Hasta La Gadget!

There appears to be some great weight coming with the proliferation of the Pebble watch in the wearables market today, at least so far as other competing companies go. As … Continue reading

Archos just dropped a huge smattering of CES news in advance of the huge annual tech show, which kicks off next week in Las Vegas. Among the various announcements, tucked away near the bottom, is the revelation that it will be introducing a “selection of smartwatches” for 2014, which will start at under £50 (roughtly $82 U.S.).

Archos doesn’t go into much detail about its smartwatches, saying only that they’ll have a “pebble-like” design and will work with both Android and iOS smartphones and tablets. The “pebble-like” seems like a blatant shot across the bow of Pebble, the Kickstarter-backed hardware startup that began building smartwatches under that name this past year, though it’s probably meant on the surface to indicate the things will look somewhat like rocks.

The Pebble is arguably the current leader in the smartwatch space, having sold somewhere around 300,000 units to date according to the latest official figures released by the company. Archos, the French company behind a line of moderately successful media players, and subsequently many Android-based tablets and gaming gadgets of questionable quality, looks to be trying to exploit the opportunity exposed by newcomer Pebble with cheaper devices in a range of options to suit the needs of various consumers.

Archos is targeting “simplicity and function” with its smartwatch designs, the company says, which could actually seem to be at cross-purposes. Maybe they’ll have some feature heavy designs, more like the Samsung Galaxy Gear, and some that are essentially just streamlined data delivery devices, more like the Pebble itself. Either way, I highly doubt Archos will find a red-hot seller in any smartwatch design – but that doesn’t mean it can’t meddle with the grand plans of Pebble and other startups.

Pebble is currently running a lot of sales and promotions, and giving away a good number of devices. This means that either A) it’s finding interest is dropping off after initial demand has been satisfied; or B) it’s gearing up to release second-generation hardware. Regardless, I still think we’ve yet to see any proof that watch-based computing is something that’s feasible as a mainstream device, and entrants from Archos are unlikely to provide said evidence.

So we have heard of how Apple has made efforts to bring iOS into vehicles through their iOS in the car program, but it looks like Google could be interested in bringing Android into vehicles as well. This is not the first time that Android has debuted in vehicles but if reports are to be believed, an Android entertainment of sorts is expected to make its debut in Audi’s vehicles. According to a report published by The Wall Street Journal, they are claiming that Google and Audi are rumored to make an announcement at CES 2014 which is taking place in a couple of weeks. The announcement is said to be about an Android-powered in-car entertainment system and will see other companies, not just Audi, hopping on board the Android bandwagon.

It is unclear as to what sort of features we might be looking at, but presumably we will see things such as access to various Android apps, Google services, navigation, music, and more, with the entertainment unit running on Android itself as opposed to syncing up with an iOS device, which is what Apple is doing at the moment with car manufacturers. In any case take it with a grain of salt for now, but competing with Apple in the vehicle space would not be a complete stretch of the imagination. We will be like at CES 2014 so be sure to check back with us then for the details.

Google And Audi Rumored To Announce Android In-Car Entertainment System original content from Ubergizmo.

Earlier this year we did a review on an Olympus OM-D E-M5 and if the recent rumors are to be believed, there is a good chance that Olympus could be announcing a new OM-D camera in the form of the OM-D E-M10. This is according to a listing by the Indonesian government which shows a registration for a device called the E-M10 by Olympus, so we guess this isn’t so much a rumor but a certainty, although at the moment is unclear as to what sort of camera the E-M10 could be about. Rumored specs include a sensor similar to that of the E-M5, but the E-M10 is expected to have a brand new image processor, but other than that not much else is known about the camera for now.

It has also been speculated that the E-M10 could be unveiled at CES 2014 which is only a couple of weeks away from taking place, so perhaps we will learn more then. Alternatively some have suggested that Olympus might take advantage of the CP+ show which is held not too long after CES to unveil the camera, so that’s a possibility as well. Either way we will be live at CES 2014 ourselves so do check back with us then to see if Olympus has anything in store for us. Until then we will keep our eyes peeled for more information and update you guys accordingly!

Olympus OM-D E-M10 Camera Rumored For Announcement Soon original content from Ubergizmo.

ASUS has released the second of two (or more) teaser videos ahead of its CES 2014 product launch. This one hints at 4-, 5-, and 6-inch handset offerings. In keeping … Continue reading