Archive for September, 2011

BlackBerry celebrate 70 million users – Video

Team BlackBerry is still growing worldwide. With 70 million users now RIM have released a video highlighting just a few stories of how BlackBerry users use their Smartphone to stay connected and become more efficient.

“BlackBerry is integral to the way we live and the diversity of our global community is truly outstanding.  We want to celebrate hitting a landmark 70 million subscribers, and thank our customers, by sharing some of their remarkable stories” said Patrick Spence,  Managing Director, Global Sales and Regional Marketing, RIM.

BlackBerry is all about helping proactive people make the most of every moment. We’ve created this video to highlight some of our customers’ successes, including how individuals, businesses, governments, start-ups and charities are all using BlackBerry to work for good in their lives and in their communities around the world.

You can see the video below:

ZTE Skate and Libra in stock at thesmartphonecentre

Are you looking for a decent specced Android device sim free but don’t want to pay a fortune? Well good news as thesmartphonecentre now has both the ZTE Skate and Libra in stock and ready for shipping.

At only £214.95 the ZTE Skate is superb value for money and comes with a massive 4.3 inch touch screen.

Inspired by the skateboard, the ZTE Skate is fashionably thin and lightweight at only 120g, featuring a large 4.3-inch screen to provide an optimal web surfing experience to consumers. It uses the Android 2.3 operating system, an 800MHz processor and the Adreno 200 graphics processing unit (GPU) to support the widescreen, high-definition display. In addition, the ZTE Skate also incorporates a 5MP camera, multimedia Bluetooth extension, A-GPS capability, hardware compass, and G-sensor.

Mango arriving!

The next release of Windows Phone is here. The UK and rest of the world will now see the update (codenamed Mango) rolling out to all Windows Phone 7 owners, beginning today, with the aim of all users receiving the update by the end of October. Check ‘where’s my update’ for the latest information on the update. Also take a look at our update guide to make sure you are prepared.

The latest release of Windows Phone brings your contacts, messages and pictures together in one place, making it easy to share life with the people you care about most, keeping you in touch and always up to date.

Archos spec change at the last minute

Looks like Archos is having to review their upcoming 1.5GHz G9 Honeycomb tablets. Apparently, Texas Instruments wont be able to keep their end of the bargain with their 1.5GHz OMAP 4 processors as they are being pushed back until next year. This, in turn, is causing Archos to rethink their tablet loadout. Rather than delay the October launch of their 10-inch (and higher-end 8-inch) tablets, Archos will instead rename these versions “Turbo” and equip them with slightly overclocked 1.2GHz versions of the dual-core TI processors found in the lower 8GB model. Come next year, when Texas Instruments is able to get their act together, Archos will re-outfit these “Turbo” versions with the newer TI 1.5GHz OMAP 4 processors.

Not sure what exactly this is going to do to the price tag or if there will be an option to have the devices re-fit with the speedier processor ala Motorola’s 4G shenanigans, only time will tell.

Posted by Gareth

ZTE show of the first Tegra 3 tablet

ZTE showcased, at the CES (China International Exhibition Center) expo event held in Beijing, its latest 7-inch T98 Android 3.2 Honeycomb tablet powered by Nvidia’s Tegra3 chipset.

ZTE T98 features a 7-inch WXGA touchscreen display with 1280*800p resolution, equipped with a 1.5GHz Tegra3 quad-core processor, 1GB of RAM, 16GB on-board storage, two cameras a 5MP on the back with 1080p HD video rec capabilities and a 2MP on the front for video chat. T98 is 11.5mm thick and it comes with a battery capacity of 4000mAh.

The slate comes with 3G GSM enabled, weird that it doesn’t pack 4G/LTE technology and no mention about NFC support either. There’s no information regarding an availability date, nor any pricing information.

Posted by Gareth

Rather exciting lookin: The Dark Meadow trailer

Phosphor Game Studios’ The Dark Meadow is an action-adventure monster slaying game set in a creepy abandoned hospital. The Dark Meadow is coming next month, and is boasting some incredibly compelling features such as gesture-based combat, "console-level" story and production, and a six-ish hour campaign that will need to be replayed multiple times if you want to see all the game has to offer.

This looks to be a pretty exciting game, and for good reason too. For the hardware and popularity of the iOS devices there should be more projects like this on there way, as sometimes it feels like a waste to be playing simple 2D physics games on iOS devices when they’re totally capable of this.

Samsung shifts 10 million Galaxy SII smartphones

Samsung’s Galaxy SII with a seemingly no-compromise spec sheet has drawn some big attention, and now Samsung have the numbers to prove it. Just in the last eight weeks, Samsung have enjoyed their sales double from 5 million to 10 million, a truly impressive milestone to say the least, especially when one of the largest markets, the United States, hasn’t even contributed. I know that the Galaxy SII really does deserve the huge sales numbers it has already achieved – I myself own one of the 10 million. If you haven’t read our glowing review of the GSII, check it out now!