How to Switch to a Sony Xperia Using Xperia Transfer | Dramel Notes

The end is nigh for your old smartphone. Your upgrade came, and it’s a Sony Xperia, perhaps one of last year’s models, or even the 2015 Sony Xperia Z5.

You’re bracing yourself for the time intensive and often frustrating task of copying your data and contacts from your old smartphone (Android, iPhone, or Windows Phone) to your new one. And then you discover Xperia Transfer, and all is right with the world once more.

Which Method Should You Use?

Sony provides two Android apps designed to manage your migration from your old phone to a new Sony Xperia — one mobile and one desktop. The former is Xperia Transfer Mobile, which works wirelessly; the latter is Xperia Transfer Desktop, which sends the data via a client app on a PC or Mac.

But which method should you use? Well, in simple terms, if you’re using Android 4.0 Ice Cream Sandwich or later, then using the Xperia Transfer Mobile app will be fine.

However, for those wanting to transfer data from an old Android device (below Android 4.0), a Nokia (running Symbian), a BlackBerry, a Windows Phone, or an iPhone, then your best bet is to use the desktop method, outlined below.

First, we’ll look at the mobile app.

The Mobile Method

To get started, check your Sony Xperia for the Xperia Transfer Mobile app, which should be listed in the App Drawer. If not, open the Play Store and install it. When you’ve done that, install it on your old Android as well.

Next, launch the app on both devices. Select Wireless connection, and choose PIN or NFC (near field communication) to establish a relationship. Using a PIN is quicker (NFC naturally requires you to activate this feature, which for security reasons should be left disabled), so choose this on your old phone, then again on your new phone.

Xperia Transfer Mobile will then display a PIN on the new phone that you must enter on the old one. You will then see a notification informing you of an Invitation to Connect — click Accept on the new phone.

It’s almost time to start transferring data. All you need to do first is confirm what exactly you want to migrate, using the check boxes.

Once you tap Transfer, the new phone will confirm that you want to give Xperia Transfer Mobile permission to access and move the selected data. The app will then transfer the data, and as long as you have enough space on your new phone, you’ll soon have everything moved over.

The Desktop Method

Migrating from an old Android device (running a version prior to Android 4.0), one with problematic wireless networking, or one that runs BlackBerry, iOS, or Windows Phone/Mobile is just as simple, but it requires you to first install a desktop client. You’ll find this on the Sony Mobile website; choose the link for PC Companion or Mac Bridge. We’ll continue with this guide focusing on PC Companion (a 29MB download), but the options on both apps are more or less identical.

After installation, connect your Xperia via USB cable to prompt for the drivers to be installed; check your phone’s display to complete installation. The desktop app is multi-purpose and also provides any information you need concerning updates, so it is worth leaving it installed (assuming it doesn’t interfere with your other apps).

With the software installed, the PC Companion feature opens, so click Start and work through the setup wizard until you click Finish. Once this is done, find Xperia Transfer on the main app window, click Start, and wait as the component is installed.

Prepare Your Old Phone

While this is happening, on your old phone, which should be disconnected from your PC, install the Xperia Transfer Desktop application. When this is done, run the app (which installs as) and follow the wizard to extract your data.

On your computer, you will be presented with a menu, where you can select your data source. Each selection you make will display the type of data that can be transferred on the right. When you’re happy with your selection, once again click Start.

You’ll be given the chance to review the data that will be transferred, including the opportunity to add or drop contacts, or manually merge them if you have duplicates.

If you’re using the Xperia Transfer Desktop app on your old Android device, now is the time to connect it via USB. Make sure you have the USB connection type set to MTP — you should be able to change this in your notifications once it’s connected.

For transferring via iPad or iPhone, first make a backup either to iCloud or to your desktop using iTunes. You can then proceed with Xperia Transfer Desktop to migrate the data to your new Xperia device. If you’re moving from Blackberry, the Sony transfer software will take everything across to your new Xperia.

Windows Phone or Windows Mobile users should choose the final option in the list above, after first ensuring their contacts are synced via Outlook or Windows. Content will need to be manually transferred, or else you’ll need to sync to OneDrive and use the Android OneDrive app.

Transfer Your Data

When the data is ready to be transferred to your Xperia, and you have connected the device, simply click Transfer to complete the process.

Sit back as the data moves from the old device to the new one, relatively effortlessly.

What Do You Think?

This is a great way to keep hold of your contacts and those much-loved photos, although don’t overlook cloud solutions when it comes to digital keepsakes you don’t want to lose! Keeping everything backed up this time around could mean an even easier switch next time.

Do you have a Sony Xperia phone or tablet? Have you used the Xperia Transfer software, or perhaps run into trouble with it? Tell us in the comments.

[Read more]

How to Make Your PlayStation 4 or Xbox One Faster (By Adding an SSD) | Dramel Notes

Sony and Microsoft chose not to ship the PlayStation 4 and Xbox One consoles with solid-state drives. They went with slower mechanical drives to keep costs down, but you can speed up load times for your console games by adding a solid-state drive to your PS4 or Xbox One.

Modern console games are generally installed to and loaded from the hard drive, not just from discs. Using a faster solid-state drive will decrease load times in games. This is the one upgrade you can perform on a game console.

You could also use this trick to add a larger mechanical hard drive and get more storage than the 500 GB drive that came with your console, if you prefer.

PlayStation 4

PlayStation 4 consoles don’t support external hard drives, so you can’t just plug an external SSD into your console. However, the PlayStation 4 allows you to access to a drive bay, where you can remove the internal drive and then replace it. You could take out the mechanical hard drive that came with your PS4, and install a faster solid-state drive — or an even larger mechanical hard drive, if you prefer.

Sony provides official instructions for replacing your PS4’s hard drive. Your new drive must be a 2.5-inch internal drive, 9.5mm or slimmer in size, and use the SATA specification. As long as you choose a drive that matches those specifications, it should work just fine in your PS4. Do some research and buy a solid internal SSD — it’d be the same kind of SSD you’d purchase if you were upgrading a computer with an SSD.

You can only have one hard drive installed at a time in your PS4, so you might want to purchase a fairly large SSD.

Sony’s guide will walk you through backing up the data currently on your console to a removable drive, accessing the PlayStation 4’s hard drive bay, installing the drive, and then reinstalling the PS4 system software on your new drive and restoring the backup.

Xbox One

Microsoft’s Xbox One doesn’t allow you to open it and replace its internal drive. However, the Xbox One does support external hard drives you can connect over USB. Buy a speedy external SSD that uses the USB 3.0 specification, plug it into your Xbox One, and you can install games on that drive. Games will load faster from a sufficiently fast external drive than they would from the internal mechanical drive.

You’ll need a drive that supports USB 3.0 and is at least 256 GB in size, or the Xbox One won’t allow you to install games to it. You should also seek out a solid-state drive that uses USB 3.0 for the fastest performance — you might want to look up benchmarks of external drives before you buy them. Cheap USB 3.0 external drives might actually be quite slow, despite being labelled with “USB 3.0”. The Xbox One offers three USB 3.0 ports, so you could have up to three external drives connected.

Plug an external drive into your Xbox One and you’ll be prompted to format it and use it for games and apps. You can also access this option from Settings > All settings > System > Storage > Format for games & apps.

You can move games between drives without reinstalling them. Highlight a game in My games & apps, press the Menu button, and select Manage game. You can then move it between your connected storage devices – for example, between an internal drive and an external drive. Microsoft’s website provides information on using an external drive with your Xbox One.

---

Games on Nintendo’s Wii U typically aren’t installed to the internal storage, unless you download them digitally and don’t play them from discs. However, you can also connect external drives to your Wii U to increase the storage capacity and potentially speed up load times if the game is loading data from the drive. Nintendo’s website explains what you need to know about adding external drives to your Wii U.

Image Credit: BagoGames on Flickr, Jon Fingas on Flickr, Marco Verch on Wikimedia Commons

[Read more]

The 5 Best Online Tools for Making Professional Videos | Dramel Notes

Not everyone can afford a copy of Adobe Premiere Pro or Sony Vegas Pro. And while there are plenty of desktop video editors out there — on Windows, on Mac, and even on Linux — nothing can beat the accessible-from-anywhere convenience of an online video editor.

What’s surprising is just how many of these Web-based video editors there are, and how many of them just aren’t very good, but the good news is they aren’t all bad. In fact, several are pretty darn good.

1. WeVideo

WeVideo is a cloud-based video editor with a powerful feature set and a lot of reasons to use it, but perhaps the best reason is due to its simple interface, shallow learning curve, and ease of use. It’s one of the few worth paying for.

A free account gets you 2 GB of cloud space, up to 720p resolution, up to 50 tracks from the music library, and up to 5 minutes of “published video time” per month. The downside is that you’re limited to basic editing features and the video will be watermarked.

Or you can pay a one-time price of $10 for 5 GB of cloud space, up to 720p resolution, up to 400 tracks from the music library, up to 60 minutes of “published video time”, no watermark, and all advanced editing features. If you run out of publishing time, you can just pay another $10.

Editing features include transitions, animations, transformations, speed ups and slow downs, green screen, a Storyboard editor, a Timeline editor, and easy exports to popular sites like YouTube, Vimeo, DailyMotion, Facebook, and Dropbox.

WeVideo is also available as an Android app and iOS app. Editing videos on a mobile device is certainly more restrictive than on a computer, but if you can handle it, WeVideo is easily one of the top choices alongside Adobe’s Creative Cloud apps.

2. Loopster

Loopster is a cloud-based video editor that’s designed to be easy enough for amateurs but powerful enough for those seeking to do more serious work. Even if you have absolutely no video editing experience, Loopster’s interface is so simple that you’ll pick it up in a snap.

A free account gets you 3 GB of cloud space, up to 480p resolution, up to 10 minutes on the timeline, up to 1 GB max size per uploaded file, and a Loopster watermark on the final video. Good enough for amateurs, and not as restrictive as WeVideo in terms of how many videos you can publish.

Paid accounts come in four tiers. The first two are for individuals — Plus ($4 per month) and Movie Producer ($8 per month) — while the last two are for organizations — Education ($80 per quarter) and Business ($130 per quarter). All of these packages remove the watermark, increase resolution to 720p, and unlock a few advanced features.

The difference between Plus and Movie Producer tiers? The former has 10 GB cloud space and 20 minutes on the timeline while the latter has 20 GB cloud space and 30 minutes on the timeline.

In addition, Loopster provides a free library of 600+ sound effects, the ability for multiple users to collaborate on one video, easy distribution to several video sites, and is also available as an Android app and iOS app.

3. Magisto

Want to make a professional-looking video without doing any serious editing work? Then Magisto is the tool for you. Think of what Instagram did for amateur photography, then apply it to amateur videography. Yeah, that about sums it up — and I don’t mean that in a bad way.

It works like this: once you have a video clip, all you have to do is upload it to Magisto, pick a “theme” for it, and decide on the background music for the clip. Despite the fact that you have very little control otherwise, Magisto’s results are rather impressive.

Seriously, Magisto does all the work. Once uploaded, Magisto analyzes the clip and determines which postions are the “most interesting”, then cuts out all of the uninteresting parts. Expect the final video to be noticeably shorter than the source video you uploaded.

Upgrading to a Premium account, at $5 per month, lets you publish longer videos (up to 2.5 minutes in length) and gives you the ability to download the final video. With a Free account, videos can be published directly to YouTube, Facebook, Twitter, and more.

Magisto is one of our preferred tools when editing videos in Chrome.

4. Wideo

Wideo isn’t a traditional video editor. Rather than taking a clip that you recorded elsewhere — such as with your phone or camera — and letting you apply changes to it, Wideo lets you create animated videos from scratch with ease.

Here’s how it works: You can upload your own images and audios (but not video clips, unfortunately) and animate them using the tools provided by Wideo. Animations include transformations, transitions, and text effects.

It’s best for making the kinds of videos you’d see as marketing promotions for a new mobile app or a business presentation full of graphs and data. Wideo comes with dozens of templates — advertisements, tutorials, infographics, etc. — that’ll speed up your video-making time.

The Free plan lets you make unlimited videos with a 30-second limit. Upgrading to the Plus ($9 per month), Pro ($19 per month), or Agency ($39 per month) plans increases the video length limit, increases video quality, and how many Wideo-provided assets you can use. The Free and Plus plans are watermarked.

5. PowToon

PowToon is similar to Wideo in that it isn’t meant to edit existing videos that you’ve recorded. Instead, you use it to create animations and presentations from scratch. Basically, if you need something like Wideo but don’t like Wideo, then try PowToon. (Or vice versa.)

Free accounts have basic animation and slide features, no downloading of videos, can only be used for non-commercial purposes, a max length of 5 minutes, a limited selection of royalty-free music and styles, and are watermarked. Compared to Wideo, it’s admittedly a bit gutted for flexibility.

Pro accounts ($229 per year) and Business accounts ($708 per year) have advanced features, better video resolution, commercial rights, more music and styles options, longer video lengths, and no watermarks. Pretty expensive, I know, but worth it if you’re going to be making a lot of videos.

Which Online Video Maker Is Best?

If you absolutely need a professional video, your best bet is to spend the money and find someone with the right tools (e.g. Adobe Premiere Pro, Sony Vegas Pro) and the proper skillset to make it a reality. If your budget is limited, however, then these tools can still get you pretty far.

Are there any online video editing tools that we missed? Which ones look most interesting to you? Share your thoughts with us in the comments below!

[Read more]

Sony Xperia Z5 Review & Giveaway | Dramel Notes

You’re looking for a new phone. Something reasonably powerful, big screen, great sound. A handset to blow your iPhone-loving friends out of the water.

This might just be it.

Sony’s Xperia Z5 is a larger phone, verging on phablet dimensions. Available in a variety of finishes, we’re reviewing and giving away one in a stunning gold finish. But is it a good enough smartphone for you to spend time reading this review and entering our giveaway?

The Sony Xperia Z5: What’s Inside?

This phone comes with a lot of spec.

 

Requiring a nano SIM, the inside of the 146 x 72 x 7.3 mm case is packed full of tech, the highlight of which is the Qualcomm MSM8994 Snapdragon 810 chipset with a Quad-core 1.5 GHz Cortex-A53 CPU and Adreno 430 GPU, backed up by hefty 3Gb of RAM.

Several versions of the Xperia Z5 are available, including the Xperia Z5 Premium, a super flagship boasting a 5.5 inch 4K display. The model we’re reviewing, however, is the Xperia Z5, the standard flagship, still with phablet dimensions (a slightly smaller 5.2 inch), but with a more battery friendly Full HD 1920 x 1080 pixel display, complete with Sony’s TRILUMINOS™ with Live Color LED for remarkable color reproduction.

A microSD slot – in the same caddy as the nano SIM – will support up to 200 GB, which will add to the 32GB internal storage.

As with any modern smartphone, you can expect to get online via mobile Internet (GSM, HSPA, LTE) or wireless, and the device also features Wi-Fi 802.11 a/b/g/n/ac, dual-band, Wi-Fi Direct, DLNA and wireless hotspot. Bluetooth 4.1, GPS, NFC, micro USB with USB host support and FM radio are all included.

Fingerprint Recognition Brings Added Security

One particularly useful feature is the fingerprint recognition, made possible using a small scanner mounted in the power button. Setting this up requires several cans of your thumb to be captured, and if you don’t vary the position of your chunkiest digit, you’ll be setting this up for a while. The best approach is to consider that the scan is looking at a strip of your thumb, and between scans move it slightly so that a different portion of your opposable digit is scanned.

All in all, the results are good, but the only benefit a thumb fingerprint recognition brings – beyond the obvious security benefits – is to save you pressing the power button. Instead, you just rest your thumb against the scanner to unlock the phone.

It’s nice to have, and can frustrate any unauthorized user, however.

Portable Entertainment Center

Like most Sony devices, the Xperia Z5 is an entertainment center, albeit one you can stick in your pocket and take with you anywhere. As a result, the smartphone has superb video and audio. The TRILUMINOS system makes a massive impact when you start watching video, while hi-res audio reproduction is as good as any other on the market, including Beats Audio, if not better.

Factor in the microSD slot and you have a smartphone that can hold its own against any other (and quite a few tablets and PCs) in multimedia playback. Whether you’re planning on enjoying music, streamed video or gaming, put simply, the Xperia Z5 is a fun device.

On the subject of gaming, meanwhile, you’ll find a PlayStation subfolder in the app drawer. From here, you can connect to your PS4 and use the Remote Play feature, as well as access various services on the PlayStation Network. It’s a bit like the Xbox 360 and Xbox One apps for Windows Phone and Android, only better…

Lollipop with a Stripped Back Custom UI

Upon booting, the first thing you see is Android 5.0 Lollipop. Although the phone ships with the promise of an imminent upgrade to Android 6.0 Marshmallow (likely January), the most important thing to note here is that Sony has been working on a new user interface that closely resembles stock Android.

The result is a user interface that feels very much like Android 5.0 Lollipop but with a heavy dose of Sony software. As for branding, the only ever present element is the clock/calendar widget which can be removed if preferred. All in all, this is a slick, satisfying presentation of Android Lollipop, which suggests good things for the imminent update to Android 6.0 Marshmallow.

A nice addition to the UI are the Favorites Bar shortcuts on the Recents screen. Here, you can add a collection of lightweight apps (all windowed) such as a calculator, timer, browser, etc., that can be instantly launched. These can prove useful, and act more like widgets that can be quickly closed rather than standard apps.

Battery Life & Performance

One of the biggest surprises about this phone is the battery life. The non-removable Li-Ion 2900 mAh battery lasts up to 520 hours on standby, with up to 13 hours talk time. How does this translate into daily use?

While on standby and disconnected from both 4G and Wi-Fi, the Xperia Z5 battery decreases in daily chunks of 10-12%. Essentially, this means the phone can last over a week without recharging in a low-use scenario, although of course this would be an unlikely occurrence.

But what it does mean is that you can leave the Xperia Z5 at bedtime and wake up 6 hours later to find that it still has something approaching a useable charge. Better still, it recharges within a couple of hours and is equipped with several battery management tools. STAMINA mode and Ultra STAMINA mode activate power save functions, the latter enabling only basic phone functions – ideal for those desperate times when you’re nowhere near a power source for recharging. Background data queuing can also be enabled to reduce battery impact.

Using Antutu Benchmark to gauge an idea of how fast the phone is, we can see that, unsurprisingly, it’s a bit of an animal. User experience and other benchmarking tools may well differ, but based on Antutu, the Xperia Z5 running Lollipop is very highly rated, with only the Samsung Galaxy S6 and Note 5, and the Letv Le1 Pro coming in ahead.

That’s not bad at all.

However, it isn’t without its quirks. For instance, EA’s Dead Space seems to launch incorrectly half the time, sometimes with perfect sound, others with just ear-splitting static. For a phone with such good audio, this is particularly jarring.

Does the 23 MP Camera Deliver?

An impressive 23 megapixel camera (5520 x 4140 pixels) with phase detection autofocus and LED flash is mounted in the chassis of the Xperia Z5, offering a 16:9 ratio. You may prefer, however, to decrease to 20 MP and get the standard 4:3, but it is 8 MP that is selected by default, so if you’re looking for hi-resolution images from this camera, open the Settings screen in the camera app before you start snapping.

Color reproduction is convincing, with tones and hues appearing lifelike regardless of the environment. Various apps can be used within the camera app, such as 4K video, Multi camera view (which records footage from your device’s main camera and that of another Sony Xperia Z5 series phone or a recent Wi-Fi-compatible camera), panorama mode, and even Face in Picture, which records or snaps from both front and back cameras, and Vine, for uploading video clips to Twitter. In total, 12 camera apps are available, with more ready to be downloaded.

Other settings are also present, such as scenes and camera modes, and the smile detection works really well. Nighttime photography without the flash is impressive, with a more realistic color reproduction than you would find on cheaper phones. Think a camera on a par with the Samsung Galaxy S6 or iPhone 6S, here, but with the added polish that Sony brings to photographic hardware.

Meanwhile, snaps and videos recorded at the same location are automatically compiled into a story, much like the feature in Google Photos and other automated movie making apps.

Is the Xperia Z5 a Phone You Want?

As you’ve seen, the Xperia Z5 delivers a competent smartphone experience, combining the best of Android Lollipop with some surprisingly good pre-installed Sony apps and solid hardware.

This is a good smartphone, perhaps Sony’s best (although 4K fans will prefer the Z5 Premium.)

Compared to another 2015 phablet that we’ve reviewed – the Samsung Galaxy A7 – the Xperia Z5 is the more user friendly device. The useful thumbprint scanner on the power button saves time; the weight of the phone is perfect – not too heavy, not too light – and the camera is superb. Benchmark results speak for themselves.

However, you might be concerned that the phone ships with Android 5.0 Lollipop rather than the current Android 6.0 Marshmallow. Sony has stated that it will be making Marshmallow available on the Xperia Z5 in due course. So no need to panic!

Sony Xperia Z5 Giveaway

[Read more]