I’m what I like to think of as a ‘reluctant environmentalist’. I get the idea of saving energy, but my primary driver is to reduce the amount of money I pay out. Sure, I’m interested in saving the planet too, but it’s the monthly bill rather than the polar ice caps that make me wander round the house turning off the lights in empty rooms!
The thing is, life is so saturated with technology these days, and all of those pieces of technology need to get their power from somewhere. My smartphone isn’t too smart when the battery runs out. So what if I were able to charge my devices using a readily available power source that doesn’t have any ongoing costs? I’m talking about the sun, of course, and the guys at Mobile Fun were kind enough to send me a solBAT II solar phone charger to try out.
First impressions were good – the solBAT II comes with a window mount for, er, mounting it on your window, and a carabiner for attaching it to a bag or rucksack while you’re out and about. I’ve tried it in both situations and found that having it on a bag makes it charge more quickly (I guess it gets more direct sunlight?), but it really spends most of its time on my office window. That’s no biggie, since the office gets direct sunlight all morning, but I thought it might be useful to know.
So, does it do the job? Well, sort of. It certainly works, and seems capable of adding several hours worth of charge to my iPhone, but the solar panels do take a very long time to charge the solBAT II up. We’re talking days when attached to my window, which means it’s not a viable option to use the solBAT as my phone’s only power source. It is, however, useful when you’re out and about and realise your phone is about to die… I’ve had the solBAT take my iPhone from 13% battery back up to just shy of 40% which, for me, takes it back out of the panic zone!
It’s worth noting that the solBAT also has the option to charge via USB. While the solar panel can take days, the USB cable will take the solBAT up to full capacity in just a few hours. In that case, it becomes a spare battery. Handy again for emergencies.
And that’s the key, really: the solBAT II is a great emergency charger. It does what it says on the box and, if you charge with solar, that’s free energy. But it’s not viable as your phone’s primary charger, which means I won’t be getting rid of my mains iPhone charger just yet.
The solBAT II solar battery pack is available on Mobile Fun for £23.95 (at time of writing).
For several years I stuck with my itty-bitty phone whose functions were limited to making calls, sending texts and waking me up in the morning. Why would I want to spend a few hard-earned Benjamins on a smartphone? Well, I drunk the Kool-aid and now I’m never more than a few feet away from my phone. Here are 
I remember when the iPhone 4S came out… I was online, watching the live blogs and tweets from Apple’s now traditional event, and the news was that the new iPhone was… well… the same as the previous one. Oh yes, it had new insides and features but, to any casual observer, it was the same at the iPhone 4.
With the release of the new iPhone comes the corresponding release of reviews from across the industry. Overall, the iPhone 5 has scored highly with critics across the board, who cite the improved hardware design, taller screen and faster performance as excellent reasons to upgrade. The feared lower battery life due to the larger screen and LTE seem not to have materialised, as Engadget reports that the phone lasts just as long or longer than the previous iPhone 4S even when using LTE.
Last week at the yearly WorldWide Developers Conference, Apple announced the latest version of their mobile operating system: iOS 6. The new version of the OS brings several new features to the table, notably ones that existed on Android for some time. As such, the update represents Apple’s continuing closing of the feature gap between iOS and Android, whilst maintaining the high level of usability that has been their trademark across all sections of their business. Let’s have a look at precisely what was announced.
It’s quite common for those who prefer older styles tend to choose a phone case that reflects this – perhaps a wooden case, or maybe a nice handmade 
From a badly designed weird case to a rather nicely constructed one, we have these breakfast food cases from Japan. There’s a choice of noodles, hash browns, rice or – my favourite – bacon and eggs. Each case is distressingly realistically well made and could easily pass for what they’re imitating if they were face down resting on your desk.
Food cases are cool, but I’ve heard of something better: this case that’ll really give you an earful. This lobe-ly case is just a giant silicone ear that’s quite amusing to bring out in public. Thanks to the massive size of the case, this should make your iPhone a lot harder to lose – and I guess that’s a good thing? Of all the cases on the list, this is the one I’d actually love to have.
This is the only one on this list that I’ve actually seen in real life – as my girlfriend has it. She picked it up in Japan, where cute (and sometimes weird) phone cases are definitely the norm. Unlike some the other items on this list, the chocolate bar case looks quite realistic; something that came back to bite me when I noticed it early one morning. I can safely report that it does not taste like chocolate.
Our ‘winner’ this time is this creepy hand case from a Japanese manufacturer (indeed, the same firm behind the breakfast food cases earlier). Available in your choice of little kid or woman varieties, both cases feature a disembodied hand that affixes to the rear of the case. This means you can hold hands while on the phone, or even use it to hold pencils. It’s weird as hell, and for that reason it takes home the top spot.
There’s been plenty of speculation about why some 
Back in 1993, a game called Myst came out that totally changed my idea of what could be achieved in video games. This was a time of poor graphics (although we thought they were excellent) and bleepy sound effects. It was the heyday of Sonic the Hedgehog and consoles like the Super Nintendo. Myst, with its beautifully rendered scenes and fiendishly difficult puzzles, was like a breath of fresh air. It looked amazing, and played like nothing else I had experienced.
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