August

mobile
October 5, 2011
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Android, iOS continue to absorb BlackBerry market share in U.S.

By on October 5, 2011 at 2:55 PM.

Android, iOS continue to absorb BlackBerry market share in U.S.

ComScore released its most recent U.S. Mobile Subscriber Report on Wednesday, which suggests that iOS and Android are continuing to absorb share at the expense of RIM’s BlackBerry OS in the United States. Android’s market share increased 5.6 points to 43.7% during the three month period ending in August. iOS grew 0.7 points to a 27.3% share during the same period. Meanwhile, RIM dropped 5 percentage points to a 19.7% and Microsoft’s Windows Phone platform and Symbian both remained relatively flat, losing just 0.1 percentage points and 0.3 percentage points, respectively. Samsung’s grip on the overall mobile phone market continued to grow in the U.S. It now has a 25.3% share, up from 24.8% in May, and is followed by LG (21%), Motorola (14%), Apple (9.8%) and RIM (7.1%). 84.5 million U.S. residents now carry a smartphone, up 10% as noted in the comScore’s May report. Read on for the full press release.

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mobile
August 3, 2011
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AT&T to offer 4G BlackBerry Torch 9810 in August, Bold 9900 and Torch 9860 to follow

By on August 3, 2011 at 5:00 AM.

AT&T to offer 4G BlackBerry Torch 9810 in August, Bold 9900 and Torch 9860 to follow

AT&T announced early Wednesday morning that it will offer three new BlackBerry smartphones this year. It will first launch the 4G HSPA+ capable BlackBerry Torch 9810 in August. AT&T promises to then launch the 4G BlackBerry Bold 9900 later this year, as well as the full-touchscreen BlackBerry Torch 9860. The BlackBerry Torch 9810 packs a 1.2GHz processor, a dual-microphone, a 640 x 480-pixel display, 8GB of storage, 768MB of RAM, HSPA+ support, a digital compass and a 5-megapixel camera capable of recording 720p HD video. It’s unclear at this point what pricing will be unfortunately, and AT&T didn’t provide branded images or a complete spec list for either of the other two BlackBerry devices it announced. Thankfully, we’ve already shown you exclusive leaked images of the Torch 9860 and we published a hands-on look at the Bold 9900 back in May. We also have a feeling we’ll be getting up-close and personal with these new devices again very soon. In the meantime, read on for AT&T’s full press release. More →

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mobile
August 1, 2011
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Nokia may unveil first Windows Phone this month

By on August 1, 2011 at 6:10 PM.

Nokia may unveil first Windows Phone this month

Nokia may be planning to unveil its first Windows Phone later this month, the unwired reports. The site claims to have obtained an invitation to a party hosted by both Nokia and Microsoft. Scheduled to take place on August 17th during the annual GamesCom trade show in Cologne, Germany, the event will apparently include a raffle of three Xbox 360 consoles and three Windows Phones built by Nokia. The invitation does note that the aforementioned Windows Phones will be delivered to winners “as soon as available,” so we’re not entirely convinced the event will follow any sort of announcement. And the choice of venue for such an announcement is at the very least curious, if not illogical. We know that Nokia won’t be pushing out flagship devices from day one, but why announce the first Nokia-built Windows Phone at a trade show for games? Then again, the event invitation does mention “exciting actions and surprises” that “will make it an evening to remember” — and we’re pretty sure no other cell phones will be announced at GamesCom so it wouldn’t have to share the spotlight. Our advice, however, is to not hold your breath. Nokia did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

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mobile
July 22, 2011
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Verizon reportedly dumping iPhone 4 accessories ahead of iPhone 5 debut

By on July 22, 2011 at 8:25 PM.

Verizon reportedly dumping iPhone 4 accessories ahead of iPhone 5 debut

Verizon Wireless will drop the price on all of its iPhone 4 accessories in anticipation of the iPhone 5 launch, PhoneArena is reporting. Verizon Wireless is expected to continue selling the iPhone 4 at a lower price point after its successor launches, however, so it is unlikely that the carrier will completely clear house of its accessories. If this report is accurate, the move could suggest Apple has a redesigned iPhone up its sleeves instead of a phone with the same industrial design and newer hardware inside. That’s in line with our exclusive report that the Cupertino-based firm will release a successor with a “radical new case design,” and another report from The Wall Street Journal claiming the phone will be thinner and lighter than its predecessor. Apple is expected to unveil the phone in late-August or in September. More →

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mobile
July 20, 2011
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Samsung Galaxy S II to launch in U.S. in August

By on July 20, 2011 at 9:31 AM.

Samsung Galaxy S II to launch in U.S. in August

Samsung will launch its wildly successful Galaxy S II handset in the United States in next month, Yonhap News reported on Wednesday. “We expect to release the Galaxy S2 in the U.S. market sometime in August,” Shin Jong-kyun, Samsung’s president of mobile business and digital imaging recently told media. The original Galaxy S launched on each of the four major carriers in the United States, as well as on some of the smaller carriers, and we expect many of them to also carry the Galaxy S II. The device made its debut in other parts of the world earlier this year and has been flying off of store shelves. On July 4th, Samsung announced that it had sold 3 million units in 55 days and said the Galaxy S II was its fastest selling smartphone ever. There’s a lot to get excited about: we called the device the “greatest Android smartphone available on the planet” in our recent review. More →

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mobile
July 15, 2011
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Sony expected to intro new eReaders next month

By on July 15, 2011 at 1:01 AM.

Sony expected to intro new eReaders next month

Sony is expected to introduce a new family of eReader devices to challenge the Amazon Kindle and Barnes & Noble Nook devices next month. In an interview with Bloomberg, Sony Electronics’ vice president of digital reading Phil Lubell said that the new eReaders will offer both software and hardware enhancements, although he wasn’t specific on what exactly the changes are. Lubell said the devices will hit the market ahead of his company’s S1 and S2 Android tablets. AT&T announced yesterday that it would ship the dual-screen S2 to its customers in time for the back-to-school season, and Sony said its tablets will receive a software update later this year with support for the company’s eReader bookstore and software. “Sony appears to be struggling to expand its e-reader business as fast as it had originally planned,” Nobuo Kurahashi, an analyst at Mizuho Financial Group Inc. in Tokyo, told Bloomberg. Sony’s Reader products currently cost between $180 and $300 and the company will need to drop that price in order to compete with Amazon’s $114 Amazon Kindle with Special Offers and Barnes & Noble’s $139 ‘All new NOOK.’ More →

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Tablets
July 14, 2011
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Foxconn to build Amazon’s 10.1-inch tablet

By on July 14, 2011 at 9:00 PM.

Foxconn to build Amazon’s 10.1-inch tablet

Foxconn will build Amazon’s rumored 10.1-inch tablet, DigiTimes reported on Thursday. The Android tablet is expected to ship in 2012 according to the report, but Amazon may want to get the device out the door a bit earlier in order to to have it on store shelves in time for the holiday season. A smaller 7-inch version that was built by Quanta computer is already on its way to Amazon and, while other reports suggested it is a 9-inch tablet, that is likely the model we have heard will launch in late August or September. We broke the news that Amazon will launch a “Coyote” tablet that packs a dual-core NVIDIA Tegra processor, as well as a larger “Hollywood” tablet powered by the new quad-core Kal-El chip. Since Kal-El devices aren’t shipping to consumers yet, it could be a safe bet to guess that Quanta Computer built the Coyote tablet while Foxconn has scored the order for the more powerful Hollywood device. More →

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Tablets
July 8, 2011
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Amazon could ship 1-1.2 million tablets during third quarter, report says

By on July 8, 2011 at 8:01 AM.

Amazon could ship 1-1.2 million tablets during third quarter, report says

According to a new report from DigiTimes, Amazon is expected to ship a “conservative” 1-1.2 million of its new tablets during the third quarter — a time frame that’s in line with earlier reports that the online retailer would get its unannounced tablet out the door by August. Reportedly, orders from Amazon are the most positive of all tablet-builders so far, and the company is expected to demand as many as 2 million touch panel displays in August and September. While very little is known about Amazon’s tablet — or possibly tablets — we have heard that it is prepping an entry level model codenamed “Coyote,” with an NVIDIA Tegra 2 chip, as well as a second more powerful “Hollywood” model that’s powered by NVIDIA’s new quad-core T30 “Kal-El” processor, which offers a 500% performance increase over Tegra 2. Amazon already has a number of services that will compliment a tablet perfectly, such as Cloud Drive, Cloud Player, Amazon MP3, Unbox streaming videos, Kindle, and more — all of which will no doubt help it stir up the current tablet market. More →

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mobile
July 6, 2011
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Apple iPhone 5 be thinner, lighter than current model according to WSJ

By on July 6, 2011 at 8:39 AM.

Apple iPhone 5 be thinner, lighter than current model according to WSJ

The Wall Street Journal is singing a new tune Wednesday morning, reaffirming parts of an earlier BGR report suggesting that Apple is preparing to release a redesigned iPhone 5 later this year. Citing anonymous sources in Apple’s supply chain, the paper reports this morning that Apple has placed component orders with key suppliers for fifth-generation iPhone parts. As has already been widely reported, Apple’s next iPhone is said to feature an 8-megapixel camera and Qualcomm radios. The report veers away from the consensus in suggesting that Apple’s next iPhone will not share its design with the current iPhone 4, however, and will instead be thinner and lighter than the current model. BGR reported last month that Apple’s next iPhone would feature a “radical new case design” when it launches later this year. Apple reportedly plans to have 25 million next-generation iPhone handsets built in 2011, suggesting the Cupertino-based tech giant might finally come closer to meeting demand. Apple sold a record 18.65 million combined iPhone 4 and iPhone 3GS units in its last fiscal quarter.

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Tablets
July 5, 2011
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64GB and 4G HP TouchPads landing in August according to leaked roadmap

By on July 5, 2011 at 8:10 PM.

64GB and 4G HP TouchPads landing in August according to leaked roadmap


According to a purported roadmap image obtained by PreCentral, HP will introduce a new 64GB version of its TouchPad this August alongside a 4G model on AT&T. The 64GB model will apparently offer a “glossy white” finish and could come equipped with a dual-core Qualcomm Snapdragon processor that’s clocked at 1.5GHz. AT&T’s 4G TouchPad is expected to come in a black finish and will offer support for the carrier’s HSPA+ network, but will maintain the 32GB capacity of the Wi-Fi model that launched last week. While early reports suggested that HP’s new 7-inch TouchPad, codenamed “Opal,” would launch in August, PreCentral says the tablet is expected to launch in the fall instead. More →

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mobile
June 27, 2011
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Apple to begin building iPhone 5 mid to late August, Apple-branded TV in the works, analyst says

By on June 27, 2011 at 1:00 PM.

Apple to begin building iPhone 5 mid to late August, Apple-branded TV in the works, analyst says

A new report suggests Apple’s manufacturing partners are preparing to begin assembling the next-generation iPhone some time between the middle and end of August. This time frame suggests that a launch might not occur until the second half of September at the earliest. Following a series of meetings in Taiwan, Morgan Stanley analyst Katy Huberty issued the new production timeline in a note to investors on Sunday. “Apple’s next iPhone will begin production in mid to late August and ramp aggressively,” the analyst wrote. Her meetings yielded no information about a new prepaid iPhone that might launch as a complimentary model in September, however. Huberty also reaffirmed reports that Apple is working on a branded television product that could open the door to a massive new revenue stream. “We also believe Apple is in the early design stages for a TV, which could add $19 billion and $4.50 of annual revenue and EPS longer-term,” she wrote in the same note on Sunday. Huberty sees Apple stock as a great purchase for investors in spite of its recent downward trend, and most analysts seem to agree, though the stock continues to drop despite countless favorable ratings from analysts. More →

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Tablets
June 24, 2011
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HP to launch 7-inch tablet in August according to report

By on June 24, 2011 at 1:20 PM.

HP to launch 7-inch tablet in August according to report

Hewlett-Packard will follow up its TouchPad launch next month with the release of an unannounced 7-inch tablet in August, Taiwan Economic News reported on Friday. Citing information from an Inventec Corp. subcontractor, the Taiwanese manufacturer is said to have received a healthy number of tablet orders from HP. The Palo Alto-based company has reportedly ordered between 400,000 and 450,000 tablets per month from Inventec, which also manufactures notebook computers for HP. The source claimed that HP’s orders are comprised of both the 9.7-inch TouchPad set to launch on July 1st, and a second, unannounced tablet that will feature a 7-inch display, though no additional details surrounding the smaller tablet model were reported. An unnamed industry insider estimates that Inventec will build and ship 3 million tablets for HP in 2011. More →

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mobile
June 22, 2011
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Amazon’s tablets could launch in August-September time frame

By on June 22, 2011 at 9:20 AM.

Amazon’s tablets could launch in August-September time frame

According to DigiTimes, Amazon’s rumored Android tablets could launch as soon as this August or September. The online retail giant has a global sales target of 4 million units, with 700,000-800,000 units shipping monthly, and it hopes to get its products in customer hands during the peak sales period of the year — just before Thanksgiving and the holidays. We’ve reported exclusively that Amazon will launch the dual-core “Coyote” and quad-core “Hollywood” tablets sometime this year, and early reports suggested the tablets are already in the manufacturing stage. Reportedly, Amazon has contracted Texas Instruments, Wintek, ILI Technology, and Quanta Computer for parts and assembly. It’s been widely expected that Amazon will launch a streaming movie service on its tablets, too. More →

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