20/07/2012

Asus and HTC offer a relatively comprehensive update list!

   Asus has announced there will be a good amount of updates rolling out to their tablets. Owners who're definitely going to be getting some Jelly Bean action are owners any of the following; the ASUS Transformer Pad, the ASUS Transformer Pad Prime and the ASUS Transformer Pad Infinity.

   But... That's not the end of the story because Asus has expressly said:

“We are still investigating Jelly Bean updates for other devices, but we are not in a position to confirm whether any other products will be eligible for an update at the moment.”

   So don't give up faith just yet, we still think there's a chance of other tablets being updated and we expect the OG Transformer will get some Jelly Bean because of how popular the device was!

   On the HTC front it seems we misreported the news yesterday. The company has confirmed 

there will be updates for the very top end of their One series. It's only the varients of the HTC One X and One S that have been confirmed so far. So for clarity that's the; HTC One X, One S and One XL, as they're known on different networks. Unfortunately the Sensation XL which was one of last years flagships has no word on whether there will be an update for that and the same is true for all the other Sensations from last years!

In other news:

• Lenovo's CEO has decided to reward his employees for their recent progress and the employees will be getting a little cut of his yearly bonus! Nice guy!
• Google has bought out the popular email solution, Sparrow. The company has done some great work for iOS and Mac devices and the personnel have gone straight into Google's Gmail division.
• Nokia's beautiful little N9 has been given a working port of Android 4.1 Jelly Bean.
• Talking of Jelly Bean; the update has been delayed Down Under because of the strict nature of Emergency calls over in Aus. Vodafone Australia has postponed the update while they make sure everything conforms!
• The London Eye will be a special treat during the London 2012 Olympics. Twitter comments about London 2012 will dictate the colour the landmark will glow at night. If the comments are good we'll get one colour, if they're bad then it's another colour and if they're anything else then well, you guessed, it another colour!
• SkyGo is now available on your Galaxy Nexus, Galaxy Note and Galaxy S3!
• Google's ad business pulled in $12billion in Q2, which is very, very good going!

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05/07/2012

Presenting the Motorola Atrix HD for AT&T.

   The rather handsome device above has just popped out of Motorola today. But, we must say it's a looker and the specs are pretty darn good too.

   There's a 4.5-inch 1280 x 720 HD Colorboost display, LTE, and a 1.5GHz dual-core processor. Which is powers Ice Cream Sandwich,  8 and 1.3-megapixel front cameras and Motorola’s own SMARTACTIONS software on top of Android 4.0.

   The goodness doesn't stop here though;  there’s 8GB of user-storage and a microSD card slot, along with a 1,780 mAh battery. The device itself crams all of this into a shell that's 69.9 x 133.5 x 8.4 mm and weighs 140g, and is clad in a soft-touch plastic. The two-tone colour-scheme can be chosen over a titanium-esque finish depending on your preference.

   You also get mobile hotspot functionality – for up to five tethered devices – together with microUSB, HDMI, Bluetooth 4.0, GPS/aGPS, a 3.5mm headphone jack, and the usual bevy of sensors such as an accelerometer, proximity and ambient light. It’s splash-resistant and uses Kevlar for increased ruggedness, along with a Gorilla Glass front.

    Motorola is keen to target the Atrix HD at business users; they've been pushing the Webtop app and it's ability to push your goods through a HDMI output and Bluetooth peripherals, somehting which they hope will make this a computer replacement, although hopefully this implementation will be better than past attempts from Moto. We don't know when it'll officially go on sale or for how much but our detective skills have pushed us to the conclusion that this is destined for AT&T when it eventually gets around to launching.

   One thing to keep an eye on is that the little guy seems to have a relatively stock implementation of Android so maybe, just maybe, Google is starting to assert some authority.

In other news:

• The domain ipad3.com has been handed over to Apple after they complained about someone else owning it.
• The new game Assassins Creed 3: Liberation will use live actors!
• If you've tried the Windows 8 preview then you can upgrade to the real thing for $40!
• The Google Nexus 7, when it hits the UK will lack access to tv shows, magazines and Google music, so perhaps that might take the gloss off of the device for you, but probably not!
• The PS Vita will be getting a whole host of PSOne games this summer as Sony continue to push their slick little gaming station.
• Lenovo have reportedly met with Microsoft to discuss the possibility of customising Windows Phone for use on future devices. This could work out well for both companies because Lenovo have access to their huge home market of China.
• The Nokia N9 received PR1.3 today, which brought over 1000 bug fixes, optimisations and updates.

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