Regardless, windows 8 is very smooth. The touch screen was very responsive and bright. I found myself struggling to get back to the metro interface when I mistakenly went to the standard desktop. No worries, the speaker immediately bought me back to where it. The email app is amazing and beautiful. Unfortunately, the camera on my Motorola Atrix 2 is not the best and it had high glare. For those of you unaware, Windows 8 RT will not run Adobe flash but it will be fully HTML5. Other featurse include full Windows Live Integration meaning if you have a Windows Live account, you can use that as your login to ensure full sync across Windows Phone, Windows 8 desktop, and the likes.

Enjoy!

Late with their products:

For example, they announced the Xperia Ion back in January at the 2012 Consumer Electronics show. The problem here is no one has any updated news on it. Its supposed to be relesed sometime in Q2 2012 but we’re now into Quarter 2 and we have not heard any news regarding the phone. We have however heard news regarding the Xperia S but that is not available in the U.S yet. Its not even viewable on the American Sony Mobile Website (www.sonymobile.com). Instead, when you visit the American site, you get a big picture of the Xperia Ion with outdated information that was posted back in February.. There hasnt been any NEW news regarding this phone, NO new videos posted on youtube, NO mention of it on their Facebook or Twitter pages and NO RECENT articles written about it by bloggers or Sony itself. It has pretty much vanished from the spotlight as of now. Everyone is now looking at the Nokia Lumia 900 (A fantastic phone) or Samsungs and HTC’s new smartphones that were mentioned at the same time as the Xperia Ion and are now available. So in essence, most people have forgotten about this phone… Also, Quad core phones are out and this is a dual core phone, so the longer they wait to release this phone, the worse the reviews will be despite the12mp instant snap camera it has.

Poor customer service.

Unfortunately, Sony has a huge customer service problem. I’m a victim. I’ve been one of the few subscribers of Sony’s Music Unlimited streaming music service. Last month my subscription didnt automatically renew because my credit card had expired and I forgot to update my account with my new number. I went to the the Sony Entertainment Network website to update my information, but when I went to renew my subscription, I continued to get the following errors:

1. Credit card Details invalid
2. An internal error has occured

I tried three different cards with plenty of funds to cover the $9.99 purchased and continued to the get the same message. I left INNOCENT comments on Sonys facebook fan page. They deleted my first comment, so I left a second one the next day and took a snapshot of it. They then deleted that too. I still havent been able to renew my subscription. I try once per day. I contacted James Trew from Engadget asking him to write a blog entry about it and they said they would only do it if I find more people who had the problem. Since no one (not even Playstation users)  or anyone that I know for that matter uses Music Unlimited, I was kind of screwed. I have pictures too. See below

In conclusion, they dont listen to their customers and their customer service needs major work.

Slapping their Premium brand on their low end products

I dont even know where to go with this but to say if your going to promote your name as a premium Brand, drop the low end products. Or at least, slap a different name on them. The VAIO brand has been damaged and even though the VAIO Z is a premium laptop (badass laptop too) people see a Vaio E at Bestbuy for $459. It looks ugly and it definitely is cheap. Way to go there. Bravia, a premium brand, damaged because of the BX series.

In conclusion, I think those three issues are their main problem. Maybe if they solve that, they can turn that $6.4 billion loss into a $6.4 billion profit in 2 years time. That’d be great! Until then, Sony has TEMPORARILY turned into a COBY brand.

Tech Guy Chris

After six years being on the market, The PSP still continues to satisfy my entertainment needs when I take road trips. Although I never whip out the console when I am at home, work or school for casual gaming, I do use it when I go on road trips. There are great PSP minis available off the Playstation store like “Brain Challenge”, and  EA’s “Sudoku” and many others that I cant get enough of playing. These two games plus the addition of movies and TV shows that I’ve purchased off the Playstation Store are enough to keep me entertained for six to eight hours and whenever I am craving something new, I can always download something new in an instant!

Tech Guy Chris

1. Apple, Inc:

Platform: iTunes

Services Offered: Music, Movies, TV Shows, games, ebooks

Works On

• Macbook
• iTouch
• iPhone
• iPad
• Windows PCs
• All cell phones and MP3 Players. (Music Services Only)

2. Sony Corp:

Platform: Sony Entertainment Network

Services Offered: Music, games, Movies, TV Shows, ebooks

Works On:

• Bravia Televisions
• Sony Tablets
• Sony Streaming Media Players
• Playstation 3 AND later Playstation consoles
• Playstation Vita and PSP
• Sony Ericsson Xperia Branded Phones
• Windows Based computers
• Sony Blu Ray Players
• Android Phones – (Music Services Only)

3. Mirosoft Corp:

Platform: Zune

Services Offered: Music, Games, Movies, TV Shows

Works On:

• Windows PC’s
• Microsoft Xbox 360
• Zune Media Players
• Windows Phone 7 and later devices

4. Amazon Inc

Platform: Amazon

Services Offered: Music, Movies and TV Shows, ebooks

Works On:

• Variety of televisions
• Kindle and android phones (Books only)
• All MP3 devices / Cell phones (Music Services Only)

Here is a FAQ with answers.

Question: I have a variety of different brand gadgets. (Example:Windows Phone 7, Playstation 3, and an iPad,) how do I make a  determination on which entertainment provider to choose?

Answer: Determine what product you upgrade the most.Whichever product you upgrade less, then use that gadgets platform.  You are more likely to upgrade your Windows Phone 7 device wthin a year or two. You may decide that you dont like Windows Phone 7 and want an iPhone or an Android enabled phone. A tablet is mostly used at Home. In this case, The best answer would be Sonys entertainment Network because you have a Playstation 3. You are less likely to buy a Playstaton 3 every year.  Keep in mind that movies/games/music/tv shows will only work on Sonys gadgets. So next time you  decide to buy a portable gadget, choose an xperia, or a sony tablet etc and go from there.

Question: I’ve decided I want to switch entertainment providers, how do I move my purchases from one platform to another (Example: From Zune to iTunes)

Answer: There is no way. You will have to repurchase any content purchased from Zune  on iTunes. If you are an advanced user, you may be able to find some decryption software to remove DRM from your purchase. That is a highly advanced way of doing it but its not recommended. It is illegal and can be very time consuming and is beyond the scope of this FAQ.

This guide is intended for people running under a Windows based PC. However, some of this stuff may be able to be of use to Linux or Mac Users as well. The security levels are determined based on what and how you use

your computer.

Novice Users - Users with little to no computer knowledge / internet browsing, facebook, etc

• Run as a “standard User”
• Install internet Security Suite (Many are free) Comodo is a great one
• Clear browsing history each week
• Keep your computer updated with security updates, and software and hardware updates
• Use strong passwords – “K3B0arD!”  is a bad example. !K3YbOArD! is a good example.
• Do not store your paswords on your computer

Intermediate Users – Users who like to tweak settings, try new software, use torrents etc.

It was pretty funny appearing in my news feed because I caught the error immediately and laughed. I am a die hard Sonic Fan after all

Music Unlimited is similar to Pandora and Rhapsody but offers a wider selection of music availble for streaming. The service has two subscription offers. At $3.99 per month you can browse through basic channels and match content in your library with music on Sonys servers. At $9.99 per month you get all the features of the basic subscription plus the ability to create your own playlists and access premium channels and create your own library. You get a 30 day free trial to the service if you are new.

I strongly urge anyone who streams music or video to their phone to subscribe to a monthly data plan of at least 1gb.

Tech Guy Chris

Pros:

• Faster and more responsive UI
• 720p recording
• Timescape is now usable
• 5 Home screens VS 3
• Multitouch is now included
• The option to record videos suitable for multimedia text messages is now included

Cons:

• Timescape cant be set as the homescreen
• Software fails at showing missed calls on occasion
• Battery life  drains much faster
• No Playstation Store or Qriocity support

The update is well worth the wait. It has many new features. One of the biggest setbacks to this luxurious phone when it released was the slow response time. It had major lag issues so bad that running Sonys app Timescape was unbearable. Timescape was designed to keep you updated on information from text messages, email, facebook, twitter, photos, videos and much more. While this was practically unusable on firmware 1.6, it is perfectly usable on firmware 2.1. It is a very interesting App to keep you in the know. Unfortunately, setting this application as your primary home screen is no longer available with this update which is a major setback.

Recording video in 720p is now an option. You can use the phone to shoot 720p video but I would strongly recommend upgrading to an 8 or 16gb Micro SD card as the 2gb that came with the phone will not cut it.

Unfortunately I noticed that battery life drains much quicker with the update than it did with the prior update. This may be because I set my screen to an animated screensaver. I called my phone VIA skype and just let it sit there to monitor the battery. At 3 1/2 hours, I had only  1/3 of battery life left. (This could be caused by WIFI connections running with Bluetooth. Those features were not turned off during the test)

Another setback to this phone is that there is no Playstation store or Qriocity support. Having both of those services, I would have liked to have seen them integrated considering this a Sony Device. (Sony Ericcson is an independent company jointly owned by Sony and Ericsson, hence the name Sony Ericsson with each holding a 50% stake). I also pay for qriocity and would like to stream music to my portable device one day and not just to the PSP.

In total, the phone update is definitely worth it. Although you could have had this update by custom modding your firmware, it would be better to just wait it out to avoid losing your warranty.

#1 Another Internet Bill

Many consumers pay enough for High Speed internet at their house and for their mobile devices. If you are on AT&T or other mobile carriers, you will need to purchase a data plan from Verizon… That would be a third Internet Bill that isnt necessary for most consumers. Wif included, if this were the only device I had, I wouldnt be able to use it if I had no Internet…

#2 No need to pay for extra storage on a yearly basis

Consumers arent likely to pay for extra storage on a yearly basis just to have their information stored in the cloud. What you offer for free isnt enough for the average consumer these days. Look at how much storage is on Ipads, and other MP3 players. Some are already full.

#3No need to pay monthly/yearly to use a computer…

Consumers really shouldnt have to pay to use a computer and then pay to have internet, and then pay to have additional storage. Consumers would rather buy a full PC with many more features… If for some reason they were unable to make their bill, they wouldnt be able to access THEIR data.

#4 Personal data should be just that. PERSONAL

There is some data such as my finances that consumers only share with their bank. No middle man really needs to have any reasons to view it. I shouldnt have to store this information on your servers. As you offer a privacy policy, everything is still hackable. Look at Sony..

Hopefully these four reasons will give insight to what the average consumer will think about when deciding whether to go with a Chromebook. They may opt out and choose Windows 8 (such as me) when it is released.

1. They say Windows isnt a secure operating system

This is my favorite one. If you hire an I.T person to give you advice on which operating system to choose and he responds with choose  ”Apple or Linux because Windows is insecure and catches viruses”, immediately replace him with someone else. Windows is a very secure operating system. Most people fail to do the right thing and run as a standard user and instead prefer to run as an administrator for no added benefit.  Apple CAN be a secure operating system. I dont trust Linux due to the fact that its open source and someone can stick a time bomb in the source and go un noticed for long time.

2. They offer a Windows Reinstall for a “BootMGR” error.

Actually, running a Windows Repair (Windows XP) or startup repair(Vista or Windows 7) solves that problem instantly. While a Windows Reinstall will fix the problem, you lose all programs and data and if you dont want to lose that, you have to go through a lengthy time consuming process which is usually unessecssary in this case.

3. “They say install Avast or AVG  because its free”over Norton Internet Security, Kapersky, McAfee, Trend Micro, Webroot Internet Security and many more.

This is my favorite. Because the internet security suites listed above are the most common, more hackers target them however, Avast only offers basic protection and I am seeing more hackers target Avast and AVG over anything else. Its amazing how many calls I get regarding viruses and when I ask what software they are using, they respond with Avast or AVG or another free one such as Comodo Anti Virus. While these offer basic protection, Norton and the other four offer superior protection and if configured correctly can be extremely secure and powerful at detecting viruses and intruders. If you want the full protection of Avast or AVG purchase their paid.  There is a reason why they offer paid versions.

3. They say Macs are virus free

This is false. Macs have less viruses but because more and more people are getting Macs, they are becoming more vulnerable. Guess what, Macs dont offer the same encryption or security features as a Windows PC.  There is now a point a click Malware program that is made available for free in the hackers forums which allows you to create malware with ease to target Macs and Windows systems.

4. They say Internet Explorer sucks and to use Firefox or Google Chrome

Internet Explorer is indeed an excellent browser. Many I.T people will say its slow, or isnt secure or doesnt display websites correctly. Firefox and Google Chrome is better because its faster, more secure, and more stable when in reality its not. Gee, if you dont install all the crapware that is bundled when installing a new application such as google toolbar,Bing Bar, Yahoo toolbar, Rhapsody bar, MyWebSearch etc. Internet explorer can run with ease. Ignore those people who say it doesnt run flash well or display sites properly and such. If you agree with them, check your Toolbars and other add ons you install, disable them and then try and load the page again.

5. They say Google Docs is better than Microsoft Office

Since when was making online word processors, spreadsheet, and powerpoints with LESS FEATURES than  a full featured Office suite better than Microsoft Office. If you want an online Suite editor, I would recommend Office Web Apps. You can read my review here on why. If you want a real desktop alternative go for OpenOffice. That is free.

Hopefully you will remember these tips and guard yourself against fake troubleshooters and real troubleshooters. Remember its your money and if they offer to do it for free, they will probably offer only a Windows Reinstall to solve the problem.

Chris