"Nah mate, I can get it done cheaper in town" 

...
Alright mate, you carry on 🤷‍♂️ (RIP)

It's an oversimplified cliché, but sometimes, you really do get what you pay for.

Expensive does not necessarily equate to higher quality, just as cheap does not indicate low quality. There's more going on behind the scenes than could be summarised on a price tag.

The price of a product or service is comprised partially of the costs incurred to deliver that product.

In the case of repair centres like us, these costs are:

> Parts

> Materials & Consumables

> Delivery

> Labour/Paying Staff

> VAT - 20% of what you pay goes straight to the government

The main variation in these costs is in parts. There's often a ton of options available - from various suppliers, in various qualities and options etc. Sometimes, more expensive parts are better quality. Sometimes, they're actually worse! For us, it's a case of constantly testing and monitoring the quality and reliability of different parts to ensure that we can offer the best repair service that we can.

Then, there's the quality of work. This primarily comes down to individual skill, built through experience and training. But it's also a reflection of the company culture. For us, this means consistent and disciplined execution of best practices - thorough cleaning, extensive testing, and no missing screws! It's treating every repair with equal care and attention, as if it were our own device.

Price does not correlate with value provided, and there's no excuse for ripping anyone off. In a modern developed economy like ours, a company's reputation often speaks for itself. So rather than a race to the bottom on price, we favour a race to the top on value.

You might have a 256GB phone... But how much can you store in that big head of yours?

Firstly, a bit of neuroscience. The brain doesn't actually store memories like a computer stores files. It reconstructs memories on demand with electricity and chemicals. We call this "remembering", but "assembling" would be a better term. Every time we assemble a memory, it is built with different neurons, which can be influenced by your current situation. Hence, our memories often change, and are unreliable forms of evidence.

Despite all the differences, some really cool research enables us to somewhat compare our brains to computers.

Your brain has about 100 billion neurons; each of which makes 1000 or more connections to other neurons; creating an estimated total of 125 trillion connections. This equates to approximately 2.5 petabytes - 2500 Terabytes - 2.5 million Gigabytes of digital memory.

Suck on that, Apple. I'm sure they're still trying to figure out a neuro-cloud subscription model. iBrain maybe?

All of this information runs on just 20 watts - which is just enough to power a dim lightbulb. How's that for energy efficiency? To store as much information as our brains do, an equivalent computer would require 1 Gigawatt (1 billion watts)! To put this into perspective, to produce this 1 Gigawatt of power would require 3.13 million solar panels, or 9090 Nissan Leaf's.

So if you do have a 256GB phone, and you're concerned about filling it up, take comfort in the fact that you have 9765 times more storage rattling around inside your skull, operating at 50 million times greater energy efficiency. 

Doesn't mean it won't corrupt from time to time. And God knows we can't delete bad memories from Recycle Bin. 

Thanks for reading!

See Our Blog for the latest industry news, tech tips, company updates, and anything else we feel like writing about. 
 

     

We had an unfortunate accident, but we still working!

Sadly, we will not be able to open on Good Friday, but will be open on Saturday as usual. Not sure about Monday yet.

The daily step count is down, but still, 1700 on one foot isn't too bad.

Using your phone to track steps can be a really useful tool. It's unlikely that you will the exact same number of steps every day, so tracking will help you stay consistent, or progress as needed.

Here's the key benefits and important notes on using your smartphone to track steps:

There's a ton of physical and mental benefits associated with getting outside, away from work and stress, absorbing sunlight, and moving your body.

Walking is significantly more effective at stabilising blood sugar than pharmaceutical intervention. It also aids in digestion, boosts your immune system, and is good for your joints.

Walking is an easily accessible activity for most people. It's a really convenient and efficient way to exercise. You've got to go shopping and take the dog out anyway, so just go a little bit faster and longer!

If weight loss is your goal, walking is an easy way to increase your daily caloric expenditure, without building up fatigue or appetite.

If you're already extremely active and/or competing in a sport that requires high power output, then walking is a great tool to enhance recovery. Walking does not risk the "interference effect" from occurring, which causes training adaptations to be diminished by endurance activity. The interference effect often occurs with conventional cardio exercise. It's also super low-impact and low-risk by comparison.

It's been proven that regular short, brisk walks throughout the day are more effective than a single long walk. 3x 10 minute walks daily are great. It's also a much more refreshing way to take a break from mental stimulation than scrolling on your phone.

Your phone probably won't be as accurate as a smartwatch or fitness tracker, but it's one less thing to buy and carry around. It will underestimate or overestimate your steps to some degree. But as long as its consistently inconsistent, the data is useful.

There's tons of step counting apps. For iOS & Android, StepsApp is very good. Samsung Health is very popular with Android users for it's accuracy and user interface.

So get out and get some steps in! Your heart will thank you.

Our brains are predicting machines. Constantly deciphering sensory data to figure out what we should do next.

Vision starts with an expectation of what is around the corner. The more ambiguous the input, the greater the reliance on prior knowledge.

Artwork, particularly abstract art, is made possible because the human brain constructs what it experiences. The painter Marcel Duchamp once said that an artist does only 50% of the work in creating art. The remaining 50% is in the viewer’s brain (Some artists and philosophers call the second half “the beholder’s share.

When you are thirsty, and take a drink of water, you instantly quench your thirst, right?. Well, it actually takes 20 minutes for water to reach your bloodstream. The brain enables the action, and as you drink, the brain anticipates the sensory effects that it will have, causing you to feel less thirsty well before you are actually hydrated.

Having learned about this, we realised that the same phenomenon occurs with our phones.

Have you ever felt you phone vibrate in your pocket when you're expecting a notification, only to find that it hasn't? This is called "Phantom Vibration". A persons proclivity to phantom phone experiences may be an accurate indicator of how much influence their phones have on their lives, or how reliant they are on them. If you react strongly and emotionally to messages, you're more likely to experience phantom vibrations.

Sometimes someone else's phone rings or beeps, and you instinctively tap your pocket, especially if they have the same ringtone. Perhaps you have an alarm or a reminder that triggers every day at the same time, and you look at your phone moments before it goes off. This is no coincidence. The brain is making predictions. We have become so concerned with missing a call or notification, that we've become extremely aware of sensations that one is incoming.

Have you ever been expecting and dreading a call? Then you'll know how any sound that resembles a phone ringer can trigger anxiety. Our brain does all sorts of things to fill in gaps and make predictions to keep us safe. Perhaps we place too much emphasise on the importance of calls and notifications. 

If we can condition our brains to distinguish between genuine emergencies and threats that require immediate attention versus an Instagram notification, we might just feel a bit more calm and focused in our day-to-day lives.

FYI, it's clearly more rabbit than duck.