Latest Gadgets, Tablets and Smartphones
As expected, Apple [AAPL] has taken down the Apple store in various countries. The store went down this morning and is expected to be down for the next couple of hours.
When the store loads back up, we expect to see details of the new MacBook Pro range included and at a push… a white iPhone 4? We doubt the latter, but the former of the two is certainly expected. [Read more…]
iFixit has done the usual, and taken apart a Samsung Galaxy S 4G smartphone.
This particular teardown included setting parts of the phone on fire to test and see what materials were used. Specifically, the team were looking for traces of magnesium.
Some interesting points include a higher capacity battery that is 1650mAh. iFixit say this increased battery storage might be a result of the higher power demands these faster phones are making. [Read more…]
Earlier this week we wrote that the Motorola Xoom was launching today and along side that launch, details of how to upgrade to 4G were being made available. Droid-Life managed to get hold of the details a little earlier that let us know what the requirements are.
The basic details indicate that the device ships 3G today. In about 90 days time, some time in May, Verizon will announce the 4G upgrade process is available. This will require that you ship your Motorola Xoom to them and in 6 or so days, they will update the hardware to 4G (free of charge) and also update the software. Once done, you’ll get the Xoom back and will be able to surf at 4G speeds. [Read more…]
Barnes & Noble has announced that the Nook eBook reader accounts for 25 percent of the eBook market in the US.
“We intend for Barnes & Noble to be a leader in the exploding market for digital content”. “We now represent 25 percent of the e-book market in the U.S., larger than our share in physical books. We sell twice as many e-books as all formats of physical books combined on BN.com.” [Read more…]
Angry Birds has been available on Android smartphones for a while now. But unlike the iOS version that you need to pay for, the Android version is free. The downside is that it is supported by ads.
A number of people would prefer to pay a dollar or 2 to get rid of the ads. When asked on Twitter when an ad free version was due to launch, Rovio responded as follows
@rbtdev @thetechchat give us another month and we’ll be there
You may remember yesterday that reports were appearing saying that the new Windows Phone 7 update is causing problems for the Samsung Omnia 7 smartphone.
The update being installed was a very minor update that made a few changes to the way WP7 will update in the future. However, when this process was run on the Omnia 7, it caused a few devices to be bricked, which is to say they were rendered useless due to a fault in the update.
We now hear that Microsoft has stopped the update for those running Samsung devices due to a problem being found. As soon as Microsoft [MSFT] manage to fix it, they’ll allow the remaining devices to be updated. [Read more…]
Apple is more than likely going to be announcing a new refresh of the MacBook Pro range tomorrow. It is expected that these will be going on sale as early as tomorrow.
Website fscklog.com posted an image of the specs which include the following:
• 2.3Ghz Sandy Bridge Dual-Core Intel Core i5 Processor with a 3MB L3 Cache
• 4GB of DDR3 RAM clocked at 1333MHz
• A 320GB hard drive
• a 13.3-inch diagonal LED backlit display with a 1280×800 pixel resolution.
• Intel HD Graphics 3000 with 384MB of DDR3 RAM.
• An integrated FaceTime-HD camera
• An 8x Superdrive
• Two USB 2 ports, an SD card reader, FireWire 800, a MiniDisplay Port, Ethernet and, most interestingly, Thunderbolt port (perhaps Light Peak?)
Earlier today, rumors hinted that Apple [AAPL] would be holding an iPad event on the 2nd March. This rumor has now been confirmed by the way of an invite as pictured above.
The iPad 2 will be announced this coming Wednesday along with what we believe to be pricing and an official release date. It isn’t clear if the iPad 2 will be released in mid to late March or early April, but expect it a few weeks after the announcement next week. [Read more…]
At MWC a few weeks back, we had the chance to see the Samsung Galaxy Tab 10.1 being announced (device pictured above). We now hear rumors about Samsung releasing an 8.9 inch version that could potentially be called the Samsung Galaxy Tab 8.9.
This new model will sit right between the Android 2.2 Galaxy Tab (7 inch model) and the newly announced Android 3.0 Honeycomb Galaxy Tab 10.1. This new model will also run the Android Honeycomb operating system it is believed. This comes from the Android 2.X range being good for devices up to 7 inches in size, so the 8.9 model is likely to get Honeycomb. [Read more…]
Some pictures have leaked of a 13 inch MacBook Pro that are believed to be the new 2011 model that could be launching as early as tomorrow.
One rumor that accompanies this is that Apple will also utilize some kind of Light Peak connector for high speed transfer between devices. This particular rumor was further strengthened last night when Intel announced an event also being held tomorrow. [Read more…]
Apple [AAPL] has scheduled a staff meeting for retail employees to be held on February 27. Attendance at the meeting requires that all staff sign an NDA from what sources say.
What can be expected at this meeting is that Apple could announce Joint Venture which is a service that could bring Apple Geniuses in to the homes of prosumers as well as to small businesses. The service would also be offered one-to-one over the phone if needed.
Google is beginning to roll out Android 2.3.3 to the Nexus S and Nexus One smartphones. This will bring both models up to the very latest version and bring new features to each device.
One thing to note is that the Nexus S is more advanced than the Nexus One in that it has NFC built in. This particular Android 2.3.3 update is mainly for updates to NFC in terms of being able to write to tags instead of just reading like in 2.3. [Read more…]
