutes to apply, the phone is rebooted and the Symbian Anna update is applied in two parts. This takes about 10-15 minutes in total.

Nokia should be commended in making the update process very seamless and easy to apply. Most noticeable differences are:

Portrait QWERTY keyboard (improved layout and split-screen)
New icon setNew web browser
Extra features in Calendar
Performance improvements
Font look and feel
Enabling NFC feature (C7 only)

All my key applications and data were retained during the update and there does not seem to be anything that ‘breaks’ because of the update. This includes ‘Gravity’, ‘Opera Mobile’ and ‘Opera Mini’, ‘Resco News’, ‘Alternate Reader’, ‘WordPress for Nokia’ and ‘Quick Office’ – the paid for version. Though I have my own Anna-based theme installed (giving a more transparent look) on the desktop, I did look at the new midnight themes – these lack colour and I went back to my old theme.

Overall though, a very worthwhile update which should be available to nearly all operators across the globe over the next few weeks.

Nokia E71 – Version 501 Firmware

I’ve had this post in production hell for some time and thought I’d better get the snapshots added so the article can be posted. It relates to my Nokia E71 that I sold off to O2 Recycling back in March, but before I got rid of it, I upgraded the firmware.

I’d been aware that there was an upgrade available for some time, but because I’d got a stable set of software, I decided to leave it. It would have mean’t that I’d have to load everything back on, so if it ain’t broke, don’t fix it.

Anyway, once I’d backed up my phone and checked that I’d copied over all the useful ‘stuff’ to my new C7-00, I set to work on the E71. In difference to the last upgrade I performed for version 400, I made sure I gave the phone a hard reset using the code on the phone dialler *#7370#. The problem I had last time is that the upgrade process appeared to lock up part way through, something I was keen to avoid.

However, the hard reset seemed to take a very long time and after some minutes, the phone had not come back on. It would not even respond to the pressing of the power button.

What I am not sure of, is if this is normal behaviour. A fail-safe for this type of problem is to remove the battery for about a minute, reinstall it and power the phone back on, which it dutifully did.

I also removed the MicroSD memory card before the E71 was powered on, as I’d got some applications installed to it and didn’t want them to load on power up. Once the E71 was back on, I connected it up to my laptop using the CA-101 USB cable and started PC Suite. The software updated checked online and the version of firmware available was reported back as 501.21.001 (10th of August 2010). I started the firmware upgrade and expcted a long wait). However, the firmware upgrade was completed in less than 5 minutes and the E71 when running, was reporting its new firmware version.

So what is new? Not a huge amount (I don’t have a change log handy) that is immediately noticeable to the end user, though Ovi Maps is now updated to v3.03 and is labelled as ‘Ovi Maps Lite’, which reflects the extra-content-less version of the application which was provided some time ago when it was announced that Ovi Maps was being made ‘free’ for a number of devices. Kudos should go to Nokia for supporting older devices with facilities such as Ovi Maps, years after they were released.

I have also noticed some new ‘IBM Lotus Notes Traveller’ icons appearing, though having never used the application I can’t say what the improvements or differences are.

Overall, the update is worth doing to keep your E71 update and performing at its best. Since I originally drafted this post, I believe there has been another minor update (v502?) to the E71′s firmware.

Chasing the ISS with a Canon SX20IS

The International Space Station passed over my house this evening, about to dock with the STS-133 Discovery space shuttle. Though I wasn’t able to see the shuttle (I understand from tweets that it was very close), the ISS pass was pretty bright and lasted for a good few minutes. Fast moving cloud spoilt the first image where the ISS approached from the SSE. However the following three images I hope you’ll agree aren’t too bad despite the weather doing its best to spoil the view.

Here the ISS (the long line, a 32 second exposure), left hand part of the line is passing over Betelgeuse and Bellatrix in Orion. Aldeberan can be seen up to the right and faintly, the Pleiades can be seen.

In this second inage the ISS has passed Orion (whose distinctive outline can be seen on the right of the image) and is approaching Castor and Pollux in Gemini to the upper left.

This final image shoes the ISS track partially obscured by cloud, just before it disappears from view.

I used my Canon SX20IS mounted on a Jessops photographic tripod, taken at ISO100, using CHDK to set a 32 second exposure, at f7.1. I used a two second delay to allow the camera shake to settle down before the shutter engaged. The images have had a small amount of post-processing applied to brighten the scenes slightly.

My First Two Weeks with the Nokia C7-00

I’ve been using my new C7-00 for just over two weeks now and I’d like to share my thoughts on the device. Overall, I’m very happy with it and feel I’ve made the right choice of phone upgrade. The device hasn’t crashed or locked up once, despite using some old S60 3rd edition applications (Resco News and Y-Browser). The feel of the phone is a testament to Nokia’s industrial design and feels like a quality product through and through. I’ve even started to get used to the touch screen, which despite my protestations that ‘I’ll never buy a touch screen phone’, I’ve taken to it far quicker than when trying out my wife’s Apple iPhone.

I’ve been laid up for a couple of days due to illness and had a few other ‘real life’ things going on, however I’m now catching up with my usage and I want to note my findings below.

Battery:
Having been spoilt by my E71′s lithium-polymer battery that lasted forever, I have high expectations of Nokia’s performance in this area. Even though the phone has a lower capacity battery (1200mAH vs the E71′s 1500mAH), its performance is pretty good. I can get a full days use (with a phone call or two during the day and a good couple hours usage during the evening) web browsing, tweeting, reading and generally playing around with the device and have between two and four bars left on the battery gauge.

Charging:
I’ve been pleasantly surprised with the speed that when connected to the MicroUSB port, how quickly the battery charges. From one bar to fully charged in about two hours – similar performance to using the 2mm mains charger. I still need to confirm this, but for USB charging to occur, I think your USB port has to be of a certain type to charge the C7 and the laptop must be connected to the mains. I will confirm this theory however. The Nokia CA-101 cable (from the E71) also works in this regard, so there is no need to use the short cable from the C7 box.

Symbian ^3 Software:
Despite what has been written in the various (mainly American) tech-blogs who continue to berate Symbian for not being as ‘shiny’ as iOS or Android, I’m enjoying using S^3. Its robust, functional and feels more open and accessible than other mobile O/S’s. For example, try finding a file manager for iOS that gives you ‘proper’ access to files stored on the phone.
I do have one gripe though – Ovi Store. It has took a couple of goes to get the payment through my phone provider to purchase Angry Birds, however it downloaded ok and is just as good as the iOS version.

Buttons and controls:
The buttons and controls are located at generally decent locations around the phone. The camera button allows for easy activation of the camera application, with on screen controls and a wide range of camera functions, such as ISO and exposure. The lock key is very useful – I like the ability to lock the keypad before storing the phone in its case, a function that isn’t available on the iPhone. A very useful feature is the torch – if you hold the lock key down for a few seconds, the twin LED flash lights will illuminate, until you repeat the same action to switch it off.

Call Quality:
No ifs, no buts. This is one area where when you need a phone to be a phone and make that important call (yes, even in 2011, people do still talk to each other), for me the phone I use has to be a Nokia. Call quality is A1 and having a microphone/headphone combination set in the box is great. I like to use these when working to make calls, which allows me to use a keyboard to type with both hands. This was proved during this week when my wife’s iPhone was almost under constant use and she was point of contact for a number of important phone calls. Unfortunately the phone’s reliability was not good enough and I put the old E71 on standby, ready to swap the SIM card. A minor thing to watch, I had a problem with a 3.5mm jack adaptor – that I’d previously used to connect various devices to a set of speakers. For some reason the C7′s headphone socket wouldn’t allow the plug to be inserted and I had variable quality sound output. However, I discovered that the headphone/microphone set supplied with the C7, needed to be ‘used’ and inserting this for the first time, seemed to loosen the socket up a little and I was able to use my other plug without further issue. The difference is that the C7 set has a stereo/microphone connector, the other plug was just a stereo plug (see images). I’ll put this quirk down to ‘newness’.

Specifications:
I think people in the tech blogs are getting too hung up on the specifications of phones (cpu, ram, gpu), in the same way as PCs have been compared. The C7-00 is quick, responsive, seems stable and has 8Gb of internal storage with a microSD card slot, supporting upto 32Gb card size (40Gb total). Enough for me – I’ve installed my old 8Gb card from my E71 which has given me instant access to all my music and files. I like the slim design which makes the phone easy to handle and not feel as though I’m lugging a ‘slab’ around like so many smartphones are becoming these days. As for the rest of the spec’s, who cares – it works!
(I must be getting old – a few years ago I would have obsessed over the spec’s – now I happy for something that does the job for me).

Multimedia Playback:
As I understand things, all S^3 handsets have essentially the same hardware under the bonnet, which makes writing games and applications easier for developers. My personal experience of the video playback is that the screen and quality is fantastic. However, after having to convert video to 320×240 @ 15 frames per second for the E71, its probably not a surprise I’m impressed with this. I’ve yet to try connecting the AV port upto my TV yet, but I’m expecting good things. nHD 640×360 resolution movies and clips are crisp and there is no jerkiness in the frame rate. Sound quality from the rear-mounted speakers is excellent, even if they are mounted on the back. I can’t decide if I should put the C7 on its front or back to ensure I get the full audio experience!

Camera Quality:
The C7 sports an 8Mp EDof (extended depth of field) camera. EDoF means that when taking the majority of pictures, they will always be in focus. For the average user, this is fine and means that there is a greater chance of the snapshot being in focus and the user being pleased with the result. However, the limitation is that close-up shots are blurred and the
camera can’t be used for macro shots or images of business cards or documents. If this is something you do a lot of, then I would recommend you try before you buy. I haven’t really tried the video recording yet so I’ll save that for another review post.

Overall Impression so far:
I’m very impressed, I’m surprised how quickly I’ve taken to using the touchscreen when previous experiences with other brands have been so bad. I’ve got all my main applications available so I’m going to be quite happy for a while yet! It will be interesting to see what the Microsoft/Nokia partnership brings to the table in the coming months and years, in the meantime watch out for my long-term report on the C7, which I’ll look to post in a few months time.

Nokia C7-00 – Buying and First impressions

 

 

Image: http://blog.rightmobilephone.co.uk/nokia-c7-review/

Over the past few weeks, my venerable E71 has been having a few problems – loss of connectivity and ‘SIM regsitration failed’ messages appearing, forcing a power off. I’d also been filling up the memory with quite a bit of stuff (music, documents etc) and after doing a bit of research on a replacement mobile phone, checked out the Nokia C7-00 on O2′s website. The specifications looked fine, sporting the new Symbian ^3 O/S, 8Gb internal memory in addition to a microSD slot (so I could move my 8Gb card from the E71 to the C7) and I could get it on a reasonable contract renewal (2yr, £25/month, no purchase cost).

I’d always extoled the virtues of havng a ‘real’ keyboard and adore the E71 form factor. I’ve tried fill touch-screen phones before, my wife’s Apple iPhone for example, but detest how sensitive the screen responds to touch and find the layout immensely irritating when used by my large fingers. I have a number of Symbian applications that I have bought over the past couple of years that I like and really can’t be bothered with making the switch to another ‘ecosystem’ having to learn what you can and can’t do with another mobile O/S. Symbian ^3 suits me – improvements made over a familiar O/S and I can transfer all my ‘stuff’ from the E71 easily. Besides, I don’t subscribe to all the Google services, so I’m not willing to make that commitment (life is too short).

Back to the E71 however, the screen size (2.4″ 320×240), I was getting tired with. ‘Try before you buy’ was the watchword so I trotted off to the local O2 shop in search of one to play with. I was pleased to see that one was on display and powered. Within 5-10 minutes of using the touchscreen, I could see that this was a phone I could use and proceeded to talk to the store ‘guru’.

To cut a long story short, I walked out with a new C7, having renewed my contract for a couple of years at £25 per month. However, I did get the impression that the guy was trying to steer me away from buying one. Comments about ‘they’d had a number of C7′s and N8′s back because of the O/S’ seemed odd, I countered this with explaining that I’d done my research and made sure I’d got upgraded versions of my favourite applications (Gravity, ProfiMail, Adobe Reader, WordPress editor, Opera mobile). I was puzzled by a few other comments and just came away from the store that he was trying to put me off. I’m sure the guy was doing his job and wanted to allow me to make the most informed decision possible, but I consider myself to be aware of the mobile O/S market and knew what I was letting myself in for. He also advised me incorrectly about the charger, when trying to sell me a car charger (I’ve got one from my N95 days) saying that I’d need one and I couldn’t use my old 2mm car charger.. The C7-00 supports USB charging via the micro-USB port and it does have a 2mm-style charger in the box.

First impressions are very good; Despite sending a email to @janole, author of my twitter client ‘Gravity’ at 10.15pm, I’d had a reply saying that my license had been transferred within 20 minutes. I’d updated my ProfiMail license online and downloaded updated versions of my applications. I left the E71 and C7 talking to each other via bluetooth and the PhoneSwitch application, copying all my old SMS’s (I really must have a clear out one day), contacts and calendar entries. Within about an hour, I was up and running again on the C7.

Battery life looks good, after heavy use (lots of browsing, tweeting, playing with the phone) the phone is down by three bars, so more than 50% remaining. The homescreens are very easy to personalise and the phone is fast and responsive. Something that has saved me a couple of quid – the C7-00 fits into my old E71 leather case (that was supplied with the phone) quite nicely (slight squeeze, but otherwise ok). The box contents are bare minimum – a quick guide on using the phone (a slight disappointment as it would have been nice to read a bit more on the differences between the S60 3rd edition FP1 and Symbian ^3), a brochure on Ovi services, BL-5K 1200mAH battery, a short length USB to microUSB cable, AC-15X 2mm mains charger and a set of hands-free headphones/microphone.

The obligatory unboxing image…heh!

Thankfully, my old CA-101 micro USB to USB cable appears to charge the phone at the same time as transfer data. In Nokia’s continuing commitment to the environment, the box contains the minimum of packaging (all recycleable), which is in their favour.

All these minor touches help make moving from one phone to another a pleasant ‘user experience’ and I’m looking forward to getting used to the phone over the coming weeks.

UK Star Count 2011

Though this post is aimed at UK visitors, I hope it may be of use to other people from outside the UK highlighting the problem of light pollution.

The Campaign to Protect Rural England (CPRE) and Campaign for Dark Skies (CfDS) are asking people to join in a ‘Star Count’ to help highlight the problem of light pollution. Light pollution is an ever-growing problem due to inconsiderate use of lighting at night, which takes away the fantastic views of the night sky, not just for astronomers, but for everyone.

The CPRE event, which is taking place this week (31st January to Sunday 6th of February), is a simple survey where people are asked to count the number of stars within a rectangle of Orion’s four main corner stars on a clear night. The less number of stars you can count, the greater the chance that light pollution is the cause.

I’d encourage everyone to take part in this survey, which will also help to find out which parts of the country have the darkest skies.

The event details can be found at:-

http://www.cpre.org.uk/campaigns/landscape/light-pollution/start-count-week-2011

Posted by Wordmobi