Archives for July 2010

RIM Demos BlackBerry 6 Media Capabilities

RIM has put up details on it’s site about the new upcoming BlackBerry 6 that will be launching soon. The details this time revolve around the media capabilities of the device and show what it can do in terms of music and video.

RIM has added music album art and discovery to BlackBerry 6. When you upload music to a smartphone running BlackBerry 6, album art is pulled down automatically if available.

The photos section has also been updated in BlackBerry 6 and allows users to easily sort through photos on the device. Organisation allows you to search by event or date. [Read more…]

Samsung PL200 Point and Shoot Camera Announced

Samsung has announced a new point and shoot digital camera called the Samsung PL200. The PL200 has a 14.2 megapixel sensor and sits in the mid-range P&S camera category.

The camera is capable of capturing video in HD format 720p at 30 frames per second.

“The PL200 is the ideal digital camera for those who value simplicity but also long for a more immersive digital imaging experience,” said Reid Sullivan, senior vice president of Mobile Entertainment Marketing, Samsung Electronics America. “With the PL200, consumers can experience the versatility offered by more advanced digital cameras, along with a comprehensive suite of automatic controls, allowing them to step up to the next level of digital camera without stepping outside of their comfort zone.”

[Read more…]

Facebook Users amount to 500 Million

Earlier this week we mentioned that Facebook was about to reach a huge milestone by the 500 millionth member signing up to use the service. As expected, this goal has now been reached.

The announcement was made by the Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg.

As expected, the company also is launching Facebook Stories which will see a number of cheesy stories published about how Facebook has had an impact on their life. [Read more…]

Dell Streak Coming to US Late July

The Dell Streak is almost available in the US. Loading up the Dell website we see that a date of July 2010 has been provided for you to get your hands on the tablet.

There is no exact date unfortunately but as it’s the 22nd today, that gives them 9 days to get it released.

The Dell Streak is an interesting device that runs Google Android. It has a 5 inch screen putting it in between the size of a smartphone and a larger tablet such as the iPad. On the back is a 5 megapixel camera and on the front, a VGA camera allowing for video calls to be made. [Read more…]

HP Slate 500 brings Eight Windows 7 Tablets to Choose From

It appears that eight variations a Windows 7 based HP Slate could be launched.

Don’t too excited just yet. These models are anything but official as they were simply found on some random HP product listing. However, the brief description ” embedded below ” should make some people’s day. It seems like the original HP Slate complete with Windows 7, 8.9-inch screen, dual cameras, and ” this is new ” some sort of stylus/pen input.

Details now indicate that as well as creating a webOS tablet, HP are also still working along side Microsoft [MSFT] to create the Slate as originally described earlier this year. [Read more…]

Android 2.2 Gaining More Distribution

Every couple of weeks, Google [GOOG] publish details on the distribution of Android on smartphones and tablets. A couple of weeks ago Android 2.2 started showing up on the chart with 1.8% share. In the last 2 weeks the new installs of the 2.2 froyo update have now moved to 3.3%.

Android 2.1 hasn’t suffered here though as distribution shows that it has moved from a 53.1% share up to a 55.5% share over the last two weeks.

The drops have occurred on the Android 1.5 and 1.6 builds where the 23.5% share 1.6 had two weeks ago is now 22.1% and Android 1.5 has dropped from 21.3% down to 18.9%. [Read more…]

Millions of Routers are Vulnerable to a New Hack

Millions of routers like the one pictured here have a vulnerability that allows hackers to intercept and redirect traffic as well as access computers on a local network.

The list of vulnerable routers tested so far can be found in a Google spreadsheet where the last column indicates whether the specific router listed is prone to this sort of attack.

The research has been performed by Seismic who are a security consultancy based in Maryland.

Craig Heffner, a researcher with the company, will both present the research at Black Hat and release a proof-of-concept tool to demonstrate the problem in practice. Heffner believes this is the best way to get router manufacturers to release firmware updates to fix the issue.

[Read more…]

Sony to Demo 360 Degree Autostereoscopic Display at Siggraph

Back in October last year, Sony showed off a new display that was capable of 360 degree 3D image. A similar prototype is going on display at Siggraph next week that also has interaction with users. Those viewing the 3D autostereoscopic display can use gestures to move the image around.

The full 360 degree image works in 1 degree seperations. No 3D glasses are needed according to the text on the Youtube video embedded below. [Read more…]

Android Smartphone Solves 7x7x7 Rubiks Cube

By mixing a LEGO NXT kit and a Droid smartphone, the 7x7x7 Rubiks cube has been solved in 38 minutes and 53 seconds. That might seem slow, but when compared to a traditional 3x3x3 cube there’s far more combinations and moves needed.

The whole kit was built by David Gilday who managed to port the cube solving robot software on to an Android device. [Read more…]

Google Images Update Incoming

Google [GOOG] appears to be in the process of giving the Google Images service a revamp. The new Google Images has a more user friendly interface and is able to show more images on the screen at once due to the text below each image hiding away when not needed.

Rather than being restricted to a certain amount of images per page, Google has opted for a scrollable wall where you can carry on scrolling with the image thumbnails loading up as needed.

Right now it doesn’t appear to be up and running but we suspect it will load up shortly as Google push it out to servers. [Read more…]

Apple Pulls App from App Store that Sneakily Added Internet Tethering

An application was recently approved by Apple [AAPL] that acted as a flashlight. The app was called Handy Light and from a quick look at it, it appeared to be a flash light app that simply lit up the iPhone so you could see better in the dark.

Nick Lee, the developer of the Handy Light app, managed to sneakily insert some code that enabled tethering on the iPhone. The app cost $1 and by tapping a sequence of colours on the screen a hidden function enabled the tethering features of the iPhone.

The reasons we believe it was pulled was not only for sneakily adding code in and pulling the wool over Apple’s eyes, but it also allowed users to access tethering which would normally cost those on AT&T [T] an extra $20/month. [Read more…]

Apple Indicated the Free iPhone Case to fix Signal Problems will Cost $175M

Apple [AAPL] last week revealed in the press conference that they were to provide a free case to all iPhone 4 owners and all those who plan to buy an iPhone 4 up till September 30. At that point the situation will be re-evaluated.

On the earnings call yesterday a question was asked about the free case and the impact it will have…

“Any way to quantify the impact of the free bumpers on next quarter?”

To which an answer came…

“Two impacts. We will need to defer revenue for the iPhone 4s that we’ve sold where we’ve not delivered the bumpers and we haven’t heard from the customers. Our estimate is $175 million. We will expense the cost of the bumpers when we ship them to customers. Our most important objective is to take care of every customer and delight them.” [Read more…]