Hasta La Gadget!

Now that HTC has essentially made good on their promise to stay solid with one hero phone for the year with the HTC One (at least this long), it’s time the HTC Desire 500 com about to bring on the differentiation. What you’re seeing here is a set of winning bits and pieces of the HTC One, including Sense 5.0 and Beats Audio, leaving out several keys – BoomSound, for example. No worries though, this device isn’t aimed at the same audience as the HTC One or One mini anyway.

Up front of this device you’ve got a 4.3-inch display with a resolution of 800 x 480 paired with a quad-core Qualcomm Snapdragon 200 processor clocked at 1.2GHz. You’ll still see HTC BlinkFeed, you’ve still got a body that looks strikingly similar to the HTC One S up front and the HTC One SV around the back, and you’ve still got a microSD card slot. This time you’ve got the ability to carry a 64GB card, on the other hand – that’ll be needed especially now that this smartphone comes with just 4GB of internal storage.

This device’s processor is backed up with 1GB of RAM, the device works with 2G/ 2.5G – GSM/GPRS/EDGE or 3G/ 3.5G – UMTS/ HSPA, and connectivity ranges from a 3.5 mm stereo audio jack to Bluetooth 4.0 with aptX. There’s no NFC included here, bafflingly, but you do still get DLNA connectivity along with all the sensors: accelerometer, proximity, and ambient light.

The HTC Desire 500 takes a slightly more traditional approach than the HTC One with its cameras, working with an 8 megapixel shooter on its back and a 1.6 megapixel camera on its front. These cameras work with the same HTC ImageChip that the HTC One S and HTC One X do, working here with new camera features such as “Continuous shooting and VideoPic” and slow motion video recording.

You’ve got dual-SIM holders that’ll allow you to switch from one carrier to the other with ease, and while we’re not expecting this device to hit the shores of the USA any time soon – there’s always Europe! At the moment, this device is aimed squarely at Taiwan, appearing first on the first of August.

VIA: HTC

HTC Desire 500 brings candy-coated One mini alternative is written by Chris Burns & originally posted on SlashGear.
© 2005 – 2013, SlashGear. All right reserved.

Serena Aunon, the second Hispanic woman to become a NASA astronaut, spoke to about 100 Latino high school students Friday to try to spark their interest in science and technology.

“I think the biggest thing to start with is exposure,” she said. “Sometimes you just have to plant that seed. You just need to plant one idea.”

Aunon’s audience was made up of high school juniors and seniors from throughout the state attending the four-day Hispanic College Institute at Virginia State University in Chesterfield County.

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Sonos is one of the go-to companies for wireless streaming options, and Android users can finally get in on the fun, thanks to an update to the Sonos Controller app. The update now enables users to play music and audio stored on their Android phone or tablet anywhere that they have a Sonos wireless speaker or player.

Luckily, the app supports Android 2.1 and higher, so most if not all Android users should be able to use the new app and stream their local music to a Sonos device. All you have to do in order to get the update running is update the app from Google Play, make sure all the devices are on the same WiFi network, and then you’ll be able to play your music stored on your Android device.

Once you have the app updated, there will be a new menu called “This Mobile Device.” Tapping on that will bring up the expected categories, including Artists, Albums, Genres, Tracks and Playlists, as well as Podcasts. The app isn’t completely fleshed out, though. We noticed some issues with podcasts showing up in different categories other than the Podcasts category.

Another caveat is that music downloaded directly from the Google Play Store can’t be played through the Sonos app right away. You have to download them from Google Play to your computer, and then transfer them to your Android device’s Music folder in order to get them to work with Sonos. This is kind of tedious, but hopefully Sonos can find a way around it sooner or later.

VIA: Android Community

SOURCE: Google Play

Sonos Android update adds support for wireless audio streaming is written by Craig Lloyd & originally posted on SlashGear.
© 2005 – 2013, SlashGear. All right reserved.

When David Butow decided to spend 2012 traveling the world to photograph Buddhism, he knew there would be a rich abundance of visual material: colorful clothing, vibrant decorations and precisely choreographed rituals.

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Move over, “Sharknado”: Syfy is taking on “The Wizard Of Oz” and this time, it’s getting twisted.

According to Deadline, director Timur Bekmambetov is teaming up with the network for a miniseries project, titled “Warriors Of Oz.” Described as a re-imagining of the classic story of Dorothy and co., “Warriors Of Oz” will center on a warrior who is “transported to a post-apocalyptic future Oz where he must team up with three other warriors, Heartless, Brainless, and Coward, in order to defeat the evil Wizard who has enslaved the land,” Deadline reports.

This isn’t the first time Syfy has ventured into the land of Oz. In 2007, the network aired the successful miniseries “Tin Man,” starring starring Zooey Deschanel, Neal McDonough, Alan Cumming, Raoul Trujillo, Kathleen Robertson, and Richard Dreyfuss.

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