29/01/2013: Apple announce 128GB iPads to compete with the Surface Pro, BB10 in polls and the ZTE Blade C! Plus much more!

Apple announce the iPad will be available in 128GB models!

   Apple has only traditionally offered their devices in 16, 32 and 64GB versions, until today! Today the guys from Cupertino revealed that a new larger capacity iPad, with the same specs as the current fourth generation devices!

   It's interesting that Apple has chosen to bump up the storage offerings at this exact moment. It may well have something to do with those 128GB Surface Pro's which are right around the corner, but we doubt Apple would ever admit to that. We're not entirely sure those are head-to-head devices either, iOS isn't quite OSX and the Surface Pro tablets offer fully fledged Windows. Not to mention the Surface Pro tablets make the smaller storage options for iPads look relatively cheap too!

   But, nonetheless people always ask for extra storage and now we have it! You can get the 128GbB Wifi-only iPad for $799 (£639) or the 3G one can be yours for $929 (£739). Are you interested? Let us know in the comments below!

   

The press release is available here.

BB10 looks good according to poll.

   Everyone's looking forward to seeing exactly what RIM will be showing off tomorrow and if a poll of American's from YouGov and Bite Interactive is a representative one then quite a fair few other people are looking forward to the release of the operating system too!

   According to a poll of 1,127 adults who were told about the known features of the upcoming BB10 handsets nearly half of the participants found at least one of the improvements compelling and a total of one in eight said they would happily consider buying a BB10 device. With this last stat we're not sure whether it's a good or bad one really, but one in one hundred people polled said they have firm intentions to pick up a BB10 device right from the off. 

   The main issue people are concerned with here is that consumers are already invested in either iOS or Android and Microsoft already know how hard it is to get people to change their OS after attempts to push BB10. What about you? Are you interested in picking a BB10 phone up or will you try to pick up a cheap Playbook to get your BB10 fix?
Via PhoneArena.

In other news:

• Samsung has today acquired NeuroLogica! They're a company that specializes in medical imaging! Things such as manufacturing portable computed tomography (CT) scanners and other medical instruments! This investment is part of Samsung's plan to become one of the world’s leading medical equipment companies by 2020!
  Via Slashgear.

• HTC have called a press conference at 3pm on Tuesday 19 February! This means that the guys from Taiwan are going to try to get a little jump start over the rest of the competition who will be demoing phones during MWC itself! The event will take place simultaneously in New York, but we're not currently sure who will be where!

• The Nexus 4 is in stock in select stores around the world at the moment. Germany, America and Canada have them and the bumpers in stock, we can't imagine that'll last too long though! Get going!
  Via PhoneArena.

• YouTube may soon be charging you to watch certain channels and shows on the website. According to Adage, Google are going to trial it on around about 25 channels! A Google spokesperson said, "we have long maintained that different content requires different types of payment models. The important thing is that, regardless of the model, our creators succeed on the platform."
  Via TheVerge.

• XBMC have released version 12 of their media center software. The update now means that there is full support for Android and the Raspberry Pi so you can get this running on any of those new USB Android computers. There's a tonne of new features as well! You can get check out the full details on XBMC's website here!
  Via Slashgear.

• Google now have a few details about North Korea's road on Google Maps. We're not sure if this has something to do with Eric Schmidt's recent visit to the country, but there's still no Street View and we'll be surprised if we see that any time soon!
  Via Hothardware.

And finally, ZTE will soon be releasing their new Blade C on the world. This will be the third in the series which you might know better for being called the Orange San Francisco's! According to UnwiredView the device will arrive with a 4 inch WVGA display, 3G, 3MP rear camera, Bluetooth 4.0, a dual-core 1 GHz MediaTek MTK 6577 processor, 512MB of RAM, 4GB of internal memory, and a 1,600 mAh battery. This isn't a bad set of specs for a phone which will cost somewhere in the range of $112 off contract (That's €84 or around about £72).

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23/01/2013: Nintendo shows off 2013 for the Wii U, Black Ops 2 double XP, Microsoft to invest in Dell? Plus much, much more!

Nintendo shows us what 2013 holds for the Wii U!

   Nintendo's Wii U console proved to be a popular option over Christmas as it racked in more money than the insanely popular Wii did over the first few months of availability. That wasn't down to number of sales, instead it was attributed to the slightly larger cost of the Wii U. Either way people still need games to play and a good overall experience on the brand new console and that's what Nintendo showed us today; a good selection of new features and games which we can expect to see over the coming months!

   There was a huge set of games which are on the way, some of them we're going to just link to trailers, but some of them are worth a quick mention! Satoru Iwata actually took the time to apologise for the lack of releases so far this year, he claimed that his teams needed more time to perfect the gameplay, but perhaps they just had short time scales to work to.

Image Credit: TheFourOhFive.com 

   All of the following titles will be available towards the end of March and onwards! You'll have  Monster Hunter 3 Ultimate, LEGO City Undercover at the end of the March. After that will be the time we start getting excited: there's a new 3D Mario action game, Zelda games, a Wario game and a new Mario Kart game on the way!!! We'll be able to see a demo of most of those at E3 later in the year! There will also be some sort of party game too, one with all of the mini games, which will support both Wii remotes and the gamepad, so you can get everyone in on the action! 

   The games don't stop there, we'll be seeing a new game centred on Yoshi's antics, which will be the brain child of the guys who made Kirby’s Epic Yarn. Last up will be Shin Magami Tensei meets Fire Emblem. It'll be a game with fighting, but we don't know too much more than that at this moment in time.

The links to the adverts for the rest of the games are below:

• Bayonetta 2.
• Monolift.
• The Wonderful 101.
• Xenoblade Wii U.

   Now when it comes to updates Nintendo is planning on releasing two; one in spring and one in summer. Both updates will boost the consoles speed and performance and hopefully this will help address the complaints of games loading slowly, which Nintendo have heard. The first update will also add new Virtual Console functionality. This will allow you to play GameBoy Advance titles and games from other old Nintendo consoles direct on your Wii U GamePad or on the TV. 

   Nintendo will offer people who already use Virtual Consoles on the Wii the opportunity to the Wii U will get a discount if they buy the same games again. The pricing models are shown below.

   Last but not least the MiiVerse will be getting a new update which will add support for mobile devices, as well as verified accounts which will work in a similar way to verified profiles on Twitter. This verification won't be available for everyone, it will be a privilege for devs and the celebrities of this world. These exclusive accounts have the ability to link websites on their Miiverse posts and you have to chance to embed YouTube videos. Both of these will arrive with the first of the two updates we mentioned earlier.

   The video embedded below will see a Nintendo employee talk you through the new features. It's 30 minutes long so it will take you a little while if you want to plough through it!

   

Via Slashgear. (1) (2) (3) (4).

   

In other news:

• If you're a dev interested in working on games for the 'Gamestick', which has been on Kickstarter lately, then you now have to option of paying $250 for the console and getting the extra bonus of a six-month window of 100% revenue on any games you release before this July! Naturally you'll also get a Gamestick, but it won't arrive before everyone else who backed the device, which is a bit of a bummer!
  Kickstarter Via Slashgear.

• Samsung has overtaken Apple to become the biggest consumer of semiconductors in the world, with a whopping 8% of the market, which given how many other companies there are is impressive! Apple was only .8% behind with 7.2% of the market share.
  Gartner Via Slashgear.

• The Verge thinks that Nokia will offer a new device which is codenamed 'EOS' which will feature a camera sensor similar to that on Nokia's 808 PureView! It will reportedly pop up on a Windows Phone 8 device which will be one of Nokia's 2013 flagships! We'll have to wait and see!
  Via TheVerge.

• The 4G spectrum auction is under way in the UK! Hopefully we will see some competitors to EE in the space very soon!
  Via BBC.

• Calling all Black Ops II gamers! From the 25th of this month to the 29th there will be a double XP weekend! So if you're looking to get through those prestiges then get on this weekend!
  Via Twitter.

• A UK shopping centre owner by the name of Land Securities has inked a new arrangement with Google to use their Product Search feature to find the best price for the items that consumers are after, free Wi-Fi will also be on offer in the shopping centres, both of these will hopefully allow shoppers to feel like they are getting the best deal! Land Security is hoping to create "an environment appropriate for multi-channel retailers", so we might be seeing more order online and pick up deals.
  Via TheRegister.

• Rumours on the internet today are suggesting that Microsoft could be putting up $3billion to take DELL private!
  Via MacWorld.

And finally, yet again Google have reiterated that churning out more Nexus 4's and 10's is a priority. Larry Page didn't get much chance to discuss it in his earnings call, but they expect things to work themselves out soon enough!

Via Phandroid.

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