How Useful Are Smartphones?

If you have a smartphone, you appreciate all the various ways you can use it. But just how many actual, practical ways are there? I've enumerated at least 41 of them along with the 30 things (many of them are actual physical devices) that the smartphone replaces.

In this spreadsheet, I walk through a "day in the life" of a smartphone user. Read across the rows. The spreadsheet is designed with the headings: Activity, Before Smartphones, Since Having A Smartphone and Notes. As you read each row, I try to progress the Activities as if they were happening all in a single day.

As to the 30 tangible and non-tangible devices it replaces:

• Clock or watch. (For local & world time)
• Alarm clock
• Calendar / Day Planner
• GPS navigation device
• CD or MP3 player
• Audio recorder
• Newspaper
• Magazines
• Books
• Computer (in some cases)
• Radio
• Fax machine
• Restaurant guide
• Yellow pages
• Maps
• Camera
• Notepad
• Flashlight
• Level
• Small ruler
• Art guide
• Grocery coupon system
• Mirror
• Egg Timer
• Stop Watch
• TV
• TV Remote (requires phone with IR)
• Photo Album
• Compass
• Dictionary

There are probably more, but these are the ones I could think of.

A Smart Phone in your future?

I never intended this blog to be exclusively religious discussions, so we’ll take a break from that and discuss something hopefully interesting to those of you considering getting a smart-phone. I was recently comparing two Samsung phones: the new “Focus” (running Windows7 on AT&T) and the soon to be released “Samsung Nexus S” (of which I am uncertain but hopeful will be on AT&T).

Specifically, at the time, I was interested in understanding video specs. I’ve never understood frame rates and interlaced verses progressive. Both the phones shoot progressive. The Nexus is WVGA 480p whereas the Focus is 720p HD. The Focus has a higher resolution. However, I would buy the Nexus (if offered by my carrier when it is released) for a few reasons:
It runs Android
It has a front-facing camera which I would use for wifi video calls (which the Focus doesn’t have)

As of today, the Nexus does NOT have expandable memory, but comes with 16 gigabytes of space, which is plenty for me. The Focus only comes with 6.9G but DOES have expandable memory. Another “plus” for the Focus is that it has a built-in FM radio, which the Nexus doesn’t. But I rarely listen to radio anyway.

What does all this mean to you? It means you need to decide what is important to you. Which features are more important? (Yes, I know in time there may be yet another new phone that has all the features I want, but as of Dec.2010, these are the two options that I am considering.) For me, 480p is sufficient for my video capture needs and won’t hog up my memory as much as 720p. I already have another device that shoots 1080p, so if I need anything that demanding, I’ll use it. But for everyday shooting, this is plenty.

I recommend using http://www.phonescoop.com for comparing phone features side-by-side when you are ready to upgrade.

Here is an excellent video to understand frame rates and such:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Z-JXfyvlPh0&NR=1

Other sources for phone reviews:

http://www.phonedog.com

http://www.phonearena.com

And, if you want to see concept phones that are being proposed:

http://www.concept-phones.com

Hope you find this helpful.