Due to the unexpected weather front currently sweeping the east coast of North America, Google has cancelled it’s planned event to announce some new devices. Instead we are being treated to a less exciting press release. Google have, however, put together a tidy and exciting combination of goodies to launch, conveniently just before Christmas and just after Apple’s iPad announcement.
Nexus 4 with Google Now and Photo Sphere
Nexus 4 is our latest smartphone, developed together with LG. It has a quad-core processor which means it’s super fast, a crisp 4.7" (320 ppi) display that’s perfect for looking at photos and watching YouTube, and with wireless charging you just set the phone down on a charging surface to power it up, no wires needed. While Nexus 4 is incredibly powerful under the hood, it also features the latest version of Jelly Bean, Android 4.2-the simplest and smartest version of Android yet. Starting with the camera, we’ve reinvented the photo experience with Photo Sphere, which lets you capture images that are literally larger than life. Snap shots up, down and in every direction to create stunning 360-degree immersive experiences that you can share on Google+ with friends and family-or you can add your Photo Sphere to Google Maps for the world to see.
Android 4.2 brings other great goodies like Gesture Typing, which lets you glide your finger over the letters you want to type on the keyboard-it makes typing fast, fun and a whole lot simpler. Android 4.2 also adds support for wireless display so you can wirelessly watch movies, YouTube videos and play games right on your Miracast-compatible HDTV.
Learn more about all of the new features of Android 4.2, Jelly Bean, here.Google Now-even more useful
We designed Google Now to make life simpler by giving you the right information at just the right time in easy to read cards, before you even ask. And the feedback has been awesome. So today we’re adding more cards that we hope you’ll find useful. Flight information, restaurant reservations, hotel confirmations and shipping details-how often have you found yourself wading through your email to get this information at the last moment? So next time you book a table for dinner, you’ll get a reminder with all the details without ever having to lift a finger. You’ll also get cards for nearby attractions, interesting photo spots, movies times at nearby theaters or concerts by your favorite artists.Nexus 7: Thin, light and now even more portable
Nexus 7 brings you the best of Google-YouTube, Chrome, Gmail, Maps-and all the great content from Google Play in a slim, portable package that fits perfectly in your hand. To give you more room for all that great content you can now get Nexus 7 with 16GB ($199) or 32GB ($249) of storage. But we also wanted to make this highly portable tablet even more mobile. So we added HSPA+ mobile data. Nexus 7 is now also available with 32GB and HSPA+ mobile ($299), which can operate on more than 200 GSM providers worldwide, including AT&T and T-Mobile in the U.S.Nexus 10: Powerful and shareable
Nexus 10 is the ultimate tablet for watching movies or reading magazines. We wanted to build a premium entertainment device, so we partnered with Samsung to do just that. Nexus 10 is the highest resolution tablet on the planet with a 10.055" display at 2560-by-1600 (300ppi), that’s over 4 million pixels right in your hands. It comes with a powerful battery that will get you up to nine hours of video playback and more than 500 hours of standby time. With a set of front-facing stereo speakers, you can watch movies right from your Nexus 10 and they simply sound awesome. But what makes Nexus 10 unique is that it’s the first truly shareable tablet. With Android 4.2, you can add multiple users and switch between them instantly right from the lockscreen. We believe that everyone should have quick and easy access to their own stuff — email, apps, bookmarks, and more. That way, everyone can have their own home screens, their own music, and even their own high scores.Google Play: More entertainment, more countries
We’ve recently added a ton of great new entertainment to Google Play, such as movies and TV shows from Twentieth Century Fox. Earlier this year we expanded our service beyond movie rentals and now you can purchase movies and build a library of your favorites in Google Play. Today we’re bringing movie purchasing to more countries – Canada, the U.K., France, Spain and Australia.
We’re also excited to announce two new partnerships. We’re now working with Time, Inc. to bring you even more magazines like InStyle, PEOPLE, TIME and others. And we’ve partnered with Warner Music Group who will be adding their full music catalog with new songs coming each day. We’re now working with all of the major record labels globally, and all the major U.S. magazine publishers, as well as many independent labels, artists and publishers.
On November 13, we’re bringing music on Google Play to Europe. Those of you in the U.K, France, Germany, Italy and Spain will be able to purchase music from the Google Play store and add up to 20,000 songs-for free-from your existing collection to the cloud for streaming to your Android devices or web browser. We’re also launching our new matching feature to streamline the process of uploading your personal music to Google Play. We’ll scan your music collection and any song we match against the Google Play catalog will be automatically added to your online library without needing to upload it, saving you time. This will be available in Europe at launch on November 13 and is coming to the U.S. soon after. This will all be for free-free storage of your music, free matching, free syncing across your devices and free listening.
Great value
We’ve always focused on building great devices at great value. And we think today’s devices offer the very best that money can buy. Here are more details on when and where you can pick up your next Nexus device:
A Nexus device is much more than simply a phone or tablet. It’s your connection to the best of Google – all of your stuff and entertainment, everywhere you go with no hassle. Now you have three new Nexus devices, a new improved version of Jelly Bean and more entertainment than ever before-all available on Google Play. The playground is open.
Posted by Gareth
Phones 4u today announces the launch of an extensive and exciting range of Windows Phone 8 devices, including six smartphone and colour exclusives.
The extensive range being offered at Phones 4u reinforces the significance of the category to the high street retailer, with staff on-hand to offer expert advice and an interactive customer experience. A series of Windows Phone launch events, in partnership with Microsoft, are also planned to take place in flagship Phones 4u stores across the UK this November.
In addition to the compelling variety of Windows Phone smartphones on offer, Phones 4u has been chosen by Windows Phone as its retail partner on its stand at this year’s Gadget Show Live event taking place from 30th November to 2nd December 2012. Phones 4u personnel – experts on all things mobile and Windows Phone – will be on hand on the stand to showcase the latest Windows Phone smartphones in the range, discuss tariffs and sell Windows Phones to consumers who are ready to purchase on the day.
Scott Hooton, Chief Commercial Officer at Phones 4u comments: “We’re delighted to be announcing our exclusive and extensive Windows Phone range of smartphones to our customers. We know from the fact that we have sold more Windows Phones in the UK than anyone else that our customers are strong advocates of the operating system and we are committed to providing them with unparalleled expert advice on the high-street and online for Windows Phone 8 as Microsoft launch the next generation of Windows Phone.”
Leila Martine, Director Windows Phone, Microsoft Ltd said: “Phones 4u has been a Windows Phone partner from the very start as it realised there was a real market opportunity for Windows Phone. An opportunity which lies with all the people who were looking for something fresh and different in their smartphone. Phones 4u continue to offer the broadest range of Windows Phones, which makes it a great place to pop in and pick one up.”
See the full range below:
With Microsoft officially kicking off the Windows Phone 8 goodness tonight it just so happens that we have had in our possession for a few days the first of two new Windows Phone 8 devices from HTC – the 8X.
This has been my first time spent with WP8 and as I have owned a couple of WP7 handsets (and still do) it has been a breath of fresh air to get hold of this latest offering from HTC. However, I don’t think the OS build on our 8X is final and I’m hoping for some extra surprises from Microsoft tonight. As an example – Skype is not not currently available to download to the 8X even though it has been working on 7.5 for some months now.
It has been great though being able to resize the live tiles and select a few new extra colours. You can see our initial impressions and unboxing below but I think we will reserve final judgment for a little while longer. Give us some time to see if we get a further updates after the Microsoft press event and then we will be more than happy to compare Windows Phone 8 with the other smartphone options available as well as a future one – we are not forgetting BlackBerry 10.
According to mobilenewscwp, EE has not yet added VoLTE (voice over LTE) to its new 4G service meaning customers will still be reliant on a 3G connection and it will only be data that utilizes the new 4G technology.
While technically speaking I can’t see why this would make a difference to voice calls anyway, where it may have an affect is with the smartphone switching from 3G to 4G as this will deplete your battery life to a certain extent. Although I use a BlackBerry as my main device I always have it connected to 3G only instead of 2G & 3G for this very reason. I’m sure the difference isn’t huge but with smartphones getting bigger and more juice hungry each year every little battery saving tip helps in my opinion.
EE chief sales officer Marc Allera told Mobile News: “I can tell you we are not carrying voice over 4G to start with, it’s data only.”
“We are not talking about time scales on that yet. At the moment we are focusing on delivering this brand launch and getting as many people as possible using data over 4G.
“Then we will look at the voice aspects when we are ready,” Allera said.
Source: mobilenewscwp
Posted by: James
It would appear that Vodafone are teaming up with East Midlands Trains in a bid to give commuters on the rail network the best mobile connection possible. Travelers to London are set to get a signal boost which is to be installed into 27 trains by early next year.
The operator hopes to complete the project, which will see equipment designed to boost mobile signal installed on 27 trains, by early 2013.
East Midlands Trains managing director David Horne said: “Our engineers have worked in partnership with Vodafone to install these boosters, which strengthen mobile phone signals, ensuring a stronger and more constant reception.
“Already, all of our trains to London have on-board Wi-Fi and by improving mobile phone signals this helps to enhance the customer experience and allow travellers to work even more efficiently or stay in touch with family, friends or colleagues whilst on the move.”
Vodafone UK enterprise commercial marketing director Peter Boucher said: “Our customers have told us that coverage on trains ranks very high on their list. Now they can keep up to date on what’s most important to them – friends, family and their online lives even on the daily commute or trip into town.
“Equally, business customers are finding better ways of working as they can stay connected so they have the flexibility to work from wherever they need to be. This activity is part of our on-going commitment to providing Britain with the best network.”
Let’s just hope this proves to be more successful than the current trains that offer Wi-Fi, as that normally is extremely hit and miss from my experience.
Source: mobilenewscwp
Posted by: James
Apparently some pics of the soon-to-be-released Samsung/Google Nexus 10 Tablet manual have just been released. While a manual is hardly as exciting as pics of the actual device, they potentially confirm the existence of the device and seemingly validate all the previous rumours. Of course, it could all be fake, but creating a whole user-manual seems like an awful lot of trouble to go through just to pull off a hoax.
We only have to wait until Monday to find out for sure. Although these pics of the manual don’t confirm this, supposedly the display for this next Nexus tablet device will surpass the quality of the Retina display in the 3rd Gen iPad. Just had to point that out.
Source: NexusTablets.net via CNET
Posted by: Gareth
It looks like owning a HTC smartphone could save you some pennies with their new ‘Smart ‘Deals’ money saving initiative which is announced today.
HTC has built partnerships with 12 leading deal providers including Living Social and Trip Advisor, allowing you to take advantage of a host of deals in your local area. These can range from Michelin-starred dining and luxury spa breaks to supercar racing days and hot air balloon rides.
Best Deals will be available on Windows Phone 8X and 8S handsets which launch in November, and HTC One X+. It will also be available on HTC One X and HTC One S through an upcoming software update.
You can read the full press release below:
The HTC Desire X may not be top of the range but looking at its specs, size and taking into consideration its price I think it will probably be a pretty popular device. Running Android Ice Cream Sandwich, with a nice 4 inch super LCD display and coupled with HTC’s Sense UI the Desire X will just feel like a natural progression for many folk that are looking to upgrade but don’t need the all singing/all dancing massive high end smartphone.
This video clearly isn’t a retail packaged one but this is normally the case when we get our first review devices from HTC direct. If we do get our hands on a retail one we will of course bring you a short and sweet video of that one too so you can see what you will be getting with your purchase.
You can check out the video below along with the HTC Desire X full specifications:
Today, Microsoft announced the availability of Windows 8 for its customers in the United Kingdom and around the world. Beginning on Friday, October 26, consumers and businesses worldwide will be able to experience all that Windows 8 has to offer: a beautiful new UI, a wide range of apps with the grand opening of the Windows Store, available on more than 1000 Windows 8 certified PCs and tablets.
Windows 8 will be available for download to upgrade existing PCs in over 140 markets and 37 languages at windowsupgradeoffer.com, and at retail locations around the world including PC World, John Lewis and other computer retailers.
“With the launch of Windows 8, Microsoft is unveiling a reimagined Windows to the world,” said Jean-Pierre Van Tiel, UK Director of Windows, Microsoft. “Whether you want a tablet or a PC, whether you want to consume or create, whether you want to work or play – Windows 8 delivers a personalized experience that fits your unique style and needs.”
Windows 8 will be available in two versions at retail, Windows 8 and Windows 8 Pro. And for our business customers, Windows 8 Enterprise offers new possibilities in mobile productivity with features like Windows To Go, DirectAccess, and BranchCache, as well as enhanced end-to-end security with features including BitLocker and AppLocker. Launching at the same time is a new member of the Windows family designed for ARM-based tablets, Windows RT, which will be available pre-installed on new devices. Windows 8 features the new fast and fluid Start screen that gives people one-click access to the apps and content they care most about, the entirely new Internet Explorer 10 that is perfect for touch, and built-in cloud capabilities with SkyDrive.
Connect
Connect with us on the following social media platforms.