Posts tagged: comparison

Adroid vs iPhone follow-up

By Greg, August 17, 2010 7:17 pm

android Well… It’s been a few weeks since I moved on from iPhone, so I guess I should provide a little update as to how things are… progressing?

You might have seen the multiple updates to my previous post, in which I complained heartily regarding the poor media management capabilities of Android (and to all those “what can be easier than drag-and-drop?” fans out there… drag-and -drop sucks. There, I said it). You might have been disheartened by this, and thought that, well, maybe Android wasn’t as good as ‘they’ were making it out to be. Don’t be that way. I found a solution – a solution that DOESN’T involve playlists. Yep – Windows Media Player.

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How and why I switched from iPhone to Android… and is it a good idea? [UPDATED]

By Greg, August 4, 2010 7:27 pm

phones Apple. for such an innocent word, it can be so divisive. The fanboys are extremely defensive of the company, almost to the extent that it’s like there’s an underlying belief that they can do no wrong, while the haters are the polar opposite – nothing that Apple says or does seems to have any element of truth to it. It’s amazing, really, that each ‘group’ is so extreme in their appraisal of Apple as a whole that there’s almost little variance. You either love them, hate them, or have little to no opinion… It’s so strange. (But hey, let’s be clear – I’m SURE there are people out there that don’t fit into my highly scientific and demonstrable definitions… This is just an generalised observation.)

And me? I guess at various stages I have fit into all of the above. At first, I hated Apple products and the hipsters that bought them. I had no interest in Macs or iPods. Then, in the early to mid-2000s when I decided I needed an MP3 player, I was convinced to get myself a 60GB iPod simply based on the fact that, at the time, there was no real competition. But while I loved my iPod, I wasn’t converted to ‘the club’ (or the cult, as some might prefer). I still hated Macs, and had nothing more than a passing interest in the iPhone when it was released.

And then I got one (a story in itself), and I was hooked. I also ended up getting myself an iPad recently – but I still have no interest in Macs (which is my personal beef – it’s not that I hate Macs, I just don’t want one).

Don’t get me wrong – I still believe that iPhone does certain things SO MUCH better than all other phones on the market. There is a reason the phone became so popular, and that’s because it really is a damn good phone. However, I found myself vehemently defending the phone to haters – even defending the obvious problems and omissions. Arguments such as “I just don’t NEED it” are common amongst iPhone users (fanboys?) – but how true is that statement, or is it just that iPhone is so easy to use, and Apple’s marketing is so pervasive, that you are almost brainwashed to feel this way?

Then came Android. Sure, it’s been around for a while, but Google is really making up on some lost ground now. Many tech nerds swear by Android, and most Apple haters do too (coincidence? probably not). But how can something really compare favourably to my wonderful iPhone?

So I decided to break out of my iMould and get myself an Android – in this case, a Samsung Galaxy S. My intention was to see whether iPhone really WAS so much better than the competition, to gauge whether or not I was simply a product of Apple’s marketing, and to see if the switch to Android was worth my time (and let’s face it – money). I did it so you don’t have to.

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Early look at digital magazines

By Greg, June 5, 2010 4:53 pm

With the dawn of the tablet age upon us (I really hope SOMEONE coins a better name than “tablet”), which will hopefully result in some kind of digital boom, magazine companies are scrambling to keep their feet in a dying industry. And who’s to blame them? The Internet contains all the same information that can be found in their pages, and all for free… While there will always be a market for physical books and magazines, the market is shrinking in favour of digital distribution. As a result, magazine publishers need to do something more drastic than deep and well-written feature articles in order to win back readers… Thus – the future (it seems) is in digital magazines…

Following the release of iPad, a number of publishers have released magazines to the market – some critics consider them a little expensive compared to their physical counterparts, but overall it’s not that bad (for Aussies at least, where Wired mag usually costs $15/month). Subscription methods have been announced, but are yet to be released; however, the magazines themselves are promising. It’s WAY too early to make a call for the greatest digital mag ever, but I thought I’d grab a few, and do a little write-up on what’s good, and what’s bad – even though it’s still early in the game. Hopefully someone will read my post and refine their mag. :)

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Old school is the best school

By Greg, April 2, 2010 5:49 pm

nostalgiawins Nostalgia. In medical terms, the suffix "-algia" refers to pain and suffering. Buggered if I know what the prefix "nost-" might mean, but it seems to me that when we pine for days of old.. it hurts. Anyway, defining the stems of nostalgia is overkill, considering the content of this post. My aim is simply to try to find out why old school games have such a strong nostalgic appeal, while newer titles seem to pale in comparison.

As a gamer that grew up in the 80s, I’ve been around (almost) since the beginning. I played text adventures, I have had to code games prior to playing them (which was sometimes more enjoyable than you think, unless the game turned out to be crap, which was unfortunately often the case), I’ve played games on tape, cartridge, CD, DVD, UMD, BDROM, and by download, and I’ve seen played on many and varying systems. I’m sure there are others out there that have seen much much more, but I’m happy with the experience to date, and look forward to what’s ahead.

However, when I look back on my childhood, and think about old school games – games such as Berserk on Atari 2600, Food fight on Atari 7800, Lock’n'Chase on Intellivision, among many, many others – all I can remember is loving every damned second of the game. But when I think about Bioshock, for example, as much as I enjoyed playing that game… I just don’t care to play it through again (at the moment at least). The same feelings aren’t there. But why? Bioshock is, at its heart, a much more polished title, with a memorable storyline and setting, and a very specific ‘feel’. Some would say it’s a much better game than, say, Food Fight. But why do these feelings exist for the (arguably) lesser game?

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The pros and cons of console and PC gaming

By Greg, March 2, 2010 7:38 pm

pc_vs_console Since the dawn of time, humankind has argued over the merits of this versus that. In the mighty world of game, there was the Sega vs. Nintendo war of the early 90′s, the PSP vs. DS age, and more recently, the Xbox 360 vs. PS3 (and both vs. Wii) conundrum. However you may feel about any of these machines, one war that has waged in the background without waning is the war between the console and PC fans.

It’s an interesting one, really. Styles of gaming have always differed across these machine types, and there has always been a pervasive divider between the two. There has also, for as long as I can remember, been a consensus amongst console gamers that PC gaming is dead. Well, it hasn’t died yet, and let’s face it… it won’t die anytime soon. Regardless of how you feel (I’m a console gamer myself), I thought it pertinent to list the pros and cons of each, if only to help me understand why such a division exists.

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Why is karaoke so popular in Japan?

By Greg, June 22, 2009 7:52 pm

karaokeroom Karaoke. Just mentioning the word can strike fear into the hearts of many. And why? Well, mainly because most of us can’t sing for the life of us, and we would hate to embarrass ourselves…

Especially in front of a bunch of strangers… Which leads many (in western countries at least) to wonder — why the hell is karaoke so popular in Japan?

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Rock Band VS Guitar Hero World Tour [UPDATED: Now with added... poll...]

By Mihoko, March 19, 2009 7:10 pm

Guitar Hero World TourBoth “Rock Band” and “Guitar Hero World Tour” have been available for a while now (especially in the US), so perhaps lots of people have already tried them. However, consider the situation in some countries, where the games have only been available for about 6 months.

This made me wonder if there were any people still thinking “should I get both, or just one of them?” I thought it would be a good time to offer my opinion, because we recently bought “Rock Band” after having played only”Guitar Hero World Tour” since its release in Australia. Continue reading 'Rock Band VS Guitar Hero World Tour [UPDATED: Now with added... poll...]'»

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