Rough Cuts Ltd Blog

Just seen a friend of mine hit 50Mbps download on EE just outside Liverpool. He has a 3Gb monthly limit on downloads. So in theory, this means he could use all of his data allowance in just over a minute. But I'm exaggerating, In all honesty, it would probably take him at least 10 minutes. To use ALL of his data allowance... for the whole month. Things need to change. Someone will get stung very quick. Very high data speeds and low, low data allowances do not mix. Watch this space.........

The Oso mount claims to have a unique type of suction cup, that will stick to more surfaces than most other in car mounts. In an 07 civic, there is a very flat part of the dashboard, which is ideal for mounting a phone. But, it's textured, so most mounts won't form a vacuum. The Oso mount on the other hand has a very soft and sticky circle, with a depressed rubberised centre. And, I must say, it works; it works brilliantly. The suction cup will fit to pretty much any, relatively flat, plastic surface, even the more textured part of the dashboard is flat enough for the circle to form a very very tight grip. If the suction cup becomes too clogged up with dust from moving it too frequently, you simply rinse it under a tap, which returns the sticky surface to its original state. The clip design is simplicity itself, quite why more car mount manufacturers don't supply a simply bulldog clip is beyond me. So, you'd assume, with a superb suction cup and a great clip design th...

I guess most people now have a convergence device, something that they use for a multitude of tasks. A smartphone that takes care of email, sat nav, music, dashmount cam, video etc etc. In which case, I also assume most people have, or need, a decent quality car mount. For most manufacturers, and I really do mean the majority, this means low production costs, medium to high RRP and margins, shoddy quality and high fail rate. If you recognise these traits and you're a bit sick of them. Then you could go straight to the best solution. Ram have been making mounts for a long time now, and the majority are based around ball and socket joints, with clamps. These units are modular, so you can customise your mount depending on your needs. The most effective, is the screw in base with a ball joint. This creates a really solid base for your device, but, if the idea of screwing into the dashboard of your car doesn't delight you, the traditional suction cup mount is also available. then...

As a keen photographer I was excited when this arrived in store. The handset is baffling, from one side a normal looking Android handset (Let's be honest, there are many that are starting to look pretty similar now aren't they... It's hard to find an android handset that's unique) and on the other side there's stonking camera. The first thing we tested was the zoom. The camera boasts a 21x optical zoom, and it's pretty damn impressive. Furthermore, it has Manual mode, Shutter Priority, Aperture priority etc and also an ISO of 3200. We took a pic outside and on manual in pretty dark street light conditions, it chose 800 and took a fairly clear picture. Close inspection showed mild graininess, but considering we overrode the flash settings and took it handheld, it was very very impressive. Of course having wifi, 3G and a full android interface and a fabulously competent camera strapped to the back makes photo management a new game to play. The device can upload ...

In a training session this week, we did a little experiment.  I reset my data counter and browsed the new 3d maps in iOS 6 on an iPhone.  In 1 single minute, of looking at just a handful of streets in London (some which didn't even download), I had used 22mb of cellular data. Obviously this is something of an eye opener and something most customers are unlikely to be aware of. Circa 100Mb every 4 minutes is really quite horrendous and could see many customers data usage totally wiped out in well under an hour.  The 3d maps on the iPhone is clearly quite revolutionary as well and something of significant curious interest. If people can't wait til they get home to try it, they'll be out of data within their first week. 

The Crayola Colorstudio HD+ is a big chunky pen designed to work with the ColorStudio HD app available for free from the app store. A number of users complain that the pen isn't responsive enough, and to be honest, from my first attempt, I found that was true as well. The pen takes a single AA battery and has a button at the end. I also thought the switch was faulty as it doesn't 'click' like it looks like it should, (like the click on the pen) however, when it's turned on, the light on the side illuminates, and if you hold it to your ears, you can hear it making a strange electrical sound. To prove you haven't just downloaded the free crayola app to use with your finger, you have to unlock it, using the magic pen. However, this is where you find out how to use the pen. Despite having a lovely round end. It only really registers if it's pretty much perpendicular with the surface of the iPad. You also have to press quite hard for it to register. After loadi...

We got these in a couple of weeks ago and I completely overlooked it. Then a customer bought one and promptly returned it. There seems to be a flurry of reviews on other websites complaining of basic functionality and incompatibility, especially in the UK and with Sky+ boxes. With that in mind, and because we're selling them. I thought I ought to investigate. So I have. To get it working, you need to download the free Digit app from the Appstore and pair the beacon with your iPhone. I'll be honest, initially, I had a couple of problems getting the app to recognise the fact that I'd linked the device via bluetooth. I didn't read the instructions, but eventually the app saw it and I was ready to continue. I added a couple of devices and familiarised myself with the app layout before bringing the item home to test. At home, I'd got the Panasonic TV right, it worked straight away, but sure enough, the Sky choice I'd made didn't work. I clicked the help me choo...