Tag: phones

Is The Smartwatch A Mobile Phone Killer?

Carl Setzer
As the smart-watch and AI (think Google Assistant and Siri) intersect, more people will adopt smart-watches. The ability to interact accurately only with our voice will be the crucial element to this. Once I can have a full SMS exchange solely via voice, the need to lug around a cell phone will whither. Now, is the smart-watch a cell-phone killer? I hate that construct ” ____-killer”. Much like the idea of a laptop being a desktop killer. And, of course, all these cellphone elements being “iPhone killers”. Anyway, in this situation, no. Cell phones won’t be killed by smartwatches. I don’t foresee games becoming really fun on a watch. Maybe with some sort of integration with a Google-Glass-esque device. Maybe. The phone’s current centralness to our personal communication system, I expect, will migrate. I see the watch to take that role. Possibly with the watch being the central device, and everything else connecting through it. What do you think? How far off-base do you think I am? Or am I a true oracle, prescient to the point of prophecy?

My son’s blasted phone

Carl Setzer2 Comments

Hey there, my tech-savvy friends, my son has an original Pixel, which he loves. However, it’s picked up an annoying glitch. When anyone calls it, the answering screen doesn’t come up. It’s physically impossible to answer it; nothing there at all. Oddly, the phone rings and vibrates, just nothing else.

Here are some key details:

  • Do Not Disturb isn’t on.
  • The phone settings screen is greyed out (I think this is significant, but not able to drill down any further).
  • He can answer calls with a bluetooth headset (tapping “answer” there).
  • I’ll check and see if Google assistant will answer the calls. Hadn’t thought of that. 
  • Recently his phone updated to Android 9/Pie (did he get Pie in the face?)

Searching Google and Bing I’ve found many folks looking for solutions to this, going back a couple of years. Otherwise, that has been remarkably fruitless. Though I found a forum where the problem was stated to be a broken codec on the motherboard, and you’ll need a new one. Amusing by not helpful.

So, anyone have any ideas? My current best guess is that this some kind of bug or conflict related to the update. Haven’t seen anything formal from the Google, so it makes me wonder if it’s on their radar. 

I’m eager for advice and counsel, oh my techie friends!

Some thinking about iOS and Android

Carl Setzer

I’m getting caught up in a few things. Just watched the June Apple WWDC. I find a lot of what’s coming exciting and fascinating. The Apple Watch and Apple tv, the new Macs…blah blah blah. That’s not where my mind is, though. 

Earlier today we received Samsung Gear 360. My son really wants to get into 360 video and start diving into VR. Well, this presented a challenge. His phone is a Google Pixel. He loves the phone. However, the app isn’t compatible with the Pixel. This product has been on shelves for several years in Android, and Samsung hasn’t built this out for other Android platforms. But yes to Apple? That seems daft. And is definitely frustrating. 

This brings out the things that keep pulling me back towards iPhones. I hate paying the Apple tax. However, there are far more things like cases, apps, and interactive tools…like Samsung’s Gear 360 app. But there are so many tools that are only available on iOS. Some apps have far greater feature sets in their iOS versions than in their Android ones. 

I understand the challenges that Android’s distributed model face. If iOS has an update, it’s available for every device immediately. Android can take years to port their updates out through their vender partners. Frustration. 

So, there’s a solid draw back to iPhone to me. I have some time before I need to make a decision. We’ll see, we’ll see…