Model Boat Mayhem
Mess Deck: General Section => Chit-Chat => Topic started by: Colin Bishop on July 08, 2019, 11:31:11 am
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I recently renewed my BT Broadbamd contract to avoid an upcoming price increase and was told I would be sent a Google Home Speaker (one of those virtual assistants like Amazon's Alexa.)
This amazing device was delivered this morning and from reading the blurb that came with it and doing a bit of online research It appears that there is nothing it can do that I could possibly want. In short it is utterly useless to me and I haven't even bothered to take it out of the box, next destination may be the recycling.
Has anyone else got one of these gadgets and if so has it enriched their lives?
Colin >>:-(
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What?! You mean you don't stream your music? Incredible!1 This is the 21st century you know. It's new technology so it must be good!!!
I bet you don't even have a smart meter. :police: :police: :police:
Just joking. Leave it in the box or let someone under the age of 25 have it. :-))
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My cousin and his wife, both 60 and not techy, use Alexa a lot. Mostly for general knowledge and fact checking and other questions they have about tv while they watch. They just ask Alexa, which saves getting up to look stuff up on Wikipedia. They also use it to ask what is on telly as using the TV guide on a cable box is a bit of a drag. You can also ask Alexa where you can buy glue, or what time Tesco closes if you want a late night pie.
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I won't have a smart meter until they are comptatible with all the energy suppliers which doesn't look like being anytime soon! I was sent a free monitoring meter years ago which clamps on the meter power supply and gives an indication of current being used but of course that doesn't specifically save you money if you are aware that turning things on actually uses electricity, something which a significant element of the population are assumed to be unaware of.
I have no problem with new technology as long as it does something genuinely useful. I have a device which beams music from my PC Itunes library directly into my hearing aids without the need to disturb. I also have an app on my phone which enables me to change programmes on the aids andto focus the sound pickup in a particular direction, all of which is of practical use.
Colin
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You can also ask Alexa where you can buy glue, or what time Tesco closes if you want a late night pie.
Not much of a payload for all that complex technology....
Colin
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Are you aware that Alexa remembers every conversation that has triggered it into action & unless you do something never ever forgets them. Alexa conversations have already been used in criminal trials but perhaps for most of us it is the security implications that are awful.
Listening devices - anything with speech commands or a microphone are not something that I will allow to operate around me.
Just part of big data - which should worry us all & no I am not a mad conspiracy theorist.
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Colin,
I as being ironic, or so I thought. Read the last line.
Doug
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Listening devices - anything with speech commands or a microphone are not something that I will allow to operate around me.
Completely agree with that.
Doug, yes I know you were being ironic, sorry, I was just sounding off a bit more!
Colin
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Colin,
No problem. I try to keep my grumbling to myself as I seem to alienate the wunderkind.
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Are you aware that Alexa remembers every conversation that has triggered it into action & unless you do something never ever forgets them. Alexa conversations have already been used in criminal trials but perhaps for most of us it is the security implications that are awful.
Listening devices - anything with speech commands or a microphone are not something that I will allow to operate around me.
Just part of big data - which should worry us all & no I am not a mad conspiracy theorist.
Lucky you don't have a mobile phone then......
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Lucky you don't have a mobile phone then......
I don't. Actually I do but it is switched off & kept in the car in case I break down & even then GPS is switched off.
And yes I try to allow the internet to know as much about me as I choose - and as much inaccurate & confusing information about me as I choose %) .
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I won't have a smart meter until they are comptatible with all the energy suppliers which doesn't look like being anytime soon! I was sent a free monitoring meter years ago which clamps on the meter power supply and gives an indication of current being used but of course that doesn't specifically save you money if you are aware that turning things on actually uses electricity, something which a significant element of the population are assumed to be unaware of.
even a smart meter only saves you money if you pay attention to it and turn things off. all the advertising is just hype and thats all they do, show how much vrious things are using- I too have an owl monitor that clamps on the cable and shows me how much I am using.
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Alexa, Siri, and her Sisters are
all connected to GCHQ and Menwith Hill
:police: :police: :police: :police:
Ned
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Ended up with a new phone last week also.
It has taken me a week to figure out how to disconnect Google from actively operating in the background.
Yesterday it suddenly alerted me to an email, and I have only had the account to satisfy having an account.
I found four years of spam, and worked furiously as to how I could un-sync the phone and disconnect the account.
{:-{ %)
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I'm so glad someone has said exactly this. I like technology but what on earth do these things do? They can alter the sound on your TV - well I can do that. They can change your heating in your house - well I can do that too. They can stream music to your home - well blow me down I can do that as well. From what I've seen they don't do anything new at all - except collect data for their masters. I won't be having one anytime soon.
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LOL. I saw this scam by BT in my in box. "Your BT Sports package is set to increase by £4 a month, renew you deal for another 18 months to keep your current pricing!" In small print it said a new BT Sport agreement will need a new BT Broadband agreement.
So I contacted BT and said, you know this half price broadband deal you gave me 6 months ago, if I renew to save £4 a month on my Sports package, will I retain the broad band discount that has 12 months to run? Erm no, said BT, your half price discount will end on the broadband but you'll save £4 a month on BT Sport!
Well seeing as Im saving over £24 a month on my current broadband & sports deal, my maths says I'll still be saving £20 a month so, thanks but no thanks.
Anyway, I want to drop BT Sport when my current contract runs out so signing up for another 18 months is a non starter.
Oh btw, the speakers on modern thin tvs are rather poor so a quality sound bar will make a noticable difference when set up right.
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I just have the basic BT unrestricted broadband, fibre to the local box and the last bit on copper. It is the fastest option around here at the moment.
Constantly bombarded to take up BT sport and get a BT mobile phone but I don't follow sport and have an independent mobile phone contract.
Colin
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I have never worked out how a smart meter will save me some money.
I only use electricity to do things that are to my advantage. Turning a piece of equipment off doesn't save me money it simply stops me doing things I have decided to do.
If I switch on my 3Kw kettle, it will cost me about 45p an hour to run, I don't need a "stupid people's" meter to tell me that.
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I have never worked out how a smart meter will save me some money.
I only use electricity to do things that are to my advantage. Turning a piece of equipment off doesn't save me money it simply stops me doing things I have decided to do.
If I switch on my 3Kw kettle, it will cost me about 45p an hour to run, I don't need a "stupid people's" meter to tell me that.
It won't save you any money but your energy supplier can sack all their meter readers and be quids in .. As an aside Octopus energy do not push smart meters but rely on the customers readings.
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Home hubs are still relatively nascent technology. Smart devices will eventually be totally integrated, so everything can be controlled from one source, which is voice activated. End of having to type things in, learn operating systems, use remote controls etc. Standards will be integrated- things like smart meters have been botched- the networking systems aren't quite there yet for that kind of thing to work seamlessly. This will change I think with the roll out of 5g technology, but it's going to take a decade at least before that's everywhere.
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The box I got today extolled the fact that the gadget could switch your iron on. Our Iron lives in a cupboard in the kitchen. In order to use it my Wife has to retrieve the ironing board from the boiler compartment, unfold it, get the iron out of the kitchen , put it on the board, connect it to the mains and switch it on to heat up before it can be used.
The Google gadget requires a smart plug (at a cost) which my wife will still need to plug in and then say 'OK Google' turn on my iron' instead of simply plugging the thing in and pressing the switch.
In what way does that represent an efficiency improvement? %%
Colin
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No. It's a poor example though. Let's say you had one connected to your fridge and your hub was able to let you know perhaps by sending a txt to your mobile that the the fridge was getting warmer, indicating a potential fault, or a loss of power. This could help you save a fridge or freezer full of food.
Then there is the advantage of voice control and a common operating system that I mentioned before. Instead of learning different manufacturers operating systems, you just have one, and it's naturally intuitive. At the moment the technology is still very raw, kind of like where home computers were at in the early 1980's, but they'll improve fast, and tomorrows interfaces will be transparent, like talking to a person rather than a machine.
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A freezer warning wouldn't help much if I was hundreds of miles away on holiday and if I was at home I'd probably notice anyway.
I agree that at some time in the future the internet of things might be useful but there is still some way to go at the moment. If I want to turn off a light it is not exactly any hardship to flick a switch and gives me some useful exercise in doing so.
These devices seem to be aimed at couch potatoes at the moment.
I have stayed at hotels with automated controls in the room which have generally proved to be totally frustrating especially when all you want to do is to get to sleep after a long day's travel and you can't work out how to turn the lights off!
Sometime less is more and it goes wrong less often.
Colin
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A freezer warning wouldn't help much if I was hundreds of miles away on holiday and if I was at home I'd probably notice anyway.
..........................I agree that at some time in the future the internet of things might be useful but there is still some way to go at the moment. If I want to turn off a light it is not exactly any hardship to flick a switch and gives me some useful exercise in doing so.............
Colin
I suspect that you remember TV's before remote controls, cars before central locking, phones that were fixed to one location in the house, slide rules to do complex maths etc. I knew of houses that had one electrical socket for the whole house - why on earth would you want more? None of the changes that have happened are essential but we all get used to them and many are now regarded as basic human rights - try stopping people using mobile phones if you doubt this.
When computers first arrived the expectation was that the total world demand would be less than 10 computers - now most cars have 15-20 and there are goodness knows how many billion in daily use world wide - and beyond. It is quite possible that the real killer applications have not been developed for intelligent hubs yet but I have a feeling that given time we will all regard them as a central part of life but it is all going to need to be wireless or the cost will be horrific. Price is critical - the cheaper it gets the more uses will appear.
I agree that the early users appear couch potato oriented but lets review this in 10 years.
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This will change I think with the roll out of 5g technology, but it's going to take a decade at least before that's everywhere.
Will it EVER get everywhere? Here in the Forest of Dean there are places where you can't even get a 3G signal, and they've been telling us for ages that 4G will be 'just round the corner'.
Yeah, right............... :((
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I remember before there were TVs. %)
I am certainly not a Luddite having spent much of my career developing computer systems but there is a difference between what is genuinely useful and what is frivolous.
In the future I imagine that many things will be voice controlled or even thought controlled but you will need the corresponding infrastructure to take full advantage of it and there will need to be alternatives to storing your ironing boards and irons in cupboards and in fact whether ironing clothes will cease to be necessary altogether.
Technology will need to move forward on a broad front and we are only just scratching the edges of that at the moment.
I have never favoured being on the leading edge of technology as that is where you hit all the obstacles. Much better to follow on behind and reap the benefits when the initial problems have been sorted out by somebody else - and a lot cheaper too.
Colin
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Newer is not always better!
Our daughter keeps trying to get us to use Spotify for music. The standard of reproduction is poor ( most users seem to have lost the art of listening) and no better than musak.
I still have my valve amp, record deck, CD player and hifi speakers to listen to music.
Smart meters here are only of use to the supply company. Who wants to continually go outside to watch it?
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The purpose of a smart meter is for second-by-second billing rather than just quarterly.
They are the first step in variable tariff billing so if you make a cup of tea during Eastenders, it will be very expensive - but that same cup of tea at 3 am will be cheap. This is to 'encourage' or 'educate' people into paying much more for their power under the guise of 'saving the planet'.
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I remember before there were TVs. %)
Colin
Wow so you are around 90 Colin
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I should have said 'in my family'!
Colin
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Liz has had a voice-controlled device for doing routine household duties for a long time - she calls it "Dave"...
DM
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Yes, but I'm sure she has found that they are frequently unreliable and unresponsive and when you ask them to turn the oven on tell you the capital of Outer Mongolia instead.
Oh, and they frequently migrate to outbuildings when unobserved....
Colin
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Some years ago I had a minor stroke. We were on a canal towpath between Leighton Buzzard and Tring. No mobile phone coverage at all. And the Media Manager for "&&&&&" still cannot work out why I want universal mobile phone coverage! Perhaps my priorities are not the same as the mobile phone companies. Johnh.
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The opinion that smart meters are intended for couch potates was put forward earlier. I would say, dumb couch potatoes.
The example of the iron - if all houses were set up like the mansion on Tracey Island, ,with additional Scutters from Red Dwarf, it might be useful, but what would the extra power used be? Information and data services use a huge amount of power, what we see at our keyboards is just the very small tip of a very large iceberg.
The people who make decisions about our use of technology are invariably those who were good at Latin and Greek at school and have spent their lives being shielded from the real world by people who, for a time, can convince them that they know what they are talking about. They tend to be influenced by gushy glossy brochures coming from tech firms in areas where recreational drugs are far too easily available. But thats just a passing thought.
And looking back on early TV - I used to pedal my bike to my older cousins house to watch Crackerjack, when we eventually got one of our own, if you wanted to watch the other channel, not only did you have to go over to the set, you had to reach round the back to work the large switch on the extra box screwed on the back. Not like today where you have a choice of dozens of channels, usually with nothing on worth seeing.
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I did notice that when I took one of my servers off line at home the power usage dropped considerably. (that said there are usually at least 6 computers online in my house 24/7
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what happens when we get a power cut PANIC ALL ROUND
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what happens when we get a power cut PANIC ALL ROUND
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Alexa phone the electricity board and report a power cut - Alexa ---- ALEXA------ Alexa?
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Alexa phone the electricity board and report a power cut - Alexa ---- ALEXA------ Alexa?
Even if Alexa had a backup/standby battery, has the router/modem got a UPS?....is that plugged into a landline?
It used to be almost a rule that in every home with a landline, somewhere there should be a regular phone that didn't need power from the mains but drew its operating current from its line. That way, if the power failed and the lights went out, you could trip over things looking for the ringing phone when your neighbours rang to tell you the power was out.
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And for the aging generation... Amanda?
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YvT_gqs5ETk
:-))
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Hi Colin understand where you come with these smart meters. Most people do not realise that part of your quarterly charge is a man coming round and reading your meter. Do the energy companies a cut in the charges to cover that no, also they can cut of your energy supply when ever they like without coming to your house!!!
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Dodes, I have been reporting my readings over the Internet for the last 10 years or more. Never more than an annual check from the companies.
Colin
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When the supply companies have all this minute by minute information, and the computational power to analyse it, how amazed are they going to be when they discover "seasons"? I have long suspected that their account office workers not only work in the office, but also sleep there. I mean, if they go outside to travel home, surely they will have noticed that the weather changes according to a fairly regular pattern?
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In the light of today's announcement:
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/health-48925345 (https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/health-48925345)
Man: Oh God! I think I'm having a heart attack. Alexa, call the quack at once.
Alexa: I'm sorry, I don't quite understand what you mean. Would you like me to cook your goose for you?
Colin
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In the light of today's announcement:
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/health-48925345 (https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/health-48925345)
Man: Oh God! I think I'm having a heart attack. Alexa, call the quack at once.
Alexa: I'm sorry, I don't quite understand what you mean. Would you like me to cook your goose for you?
Colin
"Alexa, call me a taxi"
Alexa: "You're a Taxi".
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When the supply companies have all this minute by minute information, and the computational power to analyse it, how amazed are they going to be when they discover "seasons"? I have long suspected that their account office workers not only work in the office, but also sleep there. I mean, if they go outside to travel home, surely they will have noticed that the weather changes according to a fairly regular pattern?
that would mean they had to stop setting the direct debits during the winter when usage was higher and stop them benifiting from all of the interest on our credit in our energy accounts.
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Forget about "smart" voice activated devices. I got one a few months ago and quickly got bored with cracker jokes. At least the Alexa View has video display, but the voice activated light bulb and power socket are back in their boxes after failing to find anything truly useful to do with them.
Now we come on to the truly useless silly devices: Mobile phone. About as inept as the Alex / Siri units.
I use mine for making telephone calls when I am out, and being able to send text messages. A huge expensive lump of "bling" unless you are into taking selfie pictures of your foot, Nothing much mobiles can do that a good desktop PC can't do infinitely better. Do I need to Google model boat supplies when driving? Absolutely not.
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Whether a mobile phone is useful depends on what you might need it for. I can't take my desktop abroad and the mobile allows me to connect to local wi fi and phone service which can be very useful in keeping in touch with family and friends. I can use it to manage the Model Boats website forum while I am away and keep in touch with what is going on there and indeed on theis forum too.
The maps function can come in useful too, for example we found it very useful when touring Nova Scotia and were unsure exactly where we were being surrounded by trees at an unsignposted minor road crossroad, it showed us which way we should go and our progress towards the main road.
There is a transalation application whereby you can point the camera at a notice in a foregn language and get an immediate trasnlation into English - very useful in Greece for example.
I have a regular meetup with friends in an area where the on street parking is mostly residents only but with a few open max 4 hour spaces. The machines won't let me use cash but I can use the phone to pay for parking using the Ringo application which saves a lot of money over using the loacal car parks.
As mentioned earlier, my phone can aslo be used to control the direction and programme of my hearing aids which is very useful if I am in one of those noisy situations where lots of people are speaking together and I just want to hear those immediately with me.
There are other handy features as well so for me the phone is not useless but offers significant practical benefits.
Colin
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I have a Samsung E1100 which was made and bought in the days when a mobile phone was just that and only that i.e. 2009. It sends and receives voice calls and texts. That's all I need it for. Full stop. The last time I checked its value on one of those "we buy your old phone" websites it was £0.18.
The problem is that we have continued to refer to vastly more sophisticated modern 4G and 5G devices as 'phones' when, in truth, that's the least of what they do.
I see today that Amazon have bought into the NHS by promoting their silly cylinder as a diagostic tool. Until they invent one with either a built-in MRI scanner or a long forefinger and a rubber glove I'd rather see my oncologist about Tubby the Tumour, deep down where the sun don't shine...
DaveM
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The problem is that we have continued to refer to vastly more sophisticated modern 4G and 5G devices as 'phones' when, in truth, that's the least of what they do.
Quite right Dave, smartphones are essentially now hand held multi purpose computers. Plus the camera on mine is actually better than my not very old compact camera and that sometimes comes in handy too if I'm not carrying my DSLR. Nothing is essential but some things are nice to have and come in handy on a regular basis depending on your requirements.
Colin
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One man's useless is another man's essential (or very nice to have).
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I think it depends whether you have one of these smart home devices or not. I don't and have no perceivable need or desire for what they offer. My younger colleague was trying to tell me I absolutely needed one and he said he just ordered a second. When I asked if he'd ordered the second using the first one he looked puzzled and said "no I used my laptop". I said didn't that kind of demonstrate a point? I have actually had the mk 1 Alexa on my desk at work for a while now though (mine's not plastic)...
https://youtu.be/aqAUmgE3WyM
I am considering upgrading at some point when I get bored with it...
https://youtu.be/sC8sxy9vP_w
Smart electricity meters: Not in my house and no wonder they're reportedley banned in some countries! I'm with the published literature siding on the fact they're predominantly aimed at the supplier gathering personal data rather than doing you any favours. Beware also it's been proven that the cost of the meter, and telemetry is passed onto the customer. YOU pay for both whether you realise or not. There's also no mobile signal where my meter is and I'll be damned if the electricity company is sharing my (copper) broadband connection unless they pay for it, or a new connection installed FOC, neither of which is likely. I know how to use electricity efficiently -I also don't need timers or remote controlled devices to save electricity (and such devices slightly increase electricity use anyway unless you unplug them when they're "off").
As for smartphones. I'm still waiting for a 3G signal, and I'm near a "city" apparently, not away in the sticks. I don't think there's anything wrong with smartphones apart from the users. I actually think they've rightly put tablets and ipads into the "minidisc" category. I do disagree with "apps" though. Why would I need a youtube "app", when I just go to the website. I'm told I must have a bus timetable "app" now also. No I don't, I just look at the website, or the timetable usually plastered on the bus stop wall. I don't have "apps" because I have to buy from google, and I don't buy from google.
I like drawing analogies to stories or movies. At the moment I can't work out whether we've started the progression to "Minority Report" or perhaps more likely "Idiocracy". Our current world is becoming alarmingly close to 1984, but I think IF we can survive the next 100 years -Idiocracy will be more like it. It's one of my favourite "no effort to watch" films, but I feel sorry for the next couple of generations who will be living alarmingly close to it, and never realise.
I'm not a technophobe!!! I think I'm just with the others in the minority group above a certain age these days that like tech when it serves a genuinely useful purpose. I'm very lucky not to have any disabilities apart from shocking stubbornness. For those who are limited, I can see how accessability aids are important (so they should be), but not for a fully functioning, capable person.
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I'm fully functioning and capable, just got back from driving around Crete but achieving that status sometimes needs a bit of help! And I will take that where I can get it.
Colin
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Nice response RST. I totally agree. 90% of what's on mobiles is useless rubbish to show off with.
No good for internet (far too tiny), keys are too small for big fingers, my real camera takes vastly better pictures.
Every update reinstalls annoying predictive text for automatic typos just as you send,
OK for emergency calls, that is about it.
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For you Bob, fair enough but not necessarily for others as per my earlier post.
Use the bits you need and disregard the others and look at the cost accordingly.
Colin
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Alexa for Prime Minister 8) 8) 8)
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Going to jump in, but my iPhone is key to how my employment works now...
I work in the electrical industry and we now no longer receive "safety rule" books there for we MUST have
access to the website and be able to access these documents online. Prior to attending site I am required to submit
on an email all my Authorisation, safety and qualification certificates, This means either I take my laptop everywhere OR
I use my iPhone, download it from my iCloud and send everything over.
I have also worked on the Railway and network rail has a superb app.
When you attend a railway job you must again present your credentials, it was a simple card and open to easy fabrication.
Network Rail have an app, when you get the training the training centre and employer take your picture and all your certs and upload them
and issue you a personal card with a scan code. now what happens is when you attend a site the COSS (safety person) takes your card and checks
using the app that you are the person who is the person standing there, they are trained and on what they are allowed to work on and too.
it also includes your Drugs and Alcohol testing record which is a BIG thing for the railway industry
as you can see smart phones are required more and more now just to go to work!
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In my previous job we contracted for the water industry. We went to jobs the municipal guys couldn't or wouldn't do. No mobile phone reception, VHF usually no use because of topography. Some sites had an RJ11 port which you disconnected telemetry (after permission) to use, but the phone to plug in was usually missing, or didn't work and you spent more time saying "hello". Often had to send a runner to drive 5k down the road to get a mobile signal hotspot, then drive back again to relay the message back. When you were commissioning a valve, everyone from "central" office expected instant results -ER, I don't think so, hence why it takes 4h+ to drive to site, 4h to drive back -even in a 12h day it leaves little time to do anything and sometimes it needed 4-6h watching before the job was done. Try doing that on Skye in tourist season! (no hotels for workers!!!). We started quoting and did a couple of jobs for the local Rail Depot -oh my god, it brought a new low to our expectations of safety and adherence to usual standards. It was truly an eyeopener how badly some parts of the network off the main line are apparently run. I'm glad I didn't get more involved before I left. You're welcome to it on your iPhone -other parts of the rail network certainly don't follow the same principles!!!!
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Nice response RST. I totally agree. 90% of what's on mobiles is useless rubbish to show off with.
No good for internet (far too tiny), keys are too small for big fingers, my real camera takes vastly better pictures.
Every update reinstalls annoying predictive text for automatic typos just as you send,
OK for emergency calls, that is about it.
...disqgree a bit there.
HTC, which I can't get anymore -no problems with keyboards. When I went to oneplus and went back to the shop saying "what the flip2 with keyboards I was told it's the norm -HTC was just better in every respect, but they don't make phones now. So it's not a smartphone problem for me, just stupid programming.
Actually I'm pretty embarrased to say as someone who progressed from having my own darkroom. I've been DSLR for many years after initially withstanding the tide -but I cannot now argue that the smartphone is embarrasing. Actually I partially retract that -HTC had embarrasingly good camers on their phones, now they don't do phones I'm struggling with the alternatives -but for 99.9% of the time I can understand why smart phones have become so good at cameras. That said, I just ordered another New Nikon DSLR to play with properly.
...Smartphone updates though are crazy. My HTC phones worked for years, no updates required, just worked perfectly. I wrote a £500 Sony Xperia phone off after 2 months and one update which rendered it useless. I will never "buy" a phone, or a Sony or Ericcson phone product ever again. I can't buy HTC for love nor money these days. Much Like Sony for Laptops! My latest One+ wants to update every week. To be honest the best it was was within 24h of taking it out of the box exept for finding out it didn't have an FM tuner!!!. Every update since has degraded the camera, the alarm function (primary function for me) and the general stability of the phone. I was told it's a hard learning curve for ex-HTC users whereas everyone else was generally used to a lower grade product or expectations from the start. No HTC now so have to get used to the downgrade on the rest of the market.
My One+6 appears to be special though: I have alarms set for xxam -it wakes me up half an hour before with a "notification" that an alarm is set in 30 mins. I can't disable the alarm notification. It also goes through random spells of the alarm ringing just one single time at certain points in the morning, like 04:38 -it only rings for half a second, doesn't coincide with any snooze or alarm patterns and doesn't ring long enough to wake up and work out whats happening, apart from being woken up permanently aferwards but falling asleep again when the real alarm rings. Also, when the alarm does does ring, if I swipe a wrong way it changes the alarm screen to something else -and there's no way to get back to cancel the alarm, so it just rings and rings until it times out. Then it's a mess cancelling previous and current alarms,and randomly it might ring again for half a second inbetween.
I like smart phones, but my One+6 does very bizzare things. The software on it is so bad and nobody can seem to work it out (I work with programming guys). No wonder it wants to update all the time. The software on it is full of bugs and when they fix one they break another. I'll never have another One+ product! Still glad I don't like apples though.
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...disqgree a bit there.
Actually I'm pretty embarrased to say as someone who progressed from having my own darkroom. I've been DSLR for many years after initially withstanding the tide -but I cannot now argue that the smartphone is embarrasing. Actually I partially retract that -HTC had embarrasingly good camers on their phones, now they don't do phones I'm struggling with the alternatives -but for 99.9% of the time I can understand why smart phones have become so good at cameras.
For the mag I run, I've just accepted a feature article where all the photos have been taken on a mobile. I wasn't sure, but two designers have checked them for quality and the pictures are good enough for a cover shot as well as large inside. I've had FAR worse submitted from people using a "proper" camera!
Like most tools, you can use them well or badly and the guy who sent the article in used it well.
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It is still much easer to compose and control an image on a DSLR than on a smartphone with its touch screen controls. I use my phone as a backup if I don't have a proper camera available but for general work a dedicated camera is hard to beat.
Colin
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Even easier if you can use the screen on the back rather than pear through the viewfinder, at least for closeup stuff. I love using a "proper" camera, but rarely do for model-making photos any more.
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A matter of personal preference I think. I like the viewfinder method best and find it OK for almost all applications but I can see that others might prefer to compose the image on screen.
Whatever floats your boat!
Colin
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for me, especially when taking pictures of models, the biggest difference between a "real" camera and my phone, is that i can mount the camera on a tripod.
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Plenty of tripods out there for mobile phones nowadays.
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I was using a Canon SLR until I bought a Samsung smart phone. I found to my surprise that the auto settings on the phone made it a cinch to get correctly exposed and sharp focused pictures under almost all lighting conditions that the Canon is now gathering dust. Added to which it is a one click operation to resize them to small and e-Mail the resultant directly onto the desk PC.
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Must agree that nowadays, the inbuilt photo processing on modern 'smart phone', is mind boggling!
The HDR settings is sometimes far better that I can achieve with a DSLR or Mirrorless camera ..... and 2 hours in Lightroom! {:-{
.... in fact , as you may have noticed, for last couple of years, most my show photos are now taken with smart phones!
( I sort of appreciate why the big camera boys don't include, built in, high end image processing .... but it's now getting very annoying! )
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There's an old saying, and not sure who it is attributed to, but always made sense to me- 'the best camera is the one you have with you'. Bearing in mind most people tend to carry their mobiles when out and about, if you have one with a decent camera, then it's most likely to be the one you're going to take a pic with.
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Very true but for serious pics I still prefer a 'proper' camera with mechanical settings. I find the touch screen controls on mobiles a bit hit and miss unless you are just doing point and shoot.
But the general quality of images taken by mobiles is now seriously impressive.
Colin
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iPhone Xsmax in Portrait mode
(https://photos.smugmug.com/Midwest-Booth-Bay-Lobster-boat/i-T332S7H/0/30d38af8/X4/C418076E-2A86-4DF0-B1C4-A52C89F85ABC-X4.jpg)
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A matter of personal preference I think. I like the viewfinder method best and find it OK for almost all applications but I can see that others might prefer to compose the image on screen.
Whatever floats your boat!
Colin
I use both. Viewfinder when using my DSLRs (goes back to my 35mm days) and screen on my compacts etc. even if they have viewfinders. I only have a cheap mobile for calls and texts so the camera isn't that brilliant. My wife is the smartphone user. I have a PC, laptop and tablet so don't want or need one.
Chris
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Plenty of tripods out there for mobile phones nowadays.
but my phone doesn't fit any of the half dozen tripods i already own.... and the outrageously expensive tripod for it won't fit any of the cameras i own.
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but my phone doesn't fit any of the half dozen tripods i already own.... and the outrageously expensive tripod for it won't fit any of the cameras i own.
If £2.59 is outrageously expensive (https://www.ebay.co.uk/p/Tripod-Stand-Holder-Bluetooth-Remote-Control-for-Mobile-Phone-Samsung-iPhone/21024358357?iid=352293820917&chn=ps&norover=1&mkevt=1&mkrid=710-134428-41853-0&mkcid=2&itemid=352293820917&targetid=520571361289&device=c&adtype=pla&googleloc=1007030&poi=&campaignid=1782815949&adgroupid=70885938442&rlsatarget=aud-629407027345:pla-520571361289&abcId=1139366&merchantid=10123724&gclid=Cj0KCQjwpavpBRDQARIsAPfTwiztuFzNGwNeMraOZFV9JkKfj3tlSU08zgBgZzL2ETO75fmKhE6jeDAaAmXXEALw_wcB), this isn't the hobby for you. I :-))
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If £2.59 is outrageously expensive (https://www.ebay.co.uk/p/Tripod-Stand-Holder-Bluetooth-Remote-Control-for-Mobile-Phone-Samsung-iPhone/21024358357?iid=352293820917&chn=ps&norover=1&mkevt=1&mkrid=710-134428-41853-0&mkcid=2&itemid=352293820917&targetid=520571361289&device=c&adtype=pla&googleloc=1007030&poi=&campaignid=1782815949&adgroupid=70885938442&rlsatarget=aud-629407027345:pla-520571361289&abcId=1139366&merchantid=10123724&gclid=Cj0KCQjwpavpBRDQARIsAPfTwiztuFzNGwNeMraOZFV9JkKfj3tlSU08zgBgZzL2ETO75fmKhE6jeDAaAmXXEALw_wcB), this isn't the hobby for you. I :-))
i don't consider that junk to be a tripod... I tried several of these types of things, and they can't support the weight of the phone... you need to get into the $30 range before they are of any quality at all.