Besides the expected bump in CPU clock speed, the Xperia SL (LT26ii) will obviously add a couple of exclusive hues to the family of the Sony Xperia S.
Blue and pink are the colors of choice, making happy boys and girls alike.
We wish we knew more about the Xperia SL but all in its due time. A good guess for a launch date is the start of this September's IFA expo in Berlin. We'll see how it goes.
Source | ViaWith the Galaxy S III busy grabbing the headlines, a midrange smartphone has been making its way to a number of markets without much fanfare. But you can bet the Samsung Galaxy Ace 2 won't settle for the role of just another sequel. It has a chance to prove the Galaxy S III is not the only superhot smartphone Samsung has released this season.
Samsung Galaxy Ace 2 I8160 official photo
And it's going to use it. Aiming to deliver 90% of the benefits of its extremely popular sibling for a fraction of the price, the Samsung Galaxy Ace 2 plays to the company's strengths and might turn out to be one of the unsung heroes of the year.
Dual-core might not be top-dog material in the Android realm any more, but it's enough to run virtually all apps and give you a nice smooth sailing around the interface. The entrance of ST-Ericsson in the smartphone race has enabled Android OEMs to make sub-250 smartphones, with specs that would be considered high-end on any other platform. Now who would say no to a bargain like that?
The recent crop of inexpensive but reasonably powered droids also answers another criticism Android has been facing lately - that it fails to offer performance in a compact package. Sony was first to up the ante with the Xperia U and now Samsung is ready to rise to the challenge.
Samsung Galaxy Ace 2 I8160 at ours
The Koreans have stepped up the pricing of their smartphone a bit, but they are willing to throw in a larger screen and expandable storage, so it's going to be a pretty tough pick between those two. Let's waste no more time then and get down to testing - the answers should be coming as the review unfolds.
A new Motorola device has been spotted on Chinese e-commerce site Alibaba with the model number XT907.
Although not much is known about the handset, from the image it looks like a scaled down version of the current DROID RAZR (XT912). It is said to have a 540 x 960 resolution display, same as the DROID RAZR but due to the on-screen controls it is being reported as 540 x 888.
It has the same Kevlar back but the camera module does not stick out near the top, pointing towards a lower resolution camera and/or a thicker body. The camera also says just HD video, meaning it is a 720p camera instead of the FullHD camera on the DROID RAZR.
We can also see the Verizon badge on the back, along with 4G LTE.
According to Droid Life, the handset will have the Snapdragon S4 processor and will also come in a white version.
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HTC is obviously working on an immensely powerful smartphone. At least that's what the website of the popular GLBenchmark tool suggests.
Planned to launch on the Verizon network, the unannounced smartphone has a model number HTC6435, which seems to be a follow-up of the Rezound (HTC6425). What's more intriguing to us is what exactly does this baby have under the hood.
According to GLBenchmark, the HTC6435 is powered by a 1.5GHz processor, probably not the Snapdragon S4 that the One X boasts. Moreover, it has topped the S4 chipset with more than 110 FPS in the Egypt Offscreen and Pro 720p tests .
The tested device supposedly has a resolution of 17941080, which means it'll rock a 1080p display with room to spare for some onboard software buttons. And that is another first for HTC.
In order to achieve those incredible results, this mysterious HTC phone should be seriously rigged with top-of-the-shelf hardware. The Qualcomm MSM8960T chipset with the Adreno 320 GPU comes to mind but anything is possible.
Currently the leaked info shows it's running Android 4.0.4, but Jelly Bean might not be that far.
Source | Via
Popular analyst company Nielsen has published its report on the US smartphone market in the second quarter of 2012. The quarter saw smartphone growth continue as two thirds of all new customers picked a smartphone.
Android continues to be in lead, powering 51.8% of all US smartphones and 54.6% of the ones purchased over the past three months. And that was the quarter before the Samsung Galaxy S III was launched.
iOS is the other platform on the rise, with Apple's OS accounting for 34.3% of US smartphones and 36.3% of the newly acquired ones. Expectedly iOS is starting to lose pace in the third quarter of iPhone 4S availability, but things are bound to change once the iPhone 5 comes out.
BlackBerry is the only other platform on record by Nielsen and it continues its free fall. While the RIM OS still powers a respectable 8.1% of US smartphones, it only managed a market share of 4% with new subscribers. This means that it might soon join the dreaded "others" category, officially turning the US smartphone market into a two-horse race.
As for the platform that is hoping to escape that category - Windows Phone - only managed a market share of 1.3%. The Nokia Lumia lineup is still struggling to make an impact, covering just 0.3% of the market, despite the heavy promotion of the Lumia 900 by both the Finns and AT&T.
Source | Via
Remember the Sony LT30 Mint? We got the codename way back in January thanks to a leaked roadmap, which said the smartphone was supposed to launch in September and cost 560.
Then the LT30 device leaked via the Bluetooth certification with a bunch of juicy specs a 4.6-inch HD display, a 13 MP rear camera and an HD front one.
Today we get to see a few camera samples captured with the device and learn even more specs. The codenamed Sony Xperia Mint will be powered by a Snapdragon S4 chipset, featuring 1GB of RAM and will offer 16GB internal storage expandable via microSD slot and NFC connectivity. The phone is currently running on Android 4.0.4 ICS, but it may launch with 4.1 Jelly Bean.
Here are the 13MP camera samples.
Sony LT30 Mint camera samples
The Sony Mint (or at least the unit used to shoot those samples) was reportedly using an all-plastic body with curved and rubberized back. But we have to wait for some spy shots or better an official announcement. After all September is a few weeks away.
Source (in Bulgarian) | Via
Philips has been keeping under the smartphone radar lately, but now it is back with a bang announcing the W732 Droid.
Apparently, the company has heard the prayers of Android fans and their requests for devices with better battery life and that's exactly what the W732 offers. The huge 2,400mAh battery inside is rated to give you 13 hours of continuous talk time or 10.5 hours of web browsing on a single charge.
Sporting a 4.3-inch LCD IPS display with a resolution of 480x800 pixels, the Philips W732 runs Android 4.0 ICS on a 1 GHz single-core MediaTek MT6575 processor and has 1GB of RAM. And with a 5MP camera at the back and Wi-Fi, Bluetooth and GPS on board, this Android might turn out to be a pretty decent entry-level offering.
It measures the acceptable 126.37 x 67.44 x 12.3 mm, but tips the scales at over 166 grams, which can probably be attributed to the ample juice pack. The Philips also features two SIM slots, both of which support hot-swapping.
The Philips W732 will make its debut in China and Russia in the coming weeks and will be available in five colors - black, white, pink, blue and green. Pricing and plans for worldwide availability are yet to be announced.
Via
By now you may be aware of a certain Galaxy Nexus that was temporarily banned from selling in the US a while ago for infringing upon patents that belong to Apple. One of the patents in question was regarding local search where typing a word shows up matching results from various apps on your device, such as contacts, etc.
Although the trial for the Galaxy Nexus is still going on, Samsung doesn't want to take any risks with its newest flagship phone, the Galaxy S III, which is doing quite well and they intend to keep it that way.
So before Apple could go after the Galaxy S III as well, the Sprint and AT&T versions of the phones have quietly been updated where the offending feature has been removed, along with some other changes. Of course, Samsung must be working on some sort of workaround for the problem but for now, if you updated, the search functionality on your Sprint or AT&T device would be severely limited.
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The Xperia ST26i first popped up more than two months ago, but we've heard little about it since. Well, now, thanks to the Indonesian communications regulatory body we get to know its official name. The certificate for the upcoming smartphone was spied on the website of Postel and it listed its name as Sony Xperia J ST26i.
The ST26i model name stands for a mid-range device and the specifications we've heard so far confirm this status. The Sony Xperia J is will reportedly be built around a 4" (480 x 854 pixels) display and a Qualcomm MSM7627A chipset, which features a single-core Scorpion CPU clocked at 1GHz.
The Xperia J is supposed to launch with Android 4.0.4 ICS, but we still don't know if it will ever get a 4.1 Jelly Bean update. We hope Sony mentions something about it whenever it gets round to actually announcing the phone. Sadly, we don't have any information on when said announcement might happen or when the Xperia J will actually hit the shelves.
Source | Via
T-Mobile US will launch new versions of the widely popular myTouch and myTouch Q smartphones.
Both devices feature similar specs, except the myTouch Q adds a sliding four-row QWERTY keyboard.
The new generation T-Mobile myTouch and myTouch Q are manufactured by Huawei and pack 4-inch WVGA TFT displays, 1.4GHz single-core processors, 5 megapixel snappers with HD video recording, secondary video-call cameras and the usual connectivity packages (Wi-Fi, Bluetooth, HSPA+).
The myTouch and myTouch Q are running on the outdated Android 2.3 Gingerbread OS with the familiar T-Mobile myTouch UI on top of it.
The phones will hit the T-Mobile US network on August 8 and will cost $50 (after $50 mail in-rebate) with a two-year contract.
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Samsung and Verizon have announced their plans on selling a special developer edition of the Galaxy S III in the US that will come with a bootloader that can be unlocked by the user. The phone will be sold without a contract for $599. Do note that the phone will still be locked to Verizon's network.
As you may be aware by now, the Verizon version of the Galaxy S III is the only one that ships with a locked bootloader. Through this developer edition, those who want the freedom to mess around with their phone and still be on Verizon's network now have an option, albeit an expensive one.
There is no information as to when this version of the phone will be available but it will be sold through Samsung's developer website.
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AT&T is finally rolling out the Android 4.0 Ice Cream Sandwich update to the Galaxy Note in the US. Although the international version received this update a while ago, those using the AT&T version can now join the fun as well.
Just like the international version, the AT&T version of the Galaxy Note also gets the special Premium Suite of apps along with stuff that Android 4.0 brings. As we discussed before, the Premium Suite of apps brings special S-Pen related features, such as the ability to draw shapes and getting them automatically corrected (for example, you can draw a rough square and the phone will automatically correct it to a proper square), solving hand-drawn equations and searching for them on Wolfram|Alpha and creating personalized card that you can send to people.
The update is now rolling out so make sure you check your phone to see if it is available.
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A few days ago, we reported that the official Android 4.0.4 for the Galaxy S II has been leaked and was available for download for those could not wait for it to arrive over the air.
Well, if you are one of those who did wait, you will be glad to know that the Android 4.0.4 update is now rolling out over the air for the Galaxy S II. The update brings some performance updates and bug fixes and is only available for the international model for now.
If you have one of these devices then you should check to see if the update is available for download. You will need to connect your phone to Kies to download the update.
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Google developer Jean-Baptiste Queru, also known as JBQ, has announced on Google Groups that they are now releasing the Android 4.1 Jelly Bean source code to Android Open Source Project (AOSP).
The name of the tagged release is android-4.1.1_r1 and the name of the development branch is jb-dev. The binaries are currently being released for the Nexus 7 and the Galaxy Nexus but will be released for the Nexus S and the Motorola Xoom shortly.
What this means to you is that if you rely on someone like CyanogenMod for your Android ROMs then you can expect a Jelly Bean based ROM very soon as the developers can now begin their work on it, now that they have the source code.
Do note that Google is only uploading the source code for now and this does not mean that you will get the Android 4.1 OTA update to your Nexus device just yet. That is still slated for a mid-July release and will be followed by uploading of the factory images on Google's site.
For more info, click on the source link below.
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Nokias vice president of worldwide developer relations Richard Kerris confirmed in an interview for Neowin that Verizon and Sprint will get Nokia Windows Phone smartphones soon.
Currently the Lumia smartphones are only available in the USA on the AT&T and T-Mobile network. We guess the other major carriers are also ready to jump on board once the first Windows Phone 8 devices come out.
We also got yet another confirmation of the PureView technology coming to the Lumia lineup. According to Richard Kerris it will be out "very soon", which probably means that an announcement at Nokia World in September is on the cards.
The Finns are running out of time and it is only logical that they put everything into the upcoming WP8 smartphones. And as we found out the PureView technology is one of their best weapons in this fight.
Source | Via
Developers accessing Nokia's online RDA tool over the weekend were in for a nice surprise as they spotted a number of unannounced devices by searching for other available devices near-by over Bluetooth.
Last year, we first heard of the Nokia Lumia 900 WindowsPhone in this fashion, so it's generally a legit source of leaked device names.
Well, the whole thing started yesterday with the appearance of one Nokia Lumia 910 in the list of discoverable devices via Bluetooth during a regular session with the RDA tool.
The Remote Device Access (RDA) is a service that allows developers to test their mobile applications and services remotely on various Nokia devices via a regular browser. Devs can remotely control a device, install and run applications on it, or transfer files.
In one of these test sessions later on, another device popped up - the Nokia Lumia 1001. Now that's a serious model name jump and this might suggest it's either a Windows Phone 8 device, or even a tablet.
As things heated up and the interest for the RDA tool grew immensely, people who logged in started finding all sorts of unannounced devices this way. Enter the Nokia Lumia 920, the Lumia 950, the Nokia 510, and the Nokia Belle 805.
Now take all these with a pinch of salt. Given the hype surrounding the RDA tool since yesterday, it might as well be a case of other devs messing with the available test units to display fake Bluetooth IDs. So for now consider this as just a heads-up. We won't go as far as analyzing the model names and potential market positioning, as they might turn out bogus.
Thanks to everyone who sent these in!Few weeks ago we reported that Nokia plans to sell the 808 PureView in the US through Amazon.com. Now the phone is in stock on Amazon and is being sold for $699 without a contract and unlocked.
As is the case with unlocked GSM phones in the US, you will be able to use it with an AT&T or T-Mobile SIM.
While the price is way to high when compared to some of the other markets where the phone is sold and especially for the US market where people are used to spending no more than $200 on a high-end smartphone on a contract, it is still at least an option to someone who might have considered purchasing this phone for the camera and now doesn't have to go through the trouble of importing it from other regions.
So are you that someone who was waiting for this phone and are now going to get it regardless of the price? Or do you think you will skip it and wait for the inevitable Windows Phone devices with PureView technology? Do let us know in the comments below.
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Here is a great piece of news for everyone who loves MeeGo. The Finnish startup Jolla Ltd. will develop smartphones running the Linux-based platform. More importantly however, Jolla will practically pick up the effort right from the point where Nokia left off - the newly formed company's core staff are the people who gave us the already iconic N9.
Marc Dillon is the Chief Operating Officer of Jolla Ltd. He has been with Nokia for almost eleven years. From January 2006 until his departure, he was the Principal Engineer for MeeGo at Nokia.
Quite naturally, we are eager to find out as much as possible about Jolla's future plans. As always, we'll keep you posted when there is something to announce. In the meantime, feel free to check out the newborn company's Linkedin profile by hitting the source link below.
Thanks to everyone who sent this in!
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