News

Archos HOME Phone and Internet Radio

For years there has been a rumoured Archos phone. Finally we have one, however it’s not quite the phone we had hoped. You’ll leave this one behind most of the time as it’s an Android home phone designed for your landline. That said, Archos might have something here, a market that is fairly empty.

The ARCHOS Smart Home Phone takes a Home DECT phone and enhances it with Android; that same great interface as on a smart phone along with all those excellent smart phone features; caller name, number and photo display, customizable MP3 ringtones, web and emails. And transferring contacts from your Android mobile phone to your ARCHOS Smart Home Phone is simple though the integrated applications.

Archos 80 G9 and 101 G9

Archos has are currently unveiling a couple of new tablets in Paris at the moment, the 80 G9 and 101 G9.  The 80 G9 has an 8-inch panel with a 1024 x 768 screen resolution and the the 101 G9 has a 10.1-incher (1280 x 800). Both utilise Seagate’s 7mm Momentus Thin, a 2.5-inch hard disk for slim designed originally for high-capacity laptops, in order to scale to 250GB. Also on board is a dual-core OMAP 4 processor (1.5GHz ARM Cortex A9), support for Flash, access to the Android Market and a full-size USB port. You’ll also get an HDMI output, support for 1080p playback.

The duo are scheduled to go on sale at the end of September, much like the last generation but hopefully not with the same delays that pushed them back to Dec/ Jan 2011. Pricing seems to be around $279 for the 80 G9 and $349 for the 101 G9.

In addition, Archos announced the G9 3G WWAN stick ($49,)  to compensate for the lack of 3G in the tablets. A nice idea to keep costs down as it fits in snuggly into the back.

Symbian Anna update to be made available for download in July

We have mentioned ‘Anna’ before, the forthcoming update to Nokias Symbian devices, however over at the Nokia Connection event in Singapore CEO Stephen Elop has confirmed the the the Anna update will be available next month (July) for download.

The Nokia N8, C7, C6-01 and E7 will qualify for the update and will bring an improved homescreen, redesigned interface icons, portrait QWERTY keypad, a new web browser and improved Ovi Maps.

I must say that the new N9 looks much better in my opinion but not being a Symbian user I am not really in a position to be an expert on this.

Posted by: James

Nokia announce the N9

Nokia have today officially announced the new N9 to the world. The N9 runs MeeGo 1.2 Harmattan and comes packed with some pretty decent specifications.

Size wise the N9 comes with a 3.9 inch WVGA display complete with curved Gorilla glass. Under the hood we have a 1GHz ARM Cortex-A8 processor and camera wise this one looks to be fantastic too, sporting an 8mp auto-focus Carl Zeiss lens, double LED flash and HD video recording at 720p.

Available in three colours, pink, black and blue Nokia have stated that the N9 will be available sometime this year, although some reports are saying this could be within a month. Let’s hope so. This one looks good.

You can see the full specs below along with a demo video.

Huawei MediaPad media surfaces

Huawei are hitting the market with the first Android 3.2 tablet. Engadget reports that this is a Honeycomb 3.2 tablet, the first of it’s kind. 3.2 is essentially the same as 3.1, but specifically tailored to 7-inch tablets as opposed to 10-inch. Packed within the MediaPad’s 10.5mm shell, there’s a 217 pixels-per-inch IPS capacitive touch panel, GPS, 1.3 megapixel front-facing camera, 5 megapixel rear-facing camera, 802.11n WiFi, a battery good for around six hours of life and a bona fide racehorse as a processor: a dual-core 1.2GHz chip from Qualcomm. 

The MediaPad weighs only 390g,  supports full 1080p playback, includes HSPA+ (14.4Mbps) 3G support, offers 8GB of internal storage (as well as a microSD slot) and comes pre-loaded with Facebook, Twitter, Let’s Golf from Gameloft and Documents To Go. There’s also a Bluetooth module, an HDMI output for catching those high-def flicks on the go, and Flash 10.3.

Unfortunately, there is no pricing at this stage. Pictures and a demo video below:

Seesmic devs ditch the BlackBerry platform

The popular Twitter app Seesmic will no longer be supported for BlackBerry, the developers have said today. I’m not a Seesmic user however this news saddens me a little and I hope other developers do not follow suit.

Here is what they said:

Blackberry users, we have important news we would like to share:

Effective June 30th, Seesmic will discontinue support for Blackberry in order to focus development efforts on our most popular mobile platforms: Android, iOS and Windows Phone 7.

We encourage those effected by this change to try out Seesmic for Android, iOS and Windows Phone 7, as well as Seesmic Desktop and Web.

Sincerely,

Team Seesmic

Posted by: James

Orange T-Shirt charges your mobile

Glastonbury revellers may have an extra incentive to elbow their way closer to the stages – it may help charge their phones.

Mobile phone giant Orange has released a prototype t-shirt which powers mobiles while festival-goers watch bands in action.

Users can plug their phone in to the t-shirt, which uses noise-responsive technology, for a quick top-up charge whenever they need it.

Orange will be conducting live testing of the gadget on site at the festival to see which acts are the "best to charge to" around the Spirit of 71 stage.

Tony Andrews, co-producer of the Spirit of 71, said: "Sound vibrations, particularly bass frequencies, will create enough shaking to produce electricity from a material as simple as piezoelectric film.

"It looks like it could provide a real solution to mobile charging and I’m interested to see how the Orange Sound Charge performs in a live testing environment such as Glastonbury."

Andrew Pearcey, head of sponsorship at Orange UK, said: "In a vibrant festival environment such as Glastonbury, sound is such an obvious medium that it seemed like a natural fit to use it in the development of this year’s prototype."

Posted by: James

Dual-core coming to Windows Phone handsets

Currently there aren’t too many Windows Phone handsets out there and if you want a high-end dual-core phone it’s Android or nothing.

Qualcomm are set to help redress the balance following an announcement that their new MSM8x60 chipset will be supported by both Windows Phone and Android platforms. The Dual 1.5GHz scorpion cores will be a big step for Windows Phone as currently 1GHz is the fastest CPU you’ll find in a Windows Phone handset.

Details of the new chipset include:

• Dual Scorpion-cores up to 1.5GHz
• Adreno 220 GPU
• 1080P video and playback
• HDMI mirroring
• Dolby 5.1
• 3D capturing and playback
• 16MP dual-camera support

You can find out more by visiting the Qualcomm website.

Posted by: Matt

Swype v3 released for Android

We’ve looked at Swype a few times in the past and for anyone looking for an alternative text entry method for Android phones Swype would be the first keyboard replacement that I would suggest you try. If you’ve never seen Swype before the concept is simple yet genius. You get a ‘normal’ QWERTY keyboard but rather than tap letters as you would with a regular keyboard you place your finger on the screen and trace the path across all the letter in the word without lifting your finger off. With this method of text entry it’s possible to type really quickly.

Today Swype Inc. have announced a major new version which includes support for Honeycomb tablets and WXGA screens.

Orange Signal Boost – Update

Orange is to continue the roll out of its Signal Boost service, the smart Wi-Fi application provided by Kineto Wireless. The application boosts 3G coverage by turning Wi-Fi access points in an extension of the mobile network.

Kineto’s Smart Wi-Fi Application helps offload traffic from an operator’s macro cellular network. This relieves congestion, improves network capacity performance and reduces operating costs. It also improves coverage for customers who can switch their smartphones over to use existing Wi-Fi access points when their cellular coverage is poor.

Operators using the service, sometimes referred to as UMA (unlimited mobile access), have reported a 25%-40% reduction in churn rates from subscribers and found that they consume 20% less data from the macro network.

Paul Jevons, director of product marketing at Orange said: ‘Our Signal Boost service has been very successful in providing an in-home coverage solution of those customers who require it. It is a very simple solution. You turn on the app and everything works. Customers do not need any new equipment, there is no change of number and their address book works as normal.’