ViewSonic ViewPad 7e, 149€ 8″ resistive tablet

Posted by – September 2, 2011

It runs Gingerbread using the 1Ghz Samsung ARM Cortex-A8 processor. It’s a resistive 8″ screen, to be sold for around 149€.

Opera TV Store at IFA 2011

Posted by – September 2, 2011

Opera Software presents a new Web TV user interface for the set-top-box market, one that requires least processing power to run, to enable any HDTV access to the Web, video on the web, apps, widgets and more.

Archos G9 € European pricing announced at IFA 2011

Posted by – September 1, 2011

These cool new Archos tablets start at 249€ for the 8″ 8GB 1Ghz, 299€ for the 10.1″ 8GB 1Ghz device. Consider US prices do not include VAT so similar $249 to $299 starting price can perhaps be expected in the US, though the $ is weak at the moment so US prices might start at something closer to $299 and $349 (to be confirmed officially tomorrow). You get 1.5Ghz processor speed when you choose the 16GB or 250GB versions that are slightly more expensive. Also check back for my further videos tomorrow on the Archos G9 series, I will ask them about the performance and more.

Samsung Galaxy Tab 7.7, Super AMOLED Plus, 1.4Ghz Dual-core, Honeycomb 3.2 with TouchWiz UI

Posted by – September 1, 2011

Wow, Samsung can make 7.7″ Super AMOLED Plus screens and this new tablet of theirs is thin and quite light. Not the lightest 7″ tablet 335gr as the Archo 70 Internet Tablet released last year is 300gr. Also, while it’s thin and light, they did make it slightly wider in size which seems to make it harder to fit it in all the jacket pockets, that’s too bad. But, the design is not final, maybe before they release it they manage to cut a few millimeters off the bezel to make it fit in jacket pockets. This tablet runs Honeycomb 3.2 nicely but with some TouchWiz UI customizations, this is no vanilla Android.

Pictures of it next to the Archos 70 Internet Tablet:



Toshiba AT200, 1.2Ghz OMAP4430, 7.7mm thin Honeycomb 3.2 Tablet

Posted by – September 1, 2011

Here’s the worlds thinnest 10.1″ IPS tablet. Only 7.7mm thickness.

Samsung Galaxy Note, 5.3″ Super AMOLED Plus, 1.4Ghz Dual-core, with N-Trig S Pen stylus input

Posted by – September 1, 2011

Awesome new 5.3″ Super AMOLED Plus hybrid device from Samsung. It runs on the new 1.4Ghz Dual-core processor (upgraded Exynos?), will probably run Ice Cream Sandwich beautifully. So it’s capacitive and also has what looks to be the N-Trig stylus input technology also used on the HTC flyer to let you input handwritten scribbles and annotations such as in a notepad app but also in new S Pen apps and things like annotating a screenshot of any Android instance. As you can see in this video, the 5.3″ screen is huge compared to the already big 4.3″ Samsung Galaxy S2 screen, which really is awesome because I believe even this device fits nicely and confortably in most pockets.

This extra size, in my opinion, really does provide for extra potential productivity, better video playback, better web browsing on its amazing 1280×800 resolution, this size and resolution offers a better hybrid of the Honeycomb and Ice Cream Sandwich features that are coming up.

Toshiba shows a live 55″ Quad-HD HDTV demo

Posted by – September 1, 2011

Quad HD is cool, here is Toshiba’s latest Quad-HD TV technology.

Toshiba FlashAir 8GB SDHC card makes a WiFi-G hotspot from any SDHC device

Posted by – September 1, 2011

We’ve seen the EyeFi do something like this before, this is Toshiba’s new entry into this market of enabling any SDHC device, for example any photo and video camera to transfer wirelessly and stream content out to any other WiFi device around it.

Toshiba Stor.E TV Pro, Rockchip RK2918 Linux based Connected Set-top-box

Posted by – September 1, 2011

Toshiba is using Rockchip RK2918 ARM Cortex-A8 processor in this new low cost Internet set-top-box.

Toshiba Portege Z835 Ultrabook, $999 starting price

Posted by – September 1, 2011

Here’s a very thin Ultrabook from Toshiba.

Lenovo IdeaPad U300s Ultrabook, $1199 starting price

Posted by – September 1, 2011

Lenovo is launching this new Ultrabook based on the second generation Intel Core i5 and Core i7 processors, pricing starts at $1199, goes up perhaps to about $1999 with all kinds of options in terms of dual or quad core processor, 128GB or 256GB SSD memory, 2GB, 4GB or 8GB RAM. They have done some ventilation design so there are no vents under the laptop, it’s aluminium everywhere, so it stays cold under the laptop even though this is a quite powerful new processor.

Lenovo ThinkPad, enterprise Tegra2 tablet

Posted by – September 1, 2011

Lenovo is doing 2 versions of their Tegra2 Android tablets, the IdeaPad is for consumers, the ThinkPad is for enterprise. It’s got to do with different components and design, different software and other.

Lenovo A1, 7″ 1024×600 Single-core Gingerbread Tablet

Posted by – September 1, 2011

Here’s a cheap new Lenovo Tablet targetted at the sub-$300 price point. It might use the Rockchip RK2918, or it might be some other processor similar to that, to be confirmed. Please post in the comments if you find out which processor it is using..

Samsung NX200 camera, 20.3Megapixels APS-C sensor, interchangeable lenses

Posted by – September 1, 2011

Samsung releases their new slim mirror-less DSLR-alternative of a photo camera with interchangeable lenses and a bunch of new camera UI features.

Samsung Multiview MV800 camera with fold-out screen and touch screen functions

Posted by – September 1, 2011

This is Samsung’s new Multiview MV800 has a fold-out 3″ AMOLED screen, takes pictures, and provides a bunch of picture modes that can be accessed through the Home screen menu on the touch screen on this camera.

Samsung Wave 3, Bada 2.0, 4″ Super AMOLED Plus

Posted by – September 1, 2011

Here’s the newest Samsung Bada phone, running the Bada 2.0 software on a 4″ Super AMOLED Plus screen, this is probably aimed at lower cost, although Android does allow Samsung to lower the cost of smartphones as well, so I am not really sure what Samsung is trying to do with Bada. Maybe Samsung wants to option of being able to own a smartphone ecosystem to try to profit as much as possible on every level of the value chain of the phone all the while trying to sell it for cheap. I prefer the cheap Samsung Android phones though.

20 years ago today, Linux was released

Posted by – August 26, 2011

On August 26th 1991, Linus Torvalds released Linux in the comp.os.minix newsgroup:

Hello everybody out there using minix –
I’m doing a (free) operating system (just a hobby, won’t be big and
professional like gnu) for 386(486) AT clones. This has been brewing
since april, and is starting to get ready. I’d like any feedback on
things people like/dislike in minix, as my OS resembles it somewhat
(same physical layout of the file-system (due to practical reasons)
among other things).
I’ve currently ported bash(1.08) and gcc(1.40), and things seem to work.
This implies that I’ll get something practical within a few months, and
I’d like to know what features most people would want. Any suggestions
are welcome, but I won’t promise I’ll implement them 🙂
Linus (torvalds@kruuna.helsinki.fi)
PS. Yes – it’s free of any minix code, and it has a multi-threaded fs.
It is NOT protable (uses 386 task switching etc), and it probably never
will support anything other than AT-harddisks, as that’s all I have :-(.

The creation of Linux was possible thanks to the Socialist system in Finland that provides free unlimited University education to its students, where Linus Torvalds was able to mess around with his own personal ideas for 8 and a half years for free:

Some talk by Linus Torvalds about Linux 10 years ago on the Charlie Rose TV show:

While Linux totally dominates in your smart phone (Android), in your TV/set-top-box, in the worlds servers that host all websites, in powering Government and Industry infrastructure, I believe that with Chrome OS and OLPC we are also soon likely to see Linux dominate for the home and enterprise desktop/laptop OS ecosystem.

Samsung to unveil Nexus Prime next week at IFA Berlin? I will video-blog it

Posted by – August 22, 2011
Category: Smartphones, IFA, Android

I video-blogged every IFA consumer electronics trade show in Berlin every year since 2005 (the last 2 years are here and my archive for 2005-2008 is here), I will be there again this time, bringing you 75 videos of the coolest new products to be shown there. Subscribe to my RSS feed, add my RSS to your Google Reader and subscribe to my YouTube channel for the latest. Here’s a teaser video from Samsung of what may be that rumored 4.5″ 1280×720 Super AMOLED mega Plus screen, running Ice Cream Sandwich on an OMAP4460 1.5Ghz or a new 1.4Ghz Samsung Exynos processor? It might be..

If you have any tips on new cool products that I should video-blog at IFA, let me know here in the comments, or send me an email charbax@gmail.com with the info, thanks!

$80 Huawei IDEOS sells 350K units thus far in Kenya

Posted by – August 18, 2011

SingularityHub.com publishes this article about the explosion of access to cheap Android phones in the developing world. Already 350 thousand $80 Huawei IDEOS have been sold through Kenya’s carrier Safaricom. Kenya has a population of 41 million people, 40% are said to live with less than $2 per day.

The developing world, Africa, BRIC countries Brazil, Russia, India, China, access to cheaper Android in those countries, that is the most interesting story in technology today. Sure we will all also get better, faster, more powerful, more colorful and more featureful gadgets soon also. But the idea that 5 Billion people may soon experience the Internet for the first time through Android smart phones, and thinking of what that can potentially do to improve peoples lives, that is the biggest story.

We’re talking better farming, better healthcare, better commerce, better education, better democracy. The potential is immense. Hopefully technology companies are really attentive, hopefully software developers are imaginative, hopefully telecom carriers and Governments embrace this for all and very fast, Android may reach sub-$50 phones before the end of this year to even further accelerate the reach and accessibility.

Here’s my video of the Huawei IDEOS as it was unveiled for the first time at the IFA 2010 consumer electronics show in Berlin (the next IFA 2011 is coming up in less than 2 weeks, I will provide you with a full video coverage of all the latest ARM Powered devices shown there):

Follow this blog for the latest news on the cheapest Android phones, I am trying to find some new MTK6573, ST U6715, MSM7227 and the upcoming new cheaper smart phone platforms out of China and elsewhere. Look forward to a lot of crazy cheap Android smart phone news in the months to come. By the way, I’ve used my $87 FG8 for the past 3 months as my main phone and it has worked great.

via: techmeme.com

Google buys Hardware company for $12.5 Billion

Posted by – August 16, 2011

Here are some numbers according to Josh Pritchard, posted on Quora about a week before this acquisition was announced:

–Motorola actually has ~$3.2B in cash (~$170M are “cash deposits”), with $200M more coming from Motorola Solutions, per the terms of the separation.
–They have $2.4B in deferred tax assets, that Google presumably plans to use (the media seems to be completely missing this one).

So, if you net the cash and tax assets, it’s more like ~$7B that Google is paying for the operating businesses and the patents.

Motorola Mobility has $6.2 Billion in assets (buildings and other stuff?) according to Wikipedia. Google gets 19 thousand new employees (up from 29 thousand current Google employees, a 65% jump in employee count).

Of course, what everyone is talking about are those 17 thousand patents and 7 thousand pending patents that Motorola Mobility has. Consider Motorola is a 80 year old company. Their patents most likely include many of the interesting Hardware Patents, I’m not a lawyer, but I am pretty sure strong Hardware Patents are worth much more than bogus software patents. This means Android, Chrome OS, Google TV can stay free and open source forever. Apple and Microsoft have to drop all their bogus lawsuits against Android companies immediately. Google now has the patent on the mobile phone, the Apple iPhone can be illegal tomorrow if Google wants it to be.

What do I think Google is going to do:

1. Ask the genius team behind the Motorola Atrix to join the Android team to make a platform that combines Ice Cream Sandwich, Google TV and Chrome OS into the ultimate ARM Powered device. Provide that solution as an all-in-one standard for the Android ecosystem and not just make it one product.

2. Interview any of the other 19 thousand employees at Motorola Mobility, ask who wants to work within Android, within Google or remain within Motorola Mobility and to do what. They can invent some genius interview process so somehow everyone gets what they want and what they deserve.

3. Maybe Samsung, HTC, Sony-Ericsson or simply the stock market are later offered to buy back the Motorola Mobility Hardware division without the patents but with free unlimited licence to use any of the patents on Android devices. In 6 months, if the stock market has somewhat recovered, Google may get all their money back for that.

4. Or Google can find use in owning Motorola, perhaps ask Motorola to design hardware such as Cheap $50 Android phones to bring Android to all people in the developing world, special focus on Brazil, Russia, India, China (potentially 1-2 Billion Android phones can be sold there in 1-2 years), Google can ask Motorola design $50 ARM Powered Google TV enabled Set-top-boxes that all consumers and all Pay-TV providers are going to use.

5. Maybe Android is mature enough (owning more than 80% of the smart phone market by the end of the year), Google may want to use Motorola to launch White Spaces networks worldwide for free wireless broadband for all. $99 Android phones unlocked that include unlimited free Google Voice, unlimited free wireless broadband in every city all over the world. White Spaces are unstoppable. Maybe this is the time. They can bundle a Motorola router with the phone, you plug it to your home ADSL/Cable/Fiber to expand that White Spaces network in your neighborhood.