3G vs Edge

Anandtech has an interesting post regarding 3G vs Edge on the iPhone and Samsung Blackjack. The basic premise of this post is to test out Steve Job's claim that the iPhone does not support 3G due to battery life issues. The iPhone instead only supports the much slower Edge network as well as Wi-Fi. The article goes on to measure the battery life of a Samsung Blackjack using 3G vs one using EDGE. The results show a big drain in battery life for a Blackjack using 3G. The difference is a 25% drop in battery life when web surfing or checking email, and a big drop of 53% for talk time.

While this does indeed prove that the current 3G chip implementations are power hungry I do not agree with the final conclusion that not supporting 3G was a good decision. The problem is that the EDGE network is very slow. In fact 3G is ten times faster (100kps vs 1Mbps). This makes using the EDGE network so slow that it is impractical to do much in the way of web browsing before you get frustrated. Additionally tethering the Blackjack to your laptop under 3G gives you a fast wireless modem anywhere you can get a connection. I would not even bother doing this under the EDGE network. The iPhone does support Wi-Fi but this is currently impractical to me since it is very rare to find a free public Wi-Fi spot when traveling.

For me the ideal solution is to continue to use 3G when I want to browse the Internet quickly or when I am not worried about battery life (for example when I am not traveling) and then to just switch over to EDGE network when I need to conserve my battery. Thanks to how easy this is to setup to switch between the two networks (using this trick) I can do this whenever I want. I get the best of both worlds, decent battery life and a fast data connection when I need it.

How to setup all your email accounts on your Samsung Blackjack

One of the main reasons for have a smart phone like the Samsung Blackjack for most people is to be able to quickly access your various email accounts while you are on the go. I currently have my works Microsoft Exchange emails, Google Mail and Yahoo mail all configured to be sent automatically to my Samsung Blackjack and they work great. In case you have not got around to setting this up yet or are stuck on a particular account, check out this guide from Microsoft that walks you step by step on how to set up each account:
http://www.microsoft.com/windowsmobile/gettingstarted/smartphone/email/default.mspx

Bluetooth Internet Sharing on your Samsung Blackjack

I already wrote a post on how to setup internet sharing using the USB tether that comes with the Samsung Blackjack, but what if you forgot your usb cable or just don't want to carry it with you? One solution is to use bluetooth to connect to your blackjack from your laptop to share the internet connection.

First you will need to do an initial setup using the supplied USB tether. Follow the steps in this post. Once you have the internet sharing application setup it is easy to switch to using Bluetooth instead of the usb cable.

1. Make sure that you have bluetooth turned on first on your Blackjack. You can do this by pressing the Fn+B keys at the same time. You should see a little bluetooth icon at the top of your screen.
2. Open the internet connection sharing wizard on the blackjack.
   
3. Set the "pc connection" field to "Bluetooth PAN"
4. Select Connect
5. No go to your laptop and check your internet connections. Assuming you have a bluetooth adapter setup on your laptop you should now see the Blackjack and be able to connect.
   

How to get rid of the Shutter Sound when taking a picture on your Samsung Blackjack

Like most cellphones the Samsung Blackjack has a built in camera shutter sound that goes off every time you snap a picture. It's easy to get around this feature though if you want to be able to take pictures silently. First make sure your phone is unlocked. Next grab a copy of this wave file and save it your computer as camera_shutter_1.snd . Using Active Sync with your Samsung Blackjack hooked up to your computer, copy this file over to the Windows directory on your phone. If you are in the right location it will ask you if you want to replace the existing file. Once this file is replaced there should no longer be any sound when you take a picture. If this does not work for you try restarting the phone and also make sure you have "Shutter 1" selected as your Shutter sound in the camera application (Menu->Options->Camera). In the same menu also remember to set the Sound for Zoom and Brightness to "Off".

Google Maps for the Samsung Blackjack

The singles best piece of software I have installed on my Samsung Blackjack so far has to be Google Maps Mobile. It runs as a native windows mobile app and gives you access to most of the same functionality you may be used to from Google maps. I use this all the time for finding the location of an address or looking for a restaurant or store near wherever I am at. It also allows you to get driving directions between locations and includes real time traffic data. The default map view works best but you can also switch to a satellite view if you prefer. If you find a business while searching on google maps you select it and have your phone automatically dial the number of that business. If you have a GPS Unit , then you will be happy to hear that this is also supported.

There are a few shortcut keys on Google maps mobile that make using it simpler

• + - Zoom in
• - - Zoom Out
• Space - Step forward through route
• Back Key - Step backwards
• Direction pad - Pan around map
• 1 - In driving directions this takes you to next route
• 3 - In driving diretions this takes you to the previous route marker
  

Microsoft offers a similar product called Live Search. It also offers mapping capabilities, the ability to find a nearby business and driving directions. I have both on my blackjack but end up using Google Maps more often. Mostly this is because so far I do not like the interface for driving directions on Live Search and find it hard to use while driving.

iPhone-like full screen browsing for your Samsung Blackjack

One of the cool new features of the Apple iPhone is the support of full screened web browsing. This allows you to view a page on your phone just as it would appear on a regular computer, instead of having it show up in a more limited mobile version. This to me is one of the more compelling reasons for looking at an iPhone (the large screen and ipod capabilities are two other ones) . However the iPhone lacks crucial connectivity to Microsoft outlook and its lack of a dedicated keyboard makes it a bad choice for my needs. I use my phone to keep connected to the office and I am skeptical that a touch screen keyboard is going to work very well for emails. Another big issue with the iPhone is that it will not support the faster 3G network that AT&T offers and I use this network as a high speed wireless connection for my laptop when traveling using a tethered blackjack.

Blackjack users won't have to wait too long before they will also get full screen web browsing capabilities. The next version of Opera will include a full screen browsing mode with zoom features that looks to be very similar to what is offered on the iPhone. Microsoft is also working on a project called Deepfish that seems to have similar capabilities. No word yet on when either of these is going to be released. Until then we will have to wait and see how they stack up compared to the iPhone's browser.

Get a free Samsung Blackjack

If you are looking to get a Samsung Blackjack and have not yet pulled the trigger on buying one you should check out this deal. Newegg is offering a free samsung blackjack, free bluetooth headset and free 1GB microSD card. The only catch that I saw is that you have to sign up for a 2 year activation plan with Cingular. Best of all there are no rebates involved that you have to worry about, its all just free. If you are like me and already have your blackjack then check out that deal so you can make yourself feel bad for actually paying money for your blackjack.