PHILIPS DS8550/10 Fidelio Docking Speaker for iPad/iPhone/iPod

Do yourself a favour and avoid this.  It was meant to be a Christmas present to me so i’m glad i tried it out first! Before i get to the annoying habits/faults the first thing i noticed when i switched the dock on was the sound quality and i really don’t think it’s that great. I can hear a great deal of hissing and popping noises on a lot of songs (something that’s mentioned a lot on the Amazon US reviews i’ve since discovered) – i’ve tried several files from normal quality mp3 to very high quality, all of which play crystal clear on all my other devices but it’s there on most songs on this dock.

When you power on the dock it rams the volume up really loud even though your ipad/iphone was on its lowest setting so you’re left scrambling for the volume.  Also it just randomly switches itself off half way through songs for no apparent reason. I read that it also randomly switches itself on too at high volume. Not at all what you expect for a £200 dock.  So i’m sending it back and i won’t bother with a replacement – at least not a Phillips one.

I once wrote a blog about iPad being nothing more than a pumped up iPod Touch and about how it’s pretty pointless. Ok fast forward to Christmas 2010 and the lovely Santa (Hubby) left me one under the Christmas tree and i have to say i fooking love it!  Honestly i don’t think i could do without it now, it’s so much more convenient than a netbook. I used to sprawl on the sofa watching TV with my netbook and mouse wobbling away on my knee – well no more!

Anyhoo, in the month (almost) of playing i’ve found some pretty brilliant apps. Here’s a few of my faves – click read more to have a butchers:

[..]

Got myself a fabulous Polaroid pogo a couple of weeks ago. £22 on Amazon, bit of a bargain that! The pictures aren’t as good as a normal photo printer that uses ink cartridges and the photos are 2×3” but the pictures are stickers and are really useful for sticking in your journal or on the fridge door! For that money i think it’s great :-)

Well i handed my beloved HTC Hero over to the hubby and i got myself a Motorola Milestone. I must say i haven’t taken to it as quickly as i did my Hero. It feels very much like a work-in-progress device unlike the Hero which felt fabulously polished. I love the screen on the Milestone, it’s bigger and better than the Hero (and in fact most phones). It feels very solid and it looks geeky. It’s a brilliant portable internet device.

But as a phone, it’s crap.

There is built in noise cancellation and it’s a pain in the ass. You have to hold it really close to your mouth or else the person on the other end can’t hear you. The problem with this is your cheek then brushes against the screen pressing either the mute or the hold icon. The screen should switch itself off but it doesn’t always unless you hold your phone at an EXACT angle and at an EXACT distance away from your face in preferable lighting conditions ….. WHAT THE FUCK!?

So as i say, it’s a shit phone. Interestingly though if you use something like Fring or Skype, the noise cancellation switches off and you can use the phone normally. Sadly there is nothing in the settings that lets you switch off the noise cancellation yourself, It really is a pity because there have been thousands of complaints about it. But Motorola don’t seem to do ‘listening to the customers’.

I carry around a Samsung Soul with me and i use that for the phone and my Milestone for texting and internetting on the go. And as an internet device it is amazing. The big screen is wonderful and it’s nice and snappy. It’s saving me having to go and switch my main pc on a lot. I can facebook, tweet, post to wordpress, shop on amazon, have my fave news feeds delivered to me, play on google earth, play games, email and what not without going near my pc. Fabulous! It’s a great time saver.

Now the main reason i went with this (because i was very happy with my Hero as i said) was for the physical keyboard. Well, imagine my disappointment when it turns out the physical keyboard isn’t great! Ok it’s not shite but the keys are so flat that you keep hitting the wrong one or press two at once. It’s much faster to type on the virtual keyboard. But what it is handy for is if your in the car (as a passenger of course) or on the bus, it’s a lot easier to use the physical keyboard when you’re shaking all over the shop.

The camera is also important to me because i’m always taking snaps and don’t always have a main camera with me. It’s not brilliant but it was ok for a phone – until that is i updated it to Android 2.1 which has added more camera features and a shed load of noise to the images. Lord knows why and i hope they fix it. Mind you that said, the ladybird macro photo just below this post was taken with this phone and i don’t suppose it’s that bad?

So i don’t regret having it because having a portable internet device is very important to me and i believe this is the best one. It’s a shame about the phone, keyboard and camera but you can’t have everything. However it has made my mind up that i’ll probably never have another Motorola device but will definitely be going back to HTC -something like the Supersonic (EVO) or whatever they have coming out after that because i’ll probably keep me Milestone for a while yet.

Or maybe not. As a self confessed gadget freak i’m always excited about the next new toy. My Vodafone contract will be up this December and i will be due an upgrade to a new phone. At the moment i have a Blackberry Bold. Vodafone have just announced that they will be getting the iPhone 3Gs. Oo joy! Or is it?

I’ve been playing with my iPod touch, using it to try out typing because i do a lot of emailing and texting from my phone and i just don’t like the keyboard at all. It’s nowhere near as accurate as my Bold. Plus it feels flimsier, i can slide my Bold into my jeans pocket and i know it’s not going to get damaged, it’s a tough old gal. But the iPhone/touch? My Touch is already looking very scratched and rough and i have been very gentle with it.

So, for the first time in my life, i’m not going to grab the newest shiny toy for the hell of it, and i probably won’t upgrade to the latest Bold either if they really are making it smaller. For me, it’s going to take a hell of a phone to compete with BB Bold!