A three way camera test.

I'm posting three photos, I would like you my few readers to tell me which phone too which photo. For this test I used the Samsung Galaxy S9, the Samsung note 9 and the OnePlus 6T. I will add them in no particular order, but I will know which is which. Please leave you guess in the comments please.

Okay, to make this a little easier top photo is number one..(I'm sure you can figure out the other two numbers.)

Also which photo you liked the best would be a big help.

OnePlus 6T... Maybe coming, may be mirror black TMobile fail

Okay in less you live under a rock or don't follow phones (in that case why are you here and we can't be friends) you know the OnePlus 6T is here. TMobile is the first and only carrier to have this new device in the USA. They are offering it at a great deal. Trade in a qualifying device and get $300.00 off in the form of bill credits. That's over half off. Great deal right? So I ordered one. After all I have a couple phones laying around I can use. So I ordered it on day one, I mean the first day it was available which was 11/1. Now I've been a good customer with no late payments or anything. So I don't have to put money down, just pay the sales tax. Okay now TMobile doesn't take that money until the phone ships. That's the way it has always been in the 5+ years I've been with them. So I was happy to see the money taken it that very day. But then the next day came and went with no shipping notice. So I called and was sent to the Philippines as it was after normal hours. No big deal I knew that was going to happen. They had no idea why it didn't ship, but confirmed that they never take the money until it ships. So I asked what color it was as that question never was answered when I was ordering the phone. He informed me that in less I specify it will be the default color "midnight black" well that's cool because that's the color I wanted.

So here it is day 5, I'm watching YouTube videos on the device and I'm hearing that TMobile only has one color "mirror black" so since the phone hasn't shipped and I now have no clue what color I'm getting I decide to call once again. I'm on the phone for 30 minutes with a very kind lady who is doing her damnedest to get me answers. But for the 2 questions I had she got nothing. I actually felt bad for her as she was doing everything under her power to get me something. Finally she ran out of ideas and options. I thanked her and went on with my day.

Ten to twenty minutes later I get a notification that my phone has shipped 😦. So I decided to hit Twitter in my new account (I'll post my Twitter info at the end) so TMobile help replied to my post. Wanting to know more. So for the next hour or so we are twitting back and forth. After all that I am getting the phone tomorrow instead of today and I'm getting the color I didn't want. So this is a major fail on TMobile. Now would I have ordered the phone knowing it was only in mirror black?.. Probably. But I wouldn't it ordered it knowing it was going to be the wrong color and wasn' t going to ship the next day. I would if waited to see if another color option was coming out. And now I see there is a purple thunder color....


My phone whore Twitter account is @ducken16

Hello there its been awhile

Yeah yeah I know, I haven't posted on here for a couple years.. And who knows I might just post a few times and take another break. Its not that I don't want to post, its that I get busy with one thing or another, Now I have moved to Washington State and am now working as the department supervisor for Home Depot. I work nights so my sleeping schedule is, how should I put this... Not normal. So I will be bringing you all up to speed in my little tech world with all the toys I have, like and want. So lets get this party started.


So I'm going to do this first post on the new Samsung Galaxy Watch. Now is not a major upgrade from the Gear S3 Frontier, but the S3 is getting a little long in the tooth so it was time to upgrade. This year Samsung came out with two models and three color choices, This one of the two things I don't like. There is a black version and a gold version that are 42mm and a silver version that is 46mm. No black or gold version in the larger 46mm. and no silver in the 42mm. So you have a limited choice here. I went with the 46mm silver one as I like the bigger screen and the larger battery. I have the LTE version from T-Mobile as I sometimes like to go fishing or bike riding out where a phone could get damaged easily. But it would be nice when I go out to be able to strap on a gold watch, of course I could get the smaller watch, but like I said I like the larger size.


So here is the second thing I don't like. They removed the Magnetic strip technology or commonly known as MST. This allows you to use your watch to make payments at any card reader. The Gear S3 had this as well as the Near Field Communication or NFC. Now the Galaxy watch does have the NFC but it is limited to where yu can use it, and if you're like me and live in a small town you are up a creek.


But those are the only things negative I can say and they are not deal breakers as I knew this info going in. Now for what I like. The rotating bezel has had a small upgrade, the notches are smaller and the feel with the rotation seems smoother. There are a ton of new features most of which are in the health department of which I personally don't use. I find the constant notifications to be bothersome. I turn those off right off at the start. I do pay attention to the heart rate but that's about it.

It seems that most of if not all the watch faces I was using on my S3 work with my Galaxy Watch even though its running Tizen 4.0. Also "Camera remote" works as well. It is an app that lets you take pictures with your phone from your watch. It works great for doing group shots from a distance that you want to be in. But now that I also have the Note 9 I can use the S pen to do the same thing. So why do I have the Camera Remote app installed you ask? Well I can set the phone up get in pace then open the camera remote app to make sure its framed right and everything I want in the shot is there. Then I can use the S pen to take the shot. To use the watch app to do so sometimes it catches you looking down at the watch or your hand is on the watch. The S pen can be hidden in the hand... See I know a few tricks.


The thing I like the best about the new watch is the battery life.

So this is the first charge of the watch. The battery usage includes setup and updates as well as the downloading of the apps. I have made a few calls with it. I have ran it on the network as well as tied to my phone. Now it was mostly tied to my phone so I don't want you thinking that you can get this kind of battery life running it solo. You can't I can tell you that for sure. I will be testing this out though just to see what I can get from it running solo.

Here is a picture of it next to the Gear S3 frontier. The Galaxy Watch is on the left and the Gear S3 Frontier is on the right.

I will post more on this watch after I have ran it solo. I am hoping to post on the Note 9 before then but as I will be busy all week it may be the weekend before I get the chance. As it is it took me four days just to complete this post.

Hang in there folks

I'm bringing this back to life. I'll be working on this over the weekend and hopefully have something ready to post Monday. I hope there are still a few of you left out there to read it.

Galaxy S7 edge Silver Titanium from T-Mobile

The Samsung Galaxy S7 edge..... Is a beast!
It may look a lot like last years two edge models, but there is much more to this puppy than meets the eye.

I recieved my device on the last day of Febuary, nice that T-Mobile was able to ship them early to those who pre-ordered the device.
Heres what you get in the box (besides the device that is)

The Sim card that I got is one that you have to cut to fit like they think I can do that without mucking it up...get real here But fortunatly you just have to switch out the Sim from your old device as long as its a Nano sim anyway and you are good to go. (More on the Sim later)

The S7 and S7 edge are both sporting a new 12mp rear camera. Down from the 16mp of the S6/S6edge of last year. Its really not a down grade and this has been covered by about every blogger and youtuber out there. So if you need to know why its an easy search on YouTube to find all you need to know.I'm just sayin the camera is great and here are a couple of photo's to show you.

Some of the things I like best about the S7 edge are the edge for one. Much improved over last years model and more user friendly.
For the first time ever I am not cluttering up my main home screen with a ton of apps. The screenshot above is how I have I have it setup but I am now using a different theme from the theme store. All the main apps I use I keep on the "Apps edge" You can keep uo to ten apps there. Then you can add some short cuts to the "Tasks edge as well. So its just a quick flip to get to what I need.

Another feature is that "Cooling tube" you have most likely heard about. Thats a bigger deal than most people think. If you have the S6/S6 edge and a Gear VR you know how fast it can heat up and flash the warning about the device getting hot. Well not once have I had that on the S7 edge. I've played games watched Netflix until the cows came home and never have I gotten the warning. In fact the device seems to only get a little warm. Gaming on this device is a no brainer.

Speaking of gaming, there is a gaming mode built into the device as well with some cool little features. You can limit the amount of battery the game can use. block notifications while playing. But the one I like the most is the screen shot or video recording feature. Heres a screenshot I took of a game I play way to much of.

My device comes with the 820 Snapdragon processor and it runs like a beast with a mission. I use to be all about the benchmarks, but over the last few years I only run them when I first get the device just for my own knowledge. But I did a screenshot, so you can see how well it did.

Yeah, thats not to shabby.

Now I am with T-Mobile and I am on the Jump program so I just had to order the device and then send them a phone back in its place. I have had two S6 edge phones one a 32GB and one a 64GB. I used the jump program with the 32 on the S7 edge thinking that I would use the other mostly on the Gear VR I decided to jump the other S6 edge and get a S7. (This one will be the gold platinium one)

This is also Samsungs first flagship device that you can hot swap the Sim cards with. Meaning that you don't have to power the device down to swap out the Sim. This makes it even more compelling for me to get the second device, That and my phone bill will actually go down a few bucks a month

The last feature I am going to cover today is the Always On Display (AOD) Its kinda cool and there are a few nice choices that come pre-installed. But there are also a few themes in the theme store that also have a AOD feature that look nice. I keep turning it off and then the next day turn it back on. If I leave the device face up beside me the moving of the disply always makes me look over at it and I don't like that.. But thats just me. I also have the Gear S2 and the Gear S, the latter I will hook to the regular S7. So I really don't have much need for the AOD feature. But I can see why some would love it.

This is the AOD from a theme I picked up in the theme store. Most of these are now free but later they will not be from what I can tell so you may want to jump over and grab them soon. I seen one this morning that is a paid app, so hurry.

Well thats it for now, I plan on doing an updated version of this when the S7 I ordered this morning gets here, its on back order so it will be about a week or more I will want to play with it for awhile as my main device first before I do a review on it and the differences I find between the two and anymore tips and tricks I find. I do have a few already but I'll leave them for the next write up.

Thanks for stpping in, Duck out.

Rush at 40, Rush rocks Portland.

I know this is suposse to be a phone blog... Well the picture were taken with my Galaxy S6 edge from way up top in the Moda Center in portland, so it still has something to do with phones... some what.


I was lucky enough to see this band on Tuesday night. This was my 12th time seeing the band I have been following for as it would happen to be 40 years now. This was their r40 tour celibrating the band being together for 40+ years. Now I have seen a ton of concerts in my many days. Seen some of the biggest bands around, some of the one hit wonders as well. Now on Monday before the show if you would of asked me who was the best show I had seen I would of said, Paul McCartney, Yes and Santana. Although Rush has been my favorite band, those three shows were just that good. If you asked me today who was the best show I would say, Rush 2015 tour without a doubt, not even close. They blew away every other show I had seen.

They played for about three hours with a break in the middle. At the break the road crew switched out Neil's new modern drum set for an older style drum set like he played back in the 70's. The sound difference was amazing. plus he had all those chimes and cowbells. They played songs from every album, they started the night with their newer songs and worked their way backwards ending the night with the best version of Working Man I have heard to date.

For a band that are all in their 60's the showed no sign of age. Geddy Lee was jumping up and down on stage, my knees hurt just watching him. He hit the high notes as well if not better than he ever had, and his bass playing can't be matched. Neil Peart played flawless as always his timing was perfect, even when he switched from one drumset to the other there was not loss of awsomeness.

Now for Alex Lifeson; The man has always been on top of his game, but for some reason I would always put Santana above him. Well after this show Alex has made the top of my list. He out did himself Tuesday night. His playing alone on Working Man just blew me away!


If I had to decribe this show in just a few words they would be "I have no words" But I will use these to try. "I wish I could live it all again"

Of course no show is complete without good friends. I was lucky enough to have my best friend of many years with me for her first show. Carla is new to Rush (only been a fan for about ten years or so) She planed the whole trip out and booked the hotel, tickets and bus there and back. My hat is off to her.

I also got to finally meet a long time online friend and fellow Rush fan Patricia before the show. we three went to a pre-show party then the show and met up after.

There are 5 more shows to go, then they will be done. They say this will most likely be their last major tour. If that is true I at least got to see the best show of my life on their last tour. They may still cut a few more albums and maybe even do a few shows to promote them. If I get the chance to see them again I will, if not I can live with knowing that I seen them at their best.

Oh and I did pick up some things to remember the show

Duck out

My how times have changed

I remember back when there was black and white tv's. I remember the family getting our first color tv. It was a marvel for sure. I also remember having a AM raido that I could attach to my (at the time super cool) 3 speed bike. It was red and white. I would listen to the Carpenters on a local staion KBZY in Salem Oregon... I was cool. I would take it with me when I went strawberry picking (Not that I actually did much picking) Randy (My childhood best friend) and I would listen to it all day long. Then we really moved up in the world and my dad came home one day with a Microwave oven. It had a dial that you would turn to set the time. I remember my cousin Carol teasing us about how dinner would be ready in a minute.


If you were to go to a park for the afternoon you would be out of touch with the world all the time you were there. Even the police had to be in their cars to comunicate. My how times have changed. Here I sit in a park, on a bench next to a river. You can't even see a powerline. I am typing this out on a chromebook that is using a Wi-Fi hotspot from my phone to post this.


I have a morning dove cooing and a few other birds chirping in the background. Chipmonks and golden mantel ground squerrels are all around me. If the man fishing in the river in front of me fell in the water or had a heartattack I could call 911 for help, give them the exact GPS location and they would be here in minutes.


Every once in awhile I think its good to just sit back and see just how far we have come. Then I just wonder what my 81 year old father thinks. It is a testament to us humans, we are changing the world, as it should be. Change is the only constant.


My how things have changed

Duck out.