Alexander’s Blog

Are you impressed with the 4G Long Term Evolution (LTE) wireless speeds? Great. Then you are really going to like what Samsung Electronics announced yesterday. Samsung announced that they have developed the world’s first adaptive array transceiver technology operating in the millimeter-wave Ka bands for cellular communications. This new mobile technology is supposed to provide blazing transmission speeds up to several hundred times faster than current 4G networks. Here’s what Samsung has to say about this technology:

“It transmits data in the millimeter-wave band at a frequency of 28 GHz at a speed of up to 1.056 Gbps to a distance of up to 2 kilometers. The adaptive array transceiver technology, using 64 antenna elements, can be a viable solution for overcoming the radio propagation loss at millimeter-wave bands, much higher than the conventional frequency bands ranging from several hundred MHz to several GHz.”

Before you run to the store looking for the new 5G Samsung phone, I should point out that the new technology won’t be available for at least another 7 years.

“Samsung plans to accelerate the research and development of 5G mobile communications technologies, including adaptive array transceiver at the millimeter-wave bands, to commercialize those technologies by 2020.”

Imagine watching 3D movies and games on your smart phone. How about real-time streaming of ultra high-definition (UHD) content? I have always believed that the wireless technology have been introduced to the consumers way before it was ready. We have been using cell phones for decades and still can’t consistently get a reliable connection even in large cities. Not to mention the security issues related to the wireless. What about the speed? The vendors will sell you phones for $500-$800 so you can watch television or videos on your smart phone but its like watching black and white movies from the 20s on your expensive 3D television. Or worst…..like using Skype instead of a video phone.

You can read the entire story on Samsung’s Web site here.

AVG AntiVirus is a free and popular antivirus application that people have been using on their desktop computers for years to protect their desktop operating system, such as Windows XP or Windows 7. Did you know that AVG also has an Anti-Theft Service for Android devices? Here’s how it works.

1. Download and install the AVG AntiVirus software from the Play Store on your Android device.
2. Once you have configured the software for protection, performance and privacy, click on the Anti-Theft icon to activate the service.
3. You will receive an e-mail from AVG that your service is activated, along with the instructions on how to use this service.
4. Go to any computer and visit AVG’s Anti-Theft Web page at http://www.avgmobilation.com/anti-theft.
5. Login with your Google account. Select the appropriate option, such as Shout, Locate, Lock, Unlock, Wipe, or Scan.
6. You can use the Shout option to make the device sound an alarm. Essentially, this will play a ringtone on the device. This can come handy if you can’t find your smart phone in your house and there is no other phone in the house to dial your number.
7. When you use the Locate option, it can take several minutes to locate the phone and will give you its proximity in a Google map.
8. The Lock option can be used to lock the device remotely so others can’t use it. This will require someone to enter the password that you will enter. This password is a temporary password and has nothing to do with any other password on your device or Gmail account.
9. You can use the Unlock option to send the unlock command to the device but it can’t actually unlock your device remotely. You must enter the password you provided when you used the Lock option to unlock the device
10. Using the Wipe option will wipe your Android device remotely. Needless to say, I didn’t try this feature and will have to trust AVG that it works.
11. If you select the Scan option from a desktop computer, within seconds your Android device will start scanning your computer for security threats. This is the same action that you can take from the AVG mobile application on your Android device.

Does the Service Work?

So what about security and does this Anti-Theft service really work? In my tests, I found that the application works for the most part and can be useful to lock a stolen device remotely (and potentially wipe out the device, which I didn’t try). The features work, except that the first time I used the Locate feature, it didn’t even come close to the actual location of the device. While my smart phone was in my had, it showed that my device was located in a different zip code about 10 miles away from me. After a while it did show the exact location, so decide for yourself if this is good, bad, or ugly.

Another weak point that I discovered is that the application itself doesn’t use Secure Socket Layer (SSL) to encrypt the pages on the Web site. This surprised me. A company that makes AntiVirus software should be securing pages where customers are entering passwords and working on Anti-Theft software. In other words, you are using AVG’s unsecure page to secure your Android device. Really? This makes no sense.

Not only the Web site is unsecure, the password that you provide to lock the device can only be 4-6 characters. In other words, the password you provide is going to be very weak. While this may be good enough to keep an average “Joe” out, it won’t be good enough to keep a serious hacker out.

Hopefully, over time AVG will improve this application. It’s a good start but in my opinion the application appears to be more for fun and games than to offer a serious anti-theft service……mainly due to the quality of service and the fact that AVG doesn’t offer encryption to use a security software on their Web site. As I mentioned already, it does seem to get the job done for the most part so I am not ruling it out as a totally useless application. I believe it needs work to offer better reliability for locating the device and also needs some security improvements. After all it is a security application.

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Copyright ©2013 Zubair Alexander. All rights reserved.

Looks like Microsoft’s latest operating system Windows 8 and tablet Surface RT will be available to general public on October 26, 2012. According to Mary Jo Foley, Windows Phone 8 is expected to officially launch on October 29 and should become available for ordering within a week or two after that.

No official news on Windows Server 2012 general availability yet but it seems like it will be early 2013 before it becomes available. Then why is it called Windows Server 2012? Good question. Obviously, Microsoft expected to launch it in 2012, and may still do that. Frankly, I prefer that Microsoft takes it time and doesn’t release a half-baked product like it did with Exchange 2007 and Windows Vista.

If you recall, in June Microsoft announced an upgrade offer for people who have or will purchase Windows 7 PCs between June 2012 and January 2013. They will be able to upgrade to Windows 8 Pro for only $14.99, which is essentially free. Frankly, this is a very generous offer. Microsoft also announced that people running Windows XP, Windows Vista and Windows 7 will be able to pay only $39.99 for an upgrade to Windows 8. Again, this is an incredible offer. Microsoft could easily charge more for an upgrade. Well, let’s put it this way, there is a reason why Microsoft’s operating system is on almost 95% of the computers in the world and Apple’s isn’t.

Launch Dates

Windows 8 = October 26

Surface RT = October 26

Windows Phone 8 = October 29

Windows 8 Upgrade Cost

If you purchased a PC between June 2012 and January 2013 = $14.99

Owners of Windows XP/Vista/7 = $39.99

Computer scientist, author and lecturer David Gewirtz wrote an interesting article today on ZDNet. He compares iPhone 4S to Android and expresses pros and cons of both platforms. Here’s the gist of his article but you can read his entire article on ZDNet here.

Android wins big time in customizability and support for high-speed 4G/LTE mobile broadband. iPhone 4S doesn’t support these high-speed mobile broadband options. Android also wins in the removable battery and physical keyboard categories. iPhone 4S wins in the accessories category. Frankly, this is how Apples had made millions. They charge an exuberant amount of money for their accessories and because you are locked into Apple brand you can’t go to the competition and purchase them at a lower price. Now you may consider the fact that Apples offers tons of accessories a big advantage for Apple but for me this alone is a reason not to purchase an iPhone 4S. Their prices for accessories are ridiculously high. However, I must say that that Apple offers some great accessories and they should get credit for that.

Another category in which David rated iPhone 4S higher than Android is the camera. Well, I don’t know about that. You see, the reason why iPhone users are so impressed by the 8MP camera in iPhone 4S is because iPhone 4 only had a 5MP camera and that’s a big improvement. However, HTC EVO 4G already has an 8MP camera so I would consider this category a tie.

The bottom line is this. In David’s opinion iPhone 4S is a better choice than Androids in only two out of ten categories: Accessories and camera. In all other categories either the Android is a winner or it’s a tie. Being an HTC EVO 4G user myself, I agree with David for the most part, except that when it comes to camera I would give Android an upper hand but give Apple an advantage over Android when it comes to the quality and abundance of accessories but definitely not in price.

Believe it or not, I am a proud owner of a Mac and I think Apple makes great products. I also have great things to say about iPAD 2, except for the pathetic less than 1MP camera. However, I have never been too impressed with iPhones because I believe the phone and the accessories are way over-priced, the service has been unreliable, and the quality has not been that great. There is a reason why the Consumer Report said they can’t recommend iPhone 4 because they are flawed.

My opinion: I am an Android user so iPAD yes, iPhone No!

If you are interested in reading more about iPhones, check out some of my previous posts on iPhones.

• Is iPhone Apple’s Katrina
• Apple & AT&T Security Breaches…..Again!
• Apple Publicly Admits that iPhone Bars are Fake
• Is iPhone 4 a Lemon?
• iPhone Hacked
• Security managers: beware the iPhone

You might also be interested in Sharee English’s blog To iPhone or not to iPhone.

Today a friend of mine called me and said that all of a sudden all his text messages have disappeared on his HTC EVO 4G. I did a little research on this issue and discovered that it appears to be a bug in the Android operating system (OS), rather than HTC EVO 4G because there are thousands of people reporting this error with different phones running Android OS (HTC EVO, Incredible, Droid, etc.).

Because Google, the maker of Android, does not have a fix for this bug at this time, even though they have known about this bug for a long time, all you can do at this time to prevent from potential disaster is backup your text messages if they are important to you. Resetting, rebooting, and other similar solutions don’t seem to help. The tech support for cell phone providers don’t know what to do so they may just tell you to reset your phone. It’s like you complaining that you accidentally deleted a file and would like to recover it and the tech support telling you why don’t you format your hard drive. Hello? that will wipe out all your data and everything on your computer. All kidding aside, I do sympathize with the tech support because they are not responsible for fixing bugs in Google’s operating systems. They only hope that you won’t lose your text messages again in future after the reset but unfortunately people still have the same problem after resetting their phones.

According to my research, Google is aware of this issue since December 26, 2009 and has listed this bug as a high priority (no kidding). The case number is 5569: http://code.google.com/p/android/issues/detail?id=5669. As of today (October 1, 2011) Google does not have a fix for this bug in almost two years. If you have an Android phone and have not run into this issue, you are lucky like me (I have an HTC EVO 4G). If you have lost your text messages there is not really much you can do. If you haven’t, here’s my recommendation on what to do.

Download the FREE SMS Backup+ app from the Android Market which will allow you to backup all your text messages and your call logs. Although there are lots of other similar apps, I like this particular app. It connects you to your Gmail account and backs up all your text messages in a Gmail Label called SMS (you can choose a different label if you want). Obviously, you can print, forward, or do whatever you want once they are in Gmail. If you use Microsoft Outlook, you can add your Gmail account as a POP3 or IMAP account in Outlook and receive all your text messages from SMS Backup+ in your Outlook Inbox. If you want to automatically move them to a different folder, just set up an Outlook rule. Here are a couple of screenshots from the Android Market Web site.

You can configure SMS Backup+ to automatically back up your messages at a regular interval using the Auto Backup feature. At this time the apps let you  backup both SMS and MMS messages, however, you can only restore SMS messages. Another nice feature is that you can also backup your Contacts to Gmail, if you want, otherwise just backup text messages. I think this app is way better than relying on your cell phone provider (Sprint, Verizon, etc.) to restore your messages or contacts.

If you are not worried about getting your text messages disappearing then you may not be interested in this post. However, be aware that one issue reported on HTC Forums is that if you send a message and notice that suddenly all your text messages have disappeared, all the people who received your message may also have their messages completely disappear. It’s like your messages committing a team suicide of sorts. This behavior makes you wonder if it is related to some kind of virus. At this point we don’t know for sure. Talking about antivirus, you might want to install an antivirus app on your smartphone, if you haven’t already. For example, you can download and install the free AVG antivirus app from the Market.

When you backup the messages and contacts for the first time you will connect to your Gmail account and will be asked to allow SMS Backup+ access to your Google account. According to the developer, the app will not have access to your password or other personal information. Depending on the number of text messages and contacts it can take hours so it might not be a bad idea to first delete any unwanted text messages and contacts and then start the back.