As Mobile World Congress 2015 is now in full swing, Huawei has wasted no time in announcing its latest product, the Android-powered Huawei Watch. As the company’s first smartwatch, the Huawei Watch sports a stunning design, clearly resembling a classic timepiece over a tech wearable. We’ve had a brief opportunity to play with Huawei’s current Watch prototype, and right now … Continue reading
The HTC One M9 is here, and it feels mighty familiar. The company’s new flagship, unveiled here at Mobile World Congress 2015, takes the premium metal unibody of its predecessor and slots in a new chip, new camera, and tweaks what has already proved to be a popular design. And, while it might be easy to discount the One M9 … Continue reading
As expected, HTC now has a wearable. The company has long been complimentary of wearables, and vowed long ago to have one for us at some point. With the Grip, HTC hopes to get a grip on the wearable market, and tough it has a display — the Grip is more fitness wearable than smartwatch. It also makes good on … Continue reading
There’s a Valve-centric VR headset coming from HTC this year, and it goes by the name Vive. That’s HTC Vive, a new take on the virtual reality universe. A headset that works with what HTC and Valve describe as Full Room Scale. This device combines the massive gaming knowledge of Valve, the user base of Steam, and the manufacturing knowhow … Continue reading
Now that the HTC One M9 is official, you might be wondering if it’s time to upgrade. Sporting all the latest specs, like a Snapdragon 810 octa-core CPU and 3GB RAM, might make you wonder if it’s that much better than your current phone. A new 20-megapixel rear shooter and Ultrapixel front-facing camera are quite the pair, too. If oyu’ve … Continue reading
Huawei’s Mobile World Congress 2015 announcements continue with the debut of the MediaPad X2, with a 7-inch screen placing it squarely in the phablet category. As a follow-up to the original MediaPad, the X2 has slimmed down to 7.28 mm thick, and now features a 64-bit ultra octa-core chipset inside its aluminum casing. Other upgrades across the board, including the … Continue reading
Now that Android is in everything from smartphones to cars, its users can enjoy their games and other apps in more places than ever before. But if Mad Catz is to be believed, you’ll only need one controller for all of your Android devices. It’s called the S.U.R.F.R. That’s right. Mad Catz just multiplied F with itself R times. So it’s either Sur or Surffff…f?
The Surfr – bite me, Mad Catz – is a Bluetooth 2.1 keyboard with two analog sticks, a d-pad, four face buttons and shoulder buttons. I don’t know if it has four or just two shoulder buttons though. It also has extendable rubber handles on either side.
The left stick can be used to control a mouse cursor if your app or device has one, while the face buttons double as media playback controls.
The Surfr’s most interesting aspect is the placement of the thumb sticks. The left analog stick is in the middle of the square-shaped d-pad, while the right analog stick is in the middle of the four face buttons. Mad Catz says they did that to make the buttons accessible, but I wonder if the cramped arrangement will lead to accidental button or stick inputs.
The Surfr will also come with a removable and adjustable smartphone clip. That seems considerate until you find out that the Surfr costs $80 (USD). You can pre-order it now on Mad Catz’ online shop. Let’s hope it turns out to be the best of both worlds and not two halves half-baked.
[via Gotham News]
A somewhat unlikely suspect might just have revealed the best-looking Android Wear-powered device: The Huawei Watch, from the gadget-maker of the same name, made its official debut on stage today at Mobile World Congress, and it’s easily one of the best looking devices ever to sport Google’s wearable software platform. The Huawei watch has a 286 PPI 1.4-inch AMOLED display, with a… Read More
[MWC 2015] MWC 2015 is kicking off today and we expect there will be announcements from a variety of different companies for their new and upcoming products. Microsoft is expected to make an announcement but it looks like the announcement was made slightly earlier than expected. The Redmond company announced on their website (which has since been taken down) two new handsets – the Lumia 640 and Lumia 640 XL.
Based on the naming scheme we can only assume that these handsets are the successor to the Lumia 635. That being said, what can we expect from these two new handsets? The leaked specifications of the Lumia 640 claim that it will come with a 5-inch display, 1GB of RAM, and 8GB of onboard storage. It is also said to be powered by Qualcomm’s Snapdragon 400 processor which makes it a somewhat low-end device.
The specs are also stating that it will come with an 8MP rear-facing camera, and a 1MP front-facing camera. As for the Lumia 640 XL, it is unclear as to what the difference is at the moment, but we can only assume that it will sport a larger display, but as to whether it will be more powerful remains to be seen. In any case Microsoft will be making their announcement tomorrow so be sure to check back with us then for the official details.
Lumia 640, Lumia 640 XL Accidentally Unveiled Ahead Of Time , original content from Ubergizmo. Read our Copyrights and terms of use.
LG announced its brand new gorgeous LG Watch Urbane LTE a few days ago and today we had the opportunity to get our hands on it. Unlike its sibling the LG Watch Urbane, this model does not run Android Wear, in fact, to enable LTE connectivity and NFC payment, the South Korean manufacturer had to develop its own operating system, branded LG Wearable Platform and based on WebOS.
During the briefing, LG executives insisted that the company will still develop mainstream wearable devices with Android Wear, alongside more ambitious experimental projects on the LG Wearable Platform, in order to address a broader range of customers.
The LG Watch Urbane LTE is a stand alone device capable of placing and receiving phone calls and sending sms, and it can be connected to any Android Smartphone. LG mentioned that iOS compatibility could be an option in the future, although it was not confirmed yet. The Audi version of the Urbane is slightly different, an early prototype was spotted during CES and we will make sure to stop by the German car manufacturer to check it out.
Pricing and availability were not confirmed, however we were told that the new LTE Smartwatch will launch first in Sour Korea, probably within the next couple of months.
I spent an hour playing tieh the Urbane LTE, check my complete article to see if you like it as much as I did.
The LG Watch Urbane LTE get a similar hardware than the LG G Watch R. The 1.2 GHz Snapdragon 400 is the same except for the RAM, the new model gets 1GB instead of 512MB. The 1.3-inch P-OLED display is exactly the same with a 320 x 320 pixels, (245 ppi) resolution.
At 115g, the Urbane LTE is heavier than the The LG G watch R (62g) and the Urbane (66.5g) due to the larger 700mAh battery required by the LTE connectivity.
There is no GPS in the LG G Watch R and the new Urbane LTE gets one.
The major difference between the LG Watch Urbane LTE and the former model G Watch R is the operating system, the Urbane LTE runs the LG Wearable Platform based on WebOS which features quite a different user interface than Android Wear in addition to full phone capabilities. The NFC feature is a new addition as well.
The industrial design is quite different as well s you can see in the various photo gallery, check our LG G watch R review to compare the differences.
As usual the 1.3-inch P-OLED display is excellent, and it uses the full circular surface. LG confirmed that it is the exact same display as the LG G Watch R. There was not a whole lot photos in the gallery to showcase the full range of colors that can be rendered but it was sufficient to get a good impression of the screen technology. Similarly to the Lg G Watch R, the LG Watch Urbane LTE offers an always-on ambient mode.
The elegant silver metal chassis is slightly bulkier than the LG G watch but it did not bother me at all, since the larger screen surface is more comfortable to use for various functions such as messaging or watching photos.
Two more buttons were added to the central one on the right side, which gives more control over the user interface. As I already pointed out in a previous paragraph, the devices is a little heavier at 115 grams than the LG G Watch R due to the larger battery. The wristband is made of plastic, a choice that is a little disappointing for such an elegant metal design.
Perceived performance
The touch interface is very responsive and easy to use, the combination of horizontal swipe and physical button to operate the watch is great and feels more intuitive than the four ways swipe that we know from a competitive Smartwatch.
Hardware
As previously mentioned, the hardware provides similar features than the LG G watch R, except for the larger battery (700 mAh instead of 400 mAh), the GPS and the increased RAM of 1GB. The 1.2 GHz Snapdragon 400 and the 1.3″-inchPlastic OLED are the same as the previous model.
The key feature of this new smartwatch is the new operating system a.k.a. LG Wearable Platform, based on a customization of WebOS. The new user interface is very intuitive and responsive, and I enjoyed trying it for the brief time I could hold the device in my hands. Check out the video to see how most of the functions work, please note that we could not connect the LG Watch Urbane LTE to a phone, so emails and contacts were empty.
Basically you operate the Urbane LTE using three buttons on the side, which offer easier access to the multiple menus without the need to swipe.
Back and Favorite number – bottom button
The bottom button acts as a back button and when long pressed becomes a safety feature that automatically dials any preset phone number while sending the location coordinates of the user.
Quick Setting – top button
The button at the top accesses the Quick Setting where you can access twelve functions that you can see on the photo below.
Apps – central button
The main center button switches between the watch face and list of installed apps. To browse the apps you need to swipe vertically on the touch screen. below I have listed some of the application that were available on the demo unit. many functions did not work because they required either to create an account or to connect to a Smartphone.
Phone
The LG Watch urbane LTE is a stand alone phone and you can dial a number and place a call directly from the device. The numeric pad was quite easy to use, the keys were large enough to be operated easily with my fingers.
Messaging
Similarly, you can write and send messages without being connected to a smartphone. Despite the small size, the keyboard was surprisingly easy to use and very responsive.
Music
Thanks to the internal storage you can listen to music directly on your watch, and the speaker is quite good for the tiny size. the re is another application in the list that allows to remote control your music stored in your smartphone from the Urbane LTE.
Calendar
I really loved the calendar interface, all the dates are displayed around the display and you can swipe circularly to select a day. (see photo)
Email
I could briefly check the email app on one of the LG representatives watch that was connected to his phone, however I could not play with it.
Gallery
The photo gallery is fun to play with, you can either display the picture in full screen in the circular shape or get the full rectangular picture in a smaller size.
LG Health
LG puts some effort in the activity tracking features and grouped them in the LG Health application. In addtion there are three dedicated sport applications for Golf
According to the manufacturer, the estimated battery life in continuous use is a full day, which is less than what we have experienced with the LG G Watch (one day and a half sometimes almost two days depending on usage). I am curious to see if this will hold up in the real world, knowing that LTE connectivity is so power hungry, although the watch features the category’s largest 700mAh battery.
The LG Watch urbane is impressive and beautifully crafted. The new user interface based on WebOS is really intuitive with a fully functional keyboard for messaging and placing phone calls. I am eager to know the pricing and when we will be able to get it in the US.
LG Watch Urbane LTE Hands-On Review , original content from Ubergizmo. Read our Copyrights and terms of use.
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