More on my new phone

Thank goodness getting to grips with an important item of new equipment happens only every few years! The arrival of Olivia, my Samsung Galaxy S24 Ultra smartphone on the morning of Wednesday 24th January has ensured an extended period of disrupted routine, and a lot of lost sleep from staying up late. 

Once the microSIM card was taken out of my old phone and inserted into the new one, normality went out of the window. Everything - sleep included - had to take second place to getting the new device set up sufficiently to be usable. I have always customised my phones quite a bit, so that the lock and home screens, and the layout of the apps, is always very different to how it all appears when the phone first emerges from its box and powered on. 

At first I couldn't find my way around. Long-used screen gestures didn't work. I was coming from an S20+, and four years of development had made the way my S24 Ultra operated seem rather unfamiliar. I was out of my comfort zone. But after hiding unwanted apps, installing the ones I wanted, delving into Settings, installing my usual lock and home screen backgrounds, my usual ringtone, and my usual notification sound, it all started to look and feel better.

Despite setbacks (such as Samsung's Smart Switch failing - for some arcane reason, the connection between the old and new phones kept dropping) I got Olivia 80% functional by the end of the first day, and completely so by the end of the next day, except for installing a couple of minor utility apps. 

That still left a lot of work to do. There were a great many files to import - my music, and some 67,000 photos. 

The music went in without a hitch. Not so the photos. It's now the following Monday, five days after Olivia arrived, and I'm still loading up the the photos. I'm copying them from one of my external SSDs: I connect the SSD and Olivia to the two USB ports on on my laptop, and just copy-and-paste, controlling the process from the laptop screen windows. It works; but it's slow, as if there is an electronic bottleneck somewhere that chokes the rapid flow of data to my new phone. Never mind, the end is in sight, and another two days should do it.

I can't deny that setting up Olivia hasn't been without its frustrations. But the job is nearly done. And I can see that she is going to serve me exceptionally well.

So how did the delivery and unboxing go?

Olivia arrived when promised - full marks, DPD - and after slitting open the plastic envelope, I was contemplating a plain-looking black box.

This opened to reveal a box-within-a-box, and finally the pristine phone itself.

I was immediately impressed with the finish, solidity and heft of the S24 Ultra. She was a rectangular slab, it's true, but my new phone was good to curl my fingers around.

The general public would mostly see the mint-green back with the camera lenses. I'd already bought an A3-sized rectangle of leather for making a sleeve to slip Olivia into. Here she is on that leather:

The bare-metal edges were made from titanium, and therefore promised to be tough. And the screen was made of the latest armoured glass. Even so, I decided that in addition to carrying Olivia around inside the leather sleeve I'd make, she needed a proper protective plastic case. I'd already ordered one, from Tech21, and happily it turned up just a couple of hours after Olivia herself. 

There wasn't much else in the box. Samsung assumed you already had a charger and all the cable adapters you might need. So all they supplied was a USB-C cable, a quick start guide, and a tool to get access to the microSIM tray. 

Before commencing the setting-up process, I compared Prudence (my S20+) with Olivia (my S24 Ultra) to see what the size difference was. Both without a case.

As you can see, Olivia (left in all three shots) is a couple of millimetres taller, wider and thicker than Prudence. She isn't vastly bigger, but the size difference is clear. The fact that she has squared-off corners rather than rounded ones adds to the impression of significantly greater screen area. 

Weightwise, it's no surprise that Olivia is the heavier by some margin, mainly (I think) because of the larger battery (5,000mAh versus 4,000mAh).

The next step was to remove the EE microSIM card from Prudence, open the tray on Olivia with the tool, press the card into the tray, then push the tray in. 

No nanoSD card of course. None of the S24 phones use them, which I think is a pity, but it's probably an irreversable trend with smartphones. Instead there's a gigantic 1TB of internal data storage. 

Olivia came partially charged: 55%. But it was a good idea to charge up closer to 100% before going further. I'd considered buying a 45W fast charger, but found that the old 25W charger (from two phones back) was still good enough.

After setting Olivia up as a usable smartphone (as described at the start of this post) it was time to import all those photos:

In day-to-day operation, Olivia is excellent: fast, smooth, nice in the hand, and now that I've adjusted to the latest Samsung Settings menu (which they keep altering without achieving simplicity) I'm finding my new phone pretty easy to use. Olivia is definitely a more capable phone than Prudence, although I hasten to say that my old phone was slick and speedy also. It's just that the new one is more substantial, has more potential, and if Samsung live up to their promise of updates for seven years to come, will be future-proofed for a long haul.

And so far as looks go, Olivia is a very impressive phone. I've been thrilled and proud to use her in public, so far mainly to pay for things (using Google Wallet). I'm not one to ostentatiously flaunt a new device in order to wow other people, but I can't help being aware that, having ordered her online, I've been able to use my S24 Ultra a whole week before the phone can be bought at a High Street shop. An intense but of course very temporary pleasure. But in two days' time, anyone can stroll into a shop and come out with one. 

The S24 Ultra's major selling points are AI and the new camera array. I've dabbled with AI for searches, using the S-Pen to ring things onscreen, and then seeing whether AI can tell me what they are. It's astonishingly good for that. As for Olivia's photographic prowess, the main features of the pictures taken are clarity and nice colour. They have managed to give the results a little more subtlety than I had with Prudence. Here's a sequence of shots zooming in on Ditchling church, starting with no zoom, then 3x, 5x and finally 10x. (Tap on any to enlarge them, and scrutinise more carefully)

Here are some other shots I've taken with Olivia:

If you are a casual photographer, and all you want is a beautifully clear picture with pleasing colours, then why use anything else? Me, I'll be sticking to my Leica X Vario, during the daytime anyway, although Olivia will be better for night-time shots and any shot that needs a longer zoom than LXV can provide. It's horses for courses; I'll usually have both devices with me anyway.

I dare say I'll have more to say about the AI features, but for now that's it. Verdict: another winner!

I've just bought a Samsung Galaxy S24 Ultra

It's inevitable that sooner or later one's electronic equipment needs replacing, item by item. Technological developments make it a good idea; but lack of support for security measures, and apps that no longer work so well, or not at all, are generally more pressing reasons. For instance, I absolutely must replace my 2016-vintage Microsoft Surface Book - my laptop - by 14th October 2025, the date planned by Microsoft to withdraw support for all Windows 10 devices. But at the moment I still have plenty of time to consider which new laptop to buy, and I can certainly defer the purchase to mid-2025. That being so, I can spend my money this year on a new smartphone.

It doesn't seem so long since I replaced my Samsung Galaxy S8+ with an S20+. In fact it was almost exactly three years ago in January 2021. I'd watched Samsung's Galaxy Unpacked 2021 presentation and had been wowed by the S21 Ultra, the smartphone Samsung regarded as their new flagship model, to replace the Note line. But there were snags. First, the cost: I wasn't yet used to paying anything like £1,329 for a phone, however good. And that's what I'd need to pay for an S21 Ultra with 512GB of onboard storage - nothing less would do, because (this is the second snag) Samsung were no longer providing a way to add extra storage by inserting a microSD card. If I were going to keep the S21 Ultra for a long time, there was the real possibility that I would run out of storage. I certainly couldn't manage with only 256GB, at that time the standard amount of onboard storage. I needed more than this so that I could load my phone with my growing Most Important Photo collection, considerable back in January 2021, and now in January 2024 standing at over 67,000 pictures, representing about one-fifth of my Photo Archive. It was vital to allow for future expansion, especially as I intended to buy a new camera, leading to more shots and larger file sizes that would gobble up the available onboard storage. I did not want to run out of storage too soon, and be forced to buy yet another phone. So it had to be at least 512GB, at whatever cost.  

I was rescued from spending too much, however, because I couldn't complete the online purchase process. I guessed that the volume of pre-orders Samsung received was so great that anyone like me, who took too long to get through the purchase process, was bounced out in favour of slicker buyers. 

This in fact worked in my favour. I had time to reassess what I wanted. The previous year's best model, the S20+, did take microSD cards, and cards up to 1TB at that - which solved the storage problem. The S20+ was also 5G ready. It was moreover a lot cheaper to buy, being 'last year's phone'. So I bought an S20+ instead (that's my phone Prudence) and I've been very happy with it.

Fast forward to 2024. The new car (Sophie) was already in the bag. The laptop purchase was postponed to mid-2025. It seemed appropriate to make 2024 the year for my next smartphone. 

Although I'd owned Prudence for only three years, she was in fact four years behind the latest technology. Still perfectly good for ordinary needs, but not for the enhancements AI - Artificial Intelligence - could provide. I'd seen enough of the online leaks and speculations to know that the forthcoming S24 Ultra would be rather special, and probably the one to buy. So at 6.00pm yesterday evening, I sat down in front of my laptop screen and watched Samsung's Galaxy Unpacked 2024 presentation on YouTube. I wasn't disappointed. It confirmed my impression that the Ultra was the S24 model to go for, not the two smaller phones.

If I couldn't insert a microSD card, then I wanted a vast amount of onboard storage - 1TB - and only the Ultra had so much. 

I wanted the Ultra's extra-large screen for viewing my photos, working with spreadsheets, and studying my maps. A larger screen would make all that easier. 

It didn't matter that the S24 Ultra was too large for an ordinary pocket. I used pockets only for tissues. The Ultra would ride in my handbag, as all my phones had done. 

I didn't really need the improved camera, but it would be useful to have as a standby. 

Above all, I wanted those AI enhancements, to make my Google searches more productive. After all, a smartphone is one's personal mobile encyclopaedia: I'm looking up things all the time. I never want to stop learning and discovering and understanding. 

The pictures that follow are my photographs of the laptop screen, and not mere laptop screenprints. All were shot with LXV, my Leica X Vario. Which may strike you as ironic, using such old tech to record the arrival of this year's new tech. LXV was made in November 2013 and is now over ten years old. That's very old in tech terms. Its photo specifications are minimalistic compared to those of my S24 Ultra. But I will continue to use LXV for nearly all my photography because (a) LXV is camera-shaped, not a flat slab, and therefore my grip on it is secure and comfortable; (b) LXV is a Leica, so it has presence, and is clearly a serious imaging device. I don't look like a run-of-the-mill tourist when I take my pictures, which sometimes helps to get me shots denied to ordinary shooters. My new Ultra will look stunning, but it's still only a phone. Any punter with the cash can have one and use it, regardless of their photographic skill or lack of it.    

Let's get on with what I saw. AI was certainly the Big Thing on offer. 

Samsung had sensibly teamed up with Google to deliver all kinds of tricks, and the main presenter, TM Roh (his name is actually Roh Tae-moon) - President of Samsung Communications - was almost bursting with pride and enthusiasm for this year's offerings. He made the introductions on a gigantic stage with huge background projections. 

That's him, the tiny figure lower centre in the shot just above. Everything else is a dynamic background projection. 

Early on he made an important announcement: starting with the S24 series, Samsung would provide seven years of OS updates. That's wonderful. It means that, subject to some future development that would require a different type of device, any S24 series phone bought now will be future-proofed for seven years to come. So although the initial cost of buying one might be high, you would get longevity and therefore your full money's worth. (At last)

On to the headline AI enhancements. Although I couldn't see myself using it, Samsung's flavour of AI aims to demolish language barriers with Live Translate. One could text a person who didn't know your language, and that person would see a simultaneous translation in their language of your English text. An idiomatic translation at that. Pretty good. But you could do the same thing when speaking over the phone: they would hear a translation of your English words. So phoning abroad to make a hotel reservation should now hold no terrors. Potentially amazing.

Even if there is no language barrier, and you are engaged in ordinary texting in English, Chat Assist can improve the tone and wording of your message with AI so that it won't be inadvertently ambiguous or offensive.

Or say you have been taking quick-and-dirty notes at a meeting or lecture, either by typing on the screen, or in your own handwriting using the S-Pen (a stylus) that comes with the Ultra. AI will tidy up those rough notes for you, and convert them into a neat, grammatical and nuanced narrative - in various styles that you can select, to suit the particular readership. AI can also summarise the main points, with bullets if you like, and you can swap between those styles at will to see which you prefer. What a boon.

But they revealed more. AI could now help with Google searches. This is the thing that will be most useful to me. It's called 'Circle to Search', glimpsed already on Google's Pixel phones. Suppose you came across something in a picture, wanted to know what it was, but didn't know what words to use to frame a question. Using a finger, or the S-Pen with the Ultra, you can ring, outline, or scribble onto whatever it is in the picture and AI will identify what the thing is and tell you. And if it's something you can buy, AI will show you where to buy it. This works with anything that AI has knowledge of. Such as this yummy South Korean snack:  

I often spot curious things as I go about my day. Now I can use this facility to get instant information about them. It will be very interesting to find out just how much information. I imagine that AI - as implemented for personal phones - won't go so far as to identify unknown people. But it surely will help to identify unknown places shown in pictures, and give the background on a host of objects one might come across. Such as, who painted this picture? And if it's listening, what musical work is this? (I hope this is true)

Clearly, with AI to boost it, the smartphone is set to become even more central to modern life. 

This clever young lady is now properly equipped. She's popping her Ultra in her bag. It's almost all she needs. 

I wish I had a bag that had that kind of bright internal illumination - how handy would that be at night?

Of course the Ultra's camera - cameras rather - were a major topic! Those prominent lenses were, after all, the eyes through which the AI will be seeing one's world. As I said above, I'm not personally relying on my Ultra for more than the odd shot. But most people will use the camera extensively, in combination with AI. 

The presentation imagined being let loose in a picture gallery.

Each shot was now aided by AI, so that different parts of the picture were each independently assessed for whatever was needed to bring out colour, contrast, texture, and above all crisp detail, with options to morph the background and shift the subject around. Here's a black and white example of a statue:

In this colour shot, each area of differing texture and pattern would be analysed by AI to give the best possible rendition:

Samsung obviously want Ultra users to grin with delight at every picture they take!

I missed the part where the new Galaxy Ring (a forthcoming health-monitoring device) was being shown. I couldn't give it any attention. I was instead busy placing my order for the 1TB version of the Ultra. If pre-ordering, I could get a 1TB version for £1,349 instead of £1,549, the official launch price from the end of this month - in theory a £200 saving, although whether one will ever in fact need to pay as much as £1,549 remains to be seen. I added £9.99 for delivery by DPD before 10,30am on 24th January, the earliest delivery date available. So it was £1,358.99 altogether. This time I managed to complete the online payment process successfully. I have confirmation by email.  

The S24 Ultra has a titanium case and comes in several colours, three of them available online-only. I'm having the green one - it's a light metallic green, with dark grey accents. 

Pre-ordering also secured me a nice freebie: a Samsung Galaxy Watch6. This was the smartwatch Samsung launched last August. It's had good reviews, and seems to be considered the best Android smartwatch, but like all similar smartwatches it requires frequent, probably daily, recharging. Can I somehow work that into my routine? Or will daily charging be an irritating bind? Will it be as nice to wear and use as my Fitbit Versa 3? Or just too complicated for my simple needs? The Fitbit has two big advantages: it is primarily a fitness-centred watch, and its battery lasts me eight days. Also, I love the Fitbit app and the way it present my fitness statistics. 

Well, I'll see what the Watch6 is like, and how it compares with the Fitbit, and whether daily recharging (at home in the evening, say, so that it's fully charged for monitoring my sleep) is a deal-breaker or not. I suspect it will be. I might not even unpack it. 

My Ultra arrives in six days time. Between now and then I will need to decide whether I'll buy a protective case for it. I might not. Any protective case would to some extent obscure or conceal my new phone's classy green finish, and hide the fact that this is Samsung's top-of-the-range smartphone. It'll be the best handheld device I've yet bought. I want to show it off, not swathe it in plastic, clear or otherwise. Besides, the Ultra is made of titanium, and ought to withstand accidental knocks. Then there's the size of the thing. I've cut out a dummy plastic rectangle to see how it would fit into my not-so-big left hand. It's fine; but any any protective case would add girth, and then it might not be fine any longer. Then again, if I don't fit a protective case, I can't attach a lanyard to go around my wrist, as an extra precaution against dropping it. Hmm. 

I will in any event make a snug leather sleeve to slip the phone into, similar to the one I made in 2017, and still using (although it looks a bit tatty nowadays). That'll not only keep it unmarked and cushioned while in my bag: it doubles as a resting-pad when I place the phone on a table - or indeed on any surface that might scratch it. 

Another thing: my new phone will need a name. That will definitely need much careful pondering, as I don't want to choose an unsuitable name for a phone that I'm likely to keep for quite a long time. I could choose a name that salutes not only my Ultra's green case colour, but its Korean origins, such as Jade Tiger, or Meadow Dragon. Or go green and eco with Leaf. Or continue the long run of old-fashioned but serious female names with Eleanor, Antonia, Constance, Olivia, or perhaps Martha. (Of these I rather like Olivia) Well, I'll be mulling this over. 

Update on 21st January

Unless the gods decree otherwise, it will be Olivia. And I've ordered a clear plastic Evo case from Tech21, whose transparent cases on previous Samsung phones (Tigerlily my Galaxy S8+, and Prudence my Galaxy S20+) have proved excellent. I'm not saying I'll necessarily fit it - I don't yet know how slippery Olivia will feel in my grasp, nor how eager she'll be to kiss the ground - but I will now have a very good remedy against such tendencies. And as before, I can attach a lanyard if I want to. 

When OO15 SHE met OO15 ZZZ

I've got an eye for car registration plates. I do notice them, and always have done. So when travelling westwards on the dual-carriageway A27 past Old Shoreham this morning I couldn't help seeing that just ahead of my grey Volvo car Sophie (OO15 SHE) was a white Kia car with registration OO15 ZZZ. 

How likely is it that two OO15 plates should ever meet each other? And two obviously personalised plates at that? Very unlikely, I'd say. 

If it had been a car park situation, I would have most certainly approached the other driver to have a friendly conversation, and perhaps move the cars together for a picture we could both share. They might even have come over to me first. I'm not the only one on the planet who has a thing about unusual number plates. 

Only a couple of weeks ago, I was walking back to where I'd left Sophie in a car park, only to see a man standing in front of her, grinning broadly to himself, apparently taking a photo. (His car was next to mine, and I saw later that it had an ordinary plate - so I was pretty certain it was my plate that had caught his attention) His smile vanished as he realised that the 'SHE' must be me, and that I might not be pleased at his snapping my pride and joy. He quickly moved off, embarrassed I thought. But of course his concern was groundless. I'd have only been too happy to discuss the subject of car registration plates if he'd lingered. And let him shoot Sophie's plate to his heart's content. 

But as regards OO15 ZZZ, the white Kia, we were zooming along at 70 mph and no jolly chit-chat was possible. All I could do was slowly overtake, so that the Kia's driver could observe Sophie and her plate, and have a chance to respond if they so wished. I wondered who the driver was, and what (if anything) they might do. A swift sideways glance - all I could safely risk - revealed a slim silhouette that might have been feminine. But I wasn't at all sure. He or she didn't react. No wave. No toot with the horn. No flash. Nothing at all. Most likely they were entirely absorbed in their private thoughts, and cared nothing for passing grey Volvos, even those with with personalised plates. Never mind. 

I expect that as with my own plate, OO15 ZZZ was purchased for being distinctive and easy-to-remember. It was certainly that. Even so, it wouldn't be my own choice: I wouldn't want the police to suspect I was habitually asleep at the wheel, and perhaps follow me to make sure that I was in fact properly alert. They do tend to think the worst. 

New app from Memory-Map

A new year. On the last day of the old one, I made a string of Caravan Club site bookings - my long late-spring tour that will take me to Scotland and back. And as an encore, I bought Memory-Map's 2024 All-Great Britain Ordnance Survey map package. 

It cost me £149.98. But for that, I got all of Great Britain at various scales. The ones I was chiefly interested in were the 1:50,000 and 1:25,000 scales, but I was glad to get the OS street mapping, and also chucked in free were the 1:250,000 road atlas, and the 1:1,000,000 map (good for route planning). All this represents a fantastic bargain compared to the total cost of buying the OS's own paper maps individually. 

A few days later, and after reading online reviews about it, I have installed the new Memory-Map For All app on my phone. I say 'new', but this app was launched in beta form back in 2022. It has now had its initial issues dealt with, and is there to use, fully formed as it were. It's free. (The maps it shows aren't, of course: mostly, they need to be bought) The 'for all' part of the name means that this app can be installed on a device running any platform - Apple, Android, Windows, whatever - and look and operate exactly the same. It can do this because once the user has paid for the mapping, and activated it after logging on, it downloads to storage within the app, and not in an ordinary system folder. I'm guessing that avoids the particular limitations imposed by each platform's architecture and security restrictions. Bottom line: viewing the maps is as slick as before, perhaps even more so; and Memory-Map have been able to entirely redesign the old app and add many new things to it, chiefly in the on-the-ground navigation department. So it's nirvana for walkers. 

Me, I do walk, but not so very far. Let's say I can cover 15,000 steps on undemanding terrain before my right leg starts to ache a bit. I am never now going to traverse mountain ridges in high hill country, so I don't need the mapping tools to get me up there and back again. But I do need to devise days out in Sophie; and when I get out of the car, I want to find my way around towns and villages, and locate obscure places to photograph. 

So I use OS maps a lot. I use them daily. And Memory-Map make it possible for me to view them super-conveniently on my phone. And I must say, I really like their new app. 

So what do I see on the phone screen? 

There are little control tabs at each corner, and on each long side. These (for instance) bring up different maps, fire up GPS, put markers on the map, or enable the user to plan a route with things such as altitude and distance being recorded. I use coloured flags to pinpoint Club sites, and coloured g-pins to pinpoint places I want to photograph, and other things.

You can leave these tabs showing all the time, or make them disappear after a few seconds. I set them to vanish after three seconds. But I can have them back just by touching the screen. 

As for the maps, they are all High Definition raster, and do not get blurry as you zoom in. In this screen sequence I am zooming in on Dornoch in northern Scotland, the scale changing automatically as I do so:

The OS street plan just above is a bit bare-bones, but perfectly good enough for walking around a place and finding its major features. But if looking for a particular shop, pub, restaurant or museum, I would fire up Google Maps as well.

There were other maps in the 2024 package, but these are the ones I want for my own day-to-day usage.

The phone is normally held in the 'portrait' position, but sometimes it's nice to turn it through 90 degrees and have a 'landscape' view. The old Memory-Map app wouldn't let you do that with the maps - they could only be viewed in 'portrait' style. Now there's a 'landscape' view as well. So (for instance) instead of having only this view of Holy Island on the Northumberland coast...

...you can now have this:

Or indeed this:

It makes east-west route planning so much easier. Thus a big chunk of South West England in one glance, without scrolling:

I'm delighted. 

A word of caution, though. It is possible to download all the maps in their entirety, but it would tie up your phone for a long time, as the full download at those scales would consume many gigabytes of storage. The practical alternative is to download mapping only as it is needed. Each map scale downloads automatically in screen-sized chunks, taking only a couple of seconds each time. This gradual process keeps the load on the phone's memory small. In any case, it's pointless to install the entire 1:25,000 or 1:50,000 map if only ever viewing a few selected local areas. I can personally claim some justification for downloading at least a few gigabytes. I do travel around a lot, to most parts of the country. 

Watching the map fill in and become crisp is so fascinating. It's all too easy to scroll north, south, east or west, and reveal yet more and more, until whole swathes of the country can be seen. And those OS maps are beautiful. It becomes compulsive. If your phone has oodles of storage available, and there's nothing else to get on with, you can end up doing this for an hour or more. But then, you've paid for it. So why not?