2 mobile life


beginner's guide Contents


2 A mobile lifestyle How smartphones can benefit your life


4 Smartphones – all you need to know


The beginner’s guide


5 Dawn of the tablet era Upcoming tablet computers from the iPad and beyond


6 Top smartphones A closer look at some of our featured devices 7 Heavy hitters


The high-end mobile devices with the latest features


10 Entertainment everywhere The top apps to keep you entertained, from gaming to going out


11 Travellers’ friends The best apps to help plan your next holiday


12 Apps to assist Mobile apps to keep you organised


14 Featured apps We highlight some top apps available today


15 Competition Win some exclusive prizes


THE CONSUMER GUIDE TO MOBILE TECHNOLOGY FROM


DAWN OF THE TABLET ERA


HAVE APPS, WILL TRAVEL


COMPETITION WIN A TABLET, SMARTPHONES AND FREE


BROADBAND


FOR A YEAR!! SEE PAGE 15


SMARTPHONES – ALL YOU NEED TO KNOW Sponsored by


The latest innovations in mobile technology have brought countless new ways of keeping people organised and entertained. Laura O’Brien takes a look at what is on offer


N Editor: Laura O’Brien Email: lobrien@siliconrepublic.com


Editor media supplements: Sorcha Corcoran Email: scorcoran@whitespace.ie


Advertising: Sam Hobbs Tel: 01 6251425


Email: shobbs@whitespace.ie Design: Whitespace Publishing Group Publisher: Darren Mc Auliffe Tel: 01 6251444 Fax: 01 6251402


Post: Siliconrepublic.com, Top Floor, Block 43B, Yeats Way, Park West Business Park, Nangor Road, Dublin 12


Printed by: Independent Newspapers Ltd © Siliconrepublic Ltd 2011


ot too long ago, the mobile phone was a much more limited device. It was good for calling and texting, along with some very basic games


and web access. Fast forward to 2011 and the mobile


phone has grown into something much bigger. With the development of smart- phones, there are few limits. You can connect to Wi-Fi networks or via 3G and surf the web anywhere, accessing rich graphical and media content with ease. With your smartphone, you can take


high quality pictures to rival some com- pact cameras, and fuse your creations with top photography apps to make them look even better. You can also access hundreds of thou-


sands of apps for your phone for free or for very low prices. And that’s just scratching the surface. It’s little wonder that so many people


want to invest in one of these versatile devices. According to research from Return2Sender, 600,000 Irish people owned a smartphone at the end of 2010 and they predict that this is only going to rise. While a few years ago, the iPhone was


the biggest name in smartphones, today there’s much more competition. Along with the iPhone, you have Google’s An- droid operating system, which can be seen on a huge amount of smartphones,


ranging from expensive to budget de- vices. Many phone manufacturers, such as HtC, also overlay their own unique user interface over Android to customise it further. there’s also Microsoft’s brand new


mobile operating system Windows Phone 7, which launched late last year. Not to mention Symbian, running on Nokia phones, and BlackBerry’s range of devices.


>> APPS APLENTY Evidently, there are a lot of options when buying a smartphone. And the choices don’t stop once you get one, consider- ing the mind-boggling number of apps available on each device. While it may seem a little bit over- whelming, the thing to keep in mind with smartphones is that when you have one, you can really make it your own. Buying habits for mobile phones have shifted from how they look physically to what apps they have access to. Whether you’re a shopaholic, a news


junkie, a sports fanatic or a chef in the making, you can download apps to cater for every interest. Even ignoring individual interests,


apps are fantastic for making the little things in life that much easier – maybe you want to upload some photos to Fa- cebook while at lunch, perhaps you need to find out bus times while you’re still


in town, or maybe you’re on a long train journey and want to play a video game to keep you occupied. Either way, it’s clear that smartphones can do a lot for you and the only limit is what you download to yours. Smartphones aren’t the only devices that have been in the spotlight in recent years, thanks to the launch of the iPad last year. tablets seem to be the biggest devices


of 2011, and like with smartphones, Ap- ple isn’t the only game in town. this year, there will be a huge range of Android devices, such as the HtC Flyer, which you can win exclusively in our competition, and the Motorola Xoom. HP is also planning an impressive tablet running on weboS called the touchPad, and the BlackBerry Playbook should be arriving to our shores quite soon. Along with running mobile apps,


these devices make tasks such as brows- ing the web and reading ebooks incred- ibly immersive and intuitive, relying on a natural touchscreen interface. Already, the mobile world is an im- pressive place, and considering potential future innovations such as the ability to pay for goods through your smartphone, it can only get better. If the number of innovations increas-


es as quickly as it already has done in the next few years, smartphones could keep improving on lifestyles for many years to come.


Amobile lifestyle


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