Using GPS (Karachi Maps) On My N-79

I don't understand why Nokia does not includes Pakistan in it's official map releases? (routable version) Hello a humble request to Nokia Pakistan people, apart from all the marketing and nice working you people are upto, Kindly get us a place in Nokia Maps, N-Gage and other places, It hurt to see India there but us Pakistani's being ignored.


So coming back to the topic, I recently got myself a N-79 and like many other smart phones out there it comes with a built in A-GPS (Assisted GPS) to help you navigate. Now i presume more than 80% of the users don't even use this functionality and think its useless, well on face value it is useless since there are no maps available for us to navigate on, but if you willing to spend sometime and do some khuwari (okay i will be a nice person and cover most of the khuwari topics for you) and you can get a working GPS with routable map on your GPS enabled phone.


The credit goes to wonderful people at pkmaps (http://pkmaps.freeforums.org/) a small community who believes in doing the hectic work of plotting a working map to use with Garmin GPS devices. The first action of the day would be to hand over to their forums, register yourself, pass a friendly hello to everyone and download the latest map for your city (As of now Islamabad, Karachi, Lahore are supported).



Second step would be to head up to Garmin's website and get yourself a copy of Garmin XP Mobile ( http://www8.garmin.com/support/collection.jsp?product=010-11034-00 ). Extrect the archieve and copy the content of GMobileCard to the memory card, Once you insert the memory card in your phone (i.e. if you have taken it out, the way i did was to connect my phone in mass media mode) your phone automatically ask you to install the application, if it doesn't than don't need to panic, simply browse to your memory card and install the provided sis file (garminxt.sis) just like you install any other application, so far so good.


Now come the tricky part, the software allows you to connect to external GPS unit via Bluetooth and will only allow you to use the internal GPS once you purchase it ($99) well i didn't purhased it (although this piece of software would be getting my hard earned $, its worth it i believe) so i had to rely to other ways which are oftenly frowned upon, Search for a keygen and enter your Unit ID (Once you start Garmin XT, select "Use External GPS", tools, About and it should display you the unit ID) get the key and that should sort things out and you would be able to use the internal GPS.

The map of your city which you downloaded would be named GMAPSUPP.IMG you need to copy this file to your memory card in Garmin folder. Start Garmin and click on map and you should be able to navigate once the GPS connects (if you are indoors it can take some time otherwise go outside and wait for 2-3 minutes till it connects).

One problem i faced was i kept getting Europe map instead of Karachi map (i also installed the base maps along with the simple Garmin application) and a friendly person at pkmaps told me a handy way to sort things out, i went to my phone's GPS data settings and checked my current location, once it locked my position i shooted up Garmin and it was able to pin point my location on the correct map.

As of this blog post the map has2600 points of interest pointed out on the map and more than 14500 roads and the map keeps getting updated very regurarly so do keep checking the forums, again hat's off to PK MAPS people.

All Pakistan Bloggers Meet # 2

Oh well i was a little bit late but that's better than not coming at all i guess? right? ahan! so well we are discussing how us bloggers here in Pakistan can make an impact, and darn people are full of ideas and suggestions, few of the points we discussed



1. Posting images of Pakistan, beautiful places from around the nation to improve the image of our nation.


2. Using good key words to improve google rating.

3. Showing our nation's flag proudly on our blog.

4. Should not have negative attitude towards our nation, If we need to talk about something negative than use it in a language which should not destroy our countries image.

5. Proper tagging of items posted and images posted.

6. Should not be about making money but for the nation.

Nokia N79 Review

I am back (Arnold Shalwar Naikar Style) and this time i am going to do a review of Nokia N-79 cell phone (which Nokia INSISTS to call as computer) but before i start i must thank the people who made it possible in the first place

• Mr. Adeel Hashmi (Nokia)
• Mr. Muhammed Ayaz (Syntax Communications)
• Mr. Muhammad Waqas (Syntax Communications)

The Box, Nothing Fancy Yet Have A Unique Presence

So now that i am done with obligation of thanking people lets go down (sounds pervert but honestly i don't mean it like that) to business shall we?

Technical Specifications

• 2.4" 16M-color LCD TFT display of QVGA resolution
• 5 megapixel autofocus camera with dual-LED flash and AF assist light
• VGA video recording at 30fps
• Symbian OS 9.3 with S60 3.2 UI
• ARM 11 369 MHz CPU
• 3G with HSDPA support
• Quad-band GSM support
• Wi-Fi with UPnP technology
• Built-in GPS with A-GPS functionality and 3 months of free voice-guided navigation
• microSD card slot with microSDHC support
• 4GB memory card included in the retail package
• Built-in accelerometer for UI auto-rotation
• Swappable Xpress-on smart covers (two of them in the box)
• 3.5 mm audio jack
• TV out
• Stereo FM Radio with RDS
• FM transmitter
• Stereo speakers
• Navi wheel navigation
• USB and Bluetooth v2.0
• One free N-gage game
• Keylock switch

History Of N-Series

Why reviewers avoid going into history of a product is beyond me, maybe it has something to do with the boring history classes we were forced take in school? Anyways i personally believe unless one take a quick look at the history of the product or brand we would not be in a position to justify the pros and cons of the product properly, Having said that lets explore the rich history behind N-79 shall we?

Like the name suggests "N" means that this particular line of product is targeting the "multimedia" market segment, that in layman's language means that any device having the brand name of "N-Series" will pack a serious punch when it comes to watching videos, photos, taking pictures, blogging, mobile gaming and other areas of multimedia.

Being only introduced in 2005 one can debate that the brand does not have that much history behind it but i'll eat my hat if someone can debate with me on the impact N-Series managed to make in such a short time, hat's off to Nokia's team for that.

The few common features one will find in N-Series phones would be

• Above average camera
• High Speed data connectivity
• Symbian platform (started off with Symbian 8.1 and now Symbian 9.1+ I would like to point that two N-Series phoens did not used the Symbian platform and were using Linux based OS, this is for "OMG YOU ARE SO WRONG OMGOMGOMGOMG" folks out there)
• Ability to view images, movies and listen to songs on the road bringing the device in parallel to mobile mp3/video players.

So now that we have taken a brief look at the platform this particular device is based of lets see which existing device(s) this particular phone (computer, ARGH) is going to replace.

N-79 Predecessor

Things get slightly complicated here, on the face this device looks and feels just like N-78 so i won't be surprised if it's automatically related to N-78 after all they share the looks (somewhat)

As you can see with N-78 on the left and the N-79 on the right, The N-79 DOES looks like an updated N-78 with more bells and whistles attached but that's where it all stops, I am serious if we go down comparing the specifications for both the phones its funny that they are ALMOST the same phones with different camera modules.

Why would Nokia want to introduce a new phone to replace an existing phone just couple of months down the road (N-78 available May 08, N-79 available 08) makes me assume that in Nokia's opinion N-78 was not a good seller and Nokia felt like bringing something new to the table. I personally believe that N-79 is here to take the crown from N-73 for being the new best seller phone packing features like 5 megapixel camera to make the deal more spicy.

That again is my assumption but N-78 failed to achieve the results and that does put a lot of weight on shoulders of N-79. Things get more complicated when we see the immediate competition the phone has from companies own offerings.

Target Audience

Before actually coming up with potential threats lets see the target audience this particular phone is catering. In my opinion the phone is for tech savvy style oriented people who (1) Wants the newest gadgets in their hand (2) Wants the top of the line technology with them. Maybe Nokia design team have something different in their mind but as far as i am concerned these are the target audience for the phone.

Internal Competition

My gripe with manufacturers is that they give you so many choices that making up your mind to choose a product becomes IMPOSSIBLE, an d by the time you end up deciding your mind there is a new product in market ARGH!

With the above discussed target audience in mind, N-79 have some serious competition ironically from it's own "brothers and sisters" like N-95, N-96, 6220 Classic, N-85 and N-82. You might say hey N-82 i understand but N-95 and N-96 noway! so lets see in which aspects the device is competing against the other three sets

N-95

At one time the flagship product for Nokia packed some serious punch, from 5 megapixel camera with xenon flash to integrated GPS, accelerometer and list of other goodies was a phone which many drooled on (myself being exception because i was never into BRICKS)

5 mega pixel camera was perhaps the main selling reason behind N-95 atleast in my opinion and N-79 packs a similar on surface 5 megapixel camera in a candy bar design and much lighter and slim.

N-96

The new flagship product from Nokia which replaces N-95 currently offers its user heaps of different features from a 5 megapixel camera to integrated GPS to what not, I shall be covering N-96 in more details in an upcoming review.

N-82

Before even writing anything about N-82 let me admit, i drooled a LOT on the set because of its features, yeah people might not agree with the style and specially the keypad (which resembles the one with N-78) but it had all the features one would want in a candybar form. You get a 5 megapixel camera with Xenon flash, accelerometer, GPS among other features.

For the record, i prefer the phone in black color.

6222 Classic

Personally i owned 6120 Classic and i loved it to death, unfortunately my wife lost it (WHAT? NO! ARGGGGGGHHH!!!!) and i still miss it, it was a powerful Symbian based phone which was very fast with adequate camera and was hassle free to use. I can go and on talking about 6120 Classic but we are talking about its elder brother 6220 Classic with among other major upgrades to the platform packaged a 5 megapixel camera with Xenon flash.

Nokia 6222 Classic, Following the Footsteps Of Highly Successful 6120 Classic

N-85

Both these phones are not really competition i mean they do feature similar set of features but in different form factor, i am personally not a fan of sliders or flip so candy bar has always been my style but there are people who prefer having sliders and N-85 is good option for them. With a 5 mega pixel camera and a good screen size (2.6 inch) the phone does offers a lot.

Nokia N-79 And N-85 Side By Side

So here we have three different models from the same manufacturer offering nearly the same set of features yet different slabs i.e. N-96 higher end, N-95 the previous higher end now catering the upper middle end and the N-82 catering the upper middle end.

The Box Content

Keep in mind that piece i received from Nokia was in retail packaging however it was not sealed so the content you may get in your retail back might be slightly different. There are products with box which gives you the "cheap" feel but N-79 feels every bit worth of the money you end up paying for it. The moment you lift up the lid your eyes would be dazzled with N-79 along with two covering

The Green Color Looks "More" Eeeky Due To Flash, The Brown Was Very Elegant I Must Say

• N-79 Handset (Seriously it was there! DOH!)
• Two bonus smart covers, our box had one in brownish color and one in green. The colors may vary.
• Two piece (two earbuds) handsfree with integerated remote.
• MicroUSB cable.
• DC Charger
• 4GB Memory Card.
• Leflets, Manuals, DVD's etc.

Design

From the pictures i saw i thought the phone would be BIGGGGGGGGGGGG!!! but once i got the device and i took it in hand i was pleasantly surprised, make no mistakes i still don't think it felt as nicer as E-51 or 5300 Express Music (You can judge from my approach that i like thin phones) but certainly its much better than N-95/96 or N-73. But let me just get away with one statement, this has to be the prettiest looking N series phone upto date and that Sir indeed is a compliment.

Much of the dimensions of the phone are covered by large and bright 2.4" display and the keypad. On the front you have the secondary VGA camera which serves for video conferencing a feature our mobile operators currently don't offer but can be used to take self portrait (This feature gotta get attention from self obsessed people)

On the left side of the phone you will find the slot for memory card and the micro USB along with the socket for the charger, i always prefer NOT having the charger slot on the bottom of the phone as it hinders placing it in holders etc.

On the right side of the phone you will find the volume rocker which also serves as zoom function in the camera mode and a dedicated camera key. You will also found two stereo speakers on the right side.

On top of the phone you will find a power button which can be used to change profiles quickly and a small "slider" button which locks and unlocks your phone, i found this feature to be really nifty (instead of using the good old keystroke combination) however i did found it to be slightly buggy (at times it didn't locked and took several attempts same goes for unlocking)

On the back we have the 5 megapixel camera which is covered by a active cover and dual LED flash. Once you slide the slider to expose the lens camera application automatically starts in landscape mode. While we are talking about the back it would be unfair to forget the battery which powers this baby, not a small measly one but a powerful 1200 mAh BL-6F Li-Ion battery and through out the vigrous check for a week it never let me down.

While we are talking about back lets talk about the interchangeable covers, the model i received came with green and brown in the box and the phone itself had blue colored cover, now one neat feature which Nokia has added is that when you change a cover thanks to a "contact" (you can say a chip) the phone automatically changes the theme according to the color of cover you are putting on. You however do have option of turning it on/off.

Overall the phone is very pocket friendly and light (i still remember how i used to hate the weight of my N-73). I honestly could not find any reason to whine as far as the build quality of handset i received is concerned, now i was just not happy with that so what i did was to visit few local mobile dealers in Khadda Market (DHA Karachi) and managed to see 3 sets and even they had awesome build quality (When will Shop Keepers start keeping actual working demo sets than those dummies?) so it's not that Nokia specifically choose their best assembled set to send for reviews.

Display

Sharp and bright, i would had not complaints with the 2.4" display IF i had not seen the OLED display of N-85, honestly why Nokia choose not to give OLED goodness to N-79 is beyond me, unfortunately i did not had a N-85 on hand to show you side by side comparison of the displays so until i get my hands on them together you will have to take my word for it.

If we ignore the OLED factor than like i said above the display is sharp and very much readable in sunlight. No complaints here with the 16M color TFT on that front.

Keypad

The keypad of N-79 is joy to use, i have small hands and it took me no time to type sms in giffy, In fact if you have EVER used any Nokia phone it would take you not time to be at home with N-79's keypad. I HATE (should i repeat myself? oh well my blog, my review so my rules, I HATE) keypad of N-82 and N-78, i didn't got much time to spend with both these devices but it was frustrating experience and fortunately enough with N-79 we are back with "proper" keypad.

The Navigation "Wheel" or the D-Pad is touch sensitive (i admit that it took me some exploration of the phone to figure it out, *blush*) but after a little while i switched it off because it was not "smooth" enough for me, maybe its just me or maybe its something which would be resolved in future firmware updates.

Battery

I had the phone for over a week and during this time i only charged it twice. I used the phone extensively to shoot pictures and videos, doing browsing via wifi and playing around with different options on the phone. Since mostly i had my secondary sim in the set the actual voice and sms conversation was not that much. Still i am very impressed by the battery life of this set considering all the features it packs in the little candybar body.

Voice Quality

The phone was loud enough for me even in busy environments. I managed to easily talk while bowling at Royal Rodale on top of all the music and noise there (If you have been to Royal Rodale's bowling alley or to Area-51 you can understand the amount of noise there)

Speaker phone was pretty good too, managed to use it a lot when driving and had no problems what so ever with it. No complains from my side as far as the sound is concerned.

Camera

*sigh* If i had to express myself in one word than it would be DISAPPOINTED. What's the use of having a 5 megapixel camera when most of the time you end up having a grainy picture? If you are looking for a Camera Phone than honestly go for either N-95 or N-82 they simply RULE when it comes to imaging.

Now i know you must be thinking that i have totally dissed the camera module on this phone, not entirely true, the image quality which one can achieve using the camera depends HEAVILY on light conditions, in good light conditions the phone managed to take some awesome images but unfortunately like i said those "awesome" shots were in minority. I personally think if this phone had a Xenon flash than phone would had given N-82 a run for it's money because in my opinion the ONLY aspect this phone does not wins/draws over N-82 is the camera, in all the other aspects N-79 is equal and excels when in comes to keypad. Cost factor was an issue at one time when N-79 was cheaper than N-82 but with recent price drops the N-82 is couple of thousand cheaper than N-79 (If you want a fast phone with excellent camera capabilities and do not mind measly keypad issue than go for N-82 no questions asked)

Few are just few of the pictures i took using the N-79, Click on the images to see them in full resolution.

I was satisfied with the videos i was able to make with the phone, VGA resolution at 30 fps with okay image quality was adequate for those "candid moments"

Connectivity

The phone offers you almost all the available mediums to connect your phone, Bluetooth, EDGE, 3G, USB, Wifi someone i know whined about IR not being there i punched him in the face for being an idiot, on serious note i think with all the options available for connectivity not having IR is not your average user will even notice considering that even the lower end phones have started coming out with bluetooth.

The front camera supports 3G video conferencing which is a feature which we lack here in our nation so unless some provider decides to introduce 3G here in Pakistan our only means of "broadband" on cellular phones is EDGE.

Browser

Nokia has the BEST browser out there, there i got it out of my system, Safari users are going to hunt me down now, the virtual mouse cursor makes navigation very easy and the results are crisp with seeming less shift from horizontal to vertical views.

Productivity

Calendar, Quick Office, Alarm, ZIP Manager, Unit Converter, Calculator, Notes, Voice Recorder and other typical applications makes a return in N-79 and like in many other cases of higher end phones i don't understand why Nokia gives the half baked cake (Office) to us? Why only give us the ability to view documents and ask us to "purchase" the full version, it would had been nice if they had provided the full version at least for their higher end of phones. Overall the productivity suite is complete.

N-Gage Yeah Baby!

The phone came with a N-Gage client and 10+ trial games which i had to install (under 1 minute time per game) and included was a coupon by which i could purchase a game (nice touch there Nokia). Now the first thing which i noticed was the resemblance with XBOX Live was just uncanny, from having your "gamer tag" to "gamer score" to "reputation" and i felt right at home, of course i did not ended up making my own tag and stuff which i doubt i could have done in the first place since Pakistan would not be in the supported list but i liked the N-Gage system.

There is also a "market place" where you can browse games, download trials and purchase games, again all this sounds all to familiar to me :) Overall the gaming experience was nice and i wasted good amount of time playing games which was partly due to KESC and partly due to the fact trial games could only be played for limited levels/time.

Other Features

Yes there are things i could not test and they are

GPS here in Karachi WITHOUT going third party hacks / software's which honestly i would not want to do with the phone Nokia had sent me, if it was my own phone than definitely i would had jumped the band wagon and tried "stuff" out! :)

FM Transmitter is a new "gimmick" added which will transmit the song you are playing to a fixed frequency so that your friends can "tune in" to that frequency and listen to the same song as you are.

Price

Currently the phone is available for 31,000 Rs and in that price range you can get phones like E-71, N-82, N-95 to name a few, in my opinion if the price range of this device was around 20,000 Rs. than it would had taken the market by storm much like N-73 did.

Conclusion

Time to wrap up this long review, Overall i loved the device, i wish they had provided a good quality camera with Xenon flash. I have said before in my review that this perhaps is the best looking N-Series device out there. Problem is that the phone offers almost all the features every other new phone is offering and does not bring anything innovative to the table and that makes the buying decision very hard for the end user, this device is no E-71 or 5800 Express Music for instance, both the devices i mentioned have unique propositions on the table which make them attractive to the consumer.

On a scale of 1 - 10 i would give this phone a nice 8

A Day At Business Plus

I got invited as a guest speaker / geek / expert on Right Click a technology show which air's on Business Plus hosted by charming Ayeesha Athar and stud Faraz Tayaab, We talked about information security and general trends in our daily computing lifes which can create potential problems for us and give a hacker a walk in the park to our sensitive information. It would be unfair not to mention Imran Khatak the person behind the show for his energy and brains behind the show, I wish all the best to Right Click team and would be looking forward to working with them in the future :)

Reboot Episode 5 On Youtube

Episode 5 got aired this week and it is on youtube for you to watch!

Part 1



Part 2

Reboot Episode 4

Episode 4 of Reboot is now on youtube for you to watch!

Part 1




Part 2

Debug Episode 3 Now On Youtube

In case you managed to miss the episode you can now watch it on youtube

Part 1



Part 2

Debug Episode 2

In this episode we talk about alternatives to iTunes, i don't know about you guys itunes is crappy piece of software, very heavy on system resources and slower than a pregnant elephant in a marathon. I love my ipod don't get me wrong but i hated itunes so i started looking for other ways to sync my ipod to my comptuer and i found loads of alternatives. Today we are going to discuss few of the top alternatives.

1. Foobar 2000
2. Winamp
3. Song Bird
4. Yamipod

Foobar2000 (http://www.foobar2000.org/) is free media player available which can play nearly all the media formats you can throw its way, apart from being a good media player (although i have other favourites when it comes to media players) it can also sync with your ipod to transfer songs to your ipod.

Few are few screenshots of foobar2000 in action

Main Interface

Main Interface Alternative

Convertor Lets You Convert Between File Formats

Winamp (http://www.winamp.com/) does not needs any introduction unless you were hibernating for past few years or so, perhaps the most popular and oldest mp3 player around lets you play different media formats. Among several other features it also letsyou sync with your ipod and transfer songs to it.

Nice And Easy To Use Interface With Loads Of Skins To Alter The Looks

With Enough Features To Keep You Busy For A While

Songbird (http://www.getsongbird.com) is yet ANOTHER media player in the list, and like the predecors it can play variety of media formats and among its numerous features it lets you dock your ipod to your comptuer and transfer songs to it.

Yamipod (http://http://www.yamipod.com) is the last program on our list but certainly not the least infact it happens to be my personal favourite program among the list, Why? because its a no nonsense straight ipod manager and it shows from the name (Yet Another Ipod Manager) with letters rearranged to make it better "sounding". It virtually lets you achieve all the things you can do with your itunes including having podcasts while keeping a very small memory usage.

The Main Interface

Find And Remove Duplicate Files Among Several Other Features

That's it for this segment from Reboot's 2nd Episode, do feel free to write to me with comments and suggestions both for the show or the blog and i will try to answer you as soon as possible. :-)

Reboot

Well what is reboot? it's just another tech / gadget show on air, what makes it different from other show is the fact that this show for a change have people both on and off camera who know what they are talking about, so instead of getting lousy facts and figures copied from google and lack of research evident from the content you will find something you can relate too.

We shall try to address common problems and provide some solutions catering to our local market, not everyone can get something from bestbuy and fix their computer, so how about relating it to our local market and telling viewers what to do :)

Ali Ansari, a very humble and down to earth person who enjoys gadgets as much as he enjoys music


Well, it's me, much to horror of many friends, i now haunt everyone on TV :/

Reboot - Episode 1 - Debug

So in the first episode of Reboot we decided to explore the topic which bugs us the most, so we decided to do a segment on different freeware utilities which are available and can be used easily without going through pains of cracks and serials and what not

Achieve / Zip / Compression Programs

When it comes to achieves the name winzip automatically comes to mind, but its small in size, its free and it gets the job done, this freeware program will open most of the achieves you will come across.

7-Zip (Archieve) - http://www.7-zip.org/

Adobe Acrobat Reader

Acrobat reader is widely and most used program when it comes to pdf, but as far as we are concerned it is heavy on resources and honestly does install many unnecessary features (crap or blotware) which one might not want. If you are the sort of person who wants a simple to use and low on machine resources pdf reader than I will strongly suggest foxit reader to you.

Foxit Reader (PDF Reader) - http://www.foxitsoftware.com/pdf/rd_intro.php

Windows Notepad

May sound strange why we want to include an alternative to a program which is already included for free in Windows, well·Although Windows Notepad does gets the job done but lets admit it, its undermined and that is because it lack features which could make it a powerful WYSIWYG editor, this was deliberate on part of Microsoft team in our opinion to differentiate notepad from its elder brother Wordpad.

Following are few screen shots directly from developer's website to give you a better idea of its features

Multi-View (document in clone mode)

Multi-View (document in clone mode)



Multi Document And Multi-View



XML Syntax highlighting and folding



HTML (and embedded php, java script) Syntax highlighting and folding

Notepad++ (text editor) - http://notepad-plus.sourceforge.net/uk/site.htm

Will be posting more utilities and freebies in another post so keep on reading the blog ! :)

Creating A Simple Button In Photoshop

Few of my friends were asking me how i manage to work in photoshop, Well i am learning on my own and consider myself as a "noob" and as far as i am concerned photoshop is not rocket science anyone can learn it provided time and effort is given.

So i thought about writing this small tutorial for a friend of mine, i will try to cover the steps to create a simple button in photoshop from scratch

Note :

1. I am NOT an expert in photoshop
2. This is roughly the way i do work, there would be dozens of other ways to reach the same effects, feel free to explore
3. The "button" or all the images were taken soley for purpose of creating this tutorial so i haven't bothered with any refiniements or any other thing, they are just to provide the user with some basic knowledge and than its upto his or her's creativity to explore. :)



I assume you already have started photoshop, for this tutorial and all the images i have used photoshop cs 2, your interface might vary with the version you are using. First thing is to create a new document, you can do this either by going to File -> New or simply press CTRL+N on Windows. A window will open looking similar to the image below, enter the dimensions as indicated by the image i.e. 300 x 300. For this exercise i had my background color as black (i love working with black or white)


When you are done click OK to proceed

Now you will be presented with a small window, we now will proceed to make the basic shape of the button, we want to be rectangular with rounded edges, so as indicated in the image below click in the toolbar and select "Rounded Rectangle" or you can use the keyboard shortcut "U"


We want to modify the settings so that our "button" will have more rounded edges for that find the setting in the top most menu bar and modify the setting for "Radius" the default value is 10 we want to make it 20, you can see it illustrated in the image below


Now go ahead drag your mouse (press left button and move the mouse) and create yourself a vague rectangular shape something like in the image below



Now the fun part starts, we will now convert this boring looking rectangle into something more "fancy". Right click on the shape layer and you will be presented with a menu



Click on "Blending Options" and you will be presented with a new window with different options, we will explore different options one by one to see their effects

First click on "Drop Shadow" and make the settings as per the image below, while you are playing around with different settings feel free to explore and learn what impact they do on the image


Next we will explore settings of "Satin" and make the settings in accordance to the image below


Now we have a general "shape" of a button, its time to give it some edges and bevel it, we will now check the settings for "Bevel And Emboss", As before try to match the settings as per image below, like i have mentioned before feel free to explore what impact different settings do to your image


Now go to Filters -> Artistic -> Plastic Wrap, PS will ask you if you want to resterize the layer blah blah blah, press okay, you will be taken to a window which will resemble something like the image below, make the settings accordingly



Now its time to add some text to the "button" press T and type something and it will look something like the image below (provided your text color is white)



Again right click on the text layer select Blending Options and give the text some drop shadow so it looks nicer like the image below



There you go a simple way to create an average looking button in photoshop, its not good or anything but at least it shows you certain ways of getting things done, hopefully it will come in use for someone out there :)