With gyms being closed around the world, in home workouts are becoming the in thing, for those with rewards and goals facilities on medical aids, the only way to reach those targets is with a fitness watch, now more than ever is the best time to own one. Fitbit Charge has been one of the best entry level fitness trackers from the first model, with it at the time being the cheapest and most reliable heart rate monitor on the market. There was no fancy colour screen or graphics, just did the job and did it well. Not much has changed in the fourth generation model in terms of aesthetics but the technology that is packs can compete with some of the best in the market.
The Charge 4 features improved battery life of up to 7 days, meaning less charges required, the built-in GPS tracks your pace and distance so its great for running, cycling and hiking. With the built-in GPS, you do not require your phone to be on you to track your work out. Previous models required your phone to be connected and in close proximity. The Charge 4 also notifies you when you'e reached your target rate, so you can continue to maintain that on your workout without having to keep checking your watch. The Charge 4 syncs to the Fitbit app on your mobile device seamlessly, has a host of preloaded exercises to track. The Charge 4 is already available for pre-order for $149,95 on the official Fitbit store as well as a host of bands and accessories
The KIA Sportage will also be a special car for me, I helped in it achieving the worlds longest test drive which begun in Durban, went around the country and eventually ended at Cape Point in the Western Cape. At launch there were only a few models that were available in SA and since then KIA have broadened the choice in terms of engines and offerings in the Sportage range. A couple of weeks ago I had one of them and decided to take a drive up to Joburg, hence this post will be a bit different as its more about the journey with the car rather than a test. I called a few mates, to see if they would join, I mean whats the point of having an SUV and going on a road trip alone? So once we were all packed up, it was time to hit the road on, 600 kilometers of open road (okay I lie, truck laden) lied ahead of us, and it was time to see what this this KIA was like on a long distance trip.
From our first post with the Sportage GT Line, we've established that its a great looking car. It may be a bit different from the rest of the KIA line up but as an SUV, it's got great lines, bulk in all the right places and a rear that will have you go for a second glance. Moving onto the inside, everything is well laid out and easy to reach. Spending +/- 6 hours in a cabin of a car can be frustrating for some, with many stops needed to "break the journey" but with the Sportage, I hardly felt the need to pull over, other than the odd bathroom break and stop for food. It could quite possibly go straight to my destination with it. It has all the creature comforts that we've become used to in the ever evolving motor industry.
Things like bluetooth connectivity was a luxury option but I'm glad to see that in most cars that it is now a standard, and brands like KIA have to be commended for pushing this change, where they offered it as standard from the get go but with most of the bigger European luxury manufacturers still had it as optional extras. The next phase shift is definitely mobile phone integration. Not only for in car mobile applications like Android Auto or Apple Car Play but for general safety of the driver. It's becoming a common site seeing people driving and holding their phones, this not only puts them at risk of an accident but the people around them too. On the subject of mobile phones, when it comes to long trips, passengers no longer grab a book or magazine to read on the journey, they're on their phones, which decreases battery life, and hence the need to charge the phone. In the Sportage, there was ample sockets, both in the front and the back to plug in your mobile chargers , that meant no fighting for turns and kept everyone happy.
The car itself, on the road felt pretty solid, the 2.0L engine under the hood did a great job both on the up and the down leg of the journey by giving me great fuel economy of just around 10L per 100km going up and just 8,7L per 100km coming down. Being a big SUV, it was quite a cruiser but I did feel the car lacked a bit of punch when you tried to accelerate to over-take. Cruise control isn't something I would use often but on the Sportage and especially the long tedious Villiers stretch of the N3, it was needed. Simple and easy to set, the car did all the work, the gear changes were on point and when needed, not like many other cars cruise control where the car just changes gear for any damn reason. This also contributed to the good fuel economy.
Moving back to the creature comforts, while we did get quite a bit of cabin noise, this was soon eliminated once we turned up the sound system. The Sportage comes with a sub in the back, so while you're getting clear audio up front, that nice bass boost coming from the back never hurts. The dual climate control was a live saver, as with most people, everyone's preferred temperature varies, as I soon found out shortly after departing as one of my passengers like weather indicative of the ice age... so while it was practically snowing on his side, my side was just right.
Overall, the Sportage ticket all the right boxes for a long journey, it had ample amount of space, great fuel economy, well powered naturally aspirated engine and of course, all the tech to make any nerd happy. The nice big touch screen came in handy for their GPS, where I got lost a few times in Joburg. In short, the KIA Sportage was simply brilliant for what I needed it for, it's the perfect family car for any small family, loads of space, plenty of power for city roaming and open road driving, the tech that the car comes with great for everything you require of it
Drone's have always fascinated me, ever since I saw and played with my mates DJI Phantom about 3 years ago, I found it damn cool to have a personal flying device of which you could attach a GoPro or similar type of camera to and get visuals like never before. Think about it, before personal drones were created, to get the type of visuals or images you can get with these remarkable devices, you had to be in a light aircraft of helicopter, that to with limited freedom than what you can achieve with a drone. Since they're small and nimble, their maneuverability is much more quick and agile than that of it's bigger aviation siblings, thus giving the user the ability to capture mind blowing visuals.
With the DJI range, most of the drones were quite big and bulky, understandably there's quite a bit that goes into one. Yes there were many other generics on the market which were much smaller and cost a whole lot less but like cars, they're cheaper for a reason. Most of them had limited range, crappy battery life and the camera's were not the best quality but with DJI, it was these key things that kept them a leader in the business. After releasing the Phantom 4, which in all honesty looked the same as all the others, GoPro dropped the bomb on their own drone, the Karma, it was the first of it's kind, it could fold up, which meant it wasn't that bulky to carry around, it had extended range and battery life, removable gimbal which can attach onto a selfie stick. The controller is small and slick with a built in screen, unlike the DJI's which required you to either purchase a screen or connect your tablet or phone.
The Karma really looked like the drone to conquer them all, but just one week since the announcement of it, DJI went and lifted the covers on something that just blew Karma and every other drone out the market. Introducing the Mavic, yeah I know, should have just named it the Mavric but anyway, the name isn't that important, it's what it can do that is! It also folds up like the Karma but is much smaller and lighter, in fact without the battery the drone is super light. It has a built in camera that is located in the front, it's positioning is such that there is no need for legs like previous models. The front arms fold out while the rear two arms fold under the drone. The propellers don't need to be removed as they also fold and when taking off you don't need to undo them as with the force of the spin, it opens them for you.
The Mavic has quite a few features, one of the key ones being it's FlightAutonomy which gives the Mavic the intelligence to avoid obstacles and hover precisely indoors as well as outdoors It includes 5 cameras, GPS & GLONASS, 2 ultrasonic range finders, redundant sensors and 24 powerful computing cores. This It has the come back to me and follow me feature which makes the drone follow you in flight while you're moving, pretty cool if you ask me. It's pretty fast as well, granted that it isn't as fast as the Phantom 4 and the Karma due to the smaller motors, being light weight makes up for this, it can reach 65kph on sport mode with up to 27 minutes of flight. Whilst being super light it handles it's own in strong wind conditions.
The controller for the Mavic is pretty nifty as well, a fraction of the size compared to the Phantom 4 and it has a holder with a charging port for your phone, be it iPhone or Android. Your phone is used as the view screen, so see what the camera see's and it has a LCD display on the controller giving you all kinds of info from distance to signal and battery life. It has a transmission range of up to 7km with a 1080/720P live feed onto your phone. Don't want to use the controller? You can use just your phone! The Mavic also comes with gesture controls that give it commands to track you in which way you want to with active tracking.
Another cool thing that DJI are launching with it is the DJI Goggles, which is effectively one of those 3D virtual reality type goggle but with this you can view your flight in virtual reality, as if you're flying! It comes with two screens of 1920 x 1080 resolutions, with up to 1080p image transmission. It has OcuSync wireless low latency connection
Now many say you can't really compare the Mavic to the Karma and rightly so, the camera on the Mavic isn't of the same quality, it's capable of 4K/30fps on a 12 megapixel camera with max 8 second exposure, it is stabilized with a 3-axis gimbal, whilst on the Karma you can fit on a Hero5 which is in a league of it's own interms of quality and I think the range and battery life is better on the GoPro. Which is why the Mavic's price is much less than that of the Phantom 4 and Karma. One thing is for sure, after just 24 odd hours since it's release, it is already one of the favorites for many in the droning world. You can already order yours now on the DJI website if you have $999 lying around. I wish I did!
The secret is out! Durban has just got a whole lot cooler with the launch of the multi national luxury taxi service Uber! After taking Joburg and Cape Town by storm, the brand decided to spread its wings to the East Coast, good move to seeing that we are South Africa's play ground.
The service revolves around an app which is downloadable from the app store for iPhones and Adroid phones. With this app you are able to request a cab for the route you are wanting to travel, a quote will be given and also additional info such as the name of your driver. With the app you can also track the drivers location by means of your GPS so you will know exactly where is so you can be on time when he arrives. How cool is that?
All of Uber's vehicles are state of the art luxury cars, so whatever the occasion or venue you are always going to arrive in style. Today's launch in Durban was a highlight as their first customer was none other than the legendary DJ Tira who needed a ride home from the airport. Those who have already registered with the service could track the car via the app.
Now being Durban, we're generally more laid back than the other cities and more importantly things aren't that expensive as it is in the sister cities hence you will be glad to know that the Uber pricing for Durban is lower than Jhb and Cpt with the prices being rather competitive relative to the market. This is excellent news for us Durban folk seeing that places here aren't that far off.
Now many must be asking, why should I use the service? Well with December round the corner, thousands will descend to the the city to enjoy the warm waters of the Indian Ocean during the summer holidays. With tourists comes the parties and with the parties comes the drinking, like many other provinces, KZN also has adapted a zero tolerance on drinking and driving so why risk it? You have an awesome service like Uber at your disposal, use it! its simple, its easy to use and it worth it. It's not only to prevent sober driver, in some instances places you go, there is a headache to find parking, if you take a cab, that pain is alleviated and you don't have to worry about tipping the pesky car guard!
For more info on Uber Durban, you can visit the website, otherwise follow them on twitter and instagram.
Stay tuned as we at the Bucket will be bringing you some specials from Uber Durban
We've all got smart phones for various reasons, one of them being to make phone calls but with the dawn of 3G/4G and all the goodness that came with it, our phones can do so much more. One of which is serve as a GPS. Now as most phones with small screens weren't the best for this feature it helped out none the less. The GPS apps gave you the bare minimum which is, location, directions, navigation, places of interest and speed limits but what if it could offer you more? How you may ask? Yes there are other things such as speed traps and traffic notifications but imagine if you could edit your GPS and add more info on certain places and share it with others also you could see what others had to share about other places.
That's what Nokia HERE is all about, they call it a "location Cloud" and here's what Nokia's CEO Stephen Elop had to say: "People
want great maps, and with HERE we can bring together Nokia’s location
offering to deliver people a better way to explore, discover and share
their world. Additionally,
with HERE we can extend our 20 years of location expertise to new
devices and operating systems that reach beyond Nokia. As a result, we
believe that more people benefit from and contribute to our leading
mapping and location service."
Sounds interesting and it does get better, Nokia has worked with Mozilla in developing HERE, they are one of the leaders in HTML5 and web development applications and key to that is location, Vice President of Products, for Mozilla Jay Sullivan had this to say: "We
are excited to work with Nokia as the combination of Firefox OS and
HERE's location platform provides rich possibilities for mobile
application developers to create amazing experiences for users."
Navigating around in 2D is one thing but what if you had the benefit of exploring a location in 3D? With HERE that would be possible as Nokia is planned to acquire Berkely, Calif company "earthmine" who's reality capture and processing technologies will become integral in HERE's 3D map making capabilities.
Now I know what you thinking, pretty impressive but I wont buy a Nokia so I wont be using this application but that's where you wrong. Nokia are making this software available for the 2 major giants in the mobile industry, that being Apple and Andriod. With the flop that was Apple maps on iOS6, HERE will be a welcomed relief to those with iPhones and it should be available to download on iTunes pretty soon if not already. The Andriod uses on the other hand will have to wait until 2013 to try it out. The reason for this is it
is aimed at enabling partners to create location-based applications for Android or Apple devices with Nokia’s leading content.
Just when you thought you heard it all, like a TV infomercial ...but wait, theres more! Imagine you walk down a street, see a rather interesting building but want to know more about it. What if I told you, all you had to do was pick your phone up and with your camera point to the building and all the info on it will be brought up on your phone? Cool right? Well that's what LiveSight™ is all about.
As part of its announcement, Nokia introduced
LiveSight™, a technology based on a highly accurate, 3D map of the world. LiveSight™ provides the most precise and intuitive augmented
reality experience and uses a phone’s camera viewfinder to make discovering the world as easy as lifting up a phone.Nokia
City Lens, which was developed exclusively for Nokia Lumia devices, is
the first application providing a LiveSight-enabled experience.“Establishing
a new brand is the right move for Nokia in the map and location
business. Nokia's assets in this space are world class. We believe
mapping and location will be increasingly
important to developing next generation devices and services across a
wide array of segments,” said Crawford Del Prete, executive vice
president and head of worldwide research at IDC.
I know most people think Nokia had its hey day and now its just a dying brand but I've been using my Lumia 800 for roughly 7 months now and to say I'm impressed is an understatement, sure there is a few things that they could do to improve it but the same could be said for many other devices. Also with them using the Windows 8 OS in the newer models it could prove key for businesses that use Microsoft for easy synchronisation. It will take time for them to get back into the market but don't right them off just yet.
