Hasta La Gadget!

Apple’s 5th Gen iPod touch has landed, and it marks quite a departure for the touchscreen media player. What once was described as a phoneless-iPhone has evolved into a device with a distinct focus of its own, building on the gaming prowess of its predecessor and adding in a capable digital camera to this latest generation. The first batch of new iPod touch units are winging their way to preorder customers, but one has already landed on the SlashGear test bench, so read on for some first impressions.

While the last iPod touch, though running at Retina resolution, had a less impressive display than its iPhone 4S counterpart, Apple hasn’t made the same mistake this time around. We’ll have to wait for the inevitable teardowns to be sure, but to our eyes the new iPod touch uses the same panel as the iPhone 5, and benefits from it hugely.

It’s dressed in a more distinctive case than before, at a casual glance directly related to the iPhone 5, but unlikely to be mistaken for it. The brushed anodized aluminum is tactile and sturdy, and that – combined with the length of the PMP – emphasizes the thinness: it’s now just 6.1mm thick and, at 88g, 11-percent lighter than the model it replaces. There’s some beveling to the bezel, but only on the front, which should cut down on the scuffs and scratches we saw on the iPhone 5.

Inside there’s Apple’s dualcore A5 chipset, with up to twice the processing power and up to seven times the graphical abilities. It’s certainly enough to keep iOS 6 moving slickly, though will show its particular worth when it comes to gaming and multimedia apps; we’ll be testing those out for our full review. You also get Siri, Apple Maps, the new Facebook integration, and AirPlay Mirroring.

The other big change to this generation is the camera, at 5-megapixels not quite up to the 8-megapixel sensor in the iPhone 5, but certainly the most ambitious of an iPod touch to-date. Already we can see point-and-shoots losing ground to this capable backside-illuminated sensor, benefiting from easy navigation with the touchscreen, the addition of face-detection, panorama mode, and native HDR capture. Apple doesn’t bundle iPhoto, but it’s an affordable $4.99 purchase.

Apple is keeping the 4th-gen iPod touch on sale alongside its new 5th-gen model (the older example will be cheaper, with 16GB and 32GB models, while the 5th-gen will be available in 32GB and 64GB versions) and so we’ll be seeing how they hold up against each other as well as how they compare to the rest of the portable music options out there. That will have to wait for the full SlashGear review, so until then, enjoy our hands-on gallery and video.

iPod touch unboxing & first-impressions (late 2012) is written by Vincent Nguyen & originally posted on SlashGear.
© 2005 – 2012, SlashGear. All right reserved.

MobileCon 2012 hasn’t exactly been the mecca for new products, but that scenario is ideal for giving prepaid carriers like Cricket some time in the trade show spotlight. The company showed off its latest creation from ZTE, the Engage. Despite its stellar name, don’t expect the device to pull a Picard and launch you into the mobile equivalent of warp factor nine, but it’s nothing that will come as a surprise to Cricket users: already available for the non-contractual price of $250, you’re getting a handset that runs a stock version of Ice Cream Sandwich and offers a 1.4GHz single-core Snapdragon S2 processor, Muve Music, a 4-inch WVGA (800×480) display, 1,900mAh battery, 8MP rear camera and VGA front-facing cam, Bluetooth 2.1 and microSD slot (with a 4GB Muve Music-branded card included). Its 13mm thickness may seem to be a little too much for most, and at 5.4 ounces (153g), its weight comes in on the heavier end of the spectrum for its particular form factor and overall size. Not a spec-buster by any stretch of the imagination, but prepaid users may find it to be worthy of the price tag. Head below to see a few more shots of the Engage.

Filed under: Cellphones, Mobile

ZTE Engage for Cricket hands-on originally appeared on Engadget on Wed, 10 Oct 2012 18:30:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

Permalink   |   | Email this | Comments

Here’s the thing with Windows 8: staring at those live tiles feels kinda weird if you can’t reach out and touch them. That’s why Sony has upgraded its Vaio T13 Ultrabook with a touch panel (making it technically the T13-2), allowing you to reach out across the keyboard and swipe away to your heart’s content. We’ve just left some fingerprints on a high-spec model with a Core i7 processor, 1366 x 768 resolution, 256GB SSD and 8GB RAM, which will sell in the UK from October 26th priced somewhere north of £1,000 (or $1,600, though Sony doesn’t set exact prices). A more modestly equipped i7, with 4GB and a 500GB hybrid drive should be somewhere around £900 ($1,400), while an entry-level i3 will start at £700 ($1,100), give or take. Bear mind that the dollar prices will be much lower than these currency conversions suggest — for reference, the original T13 starts at just $770.

Our first impression was that enabling touch on this traditional form factor was slightly awkward, especially if the purpose of touching the screen was to achieve something that would have been more readily accomplished with a tap on the keyboard — such as adjusting brightness, scrolling or returning to the home screen. On the other hand, the UI was incredibly responsive on the Core i7 processor and over time the touchscreen may well come to feel more natural than the touchpad within Microsoft’s new OS. Just bear in mind that enabling touch comes with a couple of sacrifices, aside from any price premium: it adds 100 grams and 1mm in thickness to an Ultrabook that was already on the chunky side, due to the addition of tougher hinges as well as the extra layer in the display. Check out our hands-on video after the break and make up your own mind.

Continue reading Sony unveils touch-enabled Vaio T13 Ultrabook running Windows 8, we go hands-on (video)

Filed under: Laptops

Sony unveils touch-enabled Vaio T13 Ultrabook running Windows 8, we go hands-on (video) originally appeared on Engadget on Wed, 10 Oct 2012 12:22:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

Permalink   |   | Email this | Comments

Yep, it’s a Samsung Galaxy Note II. With T-Mobile branding. At MobileCon 2012. Indeed, there’s not much that will surprise you when gazing upon the latest version of the quad-core Exynos-clad phone / tablet — it’s almost completely the same as the unit we reviewed earlier this week, not to mention the Sprint and AT&T models we’ve played with so far. Cosmetically, the only difference you’ll notice is the Magenta branding on the back of the device. As you’d expect, this particular Note — the T889 — won’t be getting T-Mobile LTE yet, but it does at least have LTE bands 4 and 17 (700MHz and AWS) under the hood, and it offers support for 42Mbps HSPA+ on bands friendly to T-Mobile’s network. Otherwise, the only thing that may catch your eye is the usual smattering of bloatware dedicated to Magenta’s cause. We were a little disappointed to see that the Multi Window feature hasn’t been added to the unit we played with tonight; we won’t rule out the possibility of seeing it added into the final production firmware or shortly after in an OTA update. We still haven’t been given pricing or availability (aside from being told it will be released in the coming weeks), though owners of the original T-Mobile Note will still be annoyed at how fast its sequel came out. Take a look at our images of the marble white and titanium gray version of the T-Mo Galaxy Note II below!

Myriam Joire contributed to this post.

Filed under: Cellphones, Wireless, Mobile, Samsung, T-Mobile

Samsung Galaxy Note II for T-Mobile hands-on originally appeared on Engadget on Tue, 09 Oct 2012 23:16:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

Permalink   |   | Email this | Comments

When we first got our hands on Sony’s full-frame compact camera, the Cyber-shot RX1, we were allowed to touch it, but we couldn’t use it for its stated purpose. Today, however, we got to put its 35mm image sensor and Zeiss Sonnar T* 35mm f/2.0 fixed prime lens to the test at a Sony event in San Francisco. Join us after the break to see a bit more of the City by the Bay and learn how the RX1 performed shooting stills and video.

Continue reading Sony Cyber-shot RX1 sample images and video

Filed under: Cameras, Sony

Sony Cyber-shot RX1 sample images and video originally appeared on Engadget on Tue, 09 Oct 2012 21:31:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

Permalink   |   | Email this | Comments