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MetroPCS and T-Mobile: Oh My, What an Ugly Baby – Please say it aint so…..

Ken — Fri, 11 May 2012 16:08:26 +0000

Consolidation among the smaller U.S. wireless carriers might be inevitable, as larger telecoms look to bolster their spectrum amid insatiable demand for wireless data services, but some mergers just don’t make sense. And according to a number of analysts, a merger of Metro PCS and Deutsche Telekom subsidiary T-Mobile is one of them.

While the rumored marriage of the two carriers would certainly result in a larger subscriber base, a more robust infrastructure, and a nice combined swath of spectrum, there are other considerations that make the combination a bit dubious. And though chatter about a potential deal may have cheered some investors, it’s turning the stomachs of others.

To wit, Bernstein Research’s Craig Moffett’s take on a T-Mobile/Metro PCS merger, which begins with an exclamation that pretty much says it all:

“Oh my, what an ugly baby.”

Moffet’s opinion is that combing two wireless weaklings just leaves you with a bigger weakling, particularly if they rely on different network technologies, as T-Mobile and Metro PC do. T-Mobile’s network is GSM. MetroPCS’s is CDMA. In other words, a combination of the two is not a solution to either company’s problems, at least until they meet on LTE.

“Both [companies] are spectrum constrained — this wouldn’t change that — and they rely on fundamentally different technology platforms, making a combination a logistical nightmare,” Moffet says. “It will be years before either is sufficiently transitioned to LTE to make a combination truly sensible. To be sure, there would potentially be some overlapping retail stores in MetroPCS market, there would naturally be some selling, general and administrative expenses savings, and there are perhaps some savings in LTE network deployment in MetroPCS markets. But none of these benefits would provide truly compelling justification.”

And that really does seem to be the case. Though, to be fair, the combination would give T-Mobile more customers, which it could really use, after having lost more than a half-million contract customers in the first quarter.

Still, it’s far from an ideal tie-up. Said R.W. Baird’s William Power, in a note that echoes Moffet’s: “A T-Mobile/PCS merger smells like a mess to us, and seems to speak to the challenges facing the industry, exacerbated by the government rejection of the T/T-Mobile deal, which might have created spectrum opportunities for the other operators.”

Everyone Is Scared of Amazon – And They Should Be

Ken — Sun, 06 May 2012 04:17:34 +0000

There was a time when some of the biggest electronics retailers in the world had issues with Amazon. They realized that the online retail giant was able to beat them on price, and with more and more people coming to its site, it had the ability to take them down.

The past is littered with companies that tried to go up against Amazon, including Circuit City, CompUSA, and others. Best Buy is now having some trouble competing against online giants like Amazon, and by the look of things, eventually, only mega retailers like Walmart, as well as small boutiques, might survive the online onslaught.

But over the last couple of years, something rather interesting has happened with the way companies view Amazon. As the retail firm has entered other markets, including Web solutions, e-readers, and tablets, it has caused many other firms to take notice. And in the process, the scare factor surrounding Amazon has grown with the online company.

Nowhere is that more evident than in Target’s recently announced decision to stop selling the Kindle in its stores. Barnes & Noble had been selling the Kindle line for two years when the decision was made, and by all accounts, sales were strong. It’s an odd move, for sure. But it also underscores the unique position Amazon finds itself in.

The sheer number of companies that are scared by what Amazon might do next might be shocking, but the size of those firms might be even more surprising.

Consider Google. The search giant is running the most popular mobile operating system in the world, its Android Market is performing exceedingly well, and, oh yeah, its online business is growing. Surely it wouldn’t be scared of Amazon, right?

Think again.

“Amazon has some serious leverage in the Android ecosystem”

Google has been trying for years to crack the e-commerce code, and so far, it has failed as Amazon’s business continues to grow. And with the Kindle Fire quickly establishing itself as the most sought-after non-iPad tablet on the market, Amazon now has some leverage in the Android ecosystem.

Even more concerning for Google is the fact that the Amazon Appstore continues to grow and attract developers. Unlike Apple, which controls all application revenue in iOS, Google has left its marketplace vulnerable. And Amazon has taken advantage.

But perhaps the fear companies have for Amazon goes beyond its prowess in certain markets. Unlike Apple, Google, and Microsoft, which seem to often find their way to regulatory scrutiny, Amazon flies largely under the radar. The retail giant is made to look like a consumer’s hero in the e-book antitrust lawsuit brought against Apple and e-book publishers, and for the most part, consumers trust the company.

Amazon has found its way into the rarified position of being seemingly well-liked by government regulators and consumers, alike. And for competitors or would-be competitors, that’s a dangerous combination.

Google FTC fine over Safari breach could be $10 million+

Ken — Sun, 06 May 2012 04:12:52 +0000

After the Federal Trade Commission (FTC) concluded that Google violated Internet privacy standards in the way that it interacted with Apple’s Safari Web browser, the question is now how much the search giant will have to pay in fines. Based on the huge number of individual instances of privacy violations, Google could technically be forced to fork over millions and millions of dollars.

Google is reportedly negotiating with the FTC to determine what would be an equitable fine. According to the agency, Google implanted cookies on user PCs that were able to bypass the built-in protections that Safari has. That is a blatant violation of the FTC, which can technically levy a fine of $16,000 per day per violation. And since, well, there are quite a few people who use Google, that can easily add up.

It isn’t exactly a nice trend for Google. The company recently came under fire for its Street View car, which collected WiFi data from users as it roamed the streets. That caused the search giant to be subject to a fine from another federal agency, the Federal Communications Commission (FCC). But that was a slap on the wrist by comparison – Google only had to pay $25,000.

How to Make Facebook Infinitely Better with One Browser Extension

Ken — Tue, 13 Mar 2012 15:14:58 +0000

With each update, Facebook has gotten incrementally more cluttered, perplexing, and ornery—and I'm not even talking about all your annoying acquaintances flooding it with inane status updates. Yet, at the same time, it's become a tool few of us can live without. If Facebook has you on your last nerve, here's how to fix some of its biggest annoyances in a matter of minutes—and with only one new addition to your browser.

We've talked about Social Fixer before, back when it was called Better Facebook—heck, it was even our readers' favorite Facebook customizer. If you've ever installed it though, you probably got overwhelmed pretty quickly, and dropped it for something else (or just continued to deal with Facebook's ever-inflating annoyances). After sifting through all of its options though, we discovered it's actually very simple for Social Fixer to make Facebook a ton better, without turning it into a more confusing beast. Whether you want to make the font more readable, get rid of that pesky ticker, see who's unfriended you, and much more, here's how to make Facebook infinitely better with just one browser extension..

Step One: Install Social Fixer

To get started, head over to Social Fixer's homepage and install it for your browser. It's available for Firefox, Chrome, Safari, Opera, or as a Greasemonkey userscript. Once it's installed, open up Facebook, and you should notice a few different things right off the bat.

Social Fixer looks pretty cluttered at first glance, adding tabs to your news feed, extra columns to the side of the page, and more. These features can be pretty cool, but it's a lot to deal with at first, and a lot of these features aren't things you need, so to start out, we're going to disable everything and start with a clean slate. Then we'll walk through fixing Facebook's biggest annoyances, enabling one feature at a time as we need it. I do recommend browsing these extra features later on, but for now, we're going to keep it simple.

If you're greeted with the setup wizard after installing the extension, choose the Minimalist Installation. If you don't see the setup wizard (I personally could never get it to display), click on the new Wrench icon in Facebook's blue bar, go to Social Fixer Options, and start unchecking boxes. It's better to start off with a clean slate than with the default options, so I recommend unchecking everything and saving before continuing.

Step Two: Comb Through Social Fixer's Options

Now that you've got a minimal installation of Social Fixer, it's time to fix some of those Facebook annoyances you've come to know and hate. Again, I recommend looking through all of the options Social Fixer has to offer at some point, but to kickstart your efforts, here's a rundown of our favorite tweaks that improve Facebook's interface and functionality. We'll go through the settings in order of the tab they appear under in Social Fixer's options, so just navigate through using the tabs on the left hand side to follow along.

The Popular Tab

Disable Lightbox: This disable's Facebook's new photo viewer that overlays itself over the page you were viewing. We actually think this is a pretty great feature, but if you'd rather have the old school image viewer that displayed each image on a new page, you can check this option to get it back.

Change Font Size: Facebook made its font size smaller awhile back, and if it's still barely readable to you, this option can help. You can change the font size of posts and comments separately, to help distinguish between them. Facebook's default font size for each is 11. Note also that you can increase the readability of any page by using your browser's zoom feature (Ctrl+Plus Sign and Ctrl+Minus Sign), though this gives you a bit more control.

Force the News Feed to switch to "Recent Stories First": By default, Facebook only shows you the top stories rather than every post made by your friends. If you prefer seeing all your friends' posts, this option will make your News Feed default to Recent instead of Top Stories.

Hide the Ticker: If that new ticker annoys the crap out of you, you can turn it off with this option. You can technically hide it already with Facebook, but that will still leave the bar at the top of the page. This will remove that entire section of your home page altogether and just make it a bit cleaner.

The Layout Tab

Auto-Expand Left Panel Sections: This will automatically show the sub-sections of your Messages, Events, Photos, Apps, and more. I highly recommend auto-expanding the Messages section to avoid the whole second inbox problem—that way, no messages will ever go unnoticed.

Friend Tracker: This adds a handy little box in the right hand sidebar that lets you know who has unfriended you on Facebook. It won't show you who's unfriended you in the past, only who's unfriended you since you installed Social Fixer, but still—it's pretty handy to have there just in case.

The Posts Tab

Fix the Missing Cursor Problem and Fix the Line Wrap Problem: These are just a few tiny bugs in Facebook's interface when you make posts. If you've noticed them before, check these boxes, otherwise there's no harm in leaving them blank.

Disable Facebook's Auto-Loading of Posts: As you scroll down, Facebook automatically loads more posts for you. Some find this useful, others find it annoying. I have no problem with clicking "Show Posts" to see more, so I've checked this box to avoid unnecessary page loading.

When Clicking a Link in an Application Post, Open in a New Browser Tab/Window: Does exactly what it sounds like. This makes sure links don't lead you away from Facebook; instead, they open up in a new tab or window, whatever you have your browser set to do.

Auto-Expand "See More" Links in Posts: When people write particularly long posts, Facebook will condense it to the first few lines of text and add a "See More" box so you can expand it. It also does this with long strings of comments. This option automatically expands long posts, which I like since it doesn't make my News Feed that much longer. You can click the auto-expand collapsed comment threads on posts by pages above, but I don't recommend this, since it'll make your News Feed very, very long.

The Display Tab

There isn't a ton here that I like to tweak, though it's worth looking through. If you have a problem with that "Please update your email address" box, you can hide it with an option here, as well as avoid that somewhat annoying popup box that shows up when you hover over a person's username.

The Timeline Tab

If you can't stand Facebook's new Timeline interface, this tab provides a few options that clean it up. We've talked about this once before, so I won't go into too much detail here, but the options do exactly what they sound like they do. They wont' get rid of timeline altogether, and it won't change how other people see your profile, but it'll at least give the timeline a nicer, one-column view for you when you view it from your Social Fixer-enabled browser.

The Hidden Items Tab

From the main Facebook interface, you can hide certain sections by clicking the "x" that appears in the upper right hand corner of the box. There doesn't seem to be a lot of sections that allow for this anymore, but you can hide Facebook's ads, which is nice if you aren't using an ad blocker already. This section of Social Fixer's options will show you which sections you've hidden, and let you un-hide them.

The Chat Tab

Whether you use Facebook Chat religiously or sparingly, this section is a good one to visit. You can:

Turn off the chat bar: This gets rid of that unsightly chat bar that shows up when the page is maximized, and brings back the chat popup at the bottom of the window.

Show all online friends in chat list: If you want to see all of your online friends, and not just the one Facebook has deemed chat-worthy, check this box.

Group friends by status: This puts available people together at the top of the list, and idle people together at the bottom, just to keep it all better organized.

Use compact chat list: This is nice if you're showing all your online friends and don't want the chat box to get unweildy.

Hide the chat dock entirely: This won't log you out of chat, but it's great if you use Facebook chat in an external IM program and don't want the chat dock cluttering up your Facebook.

The Theme Tab

This seems to be deprecated, as it doesn't load for me—but that's okay, because this tab was essentially for turning Facebook into MySpace with themes.

The Filtering Tab

This is where things get really interesting. One of Facebook's biggest annoyances isn't, sadly, Facebook itself—it's all the annoying things people say. Even your closest friends occasionally stand on a soapbox that can get on your nerves. Whether your friends are too annoyingly political, overly emo, or just a little too in love with their cats, Social Fixer's filters can help you filter those posts out. Of course you could always hide those people from your news feed (or unfriend them, if you're really fed up), but sometimes you still want to hear from your friends—you just don't want to hear them rant about [insert political figure here] again.

To create a new filter, go through the 5 columns and choose the filter's characteristics. Let's start with a very simple example. I'm pretty nervous about hearing Mass Effect 3 spoilers, since I play video games pretty slowly, so I want to hide any posts containing the words "Mass Effect" or "Mass Effect 3"—no matter who they're from or what type of post they are. All you'd need to do to create this filter is head to the "Other" column, add the words "Mass Effect" (without quotes) to the text box, and then check "Hide" under the Action column. This will automatically hide any post in which someone mentions Mass Effect. For extra security, you can use regular expressions to search for multiple strings of text—for example, adding /Mass Effect|ME3/ to that box will hide posts containing either "Mass Effect" or "ME3". If you don't know regular expressions, though, you can always just create multiple filters instead. When you're done, click the "Add New Filter at the Top" buttton above the filter columns to add the filter.

Now let's try something a bit more complicated. Say you have one or two friends who get a little too political on Facebook from time to time, and like to rant about presidental candidate Abe Froman. You don't want to block all posts about Abe Froman, just ones from your uber conservative/liberal/whatever friends that like to rag on him. Select those friends from the "Author" column, using the Ctrl key to select multiple people. Leave the Type field blank to include all post types in the filter, then add "Abe Froman" (without quotes) to the Other column (alternatively, use /Abe Froman|Froman/ to include posts which mention just his last name), and check the Hide box under Action. Then, click the Add New Filter button again to finalize everything.

You can do a lot more with filters, like hide specific post types, posts from applications, or apply advanced CSS to highlight certain posts, but we won't go too deeply into that here. Check out Social Fixer's Filter Documentation for more on how to use the Filter feature. And be sure to check the regular Facebook interface before you run to Social Fixer—it can already do a lot to hide specific post types and applications all on its own. Just click the arrow that shows up when you hover over a post in the news feed.

The Advanced Tab

This section mostly provides preferences for Social Fixer itself. From here, you can turn off many of Social Fixer's popups, warnings, and help messages, plus change how often it checks for updates, and more. There isn't anything here that I'd recommend turning off immediately, but if you find that Social Fixer is affecting your page in a negative way, this is the first place I'd head to troubleshoot it.

Step Three: Enjoy Facebook

That's actually all it takes. A few checkboxes here, a few there, and you've got yourself a much better Facebook. If you use Social Fixer on multiple computers, you can head to the User Prefereces section of its options and export your options for importing on another machine, which is nice. Other than that, just keep Social Fixer installed and keep on using Facebook. The developer is pretty good about updating it when Facebook's layout changes, so you shouldn't have too many compatibility issues down the road—and he's sure to fix any new annoyances that are introduced.

If you've been a longtime user of Social Fixer and you have a favorite preference we didn't mention, share it with us in the comments.

New privacy policy standards agreed to by world’s major app store owners

Ken — Wed, 22 Feb 2012 23:33:12 +0000

The California Attorney General has struck a deal with the world’s major app store opperators that will see new privacy policystandards put in place. Apple, Google, Microsoft, HP, RIM and Amazon have all agreed to require any software that uses personal information to provide a privacy policy that can be viewed in the store before an app is downloaded. The agreement will bring the various markets in line with the California Online Privacy Protection Act, which requires developers provide such a policy. In addition to providing links links to the relevant documents in an obvious and consistent location, the companies will have to offer a simple way for users to report devs that violate the rules. For more details about the deal check out the PR after the break.

Show full PR text

Attorney General Kamala D. Harris Secures Global Agreement to Strengthen Privacy Protections for Users of Mobile Applications

SAN FRANCISCO – Attorney General Kamala D. Harris today announced an agreement committing the leading operators of mobile application platforms to improve privacy protections for millions of consumers around the globe who access the Internet through applications (“apps”) on their smartphones, tablets and other mobile devices.

Attorney General Harris forged the agreement with six companies whose platforms comprise the majority of the mobile apps market: Amazon, Apple, Google, Hewlett-Packard, Microsoft and Research In Motion. These platforms have agreed to privacy principles designed to bring the industry in line with a California law requiring mobile apps that collect personal information to have a privacy policy. The majority of mobile apps sold today do not contain a privacy policy.

“Your personal privacy should not be the cost of using mobile apps, but all too often it is,” said Attorney General Harris.

“This agreement strengthens the privacy protections of California consumers and of millions of people around the globe who use mobile apps,” Attorney General Harris continued. “By ensuring that mobile apps have privacy policies, we create more transparency and give mobile users more informed control over who accesses their personal information and how it is used.”

Privacy policies are an important safeguard for consumers. Privacy policies promote transparency in how companies collect, use and share personal information. The agreement with the platforms is designed to ensure that mobile apps comply with the California Online Privacy Protection Act. The Act requires operators of commercial web sites and online services, including mobile apps, who collect personally identifiable information about Californians to conspicuously post a privacy policy.

This agreement will allow consumers the opportunity to review an app’s privacy policy before they download the app rather than after, and will offer consumers a consistent location for an app’s privacy policy on the application-download screen. If developers do not comply with their stated privacy policies, they can be prosecuted under California’s Unfair Competition Law and/or False Advertising Law.

The agreement further commits the platforms to educate developers about their obligations to respect consumer privacy and to disclose to consumers what private information they collect, how they use the information, and with whom they share it. The platforms will also work to improve compliance with privacy laws by giving users tools to report non-compliant apps and committing companies to implement processes to respond to these reports.

In six months, Attorney General Harris will convene the mobile application platforms to assess privacy in the mobile space.

There are more than 50,000 individual developers who have created the mobile apps currently available for download on the leading platforms. There are nearly 600,000 applications for sale in the Apple App Store alone, and another 400,000 for sale in Google’s Android Market. These apps have been downloaded more than 35 billion times.

These figures are expected to grow. An estimated 98 billion mobile applications will be downloaded by 2015, and the $6.8 billion market for mobile applications is expected to grow to $25 billion within four years.

The rapid growth and expansion in the mobile market exposes consumers to a wide variety of privacy invasions. Smartphones are often on and tethered to their user, transmitting rich data to the app developers. Users of mobile devices are vulnerable to privacy intrusion and abuse by numerous entities, app developers, analytic services and advertising networks. These entities could have access to sensitive information, including a user’s location, contacts, identity, messages and photos. Without a privacy policy, what companies do with the personal data they collect is largely invisible to consumers.

It is estimated that a majority of the mobile apps currently available for download through the platforms do not include even the most basic privacy protection: a privacy policy setting forth how personal data is collected, used and shared. One recent study found that only 5 percent of all mobile apps have a privacy policy.

A recent report by the Federal Trade Commission (FTC), Mobile Apps are Disappointing, evaluated the lack of privacy information available to parents before downloading mobile apps for their children. The FTC report recommended that mobile apps platforms do more to help parents and kids by providing a consistent means for app developers to display information about their privacy practices. The FTC specifically recommended that the platforms provide a designated space for developers to disclose their information in the app stores and markets and that the platforms improve enforcement of requirements for app developers to disclose the private data they collect.

Attorney General Harris, in August, 2011, convened Amazon, Apple, Google, Hewlett-Packard, Microsoft and Research In Motion as the most direct way to improve compliance with California law requiring that mobile apps have privacy policies. The platforms have committed to these principles today and are now working to implement them.

“California has a unique commitment to protecting the privacy of our residents. Our constitution directly guarantees a right to privacy, and we will defend it,” added Attorney General Harris. “Forging this common statement of mobile privacy principles shows the power of collaboration — among government, industry and consumers — to create solutions to problems no one group can tackle alone.”

Last year, Attorney General Harris also established an eCrime Unit to prosecute identity theft, data intrusions, and crimes involving the use of technology.

Google setting up high-speed fiber TV and web service

Ken — Wed, 22 Feb 2012 23:29:15 +0000

Here in the United States its becoming more and more evident that Google is preparing for a big product, one that not only brings hard-wired internet to your home, but brings you the streaming web you’ve grown accustomed to as well via Fiber. Google has been busy with the FCC lately, most recently (this week) seeking approval from the group to launch a video service over the fiber network it’s already begun building in Kansas City. This service (perhaps only in a limited form) could very well be launching inside the next two months.

According to the Wall Street Journal who uncovered the FCC filing and spoke with an unnamed media executive involved in licensing talks with Google, the service is getting close to launch already. This is almost certainly tied to the Kansas site Google has in motion already with web speeds so fast your eyeballs will blow out of your head. Check out the video launched last year when Kansas first got the Fiber deal with Google at the end of March, 2011:

Should Google take this service and add television to the mix, there’s something that’s brewing hot. Google has also been tipped to be working on next generation personal communication devices as well as a Google Home Entertainment System which is quite likely the same thing we heard of back at Google I/O 2011 by the name of Android@Home. Combine this with what was revealed earlier this week in Google seeking permission to build a 4.5-meter satellite dish array and you’ve got a monster on your hands.

Google, we’ve got a feeling you’re about to bring the fire! The fire to our homes, that is, in the form of free cloud-stored media and content stores all working over a network of fiber that you control. Google, you’re on to something hot.

What Is Windows Phone 7 Diagnosis Menu & How To Tweak Your Phone With It?

Ken — Tue, 24 Jan 2012 19:45:35 +0000

Windows Phone 7 comes under heavy fire from its opponents for a variety of reasons. First there was the “copy/ paste” saga, then issues like MMS errors and Bluetooth file transfer plagued its progress. But to be fair, underneath all that, lies an operating system that is pretty neat and user friendly. If you use WP7 with an open mind, you might just fall in love with it. However, WP7 sure is a newer OS and thus, majority of users don’t know about many of the hidden features/functions present in there. For example it took me weeks to find out that you can select individual alphabets while typing by simply pressing and holding the empty text area. One such ignored feature is the Diagnosis menu in Windows Phone 7 devices. This is a hidden menu which can be accessed using a code (manufacturer dependent), providing you with a ton of options to tweak low-level settings and let you interact with the phone’s hardware directly. The Diagnosis menu is built into devices for the use of manufacturers during device testing. Also, when you send your device back for repairing, Diagnosis menu plays a major role in tracking down the problem.

Diagnostics of your WP7 let you change and configure settings without having a developer unlocked device, and that’s the biggest advantage. Let us discuss Diagnosis menu one by one related to different manufacturers. It should be noted though that most of these codes will work for any manufacturer, simply give it a try.

Samsung Devices

When discussing Windows Phone 7, the term Diagnosis menu strictly refers to Samsung devices. There are similar variations of this hidden menu in devices made by other manufacturers, but usually they are not called Diagnosis menu.

Accessing it is simple enough. Just remember the magic code, ##634#. Put this code in your phone’s dialer and congratulations! You have now entered the Diagnosis mode. In addition to that, an app named Diagnosis will start showing up in your app list. This is merely a shortcut to the menu, and if you want, you can even delete it, it won’t have any impact on the menu’s working.

Looking at your screen after entering the code, don’t worry that you have failed somehow. The new dialer screen you see is the coveted menu. To run diagnostics on your phone, you need to know the codes specified for each task. The list of these codes is not given anywhere in the menu, but that’s what we are here for.

Useful Tasks That Can Be Performed In The Diagnosis Menu

Checking the remaining battery percentage of your phone: This might sound like an unimportant utility, but trust me, this does come in handy when you are in a pinch and battery life becomes important.
Increasing the speaker volume of your device
Increasing the headphone volume of your phone

And of course, you can enable USB tethering on your Samsung (or even some other) WP7 phone. This functionality has long been clamored for by WP7 users, and Diagnosis menu endows your phone with it, finally!
Find out the MAC address of your device and its Bluetooth

The list doesn’t end here by any means. There are so many codes that we don’t think any user knows the complete list. However, here are some of the codes that regular users might find useful. Some of these codes (especially the testing ones) might prove to be useful if you are buying a used WP7. The testing codes can ensure if the device’s components are all in working order or not. But first make sure that you enter Diagnosis before you start inputting these codes.

General Hardware Test: Enter *#0*#
This will open up a new screen in which you can test each of the three base colors individually. The options to check all sensors (accelerometer, proximity, vibration, touch, etc.) are also present in this menu.
Automatic Hardware Test: Enter *#05#
This covers pretty much all the functionality of the previous code, but this time, everything is automated. The diagnosis menu guides you through each step of testing.
Bluetooth Test: Enter *#232333#
But first make sure there is an active Bluetooth device in the vicinity.
See the EXE files on your device: *#914789#
Gives you a detailed, registry-level list of all the files present in your app launcher.
Check the lock status of your phone: *#7465625#
Gives you network lock status, subset lock, SP lock and CP lock.
Call timing log of your phone: *#22558463#
Perform Factory Reset: *2767*3855#
Please note that this code will erase everything from your phone, including SMS, contacts, account, apps, media. Only apply this in extreme conditions.
Check brightness controls: *#3*#
This can be used to check the maximum and minimum brightness levels. And also to test if the auto bright feature is working properly or not.
Clock Settings: *#0782#
Tune Sound: *#0002*28346#
Location settings: *#1472365#
Helps in monitoring how the GPS and other related stuff are working.

This list is not even close to complete. There are a lot more codes out there, we just chose the most productive ones for normal, every day users.

LG Devices

LG Quantum and LG Optimus 7 are the major Windows Phone devices from LG, with a few more expected to be released soon for Mango. In LG devices, the Diagnosis menu serves pretty much the same functionality as its Samsung counterpart, but under a different name. On LG phones this useful, hidden menu assumes the name of MFG (acronym for Manufacturing) menu.

How To Access The MFG Menu?

The code to open up MFG menu is the same as Samsung and Dell. Simply go to your LG phone’s dialer and enter ##634#. But here comes the big difference. For LG, you need to input a token password (which is not really a secret pass) before you can access the MFG app. When asked for the password, enter 277634#*#

This, by the way, stands for APPMFG (just to help you memorize it). Once you have done that, you will get the diagnostic menu screen which lists all the options available to you without having to enter or memorize any codes, unlike Samsung Diagnosis. The most relevant and useful settings are present in the Engineering menu, which can be accessed by tapping 7 from the MFG main screen.

So What Can You Accomplish With MFG Menu?

LG’s hidden menu can be used to configure a lot of settings according to the need of users. For starters, you can de-brand your LG phone using MFG. This means you will be freed of all the restrictions put on you by your service provider (carrier) and your phone will receive OS updates as soon as Windows officially releases them (no wait for carrier release).
As MFG is a diagnosis menu, it can help you diagnose most problems with your device hardware. But that’s not all, you can resolve WP7’s long-standing MMS issue with MFG too. The method described in our guide simply tells you how to turn on MMS by editing the hardware’s settings according to your carrier settings.

Apart from these two tasks, you can perform all Samsung tasks with MFG too, and it’s even simpler. Just browse through the menu’s options until you find what you’re looking for. It’s all listed there, without the need to remember any secret code.

HTC Devices

HTC phones running Windows Phone 7 present a unique case with regard to the diagnosis menu. Officially there is no Diagnostics tool available in HTC phones for WP7. However, there is a similar app (menu) which should do the trick for you. It’s named Field Test, and is once again, a hidden menu in WP7 devices manufactured by HTC.

Accessing The Field Test Menu

Go to your phone’s dialer and input ##3282#. An LG MFG-like menu will appear on your screen. Through this menu you can perform a variety of tasks including the following.

Testing GSM settings
Checking out GPRS and AMR configuration
WCDMA
Test options related to 3G

While these settings are already clearly visible in Field Test, there is one other very special setting which isn’t as easy to find. Here it is.

Limit SMS Storage On Your Phone

You might have noticed that WP7 puts no limit on SMS storage memory. This is a good feature, but there are scenarios when this can become an unnecessary burden. With the upcoming Mango update having picture and video integration with the stock messaging app, limiting your SMS memory storage might be a good idea. This can be done by accessing the Field Test menu as described above and then instead of selecting any of the listed options, navigating to the settings screen by tapping the three dots present at the bottom of the screen. A “Limit SMS Memory” option will be there. Simply toggle it on and you are done.

Dell Venue Pro

Almost all WP7 phones have some sort of hidden menu that can be accessed and then used for diagnostic purposes. The name might vary from one manufacturer to another, but the basics and functionality remain unchanged. One example of this is the Dell Venue Pro. It is Dell’s first (and for now, only) Windows Phone 7 device. The diagnosis menu is called EM in Venue Pro. The access code remains the same as that of LG and Samsung, that is ##634#. No password is needed (unlike LG) and you can perform tasks like gaining USB tethering on your Dell Venue Pro. Besides that, EM performs all other diagnosis tasks using an interface similar to LG’s MFG.

Diagnosis menu can prove to be your ultimate friend when it comes to checking if your device is in full working order or not. And that’s not all, it comes with some pretty handy extra features that can help you get the most out of your phone.

That is it for now. We hope to make this a dynamic post and will keep updating it with the release of newer WP7 devices. Stay tuned!

What an awesome TV Commercial

Ken — Wed, 18 Jan 2012 04:53:20 +0000

The AT&T/T-Mobile Merger Is Dead…..

Ken — Mon, 19 Dec 2011 22:30:32 +0000

As we heard earlier today that AT&T and T-Mobile couldn’t find buyers for assets that could help make their merger a reality, but now there’s no need to worry about it: AT&T has just announced that the deal is officially dead.

In a recent release (reproduced in full below), AT&T points at the FCC and the U.S. Department of Justice, and states that the actions of the two parties “do not change the realities of the U.S. wireles industry.”

They go on to say the the merger would have been an interim solution to the spectrum allocation issue that plagues the industry, and that without the merger, “customers will be harmed and needed investment will be stifled.” Harsh words from AT&T, and ones that may not be true if the contents of an FCC staff report are to be believed.

Released shortly after AT&T and T-Mobile withdrew their merger application, the staff report called into question the claims that the merger “would serve the public interest, convenience, and necessity.” In their investigation, the FCC determined among other things that approving the merger would drastically reduce competition and investment in the wireless space, contrary to AT&T’s claims of jobs and mobile broadband for all.

As far as the FCC is concerned, today’s is a big win for consumers a big blow to AT&T. And I mean a big blow —with the merger in ruins, AT&T must shell out $4 billion to T-Mobile USA parent company Deutsche Telekom in the form of money and spectrum access. What’s more, the death of the merger will also see AT&T and T-Mobile entering into a roaming agreement, the fruits of which we may have already started to see.

AT&T Ends Bid To Add Network Capacity Through T-Mobile USA Purchase Company Reaffirms Its Commitment to Mobile Broadband Leadership Dallas, Texas, December 19, 2011

ShareThis AT&T Inc. (NYSE: T) said today that after a thorough review of options it has agreed with Deutsche Telekom AG to end its bid to acquire T-Mobile USA, which began in March of this year.

The actions by the Federal Communications Commission and the Department of Justice to block this transaction do not change the realities of the U.S. wireless industry. It is one of the most fiercely competitive industries in the world, with a mounting need for more spectrum that has not diminished and must be addressed immediately. The AT&T and T-Mobile USA combination would have offered an interim solution to this spectrum shortage. In the absence of such steps, customers will be harmed and needed investment will be stifled.

“AT&T will continue to be aggressive in leading the mobile Internet revolution,” said Randall Stephenson, AT&T chairman and CEO. “Over the past four years we have invested more in our networks than any other U.S. company. As a result, today we deliver best-in-class mobile broadband speeds –connecting smartphones, tablets and emerging devices at a record pace –and we are well under way with our nationwide 4G LTE deployment.

“To meet the needs of our customers, we will continue to invest,” Stephenson said. “However, adding capacity to meet these needs will require policymakers to do two things. First, in the near term, they should allow the free markets to work so that additional spectrum is available to meet the immediate needs of the U.S. wireless industry, including expeditiously approving our acquisition of unused Qualcomm spectrum currently pending before the FCC. Second, policymakers should enact legislation to meet our nation’s longer-term spectrum needs.

“The mobile Internet is a dynamic industry that can be a critical driver in restoring American economic growth and job creation, but only if companies are allowed to react quickly to customer needs and market forces,” Stephenson said.

To reflect the break-up considerations due Deutsche Telekom, AT&T will recognize a pretax accounting charge of $4 billion in the 4th quarter of 2011. Additionally, AT&T will enter a mutually beneficial roaming agreement with Deutsche Telekom

HTC Sensation XE with Beats Audio review

Ken — Mon, 19 Dec 2011 21:18:23 +0000

We had some hands-on timewith HTC’s new European Android flagship a short while back, but it wasn’t nearly enough to answer all our questions about how the 4.3-inch, 1.5GHz dual-core XE compares to the original 1.2GHz Sensation, or whether the implementation of Beats Audio was anything more than a cunning scheme cooked up between the manufacturer’s marketeers and Dr. Dre’s agent. Now, though, this phone has been our closest companion for long enough to reveal its true colors. They’re red, primarily, but there’s a whole rainbow of detail right after the break.

HTC Sensation XE

Hardware

In many respects this is not a complete review, because we’ve avoided covering the same ground we already trod extensively in our review of the Sensation. Instead, we’ve focused only on those areas where there have been significant changes, or where the passage of time has altered a particular spec’s standing with respect to the ever-eager competition.

In particular, we spent a great deal of time looking into Beats Audio — far too much time, perhaps, if you’ve already convinced yourself that this Dre hookup is nothing but a gimmick. But we felt that since HTC has invested untold dollars in Beats in order to differentiate itself from the competition, and since it plans to bring the this technology to many more devices in the US and around the world, then we ought to try to come up with something definitive and — if at all possible — scientific. By all means, if you’re just curious about this phone’s musical prowess then skip down to the Software section, but for now we’ll start off with the key hardware features.
Just like the original Sensation, the XE is well-built and beautiful to behold. Its tapered edges and smooth wraparound aluminum case conspire to make it feel thinner than the 11.4mm statistic might suggest. Of course, the XE differs in its coloring and when we first heard about the red accents we were worried they might look cheesy, like a Qosimo gaming laptopor something, but our fears were misplaced. The coloring of the navigation button back-lights, the speaker grill and the ring around the camera lens all helped to lift this phone above the plain black and silver hordes. The speaker grill and front-facing camera both have glinting chrome borders which make them look extra special. Add in the bold red headphones with the Beats logo on the back of each bud and it’s an all-round good look — unless you prefer your gadgets to be more discreet.

If you grip the phone hard you’ll feel and hear slight creaks from the plastic-aluminum hybrid construction, but it’s far less than what you get on purely plastic phones. We should also mention that no matter how we held the device, we failed to encounter any of the so-called “death grip” issues that people complained about with the first Sensation.

Perhaps the only nits we’d pick — and they’re much smaller than your average nits — are the tendency of the border between glass and aluminum around the panel to collect dirt which cannot easily be cleaned, plus the strange slant of the power button. We should probably disregard this latter flaw, since the device in our hands-on didn’t have it and it could simply be a factory error or a result of transit damage. Nevertheless, if wonky power buttons turn out to be an issue with this phone, then remember: you heard it here first.

Processor

We didn’t have an original Sensation to compare against the XE side by side, but we did have an EVO 3D to throw into the mix, which has a 1.2GHz dual-core Qualcomm MSM8660 processor that’s very similar to the Sensation’s MSM8260. The comparison isn’t perfect, because the EVO 3D has 1GB of RAM instead of 768MB, but it’s nevertheless sufficient for an indication of what 1.5GHz delivers in terms of real-world advantage — which turns out to be not a great deal. The EVO 3D actually booted much quicker than the XE, taking just eight seconds from ‘Off’ to snapping a picture on the camera. Meanwhile the XE took 11 seconds to do the same thing — possibly because the extra Beats Audio logo animation takes a few extra seconds at boot up.

Our Quadrant Standard benchmark scores clustered around 2080, which was significantly more than the EVO 3D (1800) but only slightly more than the original Sensation (2000). Linpack gave us 43MFLOPS for the XE, versus 41 for the EVO 3D and 46 for the Sensation — so nothing worth shouting about there either. Meanwhile, the Sun Spider javascript benchmark for browser speed timed the XE at approximately 3,300ms, which was much healthier than the strangely slow 6320ms time from the EVO 3D, but not a great deal quicker than what you’d get from the single-core iPhone 4. Forgetting benchmarks for a minute, the fact remains that webpage rendering on the XE was impeccable.

Our impression was that anything the XE could do, the EVO 3D could just about as well, so the extra 300MHz doesn’t count for much at all in practice. We can’t help but notice that the chip in the XE is identical to that in the original Sensation and has merely been overclocked — something savvy Sensation owners are perfectly capable of doing themselves.

Battery Life

HTC bumped the battery up to 1750mAh in the XE instead of the original 1520mAh, ostensibly to let you listen to more tunes but also perhaps also to compensate for the 300MHz bump to the original Sensation’s clock speed. The lower part of the case heats up whenever you put the processor under any serious load and you can just imagine how those two cores must be gulping down energy. After a 14-hour day of heavy use, including tonn of music, a few photos and a bit of video, the battery fell to eight percent by the time we got on a train home. It subsequently fell to three percent after listening to about 30 minutes of music and then finally died after taking four final night-time photographs. In other words, there’s no forgiving fuel tank here; when the battery says it’s nearly dead, it really is. However, just like with the original Sensation, the phone is frugal with power while it’s idle and on a less busy, more normal day we’d still find around 30-40 percent of the battery remaining when plugged the phone in to charge.

In our regular battery test, looping a standard def video with low-to-mid connectivity and push settings, the phone died somewhere between five and six hours, which is slightly below average for a large screen device. For the sake of reference, the 3.7-inch single-core BlackBerry Torch 9850 lasted 20 percent longer in this test — which merely shows that the Sensation XE pays for its specs in battery life.

Camera

The camera hardware in the XE is identical to that in the original Sensation, so check out that review for a full appraisal. All we really have to add is that the slight increase in clockspeed with the XE might translate into a minor improvement in the time it takes to load up the camera app and start capturing video or stills, but it’s nothing particularly noticeable — after all, the original Sensation was no slouch in this regard to begin with.

On the other hand, one thing has changed significantly since the XE’s predecessor, and that’s time. As the months have progressed and new handsets have come to market, we’ve become less forgiving of XE camera’s flaws — particularly with video. The auto-exposure isn’t particularly smart, and it adjusts too quickly when filming video, with ugly results compared to the camera in the HTC Titan and Sensation XL — which have far better camera units. Moreover, as you’ll hear in the sample video above, the sound recording is terrible: its default sensitivity of the mic is way too high, resulting in clipped audio whenever the person holding the camera speaks, or when there’s a gust of wind or any other sharp noise.

HTC Sensation XE sample stills

Still images suffer from the fact that you can’t change the compression settings, which means the output from the eight megapixel sensor is often ruinously over-compressed to as little as 600KB. HTC’s panorama mode, which we’ve enjoyed on the Titan and XL, is absent here, too. Altogether, the camera counts firmly against the XE and feels way more outdated than the display panel.

Software

Beats Audio

HTC’s marketing department has gone to town with Beats Audio. For the record, here’s some of the language they’ve used to describe it:

“Beats by Dr Dre and HTC will work together to reengineer how sound is delivered so that the consumer feels the music the way that the artist intended.
“When it comes to doing music justice, you’re way ahead of the crowd with… Beats Audio™”
“The tailor-made headset is specially engineered to deliver extraordinary sound. Finally, hear what you’ve been missing.”

In general, this hyperbole condenses down to two separate claims: that the XE makes music sound more like the original artist intended, and that it also involves tailoring the music output to the matched Beats headphones.

Beyond these two claims, there’s very little in the way of factual information from HTC about what exactly Beats Audio is. When we’ve interviewed HTC reps on this point, the conversation has generally ended up being about “sound profiles,” which we take to mean EQ settings — or the way certain frequencies are lifted or depressed in order change the way music sounds. This fits with the impressions we had in our initial hands-on with the XE: that Beats Audio is simply an EQ setting that comes to life when you attach Beats-accredited headphones in order to lift the bass and some of the upper frequencies and hence deliver a more lively experience with certain genres of music.
We know that the Beats Audio EQ can sound great with the right type of music, but we need something more objective than that. So, with EQs as our starting point, we decided to test out HTC’s claims about Beats Audio with help from the friendly chaps at AMS Acousticsin North London. Thanks to their input, we now have a ton of objective information about exactly what Beats Audio does. Indulge us with your patience and we’ll do our best to explain.

Round One

We started out by testing the XE with the packaged YourBeats in-ears, which are re-branded iBeats with the addition of HTC’s in-line controls. As you’ll see in the video above, our test involved playing pink noise on the XE, with BA first enabled and then disabled, and recording the sound using a mic specially modified for the analyzing this type of earphone. This yielded two different power spectra, which are presented as simple tables showing the amplitude (in dB) of each frequency (in MHz) of the pink noise. Subtracting the first spectra (BA off) from the second (BA on) revealed the Beats Audio EQ, — i.e. how, exactly, the XE modifies the sound when you activate Beats Audio. For corroboration, we also ran a different test signal through the XE and YourBeats in order to get a “frequency response curve,” which is basically just a higher-res power spectrum depicted as a line graph. (Look in the gallery above for more tables and graphs at a higher res.)
The first thing our tests revealed was that the Sensation XE and packaged headphones form a bass-heavy system, even before you activate Beats Audio. Looking at the raw data with BA disabled, we see that the lowest frequencies still have the highest amplitude, while the higher frequencies get steadily quieter. This EQ is the equivalent of old-school “bass boost” and we’ve listened to enough music with BA off to know it sounds just about as boring.

Our next step, of course, was to enable Beats Audio, and this changed the picture entirely. Suddenly, there’s a massive boost to most of the treble frequencies as well as the bass, which prevents the treble from just trailing off so dismally. Looking at the Beats Mode EQ column above, we can describe the EQ as S-shaped: it has a hump at the lowest frequencies, then a valley in the middle, and a second hump at the top. This is significant because, for many types of music, an S-shaped EQ is greatly preferable to one which simply emphasises the bass. Subjectively, activating Beats Audio when listening to music does exactly what we’d expect from a good S-shaped EQ: it gives the music more presence by emphasising the bass and vocals, while depressing the less interesting mid-tones — but only when we’re listening to an appropriate genre of music such as hip-hop or house. When listening to orchestral music, activating Beats Audio does nothing good.
In addition to the treble boost, most of the other frequencies are also amplified to a greater or lesser extent, delivering an overall jump in loudness that screams “Beats Audio ON!” in the language of pure decibels. This is supported by the frequency response curve below: the BA-enabled curve follows the BA-disabled curve very tightly, but is significantly higher (i.e., louder) all the way along — with the extra boost at the bass, upper mid-range, and highest trebles that we’ve already observed.

At this point, we can debunk one of HTC’s more ostentatious claims about Beats Audio, which is that it somehow “reengineers” music to make it sound “the way the artist intended.” For this to be true, the Beats Audio EQ would need to flatten the system’s output, to make music sound more faithful to the source recording — just as studio monitors do. But Beats Audio does no such thing. We’d suggest that this makes music sound the way Dr. Dre (or his engineers) intended: with a certain S-shaped EQ that suits his kind of music. In fact, when we suggested this to an HTC rep during our hands-on video, he didn’t contradict us. Round one therefore goes to the skeptics — albeit, with the caveat that Dre’s EQ can actually sound really good when you try it with the right type of music.
But we have another question to answer before we call it a match: HTC’s second claim about Beats Audio being tailored to the packaged Beats headphone. Does the same Beats Audio EQ get activated regardless of which headphone is plugged in? If the answer is “yes,” then the consumer is simply being duped into thinking a dumb EQ is more than it is. If the answer is “no,” then the marketing spiel has some justification.

Beats Audio test results

Round Two

Our approach in this round was to run the pink noise test with three other sets of headphones: Senn CX300 in-ears, Senn HD598 over-ears and a pair of Beats Studio active over-ears. We threw in the Beats Studios to mix things up a bit — they’re part of the Beats range but they’re not officially supported by the XE. Currently, the only supported headphones are YourBeats and Beats Solos, with the latter soon to be sold with the new limited edition Sensation XL.
We should also clarify at this point that our XE allowed us to activate Beats Audio with whatever headphones we liked. However, it only explicitly acknowledged the YourBeats headphones, which triggered a popup message on the XE’s screen when we plugged them in. We’re not sure this is how HTC intended the software to behave — in fact, we’ve been told that Beats Audio should not be available with the third-party headphones. But this is how the review device worked for us — and a good thing too, because it allowed us to learn a lot more about Beats Audio.
So, starting with Beat Audio disabled, we noticed that the same excessive bass was apparent with the CX300 in-ears. However, when we moved on to the more expensive and more balanced over-ear headphones, the bass boost was matched by a similar boost to the lower trebles. This suggests that XE has been designed with a relatively common S-shaped sound profile already, even without Beats Audio enabled, but this treble amplification is largely lost with the in-ear Senn CX300, just as it was with the packaged YourBeats.
What happened when we activated Beats Audio in these tests? Well, this is where it got interesting. With the Senn CX300, Beats Audio further boosted the bass as well as some mid-range frequencies, but it totally failed to remedy the lack of treble. In other words, the EQ it applied was clearly different to that with the YourBeats, and the end result was nothing like Dr Dre’s S-curve we discovered in the last round. The same can be said of both the over-ear headphones we tried: they generally displayed the same pattern, with a bass and mid-range boost, but the end result was nothing like with the YourBeats. This is illustrated in the graph below, which compares the Beats Audio EQ with the YourBeats, versus the average Beats Audio EQ with the other headphones. The shapes are totally different, and the key difference is the treble.

This tallies with what an HTC rep told us about the way Beats Audio works: the XE has multiple sound profiles stored within it. It has separate and specific profiles for the YourBeats and Solos, plus a third ‘generic’ Beats Audio profile for other headphones, which are inherently less tailored. We can only assume that the YourBeats EQ above represents the tailored sound profile, while the other headphones were all given the generic BA profile, which looks significantly different. It’s entirely possible that the Beats engineers were aware that the YourBeats headphones have trouble delivering the treble end of the S-curve and so deliberately adjusted the tailored EQ to compensate. This means we must notch up a point for HTC: Beats Audio does appear to tailor the XE’s output to suit compatible headphones and deliver a predictable and good-sounding S-shaped power spectrum.
This leaves us at a 1-1 draw between HTC and the skeptics. The skeptics won a point when the Beats Audio power spectrum proved to be S-shaped and hence have nothing to do with “what the artist intended.” HTC drew level when it turned out that Beats Audio only delivers this particular S-shaped spectrum with the compatible headphones. So can we call it quits? Nope, we need a final round.

The decider

If we take a step back from all these charts and consider the fundamental value of what Beats Audio achieves, then we have to come down squarely on the side of the skeptics. No matter how much effort we put into testing this thing, the fact remains that these ‘sound profiles’ are just EQ settings. You can achieve exactly the same effect using PowerAMP, which costs $5 and allows you create your own EQs. PowerAMP can tailor and save your EQs to suit current headphones and even to the track you’re listening to, in order to get the sound just right. The app can also apply the EQ to lossless music, which cannot be played by the XE’s stock player and therefore cannot be listened to with Beats Audio enabled. Listening to the Black Eyed Peas in Apple Lossless format, with our own PowerAMP EQ and the YourBeats headphones, provided a great experience — and it was achieved while Beats Audio was switched off and irrelevant.

Sure, you might think lossless is overkill, and you might not have the patience or the time required to experiment with your own EQs. But we think that anyone who loves listening to music would surely appreciate having full control, and if HTC was true to its marketing they would have made this possible. If, in addition to Dre’s EQ and headphones, Beats Audio also meant we had an amazing stock player, with tons of EQ customization and a better user interface than PowerAMP, we’d be happy. If HTC went whole hog and threw in a high-end DAC to improve the overall quality of the XE’s output, we’d be over the moon. There’s still plenty of time for HTC to make improvements like that, but until then we can only conclude that Beats Audio is mostly a gimmick.

Wrap-up

HTC Rezound for Verizon unveiled: Beats Audio, 4.3-inch 720p display, available November 14th for $299

Beats Electronics’ Jimmy Iovine: ‘we have got to get to the phone’

HTC Sensation XE with Beats Audio, we go ears-on (video)

The Sensation XE is a great phone, but it is no more or less great than the original Sensation. Sure, it has some spec bumps, but these are minor and cancelled out by our concerns about the display and camera, which haven’t aged well over the last five months.
The Beats Audio software isn’t complete marketing vapor, but it’s still inherently gimmicky and adds nothing in the XE’s favor: you could achieve a better result on the original Sensation simply by downloading a third-party music player that lets you play with the EQ settings yourself.
The only thing which might sway us to by the Sensation XE over its predecessor is the packaged YourBeats headphones, coupled with the red styling on the phone. But for us to opt for the XE, it’d have to by priced similarly to the original Sensation, such that we’re not paying much extra for these headphones. They’re only good if they’re a bargain — otherwise we’d prefer to take matters into our own hands and spend $80 to $100 on some Etymotics, which would be even better.