Category Archives: Tech

Tech

I switched from iPhone to Samsung and here’s my experience…

Well I started working for a major Australian telecommunication company and a fraction of my job involves suggesting suitable mobile phone to lovely customer’s of the company. And of the big chunk of sales I make the majority of the folks go for flagship phones from Apple and Samsung. Well, I’m an Apple fanboy and I switched from iPhone 12 to Samsung Galaxy S22 so that I’d be able to help the Android lovers too.

So let me start with the good stuff about the S22. Boy oh boy the design looks amazing and is dope AF. However, there’s a tiny bit that I did not like. The bottom edge of the camera bump on the LHS wasn’t chamfered correctly and it’s a bit too sharp. The second thing I miss is the ease at which I can put my phone to silent mode. On the iPhone it’s just a small push on the silent switch and your phone goes to silent.

The selfie camera on the Samsung is definitely better than the iPhone for portrait photography as it smoothens the skin and the image looks decent for average dudes like me. On the iPhone the selfie camera clicks sharp images and I often had to use Snapseed to get the photo looking good.

The battery life ain’t that great on the Samsung S22 when compared with my old iPhone and the charging time from 30% to 80% is slightly slower than iPhone and I used fast charger during my tests.

The benefit of owning a Samsung is you can update the software using mobile data unlike iPhone. This being a 5G phone I get speeds up to 100 MBPS on LTE and my home Wi-Fi is slower than my mobile data and I actually love using mobile data over Wi-Fi.

The next question is, “Is it worth the money ?” Well the MRP of 128 GB model of the S22 costs 85999 rupees and I got it for 69000. This falls in the premium bucket and the OS doesn’t feel premium. The hardware is great but Samsung needs to ditch Android and create an OS that’s really cool like the iOS. Well, if you are an existing android user and upgrade to the S22 you are gonna like it but moving from iOS to android feels more like moving from S Class to E Class.

I never thought I’d be going back to android when I got my first iPhone in 2016 and my workflow revolved around iCloud. But now I’m back to Google Drive. This decision saves me money because Google Drive offers free storage up to 15 GB and iCloud offers only 5 GB of free storage.

Also I had logged into many applications using Apple ID and now I face issues to log into certain apps on Android and I have to use website version of the App. One such app is Skillshare.

Also unlocking the phone with face doesn’t work properly in low light conditions on the S22.

Well, that was my experience with the S22. Before closing the tab do checkout my other posts. Byeeee 🙂

Tech

Can the iPad replace laptop ?

Hello folks, welcome to CCB. I recently got an iPad and I’ve been using it as my laptop replacement. In this post I’ll be educating you on the pros and cons of using an iPad.

Let’s begin with the pros of using an iPad. Well, the iPad is extremely portable and fun to use. The portability quotient also depends on the size of the iPad. I use 9th gen iPad which happens to have 10.2 inch screen. If you are someone who uses the 12.9 inch iPad Pro with Magic Keyboard then the portability quotient definitely drops.

I primarily use the iPad for blogging, media consumption which includes apps like YouTube and social media apps like Instagram, I also use it to read e-books etc. The 10.2 inch iPad is pretty decent for reading books and I like it more than my laptop. The biggest benefit is you can hold the iPad in landscape as well as the normal orientation, this comes in handy while reading subjects like Geography that usually contains maps in landscape mode. When the aforementioned has to be done on a laptop it is a pain…

The next reason I like iPad is for editing documents and photos. The touchscreen solves hell lot of problems and makes things super easy. I recently had to make a Resume and this app called Canva helped me take the aesthetics of my resume beyond the universe. Well, the user interface of iPad also requires a learning curve and not all may find it easy.

The next and the obvious reason to own an iPad is for iCloud. I sync my iCloud with both my iPhone and iPad and things become super easy. If you are someone who uses a small screen iPhone then having an iPad can reduce stress and increase efficiency. I still remember the days when I used my iPhone 12 for drafting documents and the small screen was disappointing. Of late I use my iPad for most of the things and the experience is amazing.

Let us now talk about the cons of using an iPad. Well, Safari (browser) on iPad is desktop class but yet it isn’t top notch. There are instances where iPad is limited. If you are applying for some of the government jobs that requires desktop class browser then iPad may not do the job.

The next con is with respect to expensive accessories. I got Smart Keyboard for my iPad and it was a expensive affair. I’m yet to get the Apple Pencil.

Another con on iPad is the issue of aspect ratio while viewing videos. Usually most streaming services use 16:9 aspect ratio and henceforth you get to see the black bar above and below the video. Netflix has a feature wherein the entire screen real estate of iPad can be used but the con is the video is zoomed in and you miss out on the full frame.

One distinguishing feature to pick iPad over laptop is cellular connectivity. Yes, that costs another fortune but if you live in places that has regular power cuts and own modems that turn off the very next second the power’s down then the cellular models come in handy. If you happen to be a nomad and if data costs are cheap in your country then I’m pretty sure you’d go for an iPad over…

Well, I’m a Mechanical Engineer but currently I don’t work in that domain and my current work flow doesn’t require any application that runs only on Windows or Mac and therefore iPad does happen to replace my laptop.

Do I recommend buying an iPad ? ——— Well, the 256 GB variant with cellular connectivity, Smart Keyboard and Apple Pencil almost costs the same as MacBook Air. I got an iPad because MacBook Air hasn’t been refreshed since 2020 at the time of writing this post and also I’m an avid reader and my bookshelf would have grown taller than Burj Khalifa if I hadn’t got the iPad. An important thing to note here is not all books are available on Kindle and its counterparts, at times you may have to buy physical books. Also Kindle app allows you to increase the font size while reading books and boy oh boy it’s amazing. When you own an iPad you can get books from multiple services like Amazon, Apple Books, Play Books etc. this isn’t the case with other e-readers that use e-ink. The display of the iPad can be stressful on the eyes when compared to e-ink readers but if you follow good eye care principles and don’t read 200 pages in one go then iPad is safe on the eyes. Also these days you get spectacles that filter blue light and iPad also has dark mode.

I would buy a MacBook in the near future but I still find the iPad Pro to be sexier than the MacBook. If Apple improves iPad OS and if my workflow doesn’t require MacBook then I’d upgrade to an iPad Pro over MacBook.

Tech

Living on 1.5 GB internet per day.

Hey folks, welcome to CCB. I spent a few months on 1.5 GB data per day and here’s how things went.

Most of you reading this blog know me as a stock trader and yes I did trade stocks on mobile data. The markets are open for 6 hours a day and the most time I spent per day staring at the screen was around 2 hours 30 minutes per day and that drained 500 MB of data. Back when I was a scalper my job would get over in few minutes.

The other things I do on my phone is blogging and scrolling Instagram. I don’t blog everyday. My data would reach half its limit (750 MB) by 7:30 in the night. Post that I’d watch YouTube, if not I would use the unused data to update apps on my phone. By the way iOS apps are huge in size. I uninstalled a 2 GB game and post that there was no way I could install it back without buying extra data or use hotspot. Airtel gives 6 GB of coupons if you recharge via their app. I tried to use this 6 GB of data on my mom’s phone to update software on my iPhone 12 via hotspot and sadly it was a failure.

I don’t stream movies or text hell lotta people like others, so on most of the days the data was sufficient. Occasionally I ran out of data. Also YouTube has download feature, if you think you are going to watch a same video multiple times then downloading the video and watching it offline will save data. I use the unused data to download videos late in night.

1.5 GB data per month, unlimited calls and 100 sms per day cost me ₹598 for 84 days. That’s ₹7.11 per day. Recently I switched to 3GB data per day and the same aforementioned features and it cost me ₹558 for 56 days. That’s ₹9.96 per day. For extra ₹2.85 per day I’m getting additional 1.5 GB data.

Well, that was it for this post. See you next time with a different one. Byeee 🙂 By the way I can now install Asphalt 9 back on my phone.

By the way I use an iPhone 12. People who use other phones and do similar stuff on their phone say that their data consumption is lower than mine.