In Western Europe, one of the biggest chains to sell smartphones is a company known — somewhat hysterically, given that no one has bought a dedicated carphone for fifteen years — as the Carphone Warehouse. But there will now be 60 less Carphone Warehouse stores in Europe… thanks to Samsung, who have snapped them up with the intention of turning them into dedicated Samsung Stores. And as a bonus? The deal will help Samsung challenge Apple’s retail dominance in Europe.
In what will probably end up being the most random buyout of the year, Lenovo has bought Motorola Mobility from Google for $2.91 billion. Google will maintain ownership of Motorola’s patent trove, which Lenovo will license.
Remember Sony’s clip-on smartphone cameras that were announced last year? Well, if you were one of the few who forked out hundreds of dollars to get one, you’ll be pleased to know it’ll soon be compatible with your tablet. Sony is launching a collection of tablet attachments in the coming months in a range of sizes that are expected to cost around $36.
Global smartphone shipments grew 41 percent to reach a record 990 million units in 2013, and Android-powered devices accounted for a whopping 79 percent of them. Despite the lowest growth rate in the platform’s history, Android phones still managed to ship four times the amount of iPhone and Windows Phone devices combined.
AT&T is giving new and existing customers a $100 credit when they activate a new postpaid line for your smartphone, tablet, wireless home phone, or MiFi device. The offer starts today and ends on March 31.
If you’re anything like this writer, one of the main impediments making you think twice about purchasing a Google Glass headset is the fact that you already wear prescription glasses.
To solve this problem, Google has now unveiled its long-awaited (and rumored) Google Glass units for prescription glasses wearers: the so-called Google Glass Titanium Collection, which replaces the headband currently used for Google Glass with more traditional frames (including the option of some nifty sunglasses).
We’veseenmorethanenough iPhone cases with slots for credit cards, ID or cash. But the Push wallet phone case is the first one we’ve seen with a secret compartment that hides those valuables completely out of sight.
We’veseenmorethanenough iPhone cases with slots for credit cards, ID or cash. But the Push wallet phone case is the first one we’ve seen with a secret compartment that hides those valuables completely out of sight.
Nintendo has denied plans to bring mini games to smartphones and tablets in an effort to promote its latest console titles. Sources had claimed that the Japanese company was set to announce new mobile offerings later this week, but as many will have suspected, that’s not going to happen.
Nintendo is finally ready to swallow its pride and begin developing games and other content for mobile devices, according to a new report from Japan. It’s still unlikely we’ll ever see full Super Mario or Zelda titles, but sources say will will get free mini-games, trailers, and more to promote new Nintendo releases on its own consoles.
I love Google Glass the way it is, and love the camera. But I also want people to understand Google Glass in particular and wearable computing in general. Right now, Glass is widely misunderstood.
The problem is that the existence of Glass’s camera is distracting everyone, and causing the public to completely miss what this technology is all about.
Just look at Glass’s reputation in popular culture.
When you buy a smartphone wallet case, the chances are you’re going to have to make some cutbacks — because the vast majority of them only carry a small number of cards. But that’s not the case with the Finn wallet from WaterField Designs, which has plenty of space for your phone and all the cards and cash you can carry.
Finn by WaterField Designs Category: Wallet Cases Works With: Everything Price: $39+
Finn’s available in four different sizes: the size 25 model is designed to be a wallet only, but the other three — size 27, size 42, and size 69 — are designed to carry your smartphone as well. Of course, the larger the Finn, the bigger the smartphone you can stash into it (and the more it’ll cost you).
I’ve been reviewing the size 25 and the size 69, which measures 5.5 inches by 3.3 inches, and is designed to carry an HTC One or a Galaxy S4, according to WaterField’s website — but it’s compatible with a whole bunch of other smartphones, too. I’ve mostly been using mine with a Nexus 5, but I’ve used HTC, Samsung, and BlackBerry handsets with it, too.
WaterField calls Finn “the best wallet ever,” so let’s see if it lives up to those claims.
When you buy a 16GB smartphone, you don’t actually get 16GB of space to install apps, music and other media. No matter what smartphone you buy, the operating system needs to be installed into memory, and that takes up valuable gigabytes.
Still, some phones are better than others. As far as staying trim, the iPhone 5c is the best value for the money in its class, allowing users to install media to 12.60GB of the 16GB drive. The Google Nexus 5 comes in second place at 12.28GB.
The worst offender by far, though? The Samsung Galaxy S4. You won’t believe how little internal memory you get.
Think Google’s 1Gbps fiber speeds are impressive? Think again. BT and Alcatel-Lucent have teamed up to achieve lightning-fast speeds of 1.4 terabits per second in the U.K. — that’s over 10,000 faster than the current fastest consumer broadband available in Britain, and it will let you download 44 full-length HD movies in a single second.
What’s more, it was achieved using existing fiber broadband cables.
Google has lost its battle against a patent troll after a Texas court found Android guilty of infringing a push notification patent. SimpleAir — which has also targeted Apple, Microsoft, Samsung, and other technology giants — is now seeking $125 million in damages.
Not content with stopping game creators from using the word “candy” in their titles, Candy Crush Saga developer King is now trying to block indie developers from using the word “saga,” too. The company has filed a “Notice of Opposition” against Stoic for its Viking-themed role-playing game The Banner Saga.
If you’ve been thinking about ditching your iPhone for an Android-powered smartphone, but you’ve been put off by the time and effort it takes to transfer all of your data, you no longer have an excuse not to make the move. Motorola just updated its Migrate transfer tool to support iPhone users who want to make the switch.
Using Migrate, users can transfer all of their contacts and calendar entries from their old iPhone to a new Motorola handset in just a few simple steps. It all happens without wires, and it’s completely free.
There are bound to be teething problems as Google Glass rolls out to users. Back in October last year, Cult of Android reported on the Glass user given a ticket for “driving with monitor visible to driver.”
Now we have the not dissimilar case of a theater-goer removed from a screening for alleged piracy.
The viewer in question was watching Jack Ryan: Shadow Recruit with his wife at an AMC movie theater in Columbus, Ohio, when he was roughly removed from the screening by Department of Homeland Security officials.
With Nintendo recently admitting that its Wii U console has flopped — slashing its sales forecasts for the device by 70 percent, despite U.S. spending on games consoles reaching a three-year high — the rumor mill has been abuzz with reports that the Japanese games manufacturer would exit the hardware business altogether, and instead focus on creating games for existing smartphones and tablets.
Google has removed two Chrome extensions from its web store after it was discovered that they were serving unauthorized ads in violation of the company’s terms of service. Both “Add to Feedly” and “Tweet This Page” contained hidden code that served “undesirable” ads to their users while they were browsing the web, The Wall Street Journal reports.
I crossed the 3-million Google+ circles line this morning.
It’s weird and thrilling to have so many “followers,” and to be sandwiched in circle counts between Paris Hilton, who has a couple hundred thousand more circles than I do, and Rihanna, who will probably catch up to me and pass me at some point in the future. (One of the great things about Google+ is that the geeks hold their own against entertainers in popularity.)
But mostly, it’s been an eye-opening adventure for me. Here’s what I learned along the way.
BlackBerry and Windows Phone might be having a hard time trying to break up the monopoly on mobile software held by Android and iOS, but that hasn’t stopped the Chinese government from having a go with a platform of its own.
Built by a company called Shanghai Liantong in conjunction with ISCAS (Institute of Software at the Chinese Academy of Sciences), COS — which stands for China Operating System — aims to take on Android and iOS by providing better localization for things like language input and cloud services.
Finger prick testing could soon be a thing of the past for people with diabetes, thanks to new smart contact lenses being developed by Google that measure glucose levels in your tears. The lenses have tiny chips and LEDs embedded within them, which light up to notify the wearer that their glucose levels have crossed certain thresholds.
DoubleTwist, the company that has long been helping Android-powered devices work harmoniously with iTunes, today released a new Android app that lets users rip songs from iTunes Radio. Called AirPlay Recorder, the app essentially turns your Android device into an AirPlay receiver, then records all the audio that you play through it.
The team behind CyanogenMod has released a new CyanogenMod Installer tool for Mac that makes it easy to load the latest versions of its custom ROMs with just one click. Compatible with both smartphones and tablets, the installer does not require devices to be rooted or an unlocked bootloader.
