Watch 10,000 volts of electricity blast through the HTC One S aluminium case (video)

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  • March 16, 2012 at 6:32 am

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HTC One S case micro arc oxidation process

HTC is mighty proud of its new One series of smartphones and it has been ‘subtly’ pointing out their benefits. We’ve already seen images taken from the new ImageSense camera module found in the 4.7-inch quad-core HTC One X and the 4.3-inch dual-core HTC One S, but what can demonstrate anything better than watching a piece of aluminium getting hit by 10,000 volts of electricity?

The HTC One S case is made of one piece of aluminium metal that first undergoes a brutal treatment, called micro-arc oxidation, giving it an extremely durable finish. The case is made of aircraft-grade aluminium and the process involves 10,000 volts hitting the metal like lightning. This treatment creates a metal oxide coating that is typically thicker than by other methods, like anodizing, and results in a ceramic-like finish.
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Nexus S to get Android 4.0 Ice Cream Sandwich update soon, for real this time

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  • March 16, 2012 at 5:29 am

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Nexus S special edition back

One of the allures of getting one of Google’s developer-friendly Nexus Android devices is that you have bigger chances in getting timely official updates when new major Android versions hit. Well, the Nexus S and Nexus S 4G started receiving the Android 4.0 Ice Cream Sandwich (ICS) update only a month after Google released the latest and greatest version of Android, however the update was soon pulled with Google citing battery and Wi-Fi issues related to the update.
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Sony 3.7-inch Xperia Sola smartphone does touch navigation from afar (video)

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  • March 13, 2012 at 4:50 pm

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Sony Xperia Sola Android smartphone in red lying down

Sony has just unveiled a new smartphone in its Xperia NXT series. The Xperia Sola is a 3.7-inch Android smartphone coming in between the 3.5-inch Xperia U and the 4-inch Xperia P. The Sola shares a lot of the design cues that we’ve come to love in recent Xperia smartphones, though it’s missing the transparent acrylic strip at the bottom that we first saw in the high-end 4.3-inch Xperia S.

Nevertheless, the Xperia Sola has something unique. It’s the first smartphone to feature “floating touch” navigation technology. That is the device can sense a finger above the display and allows users to move an on-screen cursor by hovering a finger above the screen, you then tap the screen to navigate.
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HTC shows off its ImageSense smartphone camera technology (pictures)

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  • March 11, 2012 at 5:50 pm

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HTC One X ImageSense camera

With all the attention Nokia’s 41-megapixel PureView camera (found in the 808 smartphone) has been getting, HTC is feeling kinda left out. The Taiwanese company wants you to know that it’s done its homework on smartphone cameras and the result of its efforts is the new ImageSense imaging technology that can be found in the HTC One smartphone series.

ImageSense comes in two parts, the camera and a companion chip. The HTC ImageSense camera is made up of a pretty standard 8-megapixel 1/1.2-inch sensor but has a new fast f/2.0 28mm lens. The new lens will allow more light into the sensor, improving low-light performance and allowing for shallower depth of field. The module’s own image processing chip takes over all picture taking duties from the regular processor and allows for 0.7-second shoot times and 0.2-second autofocus.
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HTC Sensation and Sensation XE receiving Android 4.0 and Sense 3.6 update in Europe, here’s how to update yours now

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  • March 9, 2012 at 4:58 am

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HTC Sensation running Android 4.0 ICS and Sense 3.6 homescreen

Limited numbers of HTC Sensation and Sensation XE owners in Europe have been receiving over-the-air (OTA) updates to Android 4.0.3 Ice Cream Sandwich and Sense 3.6. HTC had eluded in a previous statement that the Sensation and Sensation XE would be getting an early taste of Ice Cream Sandwich in Europe with entire line (including the Sensation 4G and Sensation XL) to be updated by end of March.

The update comes as a hefty 200MB+ download and seems to be rolling out to individual countries in stages and specifically to unlocked (i.e. without carrier branding) handsets. If you have an unlocked European handset and are anxious for the update, you can download the leaked HTC RUU 3.30.401.101 and 3.30.401.1 on a Windows computer to manually update either handset.
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Google reaches for the cloud: Android Market, Google Music and Google Books become Google Play

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  • March 6, 2012 at 2:32 pm

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Google Play

Google just made a big play of its content and cloud efforts, pun intended. The search giant is bringing all its mobile content offerings into one umbrella, titled Google Play, this includes music, books, videos and of course Android apps. Starting today the Android Market, Google Music and Google Books all become Google Play and are accessible through play.google.com on any browser. For now this is just a name change as the individual services will continue to look as before.

Over the next few days Google will also be updating the standard Android apps on phones and tablets running Android 2.2+. The Android Market app will become Google Play Store, and respectively you’ll get Google Play Music, Google Play Movies and Google Play Books apps, depending on availability of the services where you live.
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Sony puts its WhiteMagic display technology to work in the Xperia P smartphone

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  • March 5, 2012 at 4:51 pm

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Sony Xperia P Android smartphone

The premise behind Sony’s WhiteMagic LCD display technology is simple, add a white subpixel to the standard red, green and blue subpixel arrangement and improve both brightness and power efficiency, win-win. We first covered WhiteMagic RGBW displays while we were looking at the LCD inside the new Fujifilm X-Pro1 digital camera, and Sony has now integrated the technology in its own 4-inch Xperia P Android smartphone.
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NVIDIA DirectTouch promises more responsive multi-touch experience on Tegra 3 powered Android devices (video)

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  • February 26, 2012 at 4:51 am

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NVIDIA DirectTouch architecture comparison

One of the criticisms against Android over Apple’s iOS, is that it doesn’t offer the same level of multitouch responsiveness and UI smoothness. This perceived ‘lagginess’ has been the subject of much debate, but we won’t go into that right now.

Well NVIDIA has been pimping its newest 4-PLUS-1 quad-core (plus fifth power-saving core) Tegra 3 system-on-a-chip (SoC) and created a new mobile touch technology, named DirectTouch, promising to improve multitouch experience. The DirectTouch architecture offloads part of the touch panel processing to the Tegra 3 CPU cores, reducing lag and increasing touch samples per second. This should improve user interface responsiveness and accuracy and of course gaming experience, without any expense on battery life.
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Samsung Galaxy B bezel-free smartphone rumored

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  • February 24, 2012 at 5:15 pm

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Samsung thin bezel concept smartphone in video

Would you like an edge-to-edge-screened bezel-free smartphone with that? Yes please! Apparently someone up there has been listening to our wishes. After Samsung promised that we will be getting at least a full day’s worth of battery life from our smartphones in 2012, another of our wishes could become true this year.

The rumor comes with a good pinch of salt, but if a Korean publication proves right, Samsung maybe preparing a new smartphone with a very thin bezel that would make our dreams of edge-to-edge displays true. The device is named, at least for now, Galaxy B and it may emerge in the third quarter of the year.
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Samsung Galaxy S II tops 20 million sold units in ten months

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  • February 23, 2012 at 8:57 am

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Samsung Galaxy S II

Samsung is currently head of the Android camp when it comes to selling its goods and that’s in no small smart thanks to the success of its Galaxy S series and the current flagship, the Galaxy S II handset. Now we can put a number on that success, with Samsung announcing that it has sold over 20 million Galaxy S II units in the ten months since the 4.3-inch Super AMOLED Plus smartphone has been in around. The Galaxy S II was announced at MWC 2011 in February and launched in late April last year in Asia, it was available in most European countries by May but only reached the US last September.
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LG Optimus 4X HD official: 4.7-inch quad-core Tegra 3 smartphone with Android 4.0

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  • February 23, 2012 at 5:38 am

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LG Optimus 4X HD Tegra 3 Android smartphone

It’s no secret that we will be seeing a lot of Tegra 3 devices at MWC 2012, but LG has just beat everyone else to officially announce the first quad-core smartphone, named Optimus 4X HD (a.k.a. LG X3). Looking past LG’s lengthy naming convention, the new smartphone will certainly become the flagship for its 2012 lineup. It’s a massive 4.7-inch device with a 720p HD IPS LCD display running on the 1.5GHz quad-core (or 4-PLUS-1 as NVIDIA calls it) Tegra 3 SoC. Inside that 8.9mm thin body, you’ll find 1GB of RAM, 16GB of built-in storage and a not too shabby 2,150mAh battery.

The Optimus 4X HD will be running Android 4.0 Ice Cream Sandwich and we’ve already seen that Tegra 3 SoC grabbing a 4,412 Quadrant score, handily beating other ICS devices like the Galaxy Nexus (full review here).
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Google Docs for Android update brings real-time collaborative editing and rich text

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  • February 22, 2012 at 3:00 pm

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Google Docs Android app

Google has just announced a new version of its Google Docs for Android app, that won’t just let you edit documents on the go, but will also allow you to co-edit them in realtime with other users.

Google is mirroring the same desktop experience on Android mobile devices, so provided you have an active data connection on your smartphone or tablet, you’ll be able to see live updates in documents as others type or their computers or mobile devices and you can easily join in or invite others to collaborate on your own documents.
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