What's so great about the Samsung Galaxy S4?

The Samsung Galaxy S3 was a great smartphone. Its new sibling, the Samsung Galaxy S4, has taken that greatness to an altogether new level. 

For one, it is the first Octa Core smartphone. The Octa Core is the heart of the phone, the chip which keeps it powered. What this chip essentially does is, thanks to its dual processors, ensures that the phone does not eat into the battery power and, secondly, ensures smooth apps operations. For another, the Samsung Galaxy S4 has got eerie human-attuned features. For example, you need to take care if you are the type who uses a lot of hand gestures – a mere hovering of your finger above the screen will get things moving around!

Autodesk SketchBook Express drawing app for Android

Autodesk SketchBook Express is an illustration application which is available for free (yes ~ absolutely free!) on Android and iOS. It is a perfect tool for the first-time artist as well as those who wish to hone their drawing skills and upgrade to the level of a professional. 

This app is good for Android 4.0 (Ice Cream Sandwich) and up. 

Evolution of computing devices

The Scientific American India issue of December 2009 had an interesting article titled Decoding an Ancient Computer (preview it here). 

It spoke about an underwater discovery of a ship wreck which included, besides glassware, pottery & jewelry, a fragile device which later turned out to have within its innards gear wheels with teeth.

Virtual Private Network providers

A Virtual Private Network, known in short as VPN, enables you to use another network in e-space. It allows you to access content from a site which is banned in the region where you stay. This access can be done in a secure manner & will hide your location when you access the content of that site. Of course, your VPN provider could still block access to a site which is considered as dangerous.

How to record audio and video on a Skype call

To record the audio-video aspects of your conversation via Skype, you need to install EVAER. This is ‘Excellent Video and Audio Recorder’. It is a free software which is available only for Windows. You can record for free the first 5 minutes of audio as well as video calls. For calls longer than 5 minutes, you will need to register & pay $19.95.

Microsoft News Bento App

Microsoft's news app, called News Bento, is a single news consolidated app for Windows 8 for which it is free. It provides great news photo coverage and is fully interactive by all forms: whether by touch or with a mouse or with a keyboard. Presently this app is available in the English language (US English).

2013 Apple iPhone 5S or Apple iPhone 6: what's in a name?

When Apple Inc. designs something, everybody goes crazy.There are the buyers who line up overnight in serpentine queues to be the first to buy it off the shelf. There are the competitors who want to create something equally good without getting sued over patent rights. There are the  critics who want to dissect it every which way. Finally there are bloggers like me who want to let the whole world know about its launch & features. Well, as yet nobody is really sure when the next version of the iconic iPhone will be launched. However, there is already lots of buzz about it.