Derby Beer Festival App for the Derby CAMRA City Charter Summer Beer and cider Festival 2013. A great idea !

The Derby CAMRA City Charter Summer Beer and cider Festival runs from Wednesday 10th July to Sunday 14th July 2013
This year we have gone all high-tech, for the first time ever you can now download a free Derby Beer Festival App from the Apple App Store here. Yes seriously !

The free Derby Beer Festival App for iPhone.
Use the link above to download it or on your iPhone tap App Store icon and search for derby beer festival You will need an iPhone 3GS or better to run this app.
This is a first for any beer festival and what a great idea it is. This is not an app for the sake of making an app. This is actually very useful. Someone has clearly really thought about the features of this app in great detail and it shows as you will soon see.
If you're a Beerticker then I dare say you will like this app a lot, unless you are still one of those that carries a large bundle of soiled notes with you to festivals.

When you tap the Dby Beer Fest icon, the first screen you see is the Drinks screen. This lists in alphabetical order all of the Beer, Cider, Perry, Mead and Continental beers that will be at the Derby Beer and cider festival 2013.




If you tap the search icon this will present you with a screen where you can filter your drinks list.
There are some very handy options on this page. For a start you can actually get it to only list drinks that are available at this time, ie ones that are on draught right now. I guess if its run out then this fact will be updated on this screen which is rather handy if it is.

You can get it to only show ones you have tried or only show ones you have not tried yet.
The list can be organised by Brewery, Name, ABV or your rating.
Below this is a scroll wheel that allows you to only list Beer, Continental, Cider, Perry or Mead.
If you click done this will then show your selected drinks. The scroll wheel even allows sub-filtering  so for instance if you select Cider you can also select Sweet, Medium Sweet, Medium, Dry etc.
or for beers it offers 10 different sub filters such as Bitter, Pale, Strong,  Porter etc.



So back at the Drinks list you can scroll through all of your drinks that you have filtered. Tap the A-Z letters down the right to jump to that letter.
On this screen you can tap on any drink and it will then take you to a screen which tells you about that drink and useful stuff such as which bar its at "Bar : Marquee" for instance.

Now for the clever stuff, If you scroll down you can mark the drink as tried, add it to your shortlist, rate it out of 5, Add your own notes, take a photo of your drink and even share your info via email, Text or Twitter.





Viewing the my notes and photo section for Three Cats cider :



At the bottom of the app are buttons for Ale Trail - this shows a map with all of Derby's real ale pubs marked on them and your current location. If you tap one of the pins then it gives your more detail on that pub and what they are serving.



The final button at the bottom opens up a screen full of info such as opening times, chairman's welcome, Entertainment, Beer styles, Sponsors etc



It will be interesting to see how this app works in practise, if it does then I can see this being very good for those with iPhones.

Note that the Assembly Rooms will be providing free Wi-Fi throughout the venue so this app should work really well.

Thanks
Andy

iPhone 3GS - Replacing the loom for Headphone, Power, Volume and silent switches. video on how to do it and my handy tips.

This may be of help to you if you are about to have a go at replacing a faulty Mute switch/Headphone socket/Volume controls,Power button loom on an iPhone. I did it and its now fixed !

I recently bought a second hand iPhone 3GS and the phone was in good condition, all the buttons worked  apart from one. The power button on the top did not work reliably and consistently. This made it difficult to turn the phone off as holding it in for a few seconds did not work. Also pressing it briefly to turn the phone on or off did not work very often.

Investigation online showed that this was due to a damaged switch inside the phone. Being an electronics engineer I thought I would have a go at replacing the loom. This is what the replacement 3GS loom looks like :

Replacement 3GS loom with Headphone, Power, Volume and silent switches

Note you can get either a black or a white loom, but it does not really matter which you get.

I managed to find a very detailed step by step video that shows you how to disassemble an iPhone 3GS right down to the loom that we need to replace. And I really do mean detailed, screw by screw.
You can pretty much get any replacement part for your iPhone from Amazon, the loom for Headphone, Power, Volume and mute switches, The back casing, the home button, the front glass and batteries too :



These iPhone looms are available on ebay for as little as £2.49 I paid £3.50 for a new loom from a seller in Derby as it happens. Its worth looking around as you could pay over the odds for the very same thing. Click HERE to search for 3GS looms on ebayUK.
The loom is flat when you get it, You will have to fold it to match the original one in the iPhone. It has little strips of self adhesive tape on bits of the flex. You will need to peel off the white bits.

The step by step video on removing a faulty 3GS loom:

The major problem with this video is that it does NOT show you how to reassemble your iPhone and how to install the replacement loom. It just says reverse the procedure, Yea right !!!

Some other things I would suggest. When you open the phone up you will find its full of dust and other debris. Its best to try and remove all of this before you assemble the phone otherwise these bits may end up in the camera housing area and impair the cameras view. I used cotton buds soaked in Isopropyl alcohol and also a little can of air.

My tips to help you do this:
1) You must have tons of patience, this is a very complex process to follow.
2) Allow plenty of time to take it apart and put it back together. Don't rush it.
3) You will need a clean tidy, well lit desk to do this. It's not the kind of job you should attempt on your knee or on soft furnishings as the screws in the iPhone are so tiny you won't find them ever again if you drop them.
4) You must have the right screwdriver size, do not bodge it
5) I suggest you magnetize your screwdriver, I found it impossible to assemble it without doing this.
6) In order to make sure you do not forget any screws during the reassembly of the phone what I did was get an A4 bit of paper and stuck bits of Blutak on it so I could stick the screws into it as I removed them. I then wrote next to them helpful things such as "Step 5 - 8 x screws and camera clamp". The BluTak will stop them rolling around and the notes will help you put the phone back together in reverse.

7) I found it handy to stick the back of the iPhone down onto the desk using 4 balls of BluTak, this made it easy to fit the screws back in without having to hold the phone.
8) Use a movable table lamp to illuminate closely what your working on, ideally day light.
9) The battery in my phone was stuck down so was not removable like the one in this video. I had to carefully prize it off the back panel slowly bit by bit.
10) Do not use excessive force on the connections, look at the mating parts and understand how they fit together.
11) The view at 3:49 is of the top of the phone where the power button is.
12) When removing the 8 screws that hold the motherboard in place, one of the screws near the camera has a little spring bracket that holds the camera down.
13) In Step 8 be aware there is a small springy tag on the edge of the board near the antenna that will make it hard to pull the board out.
14) In Step 10 there are a few different lengths of screws, make a note on your paper which goes where.
15) When fitting the  new headphone socket you will have to fold the ribbon flex around the moulding. On the original one you will notice that it has clear insulating tape covering the components that are on the side of it. The replacement one does not have this so you will need to insert a tiny bit of paper down this bit to stop it shorting on the metal work near that corner otherwise you may find problems with your sound.
16) If the power button falls out and you are wondering how it fits back in. That odd metal bar thing (looks like a toilet roll holder) should be down and fits into the area below the button. It is there to provide a stability to the long power button so it does not wobble when you press it.
17) The small screwdriver I used was in a set of "jewelers screwdrivers" I got from Poundland.
18) If you damage anything when putting it back together you can always get spare parts for iPhone 3GS from Amazon.


Its worth pointing out that I did NOT have a suction removal tool, What I used was a big lump of BluTak which I mounded onto the glass near the home button I then grabbed hold of it and this worked perfectly. Probably would not work if it had a screen protector stuck on it.

After I reassembled the iPhone I was expecting it to not work at all or for something not to be quite right, but amazingly everything is fully working. And the power button is now perfectly reliable. So there you go fully fixed for a total of £3.59 for the loom and about 2 hours of time.

Testing that you have reassembled the iPhone 3GS correctly.
After such a fiddly process you are bound to make mistakes and not connect something correctly so its important to check everything before your 100% happy with the repair, especially if you have done this repair for someone else. After all you don't want to hand it back and then they come back to you a week later saying the Mapping no longer works.

Things to check after repair :
1) LCD missing lines. Are all the pixels on the display still working ok.
2) LCD Backlight, Is this working ok
3) Home button, try it several times.
4) Power button, try it several times by pressing briefly then try power off mode by holding it in for 4 seconds.
5) Volume buttons, play some music and try up and down several times.
6) Mute/Silent switch. Toggle this down and ensure the bell with a slash through it shows. toggle it up and ensure the bell with volume bargraph shows. Try several times.
7) Plug in some iPhone headphones and check left and right speakers are working ok.
8) Make a phone call and check that the microphone built into the headphone lead works ok.
9) Proximity sensor - Make a phone call then using your hand cover up the top face of the phone (where the earpiece is) and ensure that the backlight goes off. This checks you have plugged in the little ribbon correctly.
10) Click on the Maps app and tap the location button (bottom left), ensure that the GPS is working by the map moving to where you are.
11) Ensure that Wi-Fi is working by using the internet via your wifi connection.
12) Connect the iPhone USB lead and ensure that the iPhone starts to charge up ok.

Hope this helps you if your contemplating doing this. If you found my guide of use then please comment or link to it from Facebook etc.

Follow me on Twitter - Andy Savage from Derby.

Thanks
Andy

Beatbox Bird "Unexpected Tweet" Ring Tone for your iPhone. Download it here for free.

Tweet
iPhone Ringtone of Beatbox Bird "Unexpected Tweet". Download it for free.

I'm sure by now you must have seen this odd mini teaser advert for the FirstDirect Bank, it features a bird doing some pretty amazing beatboxing to two other birds. there was no clue given at first as to what this was about. It just ran for a few seconds then said #unexpectedTweet
It was only till a few days later that the full advert was revealed of which the beatboxing bird was just a tiny segment. The full advert follows a Duck-Billed Platypuss

I thought I would have a go at making this silly beatboxing bird into a ringtone that you can use on your iPhone. I have made it available here for free.

To use it on your iPhone follow these simple instructions :

1) Using the mouse Right-Click on the link below and select from the popup menu

"Save Link As..." or "Save target as..." :
Beatbox Bird - Unexpected Tweet ringtone.m4r  

2) Save the file somewhere you know.
3) Run iTunes (current version is v11.03.42) goto File - Add File to Library and browse to the file you have just downloaded "beatbox_bird_unexpected_tweet_ringtone"and click the Open button.
4) If you now click on the library type button (top left) and change it from Music to "Tones" you should see this new ringtone now listed.
5) Plug in your iPhone and allow it to fully sync your iPhone. This will copy the new ringtone onto the phone.
6) Now on your iPhone tap Settings, Sounds, Ringtone and you should see the beatbox_bird listed at the top of the ringtones list. Simply tap it to select this as your new ring tone !

You can also select it as your sound for other things such as Text messages, voicemail, email, Reminders, Tweets etc.

If you liked this then please retweet my blog post using the tweet button at the top, pass it on.

The sounds of the beatboxing bird are actually provided by well known beatboxer Marv-ill Superlungs.

If you like TV Adverts then you may be interested in my UK TV Adverts web page.

Thanks
Andy

Product review for a TeckNet iEP387 7AH USB Power Bank, I can highly recommend this product. Perfect for your iPhone, HTC, Tablets etc

Product review for a TeckNet iEP387 7000mAH USB Power Bank

The product reviewed here is from Amazon :

The product I'm reviewing here goes by many names such as USB Portable Power, Mobile Emergency Charger, Power Bank, External USB Battery, Portable Charger for Cell Phone

This is one of those things you can't do without if you have a smartphone, having used it I can highly recommend it.
In my tests it was able to fully charge my iPhone 3GS from dead to 100% 4 and a half times over a week before the power pack had discharged.
As you can see in my photograph the power bank is about the same size as my iPhone 3GS.

Do you remember the old days of mobile phones when your battery would last for a week, then the smartphone arrived and we
accepted that the battery would last for one day, maybe two if you were lucky. If your going to be away from a source of power for a while then
this can cause problems especially if you then need to use your phone in an emergency. Another problem is when you are going on a long journey and are using your smartphone
to watch movies or surf the internet for a hours as this can drain the battery quicker than normal.
Well I have the solution to your problems here.
For the past couple of years I had been using a cheap battery pack which attached to the bottom of my iPhone, this would put about 50% charge into the phone. This charger recently went faulty so
I wanted to find a better solution. After a few days of research and looking at reviews of USB battery packs I found this one, the TekNet iEP387
I decided to do my own review and tests on this to confirm that it really was as good as advertised, here are my results.

When the power pack arrived it had about 80% charge in it, I charged it up to 100% before doing my tests.
Two days later I allowed my iPhone 3GS to fully discharge to 0%
Charge 1) I connected it to the TekNet power bank and it took about 2 hours to charge my iPhone to 100%
Charge 2) Two days later I repeated this from 2% to 100% in 2 hours
Charge 3) Two days later I repeated this from 3% to 100% in 2 hours
Charge 4) Two days later I repeated this from 4%
Charge 5) Three days later I allowed the phone to get down to 5% and this time the Power Bank managed to charge it to 43% before it finally stopped charging the iPhone.

I think thats pretty good from one charge.

What do you get?
You get the iEP387 Power Bank unit
A single USB lead which is used for charging up the power pack and also for charging your device from the power pack.
8 adaptors for various phones
A velvet bag to carry it in.

As per this photograph :

Dimensions:
119mm x 73mm x 17mm
It weighs just 185g so just a bit more than an iPhone (iPhone 4s is 140g)

On the top edge of the iEP387 you will find two USB sockets
5V @ 1A and a 5V @ 2.1A socket, in between the USB sockets is a LED torch

As per my photograph :

Charging the power pack:
On the right side of the unit you will find a micro USB socket labelled "IN", this is how you charge up the power pack.
In my tests I found that it took about 6 hours to fully charge (from fully discharged) using my standard iPhone mains charger that came with my iPhone 3GS.
Note - The manual says that you should NOT charge it from your PC USB port as it required more current than a standard PC USB port can provide.

Using the power pack
To charge up your device is simple, you simply plug in your device via its normal USB lead into one of the USB sockets on the TekNet power pack
then press the power button to activate the power pack. When you press the power button you should see the power indicator lights come on showing the current capacity left
in the pack. Your device should show that it is charging.
Note - This power pack has TWO USB sockets, this allows you to charge two devices simultaneously, which is a rather clever idea!
Also worth noting that one of the sockets is a 2.1A socket, this socket is for more power hungry devices such as tablets etc
the other USB socket is a standard 1A socket. If your just using this power pack to charge phones then use either USB socket as there is no difference.

Power Pack Activation
One thing worth noting about this power pack is that the USB sockets are dead until you activate them by pressing the power button. This is done
to save power and also for safety as it means the USB contacts do not have any power on them until you want power. Which is good if your car keys have
dropped into the socket.
The power pack will automatically turn its self off after a few seconds when you disconnect your device so you don't need to worry about turning it off.

Power indicator leds
Next to the power button are a set of 5 blue leds.

Charging:
When you charge the power pack these leds indicate how charged the pack is.

Discharging (i.e. charging your devices)
The leds show the current capacity of the batteries.

Torch
This power pack has a simple (single led) built in torch which can be handy at times.
To activate the LED torch press (and keep pressed) the power button for about 3 seconds and the torch will illuminate.
Press (and keep pressed) the power button for about 3 seconds to turn it off again.
If you leave the torch on then it will stay on until the power pack runs out of power, which I imagine would take many weeks to happen.

This pack comes with a wide variety of power plug adaptors for many models of phone, tablet etc as follows:
Micro USB
HTC and Motorola
iPod, iPhone, iPad
PSP
Nokia N70
NDSL
Samsung M300
Samsung P1000

You can see these adaptors in this photograph :

If none of these adaptors are suitable then just use the one that comes with your device or but a 10 in 1 kit such as :


So would I recommend this power pack?, most definitely!
Hope you found this review of use, any questions about this product let me know in the comments box.

The product reviewed here is from Amazon :



Hopefully you found my review of use, I can highly recommend this product, it does exactly what I need.
If you have any questions about this product add a comment below.

By the way if you really need even more capacity than this model, they now do a 9000mAH version which you can use to charge your Apple: iPad mini, iPhone 5, iPad 4 (Lightning Cable not Provided) / iPhone 4S 4, iPod, iPad 3, 2, 1 / HTC One, One X, One S, Sensation G14, EVO, Desire HD S Z / Samsung Galaxy S4 S3 I9300, Galaxy Ace, Galaxy Nexus, Galaxy Note, Galaxy Tab / Motorola Triumph, Atrix, Droid Razr, Defy, Defy + / Nokia N9 N8 N900 N800,Lumia 800 900,920,925 / Blackberry Bold 8520 9900 9300 9360, Z10 / Google Nexus 7, Nexus 10 / Sony Ericsson Xperia X10 X8 Arc / GoPro

Here it is :




Thanks
Andy

Video of Maps app in "follow mode" running on an iPhone 3GS while on a moving train. Using ios5

This is a quick simple video showing what the Maps app on an iPhone 3GS looks like in "follow mode" when you are on a moving train. I find it interesting how accurate it follows the railway tracks.
You can see the shadow cast by bridges in the home button on the right, as you can see it coincides with the bridges on the map.

We take this technology for granted, imagine going back to the 1980's and telling someone what you can do these days they would not believe you could have such power.


If you own a smartphone and use the built-in mapping application then you will probably be aware of what it can do. On my iPhone 3GS (still on ios5) the "Maps" application allows you to see Satellite imagery for your location by simply tapping once on the arrow button (bottom left of the Map screen) it will go into "locate" mode. Your current position on the Earth is marked by that blue dot with the white circle around it.
When you do this it uses the built-in GPS to find you and show the map.

If you tap the arrow again it goes into "Follow mode", this means it will move the map arround as you move around and keep it centered.

If I had not done this video in follow mode then the blue dot would have moved down to the bottom left and gone off screen.

If you tap the arrow for a third time then it puts it into "compass mode", this is the same as follow mode but now also orientates the map so the roads are exactly as you see them now. (assuming you are holding the phone the correct way around!).

As you probably know one of the biggest features that iOS 6 removed was the Google Maps App. This is the one reason I have not bothered to update my iPhone from ios v5.1.1

If your trying to work out where the train journey is, its near Stockport in Manchester, UK. The phone is running on ios 5.1.1, The network provider is o2 PAYG using their ALL ROUNDER WEB bolt On.

The blank squares at 2:24 are because it has not managed to download the data for those sections in time so they appear blank and then fill in as they move.

If you have updated to ios6 and miss the Google Maps app then you can now download it as a free app !
Google Maps App for iPhone ios6.

Its almost the same as the ios5 maps app but you have to get a google account and sign in if you want to save addressed etc.

Hope you found this of interest.

Thanks
Andy

How to get FREE Wi-Fi at JD Wetherspoon pubs, very simple.

If your an iPhone owner on O2 pay as you go then I dare say like me you had free unlimited Cloud Wi-Fi access as part of your deal with the iPhone. That service stopped in February 2011.
If your on PAYG then its always best to use free wifi if its available as you can soon use up your limit. PAYG web use limits are often 100mb/500mb or 1Gb per month.

Well did you know that you still can get free Wi-Fi in all Wetherspoon pubs and in fact anywhere that you see the Cloud showing up as a hotspot. It does not matter what network provider you are with, this does not matter its free to everyone!

So how do I get free Wi-Fi?
You will need to set up a free account on The Cloud. For this you just need a valid email address.
Of course you will need to set up your account via your 3G/4G phone connection (not the wifi) or set it up at home.

Set up your Cloud account here :
https://service.thecloud.net/service-platform/login/registration/

or follow the links yourself : http://www.thecloud.net/free-wifi/join-the-cloud/

When ever you want to use the free wifi in the future all you have to do is log in using the email address and password you used to register with. So once you have setup your account it really is very quick and simple, I will show you how simple here using screen grabs from my iPhone to help you.

So your in the pub, what next?
You will first need to connect your device to The Cloud, on your smartphone or laptop go to your wifi settings and see whats available.

Here on my iPhone you can see _The Cloud showing up so tap on it and allow it to connect to the cloud. on an Iphone this is indicated by the Wi-Fi symbol showing up at the top of the screen next to your phone operator sysmbol. Don't connect to any other hotspots apart from "_The Cloud"

Wi-Fi Networks as seen in a Wetherspoons pub. Select _The Cloud.

Once your device is connected to The Cloud, launch your web browser and go to any web page at all so that it redirects to The "Cloud landing page" that relates to where you are connecting from, i.e Weatherspoon adverts.
You may have to refresh it a couple of times to force the landing page to show like the one below.

By the way you may have noticed your phone showing the web page below in a pub anyway, thats because often your phone will prefer to connect to wifi if the 3G signal is weak.


The Cloud "landing page"
In this example here, I'm in the Bankers Draft pub in Sheffield so its showing stuff related to Wetherspoon pubs.
Now you need to tap the "Get Online" option (I've highlighted in red)

In a Wetherspoon pub you will get a screen like this, click on Get Online >

On the next screen as you can see there are a few choices, the one we want is "Free Cloud WiFi" (I've highlighted in red).
Note : If you are a Sky cusomer then you can login using your Skyid information.
Sky acquired The Cloud in January 2011 which is why Sky customers get free unlimited wifi.
More info : www.sky.com/helpcentre/account-and-billing/sky-id

Select Free Cloud WiFi to get 24 hours free wifi.

If this is the FIRST TIME you have used this then you will need to create your account by taping on the "Don't have an account?" link.(I've highlighted in red) Fill in all the details to create your account.

If YOU HAVE previously registered then all you need to do is fill in your email and password and tap the blue Continue button and you now have free wi-fi for 24 hours.

On this screen you enter your email and password that you used to setup your cloud account with.

Here I am running the speedtest.net app using the free Cloud Wi-Fi provided at the pub, as you can see its quite fast, The upload speed was 773kbps.

Broadband speedtest app running on The Cloud in a Wetherspoons pub.

Thats it. you now have free wi-fi at all cloud wifi hotspots in the UK.

Just remember to follow my simple guide to getting free wifi next time. The simple steps now you have registered are :
1 Connect to The Cloud hotspot.
2 Force the landing page to show.
3 Select free wifi and enter your email and password and click continue.
4 Wi-Fi is now free for 24 hours.

Note : When you register you will receive and email with the title "Cloud support - Welcome to The Cloud" stating that you have registered with the Cloud, Europe's largest independant public hotspot network.

Once you are logged into the cloud you can tap "My Account" and you can see all the locations you have logged in before and what active products you have, i.e "Cloud 24 Hours Free".

Always use free wifi if you can rather than waste your 3G/4G data plan!
If your on O2 PAYG then you can find out how much web use you have left by sending the text message BALANCE to the phone number 20202  and you will get two text messages back saying how much you have left.
For example on my O2 phone I have just tried it and it came back with "1 of 2: ALLROUNDERWEB Bolt On - You have 491.3 MB web and 17 pic msgs left this month. This expires on 09 Nov."


Here is another example of the cloud "landing page", this one is at Scream in Derby. Notice it has the same Get Online option.

example of the cloud landing page at Scream in Derby.

Hope you found this of use, Leave a comment if you did.

Thanks
Andy

How to find GSM towers in your area and the new 4G LTE network in Derby.

The new 4G LTE Network in Derby.

Working in the engineering department of revenue assurance business for mobile phone operators I'm interested in the technology behind GSM radio communications and unless you have been hiding under a rock then you will be well aware of the newest technology soon to launch in Derby. That is 4G LTE technology.

Everything Everywhere, announced last week that it is investing £3.8 million in Derby on new masts, cabinet equipment and software. In case you did not know, Everything Everywhere or EE is the new name for Orange and T-Mobile (formally one-to-one)

Derby is one of 16 cities that is getting the upgrade to its network, part of EE's £1.5 billion investment over the next three years. So we are quite lucky in Derby to have been chosen out of the 66 cities in the UK.
4G in Derby should be up and running on EE for Christmas, are you ready for it?

4G LTE is around five times faster than the fastest 3G network currently available in the UK. This will speed up downloading, browsing and streaming significantly and its definitely a worthwhile upgrade if you are want to get the most of of your smartphone.

A number of 4G LTE smartphones are launching on the Everything Everywhere (EE) network this year including the iPhone 5, Samsung Galaxy SIII LTE and the Nokia Lumia 920 and Lumia 820, the HTC One XL, as well as devices and USB dongles from Huawei and of course the new iPad.
The 4G compaitible iPhone 5 became available in the UK on Friday, September 21st......


Our current mobile networks use 3G/UMTS technology, which has been around since 2003 and which isn't really fast enough for the kinds of things we want to do today.
4G/LTE - it's short for Fourth Generation / Long Term Evolution - is its better, faster replacement, and it's been rolled out in all kinds of places one of which is Derby !


4G's amazing speed comes courtesy of OFDM (Orthogonal Frequency Division Multiplexing), the same transmission technology used by ADSL, Wi-Fi, DVB-T, DVB-H and DAB. OFDM not only reduces latency, but minimises interference and can cram more data into the same slice of radio bandwidth.

It will make 4G smartphones ideal for streaming video and online gaming, not least because 4G is designed as a data network, not a voice one, so it uses the same TCP/IP protocols that underpin the Internet.

Further speed increases are also possible with the addition of MIMO (Multiple Input Multiple Output) technology. The idea of having multiple antennas on transmitters and receivers is already used to great effect in 802.11n Wi-Fi gear.

Everything Everywhere LTE will be launched with a selection of 16 major cities by the end of this year and expanding to cover up to 70% of the UK by the end of 2013.
Testing of the 4G network started in Birmingham, Bristol, Cardiff and London. Once these initial four pilot cities are up and running, Everything Everywhere aims to switch on LTE networks across an additional 12 major cities by the end of 2012, reaching a total of 20 million people.
The cities to get 4G first are Belfast, Birmingham, Bristol, Cardiff, Derby, Edinburgh, Glasgow, Hull, Leeds, Liverpool, London, Manchester, Nottingham, Newcastle, Sheffield and Southampton.

3G v 4G tests
Here is a video of various performance tests showing the difference between 3G and 4G in the UK, using O2 3G compared with O2 4G (Be Un Limited) This test was done in the O2 arena in London as this is where the 4G LTE service is already live.

This will show you things such as running speedtest.net to show the ping time, download speed and upload speed. Also streaming 1080p Video, Large file downloads, general web surfing.
As you will see the difference is amazing.

Hopefully the other providers Three, O2 and Vodaphone will follow soon with their 4G LTE service in Derby!

GSM mast Finder.
Have you ever wondered where your local tower is located for your mobile phone operator?
You may have noticed these GSM towers located as you drive around, you will mainly see them on the tall buildings around Derby. In more industrial areas they are on tall antenna masts like this one here :

A typical GSM mast for Orange (EE).

A few years ago I found a website that shows you the location of GSM masts on a map. Recently they updated the website to make better use of modern mapping solutions so its a lot simpler to use now.

Here is a screen grab of what you will find if you search for Derby and zoom in :

The Sitefinder website showing GSM masts in Derby (Click to enlarge)

I imagine that soon this map will be updated to show all of the new masts for the 4G LTE system as it rolls out in Derby.
If you would like to search for masts in your area this is how to use the service.
Visit the sitefinder website -www.sitefinder.ofcom.org.uk
Then click on the UK map (or click "search at location"), type in your location or even your post code and click the search button. If you have selected a wide area then it will not show any masts until you zoom in.
You can drag the map around to reveal the GSM masts.
Simply click on  a blue marker to reveal which service providers use the mast.

Reference:
Macrocell - A macrocell is normally a mast or other structure supporting a large antenna designed to give coverage over a large area.
Microcell - A micro cell is a low power station, often using unobtrusive antennas, designed to give coverage over a small localised area. 

As well as O2, Vodaphone and EE (T-Mobile & Orange) masts, this map will also show ones used by Network Rail and Airwave TETRA (Police and Emergency Services).

Its worth noting that not all the masts you see may show on this map yet as they take time to be put onto this map. For example that mast in the upper car park of the DRI on Osmaston Road took several months to show on this map. If you have a look using the service you will see its an O2 mast.

In Derby you can also find out in advance of any installations of new phone masts by using the eplanning service on the Derby City Council website.
visit Derby City eplanning.
Then in the applicant name field type telefonica or Vodafone etc or set the Application Type to "Telecommunication installations" and search. This will list any plans as well as all previous plans (approved and failed).
On any search results simply click on the link in the orange bit where it says "link to more details" and then use the tabs below it such as documents to see all the detailed plans on the installation and even letters of complaint!

Smartphone Apps
There is an app available for free on the iPhone that will allow you to see on a map where they are relative to your current location. goto the App store and search for Find Tower by Giacomo Balli.

If you have a jailbroken iPhone then there is a much better app called Signal iPhone created by iPhone Dev Team member planetbeing. This app shows you all the technical details about each cell site in your area.
Here is a screengrab of what it looks like in action :

Signal running on my jailbroken iPhone.

Hope you found this of interest.

Thanks
Andy

Useful free apps for Train Passengers on iPhone. Know the Platform, live information etc

If you are an occasional user of the railway network in the UK then I have a couple of handy free apps for the iPhone that I often use, that you may find of use.

Sheffield Railway Station.

I use these apps so I know where and when trains are arriving and where they are going to. You can of course do a lot more with these apps such as buy tickets.
These are great if you have arrived at a train station, bought your ticket and want to know quickly what time and platform your next train is due without scanning the departures boards.

The apps are :
The trainline.com
Crosscountry Train Tickets.
These free apps are available for iPhone and Android.

In my examples below we are going to look at trains between Derby and Sheffield.
thetrainline app
Once installed click thetrainline icon. Click on edit and tap "Press to change home station". Lets say we are going to Sheffield. Select Sheffield and it will return you to the main screen.
Now simply tap "Next train home" and it will show you the next 5 trains that will take you to Sheffield from Derby station. It will show you the departure time, arrival time, Duration and if you have to change.

Tainline app showing next trains to Sheffield

Train Tickets app

Once installed click Train Tickets icon. Click on Live Train Times icon, Tap Departures and select Derby and tap the "View Trains" button. This will show you the next 18 trains that are going to depart from Derby station. It even tells you if the train is on time or how many minutes late it is and also what platform its going to leave from!
If you tap one of the trains then it will show you a graphical map of the position of the train for its entire journey. So you can see where the train journey started from and where its going to end.

Traintickets app showing live departure times from Derby.

Traintickets app showing graphic map position of train

Tainline app showing next trains to Derby

Here we can see that the 15:54 train from Sheffield is going all the way to Penzance :

Here we see that the 15:54 train to Derby from Sheffield is 1 minute late :

The trainline app is very handy for quick checking of train journey durations as you can never assume that things stay the same. For example normally it takes around 32 minutes to get from Derby to Sheffield but checking this now (June 8th 2012) I can see its anything from 53 minutes to 1 hour 33 minutes !!!!!
I'm guessing there are some sort of engineering works causing this massive delay? You could get to London is the same time !

Hope someone finds these free apps of use.
Andy

Best software for converting video files (divx) to iPhone format (mp4)

Over the years I have tried several bits of software for converting video files into the format that is used by the iPhone and some are better than others. For the last few months I have found a program that is perfect and very reliable and quick on Windows 7.  The iPhone is great for watching videos on long train journeys so get converting.
Here you can see the main panel of the software. I have added quite a few video files for it to convert.

uRexsoft iPhone Video Converter main panel.

Preview panel during conversion.

It seems to cope with just about any video file you give it to convert.
It will convert MKV, AVI, MPEG, WMV, MOV, M2TS videos to iPhone 4S, iPhone 4, iPhone 3G and iPhone 3GS format.
Unlike most other programs I have tried this one uses multi-core processing and works on Windows 7 64 bit without crashing.
It will convert videos into files that are compatible with iPod, iPod classic, iPod touch, iPod Nano,iPhone, iPhone 3G, iPhone 3GS, iPhone 4,iPhone 4S.
It supports these input video formats : AVI, MP4, DivX, MPEG, H264, WMV, MKV, MOV, VOB, ASF, DV, 3GP, HD VOB, HD MKV, HD TS, HD AVI, HD MPEG, HD MP4, HD ASF, HD WMV, HD MOV

The software is :
uRexsoft iPhone Video Converter.

uRexsoft Video Converter only costs £16.62 which is quite reasonable and you can pay using Paypal.


It really is very simple to use, Click on the "Output Profile" button and select your device, then add video files you want to convert then click the start button. that's it !

Adding the Videos to your iPhone via iTunes.
Once the program has completed converting the video files you should have the same files but with the following added to the end of each filename  "_(new).mp4".
To get these onto your iPhone, run iTunes and for a single video simply go to File and select "Add file to Library" (or add folder for multiple videos) then browse to the location of the converted video and add it. iTunes will then import the video and it will appear in your playlist. Now SYNC your phone to transfer the video over to your device.
If you are using an iPhone with ios 5.1 then your video can be found by clicking on the Videos icon, if your are using ios 4 then videos are in the iPod icon on the bottom bar of the iPhone.

By the way something worth pointing out is in iTunes there is a setting which can be changed which may make it better for you - goto the Edit dropdown menu - Preferences and click on the Advanced tab and add a tick to the option "Copy files to iTunes Media folder when adding to library". if you have this ticked then you never have to worry about missing videos and music. If you don't tick this then if your not careful files can be removed from iTunes simply because you have moved them around since you added them. So I think this is a much better option to avoid that issue (as long as you have the hard disk space!).

uRexsoft also make other converters if you are interested.


Hope you find this of use.

Thanks
Andy
www.derbyphotos.co.uk

The 2012 CAMRA Derby Winter Beer Festival Wednesday 15th February to Saturday 18th February.

It does not seem long since the Derby Summer beer festival was here does it, well now its not long until the Derby Winterfest 2012. Which is the 11th winter beer festival to take place in Derby.
Here is my complete guide to this Winter beer festival in Derby.
Update : Saturday 18th Feb 2012.

The 2012 CAMRA Derby Winter Beer Festival starts on Wednesday 15th February and runs until Saturday 18th February. Here are all the details about this years winter beer festival
This will take place the Derby Roundhouse on Pride Park, Derby.

If you have never been to a beer festival before then you are missing an experience, there are not just beers on sale there are ciders and Perries.  You can get some hot or cold food too. T-shirts and glasses are available to buy. And great live music to watch each day.

Its best to arrive by the free bus service from Derby Assembly rooms.

This year there will be real ale on sale in the Carriage Room as well as the Main Hall of the Round House itself. The Carriage Room will also host the extensive range of live entertainment.

Dates and opening times:
Wednesday 15th February 4pm to 11pm
Thursday 16th February 11am to 11pm
Friday 17th February 11am to 11pm
Saturday 18th February 11am to 11pm

Entrance charges:
FREE to CAMRA Members at all times. Non-members will be charged as follows :

Wednesday 15.2.12 4pm - 11pm - £3
Thursday 16.2.12 11am - 4pm - £2
Thursday 16.2.12 4pm - 11pm - £4
Friday 17.2.12 11am - 4pm - £3
Friday 17.2.12 4pm - 11pm - £5
Saturday 18.2.12 11am - 4pm - £3
Saturday 18.2.12 4pm - 11pm - £5

Travelling to the Derby Winter Beer Festival:
There is a FREE Shuttle Bus between Derby Town Centre and the beer festival provided by Harpurs Coaches. (Yes its FREE there and back honest !) and travels as below :
I have created a very detail map for this free bus showing locations etc. - Free Derby Beer Festival Shuttle Bus Map.

This free bus shuttle will run at these times :

Wednesday 15th, Leaves Derby City Centre at these times :
17:30, 18:00, 18:30, 19:00, 19:30, 20:00, 20:30, 21:00
Leaves the Roundhouse at these times :
17:45, 18:15, 18:45, 19:15, 19:45, 20:15, 20:45, 21:15

Thursday 16th, Leaves Derby City Centre at these times :
14:00, 14:30, 15:00, 15:30, 16:00, 16:30, 17:00, 17:30, 18:00, 18:30, 19:00, 19:30, 20:00, 20:30, 21:00
Leaves the Roundhouse at these times :
14:15, 14:45, 15:15, 15:45, 16:15, 16:45, 17:15, 17:45, 18:15, 18:45, 19:15, 19:45, 20:15, 20:45, 21:15

Friday 17th, Leaves Derby City Centre at these times :
14:00,14:30,15:00,15:30,16:00,16:30,17:00,17:30, 18:00, 18:30, 19:00, 19:30, 20:00, 20:30, 21:00
Leaves the Roundhouse at these times :
14:15, 14:45, 15:15, 15:45, 16:15, 16:45, 17:15, 17:45, 18:15, 18:45, 19:15, 19:45, 20:15, 20:45, 21:15

Saturday 18th, Leaves Derby City Centre at these times :
11:00, 11:30, 12:00, 12:30, 13:00, 13:30, 14:00, 14:30, 15:00, 15:30, 16:00, 16:30, 17:00, 17:30, 18:00, 18:30, 19:00, 19:30, 20:00, 20:30, 21:00
Leaves the Roundhouse at these times :
11:15, 11:45,12:15, 12:45, 13:15, 14:45, 14:15, 14:45, 15:15, 15:45, 16:15, 16:45, 17:15, 17:45, 18:15, 18:45, 19:15, 19:45, 20:15, 20:45, 21:15

The bus looks like this, its quite distinctive so keep your drunken eye open for it  :

Here we see the Beer bus on The Morledge.



Live entertainment at the 2012 Derby Beer Festival :
Wednesday 15th February its an 'Open Mic' music & song night with prearranged Performers. Bands TBC.
Thursday 16th February its The Merseybeasts.
Friday 17th February its Superdupergrass followed by the Headline Act Coldplace.
Saturday 18th February the UK Foo Fighters headline supported by Steak Club.

Venue
The Roundhouse
Roundhouse Road, Pride Park, Derby, DE24 8JE

A video showing a pan around the Roundhouse at last years winter beerfest.


For those non-drinkers giving people a lift in your car, the SATNAV postcode for Derby Roundhouse is DE24 8JE

Its also a perfect location to get to by train as Derby railway station is less that 30 seconds walk away from this venue !
See when the next train to Derby station is here - Thetrainline.com

Google Streetview of Derby Roundhouse. (note this was captured by Google before the Derby College restoration was completed!)

Smartphone mapping pin for smartphone owners:
If you are a new visitor to Derby's winter beer festival then you will find my smartphone navigation pin of use. Simply view this blog on your smartphone and follow my instruction below.

Derby Winter Beer Festival drop pin <---- Tap this link on you smartphone.

When you tap the link above, it will launch your mapping application and place a "push pin" onto the map with the exact location of Derby Roundhouse beer festival. You can then use this marker to get walking directions.

For example on an iPhone you tap the "Directions" button at the bottom and this will pre-fill in the start location with your current location and the end location with the Roundhouse.

So all you need to do is just tap the "Route" button at the bottom then tap the walking icon and it will show you walking route. If you tap the bottom left icon 3 times then this will turn on follow mode, Centre mode and direction mode. What this means is that a blue flashing dot which represents you will stay in the centre of the screen and orientated in the direction that you travel in.

If you tap the middle button at the top, this will even show you which bus number and when the next bus to the Roundhouse is from your nearest location.
My push pins are far more accurate than any other map as its not based on the postcode which most maps are. My map is based on local knowledge of the location.

Beer and Cider Lists:
The Complete Beer and Cider lists are here : (These are in .PDF format.)

The Beer List.
Cider and Perry List.
Continental Beer List.

With regards to Cider and Perry, the tub labels should tell most of what you need to know when ordering. Green labels are cider and yellow labels are perry.
Good to see they have Gwynt y Ddraig Black Dragon on as this was on in The Babington Arms and the Standing Order but sold out before I had chance to even try it !
We also have Three Cats Morley a local cider on again which was also on at the GBBF in London.
Also the classic Broadoak Perry.

Thanks
Andy Savage
www.derbyphotos.co.uk

Get yourself ready for next year : The 2013 Derby Winter Beer Festival will take place Weds 20th to Sat 23rd Feb 2013.

Where to find Georges Tradition fish and chip restaurant in Chellaston Derby.

Update August 2015 - This Fish and Chip shop is closing and moving to where Andrews Fish Bar on  Swarkestone Road used to be located.


Do you like Fish and Chips? Who doesn't! A few years ago we tried a new chip shop that opened in Belper Called George's Tradition and were really impressed with the quality. Since then they have opened up several more shops and also restaurants around the East Midlands. So far have tried Belper, Long Eaton and Allestree and they are all as good as each other. Their shops are located in Derbyshire, Nottinghamshire and Staffordshire, so far they have ten open.

In May 2010 they opened a new one in Chellaston and despite several attempts to locate the shop while out and about we could not find it. The map locations on their website are flash based so would not work on my iPhone. Typing in the postcode given on the website  "DE73 5XE" into the google mapping app would show up a marker literally in the middle of the River Trent near Swarkestone! See for yourself HERE.
So I then tried searching for the full address given on the website  "Unit 5, Royal Glen Park, Derby" and that showed several markers but non anywhere near Chellaston. Had to give in.

Well a few months on after now seeing the map location on a PC I decided to help anyone else looking for this George's by creating a few things to help.
You will notice that if you view the satellite view of where this restaurant is located then it just shows grass, thats because its a new building that was built after Google captured it from above.

1) If you are viewing this on a smartphone (i.e. iPhone, HTC, Galaxy etc)  then simply tap my link below :

Accurate Drop Pin for Georges Tradition at Chellaston, Derby

And this will launch your mapping application and place a drop pin onto the map with the exact location of George's Tradition at Chellaston. You can then use this marker to get driving or walking directions from your current location.

2) Or you can find this shop by seaching in your smartphone mapping app for Rowallan way, Derby that will take you to roughly the correct location.

If you you look at Google Streetview for this shop you will notice that they are only putting in the foundations for it.
So what I did is take a 360 degree view from near it so you can see what it looks like now in March 2011.
Its just like Google Streetview, only better quality. I have marked the shop with an interactive rollover marker.

360 degree view showing the location of George's Tradition at Chellaston, Derby :
Use your mouse to click and drag the view around. (note this does not work on an iPhone)


I have also created a high resolution version of the above (broadband needed) :
360 view of the location of George's Tradition at Chellaston Derby.

I have also made a webpage showing the two views "then and now" HERE so you can see the difference.

By the way they have a loyalty card thats worth having, The George’s Tradition Privilege Loyalty Card is pretty good as they give you 10 points for every £1 spent and each point worth 1p, in other words 10p back for every £1 you spend. So if you use their resturants from time to time then it would be mad not to bother having Loyalty Card. You can cash them in at any time to buy food from them.

I made a driving video Chellaston new estate I recorded this back in May 2008 before that corner plot was built on, in my video (at 0.57) you can see all the fencing blown down and the rocks on the pavement. This is the corner now ocupied by George's.

If you found this post of use then please leave a comment.

Thanks
Andy

Dovedale Stepping Stones, health and safety gone mad as stones height increased.

I'm sure you can't have missed last weeks news about Dovedale Stepping Stones.
Derbyshire County Council and the National Trust had placed new stones on top of the existing ones to make them more "accessible" for visitors.

The story even made it into the National Newpapers, as you can read here.

Daily Express Newspaper Article.

Daily Mail Newspaper Article.

The stones they have added onto the exisiting ones to make them a lot higher, see how it looks now HERE.

A Facebook page has been set up to request that the stepping stones be returned to the way they were before, Join the Facebook group and post your comments on here :


Dovedale Stepping Stones Facebook Group.

Return the Dovedale Stepping Stones to their former natural glory on Facebook.

How about fitting some handrails either side and some traffic lights so people know when its safe to go :)

Here is a 360 dregree VR Photograph I took in in early June 2010 BEFORE the stones height was increased.




To see my high resolution fullscreen version of Dovedale Stepping Stones click the link here:
Dovedale Stepping Stones High Resolution 360 photograph.


Iphone Map locators for Dovedale.
If you are viewing this blog on an iPhone then you can click the link below to launch the iPhone Maps application with a push pin location that you can use to located the stones.

Dovedale Stepping Stones iPhone Map Marker.

The link above is for walkers, if you want a location point for driving then use the following link

Dovedale Car park iPhone Map Marker.

Once you have clicked on the link above and your Map application has loaded up, simple tap the Directions button at the bottom of the iPhone. It will be prefilled in with Current location for the start and Dovedale Car Park for the end so all you have to do is tap the Route button and it will show the driving route you need.

For a large map showing all the details such as the walking paths etc click the link here:
Dovedale Stepping Stones Map.


Thanks
Andy

How to make a Drop Pin show on iPhone Maps via a web page link.

Something which I find annoying on the iPhone is when viewing an embeded custom google map in Safari, if you click on the link below the embeded map it launches the Maps application and loses all of the markings and pointers that were on the embeded map.

I have found a way to create a link on a web page that when veiwed in Safari on your iPhone it will launch the Maps application and put a drop pin onto the map which you can then use to get directions to or view streetview on your iPhone.

To see this in action you need to be veiwing this blog post on your iPhone. I imagine this will also work on an iPad, perhaps someone can let me know if thats the case.

Drop pin on iPhone Maps via html example.
Click the link below and it will close Safari and open up the Maps app and show a drop pin on it.

CLICK HERE.

Hopefully you should have seen that the Maps App was launched and a red Drop Pin was placed in the middle of the River Derwent.
If you want the html code for this simply click the link on a computer (rather than on an iPhone)

If you are wondering how on earth to find precise Lat/Long coordinates for your drop pins then I suggest using the Google API Polyline Encoder tool, its not really designed for this purpose but I often use this tool because its very quick, easy to use and very accurate.

Goto the Utility here:
Interactive Polyline Encoder Utility

How to use the tool to find Latitude and Longitude positions.
1) First type in a place you want to find in the field marked "Center map at:", this will get you a map of the area. You don't need to be really accurate at this stage.

2) Click the Hybrid button for high accuracy positioning of your pointer.
3) Drag the map view around to get it so you can see what you want to see, Zoom in to help accuare placement.
4) Click on the map where you want a mark placing. As soon as you click you will notice that a green marker will appear on the map and the Latitude and Longitude fields show accurate position data.
5) You can move the green marker around by simpy clicking on it and dragging it to where you want it. the Latitude and Longitude data will update as you move it around.
Its as simple as that, you are in full control of the marker.

This post may be of use to some people wanting to create web content that will work on an iPhone map.
If you found this of use then please leave a comment.
The next thing I need to see how much more you can do with the iPhone Maps application.

Thanks
Andy