I will be one of the first to admit that in terms of raw hardware and out of the box features the iPhone is lacking. That camera could be 5 or 8 Megapixel, it could have a memory expansion slot, it could have a QWERTY keyboard, etc, etc. But it doesn’t….

So why all the commotion?

At least once a day one of us will see an advert or article about the iPhone (this article included), or hear someone talking about how awesome it is. And on the other side of that you will also see an anti-iphone advert or article, and someone arguing how it is worse than their Blackberry, or Nokia Smart phone, or similar. The reasons for both of these are quite clear: Business, and personal opinion. But the problem comes in that with the iPhone, the traditional way of comparing phones and gadgets has gone out of the window.

The beauty of the iPhone is not in the hardware (unless you count the design) but instead, it is in the software that runs the device. No phone software out at the moment (at least here in the UK) has been successful in getting people to use more and more of the features on their phones than ever before. The reason for this: Simplicity.

The problem with buttons

The iPhone’s operating system is very easy to use, and brings something slightly revolutionary to the phone market: the lack of a menu button!!!

Sound’s silly doesn’t it, but it is not. Every other phone I have ever owned (even other touch screen phones) had still had a menu button putting an extra button press between you and your features. The iPhone removes this completely. Whereas on some phone I may need to go to Menu > Programs > Web Browser, on the iPhone it is merely the tap of of a finger on the Safari icon (which I can place on the dock to make it available on any home screen). Too lazy to search through the screens, use Spotlight to search for it… The number of clicks has been reduced from 3 or more, to 1. Saving over a 3rd of the time in launching an application.

The App Store

One of the major loves people have of the iPhone is the applications, and there are loads. In fact, there are over 50,000 Apps in the App store, many of which are free.

Their charm is in the fact that you can do pretty much anything if you find the right App, hence Apple’s “There’s an App for that” campaign. Mix this with the ease of installation and purchasing that comes from Apple’s experience with iTunes and it becomes a dead cert. But there are still major problems:

The approval system. Apple has a very enigmatic approval system, in fact I doubt they even know how it works. Whilst one app may be approved, one very similar app may be rejected. Apps that people think should be approved, sometimes aren’t, etc.

In Conclusion

Mix these two ingredients with an iPod, Dictaphone, GPS, Calculator, YouTube device, Calendar, Notebook, Email, Calendar, etc; and keep the simplicity in all these parts and you have a phone that many people are able to, and enjoy to, use.Yes it is not the best hardware in the world, and it is not the best value for money on the hardware front. But that is not the point.

The beauty of this device is in it’s ease of use, it’s looks, and the systems that support it. And until other phone manufacturers are able to get this mix right they will still see an increasing number of sales going to the iPhone range.

The reason is this, tomorrow sees the beginning of Apple’s Worldwide Developer Conference, or WWDC (Don’t ask us where the extra W came from). This conference brings some of the top developers in the world, as well as those just starting out, into one place for a few days of workshops, seminars, lunches, and I assume parties. But of recent years it has become a very important event for all Apple fans over the world. As the keynote that it opens with, normally pesented by Steve Jobs but opened this year by Phil Schiller, is the couple of hours where we get a first look at the ew Mac OS and… the brand new iPhone.

Now unless you have been hidden under a rock, inside a faraday cage, in the amazon rainforst; you will have probably heard one or two or 20 rumours about what people are expecting in the new iPhone. Video recording, front facing camera, magnometer (compass), repositioned speaker and headphone socket, camera button, video calling, matte/rubberised back, no more chrome frame, and coffee dispenser (I admit I made that one up myself); are all just a taster of what rumours are flying round the internet at this moment in time. There is even a rumoured name floating around: the iPhone Video.

As an iPhone fan, and owner, I am currently counting the hours, minutes, seconds, and milliseconds until the keynote starts (6pm GMT, Monday 8th June) so I can watch it online and drool over the iPhone if it is announced.

Now some of you are problably thinking “How can you be sure there will even be a new announcement?”, well there are a few clues:

1. Apple are very predictable when it comes to when they announce product refreshes, with Phil Schiller himself saying at Macworld in January that the iPhone’s refresh cycle is June/July each year
2. O2 has started to withdraw current iPhone 3G avertising here in the UK. Stores are replacing iPhone POS with adverts for the new O2 Joggler, where iPhone adverts have been for almost a year, national newspapers are no longer carrying the iPhone 3G ‘There’s an app for that’ advertising on the backs of some of their supplements, again replaced with the O2 Joggler.

This second point is the biggest hint. O2 have actively advertised the iPhone 3G since before it’s July 11th launch last year. With adverts in stores, newspapers, television, the internet. For them to start to retract some of these means that something must be happening in the world of the iPhone.

I shall start from personal experience, with 2 laptops i have bought in the last 18 months. These are the MSI GX700 and the Dell XPS M1530, both of which came to £999. The MSI was purchased in October 2007, and the Dell in October 2008; so comparing spec would be a worthless task. But I can compare the reliability and customer service I received from the two companies.

A fight for customer service dominance

MSI vs Dell
The MSI GX700 was purchased from an online retailer in September 2007, it took 2 weeks for me to receive the machine and only 2 months to be sick of it. For you see during these 2 months the power supply on the machine had failed, and the graphics card was overheating beyond what should be expected. The machine was returned to MSI for repair, and I got it back within 10 days. Now this all sounds well and good, but the start of this took forever. Contacting the retailer I was alerted that I need to contact the support department for the laptop directly. Now this is a normal measure, but much more difficult when the retailer gives you the wrong number, and you then get passed through 4 different phone connections to then find out that you have to phone the retailer again.

After all this, I got the machine back and a couple of months later put a disc into the drive (I rarely use discs, as transfer most data online or with USB memory sticks) and as the drive spins up to speed it makes a horrible buzzing noise. I send the machine back to MSI to be repaired, and it returns with the bottom of the machine not being secured properly, in fact the bottom falls off when I move it on my lap. One return to manufacturer later, and the piece of metal enclosure that covers the processor has been put on badly, and there is a good couple of millimetres gap between the cover and bottom of the machine.

After 11 months with the machine, I was able to wrangle a refund out of the retailer, due to the product and the repairs being useless. And with this refund I purchased an XPS M1530 directly from Dell.

I ordered the Dell machine on Friday, and it arrived on Wednesday. Everything was good, all questions I had at any time were answered, but a problem soon arose. My Hard Drive was making strange noises, and failing to boot sometimes. I phoned Dell Support, and as an XPS customer got launched to the front of the queue, and the technician was happy to talk me through the steps to update my bios, drivers, and check the drive for failures (all at 11PM at the weekend). When it was deemed that the Hard Drive was in fact failing, they sent a technician the next working day with a replacement hard drive and touch control panel (the original had been scratched when it arrived). The laptop was fixed and ready to work again within 2 hours of the technician arriving.

This difference in customer care shows you the added value you can get from buying a certain system over its competitors. Although the modern MSI had a higher spec, the Dell customer and technical support was much more comprehensive and useful.

But this value for money can extend to other areas, for example the ever present Mac vs PC argument.

Who helps you out more?

Mac vs PC
It is well known that if you equivalently spec an Apple Mac and a Windows based PC, that the Mac will more often than not be more expensive. But there are reasons for this, such as the Unix underpinnings that makes Mac OSX more reliable; the fact that the computer and OS are made by the same people, making them more reliable; the inclusion of iLife software giving you easy to use Photo, Music, Web and Video editing out of the box; Apple’s customer service.

Working as an IT technician at a school, you see all sorts of computers come in and out of the site; and end up fixing most of them. This normally involves reinstalling windows and setting the school provided machine back to how we gave it to them in the first place; or replacing a piece of hardware. Now, when it came to fixing a Mac Pro, which we had never done before, we were slightly intimidated; so decided to contact Apple Technical Support. The technician on the other end of the line was more than happy to help us through the installation and fixing of software, as well as have a laugh with us when we were searching for the serial number. Customer service much higher than what we get from our network solution provider, that we pay loads for, and get “Look at this article online” answers from.

Moo.com
But this sort of thing is not just something you should think of when buying your new MP3 player or Computer, it can affect you in more standard medias, such as business cards; something we had to purchase recently.

From recommendations on the internet, mainly Twitter, we decided to use www.moo.com to print our business cards; and we are very pleased that we did. We were unsure if the images we had were the correct size, etc for the cards but one of their customer service agents answered our questions very quickly. He was happy to look at the images we had and make sure they were right, he even checked the cards once they had printed to make sure they looked as good as they did on screen. And we were kept informed at every step. Now is where you get to have a laugh at me.

For you see, I accidentally uploaded and had the wrong image printed onto the cards. This image had the wrong phone number on it, which rendered them useless, something I felt silly over. Shortly after receiving the cards, I had an email land in my inbox from Moo, asking what i thought of the cards. My reply said that the printing quality was awesome, and I jokingly mentioned that I had accidentally put on the wrong number. Twenty-four hours later, I received an email with a voucher code for a free set of business cards.

This has to be some of the best customer service I have ever received, as the number error was entirely my fault. Therefore, I am going to have to go at a tangent here, and say that bitcolumns very much recommend moo.com.

Buying Tips
These tips should help you make sure you get the most from your money, no matter what you are buying.
Do your research. Read about the product and the company online; ask friends if they have ever bought anything from the same company. Check to see what their warranty and technical support cover.
Shop Around. The best prices can be found by looking everywhere you can. Price comparison websites, online retailers, the manufacturer’s website, etc. Never rule out high street stores though, as more and more are putting out offers to attract customers back through their doors.
Check their customer services.If they have an “Ask Us” feature, use it. Get a sneak preview of what their customer service is like. This link is there to entice you into buying their products, but can give an insight to their support. If they are quick and helpful then this is a good sign.
Try the product. If you are able to go to a shop or a mate’s and try out the product before you buy it, do it. This will let you make sure it is the product you want, and ensure it is right for your needs. No point buying something because it is cheaper, or got good customer service, to find that it is useless.

Here’s how to fix it in byte size easy steps!

Step one:

With no images/files open in PS, go to Edit / Color Settings. Change the top drop-down setting to Monitor Color, and uncheck “ask when opening” too.

Step two:

Go to View / proof setup / and click Monitor RGB.

Step three:

Open up any random image in photoshop.. Go to File / save for web. But we aren’t actually going to save anything. Uncheck “Convert to sRGB” (depending on versions of photoshop this will be either in the save for web settings as a tickbox or only visable after you click a dropdown arrow next to the preset option).

Step four:

close photoshop and restart. Go to the comments section and thank Bitcolumns.com for sharing the love!

Amazingly there now is, and it is called Spotify. Spotify is an instant on-demand music service in the UK, with backing from the 4 major record labels (Universal Music Group, Sony BMG, EMI Music, Warner Music Group) and mjor independent labels. With thousands of tracks available at any time, at the click of a button, legally, and free? There must be a catch, right?

And we have to admit there is one: the service is ad supported, with an advert appearing between songs every so often. Original sponsors of the service included Ford and Xbox, and the adverts are meant to be unobtrusive. There is also a paid for service, that removes all adverts and gives you invites to let your family and friends try out the service. This costs £0.99 for 24 hours, or £9.99 per month. Having used this service we are very pleased with the spead and quality at which the music arrives. But there is one slight problem… they have recently experienced security issues, which could compromise the password of any users who signed up before 19th December. Although this should not affect any subsequent users, we do warn that anyone who signed up in the first couple of months should change their password to stay safe.

Despite this we are very happy to present Spotify with a coveted bitcolumns “Recommended for Students” award.

Get used to it, it's not going anywhere.

Founded as an intelligent little search engine by two students at the Stanford University in California in 1998; US$150+ billion corporation in 2009. Sergey Brin and Larry Page certainly made their parents proud. With the days when ‘the internet’ was something nerdy kids talked about at school now a distant memory, everyone has used, or at least heard of Google. It’s presence is undoubtedly the biggest on the Internet when it comes to, well, anything. Search engine, advertising, satellite maps, software, email, videos (youtube.com, Google owned) and many others; Google really knows how to multi-task.  Want something? “Google it.” Indeed.

So how did two students go from bedroom coding to billion-dollar-business in such a relatively small amount of time? Well, simply put, Google gets around 90% of their revenue from advertising and most of their capital from investors. In 2008, Google was worth US$157 billion; only US$3 Billion short of consumer electronics giant Apple’s worth. Now, to put that into perspective for you, Apple have been around for over 40 years making powerful yet simplistic and stylish computers, laptops that fit in envelopes, CD-killing culture phenomenon’s (and in recent years, ones with phones built inside of them that DON’T look like bricks) and much, MUCH ground breaking and innovative stuff. Google has been around for 1/4 of that time. I’ll bet Forrest Gump wishes he waited a couple of years to invest his money in Google instead.

Another way the lads at Google like to earn the pocket money is by buying up fellow Internet Behemoth’s. As most will already be aware, Google bought Youtube.com in 2006 for US$1.6 billion after its exploding popularity; It seems they don’t like it when other websites steal their headline limelight. I would like to predict that Twitter, due to its current booming success will be the next to wear the “Google owned“ tag.

If not, they could always buy bitcolumns in a few years!

This video aims to explain the history and developments that led to our modern Internet, and we think it is pretty nifty.

“History of the Internet” is an animated documentary explaining the inventions from time-sharing to filesharing, from Arpanet to Internet.
The history is told using the PICOL icons on www.picol.org. You can already download a pre-release of all picol icons on http://blog.picol.org/pre-release-picol-icons

You can see the credits and more information on this movie on

http://www.lonja.de/motion/mo_history_internet.html

Twitter is a site dedicated to these short, status update-esque, messages (140 characters long, to be precise), allowing you to update online, by text, with phone applications, and more. the idea is to quickly let everyone who follows you to know what you want them to know instantly. Popular updates include: location, going out for a party, found a brand new website, taken an interesting photo, and the standard, and omnipresent, “I’m bored” messages.

You can also follow other users, allowing you to see what they are up to, and reply directly to them as soon as they publish their update. This allows conversations to happen very easily, and quickly, from pretty much anywhere you can get a connection to a phone network. But this brings the major problem with Twitter: addiction.

Having used Twitter very recently, I have to admit that I am starting to become hooked on it myself. Checking every few minutes to see if someone has replied or published a good story, and then replying and waiting some more. It is very easy to become enthralled with such a simple concept.

Anyone can join at www.twitter.com, and best of all it is free. And as everyone needs someone they can follow, why not follow @smutchings and @bitcolumns. Giving you the updates on what is happening, as it happens, and we will follow you back. If you would like to sahre your ‘tweeting’ with other users here, just put your @username in your comment.

Here at bitcolumns we thought it would be funny to see if Sam, who is a self confessed computer addict and heavy user, could last a whole week only using a ASUS Eee PC S101 instead of his standard Dell XPS laptop.

Sam will be keeping a diary of the week as it happens, on the S101, and hopefully we will see if it is possible for a heavy user to move entirely to the new platform.  Unfortunately, we have had to make 2 exceptions to this:

• Sam may use his XPS for editing the video for the bitcast (but all research must be done on the S101)
• Sam may use his normal computers when at work, to not stop the running of the school.

These exceptions make sure everyone continues to run smoothly as we transfer to our new design, and features.

Day 1 (Saturday)

I have to say that today was an easy day for this challenge, with me being at work for most of it. But… the S101 did come into it’s own during the day. I took it to work with me, so was easily able to turn it on (very quickly, I must add) and do some writing whilst eating lunch. On my normal laptop this would be awkward due to the size, and battery life on performance mode. The small size of the S101, and ridiculous battery life, allow this sort of thing to become normal.

The evening was strange though, as I am used to sitting at my desk working on the latest bit of writing, but as I write this, sat on the sofa in my parents’ lounge, I am quite easily able to enjoy the comedic stylings of Michael McIntyre at the same time. (In fact I laughed so much at one point, I almost dropped the machine.)

Day 2 (Sunday)

Today was the first true test, as I was not at work. This meant lasting a whole day without any other computer. The morning was great again, being able to sit in the lounge with my family whilst working, but the screen got a bit annoying when it came to checking my Twitter feed. As those of you who use Twitter know, the site relies on scrolling down to read the ‘tweets’.

On the 1920×1200 resolution of my XPS M1530 this is really not noticeable, as most of the posts appear at the same time. And even on my iPhone it is not agravating, as the interface is intuitiave. But the Eee PC S101 has no scroll bar (that I could find) making it frustrating to have to keep moving the mouse between the scrollbar and the links in the posts. I had to give up on persevering, and changed to the iPhone.

Spending the rest of the day watching films and comedy DVDs meant that is all the use the S101 got. Oh well, let’s see what happens tomorrow.

Day 3 (Monday)

The first day back in the IT office after starting the challenge, and I have taken the S101 to work. The guys in the office love the machine, or at least most of it. The slender, stylish design appeals. but they are slightly taken aback by the price (we just bought loads of higher spec, 15.4 inch Toshibas for about £250 each).

As the rest of my work has to be done on the desktops in the office, the Eee PC went away after about half an hour. The S101 was so easy to just place on top of my desktop’s tower, to keep it out of the way. I have to definitely mention this machines portability and ruggedness. No problems at all with carrying it around with me whilst doing this article. Admittedly I am carrying it in the protective sleeve in the bag I use for all laptop’s.

Home time means a return to using the netbook. I am getting more used to it’s layout, but trying to type a long piece of work is interrupted every so often by me having to rewrite a sentence. Not because of the size of the keys, but the awkward placement of the laptop’s Shift key (to the right of the Up arrow). This irregular placement leads to me writing new words in the middle of previously finished sentences.

Day 4 (Tuesday)

Tuesday is always a busy day for me, and today is no exception. It is the 20th of January, and the return of the bitcolumns radio segment after the break for Christmas. I spend most of the day travelling between destinations, and researching the topics and news for the evenings show. I find myself sat in an on campus Cafe at 16:00, drinking a cup of hot chocolate (It was very cold outside), and typing up the ‘script’ for the evening’s show, when Andy joins me.

As some of you may know, Andy loves the Eee range (ussually becuase of their use of open source software), and this time is no exception. The only problem he can see is the running of Windows XP on the device (something I prefer).  Soon it is time to head to the studio, and the laptop slips easily into my bag, concealed from everyone. But it was nice to see a ‘Mac’ and a ‘PC’ sat in the corner of the cafe talking to each other.

Day 5 (Wednesday)

Today saw even more travel than yesterday. I agree to meet Guy (who presents on CSRFM) at 1200 so he can have a quick look at the S101, and give his opinion. Instead, I get a phone call at 0945 asking if we can meet at 1100 instead, as Guy has to drive to the west country. Not one to argue, or even question it, I drag myself out of bed and bomb it to Canterbury (maxing at 70mph of course).

I meet Guy at, a very unbusy, Starbucks in the city centre. Leaving him with the device to get a drink (another Hot Chocolate), I return to find out he has already ‘written’ a review in his head. Agreeing with myself on the fact it looks good, and is very fast for what it is, he also brings up some bad points I missed.

His first is the how attractive to fingerprints the outer shell is. It can easily get greasy, and start to look unclean if used a lot. He also points out a slight wobble on one of the hinges, we assume is from the number of people who have been carrying it around and reviewing it, but hope is not a sign of the build quality. Unfortunately we are not able to do endurance and quality tests on the build of the machine, but we hope that this is a one off.

Another point discussed is how attractive to thieves the SD card at the back of the machine could be. All it takes is a slight distraction, and people could walk away with a 16GB SD card. Hopefully this will never happen, but it is something we took into consideration.

Guy’s full opinion can be seen in the full review of the S101, coming very soon.

This afternoon saw us recording the first episode of the bitcolumns podcast (or bitcast, as we prefer to call it). We used the S101 to write the discussion points for the show, and you may even notive them as we show off the device on camera.

Day 6 (Thursday)

After a normal day at work, I had to get down to editing the bitcast so it is ready for broadcast. This of course had to be done on my XPS laptop, as the screen and processing power on the S101 are not quite enough for the heavy duty task of editing. This unfortunately means that I spent the whole evening on my XPS, even using the internet and MSN, etc. It seems that although the S101 is a good piece of kit, I could not resist the use of my standard machine, and therefore I failed the challenge. Oh well, 5 days is good enough. Isn’t it?

Conclusion

The Eee PC S101 was a pleasure to use when on the train (before the challenge started), or in a confined area. Giving enough power for tasks such as web browsing, IMing, word processing, and the like. But, and it never was going to, it does not have the power for tasks such as image editing and video processing, and this is where the XPS system really drew me back.

I would definitely recommend a netbook, not necessarily the S101, to anyone who travles by public transport a lot, or for long periods of time. The ability to work on the move without needing a dedicated table or worrying about charging is a definite plus, and stress relief. I would not recommend it for those of you who like to be able to do powerful tasks on a mobile machine.