Sarath
iDota
An droid takes over a computer
It was the month of December, in the not so distant year of 2011, when I was already a week into my bet. The bet? It was that " I would not use my PC till New years"
So how did I survive? (or did I survive
)
Beginning:
I realised I was an Internet addict, umm... a few minutes into the bet
This was a problem. A big problem.
Sleepless nights, countless stares at my PC, bouts of restlessness and paranoia ensued. I was fine after that
The problem is compounded by the fact that my Study table is also my Computer table; which in fact is an expansive office table. It's always there calling out to me, but I did not budge. This was tough but I got over it *sigh*
I was sure the PC called out to me many a times. I could hear it but I decided to turn a deaf ear to it. I even called up my girl and told her, "The PC is trying to seduce me, what should I do?" I later rubbished that statement to save my relationship. A PC can make you go insane, even in its absence 
I forgot to introduce you to my PC > <link to my PC> plays crysis
A week went by.
At the end of week 1 I suffered from the following side effects:
This week was pretty long. In fact very long. I was spending too much time on PC. Hmm...I took a decision to use my PC for only a few hours when it comes back alive. (I think this resolution just died )
The week finally ended up with an act of cruelty (coming soon...
)
A week after and beyond:
The first week is always the hardest. Meanwhile my phone now had the onus of doing everything, (well almost everything) that I did on the PC. I downloaded a slew of apps to do the job. I quickly realised, Android can do more than I knew it could. Wow!
Weapon of choice: Sony Erricson Xperia™ Arc (I didn't really have much choice to be honest )
Initial days with the phone were crude. I was mostly trying to adjust to the smaller screen and the different environment I had to play on now. From a monstrous PC to my phone. It didn't do much in the initial week, just regular surfing and occasional music. I found a rare feature in my phone though. It...somehow...made phone calls... Never noticed that until then. Called up a few people and they went- "HOW COME YOU CALLED?!!!" I was like..."Well, Hi " This reaction was pretty universal and I decided that I would call up people more often, so that at least they don't go all hyper when I...umm...call.
I was now limited to a combination of, a capable android phone, 4.2inches of glory, home Wi-fi connection, a 3G pack with 200odd MBs left, a 16 hour battery life and lot of time to tinker around
I had no other gadget as an alternative. No ipod, PS3 or laptop.
After a couple of days, I started fine tuning the phone to prepare it for the task ahead. Take up my PCs place and do a decent job when at it.
I decided to check out the Market and I found a lot of tools, all fit for the job.
Tapatalk, helped me back into the forums. Couldn't update some of the big threads but nevertheless helped me chill out and spend some time trolling
Adownloader, did my torrent job Bleach!
MX player, played the .mkv files at 1080p with ease. I was truly impressed. My 2 years old lappy stutters to play these exact videos but the droid didn't break a sweat. Impressive!
Photobucket and Snapbucket, to upload any files online. Snapbucket is a direct upload, which is actually faster than doing it through a PC
4shared, which..umm...helped in it's own way
A lot of other apps, but I will save that. A notable mention should be made of the Android app sale in second week of December( owing to their 10bn downloads). I bought so many apps that my CreditCard threw up and went into a coma. Ironically my Dad spent a few hundreds over a phone call to inquire about them; them indicating apps that were Rs.5 a piece.
The list of apps for sale: (I am warning you, do not click, there are too many) I bought 80% of them Awesome sale! Once again, if you really want to then click after you have finished reading
You can see, that a bulk of them are games and unsurprisingly I spent close to 5 hours each day gaming on my phone. I started with Great Little War Game and Where's My Water? and took me a week to finish one of them. I realised I was spending more time on this, than I would play on my PC and stopped. In fact I didn't even download the rest of the games for the fear of ruining my life
Notable mention should be made of this app,
Sketchbook app from Autodesk made me nostalgic and I spent many hours drawing random stuff. Galaxy Note, I don't need you (haven't used it either) Good for those odd moments when you just want to scribble or draw something meaningless and preserve it like a masterpiece
Also read more in Wikipedia than my Textbooks, spent my entire bandwidth on youtube, saw Rio completely, went crazy over music and handled 6k worth of transactions solely on the phone (used games on IVG)
Checked my e-mail, show timings for movies on BookMyShow, facebook, foursquare, used evernote to write my entries and whatsapp kept me alive
I pretty much got used to the phone and didn't miss my PC so much. Sometimes it could do everything I would need a PC for. A case in example: Buying a used game from forums:
I bid on an item in IVG (tapatalk) > Conversed through PMs (phone browser) > Seller agrees > Make payment NEFT (needs PC, bro did it) > Ships the item, track it (brw) > Receive the item: confirm & leave feedback (tapatalk) > Take pics through "Snapbucket"(direct upload) or use "Photobucker" > Copy link and post it on "Latest purchase..." thread (tapatalk) > Thank everyone
Go to bed > Keep an alarm
I came out pretty impressed and went ahead and won the bet. Android FTW!
So give a sigh of relied my friends, some day, in a post apocalyptic world, a world without computers, an Android may be all that you ever need
It was the month of December, in the not so distant year of 2011, when I was already a week into my bet. The bet? It was that " I would not use my PC till New years"
So how did I survive? (or did I survive
)Beginning:
I realised I was an Internet addict, umm... a few minutes into the bet
This was a problem. A big problem. Sleepless nights, countless stares at my PC, bouts of restlessness and paranoia ensued. I was fine after that
The problem is compounded by the fact that my Study table is also my Computer table; which in fact is an expansive office table. It's always there calling out to me, but I did not budge. This was tough but I got over it *sigh*
I was sure the PC called out to me many a times. I could hear it but I decided to turn a deaf ear to it. I even called up my girl and told her, "The PC is trying to seduce me, what should I do?"
I later rubbished that statement to save my relationship. A PC can make you go insane, even in its absence I forgot to introduce you to my PC > <link to my PC> plays crysis
A week went by.
At the end of week 1 I suffered from the following side effects:
~ I became more social. I could now tell friends from strangers.
~ I started understanding my subjects better.
~ I realised I had a powerful phone. I realised I had a phone that was laggy as hell.
~ I spoke more over phone and realised that Airtel had been screwing me for months.*
~ The days are longer in December, or maybe it was my PC. I still don't know.
~ I realised I was getting weaker. I was fatigued easily and couldn't walk much. Sedentary lifestyle screwed me up
~ I cleaned my room. I cleaned my table too. I didn't clean my PC though. *no courage*
~ Mom who was unaware of the bet, though I had changed and realised to do more important things etc etc...a misunderstanding I will have to later clarify *damn* I am getting screwed
~ My UPS was shifted & connected to the TV + STB. No more powercuts. Daily soaps now run without electricity. I think the UPS tried to file a case of abuse and torture on me, after that.
~ I started understanding my subjects better.
~ I realised I had a powerful phone. I realised I had a phone that was laggy as hell.
~ I spoke more over phone and realised that Airtel had been screwing me for months.*
~ The days are longer in December, or maybe it was my PC. I still don't know.
~ I realised I was getting weaker. I was fatigued easily and couldn't walk much. Sedentary lifestyle screwed me up
~ I cleaned my room. I cleaned my table too. I didn't clean my PC though. *no courage*
~ Mom who was unaware of the bet, though I had changed and realised to do more important things etc etc...a misunderstanding I will have to later clarify *damn* I am getting screwed
~ My UPS was shifted & connected to the TV + STB. No more powercuts. Daily soaps now run without electricity. I think the UPS tried to file a case of abuse and torture on me, after that.
This week was pretty long. In fact very long. I was spending too much time on PC. Hmm...I took a decision to use my PC for only a few hours when it comes back alive. (I think this resolution just died
)The week finally ended up with an act of cruelty (coming soon...
)A week after and beyond:
The first week is always the hardest. Meanwhile my phone now had the onus of doing everything, (well almost everything) that I did on the PC. I downloaded a slew of apps to do the job. I quickly realised, Android can do more than I knew it could. Wow!
Weapon of choice: Sony Erricson Xperia™ Arc (I didn't really have much choice to be honest
)Initial days with the phone were crude. I was mostly trying to adjust to the smaller screen and the different environment I had to play on now. From a monstrous PC to my phone. It didn't do much in the initial week, just regular surfing and occasional music. I found a rare feature in my phone though. It...somehow...made phone calls... Never noticed that until then. Called up a few people and they went- "HOW COME YOU CALLED?!!!" I was like..."Well, Hi
" This reaction was pretty universal and I decided that I would call up people more often, so that at least they don't go all hyper when I...umm...call. I was now limited to a combination of, a capable android phone, 4.2inches of glory, home Wi-fi connection, a 3G pack with 200odd MBs left, a 16 hour battery life and lot of time to tinker around
I had no other gadget as an alternative. No ipod, PS3 or laptop.
After a couple of days, I started fine tuning the phone to prepare it for the task ahead. Take up my PCs place and do a decent job when at it.
I decided to check out the Market and I found a lot of tools, all fit for the job.
Tapatalk, helped me back into the forums. Couldn't update some of the big threads but nevertheless helped me chill out and spend some time trolling
Adownloader, did my torrent job
Bleach!MX player, played the .mkv files at 1080p with ease. I was truly impressed. My 2 years old lappy stutters to play these exact videos but the droid didn't break a sweat. Impressive!
Photobucket and Snapbucket, to upload any files online. Snapbucket is a direct upload, which is actually faster than doing it through a PC
4shared, which..umm...helped in it's own way
A lot of other apps, but I will save that. A notable mention should be made of the Android app sale in second week of December( owing to their 10bn downloads). I bought so many apps that my CreditCard threw up and went into a coma. Ironically my Dad spent a few hundreds over a phone call to inquire about them; them indicating apps that were Rs.5 a piece.
The list of apps for sale: (I am warning you, do not click, there are too many) I bought 80% of them
Awesome sale! Once again, if you really want to then click after you have finished reading
Sleepy Jack
Camera Zoom FX
Shine Runner
Tile Storm HD
Start Chart
Talking Ben the Dog
Hyper Jump
Sentinel 3: Homeworld
MajestyL Fantasy Kingdom Sim
Puffle Launch
Heavy Gunner 3D
Deer Hunter 3D
EzPDF
Zenonia
Tank Riders
Collapse
MX Moto
Guns’n’Glory
Toddler Tapping Zoo
HD Widgets
Instant Heart Rate PRO
Flight Track
Train Conductor 2
Where’s My Water
SUPER KO BOXING! 2
Block Breaker 3 Unlimited HD
Flick Soccer
Flight Control
Blow Up
Doodle Jump
Roll in the Hole
When I Get Bigger
SimCity Deluxe
Just Me and My Mom
BackStab HD
Jenga
Raging Thunder
Backbreaker Football
Captin America
The Sims 3
SlideIT Keyboard
Season Zen HD
Snowfall Live Wallpaper
Age of Zombies
Zynga Drop 7
Apparatus
Pano
Kids Connect the Dots
Asphalt 6: Adrenaline HD
Color & Draw for Kids
Endomondo Sports Tracker Pro
Fieldrunners HD
Great Little War Game
Minecraft
Paper Camera
Sketchbook Mobile
Soundhound Infinity
Swiftkey X
Fruit Ninja
Beautiful Widgets
Flick Golf
AirSync by doubleTwist
Reckless Racing
Star Chart
Read it Later Pro
Christmas HD
BB – Bedtime Battle
NFL Rivals
Homerun Battle 3D
Reckless Getaway
Can Knockdown 2
TETRIS®
Toki Tori
Talking Tom Cat 2
Blue Skies Live Wallpaper: Soar
Kids Learn to Read
ADW Launcher EX
Space Physics
Shazam Encore
Baseball Superstars 2011
Spirit HD
Jelly Defense
My Beach HD
Farm Frenzy
Toddler Spanish 100 Words
Need for Speed Shift
Game Dev Story
Camera Zoom FX
Shine Runner
Tile Storm HD
Start Chart
Talking Ben the Dog
Hyper Jump
Sentinel 3: Homeworld
MajestyL Fantasy Kingdom Sim
Puffle Launch
Heavy Gunner 3D
Deer Hunter 3D
EzPDF
Zenonia
Tank Riders
Collapse
MX Moto
Guns’n’Glory
Toddler Tapping Zoo
HD Widgets
Instant Heart Rate PRO
Flight Track
Train Conductor 2
Where’s My Water
SUPER KO BOXING! 2
Block Breaker 3 Unlimited HD
Flick Soccer
Flight Control
Blow Up
Doodle Jump
Roll in the Hole
When I Get Bigger
SimCity Deluxe
Just Me and My Mom
BackStab HD
Jenga
Raging Thunder
Backbreaker Football
Captin America
The Sims 3
SlideIT Keyboard
Season Zen HD
Snowfall Live Wallpaper
Age of Zombies
Zynga Drop 7
Apparatus
Pano
Kids Connect the Dots
Asphalt 6: Adrenaline HD
Color & Draw for Kids
Endomondo Sports Tracker Pro
Fieldrunners HD
Great Little War Game
Minecraft
Paper Camera
Sketchbook Mobile
Soundhound Infinity
Swiftkey X
Fruit Ninja
Beautiful Widgets
Flick Golf
AirSync by doubleTwist
Reckless Racing
Star Chart
Read it Later Pro
Christmas HD
BB – Bedtime Battle
NFL Rivals
Homerun Battle 3D
Reckless Getaway
Can Knockdown 2
TETRIS®
Toki Tori
Talking Tom Cat 2
Blue Skies Live Wallpaper: Soar
Kids Learn to Read
ADW Launcher EX
Space Physics
Shazam Encore
Baseball Superstars 2011
Spirit HD
Jelly Defense
My Beach HD
Farm Frenzy
Toddler Spanish 100 Words
Need for Speed Shift
Game Dev Story
You can see, that a bulk of them are games and unsurprisingly I spent close to 5 hours each day gaming on my phone. I started with Great Little War Game and Where's My Water? and took me a week to finish one of them. I realised I was spending more time on this, than I would play on my PC and stopped. In fact I didn't even download the rest of the games for the fear of ruining my life
Notable mention should be made of this app,
Sketchbook app from Autodesk made me nostalgic and I spent many hours drawing random stuff. Galaxy Note, I don't need you
(haven't used it either) Good for those odd moments when you just want to scribble or draw something meaningless and preserve it like a masterpieceAlso read more in Wikipedia than my Textbooks, spent my entire bandwidth on youtube, saw Rio completely, went crazy over music and handled 6k worth of transactions solely on the phone (used games on IVG)
Checked my e-mail, show timings for movies on BookMyShow, facebook, foursquare, used evernote to write my entries and whatsapp kept me alive
I pretty much got used to the phone and didn't miss my PC so much. Sometimes it could do everything I would need a PC for. A case in example: Buying a used game from forums:
I bid on an item in IVG (tapatalk) > Conversed through PMs (phone browser) > Seller agrees > Make payment NEFT (needs PC, bro did it) > Ships the item, track it (brw) > Receive the item: confirm & leave feedback (tapatalk) > Take pics through "Snapbucket"(direct upload) or use "Photobucker" > Copy link and post it on "Latest purchase..." thread (tapatalk) > Thank everyone
Go to bed > Keep an alarm
I came out pretty impressed and went ahead and won the bet. Android FTW!
So give a sigh of relied my friends, some day, in a post apocalyptic world, a world without computers, an Android may be all that you ever need
A PC is however faster at everything. The phone could do a lot but took lots of time to do that. Still thinking of how far phones have come, it's an impressive feat. The power of the modern phones really shines through.
Last edited:
nicely written 