If podcasts were cookies — or as our hosts say, biscuits — this week’s would be an Oreo. Two strong, independent, yet wonderfully united sections. The first part of the experience is firm, trustworthy yet exciting, before giving way to a soft, sugary, all american finale. Glass of milk optional.
Hosts: Dan Cooper, Mat Smith
Guest: Ben Gilbert
Producer: James Trew
Hear the Podcast
Filed under: Podcasts
Windows Phone 8 is Nokia’s big play for the future, but as a result of focusing on those devices and their higher-end target market, the company is giving up ground to firms like Huawei and ZTE with lower end devices. But the Finnish company may be looking to get its budget-friendly groove back with the introduction of new, basic handsets not based on Microsoft’s mobile OS, to be unveiled at MWC next week according to Reuters.
The tails of new models come from “company sources,” according to Reuters, and suggest Nokia will introduce “cut-price” hardware in multiple handsets, as well as a single new Lumia device on Windows Phone 8, but one designed with affordability in mind. Nokia already offers the budget Lumia 620, a $249 smartphone with Microsoft’s latest OS onboard, but that’s still over $200, whereas the average selling price of Nokia mobile phones in general was € 31 in 2012, Reuters notes, with net sales of mobile phones accounting for € 9.44 billion in sales in 2012 for the company.
Nokia has had tremendous success with its Series 40 line of devices, as Natasha noted in an article late last year, but even that market where it has traditionally been strong is under attack from rival manufacturers. Nokia is failing to attract audiences in its traditionally strong markets with even low-cost Lumia handsets. And it’s losing share fast to Huawei and ZTE, which are quickly charging up the ranks of global handset manufacturers thanks to an emphatic focus on lower end devices.
Nokia’s candle is burning at both ends, with the company facing threats in both smartphones and with low-end devices. The company said to “expect a lot of things” in 2013 based on the Series 40 platform at the end of 2012, and it looks likely we’ll see some of those things unveiled at MWC. A revamped Series 4 line could definitely help shore up its shrinking share of the under $100 market, and if a new Lumia can break the $200 barrier, we might see Nokia win back some precious smartphone share as well.
General Motors’ Buick division hasn’t had much in the way of a cool car by enthusiast standards since the late 80s when the very impressive Regal Grand National was tearing up the streets. Somewhere along the way, Buick became a boring car that your grandma drove. Buick has been working hard to revamp its image and make its cars more appealing to younger buyers and one of the cars it has been working on is the LaCrosse.
The car has rather attractive styling on the outside and a very nice interior. The car is equipped with the Buick IntelliLink allowing drivers to place calls and more using their voice. The problem for many voice control systems is that excessive noise from outside the vehicle can make it difficult for voice control systems to understand the command being said. Buick has turned to making the interior of the LaCrosse quieter to help the voice command system better understand what is being said.
Buick used various engineering processes to reduce, block, and absorb interior noise. The car has laminated window glass, triple door seals, and liquid applied sound deadening all in an attempt to make the interior of the vehicle as quiet as possible. The IntelliLink system is standard on every 2013 Buick and allows drivers to use voice commands for controlling things like navigation and audio functions and smartphone applications.
Using the voice control system drivers can control Pandora Internet radio stations and even “like” a song. The Buick system has a microphone hidden in the headliner of the car, optimally placed to pick up spoken commands. The system is also trained for different accents and dialects. The system also remembers the driver’s speech patterns when the car is turned off allowing it to respond more quickly and accurately the next time the driver is in the vehicle. The system is capable of learning accents and dialects of more than one driver.
[via GM]
Buick LaCrosse gets a quieter cabin to make it a better listener is written by Shane McGlaun & originally posted on SlashGear.
© 2005 – 2012, SlashGear. All right reserved.
When I was just a wee lad, I was told that one should not lie down on one’s back and read, it will lead to deteriorating eyesight. I am not quite sure whether that is just a bunch of baloney, but what I do know is this – I have been wearing glasses for the better part of the past two and a half decades already, and sometimes, I just wish I could do away with my glasses and have perfect vision. Permanently. Well, for those who still want to get their daily dose of reading in bed while lying down, you might want to check out the $89.95 Bed Glasses.
Yes sir, the Bed Glasses might make you look like a top notch dork, but at least you can read or view the TV while lying flat on your back, without having to experience any kind of neck strain, as there is no need to raise your head. You wear them just like regular eyeglasses, and heck, they were made in a way to fit over prescription glasses. Just like a periscope, the Bed Glasses function on principles of reflection and refraction. This prism is adjustable and reversible, so when standing upright, all it takes is a simple flip and you can check out what is right above your head.
[ Bed Glasses copyright by Coolest Gadgets ]
3D scanners are kinda old hat at this point. But, while we’ve seen more than our fair share of Kinect hacks, we haven’t come across too many phone-based systems. Moedls actually puts the power to create models like the one above in the palm of your hand… sort of. The heart of the system is either an iOS or Android app (sorry MeeGo fans), but there are actual lasers with a custom enclosure as part of the platform. Clearly, that does somewhat restrict portability, but it should all fit into a 10-inch x 10-inch x 4-inch box for storage or transportation.
Creator John Fehr started the project as a way to save some of his daughter’s sculptures in digital form. After trying many different component options, Fehr settled on a combination of parts that totaled around $300. That included a custom enclosure and variable speed rotating platform have been sourced. Right now the iOS app is awaiting approval from Apple and the Google-fied equivalent is currently in development. Combine this with a 3D printer (we hear you’ve got quite a few choices at this point) and the world becomes your playground. You can see an example of what Moedls is capable of, even at this early stage, at the source.
Check out the full list of Insert Coin: New Challengers semifinalists here — and don’t forget to pick a winner!
Filed under: Misc
Source: Moedls
Yesterday, Nevada officials rushed through a bill which makes interstate online poker legal. The decision will allow the state to form pacts with other states, allowing people to play legally across borders. More »
Nvidia made a big splash this week with the unveiling of its new, incredibly high-end, incredibly expensive GeForce GTX Titan graphics card. Despite the high cost of the Titan, gamers around the world have been salivating and many are ready to purchase. The good news if you have the funds to buy this new video card is that Asus has launched its branded version today in Europe.
The Asus GeForce GTX Titan is now available for $999. This is the most expensive video card aimed at computer gamers ever offered and should provide incredible performance for modern video games. The video card is optimized for DirectX 11.1 and PCI Express 3.0. Asus clocks the GPU at 876 MHz using the Nvidia GPU Boost 2.0 technology, the base clock is 837 MHz.
The Titan has 6 GB of GDDR5 video memory clocked at 6000 MHz. The Nvidia GPU Boost 2.0 interface will also allow owners of the Titan video card to change the clock speed, power consumption profile, and control the temperature of the GPU as they see fit. That means overclockers can tweak the GPU to get even higher levels of performance.
Titan has 2688 CUDA cores and features a 384-bit memory interface. Asus and Nvidia promised that the video card has the power to handle the most advanced games and features in resolutions above 2560 x 1600. Asus says that global release for its branded Titan will happen on February 25 and pricing can vary by location. The video card dimensions are 10.5-inches by 4.38-inches by 1.5-inches, so if you’re going to order be sure the video card will fit in your computer case.
[via Asus]
Asus launches Nvidia GeForce GTX Titan video card is written by Shane McGlaun & originally posted on SlashGear.
© 2005 – 2012, SlashGear. All right reserved.
It seems that the MacBook Air and Ultrabook market segments might not want to get too comfortable or snuggly in their current position, as the folks over at Google have finally brought to life what has been rumored before – a touchscreen version of the Chromebook, which Google has aptly christened as the Chromebook Pixel. Originally, Chromebooks were specially designed to make computing fast, simple as well as secure, and doing all of this without having to break the bank. Thing is, the adoption rate is not exactly phenomenal to say the least, but Google intends to bring the ideal of the Chromebook to the next level with the Chromebook Pixel, where it will still remain the ideal device for catching up on emails, sharing documents and chatting via Hangouts, albeit in a stunning form factor.
While partners such as Samsung, Acer, Lenovo and HP have committed to the Chromebook project in various capacities before, the Chromebook Pixel offers something totally different, bringing together what Google claims is “the best in hardware, software and design” as part of their effort to inspire the next generation of Chromebooks. The Chromebook Pixel rethinks all elements of a computer, and it will target power users who have fully embraced the cloud. While the philosophy of Chrome is to minimize the “chrome” of the browser, so too, does Pixel hope to make pixels disappear in your Web experience, where we will explain in a bit.
The Chromebook Pixel boasts of what it claims to be the highest pixel density (239 pixels per inch) of any laptop screen available in the market as at press time, packing in a whopping 4.3 million pixels that offers sharp text, vivid colors and extra-wide viewing angles. A screen that is this rich and engaging would certainly be tantalizing for your fingers to touch it, so Google decided to introduce touch sensitivity for a more immersive experience, too. Touching the screen keeps up with Windows 8-powered touch-sensitive Ultrabooks, and it is a whole lot easier and intuitive to perform tasks such as organize tabs, swipe through apps and edit photos with the tip of your finger.
The Chromebook Pixel comes with an anodized aluminum alloy body, hidden vents, seamless stereo speakers, a touchpad made from etched glass, analyzed and honed using a laser microscope for precise navigation, powerful, full-range speakers for crisp audio, a 720p webcam for clear video, and a trio of microphones which were specially designed to cancel out surrounding noise. You can choose from Wi-Fi and LTE versions that will retail for $1,299 and $1,449, respectively.
Press Release
[ Google introduces Chromebook Pixel copyright by Coolest Gadgets ]
We never used to take the speakers in phones or tablets very seriously. Frankly, we’re not sure manufacturers did either. But the old assumption that tiny = tinny is starting to seem a bit unfair. Last year, Dutch chip-maker NXP released a new type of mobile audio component — the TFA9887 — that allowed a mobile device to monitor its speaker system in real-time in order to max out volume without risking damage to the driver. Although NXP is way too modest to confirm it, we happen to know that this chip made its way into a number of HTC devices, including the new One, One X+ and 8X, where it’s been described as “feedback” speaker technology.
The extra voltage delivered to speakers by this generation of component hasn’t been especially wild — just a couple of volts above the industry norm of around 3V. But what you’re about to hear after the break is the next-gen TFA9890, which is expected to appear in devices around the middle of this year, and which racks things all the way up to 9.5V. This promises to be a much more audible leap relative to traditional no-feedback speaker systems, and you should be able to spot the difference for yourself after the break.
Filed under: Cellphones, Laptops, Tablets, Mobile
In a new report from mobile ad platform Millennial Media, the company compiles its data on mobile device share across its network for all of 2012, revealing that tablets in particular accounted for a rising percentage of impressions, with Android devices stepping up their game considerably. The Kindle Fire and Samsung tablets were the big share winners, helping Android slates grab a considerable 41 percent of the tablet mix, compared to 58 percent for Apple.
Millennial didn’t actually break out the overall values of tablet traffic in its 2011 report, but you can see from its February 2011 snapshot that the tablet/e-reader and other category had iOS at 80 percent share, with Android at just 17 percent and other at 3 percent. Android has clearly gained a lot of ground, then, and the main OEMs reaping the benefits of that growth are Samsung, which has 45 percent of the Android tablet share, and Amazon, which managed to acquire 26 percent thanks to the release of the second-generation Kindle Fire line, representing over 500 percent growth from its share in 2011.
Smartphone share also grew during the year, up from 68 percent to 75 percent, with non-phone connected devices (including tablets) also growing considerably as well, from 15 to 25 percent. The feature phone category gave up tons of ground, going from 17 percent to 5 percent share. Overall OS mix, despite Android’s tablet gains, actually didn’t shift all that much, with Android gaining one percentage point overall in 2012 versus 2011, and iOS losing one. BlackBerry remained steady in third, and Windows Phone gained a single percentage point.
Millennial notes that Android continues to take up more places in the top 20 mobile phones list on its platform, while Apple continues to be the market leader with its devices in each respective category, generating an outsized helping of traffic share from just a few core devices. The iPhone ranks number one among mobile phones, growing its share from 14.67 percent in 2011 to 15.59 percent in 2012. Samsung took over the number two spot from BlackBerry with its Galaxy S line, with 4.24 percent of impressions for 2012, growing 182 percent year-over-year.
The iPad mini was among Apple’s strongest performers, growing its share of impressions at an average daily rate of 28 percent within just weeks of its initial launch. Millennial says that’s a new best for the 7-inch tablet category, eclipsing the rapid 19 percent daily average established by the original Kindle Fire during its launch back in 2011. Overall, the picture that’s shaping up looks like it will see smartphone share start to even out as they eclipse feature phones entirely, with tablets making up an increasingly important piece of the pie, if the trends Millennial is seeing continue.
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