Tuesday, February 5, 2013

No premium fee upgrade to 4G for Three customers

Three to offer free 4G LTE broadband

Three has announced that customers will be able to upgrade to 4G LTE for free when it launches.
Mobile operator Three has said its customers won't be faced with a premium fee to upgrade to 4G LTE mobile broadband when it becomes available on its network. In fact, the firm is making a statement by saying it will be a standard feature on all its price plans. See: What is 4G? A complete guide to 4G.
Dave Dyson, CEO of Three said: "Our customers choose Three because they love the internet and know they can get great speeds and great value on our award-winning network,"
"As we add the next wave of technology to our Ultrafast network, we’ve listened to our customers and thought long and hard about the right way to do it. We don’t want to limit Ultrafast services to a select few based on a premium price and we’ve decided our customers will get this service as standard."
The firm said its network will reach 80 percent of the population by the end of March and 4G will arrive in the second half of this year. Three will use the 1800MHz spectrum already acquired as part of a deal with EE.
Customers will need a 4G capable smartphone or tablet to take advantage of the faster speeds, roughly four to five times faster than 3G. Many are on the market already such as the iPhone 5, Nokia Lumia 920 and iPad. See also: 4G vs 3G network hands-on speed test.
Three said 4G LTE versions of the Samsung Galaxy S3 and Galaxy Note 2 will launch on its network within the next month and the BlackBerry Z10 will launch mid-February.

eBay for iOS review

1:53 AM iPhone and iPad No comments

eBay for iOS review

Thanks to eBay’s iOS app, you don’t have to worry about ever missing an auction. This full-fledged app allows you to do just about anything eBay’s full website does.
eBay for iOS is a free download for iOS devices running iOS 4.3 and later. The app lets you track items that you’re watching, bidding on, or selling.
If you’re a buyer, you can review and submit best offers, bid on items at the last minute, and send messages and questions to sellers.
If you’re a seller, you can review submitted best offers, track your sold and unsold items, list new items with your own item images, relist unsold items, and create and schedule auctions.
The eBay app lets you search for items to purchase (or, if you’re just curious – say, if you’re looking at an item for resale and you want to know how much it’s selling for) using a rather comprehensive search feature.
You can search for an item using keywords or by scanning a UPC, EAN, or QR code, or you can refine your search to show completed listings, sold items, and items with free shipping.
Items can be sorted by category, condition (new or used), price range, and buying format (auction or buy it now).
Once you find what you’re looking for, you can place a bid, opt to Buy it Now, or add it to your Watch List, all through the app.
You can also share the item via Facebook, Twitter, text message or email; or sell an item similar to the one you’ve found.
The main eBay mobile home screen houses your messages centre, where you can read, send, and respond to messages from other eBay sellers.
Here, you can also save searches, manage notifications (for example, you can set eBay to notify you when a watched item is ending, when an item you’ve bid on is ending, and when you’ve been outbid, won an item, or received a best offer), and check out eBay’s Groupon-like Daily Deals site.

Edifier Esiena BT review

1:47 AM Speaker No comments

Edifier Esiena BT review

£249.99 inc VAT

The Edifier Esiena BT features an updated speaker system that combines a dock connector with Bluetooth wireless. Read our Edifier Esiena BT review to find out more.

The Esiena is neatly designed, housing two separate speaker units and a 5-inch LCD screen for displaying track information, all within a sturdy and compact unit that measures about 390mm wide, 237mm deep and 145mm high. There are large, glowing touch-sensitive controls on the top of the unit, along with a remote control that provides separate controls for treble and bass.
Audio quality is good – the higher frequencies lacked a little zing at first, but it was easy to bump up the treble using the remote control in order to get a sound that we liked. The bass output is quite firm given the relatively modest size of the unit, and while the 60W output (30W on each speaker) may not be loud enough to power a serious party the Esiena is more than adequate for livening up a dinner party with some friends.