The Top Five Gadgets You Should Have In The New Year!! - Part 2

Having covered numbers 5, 4 and 3 on the top 5 gadgets in my earlier post (read it here), time to move on to the top 2 gadgets you should gift yourself in 2015. Hopefully no major surprises here.

2. A Streaming Media Player

The Why: Be it Youtube, Vimeo (which has just been banned by the Indian government), iTunes or other legal / illegal sites, streaming services are changing (or have changed) the way we watch TV. While the shift away from cable / TV is yet to make a dent even in the West, the coming years will see more and more people choosing to abandon a cable and depend completely on streaming services (live sports is probably the only area TV trumps streaming, and that's not changing soon). Till that judgement day arrives, your cable subscription will have to co-exist with the likes of Youtube. Enter media players which can handle streaming media and plug in to your TV's HDMI port, so that you can have the best of both worlds, watch Youtube AND shift to cable just in time for that 2 year old repeat of The Big Bang Theory. And it need not be limited to just streaming media. Apps like Plex, LocalCast and Beamer (for Apple TV) make it (somewhat) easy to stream local media (like saved movies / other videos) as well to the TV. 

My Choice: I wrote an entire post on the Chromecast, so I don't think I need to repeat myself. In the tangled world of streaming media players from the likes of Google (Chromecast and Nexus Player), Amazon (Fire TV and the Fire TV Stick), Apple TV and Roku, Chromecast is my pick if you don't want to spend too much and still want to get on to the streaming bandwagon. Of course, if your world revolves around iPhones, iPads and MacBooks, the boring but effective Apple TV would be your go-to device. If you prefer the underdog (in this space), then throw your lot in with Amazon (Fire TV is not yet available in India) and if you absolutely hate the big tech companies, then Roku (pick one of its multiple offerings) is the one for you. 

This raft of offerings might just be the tip of the iceberg in what promises to be a fight for your living room. All the major tech giants have thrown their hats in the ring, even Microsoft and Sony with their Xbox and Playstations. With such heady competition, 2015 might just be the year when things get even more exciting in this area.

1. The Top Pick - A Tablet

The Why: This question would have been so difficult to answer 3 years back when I first got my iPad 2. Since then, the iPad has become our go-to device for almost everything, be it watching videos, reading books and magazines (with the excellent and cost effective Magzter app), playing games, browsing the web, reading emails and even drawing, and all this on a device with still gets me close to 10 hours of battery life. The iPad has changed how we consume content and fight boredom. Which is why the question of why you should get a tablet is no longer relevant. 

My Choice: The bigger question is, in a field so keenly contested, which tablet do you choose? The cheaper Nexus / Android tablets or the more costly iOS counterparts? For me, it has to be the iPad Air 2. Don't get me wrong, I love Android. I would bite my hand off before I would recommend an iPhone over an Android device, but in the world of tablets, Apple has Google beat (in quality, not market share). The sheer beauty and elegance of the iPad design, the simplicity of the software and the mind-boggling number of tablet optimized apps in App Store just blow its Android competition away. 

If you are in the mood for something cheaper than the Air 2, the iPad Air is still worth considering even though it's a year older (it's Rs. 7,000 cheaper). If a 10-inch tablet is too big for your needs, the iPad Mini 2 (the iPad Mini 3 is just not worth the upgrade) starting at Rs.21,900 should be your first choice. If you do want to get an Android tablet (and they have improved leaps and bounds since the early days), your best option still remains the excellent and cheap Nexus 7 (2013).

The Bonus

This was supposed to be a list of 5 gadgets, but I just realized that devices 2 and 3 on my list both require an HD output. And that posed a problem in 2013 when it hit me that my 3 year old TV has just one HDMI input and I needed to plug in both the Tata Sky HD Plus and the Chromecast. After a bit of research, I stumbled on to this - HDMI Switcher Splitter (essentially a switching device which allows you to pick which of the 3 inputs you want to show on the TV). Available for around Rs.500, it has served me well since (not to mention the money saved from not buying a new TV). Yes, I do have to occasionally get up to switch from one input to the other but if don't feel like making even that effort, there are also a number of remote controlled options available on Ebay. Lo and behold, your TV has just sprouted extra HDMI ports.   

So there you have it, my list of top 5 (plus one) gadgets you should splurge on in the new year (oh, by the way, happy new year to all!!!) Let me know which of these you already have and if you found this helpful.

Follow me on Twitter @cskartha

The Top Five Gadgets You Should Get In The New Year!! - Part 1

The end of the year always gets me thinking, not really about what I can do better in the coming year or things like that, but about deeper, more meaningful stuff. Like what gadgets I should get (or more likely, lust at longingly) in the year coming up. But since I already seem to have exhausted my quota for the next year (more on that later), I decided to take a look around and take stock of the gadgets around me and how useful they have been. Sure, I have bought the odd crappy tech thingamajig here or there, but this here is my Top Five list of electronic gadgets that I think you should have, come 2015.

5. A Fitness Tracker

The Why: Because the doctor says you have to be active in order to remain healthy. While science is still undivided on the whole 10,000 steps per day thing, it is logical that any activity that we do will only keep us healthier (yes, I can't believe I AM saying this). But I was still sceptical till my wife pestered me in to picking up a Fitbit Flex Activity and Sleep Tracker for her while in the US (it's available for $99 there, as opposed to Rs.9,500 in the above Flipkart posting). It was not until she started using it regularly that we started seeing a difference. The Fitbit allows you to see exactly how many steps you have done and distance have covered and innately, challenges you to do better every single day, subtly getting you to be more and more active every day.



The Fitbit Flex vs. Google Fit app  - You get what you pay for!!

 

My Recommendation: I haven't tried out a whole bunch of trackers to give my full opinion. The Fitbit lasts about a week between charges, is comfortable enough to wear the entire day, waterproof enough to go swimming (that is a consideration for people who unlike me, know how to swim) and has a small LED display that shows how close / far you are from your target. Good enough for me. But if you want something cheaper and are feeling especially patriotic, why not try the GetActive range of Fitbit clones. Even more bare bones is this series of clip on pedometers which I picked up from Decathlon for my father-in-law (he now walks close to 4kms a day up from close to 1 at the beginning).

But if you are the sort who hate spending money and like carrying your phone around all day, why not try the free Google Fit app? It works remarkably accurately on my Nexus 4 and can track about 100 activities (for the life of me, I can't think of more than 5!!). Of course, you have to trust Google with your data (add that to your email and the rest of your life's data), have basic location services enabled (no GPS needed) and it won't give you distance walked or sleep tracking (like the Fitbit or GetActive does), but hey, it's free and it works!! On days when I know I have been lazy (and I will be lazy because some things don't change), I dread looking at the screen. Steps tracking has changed me (albeit slightly), but am just not sure if it's for the better.

4. A Powerbank

The Why: Because its literally a bank of power. Anxiety about battery life for the smartphones and tablets we carry around and reaching for the nearest charger has almost become second nature (for evidence, look for the groups of people hanging around the charging outlets at airports). I bought my powerbank (a nameless, nondescript piece) just the day before a long flight with boring stop-overs where I needed access to my phone. It proved a life-saver not only during the trip but on several other normal office-going days as well. In a world of dying phone batteries, the powerbank is a definite must-have.

My Recommendation: This is as generic a device as you can probably get. Having handled the Xiaomi Powerbank 10400 mAh (pictured above), I can tell you that it is a well-built capable and well-priced device (with the added distinction of being the one Xiaomi device which you can just go out and buy, unlike their phones). But its not the most portable device around which means it's one more thing which needs to be lugged around. My advice would be to shop around, depending on what your requirement is. If you are always going to be only a few hours away from the nearest charger, a more portable power bank with a smaller capacity (and size) should be sufficient. If you are the outdoorsy sort who treks over the weekend but needs his twitter and Facebook updated (hey, am not judging), then go for the Xiaomi. After all, its just a well-built battery with some electronic circuitry and usb ports thrown in, but it will reduce one cause of worry.

3. The Tata Sky HD Plus

Tata Sky HD+ has changed how I watch TV

The Why: Digital Video Recorders (DVRs) have been around for the longest time, but it was only around Feb 2013 that I happened to stumble on a gem of a product that Tata Sky has been offering in the Indian market since around 2011. Suffice to say, TV viewing has never been the same again. With the ability to pause live TV anytime (and rewind and fast forward the same), record programmes (and entire series) and also, watch one channel while recording another (or record 2 channels at once), who would ever go back to normal TV watching again. The ability to watch MORE TV has weirdly allowed me to spend more time doing other stuff that I love, safe in the knowledge that my tv program is recording at home, rather than centering my life around the TV schedule. It has also allowed me to discover a lot of new content which I can enjoy at my convenience without bothering about ads (I just fast forward past them). Seriously, if I had to stay awake every weeknight just to watch House M.D., I can't imagine having watched up to Season 8 already (on a side note, that dude is crazy!!) without missing a single minute. Add to this, the ability to use their Video on Demand channel to watch videos and movies for free and it all adds up to one great package.

 

Of course, all this comes at a cost which means that you are probably locked in to their services for the foreseeable future, but that's not turned out too badly for me thus far (fingers crossed!!). So while streaming live TV might be the future, the Tata Sky DVR should be the present for your TV.

Disclaimer: When I chose to shift from Hathway to Tata Sky, the HD Plus box was the only viable DVR option available in the market. Recent research indicates that Airtel has also launched a HD Recorder box as well which with 500GB of storage also appears quite competitive. As I mentioned earlier, I am quite happy with Tata Sky's service and have not checked out Airtel's offering at all.

So, that's the first part of my list of 5 gadgets which I think you will find useful. Let me know what you think.

The Smartphone Awards 2014, Part 2 - The Best Budget Phones

Having covered the best Phablets of 2014, its time to move on to the very opposite side of the spectrum, the little ones. Not so little perhaps not in size or performance (as we shall see) but in terms of price. Now, as with the phablets, a little bit of arbitrariness is required to define what exactly is a budget smartphone. For the purposes of this list, I have decided to consider all phones below Rs.15,000. Again, before the awards themselves, a look back at how important 2014 was in the budget smartphone space.

2014 - The year Motorola dragged Android back in to contention

Towards the middle of 2013, a similar list of top budget smartphones would have been filled with Windows phones. Android manufacturers had pretty much filled this space with so-so phones crammed with middling to poor hardware, ham handed software and a definite lack of respect to the consumer who didn't want to shell out extra bucks for a premium phone. Windows Phones on the other hand were perfectly optimized for low-spec devices, had a somewhat intuitive user interface, some great hardware (because...Nokia) and seemed poised to make the entry-level space completely their own. The consumer could either choose from a rich mature app ecosystem (Android) or a capable, well-performing phone which they could use on a daily basis, but not both. A tough choice.

Windows Phone OS just could not keep pace as Google revamped it's software for cheaper offerings

 And then, in steps, the then Google owned Motorola with the fantastic, amazingly priced, well-designed, very efficient Moto G. Released towards the end of 2013, this device probably single-handedly changed the perception of how a phone maker can pair decent hardware and specs with good performance and yet, price it well. Come 2014, could they repeat that trick with the 2nd gen Moto G?

The Winner: Moto G 2014 (Rs.12,999)

Turns out, they can. The 2014 Moto G is not a massive improvement over its predecessor, but it does make subtle tweaks. A slight increase in display size (up to 5 inches from the earlier 4.5), a better camera (up to 8MP from 5 earlier) and the addition of an SD card slot, all help make this phone more desirable, without compromising on performance. My wife's 2013 version has stood up well to some rough treatment (including an inadvertent dip in the water) and there is no doubt that the new version is also game for some rough treatment. Definitely the phone to go for if you want no frills, good hardware, intelligent software (with double quick updates) at a pretty low price.

Moto G 2014 - The King of the Budget Smartphone

The Cheaper Alternative: Moto E (Rs. 6,999)

Just in case you were thinking the Moto G was a fluke, bang came the even cheaper Moto E. Designed specifically keeping the developing markets in mind, this one definitely makes compromises on the hardware and design front, but none whatsoever on the performance front. Even with a lesser processor and only 4GB of internal memory (compared to the 8 and 16 GB versions on the Moto G), the E still manages to get through its paces without a hitch. This phone might not be for the serious gamer (you'll have to plonk down some more dough for that), but it manages to handle multiple apps, video playback, multi-tasking and even the odd games without any issues. Motorola has displayed some serious software design skills to ensure this phone runs so smoothly on such bare minimum internals (skills the likes of Samsung and HTC could definitely learn from). 

The Moto E

Notable Mentions: The Android One phones

Google's master plan to get the next billion on to Android

As you would probably have gleamed from the first two choices, I do have a preference for minimalist software which is closer to the Nexus experience. For me, Google understands software, it understands UI design and it definitely understands Android, which is why Android manufacturers will be better served learning a lesson from Motorola in leaving the software simple and Nexus-like. 

The Android One is Google's initiative to take smartphones to the next billion (this itself probably deserves another blog post). Suffice to say, Google designs the software, decides the specs and are manufactured and marketed by the likes of Micromax, Spice and Karbonn. Not stellar names to be honest. These phones have almost exactly the same hardware and thanks to the largesse of Google, the exact same software as well. 

There is almost nothing to choose between the three phones currently available, but I went for the Micromax Canvas A1 (Rs.6,499) when the time came to choose a phone for my dad (Micromax hardware had impressed me earlier and this time, I knew the software would be decent as well). Design-wise, its as plain looking as the Moto E, hardware-wise, just as middle of the road and performance wise, just as value-for-money. Whether you want to spend an extra Rs.500 for some additional nifty Motorola software and a better brand name (not to mention, Gorilla Glass 3 protection for the clumsy sort), is up to you. 

The Micromax Canvas A1. Not a great looker, but a decent performer.

So there you have it. The best smartphones cheap money can get you. The field is quite crowded, so I might have missed something, but you really cannot go wrong with this list. Do let me know what you think in the comments.

The Top Smartphones of 2014, Part 1 - The Phablet Awards...

It’s that time of the year when we look back on the year gone by and think “Boy, has it been a whole year since I had this very same thought?” It’s also that time of the year where, with the holiday season approaching and tech releases far behind us, I can take a nice, long look at the new gadgets that 2014 blessed us with and pick my favourite smartphones. This essentially is the list of smartphones that I would go out and buy immediately (if I had that kind of cash, that is)

Before we get in to the top smartphones of the year, here’s my two cents on some of the trends that became very visible in the smartphone market in 2014.

The race to the bottom has officially ended 

If 2013 saw almost all major smartphone manufacturers (except Apple) bring to market cheaper and cheaper devices and wage a price war for market share, 2014 was when this race came skidding to a halt in the face of common sense. Prices on most smartphones have seen a rise, most markedly in the flagship device space.

Specs no longer really matter, performance does 

The importance of hardware specs as a selling point has also decreased, coinciding with the release of Android Kitkat and then Lollipop. Smartphone makers have realized that consumers are quickly getting lost in the long list of numbers in hardware specs and only really care about performance.

Phablets are well and truly in 

Once Apple, long at the vanguard of the “Small is Better” battle, took the plunge and released the enormous iPhone6+, you knew the phablets were officially, a thing. That its smaller brethren, the iPhone 6 outsells it 3 to 1 just shows that big phones may not be everyone’s cup of tea.

Minimalism in software is quite welcome

When Samsung, the poster child of excess, decides to strip down the latest version of its Touchwiz interface, you know things have changed for the better. LG, HTC and Sony also quickly followed, Motorola, of course, was right there waiting for them all along. 

Overall, a lot of positives and everything I can get on board (except for maybe the phablet thing). So without further ado, here are my Smartphone Awards of 2014.

The "Phablet" of the Year

What actually can be called phablet is a matter of debate, but for the sake of being objective, I have decided to consider any device with a screen size of 5.5 inches or more as a phablet. As I mentioned earlier, this was the year the phablet went mainstream with Apple and Google joining Samsung in the race to cram your pocket and empty your wallet (which is why this is a separate category).

The Winner: Samsung Galaxy Note 4 (Rs. 57,000)

The device which spawned the phablet defeats its competition hands down armed with its great multi-tasking capability (notably how it allows multiple apps to be opened side by side), brilliant specs (the phone has almost every sensor you can conceivably think of, combined with a 16MP camera which can shoot 4K video as well), ever improving S-Pen support and an almost other-worldly 5.7inch display.

Honorable Mentions: iPhone 6Plus (Rs. 62,500) and LG G3 (Rs. 40,100)

The iPhone continues Apple's tradition of making boring, somewhat uninspired but well made phones boasting good displays and perhaps the best camera among all smartphones but loses out due to its lack of a stylus and lesser multi-tasking capability compared to the Note. 

The Biggest iPhone out there...

LG G3

The LG G3 is perhaps the surprise of the bunch continuing LG's impressive resurgence since the Nexus 4 showing good design chops (gotta love those thin bezels) and smart software and some neat features. An 13MP camera boasting optical image stabilization ain't too shabby either.

The Nexus 6 - When is Big just too Big?

The disappointment in this section has to be the Nexus 6 (Rs. 44,000). Sporting a ridiculous, palm aching, joint spraining, pocket bursting 5.96 (heck, 6 inch) screen, the sheer size of the device and the fact that vanilla Android makes almost no concession for usability in such a gigantic device (not to mention, hardly allows the user to make the most of a huge screen), makes it a definite no-no for me. The fact that it is almost continuously out of stock at the Play Store does not help either. The older, smaller Nexus 5 is still the best bet for your vanilla Android fix.

The "When Will It Ever Be Available" Award

Meet the OnePlus One,
the BigFoot of the Smartphone World

Has to go to the OnePlus One (Rs. 21,999). I was a sceptic myself till I finally found someone who had snared an invite and managed to get his hands on one (I felt like an anthropologist who finally gets to meet the BigFoot).

While future support for the device is uncertain (since Cyanogen will not be providing updates going forward) and customer support from the manufacturer has been less than stellar, the low price combined with top of the line specs makes it worth taking a punt on. Provided, of course, you jump through some hoops to get an invite. Good luck with that!!!

So that was the first part of my Smartphone Awards. I'll be back with the best budget smartphones and the best normal sized premium handsets. Do let me know your thoughts in the comments section.

How Uber wants to change the world and Why it will have to change itself.

The idea for Uber was probably the purest distillation of an ethos which would appeal to all Silicon Valley technologists (in fact, tech lovers everywhere). The fact that you can pull out your smartphone and know with exact certainty how far the nearest cab was and when you can get a ride. Using a mobile phone to literally change the world, one taxi ride at a time. 

That was what Travis Kalanick and Garrett Camp, two serial entrepreneurs, set out to do in 2009 with a little app called Uber (initially UberCab). Their aim was simple, use the power of the internet to connect a cab driver (or a regular driver) with the customer and to ensure, that the customer is never left stranded without transport on a stormy night. Their stated intention (as with most high-minded Silicon Valley startups) was much more complicated, to make using Uber cheaper than owning a car. With the Uber Partner app installed, anyone with a car (in the US and a few other countries) could switch on the app and earn a few extra bucks (over his / her livelihood) taxiing folks around. The ability to track your taxi, see your driver details and his / her rating and a three level background verification system (although how stringent and effective this seems to vary as per this account) ensured rocketing popularity among the smartphone totting populace in San Francisco. The model was simple, unique and disruptive. 

Fast forward 5 years and that little app, and the company it front ends is worth $40billion, and has spread to over 45 countries and over 200 cities. The thought that you can travel halfway across the world and yet use the very same app, using the very same process to have something as physical as a taxi ride instantaneously delivered to you, regardless of whether you are in Bangalore or New York, constitutes probably the best implementation of a connected, smaller, "mobile / digital" world (Amazon and Ebay are probably right up there as well). 

The ride to super - startup status has been controversial, to put it mildly. The company has managed to rile everyone from taxi drivers and their unions (very expected, since their model was being disrupted), to government officials, competitors, financiers, its partner drivers and even end users. Most of it has to do with their ultra-aggressive, take no prisoners approach to business. Kalanick makes no bones about how Uber sees the emerging ride sharing app market, to him market share is paramount. "You have to win 98 (percent) to 2." (something that you see across the tech world, be it Google, Facebook, Microsoft and Android in their respective areas). Of course, if Uber has its way, taxis are just the beginning. As they are fond of saying, If we can get a taxi to you in 5 minutes, what else can we deliver? 

Their modus operandi to any market is simple, enter quickly, hook the customers in by using promotions, establish the service firmly in the customer's mind and get entrenched, all before the slow-moving government machinery wakes up to react (perfectly illustrated by how they entered Portland and of course India). The company has also employed dubious means of undermining Lyft (a serious competitor in the US) by contacting prospective Lyft investors and informing that they would not be able to invest in Uber should they pump in money into Lyft (not to mention, its downright unscrupulous campaign of causing ride cancellations for the genial, un-Uber-ly Lyft).

Welcome to the Real World

Now, of course, governments and judiciary are starting to wake up. Banning Uber and imposing huge fines have been a common outcome of governments wielding its immense power. Uber's meteoric rise has also probably come too quick for the firm, as it comes under fire across the world (the service has been banned in India, various parts of South East Asia, Spain and Holland in the last one week alone). A classic case of grandiose Silicon Valley ambitions meeting cold hard reality (in this case, a reality filled with riled administrators, taxi unions and drivers). Uber's wilful manipulation of loopholes and lax regulation is beginning to catch up with it, hastened of course, by the unfortunate incident in Delhi. While the future of the company is not at stake (the company is in the process of raising a further $600M from Chinese search giant, Baidu), this spate of bad news means that Uber will find itself at the mercy of the very same social network effect that made it an overnight success. 

Time to roll with the punches

To respond, the company needs to ensure that it shows a humility and willingness to change that has so far eluded it. While Uber along with its brethren (Ola and TFS) are asking the drivers to submit more information and a comprehensive background check (along the lines of its US operations) has to be mandatory, the company also has to own up to its slip up and commit to doing better, publicly. Even better, would be suitable modifications to its app to account for a safety-deficit country like India (especially for women passengers). A crisis response call center, to be used only for emergencies, is definitely needed. Uber has to respond with the innovation and customer orientation that it initially made its name for, rather than the grittiness and nastiness that has purportedly come to be its hallmark. 

Because, the world needs Uber, but a humbler and nicer one!       

Why you need to buy a Chromecast!!

So, its finally here... After more than a year of rip roaring success globally, the Chromecast has finally landed on Indian soil. I managed to get my hands on this $35 streaming dongle way back at the start of this year from the US, but its now available in India for Rs.2999 (about $50).

So here's a short FAQ on what exactly the Chromecast is and why I think you should buy one...

What exactly is the Chromecast?

The Google Chromecast is a wireless HDMI streaming dongle. While its not the only ones in the category (the Amazon Fire Stick and the Roku Streaming Stick are the others), the Chromecast practically invented this category. It is basically a WiFi enabled dongle which plugs into the HDMI port of your TV and enables you to stream almost any web-based content from your smartphone / tablet / laptop on to your TV.

Sounds complicated. Maybe I should get that engineering degree after all...

Pardon the jargon. Simply put, the Chromecast is a cheap way of making your not-so-smart TV smart and connected. Just plug it into the HDMI port, connect the included charger (either to the power socket or to the USB port of most TVs) and download the Chromecast app on any Android or iOS device and you are all set. The Chromecast mobile app will guide you through a simple process where you select your WiFi network, enter the credentials and voila, your Chromecast should be set up. Its as simple as that.

What all can you stream?

Short answer, almost everything you can think of.

Now, the longer answer, almost all web based content and then some more. Google has supposedly made it really simple for developers to add Chromecast support to their apps and once you fire up the app, you should see the below icon.

Click on it, select your Chromecast device and you should see your TV screen refresh and the video should start playing on the TV. Easiest way to check? Head on to youtube.com on your laptop and hunt around for the cast icon above and get cracking.

But the beauty of the dongle is that it is not just limited to web based streaming. Using Plex Media Server and its companion mobile apps will also help you stream your local media files. So if you have any video / movie files downloaded on your hard disk (ahem ahem!!) you can now watch them quite easily on the big screen. With the Google Cast extension for Chrome and upcoming Chromecast support on the Firefox browser as well, you can even cast and then browse, websites using your TV as a second screen. 

What's more, Google recently even threw open the Cast Screen option on certain mobile phones, so that you can even mirror your mobile / tablet screen using the Chromecast (similar to the much simpler Airplay Mirroring on iOS devices). 

Sounds too good to be true.. All this for less than Rs.3k?

Well, you do get what you pay for, in a sense. Mirroring (either browser or screen mirroring) is somewhat laggy and performance will vary depending upon the hardware of the laptop / mobile device you are using and your WiFi network speeds. Cast implementation across apps is inconsistent, to say the least, and certain nowhere near as intuitive as Airplay for Mac / iOS devices. 

That being said, app support and performance are miles ahead now compared to even a few months ago. At the end, it comes down to whether you think Rs.3000 is too much to spend on a Google sponsored brain surgery for your TV. As for me, I haven't looked back since I first got my hands on it.