Tag: Blog

How to know if your battery is on it’s way out on cell phones!

Paul

Batteries won’t last!

I know this all to well.   With all my phones from the Lg Optimus F3 to my Kyocera Risa.  Every phone I have had, I get to know when the battery should just be replaced.   I will talk about my experiences and hopefully it will help you when it comes time to replace that battery.

Nothing I say should constitute you going out and buying a battery but it will at least help you know if you might need to.   It however is up to you when and if you get a replacement battery.

Shorter charge cycles!

This one is the first sign the battery, which has circuits that close off to prevent the battery from fully charging.  These circuits help keep the battery from exploding or leaking and causing serious damage to you or the phone.  It can show itself in several ways.   You might find that you have to charge your phone up more frequently or that it says you have a full battery one hour ago and now it is down to half or almost empty.   

Phone gets warm to touch while charging!

It isn’t uncommon that from time to time when your charging your phone the phone may get slightly warm due to the charging of the batteries but it gets warmer than usual.   This is caused by the phone trying to force charge the battery to charge a cell that looks to be almost dead and it is trying to keep it alive.

Bulges on cell battery!

It isn’t always the case but if you examine your battery of your phone.   I saw this with my HTC inspire 4g Phone, where the battery was getting a slight bulge and shorter charge and discharge cycles were happening.  

Cell Phone Apps

Although I will remind you that even getting a new battery might not be cause of your phone not keeping charge.   Some android phones use more battery life due to apps or other such widgets that are constantly be used on the phone.   These tend to help reduce the life of your battery and it will not help if you battery isn’t dead or on it’s way out.  You may find it helps for the small time but you will be back at where you left off.   Before you consider buying a new battery, consider looking into which apps you might not need and remove them.   This will greatly increase your battery life and your experiences.

Got a Story you want to tell people, just leave a comment and tell me your experiences in this subject matter!

First Impressions of the LG Optimus F3 4g LTE by Virgin Mobile!

Paul

Specifications:

Display: 4.0-inches (Gorilla Glass)
Camera: 5-MP Processor 3-MP Front
Speed: 1.2 GHz OS:
Android 4.1.2 (Jelly Bean)
Wifi
Blue tooth
NFC (Near Field Communications)
CDMA, 4G (EVDO+HSPA), 3G

Since getting my ZTE phone wet the last few weeks ago, I decided I would jump up and try a new phone out.  So this weekend I went to Walmart to see what they had and I was surprised that they were out of the ZTE’s, I liked that phone because the screen size.   Even though they both say 4.0 screen size, I could swear the ZTE is slightly bigger probably more closer to 4.1 but that is just me.   You can read my full review of the ZTE AWE and decide for yourself.

First Impression:

I have done this in past with the ZTE Awe and I’ll talk about my first impressions of this phone and go into more detail later.   First off, it has no way to do the Wifi Hotspot like the ZTE but you do have the option of Blue tooth Tethering your phone and I can also do a hard tethering from the phone to Windows/Mac laptop.   So you can still use the 4G speed for surfing the net.  I will look into finding out how to get complete wifi tethering later on.   I know I will have to circumvent Virgin Mobile but that seems to be the only way to have true wifi tethering enable with them.   They seem to try to frustrate the customers who do want true unlimited service.   I haven’t really had the chance to see if they consider 4g as true unlimited, or if it is still bound by the reduce in speed of 3g after 2.5 GB of bandwidth.

Comparing it to the ZTE AWE!

After using the ZTE Awe, I thought I should oa quick comparison of the two phones.   Each has unique properties and have reasons why you will want to use that particular phone.   So I’m going to tell you my experience in hopes this will help you make a choice of the two.   It won’t be an in depth comparison but it will be a quick overview.

ZTE awe is a little lighter and lest thicker than the LG Optimus.   It depends on on what your looking for with weight and thickness but I honestly think the LG Optimus is slightly thicker and heavier to either to make you believe it is stronger or it is stronger.  The LG Optimus has better camera properties, even though they both have 5 Mega pixel cameras, it looks like the Awe uses software to make it get to 5mp.  You can tell when I used the camera on the LG Optimus, it actually looks better and much more responsive.  The Awe only comes with a 1mp front camera and the LG Optimus comes with a 3mp front camera.  If your going to be doing video chats on a phone, I think you will want to be much more details.  

The Touch screen on the AWE doesn’t feel anywhere like the Gorilla glass that comes with the LG Optimus F3.   I do not know how to describe this but I do enjoy the touch screen on the LG Optimus better than I do with the ZTE Awe.   If feels much more sturdier and less breakable.   Although I have dropped the AWE several times, and the phone has yet to shatter.   So I know the AWE will not break as much as it looks.  

Finally, The LG Optimus F3 is a good buy for those who want to have a better experience with photos, and even the speed.   I have been able to pick up data signal’s in places I usually had a hard time getting signals.  So that is also another plus.   The Zte AWE is good for those who need a cheap phone for games and watching movies on it.  So I’ll let you decide which on you want to buy.  

Why being Single is freaking Awesome!

Paul

Myles Munroe – January 28, 2005

This Book helped me with Singleness!

I have been reading “Single, Married, Seperated, and life after Divorce” (Amazon Affiliate link) and after reading this.   I can’t but help tell you why being single helps me in so many ways.   I although know the desires of my heart and others where you may want to find that special someone.   This book however has so many good qualities to help people learn that being single can be so undeserving.   Being single can be so much fun and less stressful.  

I’m going to share with you some of the things that I have learned from this book that will help you wanting to be single even more!

No unexpected expenses!

Let’s face it being married, you have to know what your partner bought and forgot to tell you.   The only thing you have to worry about is having enough saved to pay for unexpected car repairs.  Even with both you in constant communications with your spouse, there is always going to be things your spouse will buy and tell you afterwards.   

No fights!

When I was with my ex, I was always having stress because we would be at odds with each other and we would always have to compromise.   While I am single, I do not have to worry about any compromising.   It’s my way and I do not have to listen to no one!

Myths about Married and Single People!

I seriously love the show Mythbusters and watch it every chance  I get.   So this myth that being married or even being single has so many disadvantages but it is clearly a myth.   Being unique is something that we should strive for in our day to day life.   Whether we are married or single, no one understand that being single can be a very make for more enjoyment.  Most people confuse Singleness with what it’s like being single.   People see others hugging, and showing affection and they yearn for that closeness but yet they do not know themselves.   Until you know yourself, you can not understand others and this is why being single is so Awesome!

I’ve pretty much told you my take on why being Awesome is so good, but I would love to hear yours.  Please feel free to leave a comment and tell me your thoughts on this book!  I learned so much from this book and I’ll probably reread it to learn even more!  

I encourage people to go read the book and become an individual (Amazon Affiliate Link).   When you do that and have a life filled with singleness, then you may find that special someone walking into your life!  

My ZTE Awe got dumped in a water hole!

Paul

The experience that I know!

I have done this many times with phones just like the HTC Inspire, it was another one that got wet!  You just have to know what to do as soon as it gets wet to prevent any damage!  It isn’t anything new but someone people just do not think about this until it is too late.   As for me, I learned that if you can take the power source out of the phone, it stands a much better chance of surviving then when you do nothing and then the wiring gets fried.

What to do if it does get soaked!

I will be glad to lead you through how I saved my ZTE Awe phone and kept it from getting fried.   How I dried it and how you can do it without using Rice.   

  1. Once your phone gets wet, your first response is to always pull the battery, if you can!   I am sure not everyone thinks about these kinds of things but once you remove electricity from the equation, you stand a much greater chance at saving the electronic device!
  2. After that, you should get as much of the water off the phone as necessary without breaking the phone.  I just flung it around with my hand a few times.   
  3. I also took the back off and left the back uncovered.   This will help the phone dry quicker and easier.   You may see water spots in the screen if you leave the back on.   It has to be able to dry the inside of the phone also.
  4. I used a Hair dryer, If you used this technique remember the phone should not get to hot.   You best bet is to keep it in your hand as you blow air any place on or in the phone you can without causing damage.   If the phone get hot in your hands it is time to let the phone cool off.   This way you will not damage the phone.   BATTERY MUST BE REMOVED before doing this and after this for an hour!
  5. I then would use the hair dryer every day over the next week to help dry the screen off and get those water droplets to go away from the screen.   You can continue to do this as long as you like as long as you do not get the phone extremely hot and you do not have the battery in the phone as you use the hair dryer on the phone!

Now since I got the phone dry I no longer have WIFI or Blue tooth capabilities, and I am seriously thinking about buying a new phone but something that will allow me to make a portable hotspot with laptop and tablet.  The only one that looks to be promising for Virgin Mobile, is the Samsung Galaxy S2 (Amazon Affiliate Link).   Which I might just buy that myself and use that for my internet at home.

I am sure it was the phone getting wet that caused the wifi and blue tooth to be broken, at least it seems to be the problem.   So I want to hear from the community about the Samasung Galaxy S2 and how has it been with Virgin Mobile US?  Let me know by leaving a comment,

Several online retailers have weak password security!

Paul

Retailers makes it easy for hackers!

Dashlane releases their top 100 online Retailers and “The Illusion of Personal Data Security in E-Commerce” this makes it easier for the hackers to know the common passwords for sites.   Some of the retailers that are mentioned are:
  • Cafepress (affiliate link) — Although I have been a huge supporter for those really cool shirts and other personable merchandise.   They only require a 3 character password.  If your using a 3 character password, then you are just yelling to the hackers come get my credit card information and personal information!
  • Scholastic Inc — This one seem likes they allow this for kids, I just hope they don’t give out all that valuable information.   They two also only require a 3 character password for an account!
  • 1-800-flowers (1800flowers.com) — Only requrie a 1 character password, which means that you could use Q for your password and you’d be all set for someone to take your credit card information really quickly.

Those are only the few that I found that were really interesting.   I am calling out these retailers to make changes to their password lengths.  You can see the complete list of the 100 retailers with passwords length and various other data.   This link is thanks to Steve Gibson to see all the important stuff!

Password Length

I’ve talked about Lastpass in the past so I will not talk about it anymore.  I do recommend people use the maximum length you can have on sites that are really important to you.   This will prevent hackers from guessing real simple passwords.   Although you should have Higher, Lower, Numbers, and Special characters in your password to make password guessing even harder.  It is up to you to prevent your account from getting hacked or taken over.   No one can help you but yourself!