by Matthew on October 28, 2009
Earlier today we posted about Google Maps Navigation. The navigation program is free for Android 2.0 based devices and could potentially be a more popular option than the other free satnav software available from a few companies. We just came across the official video showing a tutorial of exactly what the software is capable of doing.
As mentioned on the video (below) the Google Maps Navigation features voice guidance and turn by turn navigation which is exactly what is required on Android based phones. [click to continue…]
by Matthew on October 28, 2009
After seeing a review, pictures, teasers of the new Motorola Droid it has now been made official. It will be going to the Verizon network in the US on 6th November costing $200 after a rebate.
From the announcement we see that Droid doesn’t refer to just this particular phone and instead, it’s a family of phones with this Droid being the first. Spec wise it has a 3.7″ screen that can display 480 x 854 pixels along with a Cortex A8 processor. For storage the Droid has a 16GB SD card included in the package.
The only real thing that’s new here is the dock that you get. Other than that the biggest thing is the software it runs. Motorola Droid runs Android 2.0 which was officially announced by Google yesterday and is a fantastic update to the previous 1.5/1.6 versions currently available. Google just today announced that they are offering a free navigation application for Android 2.0 owners which furthers the abilities of the phone. [click to continue…]
by Matthew on October 28, 2009
Google [GOOG] have announced that they have created Google Maps Navigation that will be available on Android 2.0 phones. The new navigation system is free and is far better than the standard Maps program that is currently available. Whereas before the map system wouldn’t hand out directions (although it could follow you), the new version provides full navigation features.
The Google Maps Navigation is completely free which gives it an advantage and it works based on data downloaded as needed so you wont actually need to download all the maps. Searching is made easy as you can voice search and don’t necessarily need to know the full address to plan a route. The system also can use traffic information and use street view for helping you in your travels. [click to continue…]
by Matthew on October 28, 2009
Mobiles.co.uk based in the UK have now priced up the HTC HD2 on their site along with the prices of contracts for both 18 and 24 month periods. The cheapest you’ll get a HD2 for is free based on a £40/month 24 month contract with the monthly contract dropping to just £15 if you are willing to pay £259.99 for the phone. That’s not a bad price for this much anticipated phone.
A quick reminder of specs show the HD2 has a 4.3 inch display that uses capacitive touch and also reacts to multitouch too. The phone uses HTC’s Sense UI installed on top of Windows Mobile 6.5. A 1GHz Snapdragon processor makes the OS run smoothly. Connectivity wise it has HSDPA, WiFi, Bluetooth and for location based services GPS is also included. [click to continue…]
by Matthew on October 28, 2009
Symbian have launched the Horizon App store that aims to compete against app stores already open by Android, BlackBerry, iPhone and Windows Mobile. The Horizon App store went live today along with the first 50 applications. Symbian also have plans to allow 1000’s more applications through the system next year.
The Symbian operating system is used on a lot of phones including many Nokia phones, Samsung, Sony Ericsson etc… and a lot of these companies already have started app stores. Nokia for example, has the Nokia Ovi store. Each of these app stores will support the new Horizon store and integrate offerings in to their stores. [click to continue…]
by Matthew on October 28, 2009
If you are wondering if it’s time to upgrade from good old trusty Windows XP or not so trusty Windows Vista to Windows 7 then the Windows 7 Review series over at Zath is doing a pretty good job at describing the features that have changed and what’s new in the just released operating system.
The review series covers items such as the new task bar, Aero, security, performance, file/software compatibility, applications included and finally on to what version you should be choosing. [click to continue…]
by Matthew on October 28, 2009
LG and Samsung have been showing off some cool transparent OLED displays. The LG screen measures 15 inches and could work in notebooks. Samsungs screen measures just 2 inches and could potentially be used in mobile phones.
It is unclear why transparent screens are needed unless perhaps used for shining light through to project on to a larger screen, but even if they have no purpose they still look rather good.
Instead of using the back section of the screen that prevents transparency, this has instead been removed. Each has a transparency of 30%. For the LG screen it is unknown what the resolution is, but the smaller Samsung screen can show 176 x 220 pixels. [click to continue…]
by Matthew on October 28, 2009
Google [GOOG] have launched the Google Powermeter service for people in the UK. The tool is based online and allows households to monitor their energy usage so that you know exactly what could be switched off.
The system has already been trialled in the US, and makes use of smart meters to relay information over to the web about how much power you are actually using. If you don’t have a new smart meter then you can purchase an add-on clip that works with regular power meters.
Once your meter is hooked up to the web and the Powermeter service from Google you can then log on from anywhere in the world to see how much power your set-top box and any lights left on are actually using which by being shown in graph form could help sway you to think if you actually need something switching on and left in standby while not in use. [click to continue…]
by Matthew on October 28, 2009
The Nokia Booklet 3G is soon to launch. Engadget in Spain managed to get their hands on a Nokia Booklet 3G for unboxing to see what it’s all about. Installed on the Booklet was Windows 7 Home Premium which is a step in the right direction from Best Buy which were showing a Windows 7 Starter Edition.
The video is after the jump, but for now a quick run down of the specs shows that the Booklet 3G weighs 1250g max, measures 264 x 185 x 19.9 mm, runs an Intel Atom Z530 1.6GHz processor and has 1GB of RAM. [click to continue…]
by Matthew on October 27, 2009
The highly anticipated HTC HD2 has just been unboxed and uploaded to Youtube in the last day. Although the box used is just a temporary box, it’s still good to see the actual phone and what it looks like while booting up etc…
We are still waiting for a HD2 to arrive here and have been told that there are no review units around anywhere just yet… so someone must have a a secret stash of them somewhere… do tell if you are one of those who know.
Items included in the box are a charger, hands free kit along with inline controls as well as a USB cable for charging/syncing. On to the phone it’s self, the most striking feature of the HTC HD2 is the huge screen that the phone has. It measures 4.3 inches and is capacitive as well as being multi-touch. Powering the phone is a 1GHz snapdragon processor to make things run quicker than average. OS wise it runs Windows Phone (WM 6.5) that uses HTC sense style overlay to make things run a little nicer. [click to continue…]
by Matthew on October 27, 2009
Toshiba have announced that they are to mass produce camera phone CMOS sensors that can capture images at 14.6 megapixels.
The new sensors will measure 1/2.3 inches and manufacturing will start in the 3rd quarter of 2010. To build the new camera sensors Toshiba will process them at 65nm on to 300mm wafers with a production rate of about half a million per month. [click to continue…]
by Matthew on October 27, 2009
Google [GOOG] this morning officially announced that Android 2.0 is now supported in the SDK. Android 2.0 was only first revealed just a couple of weeks back in a surprise video posted by Boy Genius Report and after their preview with it, it was revealed that a number of fantastic updates had been made.
Android 2.0 is also known as Eclair and it comes with a number of updates that allows more seamless integration on the device for contacts, syncing due to new API’s being created to provide a lot more power to the developers. Quick Contact is also capable of being embedded in to applications.
The new Bluetooth API provides a more seamless way of letting phones connect peer-to-peer for gaming which can include screen sharing where graphics on one screen can be seamlessly shifted on to a second phone like a multi-monitor setup. [click to continue…]
by Matthew on October 27, 2009
Asustek have revealed details on their first supercomputer this week named the ASUS ESC 1000. The ESC 1000 is capable of speeds up to 1.1 teraflops by using NVIDIA graphics processors.
One teraflop is one trillion flops (floating point operations per second), a measure of computing speed. Computers able to perform at such high speeds can be used in a variety of ways, including scientific research, image manipulation, engineering modeling or for medical purposes.
The ESC 1000 is powered by a 3.33GHz Intel LGA1366 Xeon W3580 processor that is designed for use in servers. What really gives this machine a good kick is the amount of processing cores it has. The machine has 960 graphics processing cores provided by NVIDIA with three Tesla C1060 Computing Processors along with a Quadro FX5800 each also provided by NVIDIA. [click to continue…]
by Matthew on October 27, 2009
Along with all the new announcements last week of the iMac, MacBook and Mac Mini the prices of RAM and CPU upgrades for the MacBook Pro quietly dropped.
From last week onwards you are now able to get a MacBook Pro (high end model) for just above $1000 which shaves a few hundred off the price. Also AppleInsider have reported that the Australian Apple store has also reduced prices on MacBook Pro configurations with the 17″ model dropping by up to $700 AUD down from $4000 to $3300 AUD. [click to continue…]
by Matthew on October 27, 2009
It seems like Nintendo may be launching a new Nintendo DSi that will have a larger 4 inch screen. The launch, according to Nikkei, will only be for Japan and the price for the new version will be the same as the price for the previous version.
The new larger screen is rumoured to be the same resolution of the smaller screen and simply just gives the option of 2 screen sizes when purchasing the DSi. [click to continue…]
