For the second year in a row, AT&T's LTE service has proven to be the fastest in our survey of wireless broadband performance across the United States. T-Mobile LTE appears to be spreading rapidly, and is pumping out high speeds. Verizon LTE is reasonably quick and easily the most pervasive, while Sprint LTE lacks speed in urban centers.

Those are the top-line findings of our most recent study of real-world wireless broadband performance in America. In March and April, we measured the LTE services of the four major national wireless carriers in 20 cities from coast to coast.

LTE goes mainstream

A quarter of U.S. cellular subscribers now have LTE service, and analysts expect that number to grow to nearly 70 percent in 2017. More and more new phones will bear the LTE label, and phones that connect only to 3G service will become increasingly rare.

In fact, 3G networks were originally designed for voice, not data. The carriers retrofitted them with IP technology to make them convey data, but you can retrofit only so much until returns (in speed and capacity) begin to diminish. New LTE networks are constructed from top to bottom with IP as their main language, so they are far faster, more economical, and more flexible than the clunky old 3G networks. But 4G is very expensive to build from the ground up, as investors in the Big Four wireless carriers can attest.

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In this year’s wireless speed tests, TechHive and its testing partner OpenSignal focused on getting real-world results. That’s why we used ordinary, readily available smartphones and tested in the physical spaces where real people use such devices, both inside and outside buildings.

Drive test metrics are great to have, and they help mobile carriers improve service and target problem areas on their networks. However, with over 34 percent of households in the United States claiming a mobile phone as their only phone, we know that most smartphone users are either at home or at work, presumably somewhere inside a building.

The results

In our tests, outdoor service was usually better than indoor service, but not by much. Both 4G and 3G service suffered an average speed loss of less than 0.7 megabits per second (700 kilobits per second), but that small difference turned into a big one for services where download speeds were less than 1 mbps to begin with.

Overall, 3G service showed marginal speed decreases when we used it indoors. Sprint, T-Mobile, and Verizon 3G speeds degraded by 5 to 9 percent in indoor usage. AT&T was an anomaly: Its 3G service produced download speeds that were 5.28 percent faster indoors than outdoors.

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TechHive, together with testing partner OpenSignal, visited 20 U.S. cities throughout March and April to measure the real-life speeds of wireless networks across the country. We found that LTE speeds are getting faster, that AT&T has the fastest LTE speeds right now, that Sprint's and Verizon's respective 3G services are stuck in low gear, and that the differences between the speeds of the carrier's various services are considerable. This infographic should help you get a handle on our most prominent findings.

When your cool new LTE phone loses touch with your LTE network, the 3G radio inside the phone will immediately connect to the older 3G network for your data service. But 3G is slower, so the downshift needs to be a smooth one—one that doesn’t yank you down to a speed so slow, you can’t continue what you’re doing.

If such a jolt were to happen while you're watching streaming video, your movie might might begin to stutter, playing in fits and starts. It might even stop working altogether.

That’s why a comparison of the major national carriers’ combined 3G and 4G speed is important. The fastest LTE speeds can be easily forgotten if your backup 3G service slows throughput to a trickle.

TechHive benchmarked nationwide wireless speeds throughout March and April, and our 20-city tests show that AT&T’s LTE service and HSPA+ service offer the fastest combination of 4G and 3G for dual-mode smartphones and tablets. AT&T’s LTE service showed average download speeds of 13.15 megabits per second, and average upload speeds of a solid 6.45 mbps across our 20 testing cities.

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LG hasn't always been a fan favorite: For a long time the company was best known for its budget handsets that did little to stand out from the competition. In recent years, however, LG has earned a reputation for creating solid, reliable devices. The LG Optimus G Pro continues that string of successes, blowing away its nearest competitor in size and design, the Samsung Galaxy Note II, and rivaling the recent HTC One and Samsung Galaxy S4 as one of the best Android phones on the market. The G Pro runs like a sports car engine in the body of a family minivan—an unassuming aesthetic mixed with luxury performance. Provided you can fit it in your hand (a big caveat), this quick, flashy giant might very well be the phone for you.

Built for Goliath

At 5.9 by 3.0 by 0.4 inches the Optimus G Pro is larger than almost any other phone on the market. Like last year’s Galaxy Note II, the G Pro packs 5.5 inches of screen real estate, straddling that fine line between tablet and phone.

Michael Homnick

On the other hand, the G Pro carries its size well. It’s definitely overlarge (people with tiny hands, beware), but I found the G Pro surprisingly comfortable to operate. In addition to a volume rocker, the left spine of the handset features a quick-launch button that can be customized to open any app on the device—handy for accessing the camera or a browser. The G Pro is slightly slimmer than the Galaxy Note II, which helped it sit better in my average-size hands. You’re also able to compress the keyboard closer to the left or right side if you really want to use the device one-handed.

Michael Homnick

As for the screen, it’s a beautiful behemoth running at 1920 by 1080 resolution, with a pixel density of 400 pixels per inch. That’s a much higher resolution than what you get on the Galaxy Note II’s 267 pixels per inch and 1280-by-720-resolution display, though the G Pro's density doesn’t quite live up to what the HTC One and Galaxy S4 offer (both are 1920 by 1080 displays, with 469 and 441 pixels per inch, respectively). Unfortunately, this beautiful screen is housed in a cheap plastic exterior that relentlessly attracts smudges. The phone is by no means ugly—especially with the screen on—but it just doesn't stand out, as the lovingly-honed HTC One does.

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The Sony Xperia ZL ($759, unlocked) is your average high-end smartphone. It ticks all of the appropriate boxes: large, full-HD display, a camera that's chock full of megapixels, speedy LTE-connectivity (I tested it on AT&T's network), and a beefy quad-core Snapdragon processor. But in a world of iPhones, HTC Ones, and Samsung Galaxy S4s, ticking off all the boxes is far from enough.

A pretty face

The Xperia ZL's 5-inch 1080p display is gorgeous, provided you’re looking at it dead on. The screen begins to look washed out the moment you tilt the phone away, which can be off-putting if you’re a stickler for these sorts of details. I got over it: the loss of color accuracy is annoying, but I don't spend too much time ogling phones at disparate angles so it doesn't feel like a deal breaker. However, if you're fond of showing photos off to your friends or watching videos on a bus ride, keeping tabs on how you hold the phone can be a bit annoying.

Nate Ralph

Bothersome viewing angles aside, the phone's display is a treat to look at. The screen's bezel is wondrously thin, and the 443 ppi pixel density offers clear, crisp text, so everything—from photos and videos to app icons—looks bright and vivid. If you aren't completely satisfied, the ZL even offers white balance settings, so you can tweak the color temperature to suit your tastes.

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It’s been a while since BlackBerry released a phone with a physical keyboard, and the touchscreen-only Z10 released earlier this year fanned fears that the company was abandoning its roots. The Q10 assuages those fears somewhat, though the phone feels more serviceable than revolutionary. It’s a solidly built piece of hardware that will please those who’ve waited for a new physical-keyboard BlackBerry, but the Q10’s small screen and limited app support will keep many away.

A return to form

Michael Homnick

The BlackBerry Q10’s design is packaged nostalgia. BlackBerry isn’t as ubiquitous as it once was, but the shape of the Q10 is still iconic of a time when the company reigned over the corporate market. For BlackBerry diehards, that alone might be enough. After all, there aren’t many options left.

The Q10’s screen is larger than those of its BlackBerry Bold ancestors, and is incredibly sharp and responsive, but it still measures a mere 3.1-inches. That might not matter if you’re itching for a new phone with a physical keyboard, but anyone who’s debating moving down in size might want to reconsider.

Browsing anything besides pure text is a bit claustrophobic on the Q10: Videos are minuscule, and webpages without dedicated mobile sites are a chore to navigate. You can zoom, but the narrow screen requires constant horizontal scrolling to see anything. And it has no landscape mode to help you, so browsing some sites feels overly tedious.

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This is the burning question of the moment: Should you buy the Samsung Galaxy S4? After spending a few days with the phone and running it through TechHive's suite of tests, I can confirm that the Galaxy S4 is an impressive Android phone. Samsung's latest offering tops its previous efforts in many respects, and Android fans are rightly excited by the Galaxy S4's imminent release (slated for the end of the month). That's not to say that the phone is perfect: For all of its innovations and cutting-edge specs, the Galaxy S4 has shortcomings that prevent it from being the ideal smartphone.

Familiar face

ROBERT CARDIN

At first glance, the Galaxy S4 looks similar to its predecessors, the Galaxy S3 and Galaxy Note 2. The phone shares the same rounded corners, Home button, and primarily plastic design; yet the Galaxy S4 feels more polished overall. The new phone's buttons are more durable than those on the Note 2 or Galaxy S3, and its plastic components seem to be of higher quality. Measuring 5.38 by 2.75 by 0.31 inches and weighing a scant 4.64 ounces, the Galaxy S4 is slightly lighter and thinner than the Galaxy S3. However, the Galaxy S4 felt blockish next to the Galaxy S3's gentle curves and wasn't as comfortable to hold.

Michael Homnick

The 5-inch, 1920-by-1080-pixel display on the Galaxy S4 offers an impressive 441 pixels per inch, making it one of the sharper-looking screens around, and beating the pixel density of the iPhone 5 (326 ppi) and the Galaxy S3 (306 ppi). Still, colors looked more saturated on the Galaxy S4 than on competing smartphones. The thin bezel surrounding the screen made using the phone one-handed more difficult because of the ever-present hazard of inadvertently hitting the Menu button or the Back button—a mistake that tended to happen as I was trying to type an email or text message.

Michael Homnick

The back of the phone comes off to reveal a removable 2600mAh battery, and a MicroSD card slot that can accommodate up to 64GB of additional storage. TechHive’s lab clocked the Galaxy S4's battery life at a solid 7 hours, during which it continuously played back HD video, and I managed to squeeze a full day of use out of the phone while browsing the Web, downloading apps, taking pictures, before having to recharge it.

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Even as we move into spring, it's still chilly enough many mornings that gloves are a welcome addition. And while out daily with my two small dogs before work, I still need check in on email and Facebook via my smartphone, even while holding a double leash.

But when my fingers are cramped with cold, it's difficult to manipulate my phone's touchscreen. I also fear that stiff fingers in thin gloves, combined with jerks by my pets, will send my phone tumbling to the sidewalk.

So, I tried a pair of Isotoner's Smartouch 2.0 matrix nylon ultra plush gloves, which have conductive threads woven into the tips of three fingers on each glove (that's one more finger than the previous version of the gloves provided).

The conductive threads on the tips of the thumb, first, and second fingers of the gloves conduct electricity to your touchscreen in much the same way your fingers do—so opening bookmarks, such as email, Google, and calendar, on the touch screen was as easy as doing so with ungloved fingertips.

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The HTC First is one of the more intriguing Android phones I've had the chance to review. The result of a collaboration between HTC and Facebook, the First is the first phone to ship with Facebook Home preinstalled—doing away with the traditional Android home screen in favor of a continuous Facebook news feed. Apps such as Gmail and Maps are hidden away, while the official Facebook and Messaging apps take center stage. The phone is aimed at fans of the social network, but the First's unassuming design and modest $100 price tag (with an accompanying 2-year contract on AT&T) should prove enticing to anyone looking for a smartphone on a budget.

Keep it simple

The first thing you'll notice when handling the phone is its size: Measuring 4.96 by 2.56 by 0.35-inches, the First has roughly the same dimensions as the Apple iPhone 5. The phone is composed primarily of a soft-touch plastic that makes it pleasant to hold, and the device's smaller stature makes it easy to use one-handed. Like the HTC One, the First boasts a simple design that helps keep the phone from feeling overly complicated. The buttons on the First all feel sturdy and responsive, though I had trouble keeping the phone's MicroUSB cable securely in the charging port.

The phone lacks a user replaceable battery, and there's no MicroSD card slot, which means you're stuck with the 16GB of on-board memory for storing your apps, photos, music, and movies. Most won't care about these missing features, but it's something worth considering if you're someone that likes to have Michael Jackson's entire discography with you at all times. The First's 4.3-inch display packs an impressive 341 pixels per inch (ppi), making it sharper than the Retina display on the iPhone 5, though the screen looks unusually dark even on the brightest settings.

The First lacks the Beats audio software found on pretty much every other current HTC phone, and as a result, audio played through the phone's speaker sounds hollow. The speaker's location is also inconvenient—when holding the phone in landscape mode, your hand often covers it up, which leaves you with muffled sound while watching videos or playing games.

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HTC knows how to make good-looking hardware. I loved the white ceramic body of the HTC One X and Nokia could learn a thing or two about making Windows phones by taking a closer look at the HTC Windows Phone 8X. The company’s latest offering, the HTC One, is a paragon of industrial design: Its chiseled chamfers, rounded edges, and chrome accents are sure to turn more than a few heads when you whip out the phone in public. But the One is more than just a pretty face: HTC packed a lot of power under the phone’s hood, and the handset’s camera benefits from numerous software and hardware tweaks that should excite fans of mobile photography.

A feast for the eyes

Jason Cross

The first thing you’ll notice when holding the One is how well it sits in your hand. At 5.4 by 2.7 by 0.4 inches, the phone is larger than Apple’s iPhone 5 but smaller than HTC’s previous handset, the Droid DNA. Though the phone comes with a 4.7-inch display (shades of the Samsung Galaxy S III), the One’s aluminum unibody design and gentle curves compare favorably to the S III’s primarily plastic body. That slick exterior does come at a price, however: The One’s power and volume buttons sit flush with the phone’s chassis—which makes them difficult to press—and the 2300mAh battery is nonremovable. The phone also lacks a microSD card slot, meaning that you’re stuck using the supplied 32GB (or 64GB, if you buy the larger model) of on-board memory to store your photos, apps, music, and movies.

Jason Cross

The absence of expandable storage is lamentable, especially since in other respects HTC designed the One to function as a multimedia powerhouse. The One’s 1920-by-1080-pixel display packs 468 pixels per inch, which makes viewing HD content a feast for the eyes. Bordering that gorgeous display are two large, front-facing stereo speakers, which pump out surprisingly loud, clear audio. One big advantage of positioning the speakers on the front of the device rather than on the back is that audio doesn’t get muffled when you set the phone down on a flat surface. I did notice an occasional pop at higher volumes, but the speakers’ sound quality was more than acceptable overall.

If you tend to mislay your TV remote, you’ll appreciate the One’s built-in IR blaster, which lets you use the phone as a universal remote control. The phone has a TV app with a setup wizard that simplifies the task of programming the One to work with your TV, cable box, and home theater. The app also pulls listing information from Peel, showing which TV shows and movies are currently playing. You can arrange for the phone to remind you when your favorite shows are on and to provide a brief synopsis of specific episodes. I tested the remote functionality of the phone with an LG TV and a Motorola cable box in our office and was surprised at how well the combination worked. Though I was 13 feet away from the cable box, I noticed little or no delay when I changed channels or browsed through the guide. The app is so well made that I almost wish I subscribed to cable...almost.

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It's been a long time since a BlackBerry phone ignited our collective imaginations. But the BlackBerry Z10, from the newly rechristened BlackBerry (formerly Research in Motion), certainly has done that. The Z10 (due in March on multiple carriers, though only Verizon has announced a price: $199 with a two-year contract) puts BlackBerry back in the game in a real way, with its attractive hardware, its elegant and innovative BlackBerry 10 mobile operating system, and a relaunched app store that now offers music and video too. And it might just be enough to help stem the BlackBerry exodus and recapture some of the company's past glory, not to mention market share.

Might is the operative word here. BlackBerry undoubtedly faces an uphill battle in its quest for relevance. The smartphone market has evolved dramatically in the past few years since BlackBerry began its downward slide. As a company, BlackBerry needs to compete not just on a phone's hardware but also on its operating system and app and media environment. BlackBerry is definitely a latecomer, but it gets enough right with the Z10 that owning a BlackBerry handset might actually have a shot at being cool again.

Hardware: Snazzy display

The BlackBerry Z10 has a stylish look, with matte-black accents at the top, bottom, and edges, as well as a softly textured back. On the back, like a bull's-eye, sits the BlackBerry logo, which doubles as the NFC antenna. The back is easy to remove, and easy to snap into place. Underneath, you get access to the battery, the micro-SIM card slot, and the MicroSD card slot.

The front of the Z10 has no buttons. Rather, the display is the dominant feature, accompanied by another BlackBerry logo that serves a starting point for the phone's gesture interface (for example, you swipe up from the BlackBerry logo to wake the phone or to minimize an app). The 1280-by-768-pixel IPS display, sheathed in Gorilla Glass, measures 4.2 inches. While this size is appropriate for one-handed use, it's neither as large as some of the current jumbo phones in the Android world nor competitively sized with mainstream Android models (currently at 4.6 inches).

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Galaxy S III? Nexus 7? In any case, congratulations on your new Android phone or tablet. What’s that? Someone told you there were no decent games on Android? Well, as 2013 rolls in, not only have most iPhone developers ported some of their best titles to Google's mobile OS, but we’re also seeing many great games that are available only on Android. Read on for a list of fun, accessible, and affordable Android games that will keep you glued to your phone or tablet wherever you go.

Angry Birds

Angry Birds is, by anyone’s count, the once and future king of mobile games—three years after its release, it’s still impossible to ride the subway for a week without seeing someone playing this game. The premise is simple: Pigs have stolen the Birds’ eggs, hence the Birds are Angry; use the touchscreen to slingshot your Angry Birds at the pigs. The levels are creative, you can use birds with special abilities, and the game's theme song will stick in your head for the rest of your life. Highly recommended—and if you ever finish it, you can move on to Angry Birds Seasons, Angry Birds Rio, and Angry Birds Star Wars.

Price: Free

Pac-Man Championship Edition

Who doesn’t love Pac-Man? No fair answering “people born after 1990.” Okay, who doesn’t love Pac-Man with high-definition retro graphics and a weird trance-rave aesthetic? Also people born after 1990? Huh. Well, tell you what—Pac-Man is a classic, and this is a great, stylish, fast-paced remake of a classic. The ghosts are faster, the levels are more varied, and Pac-Man himself is more agile, skidding around corners like a 1972 Trans Am.

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As much as we hear about LTE service these days, the fact is that three-quarters of U.S. wireless subscribers still use good old 3G service. For AT&T and T-Mobile customers, this entails HSPA service (although the companies call it “4G”), while Sprint and Verizon users are relegated to CDMA service.

In recent years, all of the major wireless carriers have faced a significant challenge in funding the build-out of their new LTE networks while reserving enough to pay for the upkeep of their existing 3G networks. This maintenance is important for keeping 3G smartphone users connected to the Web, of course, but it’s also critical because all of the carriers still run their voice services over their legacy 3G networks. The migration of voice services to the LTE networks is still years away. When that process is complete, voice will become an all-IP service (VoIP).

TechHive has completed a sweeping testing project of nationwide wireless speeds, and overall our numbers show that HSPA (T-Mobile and AT&T) service is continuing to outpace CDMA service (Verizon and Sprint) in raw network bandwidth.

T-Mobile’s HSPA 14.4 service registered scores of as high as 5.49 megabits per second for downloads, but also had scores as low as 0.02 mbps. AT&T’s service was a bit more consistent, hitting in the range of 2 mbps to 4 mbps in most of our test cities. Overall, the average speeds for both carriers rose considerably from last year. (See the chart below.)

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Microsoft confirmed Wednesday that it has tweaked its Windows Phone YouTube app, eliminating the download capability that Google had asked for. Still missing, however, are ads—an ommision that will rob Google's content partners of revenue that they would otherwise earn.

Microsoft's updated YouTube app is now live in the Windows Phone Store, with an update date of May 22. PCWorld played several videos using the new app. While the download feature has been removed, pre-roll ads—such as the one usually embedded before Psy's "Gangnam Style"—appear to have been removed as well.

According to reports from The Verge and elsewhere, Google demanded that Microsoft remove the YouTube app from its store. "Content creators make money on YouTube by monetizing their content through advertising," Google's complaint letter read. "Unfortunately, by blocking advertising and allowing downloads of videos, your application cuts off a valuable ongoing revenue source for creators, and causes harm to the thriving content ecosystem on YouTube."

Microsoft

As Google noted, users do have access to the YouTube Web site via the Internet Explorer mobile browser embedded in Windows Phone, which preserves what others see when they access YouTube via the Web: ads, and the lack of the ability to download videos. (A number of other services have permitted users to download YouTube videos.) Ads have become increasingly important to Google, as the company turns on paid subscriptions and ramps up enhanced campaigns across numerous brands.

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Our Internet experience has become irreversibly mobile, and the stakes couldn’t be higher. It’s not unusual for a family to pay $2000 a year in wireless-service bills alone. For anyone living in the United States, in fact, the cost of moving 1MB of data over a cellular network is among the highest in the developed world.

The real speed at which smartphones and tablets connect to the Internet couldn’t be more important. That’s why PCWorld (and now TechHive) regularly conducts the nation’s largest independent-media study of real-world wireless network performance.

Focusing on the four major U.S. wireless networks, we seek to arm you with the information you need to judge the carriers’ marketing claims about their networks, weigh the relative value of each carrier’s offerings, and ultimately make a more informed decision when buying a device and signing up for service.

This year’s study is our largest to date. TechHive, in partnership with testing firm OpenSignal, visited 20 medium-size and large U.S. cities in April and May to measure the speeds of the AT&T, Sprint, T-Mobile, and Verizon 3G and 4G wireless data services. Our mission was to capture a real-life snapshot of the performance of each company’s service.

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Reprogramming the identification number of a cellphone could be punishable with a prison sentence of up to five years under the terms of a proposed federal law introduced Friday.

The Mobile Device Theft Deterrence Act of 2013 makes changing the International Mobile Equipment Identity (IMEI) number in a phone a crime. The IMEI number is a unique identification number in every cellphone and is exchanged when a mobile phone signs on to a mobile network.

In an attempt to combat the growing number of violent street robberies of high-end smartphones, carriers have built a database that blocks stolen phones from being reused. The database relies on the IMEI number, so if the number is reprogrammed in a stolen handset, it could bypass the database check and get resold and reused.

Reprogramming the number isn't easy, but it also represents a weak point in the battle against these robberies, which now account for close to half of all street crime in several major U.S. cities. While the theft of the phone and the sale of stolen goods both constitute crimes, the electronic reprogramming in the middle doesn't. The new law would change that.

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Samsung Electronics has reported global channel sales of over 10 million units of the Galaxy S4 in less than a month after its global launch.

The new smartphone from the Samsung stable has outstripped its predecessors in first-month sales.

The GALAXY S III reached the 10 million mark 50 days after its launch in 2012, while the GALAXY S II took five months and the GALAXY S seven months to reach the milestone, Samsung said.

The device is now available in over 110 countries and will gradually be rolled out to a total of 155 countries in tandem with partners, Samsung said Thursday.

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Nokia is targeting HTC’s latest slate of smartphones, including the HTC One, with new legal action in the U.S. that demands the Taiwanese company cease the alleged patent infringement.

Nokia is accusing the HTC One, and several other HTC phones, of infringing three Nokia patents, according to a lawsuit filed by the Finnish handset maker on Thursday. The patents deal with handset radio frequency identification technology for use with applications. The lawsuit, filed in the U.S. district court of Southern California, is demanding HTC stop the alleged infringement and pay damages.

Other handsets named in the lawsuit include HTC’s Droid DNA, the HTC First, and last year’s generation of HTC One phones.

Nokia on Thursday also filed a patent infringement complaint with the U.S. International Trade Commission (ITC), the company said in an email. Nokia said both the ITC and U.S. district court complaints cover nine patents new to its legal dispute with HTC.

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The Verge is reporting that AT&T has sneaked another fee into the phone bills of its 70 million or so postpaid wireless customers. The fee, called a "Mobility Administrative Fee" adds another 61 cents to the bill each month.

We ran a little basic math using information from AT&T's most recent quarterly report, and found the carrier will make an extra $2.5 billion over the next five years from the new fee alone. If the carrier's postpaid subscriber rolls increase, as it hopes, it will make even more.

AT&T started charging the fee May 1, and shows the new fee breakdown on its Additional Charges page.

"Consistent with similar fees charged by other carriers, the monthly fee of 61 cents per line will help cover certain expenses, such as interconnection and cell site rents and maintenance," an AT&T spokesperson said in an email to TechHive.

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The HTC First, also known as "the Facebook phone" thanks to its Facebook Home integration, is looking more and more like a flop.

The phone has reportedly been a sales disaster in the United States, and while official sales figures are unknown, Facebook has told its U.K. launch partner EE to hold off on selling the phone in light of negative feedback in the United States.

EE has canceled all pre-orders for the phone, and it doesn't seem like the carrier will be taking orders again anytime soon.

“Following customer feedback, Facebook has decided to focus on adding new customization features to Facebook Home over the coming months,” EE said in a statement to Engadget. “While they are working to make a better Facebook Home experience, they have recommended holding off launching the HTC First in the UK, and so we will shortly be contacting those who registered their interest with us to let them know of this decision.”

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This time of year tends to slow down my progress whenever I’m outdoors; my wife, it seems, can’t pass a flower without taking a picture of it on her phone. Indeed, no matter what kind of camera you own—SLR, compact, or smartphone—spring is a great time to take photos of flowers, insects, and other small details of the natural world.

Macro mode

You can get some really nice close-up photos (technically referred to as macrophotography) with almost any camera by remembering a few rules. So what do you need to know?

For starters, every camera lens has a minimum focusing distance. You can’t cheat the laws of optics; get too close to your subject, and the result will simply be blurry. The iPhone, for example, has a minimum focusing distance of about 2 to 3 inches. That’s great, especially since you don’t need to do anything special to trigger close-up mode.

Many compact digital cameras, on the other hand, won’t automatically focus once you get within a foot or so of your subject. In order to take a macro photo just inches away, you’ll need to turn on the camera’s macro mode, which is usually a button or menu setting with a tulip symbol. The macro mode rearranges the camera’s optics to focus very close up, but remember to turn it off when you’re done—a camera in macro mode won’t be able to focus sharply on subjects that are at a normal distance.

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In springtime, people’s fancies may turn to love, but their to-do list turns to cleaning. Make this the year that you finally recycle all the ancient MP3 players, toner cartridges, ethernet cables, and bulky monitors out of the closets, garages, and spare rooms where they’ve been lurking. Your home will feel more modern, and you’ll be doing your part to boost the 27 percent electronics recycling rate in the U.S.—just in time for another spring constant, Earth Day.

Why recycle at all?

Sure, it would be easier just to dump all your old, unwanted electronic stuff in the trash. However, old computers and their related peripherals contain a lot of heavy metals—lead, cadmium, mercury—that are bad for people’s health when they get into the soil and water. In addition, when old electronics hit the trash heap, they’re out of a recycling stream that can cut the energy costs for production of future electronics.

But if the environmental concerns don’t grab you, consider the business benefits to recycling electronics: According to the Institute for Local Self-Reliance, compared to disposal, computer reuse created 296 jobs per every 10,000 tons of material disposed of each year. The Electronics TakeBack Coalition estimates that the U.S. generates approximately 1.7 million tons of electronic waste annually—so imagine the job potential that’s still there. And if those arguments don’t sway you, maybe the long arm of the law can: It’s illegal in 25 U.S. states to simply trash your old electronics.

Now, don’t you want to avoid breaking the law? Don’t you also want to employ people and keep the planet clean by recycling your old stuff? Of course you do, so let’s get started.

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Back in January I wrote about the "inconvenient truth" of trying to charge your iPad from a USB port: there's not enough juice.

My recommendation at the time was Digital Innovations' ChargeDr, a USB dongle that allows tablets and other devices to charge more quickly. It works (quite well, in fact), but it's a $30 solution.

If you fancy free workarounds instead, check out Asus Ai Charger. This free utility promises to charge iPhones, iPods, and iPads up to 50 percent faster using your PC's existing USB ports.

That's a pretty lofty claim: software that can boost the effective power output of hardware? It sounds almost impossible, but I'm here to tell you: it works.

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While Apple users have iCloud, and Android fans have Google Drive, Windows Phone devotees have SkyDrive. SkyDrive is Microsoft’s free online cloud storage service and every Windows Live account automatically receives 7GB of free storage space, which can be accessed from any device with an Internet connection—including, naturally, Windows Phone 8 handsets.

There are a couple of different ways to use SkyDrive with your Windows Phone 8 device. Windows Phone 8 has some basic SkyDrive integration built in so you can save and backup files to SkyDrive, even if you don’t want to download the SkyDrive app from the Windows Phone Store.

SkyDrive is integrated into Windows Phone 8 mainly in the Photos, Office, or OneNote apps. For example, when looking at a picture in the Photos app, you can save that picture to your SkyDrive by tapping the More button (three ellipsis in the lower right corner) and then 'save to SkyDrive.' You can also set up your Photos app to automatically save photos and videos to SkyDrive, by going to Photos > More (...) > Settings > SkyDrive and turning automatic upload “on.”

Likewise, when you save a document or spreadsheet in the Office app, you can choose to save it to SkyDrive by tapping the 'save as' button and choosing “SkyDrive.” You can access these SkyDrive documents (even if you don’t have the SkyDrive app) by going to the Places screen in Office and choosing SkyDrive. The OneNote app automatically syncs with your SkyDrive account, saving a copy of any notebooks and notes that you’ve made on your phone to the cloud. To manually sync your OneNote notebooks, open the OneNote app, tap the More ellipsis button, and tap 'sync.'

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Though Android’s global market share is intimidating, two other numbers are enlightening: 22 percent of Android users eventually switch to an iPhone, while only 9 percent of iPhone users go the other way. As those numbers suggest, switching from Android to iPhone isn't that difficult. Here’s how to make that transition as painlessly as possible.

Keeping contacts

Users switching phones often worry first about retaining their contacts. But help is available: Most carriers are happy to assist you in moving contacts from one device to another. They usually handle this task in-store when you activate your new iPhone. If you’re activating at home, check your carrier’s support page for its contact transfer service.

Even if you've already bought and activated your iPhone, your carrier should be able to transfer your contacts, as long as you still have your old phone or you’ve backed up your contacts.

If for some reason you can’t get your carrier to help, you can move your contacts yourself. Assuming that you synced your contacts with Google or a Microsoft Exchange server, you can retrieve your information from there.

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Windows Phone 8 prides itself on being a highly customizable mobile operating system. From the location and size of the live tiles to the lock screen and theme colors, each Windows Phone 8 handset offers a ton of options—something you'll likely notice upon your first visit to the Settings menu. If you haven't already perused the lengthy list of settings, check them out by tapping the Settings icon, which looks like a small gear, or by selecting Settings from the App list.

However, there's no need to be overwhelmed: Although the settings may seem extensive, that's only because the new OS has fewer top-down menus. In other words, many of the settings that you usually find nested in menus on other devices are located right on the main settings screen in Windows Phone 8. (Depending on what type of Windows Phone 8 handset you own, you may see other options that are not mentioned here. For example, HTC 8X phones also have Beats Audio and Attentive Phone settings, while Nokia Lumia handsets also have Display+Touch and Nokia Account settings. This article focuses only on settings that are universal to all Windows Phone 8 handsets.)

To start off, note that the Settings menu consists of two screens. The first screen, for system settings, covers general device adjustments (such as changing your ringtone or toggling Bluetooth, Wi-Fi, or airplane mode). The second screen is for application-specific settings (such as choosing which apps may perform background tasks).

System settings

Ringtones+Sounds

The Ringtones+Sounds setting screen is where you can adjust and modify the assorted sounds your phone makes.

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Android’s appeal lies in the option to customize it as much or little as you desire. The rabbit hole is deep, yet you don’t have to plunge into the scary world of rooting and ROMing to change how Android looks and works.

This guide is for users who want to take their first steps into the world of advanced Android use and customization. The tricks described here will help you make your device more intuitive and more capable, yet each tip remains within reach of the greenest Android newbie. As you learn these advanced tweaks, you’ll see even more opportunities for further customization. The road to Android fandom is paved with small changes that gradually transform your device. So come on—take the first step.

Make your home screen feel like home

Android’s home screen is where most interaction occurs. Your favorite apps and widgets always appear here for easy use and quick access to information. You’ll spend a lot of time with your home screen, so settle in and don't be afraid to get cozy. Choose a new wallpaper. Then prepare to unlock the path to serious customization.

The key to getting Android to be just the way you want it is to download an app known as a launcher replacement. As the name suggests, this kind of app replaces the operating system’s default launcher process and lets you change the look, size, and position of icons; add or remove home screens; change how scrolling works; add or remove columns or rows of icons; and much more. The exact options depend on the launcher, and many different launchers are available for download from the Google Play Store.

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The batteries that your mobile devices contain are miracles of engineering. They hold amounts of energy that their predecessors couldn’t come close to equaling. Properly using this potential can help your mobile batteries last longer on the road. Here are our tips for obtaining optimum battery performance.

1. For the quickest Tablet charge, use the original charger or a charger specifically designed for it.

iPads and other tablets have large batteries, so they come with chargers that can output lots of juice to recharge them quickly. For example, the iPad's adapter can output up to 2100mA (2.1 Amps), which is more than double the amperage that a typical USB port can support. This extra power output makes a huge difference. In our tests, charging an iPad took 5 hours, 9 minutes with the iPad charger (which can deliver up to 2100mA), but it took 10 hours, 13 minutes with an iPhone 5 charger (which maxes out at 1000mA). In a similar test with a generic USB travel charger, the charger took more than 24 hours to build up a full charge in the same iPad.

As these tests demonstrate, to reduce charging time to a minimum, you need to use either the original charger or one designed specifically for your device. Some devices contain circuitry that won’t allow the battery to use the charger's full capacity unless the charger contains a special authorization chip: otherwise, the device will charge at a much slower rate. For instance, when we tried to charge an iPad 4 with a Samsung Tab 10.1's charger, the process took over 19 hours to complete, even though the Samsung charger can deliver the same amount of juice as the original iPad 4 charger. That’s because the iPad 4, not recognizing that the charger could deliver a larger flow of power, limited the incoming current to an unnecessarily low level. The same was true of the reverse situation: When we tried to charge a Samsung Tab 10.1 tablet with an iPad 4 charger, the process took more than 15.5 hours. In contrast, the original Samsung charger completed its work on the Tab 10.1 in 4 hours, 46 minutes.

2. Most cell phones don’t need a specific charger.

Cell phones, which carry smaller batteries than tablets use, don’t require high-current chargers. As a result, you can use a generic charger to transfer power to them, without suffering a severe slowdown in charging time. When we timed how long an iPhone 5 took to reach a full charge when fed by various chargers, the differences ranged from 2 hours, 4 minutes with an HTC travel charger to 2 hours, 59 minutes with a Samsung charger. The original iPhone 5 charger took 2 hours, 16 minutes—so you won’t suffer much of a penalty for using a third-party charger with your cell phone or other small device.

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Smartphones are incredibly useful gadgets, but they also make tempting targets for thieves. A thief could try to make off with your phone, or just siphon off your data and private information using malicious software. Fortunately, a handful of best practices can go a long way toward keeping your device and data secure.

Never check the time on your phone

Before we get into the software side of things, here's a quick tip to keep your phone secure: If a stranger asks you what time it is, never pull out your phone to check the time. This is a common ploy thieves use, because asking for the time gives them a socially acceptable excuse to get close to you, and when you pull your phone out, you're looking at the screen, not at them. This makes it very easy for the thief to just reach out, grab the phone from your hand, and make a run for it.

Use a PIN code or pattern lock

Newer versions of Android include a feature called Face Unlock that lets you use the image of your face to unlock your phone. Sounds futuristic; unfortunately, it's not a secure system, and can be circumvented with something as simple as a photo.

To more securely lock your device, you should instead use a pattern lock or a PIN code. Pattern locking has you draw a specific pattern on the screen, while a PIN code has you enter a numeric code to unlock the device. Both methods are relatively secure, but they share one low-tech soft spot: smudges. If you unlock your phone and then look at it from an angle, you will likely see a trail of smudges showing what your pattern looks like, or what digits your PIN code consists of.

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