27/09/2012

Qualcomm introduces some cheap quad-core processors for 2013's mid-range!

   Today Qualcomm has announced they have three new reference designs for future mobile phones. Each of them includes new processors which we can expect to see in consumer products next year.

   The new processors have the memorable names MSM8225Q and MSM8625Q! Each of these will have four CPU cores each and will support LPDDR2 memory. The chips will also have dual-SIM support, enough bus bandwidth for 720p video encoding and decoding and they'll play nice with 720p displays.

   The processors have slightly different radio compatibilities; the MSM8225Q has an integrated UMTS modem, while the MSM8625Q works with Qualcomm’s own integrated multimode UMTS/CDMA modem. Both of them will work with FM radio, Bluetooth 4.0, wi-fi connectivity, and Qualcomm Atheros AR6005 and WCN2243 chips.

   The final processor that's being worked on is going to be called the Snapdragon S4 Plus MSM8930. It's made specifically to support all China operators with UMTS, CDMA and TD-SCDMA. This processor was first announced way back in February 2011 and should be with us by the end of the year, but it won't turn up inside your next device until the first quarter of 2013. This processor is dual-core and has support for 4G LTE. So it'll work with LTE-TDD and TD-SCDMA in China!

In other news:

• Happy birthday Google!!! The company is celebrating their 14th birthday today!

• Rovio's new Bad Piggies is officially available in your app store of choice!!!... Assuming it's Google's Play store or Apple's App store.

• Google's Eric Schmidt came out today and all but called Apple a patent troll. This is what he had to say;

“Literally patent wars prevent choice, prevent innovation and I think that is very bad. We are obviously working through that and trying to make sure we stay on the right side of these issues. So ultimately Google stands for innovation as opposed to patent wars …I think one of the worst things that happened in the last few years has been the belief that somehow there are so many patents in the mobile phone world, an estimated 200,000 patent that are overlapping and complicated and so forth, that one vendor can stop the sale of another vendor’s phones or devices.”

• LG has filed a patent suit against Samsung in Korea, with the former accusing the latter of stealing some of the OLED technology. The most that's at stake here is $6million, so it hardly seems worth it to us!

• It turns out that the real reason Apple decided to ditch Google maps was because Google was unwilling to offer iOS users turn-by-turn navigation. Google instead wanted to reserve that particular right for their Android users! 

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13/09/2012

Google threatened to cut Acer off the Android list!

Via CoolSmartPhone.

    Now we should take this one with a pinch of salt as it's straight from one of Google's Chinese arch enemies! The story goes that after a phone collaboration between the Acer and Alibaba was shelved at the very last minute!

   The pair has been planning to launch the 'CloudMobile A800' smartphone together, but Reuter's has said the event itself was strangely written off after Acer was told that “Google would terminate Android product cooperation” if the phone was revealed.

   Unsurprisingly Acer has been schtum on the matter, but Alibaba has been harder to silence, they came out and announced that “Our partner received notification from Google that if the new product launch with Aliyun went ahead, Google would terminate Android product cooperation and related technical authorization with Acer.” The company went on to say that Google’s decision was “clearly unfair to consumers” and it's pretty hard to disagree.

   At the moment we have no idea what the next move will be and we don't expect to hear anything out of Google or Acer soon! Perhaps it was Aliyun's plan to run Android apps which tipped the balance?!?! 

   But, we'll leave you with Alibaba's take on the whole situation; “We believe that by introducing the Aliyun OS we are giving consumers and hardware makers more options which is the foundation of a healthy and strong market. We think that it should be left to the market to decide.”

Via Slashgear.

In other news:

• LG has teased a press event for the unveiling of a quad-core Qualcomm based phone. We expect this to be the LG Optimus G and we will give you all the details when the event happens!

• Wii U pricing! If you're based in the US it'll be $299.99 for the Basic version, while the Deluxe will be $349.99. For European's pricing will be released on November 30 by individual retailers.

• The iPhone 5 will be available on Cricket, in the USA, as a prepaid phone!

• iPhone 5 won’t work with some accessories even with Lightning adapter!

And finally, Motorola and Intel have an event coming up together and on the eve of the release Intel have said that they have optimised Android 4.1 Jelly Bean Medfield powered phones!!!

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05/09/2012

Nokia's Lumia 820 and 920 become official!

   After a tonne of leaks of these two phone this week today we officially know! The first of which is the Lumia 920, the new high end offering.

  That body is a new glossy finish, instead of the beautiful matte of the Lumia 800 and 900 predecessors. On the plus side Nokia is offering more colors out of the gate in this round, with the yellow getting particular love at the press conference. Thankfully knows the importance of a good screen and this one has a resolution running at 1,280 x 768, just slightly better than 720p on a 4.5" screen. This screen makes colours pop and still manages to have inky blacks. Under the hood there's a 1.5Ghz Snapdragon S4!

   The new Windows Phone 8 homescreen tiles stand out sharply and the whole minimalism of the UI looks great on the advanced LCD. The Lumia 920 will be offered in yellow, red, grey, white, and black, but we don't know anything about pricing just yet!

  The Nokia Lumia 820, on the other hand, will come in red, yellow, grey, cyan, purple, white, and black. Interestingly it's not really that much of a downgrade from the Lumia 920 apart from in terms of screen and size! 

   There is a 4.3-inch 480 x 800 screen which is solid but not amazing for these day, the same 1.5 GHz dual-core Qualcomm Snapdragon S4 processor in it's bigger sibling, 1GB of RAM, and 8 megapixel camera only this one doesn’t feature their PureView technology. And yes there is wireless charging!!! Nokia will offer removable back covers for those wanting to cut the cord.

   The Lumia 820 comes with an exchangeable shell design. Exchangeable shells not only make it possible to select from a range of colors, but also to add wireless charging. Finally Windows Phone 8 now supports micro-SD for expanded storage. The only downside seems to be that 480 x 800 resolution display and this is a great mid-range device.

In other news:

• Nokia has now shifted 7 million Lumia devices! 4 Million of those were moved in the last quarter!

• Apple's next iPhone is reportedly getting a notably bigger battery to power the LTE!

• EC approves UK mobile wallet scheme from EE, Vodafone and O2, despite Google complaints!

• Samsung Galaxy Note II put up for pre-order for mid-September here in the UK.

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30/08/2012

Lenovo from IFA 2012!

   Lenovo released a couple of tablets from their A series the over day which we have previously covered, but there's one that we haven't mentioned that really stands out!

   That device is elegantly named the Ideapad S2110 The tablet itself has a 10.1-inch IPS LCD display with 1280 x 800 pixel resolution and a nice 420nit brightness and it's got a great little attachable keyboard dock for all your work. You’ll have 10-finger touchscreen abilities here too because the show is run by the powerful Qualcomm 8060A/8260A 1.5GHz dual-core processor (aka a dual-core Snapdragon S4).

   The tablet on it's own is rated for 10 hours of battery life and with the keyboard dock you’ll have 20 hours of battery life! Without the dock the whole thing weights in at just 580g so it's quite heavy but not unbearably so. If you're one of them people that likes good shooters on your tablet then this one will just about pass; there's a 5 megapixel camera with Auto Focus and single LED flash, the front houses a 1.3 megapixel camera for video chat. Inside you’ve got 1GB of RAM as well as Bluetooth 4.0, built-in FM Radio, and this thing is Wi-fi only, sorry!

ZTE Grand X IN gets released!

   ZTE has another addition to their Android line-up today and this one is the world's first Android 4.0 Ice Cream Sandwich smartphone with an Intel inside.

  

   The phone has an Atom X2460 running the show and the back casing is quite unique because it's hatched and surprisingly interesting. On the front there's a 4.3-inch 960 x 540 display and a 0.3MP camera and round back you've got a powerful 8 megapixel camera with single LED flash. 

   Depending on your point of view you'll either be smitten with ZTE’s custom user interface we will just say it's a very bubbly affair with a few custom widgets thrown in for good measure. By way of redemption though there is 4G HSPA+ connection with up to 21Mpbs and has Intel's 'Hyper-Threading Technology' too. With this technology and the Intel XMM 6260 Platform you’ll be working with ultra-fast web browsing and an all-around super speedy user experience chipzilla promises.

   To keep you going through the day you've got a 1650mAh battery and the rest of the internals include 1GB of RAM with either 4 or 16GB of ROM. You’ll also have the ability to expand your memory by 32GB through the microSD card slot. The sensor set includes; GPS, Bluetooth 2.1 + A2DP, Dolby sound, RM Radio, Accelerator, Gyroscope, Compass, Proximity senros, and Light sensor as well.

HTC Desire X.

   HTC has come up with a new refresh of the classic HTC Desire, but this phone is quite a strange beast because it's a high-quality mid-range phone and it's pretty much in a range of it's own because of the mismatch of the internals.

   This phone has a solid 4-inch 480 x 800 pixel super LCD display and an ultra powerful 1Ghz dual-core Qualcomm Snapdragon S4 processor and the software is a Sense 4.0 take on Android 4.0.4 Ice Cream Sandwich although we haven't heard if it'll be updated to Jelly Bean, but we expect it will.

   The storage, as will all Desire devices, leaves something to be 'desired', in this case there's 4GB of internal storage and 768 MB of RAM. In an attempt to appease you HTC will throw in 25GB of cloud storage free with Dropbox for two years. But at least there's a microSD card slot for up to 32GB of extra storage. As always you can get some Beats Audio out of that 3.5mm headphone jack.

   You audiophiles will also appreciate the Bluetooth 4.0 stereo audio quality – APT-X CODEC for BT A2DP is also included. You’ve also got the option for HD voice calls, if your network offers it and an FM radio. Your sensors include a proximity sensor, ambient light sensor, and G-sensor. The battery in this device is another1650 mAh unit that HTC claims will provide 10 hours of talk time in 3G or 20 hours in 2G, with 34 days of standby if you’re using 3G or 31 days using 2G – we're not sure who HTC employed to do their maths!!!

   The camera is also noteworthy; it's a 5MP BSI lense with HTC ImageChip, the same one that you might have in your HTC One series device. The camera also uses a F2.0 aperture, wide angle 28 mm lens, and an LED flash with SmartFlash. SmartFlash functionality is quite useful as it allows five level of flash that are automatically set by your camera detecting distance to the objects at hand.

   All in all it's a nice mid-range device but we're not sure this is going to drastically change HTC's fortunes.

In other news:

• In case you needed any more confirmation Amazon are soon to announce a Kindle Fire successor then the original device has now been listed as 'sold out' on Amazon's website. Hold tight refresh incoming!
• Amazon's App Store is now available in Europe!!! 

And finally, Sony's new Xperia T and V have both benchmarked higher than Samsung's Galaxy S3, so they are mighty good devices! Some of the benchmark results have been included below!

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20/08/2012

Jolla to introduce Android app compatibility and some more news on their phone!

   We've covered Jolla mobile quite a few times here on TheTechFella and regular readers will know that the company are in the middle of creating a MeeGo powered phone. One of the fundamental problems with MeeGo or any new OS, is that there is a severe lack of apps. Apps recently have become one of the key selling points to any phone buyer.

   Jolla seems to appreciate this and, according to ArcticStartup, the company plans to utilize Android's app ecosystem to ensure there is a lot of apps for their future buyers. This information comes from a recent interview between Jussi Hurmola, the CEO of Jolla and Tero Lehto from Finnish 3T publication, where the latter asked the former how he plans to tackle the problem of building an app ecosystem for a phone. Hurmola reportedly said he plans to use Android apps (but he didn't want to officially announce that yet) as well as Qt and HTML5-applications all through OpenMobile's ACL (application compatibility layer). 

   Hurmola also promised a new UI which is 'more modern' than both Android's and iOS' so if they can live up to that then they may have a challenger on their hands! Another tasty little tidbit was that the device will have a screen larger than 3.5" so everything is sounding promising at the moment!

   Given the huge support MeeGo generated when Nokia announced their N9, Jolla may well have a chance. But, it'll be interesting to see what their device looks like when it gets announced later this autumn, that device will literally make or break this company!

In other news:

• As part of the restructuring of OnLive, the streaming gaming provider has laid off half of their workforce and OnLive all of tyheir their assets will now become part of 'a newly-formed company'. This will mean that HTC's infrequently mentioned $40 million investment will be lost and that'll be another round of bad news for the companies accountants!

• 500,000 Android users in China have been infected with a malware called SMSZombie. Thankfully for those of us outside of China this isn't too big of an issue because the malware exploits a vulnerability in China Mobile's payment systems so it shouldn't affect people in other parts of the world!

• Apple and Samsung have almost finished testifying in their cases and the jury is poised to start deliberating, but the pair were given one last chance to talk it out. Guess what! There was no agreement so far, but Bloomberg believes that the CEOs of both companies, Tim Cook and Kwon Oh Hyun, will hold a telephone conference call to see if any resolution can be agreed before we give full power to the jury. 

•  LG's Optimus Vu will soon be heading outside of Japan and South Korean and will land in the USA and 'select countries' in Europe, Africa, Asia and South America. The 'phablet' will be refreshed with a Quad-core Tegra 3 processor for most people but the US version will have a 1.5Ghz Snapdragon S4 processor. All we know about availability or pricing is that these will be ready for September!

• Samsung's upcoming Galaxy Note 10.1 has been taken apart by iFixit and they've decided that should anything go wrong with the device it'll be nice and easy to repair! Unlike the new Retina Macbooks and the latest iPad, both of which iFixit criticised for the low likelihood of a successful repair.

• Netflix has been on a recent world wide march lately as they've rolled out there service throughout some Western parts of Europe and announce Scandinavian availability is coming soon. And it seems that this is coming good for the company because they've announced today that they have already managed to rack up a million subscibers throughout the UK and Ireland! Not bad going!

• On a similar theme Barnes and Noble have announced that they too will be bringing their lines of eReaders and content to the UK starting from this autumn. Their address will be nook.com.uk if and when they get their storefront up and running!

• And finally, the Galaxy S3-esque device pictured below is supposedly te upcoming Galaxy player and a full list of specs is available on the picture below! And hopefully the device will make an appearance at IFA in a couple of weeks!

 

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Samsung Galaxy S3 heading Stateside!

   The Galaxy S3 is finally coming to the Land of Stars and Strips!!! Samsung have announced the phone for the five major mobile carriers over in the United States in one sweep. The device will start on the top four carriers for $199 on-contract, the likes of Verizon, T-Mobile, Sprint and AT&T will be joined by U.S. Wireless as carriers. 

   This is great news for U.S. Wireless and it's customers because they can genuinely compete with the big boys now! We expect their version to be carrying 4G LTE, just like Verizon and AT&T’s versions, but T-Mobile's will get HSPA+ 42!

   Samsung has announced that the phones will arrive through June in the USA, each individual network will announce their own individual release date. This device is slightly different from the international version. The international version has an Exynos quad-core processor, this one however has the Qualcomm Snapdragon S4 dual-core processor clocked at  1.5 GHz, as well as rocking a huge 2GB of internal RAM.

   Other than that everything is the same; Gorilla Glass 2.0, removable 2100 mAh battery, both 16GB and 32GB internal storage variants, as well as the same 8 megapixel camera with 1080p video capabilities that we’ve seen on the original Galaxy S III. Exciting stuff!

Announced release dates:

Verizon: Pre-orders start June 6, no word on general availability. (16GB $199.99, 32GB $249.99 with 2 year contracts.)

AT&T: No word yet, check back for updates! Pre-orders start June 6, same pricing as Verizon and an exclusive Red variant to complement the White and Blue ones everyone else is getting.

Sprint:  No word yet, check back for updates! Sprint were so quick off the mark we missed them! Pre-orders started today (5th June) and they expect devices to ship on June 21, again same pricing structure as the two above, it's looking like that's what Samsung's enforcing on the Galaxy S3.

T-Mobile: Pre-order 'shortly' and general availability June 21. (No official pricing, but it's rumoured to be the same as Big Red's)

U.S. Cellular:   Pre-orders from June 12, in-store and online availability sometime in July. (No Pricing).

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