One Day with the HTC One S

There comes a time in the life of a mobile phone owner when they have to consider dumping their previous phone for a new model. The last phone I truly owned that was designed to last was the classic Nokia 3330; a phone that, although it had no camera or apps, the internet was built around WAP and the most graphically amazing game was Snake 2, would survive an apocalypse.

Since then I’ve had two Sony Ericsson’s, the first of which stopped reading the memory card so I couldn’t load music or save anything to it, and the second which would switch itself off every time a text message was sent and would refuse two out of three times to pick up calls. These were followed by a Nokia 5800 Express Music which was the most enjoyable of the phones to use but even it succumbed to my bad run of luck and ended up with a cracked LCD screen. I’m not sure how it happened as it went into my pocket fine and came out damaged, but the crack rendered it unusable as the screen began to become a jumbled mess. A £25 screen replacement at Kirkgate Market solved the issue temporarily but even that didn’t work all the time with the screen not working properly early in the morning or late at night... a little bit like me. Not to mention the embarrassing farce I had with it as, open receiving my ‘fixed’ phone I immediately put the memory card back in the wrong slot and got it jammed in thus had to return to the stall with my tail between my legs.

With my phone rapidly becoming as much use as a Mensa application form at a TOWIE recording it was inevitable that I would have to get a new one and dip my toe firmly into the smartphone market. The Nokia 5800 had been pretty useful in that it was a well-rounded phone that took reasonable photos, played music, was competent at Internet surfing and had the ability to download some apps, it couldn’t stand up compared to the new range of phones. The use of Facebook and Twitter was slow and cumbersome; e-mails only accessible through the browser which was ok at viewing but half-hearted with composing and would regularly crash; uploading photos to the net unintuitive. Though it had been a great phone and served me well it wasn’t necessarily built for 2012.

So what phone to go with? There are three major players in the smart phone market: Apple with their iPhone, RIM with their Blackberry and HTC with their Android phones. I’m not a big fan of Apple both ethically and monetarily, feeling their very expensive for what you get and as a company Apple are very locked down and restrictive; I’d been warned off getting a Blackberry by several of my friends, so I was ideally after a HTC on Android as it offered lots of apps through their store and I’d known several friends with one who’d said good things.

Not knowing a huge amount about mobile phones – and indeed whether I was at the end of my contract to upgrade – I headed to the T-Mobile store in York to browse through their selection of phones and to check whether I could upgrade. The good news was that I could – thanks to a quick text of ‘Up’ to 150 on my phone – but the choice wasn’t exactly breathtaking. For a new phone with no extra to pay I was offered a Sony Ericsson phone – after my experience with two of their models I was definitely not willing to go with one of those – or a Motorola. I’ve had no experience with a Motorola and the only person I’d known with one was my auntie, but she revealed through a quick phone call that hers wasn’t a smartphone but what she had used had been reliable. She also said she had a HTC currently which was very good but hungry on the battery. To me, battery life isn’t so much of an issue as I had become used to charging up my power-hungry Nokia each night.

With the choice as murky as ever I asked the sales assistant about the options. To complicate matters my phone is on a contract in my mum’s name as she benefits from a half price deal thanks to a previous employer. Therefore a plan for me to swap to another contract and keep my phone number – essential as my number is known to a lot of people not necessarily in my phone book and the change would be a considerable amount of hassle – and my mum to swap from Pay As You Go to the cheap contract was a no go due to a situation I wasn’t following when they explained it to me never mind repeating it here. Basically I couldn’t swap contract without losing my number and for my mum to get the deal would either have to pay £30 for the privileged or get hold of another SIM card, switch over her details over the phone, then switch it back to T-Mobile. But, crucially, this still wouldn’t solve the problem of my phone number and was either costly or a hassle.

Even the T-Mobile person on the phone was confusing, especially when discussing HTC models 1S and 1X and their differences, when both letters sound incredibly similar over the phone. Nice naming there, HTC.

So basically I was stuck with two choices: relinquish the cheap contract and go over to a more expensive monthly one and get a free phone, or stick with this contract and pay £160 for a new phone. Basically, I worked out, over a year there was little difference but the latter was cheaper in the long term. Though balking at the cost of the handset – my Nokia 5800 was just £30 to buy last time – it was the option I picked and I was handed over a new phone in what was, from this point onward, relatively pain free. Well, aside from the courtesy transfer of contacts from one phone to the other which only transferred over half of them.

So, with my Nokia thrust into a drawer it was time to try the new phone.

The first thing to note is that it’s considerably bigger than a standard mobile phone, which is good news for the touch screen. In compensation it’s much thinner and lighter but less friendly on the pocket just to its size. The screen is bright, the battery life as expected, and the aesthetic feel good. It comes with an 8mb camera and the usual bells and whistles, including the ability to connect to your home wi-fi to save on the phone costs.

The phone helpfully takes you through an intuitive set-up wizard when it’s first turned on. This includes setting the time; letting you log into Facebook, Twitter, Hotmail, Google, Flickr, SkyDrive and lots of other applications so they automatically feed onto the phone; and some more, slightly worrying, Big Brother style sections that track your location.

The HTC 1S itself is, once you get your head around a different phone, is relatively simple to use. The screen unlocks with a quick flick of a ring (steady!) and locks again with a quick button press. The time is displayed in big characters at the top above the weather and at the bottom are the options for phone book, e-mail, main menu, messages and camera. Below that is a back button, home button and application button. Right at the top are a whole range of symbols for new messages, e-mail, wi-fi, signal strength, battery life and, rather redundantly, the time again. In the space, and on other windows found with a flick left or right, can go quick links which were soon filled up with Facebook, Twitter, About UoB, BBC News, RamAir and, er, Draw Something, which I’m ashamed to say was the first thing I downloaded. Fun it is too.

The experience of using the phone is a mixed bag. The phone menu is simple to use and concise and picks up contacts from Hotmail, Facebook and your Sim with photos displayed. Unfortunately the process of removing duplicates is a slow and painful one especially with the list moving back to the top when a duplicate is removed. Also, the screen is a little too sensitive and occasionally led to me accidentally calling a contact rather than editing them. A way of editing contacts via the PC would have been useful. You can also group friends in a variety of ways and set-up quick dials too, both straight forward.

The e-mail screen was the most eye-opening for me with a very intuitive way of doing things with the ability to delete, mark and read e-mails far better than on my previous phone. Sadly switching to the ‘folder’ menu involves a couple of clicks and the keyboard takes some getting used to for larger fingers. Though I’d lost the stylus to my previous phone under a takeaway’s counter a couple of years ago (don’t ask) I miss it when typing as pressing ‘M’ on the keyboard often slips over to the backspace so you can end up losing more than you’ve typed. I imagine it’s something I’ll get used to though.

Messaging does its job and is straight forward and the camera is simple and powerful, and in HD, with a wide variety of flash and image options and, if you really want it, Instagram-style filters.

On the main menu are a variety of useful applications including a flashlight, calculator, sat-nav-style interface for driving and a settings menu, which among other things allowed me to re-import all the contacts from my previous phone more successfully in store. There are, of course, lots of other apps to install and though I’ve only scratched the surface of those available there seems to be plenty and the service simple to use.

Though the phone is powerful and mostly has been fun and easy to set-up there are some weird decisions. The ability to switch to silent or meeting mode is not accessible from the homepage unless, like me, you find the macro button hidden away that can be dragged to the front page. I’d also been spoilt by the music management of the 3DS as a portable music player so the music I transferred over doesn’t group as well as it did on that portable console, ironic really when its music playback is a tertiary function whereas this phone, with its beats audio, is built around it to some respect. That said it’s a problem I can get around and the music sounds great, both through the speaker and headphones, with lots of tweakable options. Also, the ability to switch simply between multiple Facebook accounts like you can with Twitter on that app wouldn’t go a miss. Also, on one phone call, I felt the phone getting rather hot so hope this is a one-off rather than a recurring thing. I don’t want to burn off my ears after all!

So far I’m impressed by the phone. Its handling of e-mails, messages, Facebook and Tweets is great both in the app and on the alert menu and, though it means I’m now never away from my e-mails, it’s much easier to interact with things. The phone is lightweight, portable and the screen is bright. The music sounds great and it’s straight forward to use. The lack of an instruction manual in the box or an obvious way of backing up information from the phone to your PC lets it down but overall, aside from the cost I had to pay to get it, I’m enjoying the phone and adapting to it well.

I’ll let you know a week on from purchase if I’m still feeling as positive then.

The Cabin In The Woods (Movie Review)

Horror films are something that I don’t usually rush to the cinema to see, though it is a genre I’m happy to put over my money for, from the pop end of the market with the Final Destination films, to recent ones such as ‘The Woman In Black’. But there was definitely something in the marketing and the reaction on the internet to the ‘The Cabin In The Woods’ that made we want to see it.

And I’m glad I did as ‘The Cabin In The Woods’ is one of the best concepts in a movie I have ever seen. The film tells the story of five teenagers who head to a, er, cabin in the woods, for a weekend but upon arriving there, in the wake of a warning from the owner of a local deserted petrol station, they find a cellar full of mysterious objects and trinkets that sets in motion a chain of events that sees them being picked up one by one.

So far so cliché you may think, and you’d be right to believe that, as it’s intentional. Though the trailer for the film did give some clues away that this is more than an ordinary horror film don’t worry about the spoilers as the major schtick of the film is revealed in the very first scene but there is much more to come that you won’t know about.

What the trailer doesn’t reveal is possibly the most fun final thirty minutes in a film for a long time. The first forty minutes or so is typical horror movie territory with a handful of jump scares, dark rooms and typical teenage pursuits including drinking, smoking and, er, making out with a stuffed wolf’s head. This first part of the movie does occasionally find itself dragging though it’s punctuated with excellent turns from the cast especially Fran Kranz as a stoner, who has some of the best lines in the film and delivers them flawlessly, and Bradley Whitford, who lights up the screen when he’s on, and with the switching between two different scenarios there’s always something new to keep the film fresh. Matched cuts and juxtaposition are used excellently in the film and one scene set before the bombastic finish will have you smiling.

It’s the finish, though, that makes the film and without giving anything away it’s an excellent balance of tongue in cheek plotting, horror action, top class CGI and an eye for comic timing. ‘The Cabin In The Woods’, throughout its 95-minute run time, manages to balance very effectively its scares, laugh-out-loud moments, “romantic” sections and smile-enducing action scenes without ever seeming like its spreading itself thin. A scene with Bradley Whitford near the end, built up throughout the film, is a great pay-off and if you don’t enjoy the final half an hour with a permanent smile on your face and occasionally a dropped jaw then there’s clearly something wrong with you.

With plenty of twists and turns, mild scares and a plethora of well written and hilarious lines and scenarios, plus perhaps the most depressing end to a film since ‘The Butterfly Effect’, I whole heartedly recommend ‘The Cabin In The Woods’. The first half of the movie may have its moments of cliché and times when you’d like it to move a bit faster, but this is more than made up by the ending.

It was almost enough to give me a husband bulge, to quote the film.

9/10

You can also read Liam's take on the movie at http://cybaria.net/horror-deconstructed/

The Pirates! In An Adventure With Scientists! (Review)

Only the fifth feature film from the Aardman stable in twelve years (and only three of those have been claymation) ‘The Pirates! In An Adventure With Scientists!’ is adapted from the book of the same name by author Gideon Defoe and is another classic example of a great family film for the Easter period that combines both a funny, well-written and twisty-turny plot and a loving eye for detail and background visual jokes that few other animation companies spend time and effort on.

‘The Pirates!’ tells the story of the Pirate Captain (Hugh Grant) who, alongside his crew, sail the seven seas going about their business in the hope he’ll do enough great piratical deeds to earn the Pirate of the Year trophy. Sadly, in pirate circles, he’s a bit of a loser and thus fails to score any booty and becomes humiliated in front of his more successful peers. That is, until thanks to a chance meeting with travelling scientist Charles Darwin (David Tennant) who discovers his faithful parrot is actually the last living dodo, he heads to London to claim a science prize, lots of booty and the award he so longs for. Sadly it doesn’t quite go that away with Darwin and Queen Victoria (Imelda Staunton) having other plans for the rare bird.

The animation of ‘The Pirates!’ is probably the most ambitious of all the Aardman features so far with lots of love going into each frame. With support from CGI in creating the water, it truly is a beautiful film and the characters animated with much detail. Scenes such as a daring rescue involving a bath-tub and a final showdown on a boat are as thrilling and well choreographed as any action film and running jokes involving Darwin’s revolutionary evolutionary monkey servant and the Pirate Captain attacking ships really make the film.

Voice wise the actors are spot on and each bring a different character to each role with Grant, Tennant, Staunton and many others relishing the role. Charles Darwin in particular is the most interesting of the interpretations, turning the scientist into a depressed loner with a desire to find a girlfriend, leading to many of the jokes of the piece.

Alongside the plot, which is full of twists and turns, exotic locations, and never loses its pace, the film feels much bigger than its 88-minute running time suggests. It also deserves repeat viewing for the amount of background detail and visual jokes, only some of which are covered in the worth-waiting-for credit sequence.

Tightly plotted with throwaway sections early on coming back later with relevance, the period setting of the piece is great but it isn’t afraid to throw in some modern anachronisms to get a laugh, such as the Pirate Captain being street or the name of Victoria’s ship.

It’s perhaps not as laugh out loud funny as the Wallace and Gromit feature or ‘Flushed Away’ but the humour is not to be missed and there are still several belly laugh moments and many jokes that appeal to the adult mind as well as for children. As with any Aardman film there are so many little moments in the film that make you chuckle that it’s difficult to list them all without spoiling the film, but let me just say it’s difficult to watch the film without a constant smile on your face.

The soundtrack is also worth the ticket admittance with a song from Tenpole Tudor sitting beside a ditty from Flight of the Conchords alongside some hilarious sound effects.

My biggest upset with the film is that several of the big jokes were included in the trailer – but this is more of a bugbear with movie trailers in general – but when the alternatives this Easter for a film to see involves a fifteen year re-release of a disaster movie and a kids film that involves kids killing each other, the warmth, hilarity and general time and care that has gone into creating ‘The Pirates!’ makes this a must see film.

(8/10)