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    <title><![CDATA[Discussion on Android 4.0: Eight new features that actually matter ]]></title>
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        <title><![CDATA[Battery life in smartphones]]></title>
        <link><![CDATA[http://www.techrepublic.com/forum/discussions/102-349542-3520977]]></link>
        <description><![CDATA[Actually, I've been able to tweak my android phone (Nexus One) for greatly improved battery life.  I leave GPS and Wifi on, and the smart manager minimizes their use of battery.  The only feature I disable is the 3G by limiting the phone to 2G speeds when apps are accessing data in the background, but when I want to use 3G I can re-enable it with two taps. If I don't make calls or turn on the display (like overnight for example), my battery usage is LESS THAN 1% an hour.  With moderate usage I can easily get two days on a charge, with the GPS and other features left on continuously. It's a matter of fully understanding and working with the features that are available in an open-source phone. Now I am the first to admit that Apple makes some of the coolest gadgets in the world, but I have to agree with ejoeplumber about Apple users accepting the choices Steve Jobs limited them to, while Android users prefer not to accept those limitations and enjoy the variety of devices the OS lends itself to.  It took a lot of learning and work on my part, but the result is that now I have a phone that serves my purposes far better than an iPhone ever could.  That's what *I* wanted, and it's what I have.  For those who don't want to learn what I did to get a phone like I have, an iPhone is a very good idea...but the Android OS in a good piece of hardware has far greater potential because it doesn't have the limitations Apple imposes. I could never personally understand why people made such a fuss over iPods that didn't have FM or voice recording capability, or iPads that couldn't play Flash or connect to a simple thumbdrive. No Apple device allows the owner to change the battery, or expand the memory, for example. That didn't make sense to me, but it doesn't seem to bother the Apple product owners at all.  I guess it takes all kinds..]]></description>
        <guid><![CDATA[http://www.techrepublic.com/forum/discussions/102-349542-3520977]]></guid>
        <dc:creator><![CDATA[Txtraveler]]></dc:creator>
        <pubDate>Thu, 10 Nov 2011 20:35:20 -0800</pubDate>
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        <title><![CDATA[BUMP requires data to send through the cloud?  Correction ...]]></title>
        <link><![CDATA[http://www.techrepublic.com/forum/discussions/102-349542-3519721]]></link>
        <description><![CDATA[You said in your post:  &quot;BUMP requires data to send through the cloud&quot; but bump uses the Bluetooth and sends phone-to-phone, short range.  No &quot;cloud&quot; is needed.  Disclaimer:  of course, nobody really knows what &quot;the cloud&quot; is, because the cloud itself is indefined.  That's what we've been using in IT for years to represent &quot;the unknown&quot; portion of a network, or the area we don't really care to document because it's outside of our scope.]]></description>
        <guid><![CDATA[http://www.techrepublic.com/forum/discussions/102-349542-3519721]]></guid>
        <dc:creator><![CDATA[rAllcorn]]></dc:creator>
        <pubDate>Mon, 07 Nov 2011 12:02:44 -0800</pubDate>
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        <title><![CDATA[Mine does this!  (manages apps, reports usage/percentage)]]></title>
        <link><![CDATA[http://www.techrepublic.com/forum/discussions/102-349542-3519699]]></link>
        <description><![CDATA[My Droid Bionic is &quot;great&quot;!  It's truly what an Android should be!  All I have to do is to his the MENU button, SETTINGS, and MANAGE MY APPS.  It's built into the OS!  I can choose from RUNNING APPS, or ALL APPS, or the MEDIA AREA (what's using that area), etc.  I can tap on one, stop it, clear it's cache, or uninstall it altogether!   There's also an app called &quot;Task Manager&quot; that reports the % CPU being used, and how much memory is being utilized for it.  And if I add an app in the &quot;Auto-end list&quot; then 2 minutes after my screen-lock kicks in, the app is terminated.  Now I didn't have all of this cool stuff with my HTC Thunderbolt.  I really like that phone, but it fell so, so short of what I was hoping for.  When I traded it out for a Droid Bionic, everything got &quot;wonderful&quot;!   It's like I took a &quot;happy pill&quot;.  All of what I wanted, &quot;worked&quot; and worked well!  So, don't lose hope!  It's &quot;out there&quot;!  *NOTE:   This &quot;task manager&quot; seems to have come with the OS (or the Bionic) ... couldn't find a link to send you for it in Market.  Sorry.]]></description>
        <guid><![CDATA[http://www.techrepublic.com/forum/discussions/102-349542-3519699]]></guid>
        <dc:creator><![CDATA[rAllcorn]]></dc:creator>
        <pubDate>Mon, 07 Nov 2011 11:56:52 -0800</pubDate>
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        <title><![CDATA[Android 2nd Fiddle to iPhone?  Think again!!  (50% marketshare)]]></title>
        <link><![CDATA[http://www.techrepublic.com/forum/discussions/102-349542-3519696]]></link>
        <description><![CDATA[I can't believe you think the Android takes 2nd place to the iPhone!  Android has over 50% of the marketshare, Apple's iPhone has 25%, and the rest is divided up amongst the various other carriers/vendors.  Android (a good one), and iPhone are both good phones - Android is for those who want the &quot;freedom&quot; to think Open Source, and use what they want, tweak the sounds with what they want,etc. iPhone on the other hand is for folks that just want the phone to work.  They don't want the choices if it means it's going to take more than 5 minutes of their time.  So, Apple's iPhone &quot;works&quot; for those folks.  But I really just about fell out of my chair laughing when I read your line ... wait - let me quote it:  &quot;I may not be near a charger and I may still want to use my phone some more.  I want my battery to stay charged for the next day or 2.&quot;   Nobody, and I mean &quot;nobody&quot; who has ever used a smartphone expects to get 2-3 days out of their phone, especially if they've used the GPS features, or something similar!  It just won't happen ... That's why the Androids have &quot;extended life&quot; batteries you can move to, and the iPhone's have these little &quot;battery charger&quot; deals you plug into the bottom to buy you some more precious time to finish out the day.   (notice I said, &quot;finish out the day&quot;, not &quot;the week&quot;)As a treat for my son this Spring Break, we (my family and our iPhones) took the Commuter Train to downtown Austin and spent the day touring.  It's funny how you seldom tour your own area.  Anyway, we were on foot, so we used our GPS to help us find stuff and save blocks and blocks of wandering.  By lunchtime, we looked like drug addicts!  We were frantically looking for some public place where we could plug in our phones and charge them!!  It was just plain rediculous!!  So, if you're planning to get 2-3 days out of your phone, Android or iPhone, I'd suggest you turn off &quot;everything&quot;, and I mean &quot;EVERYTHTING&quot; including the brightness, screen-lock timer, etc. and also turn the phone totally and completely &quot;OFF&quot; at night, if you want 2-3 days out of it.  If you are lucky, you might just make it.  But I seriously doubt it.  You'll be hungrily seeking somebody - ANYBODY with an electrical plug so you can &quot;plug in&quot;!!   As far as the background apps, the Android has a &quot;background&quot; ON/OFF switch that can shut these babies off when you're desperate to save your power.  And eventually, iPhone will have it too!  They both copy from one another.  But it'd be nice if say the GPS app had an option where you could turn it off and it only came on when needed.]]></description>
        <guid><![CDATA[http://www.techrepublic.com/forum/discussions/102-349542-3519696]]></guid>
        <dc:creator><![CDATA[rAllcorn]]></dc:creator>
        <pubDate>Mon, 07 Nov 2011 11:38:46 -0800</pubDate>
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    <item>
        <title><![CDATA[no, you should stop posting because you're a long-winded bag of brownies]]></title>
        <link><![CDATA[http://www.techrepublic.com/forum/discussions/102-349542-3519336]]></link>
        <description><![CDATA['nuff said.]]></description>
        <guid><![CDATA[http://www.techrepublic.com/forum/discussions/102-349542-3519336]]></guid>
        <dc:creator><![CDATA[i_tiberius@...]]></dc:creator>
        <pubDate>Sat, 05 Nov 2011 10:18:24 -0700</pubDate>
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    <item>
        <title><![CDATA[Apples to oranges...]]></title>
        <link><![CDATA[http://www.techrepublic.com/forum/discussions/102-349542-3516192]]></link>
        <description><![CDATA[That's only because people like you are wrongly comparing the sells of company's phone to the distribution of an os. now if you compare either the sells of google branded phones to apple branded phones, or the sells of android devices to ios devices (iphones, ipods, ipads, apple tvs) apple trumps...you wouldn't make a dumb statement like omg microsoft sold a million pc's last week]]></description>
        <guid><![CDATA[http://www.techrepublic.com/forum/discussions/102-349542-3516192]]></guid>
        <dc:creator><![CDATA[A Black Dude]]></dc:creator>
        <pubDate>Fri, 28 Oct 2011 05:51:37 -0700</pubDate>
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    <item>
        <title><![CDATA[really...]]></title>
        <link><![CDATA[http://www.techrepublic.com/forum/discussions/102-349542-3516190]]></link>
        <description><![CDATA[you sound retarded. if thats the case, why not get an iphone do the same thing (i.e. jailbreak it)?]]></description>
        <guid><![CDATA[http://www.techrepublic.com/forum/discussions/102-349542-3516190]]></guid>
        <dc:creator><![CDATA[A Black Dude]]></dc:creator>
        <pubDate>Fri, 28 Oct 2011 05:39:15 -0700</pubDate>
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    <item>
        <title><![CDATA[get em jj]]></title>
        <link><![CDATA[http://www.techrepublic.com/forum/discussions/102-349542-3516184]]></link>
        <description><![CDATA[i was gonna comment but i see you have everything under control. you can obviously tell people here have not heavily tested other mobile platforms or they would know that other os handles multitasking totally different than the current android os's. apple has what only 3 multitasking api's? everything else is just a saved state that is resumed upon relaunch ( i.e what android is now trying to implement with 4.0)]]></description>
        <guid><![CDATA[http://www.techrepublic.com/forum/discussions/102-349542-3516184]]></guid>
        <dc:creator><![CDATA[A Black Dude]]></dc:creator>
        <pubDate>Fri, 28 Oct 2011 05:29:45 -0700</pubDate>
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    <item>
        <title><![CDATA[Multi-phones interoperability]]></title>
        <link><![CDATA[http://www.techrepublic.com/forum/discussions/102-349542-3516089]]></link>
        <description><![CDATA[Nowadays many use more than one phones and there should be higher interoperability among different models or even brands. Can something like a cloud phone book be achieved with apps?]]></description>
        <guid><![CDATA[http://www.techrepublic.com/forum/discussions/102-349542-3516089]]></guid>
        <dc:creator><![CDATA[chdchan@...]]></dc:creator>
        <pubDate>Thu, 27 Oct 2011 19:00:10 -0700</pubDate>
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    <item>
        <title><![CDATA[It's all relevant as to what you need!]]></title>
        <link><![CDATA[http://www.techrepublic.com/forum/discussions/102-349542-3515362]]></link>
        <description><![CDATA[After my experience with the HTC Wildfire, I had my doubts about Android. Since switching to Samsung Ace I am getting to appreciate Android more, even if there are still some issues.My main issue with the Wildfire was the battery lasted less than 2 days, even with managing the background apps - and no Spitfire_Sysop I did not install the apps, they came preloaded. I never wanted stock market updates, yet there they were, constantly running in the background.The Ace both manages my apps better, but still needs improvement, (clicked on Chat once and now it keeps popping up in the background from time to time) and a stronger battery. Most of my power is still used by Cell Standby and Phone Idle. Android needs to allow users to be able to be able to uninstall certain preloaded apps that are not needed without having to root the phone and possibly void the warranty. Often there are better apps on the Market than the preloaded ones, and this will also free up space on the phone if needed.How much power will processor use?As the Nexus comes with Android 4.0 and has a 1750mAh battery and better app management, then bring it on and lets see it in action.]]></description>
        <guid><![CDATA[http://www.techrepublic.com/forum/discussions/102-349542-3515362]]></guid>
        <dc:creator><![CDATA[daviddag]]></dc:creator>
        <pubDate>Wed, 26 Oct 2011 02:22:33 -0700</pubDate>
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    <item>
        <title><![CDATA[Had An Android]]></title>
        <link><![CDATA[http://www.techrepublic.com/forum/discussions/102-349542-3514969]]></link>
        <description><![CDATA[I had an Android phone - Motorola Droid-X for about six months.  Not so much an issue with the OS as with the manufacturer and carrier.  Lots of stuff that I didn't need and didn't want on the phone and no way to remove them short of rooting the phone.  All that crapware would start up every few minutes and I would have to kill them to conserve battery.  And, I have a holster with a magnetic flap - the phone would sense the magnet and automatically assume that I wanted to connect to some sort of home base system and turn on whenever I put it in the holster.  Next thing I knew - dead battery.  No way to deactivate the &quot;feature&quot;.  It had an 8-megapixel camera that took really crappy photos.  I'm not really an Apple fanboi, would never own one of their computers, but some of their stuff is nice.  Better camera, even at 5Mp.  Liked the larger screen on the Droid better, though.  Even with some of the shortcomings of the iPhone-4, I believe it is a better phone than the Android that I had.  I might feel differently with some of the recent changes to Android.  Will do some in-depth comparisons when my contract is up next year.]]></description>
        <guid><![CDATA[http://www.techrepublic.com/forum/discussions/102-349542-3514969]]></guid>
        <dc:creator><![CDATA[DT2]]></dc:creator>
        <pubDate>Tue, 25 Oct 2011 07:30:28 -0700</pubDate>
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        <title><![CDATA[Theres an APP for that]]></title>
        <link><![CDATA[http://www.techrepublic.com/forum/discussions/102-349542-3514435]]></link>
        <description><![CDATA[The beauty about Android is there will be an APP for most of these things you want to do, you have a choice.I like Android Assistant (probably one of many) it shows you whats running and gives you the option of closing it.Brilliant little app, I can recommend it]]></description>
        <guid><![CDATA[http://www.techrepublic.com/forum/discussions/102-349542-3514435]]></guid>
        <dc:creator><![CDATA[Ken@...]]></dc:creator>
        <pubDate>Sun, 23 Oct 2011 19:55:52 -0700</pubDate>
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        <title><![CDATA[Not true at all]]></title>
        <link><![CDATA[http://www.techrepublic.com/forum/discussions/102-349542-3514414]]></link>
        <description><![CDATA[I'm not sure if you have a development background or not, but if you do, I highly encourage you to read the documentation for WP7 around background stuff. An app put in the background does indeed consume RAM, but it is halted with the exception of specific &quot;background tasks&quot; that it can create. And those are designed to not consume massive amounts of CPU. Furthermore, when RAM gets tight, WP7 performs a &quot;tombstoning&quot; of the application anyways (shutting it down, but giving it a chance to save its state or otherwise wrap up), and when the user returns, the app is notified that it is coming back from tombstoning, not starting fresh, so it can choose to reload its previous state.This is a massive difference from Android, which, like I said, just puts stuff in the background like a PC. That model is fine for aPC with many GB of RAM, lots of CPU power to spare, a high speed, unlimited Internet connection, and is either plugged into a wall outlet or running on a big battery. But for a phone or tablet, it is deadly.J.Ja]]></description>
        <guid><![CDATA[http://www.techrepublic.com/forum/discussions/102-349542-3514414]]></guid>
        <dc:creator><![CDATA[Justin James]]></dc:creator>
        <pubDate>Sun, 23 Oct 2011 17:24:46 -0700</pubDate>
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    <item>
        <title><![CDATA[No Sturm and Drang]]></title>
        <link><![CDATA[http://www.techrepublic.com/forum/discussions/102-349542-3514332]]></link>
        <description><![CDATA[You saw no comments because these features are not a new invention.]]></description>
        <guid><![CDATA[http://www.techrepublic.com/forum/discussions/102-349542-3514332]]></guid>
        <dc:creator><![CDATA[YetAnotherBob]]></dc:creator>
        <pubDate>Sat, 22 Oct 2011 20:58:09 -0700</pubDate>
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        <title><![CDATA[Background]]></title>
        <link><![CDATA[http://www.techrepublic.com/forum/discussions/102-349542-3514323]]></link>
        <description><![CDATA[No, a program running in the background is still doing everything that it would be doing if it had the screen up. A program hibernating is just sitting back there and doing nothing except for the memory it takes up.They are different things. I believe that you will find that iOS and Win7 both have the same features, which means that they will have the same problems if you lose track of what you asked the program to do.]]></description>
        <guid><![CDATA[http://www.techrepublic.com/forum/discussions/102-349542-3514323]]></guid>
        <dc:creator><![CDATA[YetAnotherBob]]></dc:creator>
        <pubDate>Sat, 22 Oct 2011 20:54:59 -0700</pubDate>
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        <title><![CDATA[What's that got to do with the price of rice?]]></title>
        <link><![CDATA[http://www.techrepublic.com/forum/discussions/102-349542-3514219]]></link>
        <description><![CDATA[&quot;Android is made for those of us who do want to do more with our phones.Why are you on this forum?&quot;That makes no sense at all. Android is being pushed to everyone by the carriers, the sales numbers have made it clear that it is being used by many many times more users than just those who &quot;want to do more with our phones&quot;. I am on this forum because I like to discuss things. Should I stop posting because I don't think that Android is the bee's knees?J.Ja]]></description>
        <guid><![CDATA[http://www.techrepublic.com/forum/discussions/102-349542-3514219]]></guid>
        <dc:creator><![CDATA[Justin James]]></dc:creator>
        <pubDate>Sat, 22 Oct 2011 05:34:51 -0700</pubDate>
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        <title><![CDATA[There's a huge difference between Android's multitasking and other's]]></title>
        <link><![CDATA[http://www.techrepublic.com/forum/discussions/102-349542-3514218]]></link>
        <description><![CDATA[If you read the dev docs you'll see it. Lots of details to go into, let's just say that on WP7 and iOS, things aren't sitting in the background chewing battery and data. They are designed for having apps idle and doing minimal work in the background, and the APIs and docs really encourage that. Android is like a PC's multitasking model, whatever you do in the foreground can be done in the background... and for the most part, putting the app in the background doesn't signal to the app that it should scale back or force a reduction in resource usage.J.Ja]]></description>
        <guid><![CDATA[http://www.techrepublic.com/forum/discussions/102-349542-3514218]]></guid>
        <dc:creator><![CDATA[Justin James]]></dc:creator>
        <pubDate>Sat, 22 Oct 2011 05:32:30 -0700</pubDate>
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        <title><![CDATA[That is what android is for]]></title>
        <link><![CDATA[http://www.techrepublic.com/forum/discussions/102-349542-3514070]]></link>
        <description><![CDATA[That is what android is for.If you don't like the way something acts, Change it!!!That is it.Make it exactly what you want.If you dont want to think, use an iphone and live with what they give you.If you care what you get? choose an android and make it what you want.If you want control? then take it!]]></description>
        <guid><![CDATA[http://www.techrepublic.com/forum/discussions/102-349542-3514070]]></guid>
        <dc:creator><![CDATA[ejoeplumber]]></dc:creator>
        <pubDate>Fri, 21 Oct 2011 15:54:03 -0700</pubDate>
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        <title><![CDATA[... reason Android plays second fiddle to iPhone (response to that)]]></title>
        <link><![CDATA[http://www.techrepublic.com/forum/discussions/102-349542-3514014]]></link>
        <description><![CDATA[If you want the OS to do everything for you, with canned decisions on how it is done, then the iPhone is your baby - NOT the Android.  Android is all about freedom ... freedom of choice.  This reminds me of the children of Israel.  For 400 years they cried and moaned to God, &quot;Rescue us!  Get us out of here!&quot;  and when He did (it took a lot of work to orchestrate that big move, you know!) then all they did was whine and moan to God about how they &quot;had it better back in Egypt&quot;!  iPhone:  it just &quot;works&quot;!  Everything is pat, set, and running.  It's a great phone!  And you don't have to worry about stuff not working together.  BUT, you have to give up a few freedoms for this.  Android:  you have to &quot;work it&quot; to get everything the way you want it.  That's because you now have &quot;freedom&quot; to do it, how you want it, when you want it, and &quot;if&quot; you want it!  But, there's a drawback.  You can't just get it and use it.  You have to figure out what apps you want to use to do what ... how are you going to play and sync your music?  your movies?  your podcasts?  ebooks?  With the iPhone it was all one application, one choice, and it all &quot;worked&quot;.  With Android, there is a LOT of ways to do it, but you - have - the - freedom - of - choice here!  You have to make up your mind what you want!  iPhone - works, limited choices, ready-to-go!  Android - works with &quot;tweaking&quot;, all kinds of wonderful choices, not quite ready to go (you get to do it)My only complaint, as an Android user?  Why, when they develop an &quot;app&quot;, can't they develop it for both?  It shouldn't be that hard!  Then, we would &quot;all&quot; have freedom of choice, in our software!  I left Apple's iPhone 3GS recently (the lock button stopped working - still had time on the 2yr clock) and had a few apps on the iPhone that I really miss!  (MotionX GPS, a wireless analysis app I used, my Guitar tuner, etc.)  These apps are not only not available on the Android, but when you search for them, something else comes up, and it's usually not as good.  So &quot;freedom of choice&quot; has it's price!  *Adam &amp; Eve found that out in the Garden of Eden ...]]></description>
        <guid><![CDATA[http://www.techrepublic.com/forum/discussions/102-349542-3514014]]></guid>
        <dc:creator><![CDATA[rAllcorn]]></dc:creator>
        <pubDate>Fri, 21 Oct 2011 12:37:34 -0700</pubDate>
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        <title><![CDATA[Argument lacks merit.]]></title>
        <link><![CDATA[http://www.techrepublic.com/forum/discussions/102-349542-3513991]]></link>
        <description><![CDATA[As of iOS 5, I believe only RIM won't allow background multitasking, so you're suggesting everyone else should be using a blackberry?]]></description>
        <guid><![CDATA[http://www.techrepublic.com/forum/discussions/102-349542-3513991]]></guid>
        <dc:creator><![CDATA[tkejlboom]]></dc:creator>
        <pubDate>Fri, 21 Oct 2011 11:47:03 -0700</pubDate>
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