An Asus Zenbook arrives with a 15.6" screen with 216ppi!

   When Apple chose to whack those 'Retina displays' inside their MacBook range of laptop devices companies all over scrambled to offer something similar in their portfolios and it started a trend of companies trying to get the screen with the highest resolution on computers!

    Asus is the latest manufacturer to step up to the 2880 x 1620p resolution with their new 15.6" ZenBook UX51VZ-DB115H. This device didn't have much of a fanfare or launch event, but it just popped up on the German version of Amazon as a pre-order!

   If you look into the specifications a bit more you'll find that the screen offers a ppi of 221 which is simply great! Otherwise the internals are pretty much what you would expect to see on a high-end laptop: there's an Intel Core i7-3632QM processor, 8 GB of RAM, a choice of 256 GB or 512 GB SSD, and the package is rounded out by graphics from Nvidia in the shape of their GeForce GT 650M GPU.

   The chassis is aluminium which gives the whole thing a premium feel and there's the welcome additions of the integrated DVD burner and an HD resolution web camera for those Skype calls! There's set to be three USB 3.0 ports, Windows 8, an internal eight cell battery with 90 Wh of power and all of that is crammed into a body which measures in at 380 x 255 x 19.7 mm and weighs 2.06 kg, which although is slightly heavy, should be fine given the quality of materials which are used here!

   If you want one of these laptops then you can pre-order one now and it'll cost you €1700 for the base model which comes with a 256 GB SSD, to get the 512GB SSD model then you'll have to pony up €1999. If you can't do without the biggest and the best and you want it to run Windows 8 then this is a good device to take a look at!
Via Slashgear.

Read More

Everything from Apple's iPhone 5 event!

It's official guys here we have the iPhone 5!

Design:
The phone is a slight redesign and to directly quote the Apple guys the, "iPhone 5. It is made entirely of glass and aluminum. It's designed and built to an exacting level of standard unlike anything we, or anyone in our industry, have made before."

   Improvements to the aesthetic include slimming the whole thing down to 7.6mm thick, which is 18% thinner than before, it's 112 grams which is 20% lighter than the 4S!! The company assures us that this won't affect one handed use; "For the first time ever we've increased the size of the display. By making the screen taller, but not wider, you can still comfortably use it with one hand."


Screen:
This time we have another Retina display, at 326 ppi, but the new resolution is1136 x 640 resolution, because the screen is slightly larger at 4 inches. The whole thing is the same width but a bit taller with a new 16:9 aspect ratio.

The enlarged screen has allowed Apple to cram in five rows of icons, on top of the four shortcuts on the bottom.
All the first-party apps have been optimized to show a bit more stuff. In Calendar we see a full five-day workweek, now.

What about the old apps? They run letterboxed.

So, pixel-perfect rendering. There are black borders on either side so the display is centered.

44% better color saturation, full sRGB rendering here.

Connectivity and Carriers:

And yes we have LTE(!!!) as well as GPRS, EDGE, EV-DO, HSPA, HSPA+, DC-HSDPA. HSPA+ is 21Mbps, DC-HSDPA is 42Mbps, and LTE is a max of 100.

Interestingly there seems to be a limited supply of Carriers: 

In the US: Sprint, AT&T and Verizion. All will support LTE.

Canada: Rogers, Telus, Bell, Fido, Virgin.

In the UK it'll be on O2, Three and Everything Everywhere! It's likely Vodafone and the other networks will have it too but we haven't heard officially yet! The rest of the continent has a convenient little map, right.

New internals:

New chip, the A6! 2X faster CPU and 2x graphics compared to the A5 -- is this compared to the A5 or A5X?

22% smaller, too, and more energy-efficient.

Battery

There's no word on specific battery capacity but it's rated for standby 225hrs, 8 hours lte, 40 hours music and 10 hours wi-fi.

Camera:

It's an 8-megapixel 'iSight' camera, capable of producing shots up to 3,264 x 2,448p resolutions, The sensor is backside-illuminated, with a five-element lens and f/2.4 aperture. Same as the iPhone 4S but thinner.5-element lens and f/2.4 aperture. Same as the iPhone 4S but thinner. dynamic low light mode. It evaluates nearby pixels to give up to 2 f-stops greater low-light performance. 40% faster than the 4S. Finally they have an official panorama mode!It's a 28 megapixel resulting image!

It's 1080p still but with better video stabilization, and there's facial recognition. You can grab photos, too, still.The front-facing camera is now 720p, backside illuminated. Facetime over cellular but they didn't specify which or any networks which would do it!

Audio:

The audio system - there are three microphones. Front, bottom, and back for better voice recognition and noise cancellation.

Connector:

Many things can be done wirelessly...Bluetooth for audio, WiFi for AirPlay or syncing to iTunes, "and best of all with iCloud we can download all our content wirelessly."

"So now we have Thunderbolt and Lightning."

Got old docks? "We're creating a bunch of accessories to help you with that."

No word on adaptor pricing, but big name brands such as Bose are already working on new speakers!

iOS6: 

"Can you recommend a good movie in theaters?"

iPhone 4S, iPhone 4, 3GS, new iPad, iPad 2 and iPod touch all are getting iOS 6 and it'll be available, before the new iPhone, on September 19th!

• Here we've got the Integrated maps we saw at WWDC!
• "We've also built a search engine in so you can look at local points of interest." There are 100 million.
• Passbook for all of your tickets and bank details and everything else! Safari enhancements so that it's more of a desktop experience.

• Siri updates: Ask about a sports result; "how did Man Utd do last weekend?" it'll give you the score.You can also now post statuses to Facebook or Twitter via Siri!

Colour options!

The phone will be available in two colours; black and white again folks! The white version has a raw aluminum back. The black one has the black anodized backing.

Pricing and pre-orders:

And pricing, it's the same as the 4S currently is so for those of you in the US that's $199 for 16GB. $299 for 32GB, $399 for 64GB. Which means that the iPhone 4 is now free on contract and the 4S is now $99. Something which Apple says presents the 'best option' in every price bracket.

Pre-orders start on Friday the 14th. Shipping on September 21st in the US, Canada, UK, Germany, France, Australia, Japan, Hong Kong and Singapore.20 more countries next month."This will be our fastest phone roll-out ever."

What we're left wanting!!!

NFC or Bluetooth NFC.

Micro-USB compatibility.

Wireless charging. 

Bigger screen (subjective of course).

New iPod's!!!

New iPod Nano (7th Gen.)

• Apple said that with the new Nano they "wanted to give it a really large display. We want to have really easy to use controls. We want to make it thin and light... and of course we'd want to give it the latest technologies like Lightning."
• 2.5-inch display in the nano that's multitouch. It's super tiny but has a wider screen than before. Looks to have a tiny Home button. It's 5.4mm, 38% thinner than the last Nano!
• There's an FM tuner with DVR functionality -- pausing and rewinding.
• Ohh and there's Bluetooth too!

New iPod Touch

• Just 6.1mm thick, 88 grams in weight and a slightly redesigned, more squared back.
• 4" display.
• A5 processor for better gaming!
• Five megapixel iSight camera. Backside illuminated, f/2.4, five element lens and that same sapphire crystal lens cover. 1080p video with image stabilization and the ability to use iMovie right away!
• 720p front camera for FaceTime.
• Up to 40 hours of music playback in the touch, 8 hours of video. Slightly increased over the 4th gen Touch.
• Siri capabilities!
• But no 4G!

Other announcements from the event:

• There are reportedly 700,000 apps in the App Store now!
• The iPad is responsible for 91% of tablet web traffic.
• 60% of tablets sales were from the iPad!
• 27% US Market share in PC sector.
• iTunes has had a serious facelift! Essentially they've tried to make everything easier to use! And there's a little pop-up mini player for iTunes! But, "The new iTunes will be available in late October" so not until iOS 6 has landed.

And finally, there's new earbuds!

Read More

Apple, the next iPhone and the future.

   Some things happen once a year; Christmas, Easter, your birthday, your anniversary or your family holiday! In the same category is Apple's iPhone release! (Obviously it's importance equals the previous bunch!).

Wouldn't you love it to look like this?

   Every year since the iPhone's inception this one event has generated huge intrigue, excitement and some degree absurdity; it's a moment everyone reports on and everyone reads. Apple have managed to create a level of hype around this annual release that the IDC reported the company's sales have slumped recently as consumers hold their cash for the next version of the iPhone to land!

   But, what does Apple's iPhone need to be to maintain their dominance and hold the position of the highest selling single handset?

   Before we tackle that it's worth remembering that Apple makes and sells millions of devices at premium price points and it's this premium that means they cannot afford to get complacent! The iPhone 4S was widely viewed as a disappointment; on the surface the device didn't change, the internals changed slightly. Some viewed it as Apple putting in minimum effort, others viewed it as a genius stroke and asked why change something that is 'exceptional' already? Apple can't afford for the next device to be average, it needs to blow people away again.

Who needs to be wow-ed?

   You may ask why? Yes Apple will always have that core of people who buy anything Apple produces, the fanboys, if you will. But, Apple has competent challengers like never before. There are lots of people out there who have had their heads to Samsung's high end devices and the wonders of Android. I'm sitting in a room now with, 5 Samsung phones, a HTC and a dumbphone. The Samsung's sales to us have included 2 Galaxy S3's and some lower-end Android powered phones.

"It's very hard to justify buying an iPhone 4S over a Galaxy S3, unless you're very heavily invested in iOS."

   We are the people Apple needs to win back with larger, more appealing devices because at the moment it's very hard to justify buying an iPhone 4S over a Galaxy S3, unless you're very heavily invested in iOS. Apple must reverse this to ensure their dominance. The next iPhone needs to wow people in a way the 4S doesn't when faced with the competition.

Apple releases the iPhone at a challenging time of year!

   It's also worth remembering that Apple's releases are effectively half a year behind HTC, Samsung, LG and their crop of Android power houses. HTC and LG tend to release their phones in late January/early February, while Samsung has their Galaxy S range announcements in May. These guys have a whole half a year to offer up superior phones before Apple can come back with something just as good. Apple should try to best these competitors with their September release instead of playing catch up to the ones that their competitors just release! So please bare in mind that next year will usher in quad-core Snapdragon S4 Pro's as standard, 1080p screen as standard, so the iPhone will have some serious competition within 5 months and the new 'set' of Nexus' within a couple of months of the release!

Will patents affect anything?

   There's not just pressure from other companies devices, Apple as a whole company needs to be wary of patent lawsuits too. If the company decides to go on an offensive and get hoards of devices banned from sale for various reasons they will become 'the bad guy' and consumers will start to punish them. But, this is something Apple should have the foresight to both predict and avoid. This is pretty much the only way Apple can go wrong with the next iPhone!

   So what would TheTechFella like to see from Apple's 'new iPhone'. Well if I had my way I would have a lot more than we're expecting.

What I want!

Which would you go for?

• I would love to see Apple step up to a 4.3" screen, this is almost the perfect size for ease of handling and giving you ample size to read everything you need to on your phone. 
• On top of this I would love to see a good processor in this one, maybe the A5X or even a slightly more updated version of this chipset!
• On the storage front there has to be a minimum of 16GB's of storage and an SD card would be a dream come true, but it'll probably remain as just that, a dream.
• A metal chassis would be good, but anything that will make iPhone's less likely to smash than the current crop is!
• A metal chassis doesn't have to be dull and understated either! What about a range of colours like the iPod's have?!

This is something like what Apple will release!

What we'll probably get!

• A 4" Retina display.
• Metal chassis, no glass in sight.
• An A5x chipset, the same one that's in the new iPad.
• A new charging/docking connector.

   As a final word I'd just like to mention that whatever Apple makes it'll sell by the bucket load because it's a premium, high quality, well made, well supported and all round great device. Apple is now what Nokia used to be; the leader, the innovator and the top dog. But, the question is 'will Apple be able to cement their position as we head into 2013 and the next wave of superphones.

   There's probably tonnes I've missed and there's probably things you'll disagree with in this post, let me know what you think in the comments!

Read More

22/05/2012

Google and Motorola deal completes!

   Today Google has finally completed their acquisition of Motorola, after China approved the move yesterday afternoon. This is great news for the two companies and it will be great to see how Google can exercise an influence on Motorola and whether they get an unfair advantage over other Android manufacturers.

   The other rumours today have been that Google may be planning to cut 40% of jobs at Motorola as they aim to streamline the company and turn a profit in the near future. There's no exact word on future plans but the press release states that the Motorola acquisition will help “supercharge the Android ecosystem and will enhance competition in mobile computing". Keep it locked here for the news as it happens.

Will.I.am seen tweeting while Olympic Torch carrying!

   So this is kind of more fun than any real news, but The Voice judge and superstar rapper, producer and song writer Will.I.am was today a torch bearer for the London 2012 Olympics. But, the Black Eyed Peas co-founder took a slightly different angle on how to act while carrying the torch than the rest of the crowd so far.

   He took to his Blackberry Torch today to Tweet while he was carrying a big gold burning torch. His tweet said;

will.i.am ‏@iamwill

1nce in a life time experience #runningthetorch in the uK...

 We're pleased you enjoyed it Will!!!

Upcoming iPhone rumours pour out!

   The last few days we've been hearing a lot about Apple's upcoming iPhone and what features it will and won't have. The main rumour is that Apple will up the size of the screen and the consensus is that this probably will happen.

   Today the rumour has come from 9to5 mac that the screen will be a 3.95" display and it will have a new pixel ratio of 1136x640, which would usher in a new aspect ratio of 16:9, while maintaining the 'retina display' title, by keeping the pixel density well about 300pixels per inch.

   9to5 Mac have also said that they expect the new iPhone to have an updated charging port which takes up less space at the base of the phone. The new port is rumoured to be slightly smaller than the MicroUSB standard 

In other news:

• The Galaxy S3 has reportedly been received very well in the UK with the Carphone Warehouse today announcing that the device has been ordered 'by the thousand' and they have 'sold better than expected'. The international version has also gone up for pre-order in to USA too, but you guys should probably hold out for an official LTE version.
• Windows Mobile devices you have now officially lost your app store, sorry guys!
• The Samsung Galaxy Ace 2 and the Sony Xperia U have both gone on sale in Three UK's mid-range today and both can be yours for around £20 a month on contract or £200 off contract.
• Samsung have today refuted the claim that 'lawyers designed the Galaxy S3', the official line from their Design VP is that 'the design is part of a 5 year plan' to change the design language at Samsung, sorry guys but we're still not entirely convinced. I for one am still blaming Apple's lawyers!

Read More