One
of the things we love best about Nokia Lumia and Windows Phone is that
we’re always discovering fantastic little features we didn’t know about.
Whether it’s a new camera trick, a clever software innovation or a
little update that makes a big difference, these constant marvels always
put smiles on our faces. To share some of this childlike glee with you,
we’ve showcased some features, you might not yet have noticed. Get your
Nokia Lumias at the ready!
1. Make your music sound better
Nokia Lumias are famed for being amazing music making machines. But did
you know that if you pop in your headphones you can adjust the sound
quality via the audio option under general settings?
You have the option to choose a selection of pre-determined settings,
or fiddle about with the equaliser yourself. Otherwise, you can go full
DJ and enable Dolby playback by swiping right and hittingplayback. Nokia Music just got even funkier!
2. Create a Group Live Tile
Groups are a brilliant way to mange your social networking stuff and
stay in touch with the people who matter, whether that’s your
footballing buddies or your family. When you create a Group, it shows up
at the top of your contact list. Tap it, and you’ll see the Group
members’ Live Tiles and social networking updates, along with options
for group email, texting, and chat. You can also pin it to your Start
screen. What’s more, it’s super simple to create. On your Start screen
tap People, flick to All, tap New and then tap New Group. Tap a contact name then Save and you’re off and away!
3. Change your text size
No matter how big the screen size, sometimes it’s nice to have your font
a little bigger too. If you want to resize your Nokia Lumia’s text,
simple Go into Settings then Ease of access and you’ll find five different size settings for the text. You need never squint again.
4. Share your location in a text
Meeting a buddy in a bar or hooking up with your girlfriend for
afternoon coffee, but they don’t know how to get to your location? Don’t
worry. Write a text message and you can add a map of your location.
Just tap the paperclip icon and choose location.
If your buddy or girlfriend has a Nokia Lumia it will open your
location in their HERE Maps, otherwise it will open in their browser.
5. Hide your caller ID
Sometimes you’d just rather not have people see your caller ID. If you
happen to be in one of those situations you can change your settings
with in a couple of taps. Just go to caller history, tap the fullstops
icon at the bottom right, and hit Settings. Then choose who gets to see your caller ID by default, everyone, your contacts, or no one at all.
6. Get a room
Imagine if you could get a digital room where all your nearest and
dearest could share pictures, chat, make appointments or broadcast their
locations to everyone inside. Well, imagine no more. Go to the People
Hub on your start screen, side swipe and you’ll find the word together. From here press the ‘+’ key at the bottom and then select room choose
a name and hit the floppy disc save button at the bottom. Windows Phone
8 will now set the room up. When you’ve added everyone you want to
include, press the tick and your friends with Nokia Lumias or other
Windows Phone 8 devices will now be invited to join.
7. Search a web page
Find the info you need from a web page isn’t always a straightforward
task, especially if you’re using a smartphone screen. Fortunately, with
Windows Phone 8, within the browser, is a search tool called find on page.
When in Internet Explorer, press the fullstops icon and select find on
page towards the bottom of the list. Type in your search query and press
enter. Hey presto! All text found in the search will show up in your
chosen accent colour, and there’s an arrow key to scroll through all the
findings at the bottom of the display.
8. Make searching simpler
If you’ve got a lot of friends in the People Hub or a lot of apps in
your apps list it can sometimes take time finding what or who you want.
For quicker navigation you can just tap the header letter of a section,
the “a” at the top, for example, and get a large overlay of all the
letters in the alphabet. Tap one and hop over to that section for all
your contacts beginning with each letter. It really makes searching
simple.
These are just a few of the cool features that you might not have known
about. If you have any others you’d like to share, please drop them in
the comments below.
