As I was on a short-timer's schedule, I called Roberts Camera of Indianapolis, Indiana to see if they had a GH4 and would do a trade-in of my GH3.
It seemed a bit confusing to the first person to answer the phone, but the second person made it clear--they had no GH4s in stock and three on the waiting list.
Today, I'm nowhere close, though I may try a dealer in New Jersey where they've also done Panasonic presentations. I believe they are Unique Photo. Equally, Adorama is across the river in Manhattan. I trust Adorama to help me, but I hear about many bad experiences dealing with the various personalities in the store. Maybe, the people are not from the Northeast. I used to hear many stories about people from New Jersey, New York, or Philadelphia. In my experience, they were misinformed. These rude, hateful people are some of the most genuine, loveable people you'll ever know. They just say what they mean, and so do I. I lived in Philly for eight years, and supposedly, my biological father came from Philly.
In any case, I want to trade the GH3 and the closest dealer in California to where I'll be living does not trade. That doesn't mean I won't be able to find a shop, but I'd rather deal with New Jersey or New York where I can trust the person will show me the contempt, rather than try the schmooz me into doing what they want. (I really liked Roberts Camera for their no-nonsense approach to dealing with people and cameras--give the customer good advice and a good deal.)
Maybe, Unique Photo will be able to help. I really hate driving into and out of the city (New York City) but parking is worse. Of course, if New Jersey Transit is working, it might be a piece of cake in a few days, to get to Adorama.
Update 2014.06.08: I was at Unique Photo this morning. They were friendly and knowledgeable. They expected a shipment last week and didn't get it. They have 3 people on the list ahead of me. It sounded as though they had a significant quantity arriving, so I may just get the body this week.
They also tempted me with the Panasonic GM1, which is clearly a dear and tiny camera body. I'd really like to see it on the end of my Olympus 35-100mm f/2.0, with the tripod mount attached to the tripod, of course. Otherwise, it's not quite balanced. I was impressed with how very tiny the Olympus 60mm f/2.8 macro was.
Update 2014.06.11: I returned to Unique Photo since I hadn't heard anything and I wanted to make sure that they weren't going to send a GH4 to an address I no longer occupy.
They didn't get their shipment yet. Maybe, they'll get it this week. They didn't know. Rather than have the GH3 and a GH4, I traded the GH3 for US$500, which is low, but you can sometime get a new GH3 for under US$900, so it's better to get US$500 than having it collect dust. I bought an Olympus E-M1, which I will still use after I buy a GH4.
I still feel that the E-M1's battery and grip are too small, but I was tempted to buy a Panasonic GM1, so what's more weird? I don't know. Hopefully, the E-M1 will work well with my Four-Thirds lenses in real-life situations. I still have my E-5 and E-1.
It's taking a while to charge the battery, so maybe it will last longer than I remember. I hope Panasonic will have their stock soon.
Update 2014.11.30: A few days ago, I finally got my GH4. Stock is not only good, but they've had a $200 instant rebate on the camera body. When I tried my extra GH3 battery in the GH4, it seemed to be full, after nearly six months.
Mike's camera was fairly close--about 33 miles from where I live now. Their people are not brand fanatics and are willing to talk intelligently about any brand you might want to buy.
It's a long time to go without. The E-M1 has been good and the GH4 seems to be everything the GH3 was but better.
Showing posts with label Indianapolis. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Indianapolis. Show all posts
Friday, June 6, 2014
Wednesday, February 19, 2014
Olympus 12-40mm f/2.8 is in my bag (usually in use though)
Today, I took a drive to get some Asian groceries and enjoy the not-so winter weather. It was above freezing, and the snow was melting, and given how many days we had well below freezing, it was time for a break.
I first went for a fake cheese steak. I lived in Philadelphia for eight years, and there is yet to be a place 100 miles or further from Philadelphia that can produce a good cheese steak. Some of them claim to be famous even--that's just odd. Lenny's Subs has been advertising about how great their sandwiches are. The founder moved to Memphis, Tennessee and wanted an authentic cheese steak, so he had to create it.
As you probably didn't read in my earlier diatribe on getting it right, you have a roll/bun, thin steak, and mozzarella or provolone cheese or cheese whiz to top it and onions are an option, grilled or raw. These people had the meat, a too soft roll, and Swiss cheese (although I was able to order provolone) and grilled onions. It was a let down.
So, not far from the sub shop was a branch of the camera shop where I have recently enjoyed some photographically-related social activities. Well, it wasn't there any longer. They'd moved. I called. They answered, and they gave me their new address. Strangely, they seem to be on the edge of a roundabout/traffic circle/rotary, in a small strip mall.
They had quite a lot and it was displayed quite nicely. With high ceilings, it wasn't nearly as claustrophobic as their old (1920s?) store in downtown Indianapolis.
I talked to one of the people who ran the Olympus photo walk. He even remembered me. I'm not sure if that was good or bad.
We talked about FujiFilm mirror-less cameras, since they were next to Olympus' case. He really likes the X-E2, which I think is quite advanced, but not quite the right shape for me. He said that the downtown store was getting two X-T1 bodies, but they're already promised to someone. I told him that I was waiting on weather-sealed lenses and he reminded me that not everything goes as planned. The 50-140mm f/2.8 and 16-55mm f/2.8 fit me reasonably well. I'd like to see how the FujiFilm16-55mm and Olympus 12-40mm are in an optical comparison.
In the end, I bought the only 12-40mm f/2.8 lens that they had. It was made in China, if that's important to you. It feels just as good as my Four-Thirds HG and SHG lenses. These 12-40mm lenses have been selling almost as quickly as they can get them. After all the screaming about fixed focal length lenses, I'm surprised that people are buying the 12-40mm lens. I suspect people on that photo walk were thrilled with the lens, as it is better than other choices. (Yes, this is my opinion. It's my blog--practically everything is my opinion. My opinion about Panasonic micro Four-Thirds lenses may improve once my 35-100mm f/2.8 is back in my hands. My other micro Four-Thirds lens, the Panasonic 45-200mm f/4.0-5.6 does not help.)
I don't buy lenses often, but I spend quite a bit on each. I almost always buy weather-sealed zoom lenses because of sports, but also because I like the flexibility in other situations, such as quick portraits, food photography, and building exteriors. Olympus' HG and SHG Four-Thirds zooms can be used wide open, unlike other brands, because they're sharp across the frame. That's another reason I've been slow to buy micro Four-Thirds equipment. The zoom lenses sucked--until now. Once again, my Panasonic 35-100mm didn't impress me except in focusing speed and that doesn't really lend much to image quality. Perhaps when it is returned to me after the repair for the ugly, nasty lens flare (with lens hood and sun out of frame), it will be a much better lens.
Of course, with a busy day, I didn't have time to photograph anything, but I brought it home, mounted it, and took a few photos of the Olympus E-5 with the Leica/Panasonic 25mm f/1.4. The 12-40mm f/2.8 doesn't seem to like the dark much (what f/2.8 lens does?), but I'm sure I'll find it extremely useful. This is the first time I've had a 24mm (135 format) equivalent available since the 1970s. I have two lenses that start at an equivalent 28mm but that's just not quite wide enough in some situations, and you can't always walk further back. Of course, 14mm (Olympus, Panasonic) or 15mm (FujiFilm) would be amazing in constant aperture zoom lenses. Given the 7-14mm f/2.8 zoom Olympus has shown as a mock up, I'm inclined to wait. It is supposedly due in 2015, but because of the aperture and weather-sealing, it's a better choice for me.
This will also be the first time I'll have a truly light lens on the GH3. Olympus' 14-54mm f/2.8-3.5 isn't bad on it but the 14-35mm f/2.0 is heavy and the Leica 25mm f/1.4 is almost that heavy and it's huge for a fixed focal length lens with that 62mm filter size but not as big as the 67mm or 77mm filter sizes of the two zooms. The 12-40mm is tiny but it also has a 62mm filter size. The Four-Thirds Olympus 50mm f/2.0 macro may still be my smallest lens.
The lens hood is rather small, but I don't see it as ineffective. The lens hood for the 14-54mm is a reasonable size but shows up in the photo at some focal lengths, and the lens hood for the 14-35mm is huge but is still dwarfed by the lens hood for the 35-100mm f/2.0 lens.
The focusing mechanism reminds me of the 14-35mm lens. It extends on both ends of the zoom range.
The size difference between the E-5/14-35mm and GH3/12-40mm is amusing, much like the comparison with the E-5/35-100mm f/2.0 and GH3/35-100mm f/2.8.
I live about 70 miles northeast of San Jose, California, past the foothills, into the farm land. The sun and heat are strong through summer, and even though we've passed into autumn/fall, the light is still quite bright and during the afternoon, it is difficult to keep exposure even.
I first went for a fake cheese steak. I lived in Philadelphia for eight years, and there is yet to be a place 100 miles or further from Philadelphia that can produce a good cheese steak. Some of them claim to be famous even--that's just odd. Lenny's Subs has been advertising about how great their sandwiches are. The founder moved to Memphis, Tennessee and wanted an authentic cheese steak, so he had to create it.
As you probably didn't read in my earlier diatribe on getting it right, you have a roll/bun, thin steak, and mozzarella or provolone cheese or cheese whiz to top it and onions are an option, grilled or raw. These people had the meat, a too soft roll, and Swiss cheese (although I was able to order provolone) and grilled onions. It was a let down.
So, not far from the sub shop was a branch of the camera shop where I have recently enjoyed some photographically-related social activities. Well, it wasn't there any longer. They'd moved. I called. They answered, and they gave me their new address. Strangely, they seem to be on the edge of a roundabout/traffic circle/rotary, in a small strip mall.
They had quite a lot and it was displayed quite nicely. With high ceilings, it wasn't nearly as claustrophobic as their old (1920s?) store in downtown Indianapolis.
I talked to one of the people who ran the Olympus photo walk. He even remembered me. I'm not sure if that was good or bad.
We talked about FujiFilm mirror-less cameras, since they were next to Olympus' case. He really likes the X-E2, which I think is quite advanced, but not quite the right shape for me. He said that the downtown store was getting two X-T1 bodies, but they're already promised to someone. I told him that I was waiting on weather-sealed lenses and he reminded me that not everything goes as planned. The 50-140mm f/2.8 and 16-55mm f/2.8 fit me reasonably well. I'd like to see how the FujiFilm16-55mm and Olympus 12-40mm are in an optical comparison.
In the end, I bought the only 12-40mm f/2.8 lens that they had. It was made in China, if that's important to you. It feels just as good as my Four-Thirds HG and SHG lenses. These 12-40mm lenses have been selling almost as quickly as they can get them. After all the screaming about fixed focal length lenses, I'm surprised that people are buying the 12-40mm lens. I suspect people on that photo walk were thrilled with the lens, as it is better than other choices. (Yes, this is my opinion. It's my blog--practically everything is my opinion. My opinion about Panasonic micro Four-Thirds lenses may improve once my 35-100mm f/2.8 is back in my hands. My other micro Four-Thirds lens, the Panasonic 45-200mm f/4.0-5.6 does not help.)
I don't buy lenses often, but I spend quite a bit on each. I almost always buy weather-sealed zoom lenses because of sports, but also because I like the flexibility in other situations, such as quick portraits, food photography, and building exteriors. Olympus' HG and SHG Four-Thirds zooms can be used wide open, unlike other brands, because they're sharp across the frame. That's another reason I've been slow to buy micro Four-Thirds equipment. The zoom lenses sucked--until now. Once again, my Panasonic 35-100mm didn't impress me except in focusing speed and that doesn't really lend much to image quality. Perhaps when it is returned to me after the repair for the ugly, nasty lens flare (with lens hood and sun out of frame), it will be a much better lens.
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| Olympus 12-40mm f/2.8, extended, with lens hood |
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| Olympus 12-40mm f/2.8 without lens hood |
Of course, with a busy day, I didn't have time to photograph anything, but I brought it home, mounted it, and took a few photos of the Olympus E-5 with the Leica/Panasonic 25mm f/1.4. The 12-40mm f/2.8 doesn't seem to like the dark much (what f/2.8 lens does?), but I'm sure I'll find it extremely useful. This is the first time I've had a 24mm (135 format) equivalent available since the 1970s. I have two lenses that start at an equivalent 28mm but that's just not quite wide enough in some situations, and you can't always walk further back. Of course, 14mm (Olympus, Panasonic) or 15mm (FujiFilm) would be amazing in constant aperture zoom lenses. Given the 7-14mm f/2.8 zoom Olympus has shown as a mock up, I'm inclined to wait. It is supposedly due in 2015, but because of the aperture and weather-sealing, it's a better choice for me.
This will also be the first time I'll have a truly light lens on the GH3. Olympus' 14-54mm f/2.8-3.5 isn't bad on it but the 14-35mm f/2.0 is heavy and the Leica 25mm f/1.4 is almost that heavy and it's huge for a fixed focal length lens with that 62mm filter size but not as big as the 67mm or 77mm filter sizes of the two zooms. The 12-40mm is tiny but it also has a 62mm filter size. The Four-Thirds Olympus 50mm f/2.0 macro may still be my smallest lens.
The lens hood is rather small, but I don't see it as ineffective. The lens hood for the 14-54mm is a reasonable size but shows up in the photo at some focal lengths, and the lens hood for the 14-35mm is huge but is still dwarfed by the lens hood for the 35-100mm f/2.0 lens.
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| Olympus 14-35mm f/2.0 |
The focusing mechanism reminds me of the 14-35mm lens. It extends on both ends of the zoom range.
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| GH3 with 12-40mm, E-5 with 14-35mm |
The size difference between the E-5/14-35mm and GH3/12-40mm is amusing, much like the comparison with the E-5/35-100mm f/2.0 and GH3/35-100mm f/2.8.
 |
| 58mm vs 77mm filter size |
I am thrilled to say that I'm taking advantage of the wider angle. It's certainly been useful.
I've photographed this court house a few times but was never able to get a whole side of it at once.
As I noted during the photo walk, the flare resistance is quite good, although I tweaked this photo to dial down the overwhelming sunshine. You can't have a miserable, cloudy day and then, have sunshine, correct, when you'll just return to misery? Now, that I look again, it has a bit too much of an unnatural look to it in the smaller size. It's just great to be able to handle larger structures without stitching.
I'm liking the color, also. I've had poor luck with the Panasonic lenses and the color, although I suspect that will be the case, even if they're perfect. This is the first time that I've felt that the GH3 was giving its all with native lenses.
Just thinking about it, this is the first time since November 2011 that I have not had any image stabilization, in the lens or moving the sensor. Of course, I haven't had any terribly dark situations yet, but I never saw the E-5's IS helping me through difficult times.
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| Even near sunset, the color is good |
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| Interesting that Google's Blogger has changed the photo from silhouette on import |
Update 2014.02.26: I haven't removed the lens from the GH3 yet. I've been testing to see if there is a real problem with it breaking. It's certainly better to find the problem in the first few days, rather than after the warranty is finished. The lens continues to impress me and it feels as though the GH3 is totally different.
Update 2014.03.05: I can't express fully how happy I am with the 12-40mm lens. Ultimately, it's not a lens for the dark (could they have coaxed f/2.5 out of a lens with a 67mm filter size?), but my tripod could help with that, once it's a bit warmer outside. My feelings about the GH3 have become warmer, though. I find the lens to be extremely useful and it's so light that I don't seem to miss image stabilization, not that I knew when it was helping on the E-5 or within the Panasonic lenses.
The image quality seems to be so much better now that my regrets about buying a Panasonic body are completely gone. It really has taken me back to the days in 2004 when my Olympus E-1 was new and I only had the 50-200mm and 14-54mm lenses. I expect the 40-150mm f/2.8 to be equally engaging, so maybe work will just be joy. If the GH4 turns out to be wonderful, I may not have any need for the FujiFilm X-T1.
Update 2014.03.19: Are they sure this aperture is f/2.8? I seem to be getting clear shots that don't seem possible with f/2.8, especially since I'm doing it without any image stabilization.
Update 2014.07.27: I've been using this lens with the Olympus E-M1 (I traded my GH3 in anticipation of a GH4) for the skate park and the extra little bit of the wide angle has been great. It has some of the typical wide angle distortion, which gives close up shots something close to the skate park style that people love without the fisheye. It obviously hasn't broken and it's been a good companion. If there is a everyday problem, it's that the AF ring/clutch is too easily moved while I'm shooting, and I haven't spent a full day trying to manually focus it. The micro Four-Thirds lenses are all too tiny for me, but at least this one is a bit bigger than most. I still prefer the ZD 14-35mm f/2.0 though.
Update 2014.10.02: By now, I've shot over 10,000 photos with this lens, most of them related to skate parks. It has done well, but it hasn't been quite as wonderful as it initially seemed. However, real-life problems have been few.
There have been two situations that have caused me to wonder.
- In rare strongly-lit situations, lens flare is a problem
- In mixed light, where strong light is bordered by deep shadow, auto focus with the E-M1 fails occasionally
Otherwise, the lens has been an excellent example of any lens so small. I must say that I don't feel it's nearly as good as any of my Four-Thirds HG or SHG lenses. However, it is quite amazing, especially at 12mm, a focal length I don't have with any other lens.
During a trip to Santa Cruz, the skate park's pipe was enough to channel the sunlight into a form that caused lens flare that I didn't expect. I didn't think that the lens was perfect but it was more than I'd seen from any Four-Thirds Olympus lens.
More recently, in early evening, when harsh light meets harsh shadow, the auto focus with the E-M1 suddenly changes at that moment when I'm ready to take a photo. I'm not sure whether this is a problem with the lens, the E-M1, or the combination. The only other micro Four-Thirds lens I use on the body is the Panasonic 35-100mm f/2.8 and I use it so rarely that I can't make a direct comparison. There is a huge difference in the responsiveness, though, with the 35-100mm being significantly less responsive.''
Update 2015.09.07: It's been almost 1.5 years now since I got this lens. It has been used almost every day--on the Panasonic GH3 first but lately on the Olympus E-M1 and Panasonic GH4.
There were early warnings about the build quality of the lens, claiming that it simply fell apart without any unusual circumstances. I have tortured the lens in many situations and it has been great. The front lens cap has fallen apart. There is a little wear on the bottom, as I have put it down at skate parks. (I wish the E-M1 was as healthy. I have over the 150,000 shutter actuations apparently and it needs a replacement, along with a new eyecup mount.)
Sunday, November 10, 2013
I bought an iPhone 5c (over the LG G2) and stayed with my carrier, Sprint
There is always hope, but sometime, it's almost minimal. That's how things are today.
Friday, I went back to the local Sprint store and traded my iPhone 4S for an iPhone 5c. Everyone working at the store was wearing an LG G2 t-shirt. I really thought about buying a G2 or the Google Nexus 5. I wasn't 100% sure about either for various reasons. They're both big. The Nexus 5 didn't have Otterbox or similar brand cases, and it only came in a 16 GB capacity. The G2 had 32 GB capacity but I was uncertain about operating system updates and the various complaints against the interface, even though it has the Sprint ID crap on top of the Sprint version--something I know that didn't get in the way too much.
You can call me cheap but the iPhone 5c fits my conservative feeling about technology. I've already read too much about weirdness with the iPhone 5s, as I read about troubles with the iPhone 5 when it was new, and I generally don't go for the first of Apple's trial runs because I've paid painfully for being first.
The iPhone 5c is slightly more technically than the iPhone 5, in a newer design. It has 2 bands for LTE, rather than 1. If Sprint were deploying all 3 bands soon, and LTE was my main goal, then the G2 or Nexus 5 would have been better choices. However, the 1900 MHz and 2500 MHz bands will do, with the 800 MHz band coming later. The Sierra Wireless/Netgear mobile hotspot I have only does 1900 MHz for LTE and 2500 MHz for WiMAX, and only 1900 MHz for EVDO. By the time I get my next phone, everything will be settled.
Still, US199.99 for the 32 GB iPhone 5c and a trade-in value of $143 for my iPhone 4S, made a difference of $56.99, which is a cheap price to switch a generation (or two, if you look at the timing). Of course, I had to buy another AppleCare+ plan for $99.00 but that's not bad, and then, a cable with a Lightning connector. It wasn't cheap, but for the quality, it wasn't expensive really. Monoprice would have a better deal, but I didn't order it ahead of time and deals at Target or Best Buy were worse than Sprint. I ended up giving all of my extra iPhone 4S accessories to a friend who still has his. At some point, Lightning cables and accessories will become common, and therefore, inexpensive.
The only thing that doesn't seem a great deal is the Ottberbox Defender case for US$49.99. Of course, it's changed for the new form. What seemed sloppy in the iPhone 4S case is taut and what was taut in that case is now loose. The screen protector is no longer hard plastic and there is a gap, so you must press the plastic against the display. Does this protect it better? I don't think so because dust can enter through the opening for the Home button and the speaker/front camera opening. Oddly, the porthole for the Apple logo is not correctly placed.
The fit of the case is so much better overall and the Lighning port cover doesn't close accidentally as did the cover for the 30 pin connector. The case is gray and white, so that seems a bit more appealing (at the moment) than the older, black-only case. In fact, Otterbox has several color combinations available by special order. I doubt retailers will carry them all. (Update 2014.01.05: I've changed to the Ballistic SG MAXX, which has apparently been renamed Hard Jacket Maxx or something like that, plus added an Invisible Shield screen protector because the Defender screen protector made it difficult to work the phone.)
As far as usage goes, the phone feels faster, as it should stepping from the A5 processor to the A6 processor. It would have been nice to get the A6x but it probably generates too much heat in a small package. Besides, the cost was likely too much to add it and price the phone were it is.
I had a chance on Saturday to gauge LTE, when I was at a Panasonic photo/video workshop at a camera store in downtown Indianapolis, Indiana. I was recently at that store for a product introduction for Olympus, and LTE wasn't healthy. At 0.75 Mbps, I found it mostly useless. Sprintcare advised me that two towers were down and putting strain on single tower. Saturday, a couple of months later, I got 1.0 Mbps, which certainly doesn't even look like 5 Mbps or 10, 15, 20, or 25 Mbps that this technology is supposed to allow. Obviously, the buildout is still in its infancy.
Further into the suburbs, I got not quite 3 Mbps, and there were gaps in coverage along the way. When I was in Greenwood Park mall, one end switched all the way down to 1xRTT (thankfully not the circle since iOS 7 but it's labeled 1x), but near the Sprint kiosk, there was LTE available, not that it worked very well, but it was present.
I was told to expect LTE here in 6 months. Given my 60+ mile drive home, I have no doubt that it will be deployed along I-70, as it went quite a way, covering several small towns along the interstate highway. It stopped in the middle of nowhere, not at an intersection along the highway, which seemed odd to me, but I'm not a communications planner. With about 38 more miles to get to the town where I am now, it looks like progress is actually happening in a very backward area that only got 3G service in early 2009.
When I was outside Cincinnati today, in the Springdale area, I noticed the LTE indicator on the phone. Cincinnati is not an announced area, as far as I know, and the WiMAX there is more overloaded than the 3G service, so it was surprising to see the results.
As for the increased resolution, there is room for an extra row of icons and using my backup from the iPhone 4S, it looks a bit lonely toward the bottom. I wish that they would let me expand the favorite apps at the bottom into two rows. It's not as though it's a hardship, but it could be more convenient. Apple is learning, but learning so slowly that the rest of us need a class on patience.
I'm sure someone out there thinks that I'm ridiculously stupid for staying with a CDMA phone. Here is my reasoning: There was a demonstration of how you could use a $15 phone and a little bit of knowledge to fake a GSM tower and listen to conversations. It's not that I make a lot of conversations, secretive or otherwise, but it's ridiculous to open yourself up when you give that credit card number over the phone and a third party is listening.
They call CDMA old, but GSM goes back to the 1980s--further than CDMA really. I'm excited about VoLTE--voice over LTE technology, where we can give up both GSM and CDMA but it's going to be later in the decade.
Update 2013.11.26: Two weeks have passed already? The phone has proven itself. LTE, where available, works well. I don't see that the phone can fix communications problems but at least, it's not making them worse, as it seemed to be with the iPhone 4S or the LG Optimus S. Perhaps, Qualcomm is better now or it's just that the antenna configuration is much better. I'm holding the phone the same way as always. For a moment yesterday, I was thinking of my Sanyo PM-8200 with the pull-out antenna. That phone had amazing sound but flip phones could be thicker then. Having a phone that sounded better than a landline phone was incredible at that time. It was only when I got to the premium Samsung A900 that my expectations went down.
I was going to say that my problem with compass interference had completely gone away, but I can only say that it's minimized. I haven't seen the actual message about compass interference, but I find that the map is looking the wrong way occasionally.
I haven't seen anything terrible, which is both great and expected of what is mostly a 1 year old phone with some enhancements. When iOS 7 is more mature, I expect that it will be as good as a phone can be.
My 2013 Google Nexus 7 tablet will fill my need for Android.
Update 2013.12.06: My pro rata bill came and that's always a time for panic as it is big. The bill was almost exactly the same, except for the US$36.00 activation fee and AppleCare+ for US$99.00, and of course, there was additional tax because of those two. It's a bit more (~US$60+) than my bill from two years ago when I got the iPhone 4s when they started charging the smart phone premium data fee but I don't recall much about the changes.
Service has been unhappy and great in alternating cycles. LTE is still months away, though it works in the small town of Eaton in Ohio about 12 miles away, though no longer in the Cincinnati area. It would be great to have a really good response from the devices, although the iPhone 5c generally works better than the mobile hotspot. How any carrier buys products to work with their supplied connections, and they don't really work together well, I will never understand. All the carriers seem to have the same problems and it's never their fault, just like the cable company.
Update 2014.01.05: I am definitely not pleased with service lately. It's likely because of holiday shopping and ongoing upgrade work, but service at home is unusable at times. I don't mean that it's pathetically slow. I mean that it's time to shut off the phone slow because nothing is getting data. The mobile hotspot is worse for whatever reason. Checking the network.sprint.com website shows me that cows and horses about 6 miles east of here have LTE service and it's arriving from all sides, but when tiny towns have the service and a town of 35,000 doesn't, it makes me wonder what the priorities are. The phone is great however and hasn't disappointed at all.
Update 2014.03.26: After spending several months with the latest version of Android (4.4.2) and recently updating the iPhone 5c to iOS 7.1, I couldn't be more pleased that I didn't get an Android-based phone. There is always something just a little bit off about Android. Thankfully, the tablet isn't bad as its 2012 counterpart was. I like the 2013 Nexus 7, and it's a much better piece of hardware than the iPad mini but it would be good if Google fixed the operating system, so it wasn't a pig and the battery wasn't half depleted if I leave it off the charger all night.
The iPhone 5c has recently taken up mobile hotspot duties and it works well enough, but there seem to be some flaws in the functionality in iOS 7.1. Otherwise, the phone is quite good, which should be expected since it is a warmed-over iPhone 5 with dual band LTE. LTE works quite well, and I've seen over 12 Mbps with it. However, at home, I'm still struggling with service. I suspect the technician is the same one who couldn't get 3G/EVDO working on schedule, and can't keep the network working consistently either.
I'm no longer using the Otterbox Defender case. I switched to a Ballistic SG MAXX case, tossed the screen protector, and bought an Invisible Shield screen protector. It was a lot of money, but not wasted.
Update 2014.11.26: It's been over a year with the iPhone 5c and it's still a good phone. Thankfully, the rather broken iOS 7.x has been replaced with the somewhat broken iOS 8.1.1 finally. I think Sprint is still my biggest hurdle, but I don't see good alternatives. My service is only really bad at home.
Given that I'm using the SG MAXX case (and they've changed the name of that model), there have been no destructive drops. I'm pleased that the case is both strong and that I can remove it easily.
If there is one odd problem with the phone, it's something that seems to have happened recently. Syncing with the computer has become flaky. I switched from the long, Sprint-supplied cable to the original, short Apple-supplied cable and it is more reliable, but not 100%.
However, part of the problem could be that I upgraded to OS X 10.9.5 about the same time as I upgraded the phone to iOS 8.1. It could also be that my MacBook Pro is often in the backpack with me, but that shouldn't loosen just the USB ports. I'd expect that it would loosen practically everything.
32GB seems not to be quite enough, possibly because the apps are arriving in 32-bit/64-bit combos with enhanced artwork for the upgraded resolutions for the iPhone 6 and 6 Plus. I have a little bit over 16 GB of music (256 Kbps mp3 encoding), so the rest of the storage is related to apps. Asphalt 8 and Galaxy on Fire 2 (HD) take a lot of storage for data.
In any case, I'm still pleased with the iPhone 5c.
Friday, I went back to the local Sprint store and traded my iPhone 4S for an iPhone 5c. Everyone working at the store was wearing an LG G2 t-shirt. I really thought about buying a G2 or the Google Nexus 5. I wasn't 100% sure about either for various reasons. They're both big. The Nexus 5 didn't have Otterbox or similar brand cases, and it only came in a 16 GB capacity. The G2 had 32 GB capacity but I was uncertain about operating system updates and the various complaints against the interface, even though it has the Sprint ID crap on top of the Sprint version--something I know that didn't get in the way too much.
You can call me cheap but the iPhone 5c fits my conservative feeling about technology. I've already read too much about weirdness with the iPhone 5s, as I read about troubles with the iPhone 5 when it was new, and I generally don't go for the first of Apple's trial runs because I've paid painfully for being first.
The iPhone 5c is slightly more technically than the iPhone 5, in a newer design. It has 2 bands for LTE, rather than 1. If Sprint were deploying all 3 bands soon, and LTE was my main goal, then the G2 or Nexus 5 would have been better choices. However, the 1900 MHz and 2500 MHz bands will do, with the 800 MHz band coming later. The Sierra Wireless/Netgear mobile hotspot I have only does 1900 MHz for LTE and 2500 MHz for WiMAX, and only 1900 MHz for EVDO. By the time I get my next phone, everything will be settled.
Still, US199.99 for the 32 GB iPhone 5c and a trade-in value of $143 for my iPhone 4S, made a difference of $56.99, which is a cheap price to switch a generation (or two, if you look at the timing). Of course, I had to buy another AppleCare+ plan for $99.00 but that's not bad, and then, a cable with a Lightning connector. It wasn't cheap, but for the quality, it wasn't expensive really. Monoprice would have a better deal, but I didn't order it ahead of time and deals at Target or Best Buy were worse than Sprint. I ended up giving all of my extra iPhone 4S accessories to a friend who still has his. At some point, Lightning cables and accessories will become common, and therefore, inexpensive.
The only thing that doesn't seem a great deal is the Ottberbox Defender case for US$49.99. Of course, it's changed for the new form. What seemed sloppy in the iPhone 4S case is taut and what was taut in that case is now loose. The screen protector is no longer hard plastic and there is a gap, so you must press the plastic against the display. Does this protect it better? I don't think so because dust can enter through the opening for the Home button and the speaker/front camera opening. Oddly, the porthole for the Apple logo is not correctly placed.
The fit of the case is so much better overall and the Lighning port cover doesn't close accidentally as did the cover for the 30 pin connector. The case is gray and white, so that seems a bit more appealing (at the moment) than the older, black-only case. In fact, Otterbox has several color combinations available by special order. I doubt retailers will carry them all. (Update 2014.01.05: I've changed to the Ballistic SG MAXX, which has apparently been renamed Hard Jacket Maxx or something like that, plus added an Invisible Shield screen protector because the Defender screen protector made it difficult to work the phone.)
As far as usage goes, the phone feels faster, as it should stepping from the A5 processor to the A6 processor. It would have been nice to get the A6x but it probably generates too much heat in a small package. Besides, the cost was likely too much to add it and price the phone were it is.
I had a chance on Saturday to gauge LTE, when I was at a Panasonic photo/video workshop at a camera store in downtown Indianapolis, Indiana. I was recently at that store for a product introduction for Olympus, and LTE wasn't healthy. At 0.75 Mbps, I found it mostly useless. Sprintcare advised me that two towers were down and putting strain on single tower. Saturday, a couple of months later, I got 1.0 Mbps, which certainly doesn't even look like 5 Mbps or 10, 15, 20, or 25 Mbps that this technology is supposed to allow. Obviously, the buildout is still in its infancy.
Further into the suburbs, I got not quite 3 Mbps, and there were gaps in coverage along the way. When I was in Greenwood Park mall, one end switched all the way down to 1xRTT (thankfully not the circle since iOS 7 but it's labeled 1x), but near the Sprint kiosk, there was LTE available, not that it worked very well, but it was present.
I was told to expect LTE here in 6 months. Given my 60+ mile drive home, I have no doubt that it will be deployed along I-70, as it went quite a way, covering several small towns along the interstate highway. It stopped in the middle of nowhere, not at an intersection along the highway, which seemed odd to me, but I'm not a communications planner. With about 38 more miles to get to the town where I am now, it looks like progress is actually happening in a very backward area that only got 3G service in early 2009.
When I was outside Cincinnati today, in the Springdale area, I noticed the LTE indicator on the phone. Cincinnati is not an announced area, as far as I know, and the WiMAX there is more overloaded than the 3G service, so it was surprising to see the results.
As for the increased resolution, there is room for an extra row of icons and using my backup from the iPhone 4S, it looks a bit lonely toward the bottom. I wish that they would let me expand the favorite apps at the bottom into two rows. It's not as though it's a hardship, but it could be more convenient. Apple is learning, but learning so slowly that the rest of us need a class on patience.
I'm sure someone out there thinks that I'm ridiculously stupid for staying with a CDMA phone. Here is my reasoning: There was a demonstration of how you could use a $15 phone and a little bit of knowledge to fake a GSM tower and listen to conversations. It's not that I make a lot of conversations, secretive or otherwise, but it's ridiculous to open yourself up when you give that credit card number over the phone and a third party is listening.
They call CDMA old, but GSM goes back to the 1980s--further than CDMA really. I'm excited about VoLTE--voice over LTE technology, where we can give up both GSM and CDMA but it's going to be later in the decade.
Update 2013.11.26: Two weeks have passed already? The phone has proven itself. LTE, where available, works well. I don't see that the phone can fix communications problems but at least, it's not making them worse, as it seemed to be with the iPhone 4S or the LG Optimus S. Perhaps, Qualcomm is better now or it's just that the antenna configuration is much better. I'm holding the phone the same way as always. For a moment yesterday, I was thinking of my Sanyo PM-8200 with the pull-out antenna. That phone had amazing sound but flip phones could be thicker then. Having a phone that sounded better than a landline phone was incredible at that time. It was only when I got to the premium Samsung A900 that my expectations went down.
I was going to say that my problem with compass interference had completely gone away, but I can only say that it's minimized. I haven't seen the actual message about compass interference, but I find that the map is looking the wrong way occasionally.
I haven't seen anything terrible, which is both great and expected of what is mostly a 1 year old phone with some enhancements. When iOS 7 is more mature, I expect that it will be as good as a phone can be.
My 2013 Google Nexus 7 tablet will fill my need for Android.
Update 2013.12.06: My pro rata bill came and that's always a time for panic as it is big. The bill was almost exactly the same, except for the US$36.00 activation fee and AppleCare+ for US$99.00, and of course, there was additional tax because of those two. It's a bit more (~US$60+) than my bill from two years ago when I got the iPhone 4s when they started charging the smart phone premium data fee but I don't recall much about the changes.
Service has been unhappy and great in alternating cycles. LTE is still months away, though it works in the small town of Eaton in Ohio about 12 miles away, though no longer in the Cincinnati area. It would be great to have a really good response from the devices, although the iPhone 5c generally works better than the mobile hotspot. How any carrier buys products to work with their supplied connections, and they don't really work together well, I will never understand. All the carriers seem to have the same problems and it's never their fault, just like the cable company.
Update 2014.01.05: I am definitely not pleased with service lately. It's likely because of holiday shopping and ongoing upgrade work, but service at home is unusable at times. I don't mean that it's pathetically slow. I mean that it's time to shut off the phone slow because nothing is getting data. The mobile hotspot is worse for whatever reason. Checking the network.sprint.com website shows me that cows and horses about 6 miles east of here have LTE service and it's arriving from all sides, but when tiny towns have the service and a town of 35,000 doesn't, it makes me wonder what the priorities are. The phone is great however and hasn't disappointed at all.
Update 2014.03.26: After spending several months with the latest version of Android (4.4.2) and recently updating the iPhone 5c to iOS 7.1, I couldn't be more pleased that I didn't get an Android-based phone. There is always something just a little bit off about Android. Thankfully, the tablet isn't bad as its 2012 counterpart was. I like the 2013 Nexus 7, and it's a much better piece of hardware than the iPad mini but it would be good if Google fixed the operating system, so it wasn't a pig and the battery wasn't half depleted if I leave it off the charger all night.
The iPhone 5c has recently taken up mobile hotspot duties and it works well enough, but there seem to be some flaws in the functionality in iOS 7.1. Otherwise, the phone is quite good, which should be expected since it is a warmed-over iPhone 5 with dual band LTE. LTE works quite well, and I've seen over 12 Mbps with it. However, at home, I'm still struggling with service. I suspect the technician is the same one who couldn't get 3G/EVDO working on schedule, and can't keep the network working consistently either.
I'm no longer using the Otterbox Defender case. I switched to a Ballistic SG MAXX case, tossed the screen protector, and bought an Invisible Shield screen protector. It was a lot of money, but not wasted.
Update 2014.11.26: It's been over a year with the iPhone 5c and it's still a good phone. Thankfully, the rather broken iOS 7.x has been replaced with the somewhat broken iOS 8.1.1 finally. I think Sprint is still my biggest hurdle, but I don't see good alternatives. My service is only really bad at home.
Given that I'm using the SG MAXX case (and they've changed the name of that model), there have been no destructive drops. I'm pleased that the case is both strong and that I can remove it easily.
If there is one odd problem with the phone, it's something that seems to have happened recently. Syncing with the computer has become flaky. I switched from the long, Sprint-supplied cable to the original, short Apple-supplied cable and it is more reliable, but not 100%.
However, part of the problem could be that I upgraded to OS X 10.9.5 about the same time as I upgraded the phone to iOS 8.1. It could also be that my MacBook Pro is often in the backpack with me, but that shouldn't loosen just the USB ports. I'd expect that it would loosen practically everything.
32GB seems not to be quite enough, possibly because the apps are arriving in 32-bit/64-bit combos with enhanced artwork for the upgraded resolutions for the iPhone 6 and 6 Plus. I have a little bit over 16 GB of music (256 Kbps mp3 encoding), so the rest of the storage is related to apps. Asphalt 8 and Galaxy on Fire 2 (HD) take a lot of storage for data.
In any case, I'm still pleased with the iPhone 5c.
Wednesday, January 16, 2013
Sprint LTE seems to work
I was in the Indianapolis area today, and as I had checked the Sprint coverage page last night, saw that they had gone live with LTE. The funny thing about their data maps, unlike their voice maps, is that they don't show relative signal strength. It's all covered in orange, when in reality, it might not be covered at all.
My current home coverage is like that. It' shows up as a blanket of 3G goodness when, in fact, I often get unusable service. The voice coverage shows me on the edge of great voice signal strength.
I took my mobile hotspot (Sierra Wireless Tri-Fi, as they call it), into the pizza place where I went to eat lunch, along with my laptop computer. It connected slowly, then disconnected, then connected again. As I was trying to actually use the connection, the hotspot disconnected from the computer. C-R-A-P. This is the second device, as the first one was confused about whether it was fully charged or not, and disconnected regularly.
My guess is that the disconnections happen when the towers are overloaded. Despite their assurances, I think their capacity upgrades only minimized the horror and they needed 6 or 7 more to put things back to where they were before they started selling Apple's iPhone. They've been selling smart phones like crazy. Apparently, nearly half of people in the U.S.A. are using smart phones. I saw almost great speeds on Christmas Day, so it makes sense.
There was a handy Sprint store around the corner, so I stopped to talk. I casually asked why it wouldn't connect to LTE and the representative told me that the towers were only about 30 % of the buildout. That seems consistent with Verizon and AT&T boasting LTE coverage when there wasn't much. Sad, isn't it? Still, some is better than none, as long as it works.
After I'd finished my regular shopping, I headed to Sam's Club for gasoline and to see if there was anything else I desperately needed. $3.079 wasn't bad for regular, since I'd seen up to $3.219 on the way there.
I tried the mobile hotspot again, and it showed the 4G symbol. Since I knew Indianapolis didn't have WiMAX, I was quite pleased to be connected to LTE for the first time with the device. I'll upload the screenshot but the PING came back as 70 ms, with a download speed of 4.65 Mbps, and an upload speed of 3.81 Mbps. Considering the technology, it's slow, but if I'd checked my 3G connection, the LTE speed would look wonderful. I'm hoping to see much better. I tried Verizon's LTE in West Carrollton, Ohio and the download speed at that time was ~5.8 Mbps but it was a more mature buildout by that time. I considered it too slow for the money Verizon charged, and considering that I had minimal coverage in my own town at the time, it didn't make sense. Since then, they added LTE but it's only good if you happen to be where it works.
Now, I'm thinking that Sprint may try to compete with Verizon since the two have this town sewn up. T-Mobile doesn't even have 3G service here and there is no MetroPCS or Cricket. AT&T has 3G service but that could collapse at any moment once their customers upgrade to 3G data phones. It's not likely they'll have LTE here until the end of the century. I don't even think that they had EDGE here until 2006 or 2007.
If nothing else, the pizza and breadsticks were good.
Update 2013.11.11: It's going on 10 months since I wrote this. I see Sprint covering more of the state of Indiana, but service in Indianapolis is anything but exemplary. Downtown, near where they showcased LTE for the SuperBowl, I've seen service as low as 0.75 Mbps and the other day, it was running at 1.0 Mbps down. I also got 2.88 Mbps in the suburbs where the buildout didn't seem to be finished. However, service in the mall was better near the Sprint kiosk, and often dropped to 1xRTT elsewhere.
I'm on my third hotspot now, and this one doesn't seem to be better. Why doesn't the equipment for their towers work well?
I'm interested to see how Verizon is doing. About a year ago, I went to visit someone in a small town to deliver a few things. She was showing me her Verizon Samsung Galaxy S III and I noticed that LTE was lit. She tried to look up something and it paused for over 1 minute, switched to 3G/EVDO, and returned results finally. So much for more coverage. Putting LTE on one tower just doesn't do more than stake a claim. It has to work.
Oh, and I just had pizza and breadsticks there again the other day.
My current home coverage is like that. It' shows up as a blanket of 3G goodness when, in fact, I often get unusable service. The voice coverage shows me on the edge of great voice signal strength.
I took my mobile hotspot (Sierra Wireless Tri-Fi, as they call it), into the pizza place where I went to eat lunch, along with my laptop computer. It connected slowly, then disconnected, then connected again. As I was trying to actually use the connection, the hotspot disconnected from the computer. C-R-A-P. This is the second device, as the first one was confused about whether it was fully charged or not, and disconnected regularly.
My guess is that the disconnections happen when the towers are overloaded. Despite their assurances, I think their capacity upgrades only minimized the horror and they needed 6 or 7 more to put things back to where they were before they started selling Apple's iPhone. They've been selling smart phones like crazy. Apparently, nearly half of people in the U.S.A. are using smart phones. I saw almost great speeds on Christmas Day, so it makes sense.
There was a handy Sprint store around the corner, so I stopped to talk. I casually asked why it wouldn't connect to LTE and the representative told me that the towers were only about 30 % of the buildout. That seems consistent with Verizon and AT&T boasting LTE coverage when there wasn't much. Sad, isn't it? Still, some is better than none, as long as it works.
After I'd finished my regular shopping, I headed to Sam's Club for gasoline and to see if there was anything else I desperately needed. $3.079 wasn't bad for regular, since I'd seen up to $3.219 on the way there.
I tried the mobile hotspot again, and it showed the 4G symbol. Since I knew Indianapolis didn't have WiMAX, I was quite pleased to be connected to LTE for the first time with the device. I'll upload the screenshot but the PING came back as 70 ms, with a download speed of 4.65 Mbps, and an upload speed of 3.81 Mbps. Considering the technology, it's slow, but if I'd checked my 3G connection, the LTE speed would look wonderful. I'm hoping to see much better. I tried Verizon's LTE in West Carrollton, Ohio and the download speed at that time was ~5.8 Mbps but it was a more mature buildout by that time. I considered it too slow for the money Verizon charged, and considering that I had minimal coverage in my own town at the time, it didn't make sense. Since then, they added LTE but it's only good if you happen to be where it works.
Now, I'm thinking that Sprint may try to compete with Verizon since the two have this town sewn up. T-Mobile doesn't even have 3G service here and there is no MetroPCS or Cricket. AT&T has 3G service but that could collapse at any moment once their customers upgrade to 3G data phones. It's not likely they'll have LTE here until the end of the century. I don't even think that they had EDGE here until 2006 or 2007.
If nothing else, the pizza and breadsticks were good.
Update 2013.11.11: It's going on 10 months since I wrote this. I see Sprint covering more of the state of Indiana, but service in Indianapolis is anything but exemplary. Downtown, near where they showcased LTE for the SuperBowl, I've seen service as low as 0.75 Mbps and the other day, it was running at 1.0 Mbps down. I also got 2.88 Mbps in the suburbs where the buildout didn't seem to be finished. However, service in the mall was better near the Sprint kiosk, and often dropped to 1xRTT elsewhere.
I'm on my third hotspot now, and this one doesn't seem to be better. Why doesn't the equipment for their towers work well?
I'm interested to see how Verizon is doing. About a year ago, I went to visit someone in a small town to deliver a few things. She was showing me her Verizon Samsung Galaxy S III and I noticed that LTE was lit. She tried to look up something and it paused for over 1 minute, switched to 3G/EVDO, and returned results finally. So much for more coverage. Putting LTE on one tower just doesn't do more than stake a claim. It has to work.
Oh, and I just had pizza and breadsticks there again the other day.
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