(Ice Cream Sandwich) Size (H X W X D) 130.7 x 68.9 x 7.1 mm Display Size 4.3″ Super AMOLED Memory 16 GB (Internal) and 16 GB microSD (Installed) Processor Speed Dual-Core 1.2 GHz Camera 8 MP (rear facing)

1.3 MP (front facing) Video Camera HD 1080p 1920×1080 resolution @ 30fps (rear facing)

HD 720p (front facing)

Overview

I used the Motorola Droid RAZR off and on for several weeks. I must first disclose that my day-to-day phone is an iPhone 4S. However, I’ve tried to make this review focus on the RAZR and not about the iPhone vs. Android operating system. Some of my comparisons are made against the iPhone though, because that’s what I know best. Also, since I co-own Appsolute Genius, I’ll be using an IQ scale in my ratings (Genius, Above Average, Average, Below Average, and Mentally Handicapped).

The packaging of the RAZR is reasonably nice. My first impression of it, as a very big, very thin phone with a giant screen, was good. After using it for a while, I have concluded that the RAZR is something I could use day to day, but it wouldn’t be my first choice. It has very good hardware and is a snappy phone. Nonetheless, the RAZR failed to meet my expectations in a few key areas. The camera and video camera are decent, but from my point of view as an avid photographer, they have some major issues I’m not happy with. The battery life is a clear improvement over other Android phones I’ve used, but it’s still not quite where I need it.

I think the bundle of software the RAZR comes with is a nice touch. It has all the Google software (no surprise) such as Gmail, Google Calendar, Google Maps, Google Navigation, and more. You can also change your keyboard to SWYPE. The default predictive text on Android is not very good. However, SWYPE allows you to draw the pattern of the word, and it’s amazing! I would add it to my iPhone 4S tomorrow if I could. The voice control and voice dictation simply doesn’t compare to Siri, but that really is just an Android vs. iPhone issue, so I’ll let it slide.  I am still really annoyed that you have to pay extra for Visual Voicemail on the phone.

Overall, I wouldn’t say that the Droid RAZR is a Genius, but I would say that it’s Above Average!

Hardware: Genius

Let me start by saying that when I opened the box, I couldn’t get over how big and thin the Motorola Droid RAZR is.  I had to put it side by side with my iPhone 4S to see if it really is as thin as it looks. The RAZR is very light and easily fits in my pocket. The finish of the phone looks and feels plasticky, which doesn’t feel high-end to me.  The screen is a very nice Super AMOLED display with a 960 x 530 resolution. At 4.3″, it really does feel very big when looking at the web or apps.  As a side note, I have very large hands and find typing with the phone a little difficult, while my wife doesn’t enjoy typing on it at all due to her very small hands.

Speed: Above Average

A 1.2 GHz Dual-Core processor is very, very fast but not groundbreaking these days. However, I don’t think you’ll find the RAZR to be slow. The only time I notice a lag is when I turn the orientation of the phone for portrait to landscape. I do believe that is more or an Android issue as it happens on my tablet.

Camera/Video Camera: Average

Motorola RAZR Macro Photo Sample

iPhone4s Macro Photo Sample

When is the last time you carried a point and shoot camera with you? It’s been a few years for me, and I’m a big amateur photographer (just checkout my Facebook page and you’ll see). My phone MUST have a good camera! In fact, I asked a friend of mine who is a skilled professional videographer to help me test the camera functions. His experienced input helped me understand why I don’t like the camera and video camera so much.

Motorola RAZR White Balance Sample Photo

iPhone4s White Balance Photo Sample

I think the RAZR’s camera speed is fairly good. It’s very comparable to an iPhone 4S. However, right out of the box, the white balance is way off. The photos don’t look realistic at all because the colors are off.  I was able to tweak color balance issue and fix it. However, an average user (like my mom or dad) would just have bad photos.

Motorola RAZR Photo While Moving Sample

iPhone4s Photo While Moving Sample text

I had another problem with how the RAZR’s phone handles motion. Almost every picture I took while moving or in a car is blurry. On the iPhone 4S, the same pictures are razor (no pun intended) sharp, but a tiny bit grainy. This is because the iPhone changes the ISO of the photo to a higher speed (800 or 1600), while Android just leaves the shutter open longer. Another small issue is that widescreen pictures were limited to 6MP. Finally, the macro function (taking very close pictures) had a difficult time focusing and doesn’t work well at all.

Motorola RAZR Photo Sample in Low Light

As for the video camera, it provides a very similar experience to the camera. The macro function doesn’t allow for good close-ups. It also doesn’t handle motion or low light situations well, because it keeps the shutter open.

Battery Life/Charging: Above Average

Most people who have owned a 4G/LTE Android phone have come to realize that the battery life is just not up to par, as many need recharging after 5-6 hours. As a business user, my basic requirement is that my phone makes it through the day without needing to be charged. The RAZR comes so close! I seem to make it 8-10 hours without heavy use. That’s good enough for most days but proves to be a challenge at conferences and while traveling.  With most Android phones, you’d simply buy a spare battery. However, Motorola chose to not allow you to replace the battery. Your best bet for managing the battery when you know you can’t recharge for 10-12 hours is to just turn off the 4G for the day. I also took issue with the battery charger itself. While I like that it’s a USB hub with two ports, I don’t like the small connector. In time, I believe this could break, and it’s just too easy to pull out.

About the Author: Brian Cauble is the CEO of Appsolute Genius.

Cooking Light created a very attractive app. The photography is very well done and some of the features are very nice. I love that you can create a meal and it will tally up the nutritional information. Considering their demographic, this is key!

However, that’s where the good news seems to stop. They’ve made a bunch of mistakes. First they charged $3.99 for the app which is fine but will severely limit the audience. So I wonder if the goal of the app was to make money or to extend the brand? Second, they put ads in an expensive app. They are getting crushed on reviews for this. Rightly so in my opinion. Consumers expect an ad-free app if they pay for it, especially if it’s $3.99. Third, they included only 300 recipes. When you take out categories you might not eat like vegetarian or seafood, it becomes an even smaller set of recipes. They most likely did this because of the photography. However, should they have sacrificed using so many photos for more recipes? There is some stiff competition in the food app category. Apps like Epicurious have many more recipes and are free. Finally, it seems to be missing a search. In an app for recipes, it should have a great search. The developers can’t have used their own app otherwise they would have realized it was missing an important feature.

Hopefully, Cooking Light will listen to the feedback and quickly fix the problems. There is a real opportunity to make this app a big winner and something Apple would feature.

Cooking Light Recipes: Quick and Healthy Menu Maker Time Inc. Category: Lifestyle Updated: Jun 20, 2011 53 Ratings

Recently, we’ve run into a few companies promising to do it all. We would talk to a company and they would ask us to create a system using the iPad, backend systems, and a web portal or web app. Since we have a partner company extremely capable of creating the web side of projects, this was easy for us to do. However, occasionally there would be a kink. A potential client would ask us if we could do something we didn’t do (such as their marketing). In one real case, a company actually told us they wanted a vendor who could do everything. They wanted one company to create everything from Apps to apparel with a marketing strategy and website mixed in. We told them that we were sorry but that it really wasn’t something we could do!

To our surprise, they told us that they knew someone else locally they could work with. We knew the company well, and we knew for a fact that they didn’t specialize in Apps. In fact, they didn’t specialize in most of what our prospective client needed. However, they definitely said they could do it all! It was an interesting lesson for us. We still refused to say we could do everything. We might have gotten the client, but we wouldn’t have been able to deliver a superior product on every part of the project.

So how do you tell the difference between someone who will tell you anything and someone who can really help you? You probably aren’t an App developer and you probably aren’t a marketer! Here are a few tips to help you find the right company.

• We do it all! Always be wary of any company who says they “do it all”! Our company is constantly reading about Apps and about the mobile development industry. In fact, it’s all we do and it is hard to keep up with it!
• Get specific! Ask a company for specifics of projects they’ve done like yours. They may not have done everything for one client, but they should be able to give you examples of a marketing campaign they’ve done like yours. They should be able to show you Apps they’ve created that are similar to yours (at least in concept)!
• Sometimes your baby is ugly! A good vendor will tell you the bad and good of your ideas. A good vendor knows their industry and what works. They won’t just take every single idea you have and implement them without feedback or questions.
• The cool factor! We all like working on “cool” projects. However, if your vendor says “cool” 15 times and never once asks you about the business goals for your project, you should run (not walk) away! The App you are creating may be cool, but most importantly, it should make you money or save you money.
• Get references! References are not a home run every single time. Any decent company should be able to give you a good reference or two. However, combine a few really good references with the first four factors above and you may have found the right company.

It can be tough to tell the difference between a used car salesman and a company who can really deliver. Hopefully, this post will help you make a better choice with your next vendor. What has worked for you in the past when hiring a new vendor? We’d love to hear your thoughts!

• Games – This is fairly obvious but any 2D or 3D game (The most popular category in the store).
• Entertainment – These are novelty Apps for pure enjoyment. Do you want to see what you would look like bald?
• Utilities – This is everything from alarm clocks to barcode scanners to levels for hanging pictures.
• Social Networking – If your App is an extension of a social networking platform or intended to help users communicate or network with each other, Social Networking might be your best bet.
• Music – If your App is for playing music, modifying music, or identifying music, it belongs here.
• Productivity – For any App which helps users be more productive such as to-do lists, calendars, or note taking (Evernote)!
• Lifestyle – This is a more general App category including things like cooking Apps or journals.
• Reference – If your App is a reference guide to anything from anatomy to bar tending, this is a good choice.
• Travel – For all Apps that are travel related! If your user will use your App while traveling or planning for travel, put it here.
• Sports – This is a fairly obvious category. If it is sports related in anyway, this is your category.
• Navigation – If you are helping people find things, Navigation is the correct category.
• Healthcare & Fitness – If your App is meant to improve a users health or fitness level, use this category!
• News – If the focus of your App is to let users keep up with some type of news, News is the obvious choice.
• Photography – If you help users view, share or modify photographs, pick Photography.
• Finance – Are you helping users manage money, make financial decisions, or keep up with market conditions? This is your category if the answer is yes.
• Business – This is a misleading category. A lot of general business utilities will fall here.
• Education – If you feel like you’re helping users to learn facts or skills, education might be a wise choice.
• Weather – This is another obvious category!
• Books – This is for all things book related, interactive or not!
• Medical – If the focus of your App is for medical professionals (doctors, nurses, paramedics) or to provide medical information, pick medical.

This is a big list, but keep it simple and pick the most obvious categories. Also remember, put the App in the category that people are most likely to search. You may think of your App as a utility but if people will search for it in Travel, then it is a Travel App!

Checklist

As mobile App developers, we get approached everyday to create apps for companies. Often, they tell us they want an iPhone app, Android app, iPad app, or all of the above. We respond by telling them that we’d love to work with them but we have a few questions first. Ultimately, we ask why they want to create an app and why now. Many times companies can’t seem to answer these basic questions. They really seem to want an app because everybody is talking about apps! In short, it seems like an item they want to check off their list of things their companies needs to do.

While it always amazes us that a company will spend thousands of dollars without knowing what they want to accomplish, it’s not a project we will take. We are very happy to help a company figure out the best app for them. However, we really need to understand the business goals of a company. We also need to understand the ideal customer of a company. How can we build apps that help a company grow business without knowing a little bit about what makes them tick? Once we start to understand a business, we can create an app that can help their business.

If you are considering having an app built for your business, take time to explore your goals and consider your customers. A good mobile development company will be able to help you explore this. An “order taker” will just quote you a price without trying to understand your company or your goals. That would be fine if you just wanted a burger! This is always phase one for us regardless of if your company is in Birmingham, Al or North Carolina. In the long run, this will go a long way towards maximizing your mobile investment!

Stay tuned for a future post discussing understanding your customer and how they might use your app!

iPhone, iPad, and MacBook Air sitting on table

Appsolute Genius is a company that creates mobile Apps, but we are also a company that creates custom software for mobile computers at the same time. It’s important not to forget that we really have computers in our hand. Compare the specs of the starting MacBook Air and you’ll find it has a 1.4GHz processor. Well the iPhone has roughly a 1GHz processor. The MacBook Air does have 1GB-4GB of RAM while the iPhone has 512MB of RAM. However, the iPhone and iPad don’t need as much RAM because they don’t run 20 programs at one time. These computers which just happen to have phones and touch-screens are only getting faster and better with every version!

You need to remember that while an App is software, the first thing that makes it really different is that it is truly mobile. You can go anywhere with these devices which changes how you use them. Second, they use a touch screen for an input device. This makes mobile devices feel much more intimate and requires someone who understands how to design for a touch screen. Your average web developer in Birmingham, AL or anywhere else isn’t use to thinking like this and doesn’t understand how to design for touch. Finally, the arrival of cloud storage services like Dropbox or Box.Net means your data can be with you everywhere you go. It’s time to realize that tablets and smart phones may be the first truly personal computers!

There are many answers to why a user would use your app. One reason is that your app is entertaining (fun) and makes a game of something. However, I use many Apps every day that I love that are not fun or not a game. I love Pandora! Why? Because Pandora allows me to listen to music that suits my taste and let’s me do it almost anywhere without having to buy the music! I also love ESPN Scorecenter. Why do I like this App so much? It’s because I want to follow sports scores effortlessly and it’s makes doing this very simple. These are just two mobile Apps that I really like, and neither is fun or a game. Some of the reasons for why someone would use your app are listed below.

• Makes something easier – buying shoes, watching a movie, finding a house you want to buy, etc.
• Valuable information – sports scores, stock prices, subway schedules, lake conditions for fishing, etc.
• Pushed information tailored to your interests – notice of a deposit to your account, the expiration of an auction where your the high bidder, etc.
• Fun and Entertaining – games (Angry Birds), Location Based services (Foursquare), Augmented Reality (Starwalk), etc
• Saves money – Couponing Apps such as Groupon or Living Social

These are just some of the reasons your customer would use your App, and to make a great app, you must make something people want to use!

There are many reasons to attend! You’ll meet people from all over the world. In one session, you’ll meet a web developer from Oklahoma and later than evening, you’ll meet a startup who just received a $30 Million Series A round of funding. There are so many sessions that you often won’t be able to decide which sounds the best. Some of the sessions will be a bust and others will blow you away! You will see new startups being launched for the first time. Some of the biggest startups today such as Twitter where launched at SXSW. After attending sessions all day, there will be parties all over the city. Some are officially sponsored parties and others are small private RSVP parties.

SXSW is truly an awesome experience and I think anybody in technology should attend at least one time. So in honor of my amazing 6 days and 5 long nights in Austin, I’ll discuss my favorite sessions and the trends I noticed swirling around!

Sessions that stood out:

• Developing a Seamless Web to Mobile Experience - Omar Green from Intuit gave a compelling talk about how Intuit is really digging into the customer experience to innovate. I walked away committed to spending more time with end users before releasing another product!
• The Thank You Economy - If you’ve never heard Gary Vaynerchuk, you have no idea what you are missing! His speech was funny, compelling, and very thought provoking. Gary discussed his theory that companies who will win in the next generation are those that really deeply care about their customers. He believes caring is profitable and we are returning to a world more similar to our great grandparents’ world where businesses knew and cared about each of their customers. He also threw a hell of a wine party!
• Five Startups You Meet in the Deadpool - Throw together two very savvy investors and two very savvy entrepreneurs (Hashable and Thrillist) and what do you get? A fantastic discussion about building businesses and things you MUST know if you hope to build a great business. They were all great, but Christine Herron really stood out to me and the discussions about customer acquisition where amazing!

Trends I noticed:

• Daily Deal Takes Over – Last year seemed to be the year of the Location-Based startup at SXSW. This year definitely seemed to be the year of the Daily-Deal startup. While Groupon.com and LivingSocial.com have been around for a few years, there were a bunch of startups at SXSW rolling out new daily deals with a twist. There was also a fair amount of discussion about consumers getting fatigued by daily deals and how this space will evolve to create more value for local businesses.
• Group Communications – Group communications also seemed to be the aim of many startups. Many of us realize that people at events have a need to keep up with each other in a better, more organized way than you can do with plain-old text messages and Foursquare. Expect to see one or two of these to explode in the next year.
• Enough Talking About Social Media – For the first time in a while, it seemed that people were tired of discussing social media and how you should use it. There were some sessions about the topic, but nothing like I’ve seen in past years. While most of the world is just finding out about Twitter and Foursquare, the SXSW crowd seems to be tired of the endless debates about it.

These are just a few of my take-aways. I hope I’ve convinced you it’s worth attending in the future. You won’t have a crazier, more interesting, or thought provoking week all year!

I was honored to be part of an impressive judging panel, along with Simon Cole of THINK, Inc., John Masour of ZigZag Marketing, and the organizer of ProductCampRTP, Brett Cooper.  Together, we watched eight different groups present their apps. Ideas ranged from a silly, but addictive game called Cat Punch Fever, to an app called Social Fly which would allow people to meet like-minded individuals while on airport layovers.  In the end, we agreed that the winner would be Stinky Fridge?, an app which would track the perishable foods you’ve purchased and let you know how long they have left before “the stink” begins.

So what does the winner get?  Well, to me, this is the best part.  The winning team will have their app, Stinky Fridge?, developed by Appsolute Genius as part of our sponsorship for ProductCampRTP.  We’ll be working with the entire team to take the app through a full development lifecycle, and finally have it submitted to the App Store.  Once it’s developed and in the store, TIMA (Triangle Interactive Marketing Association) will be helping to market the app.  All proceeds will go directly to ProductCampRTP, in order to support future events full of innovation.