Product Review - @SamsungSA Galaxy Tab4 - 10.1" Tablet

Hi Guys,

Samsung has launched a lot of products to cater to the markets in all segments of users. They keep launching niche and flagship products for high end customers and value for money products for others. They have products which suits every budget and gives your money's return by their superior service quality and warranty on their products. 

Tablets have become an integral part of society and I still remember people clicking snaps with them in London Eye thought it would block the view of the other people on-board but nevertheless people carry this device all the time with them to stay connected to the world. Samsung has launched several tablets in the market before with huge success and now they have come up with another android tablet called Samsung Galaxy Tab4 with 10.1" WXGA LCD display which is available in the market in black and white colors. It's better than the 7" inch tablet as it gives you much more viewing area along with multi-tasking capability to open several (two apps) windows together.

The tablet has a very nice display with screen resolution of 1280 x 800 pixels which comes with a 1.2GHz Quad-core processor with 1.5GB RAM and 16GB ROM. Out of 16GB around 12.7GB is available for users to consume. The processor gives sufficient power to play all the tablet games without any lags. Galaxy Tab4 has a 6800mAh battery which gives the tablet power for nearly 8-10 hours under moderate usage. The tablet has Bluetooth v4 to connect to the other bluetooth enabled devices really quick.

Samsung Galaxy Tab4 has multi-user mode where you can restrict the access to apps and other material if the same tablet is being used by kids or anyone else in the family. This Wi-fi tablet runs on Android v 4.4 KitKat and gives access to all the apps in Play store as well as Samsung's own version of apps. The tablet has 3MP rear camera with 4x digital zoom and 1.3MP front camera for video calling. The sound comes from speakers on both sides of the tablet and is sufficient for your daily needs. The main screen contains only one physical button along with two touch sensitive buttons.

The Tab4 weights around 490 grams and easy to carry with you all the time. The tablet comes with a charger and micro-USB cable. The tablet has nice features like SoundAlive which helps you to set your own equalizers as per the music or video you are playing. 3.5mm jack is also available to use the tablet with headphones etc. The tables do get a lot of fingerprints all over it as matte finish plastic back catches it a lot. The tablet is very responsive to the touch and has very good build quality at the price point of R4000.

Galaxy Tab 4 has 3G as well as Wi-fi capability to connect to the internet and has GPS connectivity to help you with Google maps too. The tablet can play 1080p full HD videos along with HD recording. Overall, this is an android tablet with 3G feature to buy if you are looking for something in that price range which can help you stay connected to your family and friends. The thing I loved the most about this tablet was it's display quality which is much better than many tablets in the same price range along with the sound output the two small speakers on the sides produces. Follow Samsung SA on twitter and facebook.

Cheers!!!

Follow me on twitter @araijain or @thelifesway
Email - thelifesway@gmail.com for invites to launch events / sponsored posts and product reviews!
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@MercedesBenz_SA #BOKEH Fashion Film Festival - Johannesburg

Hi Guys, 

After a breath-taking event held in Cape Town earlier this year, the Mercedes-Benz Bokeh Fashion Film Festival arrived in Johannesburg for a one night only extravaganza at the Mercedes-Benz Lifestyle Centre in Bedfordview. The location was awesome as it was a AMG special dealers showroom and really loved all the latest models of cars on display. 

Invited guests braved the onset of winter and freezing temperatures to dress in their fashionable best and join celebrities, VIP’s, local and international film-makers for a sensory interactive brand experience. Each guest was chauffeur driven in the latest Mercedes-Benz models and entered an Oscar style red carpet flanked by a host of local and international media jostling for the perfect shot and interview opportunity.

The venue was transformed into a light and sound extravaganza with winning films from the Mercedes-Benz Bokeh Fashion Film Festival presented on large format UHD Hisense screens. Selvin Govender, Marketing Director of Mercedes-Benz cars commented, “This is the second year in a row that we are title sponsors for this event and we are even more excited about the overall success of our brand alignment and collaboration with Adrian, his team and the fashion film genre. Fashion Films are relevant, powerful and stylish and this is exactly why we feel that this event is the perfect platform for our brand, as it definitely showcases the stylishness and elegance of our Mercedes-Benz vehicles. Naturally, we were first to embark on this alignment and as a result, the Mercedes-Benz brand in other countries are now looking to follow.”

Aidan Whytock, winner of The Mercedes-Benz Award along with the US$ 10000 prize money, thanked founder Adrian Lazarus and Mercedes-Benz for their commitment and support, and mentioned that the competition had allowed him to showcase his winning film internationally, opening doors and opportunities for himself and other entrants. His movie was simply awesome and moved the other passionate photographer to learn some of the video photography and participate next year in this contest.

The Cape Town Fashion Council were joined on the evening by some of South Africa’s top designers including Spero Villioti, Hendrik Vermeulen, and Gert-Johan Coetzee. The ever stunning MC Bailey Schneider donned an exquisite Spero Villioti Couture dress to welcome the guests and introduce proceedings. Catherine Timotei also grabbed the attention by exhibiting several original art masterpieces and Mercedes-Benz had guests drooling at an interesting showcase of their latest and greatest cars.

What started off as a dream for founder and MD, Adrian Lazarus, is now a reality. “We’re just getting bigger and better every year, and once again Johannesburg didn’t disappoint. Guests ventured out in freezing conditions tonight to join us and experience the incredible talent that this year’s Fashion Film Festival offered, and we are all delighted for the support as well as our amazing sponsors,” said Adrian. It was really freezing as the weather Gods decided to start winters on that very first evening but the warm food and drinks kept us sane. 

Sponsors of the event included: Mercedes-Benz South Africa, Hisense, Cape Town Fashion Council, Fashion-One TV, MAC cosmetics, Luxury Brands, GHD Hair care, Sunglass Hut, Monkey Shoulder, Tranquini and African Pride Hotels. Tranquini was a nice non-alcoholic drink which is catching a lot of attention and I really loved drinking the same. 

The goodies bag has awesome Mercedes Benz 8gb pendrive, Mercedes Benz Keyring along with Sunglass Hut Gift vouchers and the very first issue of BOKEH magazine which was launched recently. Overall, it was a great event with lot of great Mercedes-Benz cars, selfie stick models and live performances by entertainment singers as some models of the cars make their way into the event area. 

Cheers!!!

Follow me on twitter @araijain or @thelifesway
Email - thelifesway@gmail.com for invites to launch events / sponsored posts and product reviews!
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Product Review - All-in-One Media Keyboard @MicrosoftSA

Hi Guys, 

Keyboard was an integral part of our desktop and laptop experience till the time touchscreens have taken over in Windows 8 and mobiles/tablets environment. From time to time keyboards have been given various design changes by several brands to include multiple functionality like multimedia capabilities and gaming experiences. These days Swype and other flow keyboards have taken the world by storm in the mobile and tablet environments. 

I still remember the first keyboard I saw was a big huge MS-DOS operating system machine way back in 1992. When my father bought me my first desktop, I got this amazing keyboard with volume and other multimedia controls way back in 2002. With the old technology making way for the new, I saw wireless keyboards way back in 2005 and instantly fell in love with the same. The price was at least 10 times more than a wired branded keyboard. 

Today I am writing this blogpost from the Microsoft's All-in-One Media Keyboard with my laptop long far from my hands and connected via wireless (USB) dongle. As I am writing this first post from this keyboard I am falling in love with this tech. Though I have been using a wi-fi mouse since 2011 and loved Microsoft Arc mouse also but this is an amazing keyboard as it has integrated muti-touch trackpad. The trackpad has left and right click buttons as available in any normal trackpad and mouse which makes the experience of using this keyboard much more great.

Microsoft All in One Media Keyboard runs on 2 AAA size batteries (included in the package) and have a magnetic slot to keep your usb dongle (nano-receiver) attached to the same hidden underneath along with the batteries compartment. The power on off button is on the right hand side of the keyboard if you want to preserve battery life when not in use. 

The trackpad is really sensitive and responsive with swipe, drag, zoom and click with ease. Just by tapping two fingers it gives right click menu. The pinch and spread to zoom works just fine. There are many more such features you can use if you are using Windows 8 machine. The keyboard also works with some selected Smart TVs and gaming consoles which can be checked online for compatibility. The keyboard has spill-resistant design and each key has it's own space between themselves.

The keyboard has no backlight which could have been a beneficial factor in the long run considering you want to use it on a Smart TV. The other thing I found was that I was using UK laptop which has '@" key switched with "'" and this keyboard also behaved liked my laptop keyboard which is intelligent. I also missed the home & end keys. The keyboard has all the functional keys that can be customized to Windows 8 gestures with a software upgrade available at www.microsoft.com/hardware/downloads

Overall, this Microsoft All-in-One Media Keyboard is great to buy as it gives you access to both keyboards and trackpad functionality. The price varies between R450-500 across various stores in SA. Follow them on twitter and Facebook. 

Cheers!!!

Follow me on twitter @araijain or @thelifesway
Email - thelifesway@gmail.com for invites to launch events / sponsored posts and product reviews!
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Product Review - @HuaweiZA MATE7 - Android Phablet

Hi Guys,

Huawei needs no introduction as it's one brand which will make its presence felt to you automatically via its niche products and network services it provides to the other big brands. Huawei has dropped "Ascend" brand name from its devices like P6, P7 and Mate7as well as recently launched P8 because Huawei brand awareness globally has increased drastically in the past year. P branded devices are now flagship models, Mate is used to identify phablets and G is for affordable premium products.

The latest in the series of new launches is the Huawei Ascend Mate7 phablet which has 6 inch FHD IPS in-cell LCD display which shows bright colors even in sunlight. The pixel density is 368PPi with 16M colors. The Mate 7 has a metallic body and bezel and weights only 185g.

The processor used in Huawei Mate 7 is Hisilicon Kirin 925 which is built around octa-core architecture with four large A15 1.8GHz cores and four small A7 1.3GHz cores. These processor starts working as and when required by a specific app or functions. I was able to play HD videos and take amazing photographs and there was no lag the phone showed during any of those functions. Mate7 has 2GB RAM with 16GB of ROM out of which more than 12GB is available for the consumers.

The battery life of Mate 7 is 4100mAh which gives you a full day of uninterrupted entertainment with heavy use of all applications. The phone also has some power saving modes (normal, smart and ultra) to make it go longer in case of emergency. Ultra power saving mode disables other apps and brings the call and text messaging to make you stay connected for some more time. 

Mate 7 has LTE Cat6 connectivity which can download at 300 Mbps speed to get amazing online viewing experience. Though the network to support this is still not in South Africa but your smartphone is ready to download the content as and when required. The Mate7 is running on Android 4.4.2 KitKat and it also has its own Huawei Emotion UI on top of the same.

The best part of Mate 7 is its single touch fingerprint technology which is located at the back of the phone just under the camera. This helps you to open the phone using any of your five fingers and can also be used to perform different functions like clicking selfies. The tech behind this amazing is a reader featuring 184 x 184 pixels, 508 ppi resolution with 8 bit grey level identification to know exactly who are you. This works well with both wet and dry fingers. 

Mate7 has 13MP rear camera with f2.0 and 5MP HD front camera to take awesome selfies. The rear camera takes some really nice photographs as I took it to Central Drakenburg and took a lot of pictures with a single touch on the fingerprint scanner of the phone. The rear camera can take 1080p videos and the phone can play them too on its screen. The flash is strong enough to take pictures in the dark. Check out some of the pictures taken using this device on my instagram channel or Photoyatra with hashtag #AscendMate7 

Mate7 comes with a charger, normal earphones (old style) with built in mic, USB cable and some manuals but the black box packaging is simply amazing to open. The sound output by the device is very loud and you can easily watch youtube video's etc without any headphones. I watched a lot of content on this phone because of it's big screen and battery life also helped me to watch the same all day. I also used the device as a portable hotspot and it really was able to catch Telkom signal even in the basement of Sandton Convention Center.

I really liked this phablet which comes at around R5700 which is a great price if you don't require S-Pen if considering Samsung Galaxy Note4 which trades at around R9000 and iPhone 6 Plus which is even more costlier. The touch and feel of Huawei phablet Mate7 is niche and looks expensive too and at that price point it makes it value for money device. I will strongly recommend this product to those who wants a bigger, larger display along with super fast processor which can do multitasking and also takes great photographs even in running car. Follow the brand on twitter and Facebook.

I really didn't wanted to let it go but I had amazing fun with the device. The only cons I could identify was the #selfie images captures doesn't get inverted automatically so if there are any alphabets written behind, they appear as mirror image. See the image as an example, sorry for using other brands diary as I didn't had any Huawei branded stuff. This is also a problem with Microsoft Phones and this needs to be corrected in the next software update for the camera.

Cheers!!!

Follow me on twitter @araijain or @thelifesway
Email - thelifesway@gmail.com for invites to launch events / sponsored posts and product reviews!
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#Lumia apps for the busy mom @MicrosoftSA

Hi Guys,

Being a working mom or even a stay home mom can be quite a challenging job with tasks from running errands, ensuring that the kids’ needs are met, helping with homework etc. Knowing how hectic things get we thought we’d share some apps from the Windows Phone store that all moms will love making use of (even dads!). We hope this list includes something all moms will find useful, no matter her interests from gaming to baking, to the creative or entrepreneur.

PicknPay

The Pick n Pay app is free and lets you manage your account anywhere and everywhere. Keep track of your Smart Shopper points, view shopping history, see current promotions and view or use vouchers. You will really appreciate the convenience the PicknPay apps brings to your Lumia handset with features like getting cash back on your card or getting airtime, in exchange for points. Other services include getting travel rewards with Avios or purchasing Webtickets.

PriceCheck
Are you too busy to shop around for deals in store? Download the PriceCheck app and at your convenience, compare the best deals on an extensive range of products before heading out. PriceCheck says it has more than 30 million products listed. You can sift through by category or location. It’s also useful when you are in-store and want to scan a barcode. Results include prices, description, images and user reviews.

Home Remedies

For moms who rely on home remedies to keep the family in good health, look no further than the Home Remedies app. It has more than 50 recipes made from herbs, vegetables, spices or fruit, and claims no side effects. There are options for colds, coughs, acne, hair loss, etc. You can also sift through kids, women, obesity, diabetes etc.

 

Dictate Now!
For the moms who always have their hands full, the Dictate Now! app is a life saver. We all know that typing takes up more time, so why not just speak to your phone? If you are on any app, just hold down the Windows button (WP8) or Search button (WP8.1) and say “dictate now to clipboard”. The Dictate Now! app will then listen to what you say next and copy it to the clipboard, which you can then paste into whatever app you are in. Or, you can run the app on its own. 

Cozi Family Organiser

Cozi Family Organiser has won the award for Best Family App in the Appy awards and for good reason. It has a colour-coded shared calendar to view schedules of individuals or the family, set reminders, shared shopping lists, see items added by family members, and to do lists. The whole family shares one account but each individual can access it using their own email addresses. Another bonus is the cross platform support. 

 

Sometimes these mobile apps really makes it very easy for us to order stuff and other times we want to De-stress ourselves via going to the actual stores and have our own say what to buy and what not? Smartphones have taken the market via storm and Windows Phones is also gaining market share from Android and iOS as more and more apps are being developed for this platform also. 

Cheers!!!

Follow me on twitter @araijain or @thelifesway
Email - thelifesway@gmail.com for invites to launch events / sponsored posts and product reviews!
Checkout my Instagram (araijain) page
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