What the Tech

Why your kid needs a smartwatch

Posted on March 7, 2019April 9, 2019 by McKay Smith

Inspire your kid to do to their daily chores – it’s a win-win

With the Garmin Vivofit Jr 2, the parents can award points to their children for doing daily tasks and chores. The idea is these can then be traded for treats, so your children have an incentive to brush their teeth or play nicely with their siblings. The strap is soft and stretchy, making it comfortable to wear both day and night. Parents don’t even need to remind their child to charge their watch, because the battery lasts for up to a year.

The Fitbit Ace is another great choice especially in the sense that it is a great way to encourage and motivate kids to get moving. This smartwatch makes daily physical activity fun by tracking daily steps and providing rewards as well as badges for hitting certain goals.

The best benefit for a parent in my opinion for their child(ren) to have a smartwatch is the GPS tracking capability that the smartwatch supports. For as little as $5 to $10 a month, a parent can attach a working cellphone number to the smartwatch so as to be able to call their child with as well as the phone number makes it so that the GPS tracking capability is activated. if your child is out and about a lot with friends especially playing in the neighborhood, it is worth the extra $5 to $10 a month in expense for a parent to provide them with the peace of mind at the touch of a button to keep tracking of their kid and know that they are safe.

What to consider when purchasing a new smartphone

Posted on March 2, 2019April 9, 2019 by McKay Smith

Performance

Nobody wants a phone that can’t perform for the tasks that the user throws at it. Especially if you are a busy person who needs to field a lot of phone calls as well as emails from their phone, it is important your phone is able to keep up with what you rely on it for.

Display

This is important because most cellphone users are smartphone users, and therefore are doing a lot of reading on their smartphone. It needs to be able to live up to its price point.

Battery Life

One of the most important things to consider is battery life. If a phone is not able to handle at least moderate usage to get you through your day, then it is probably not the phone for you.
I recommend checking out reviews on YouTube of the phone you are considering purchasing to see what those reviewers have to say about that phone. It can give a great frame of reference to if the phone is for you.

Camera

A popular saying goes, “the best camera is the one you have with you.” The camera that someone typically has with them presently is their smartphone. To have a decent camera with you considering you have your phone with you all the time is a win-win.

I recommend checking out reviews on YouTube of the phone you are considering purchasing to see what those reviewers have to say about that phone. It can give a great frame of reference to if the phone is for you.

The Right Sound for You

Posted on February 22, 2019April 9, 2019 by McKay Smith

Soundcore Flare

If you are in the market for a Bluetooth speaker that is the right bang for your buck, especially if you are on a budget and want something that is portable, the Soundcore Flare is the one for you.

Pros:

12-hour battery life on a single charge
Can be interacted with through its smartphone app
IP67 water resistance rating allowing it to effortlessly withstand dust, spills, rain, and even complete submersion in water
2 Flare speakers can be connected simultaneously to one device for stereo listening
Supports bass boost
Has lighting that is reactive to the music the speaker is playing as well as the ability to set the mood by having a specific color display always

Cons:

Charges via Micro USB which is becoming a thing of the past – most everything is transitioning to USB Type-C now-a-days.
The speaker is small, so it should be able to fill a small room, but don’t expect to be blown away by its sound out in an open area such as the beach.

I personally have owned this Bluetooth speaker for about a year now and can say that my speaker is still just as good as it was the day that I got it. It has been able to hold up from being submerged in Lake Powell as well as about a year of it daily playing music in my shower with no signs of water damage whatsoever.

I also really have enjoyed the option to boost the bass simply by the press of a button as well as the lighting effects. My favorite mode is for the lights to pulsate to the music the speaker is playing.

Conclusion:

Overall, although it is not the best Bluetooth speaker on the market; it most definitely is, in my opinion, the best Bluetooth speaker in its price range. I believe that you will be as happy with it as I have been.

Newsworthy Tech

Posted on February 16, 2019April 9, 2019 by McKay Smith

2019 Hype

Throughout this last year especially and making their way even more so into 2019 are bezeless displays. The desire for displays to have no border and be nothing but screen has been around for the past few years and companies have been slowly but surely been moving towards accomplishing their goals to achieve this. But even more so in recent newsworthy tech are foldable displays. I’d like to discuss with you why these are important for modern society.

Foldable Smartphones

Instead of being the same as they were before (flip phones dumb phones) phones or smartphones are now folding in a different way, the screen actually folds! This is very innovative technology that has not yet found perfection, and perhaps might be a ways off from just that, but the fact that this tech exists is totally awesome.

As for what is available thus far, that tech has proven to be more useful than gimmicky, actually. Consider how quite a few smartphone users have a tablet as well; then consider combining those 2 into one device!

This would be great because:

Smartphones are much more portable and can be transported in your pants pocket, while tablets are not as portable, but have a folding display to bring your tablet along with you gives you that portability!
If someone is looking to edit things on their phone, it makes for a better experience having a bigger screen real estate; just by the fold of your smartphone screen, there you have it.

The current companies with foldable smartphones are Samsung with the Galaxy Fold and Huawei with the Mate X. These smartphones aren’t going to be for everybody especially considering their price point(s) coming in at almost $2000 USD, but perhaps with time, these tech giants amongst others will find ways to bring their prices to a more desirable number.

The Top Tablet of 2018

Posted on February 12, 2019February 15, 2019 by McKay Smith

iPad Pro 11

The iPad Pro 11 was released in November of 2018 making its big entrance at the end of the year and becoming the most popular tablet of the year. It has a revamped display that omits the home button from the front of the iPad just as the newest iPhones have done away with their home buttons. This has proven to be very appealing for many users because the current trend has been to create displays on both phones and tablets have edge to edge screens.

The Specs:

Size: 11.0 inches with a 82.9% screen-to-body ratio
Memory: 64/256/512GB, 4GB RAM or 1TB, 6GB RAM
Main Camera: 12MP, f/1.8
- features: face detection, HDR, panoramo
- video: 1080p @ 30 fps
USB 3.1, Type-C 1.0 reversible connector; magnetic connector
Colors: Silver, Space Gray

Acting upon the future with Type-C

With the inclusion of Type-C versus the traditional lightning connector that has been around for years upon year, the iPad Pro has become more powerful than ever. Through the Type-C port, consumers are able to connect many different accessories to their iPad that were not supported before with the lightning connector. These accessories include, but are not limited to: an external display, DSLR cameras, charging of your iPhone or other devices, import photos and videos from external storage, hardware keyboards, and wired keyboards, as well multi-port hubs. This is all huge because the USB-C connector has opened up some many more doors for iPad Pro users, bringing more interest to those who felt limited by the lightning connector.

iPad Pro 11 connected to DSLR camera via USB Type-C

“It’s such an intimate creation process that it made me realize that Apple’s not merely trying to change my or your old habits. Apple’s not trying to make the iPad Pro a laptop replacement because the device isn’t one. It’s trying to do something bigger: invent a new way of creating for a new generation that is not bound to the old computing laws of clicking a mouse.”
– Mashable

Who is the iPad Pro 11 for?

In my opinion, the iPad Pro 11 is not for everybody. If you are just someone that is looking to read books and consume media such as TV shows from your tablet, look no further than the cheaper iPad 2018. But, for those that are looking to edit photos and perhaps a little video as well as take advantage of the USB-C port included on the iPad Pro 11 through supported accessories, this by far is the best bang for your buck.