Android

Paul Brown recently wrote a great article on Why Spotify is an iTunes-killer worth paying for. In it, he mentions that you can sync your local music with Spotify on your mobile. This feature’s been around in Spotify for a while now but it seems that not everyone was aware of it. Instead of having to use cables or manually copy files to your phone, Spotify can sync them for you via WiFi. So to complement Paul’s article, here’s [...]

I bought a Samsung Galaxy Tab at the weekend and have now had a couple of days playing around with it. I wanted a tablet mostly to replace my Eee PC netbook, which I’d use for browsing and tweeting while watching TV or lounging about in bed. I bought an unlocked Galaxy Tab for £499 from my local Phones 4U store. It doesn’t need a SIM card so I didn’t have to take out any kind of contract: this makes it essentially a wi-fi [...]

Although Spotify has over 10 million songs, there are sometimes bands I’d like to listen who aren’t on there yet: The Beatles, Rammstein, Arcade Fire, Oasis and some of these bands too. Spotify also lacks audiobooks and audio-drama (such as the excellent Big Finish Doctor Who range), so there are occasions when you’re forced to listen to those things your grandparents talk about: MP3 files. Since I listen to music on my [...]

Here’s a quick video demonstrating Spotify’s voice commands. The search works perfectly, but Spotify is supposed to be launchable using voice commands too but I can’t get it to work. Sorry about the focus and glare in this clip, it’s my first attempt at a video :p

Here’s a short video demonstrating how to select a band name from a webpage on your PC then launch some tunes on Spotify for Android. I use this at work where I can’t run Spotify on the desktop, but can listen to it on my Android smartphone instead. The video shows the Google Chrome web browser, the Spotify Chome extension, and the Google Chrome to Phone extension.    

Managing Spotify playlists has always been tricky whenever you have more than a few dozen playlists to keep track of: you soon end up with a big long list of albums and playlists that’s difficult to search through. As a workaround, I  used the Firefox Bookmark Manager to store my “overspill” of playlists (where a playlist is usually an album or custom list of songs). I had folders named as genre tags and kept it all synced [...]

It’s been a while since we posted an Android update, so here’s what I reckon are the current Top 10 Essential Android Apps. Everyone will have their own personal favourites, but these ten apps are what I recommend any new Android user should check out first.

Android smartphones were made for music: with their fully-enabled multitasking feature, expandable memories and unrestricted choice, an Android phone makes iPods and mp3 players obsolete. Factor in Spotify and you have access to million upon millions of high-quality streaming music tracks. As well as the official Spotify Mobile app, an increasing number of Spotify-related apps have appeared for Android. Here’s a look at what’s [...]

I recently “side-graded” from the Motorola Milestone to another Android 2.1 smartphone: the HTC Desire. My contract with T-Mobile was up for renewal, the quirks of the Milestone were beginning to frustrate me, and I’d had a go on a friend’s Desire and instantly… well, desired one. There’s loads of great Desire reviews around the web, so here’s a post about how it rates against the Milestone.

Spotify for Android was recently updated to version 0.4.04. This update included the new social and local file features found on the desktop and iPhone versions, as well as Last.fm scrobbling and a few other goodies. Here’s a look at the changes.