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While others are content to tempt the public with a mere seven inches, Hannspree have stepped up to the fold and revealed a tablet that offers a full three inches more. First shown today at Berlin’s IFA expo, the 10″ device has an LED backlit 16:9 screen with the standard 1024 x 600 resolution (however it’s not yet clear if the screen is resistive or capacitive). On a more interesting note is Hannspree’s decision to pack its slab with Nvidia’s very capable Tegra 2 chipset to power its Android 2.2 OS. Its also armed with a raft of input and outputs including Mini USB and Mini HDMI ports – perfect for PMP action, especially with it’s 3500mAh giving up to 8hrs playback. Given its size, power and software, this certainly could be a device to watch.
Hannspree are planning to release the unnamed device in Europe in November at €399 for a 16GB / WiFi model and a 3G variant for €499, a price competitive to similar fruity products.
Source: ZDNet.de
Posted by: Ian
There’s growing evidence to support the possibility of the imminent release of a sixth generation iPod Nano. Various leaks over the past few months detailed on Apple blog Appleinsider.com has shown the device to likely be a 1.2″ square device, a hybrid of the Nano’s screen and the Shuffle’s form factor. With limited physical buttons beyond a + and – set of button and the hold switch, it would appear touch to be the order of the day, and rumours speculate this touch screen to be capacitive and possibly with a simplified iPod touch interface. It’ll still retain the iPod docking connector but just how well it will sit in the users various docks isn’t clear but leaked silicone cases point towards a slim device which shouldn’t have much of an issue.
Further rumours abound that Apple is to release a revised iPhone 4 device, fixing the antenna non-issue. Among the first lucky Apple-ites who will get this new wunderphone-that-has-had-a-revision-that-isn’t-really-required-as-there-is-nothing-wrong-with-the-original-design will be those provided for by carrier TelCel in Mexico. Let’s see if it makes it around the world.
New Nano Case?:
Following news that the original Samsung Wave has sold 1 million handsets worldwide, the chaps from Seoul have seen fit to bless the world with a raft of new Bada-powered devices. The device you see here is the catchy monikered Wave 743, looking part Tocco and part iPhone 4, and it and its new brethren will be running Bada’s latest revision, Bada 1.1. Sadly though it seems that Super AMOLED is no longer riding the Wave, with the 743 sporting a 3.2" TFT screen (touch type undetermined), 5mp camera w/ LED flash, microSD slot and WiFi. The new Wave, like its Galaxy S cousin is also packing Bluetooth 3.0 – the more the merrier.
Read on for more Bada bling
You’ve all heard the stories of app programmers getting super-rich off of super-small programs, and now research2guidance.com has shown just how much cash is swimming around the app game. In the first half of 2010, the smartphone application market was valued at rather staggering $2.2 billion, up from $1.7 billion of the previous year, and app downloads themselves rose 0.8 billion to 3.9 billion. Now lets look at that again – the figures represent the first half of 2010, a period that doesn’t include several important factors – most noticeably, no iPhone 4. Plus it just misses the releases of arguably the most successful Android handsets yet with HTC’s Desire and EVO, Sony’s Xperia X10 and Samsung’s Galaxy S family. It’s also just on the cusp of Froyo’s release, so while these are extremely impressive figures, if we take into account the news of Android handsets outselling the still ridiculously successful iPhone 4, the second half of 2010 could see an even more impressive growth. One thing is for sure, there’s an App goldrush and it shows no sign of stopping.
Posted by: Ian
In their never ending quest for total world information domination (or something like that), Google have now added calls to regular telephones from your Gmail account. For some time you’ve been able to have voice chat and video chat through Google Talk but this is the first time the Googleplexers have stepped their Google communications suite out of the G-bubble and into the real world of telephone calls with Google Voice. Presently you can call for free only in the US and Canada (and only until the end of the year), while in the UK, Germany, France and interestingly China will have to pay 2 cents a minute (pre.) Clearly this is a big stab at the heart of Skype but it’s yet to be seen whether Google can topple the world’s best known VoIP provider with some 550 million or more users. Google Voice does have some interesting features though, including allocation of a Google Voice number which you can set to ring any or all of your contact numbers. Smart. Currently this is all still through a desktop browser but it’s not a great leap of imagination to think that Google will filter their new technology to their own Android mobile operating system. It does however remain to be seen how this will work in China – will the communist government allow encoded communications or has a deal with the big red and the big G already been struck?
Google Voice is currently only in the US but will be rolling out to the other test nations in the near future. Watch Google’s video here for an animated overview.
Posted by: Ian
One of Microsoft’s Windows Phone 7 trump cards – Phone to Console – will be standard with WP7 handsets BUT not at launch. Coming across a little like the combination play between the Gamecube and the Gameboy Advance, it heavily integrates your Xbox Live account into your mobile gaming including your avatar (editable on the phone), messages and achievements. Additionally, if you have a game on the phone that integrates with a sister title on the 360 (Assassin’s Creed for example), it’ll add achievement points to your Live score and, game dependant, open up parts of the main title. There’s also phone-to-phone for free (Silver Live) on turn-based games (chalk one up for Tower Defence games). Clearly MS playing this card for all it’s worth and could prove interesting with Apple and Android having no comparable technology.
Check out RGBFilter’s comprehensive video interview with Greg Milligan of MS Canada here, with plenty of WP7 and Live action. You also get a good look at an LG WP7 handset that’s not the E900.
Posted by: Ian
We all know that “up to 20 meg broadband” is rarely that, unless you live in your local exchange and have a one meter phone line. So someone had to get into trouble for promising the on-line earth and not living up to it, and first for the slapdown is everyone’s favourite telephone infrastructure monopolist, British Telecom.
Amazingly their Adam and Jane advert has not been banned for being teeth-grinding tat, but for saying that even at peak time you’ll still be able to browse the web at full speed. Of the 17 complaints (including rivals Talk Talk, Virgin and Sky Broadband), some complained that ‘Jane’ was browsing at near LAN speeds, and this sort of speed was certainly not available to them. Indeed, the Advertising Standards Agency pointed out “because we had not seen sufficient evidence to support the claim that BT’s new broadband service was consistently faster than its existing 8Mb service even at peak times, we concluded that the ad was likely to mislead”. Ouch. Next up – ‘Unlimited’ mobile broadband promises and why the purveyors should be beaten with large fishes.
Posted by: Ian
Accompanied by a moody soundtrack, Samsung have made the much-rumoured Galaxy Tab official with a teaser video you can see here. While the video offers few surprises beyond conformation of Froyo from the get go and a big iPad-style keyboard, it certainly gets the juices flowing ready for the September 2nd date in Berlin.
The Galaxy Tab (or GT-P1000) has been the subject of some speculation recently, with the recent video of the Tab being used on a Sydney train making its way onto YouTube yesterday. Giving no further clues beyond conformation of the now-obvious capacitive screen, the user claimed it was ‘different’ to an iPad. Chinese site ifanr.com however does give further details with an anonymous tipster having enough hands on time to even take a few cheeky snaps. Describing it as ‘"thicker than the Streak" and armed with a 1024 x 600 screen and 3.2mp camera, it’s also described as "plasticky". How well Android translates to a proper, mobile data enabled device is yet to be seen, and will it still feel like a big Galaxy S in the same vein of the iPad/iPhone. Not long to wait now.
More pics Sir?
We’ve had the HTC end of the Windows Phone 7 rumours recently and very attractive they have been too, but let’s not forget that the smartphone giants aren’t the only cards in Microsoft’s WP7 pack. As well as Samusung, another Korean tech giant in LG (nee Lucky Goldstar) are also sailing Redmond’s new mobile OS boat, and their handsets are starting to appear. So far we have the C900 slider and its keyboard-less bretheren the E900. All are of average size, with the display likely around the 3.5″ or more area. They both sport the requisite WP7 button layout and should, if MS sticks to its guns, pack at the very least a 1GHz CPU. While it is difficult to gain much info from the pics and video, we can see it has a headphone jack and a USB port on the righthand side, a possibly capacitive screen, plus a new (and possibly LG exclusive) app called ‘Media Sharing’. Is this LG’s version of the Galaxy S Allshare app? All will be revealed before the end of the year.
More photos below and video here.
While 31″ is positively monitor-like in the ever growing world of LCD and Plasma display technology, 31″ in OLED terms is a minor miracle. The forever next-big-thing display technology has, until now, been strictly portable TV sizes – Sony’s 11″ XEL-1 being the most prominent and expensive example, although Samsung has previously displayed a 31″ device a couple of years ago at a trade show. As of yet though, no commercially available model has left the Korean’s factory. AMOLED has of course risen in prominence with its inclusion on HTC’s Legend and Desire handsets as well as the Super AMOLED variant appearing on Samsung’s higher devices, and has noticeably better contrast do to it’s local illumination switching per pixel. For some time OLED screens have been hampered by issues with certain parts of their RGB spectrum expiring before the others but manufacturers believe this is becoming a thing of the past so while LG does not yet have a release date or price, it does show that the technology is viable for larger panels and could be on its way to a front room near you soon.
Posted by: Ian
While others are content to tempt the public with a mere seven inches, Hannspree have stepped up to the fold and revealed a tablet that offers a full three inches more. First shown today at Berlin’s IFA expo, the 10″ device has an LED backlit 16:9 screen with the standard 1024 x 600 resolution (however it’s not yet clear if the screen is resistive or capacitive). On a more interesting note is Hannspree’s decision to pack its slab with Nvidia’s very capable Tegra 2 chipset to power its Android 2.2 OS. Its also armed with a raft of input and outputs including Mini USB and Mini HDMI ports – perfect for PMP action, especially with it’s 3500mAh giving up to 8hrs playback. Given its size, power and software, this certainly could be a device to watch.
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