Hasta La Gadget!

Haven’t been reading every Netflix quarterly report or listening to each earnings call for the last several years? No problem: you can quickly get caught up on the company’s strategy thanks to a “Long Term View” document posted to its investor relations site. Boiling down many of the things executives like Reed Hastings have been saying into a single PDF, it’s an easier to digest road map of where Netflix thinks this whole online video thing is going. Among other things, it sees the simplicity of its offering — no ads, no VOD, no-hassle cancellation, access on any screen at any time mobile or TV — as a main selling point. How to keep customers happy? Make sure that they think of Netflix as the better option for their entertainment time than other possible choices. Hit the source link to dig into it yourself or check below for a breakdown.

Filed under: Home Entertainment, HD

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Source: Netflix (PDF)

The rumor about that more affordable iPhone just keeps coming back, but this time we’re finally seeing some sort of progress. Courtesy of case manufacturer Tactus, we’re apparently looking at the upcoming budget iPhone’s polycarbonate shell, which was spotted at a factory that provides parts to Foxconn. It’s the same story for the “iPad 5” case leak that Tactus published two days ago (the same day as our own scoop), so the company does seem to have a good contact for these kinds of goodies — and it is a very competitive market, after all.

Compared to the old polycarbonate iPhone 3G and 3GS, this mysterious shell appears to have a flat back instead of the old curved one, meaning it should reduce manufacturing complexity and therefore the cost as well. Another notable difference is that the old volume rocker is split into two, and then there’s also the LED flash that was absent on the old polycarbonate iPhones. Tactus adds that this body is slightly taller, wider and thicker than the iPhone 4 and 4S, but what we do struggle to believe is that apparently the same factory is producing this shell in black and white as well as blue, red and yellow. A decoy, perhaps? Only time will tell.

Filed under: Cellphones, Mobile

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Source: Tactus (budget iPhone leak), (“iPad 5” case leak)

It looks as though Canon will have a new DSLR to announce very shortly, if a listing on Best Buy’s website is any indicator. The page offers us no images to ogle, but it betrays an unannounced 18-megapixel shooter dubbed the EOS-b, accompanied by an 18-55m lens kit and an $800 price tag. Canon Rumors notes a smaller footprint, trimming five ounces of fat and bulk off the T4i’s measurements. The camera specs are identical to the T4i and EOS M, too, but an optical viewfinder and pop-up flash make us wonder if it isn’t a pint-sized follow up to the T4i. You can look forward to a Digic 5 image processor, nine-point autofocus system, 3-inch 1.04K dot TFT-LCD touchscreen, four frames-per-second burst shooting, an ISO range from 100 to 12,800 with a high setting of 25,600 and HD video capture. There’s no word on when this APS-C shooter will officially be announced, but you can try your luck at placing a pre-order by clicking the Best Buy source link.

Filed under: Cameras

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Via: Canon Rumors, Photo Rumors

Source: Best Buy

Despite a strong showing of slates in 2012, ASUS showed precious few tablets at CES last week. Missing from the show? Its latest MeMo Pad — a 7-inch 1024 x 600 tablet rocking Jelly Bean, 16GB of storage, a Mali 400 GPU, 1GB of RAM and a 1MP front-facing camera. ASUS didn’t name the tablet by model number, but it’s a dead ringer for the ME172V that slipped through GLBenchmarks last month, and fits the bill of a recent federal authorization. The new slab isn’t quite as nice as the Nexus 7 its predecessor became, but at $150, it’s a little easier on the wallet. ASUS also cautions buyers that the MeMo pad is a “tablet-only product,” clarifying that it won’t be getting a Transformer Pad-like keyboard dock — assuming you could type on a 7-inch keyboard, that is. Check out the slate’s official press release after the break.

Continue reading ASUS MeMo Pad makes quiet post-CES debut, offers Jelly Bean and 16GB of storage for $150

Filed under: Tablets, ASUS

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ASUS has been a strong force in the tablet game even before it set a new price-to-quality standard with Google’s Nexus 7. It looks like the firm could be tightening the budget screw even further, if some recent GLBenchmarks are to be believed. The details are sparse, but outline a product with model number ME172V (which follows from its pre-Nexus smaller tablet line), that runs Android 4.1.1 Jelly Bean, sports a 1,024 x 552 (likely 1,024 x 600) resolution powered by a Mali 400 GPU and 1GHz chip. There’s no indication on the number of cores, or, well, much else for that matter. Various rumors are keen to suggest there’d be support for microSD, which if true, would make it unlikely to be a Nexus. But a budget tablet by the same manufacturer, is likely enough for many people all the same.

Filed under: Tablets, ASUS, Google

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Via: Pocket Now

Source: GLBenchmark