Hasta La Gadget!

It’s not a mistake that Bill Gates spoke this week on the Microsoft Surface saying Apple may have to follow suit at essentially the same time as Andrew Kim’s The Next Microsoft branding has come along. Actually it’s more like divine intervention, with some power up above finally telling Microsoft to get their rear in gear, to not only chop out the middle man in more ways than one, but to get some graphic designers worth their salt as well. The biggest news at the moment is the fact that in an interview with Charlie Rose this week, Bill Gates was quoted saying that Apple will probably have to create their own Surface-like device in the near future because Microsoft’s effort was so awesome.

Speaking on not only the Surface but Microsoft’s entire history, Gates let Rose know that he doesn’t regret for a second the decisions he’s made in regards to the hardware ecosystem for the big M: “I actually believe you can have the best of both worlds. You can have a rich ecosystem of manufacturers and you can have a few signature devices that show off, you know, wow, what’s the difference between a tablet and a PC.” He speaks of course of Windows as an operating system and 3rd party manufacturers such as HP, Dell, and Acer.

The Microsoft Surface is a bit different, with Microsoft not being open about who actually created the components for the devices, instead presenting the product as their very own. This next-generation device, as he and Microsoft would like to present it, is ready to take the spotlight in the very near future.

“You don’t have to make a compromise. You can have everything you like about a tablet and everything you like about a PC all in one device. And so that should change the way people look at things.” – Gates

When asked by Rose whether or not Apple would “have to change” the way they’re creating the products they’ve got now, whether or not they’d have to create a Surface-like product in the future, Gates replied at first with a bit of hesitation, saying that the market hadn’t yet decided if it wants the Surface in the first place.

Gates continued, though, with the thought that Apple would have to create a Surface-like device was indeed “a strong possibility.”

“This is a seminal event.” – Gates

Have a peek at our timeline below for everything Surface up unto this point, and stay tuned as not only the Surface price is revealed in the near future, but the release date is dropped as well!

[via CNET]

Apple Surface a possibility says Bill Gates is written by Chris Burns & originally posted on SlashGear.
© 2005 – 2012, SlashGear. All right reserved.

In just over a week from today, users will be able to get the “Next Big Thing”, aka the Galaxy S III, from Samsung through their favorite 4G LTE toting network Verizon Wireless here in the USA. This device will be mainly the same Galaxy S III we’ve seen several times before, but this time coming with Verizon’s ultra-fast network for data. Have a peek at the rest of the specifications for this beast below right alongside the most updated pricing released today.

Verizon has sent out word that this device will be costing $199.99 and $249.99 depending on if customers want a 16GB or 32GB model, though both models work with a microSD card slot able to handle a 64GB 3rd party card. This device will be available in stores and online in every make and model save the 32GB version which will be online but not in stores immediately. The 32GB version of the device will be in stores “in the coming weeks.”

The Samsung Galaxy S III is a unique device for Samsung in that it’s essentially identical no matter where you pick one up with whatever carrier you desire, and is also available on five major networks here in the USA at once. This smartphone has a 1.5GHz dual-core Qualcomm Snapdragon S4 processor and 2GB of ram for ultra-powerful handheld computing. It’s also got S-Beam, a feature only on the Galaxy S III for now but spreading to Samsung devices galore in the near future.

Have a peek at our reviews of each of the iterations of the Galaxy S III right now in the timeline below and go line up at Verizon for your device immediately!

Galaxy S III hits Verizon on July 10 is written by Chris Burns & originally posted on SlashGear.
© 2005 – 2012, SlashGear. All right reserved.

If you were planning on heading to Verizon to pick up your favorite 4G LTE capable tablet this week, you might be in for a surprise – the prices for these devices have gone up significantly. The reason for this is that Verizon has decided to stop subsidizing tablet prices, selling them instead for their full original ticket price with no service contract attached. This move comes along with Verizon’s new Share Everything plans which were enacted last month.

On the negative side of this coin, you’ll be paying a large amount of cash up front if you want to own a tablet with Verizon. If you want the least expensive 4G LTE-toting Motorola Droid Xyboard 10.1, you’ll be paying $630 USD. If you want the least expensive 4G LTE-toting Apple iPad, you’ll also be paying $630 USD.

The plus side is that with this new system, you’ll be able to add service for a tablet for just $10 a month for starters – which is cheap until you actually start using your internet. For data per month you’ll be paying $60 a month for 2GB, $70 for 4GB, $80 for 6GB, $90 for 8GB, and a whopping $100 gets you 10GB of data per month. Each 1GB of data overage costs you $15 USD unless the user chooses to go over and says so before they do so – in that case it’s just $10 per 1GB.

Current customers are grandfathered in to their current data plans while new customers will only be able to choose from this Share Everything set of plans. Pre-paid tablet plans also exist, with $20 for 1GB of data, $30 for 2GB, $50 for 3GB, or $80 for 8GB – see if you can find the strangeness in these prices. And of course, go grab a tablet now!

Verizon tablet prices explode is written by Chris Burns & originally posted on SlashGear.
© 2005 – 2012, SlashGear. All right reserved.

Today you’ll be able to head on down to your local US Cellular outlet and pick up no less than the smallest of the three HTC One devices on the market, the HTC One V. This device was announced alongside the HTC One X and One S earlier this year in Barcelona at Mobile World Congress and we’ve had our fair share of a look at each and every one of them. This device works with Android 4.0 Ice Cream Sandwich, has Beats Audio embedded within, and will be yours for less than $200 this afternoon.

The HTC One V is the most pocket-friendly of the three HTC One devices on the market today, and is also the only one of the three to be released without some sort of 4G connectivity. Instead you’ll be working with the perfectly suitable 3G network of US Cellular, and the whole package will be yours for the lowest price for an HTC One device on the market. You’ll be paying $129.99 after a $100 mail-in rebate, this attached to a two-year contract with the carrier.

Be sure to check out our full review of the HTC One V and get back to us with comments on how you’ll be picking it up or leaving it behind today! Also head to our timeline for the HTC One V below and stick around for more hands-on action soon!

HTC One V hits US Cellular today is written by Chris Burns & originally posted on SlashGear.
© 2005 – 2012, SlashGear. All right reserved.

A report out earlier today from NPD highlighted how tablets are taking over from notebooks as the mobile PC of choice. By coincidence, a survey has been published by Gartner today that sheds some light on the “how” behind that shift: more people are using tablets for the functions that used to be the preserve of PCs, such as checking email, social networking and checking the weather.

The survey also found that tablets are becoming a mainstay for people who read newspapers, magazines and books. More than 50 percent of respondents said they preferred to read on tablets instead of on paper. It’s not clear if ‘tablets’ in this case includes devices like the Kindle as well, but what’s clear so far is that a portable touchscreen is not replacing the physical versions of those completely, yet: it’s about “less paper” rather than “paperless”, Gartner says.

Gartner’s findings are from the end of 2011 and covering just over 500 consumers in the UK, U.S. and Australia, was run as a diary where people recorded what they did on their three most-used devices: those, it seems, were predetermined as tablets, mobile devices and PCs. The research does not look at the actual devices, to see whether the iPad, for example, is seeing more usage than an Android tablet.

Gartner found that just as it is with PCs, email was the most popular activity with respondents: 81 percent said they checked email on tablets. After that, newsreading was the second-most popular activity at 69 percent; checking weather was the third-most popular at 63 percent; social networking was at 62 percent; and gaming in third at 60 percent.

And what’s interesting is that while we’ve heard a lot from magazine, newspaper and book publishers about how the rise of tablets has changed their business models around, the Gartner survey gives us the other side of the deal: it shows that consumers are really using their tablets as a replacement for all three, with a majority of respondents, 51 percent, saying they preferred to get their periodical hit from their tablets more than the paper versions.

Carolina Milanesi, research vice president at Gartner, notes that tablets scored much higher as a printed matter replacement than phones or PCs.

“The rapid adoption of media tablets is substantively changing how consumers access, create and share content,” she writes. “On average, one in three respondents used their media tablets to read a book, compared with 13 percent for mobile PCs, and 7 percent for mobile phones.”

In fact, at home tablets seem to stand in a class of their own for consumers, in that they are used alongside whatever else a consumer is using; meanwhile, that “whatever else” is often shifting, from TV to PC to mobile device depending on what users are doing. Tablets, Gartner notes, are used most in the living room (87 percent), the bedroom (65 percent) and kitchen (47 percent), and less on the weekends than on weekdays, when we tend to be out of the house more.

And just as the NPD analysts pointed out that notebook PCs are being more tablet-like, here we get some confirmation from the consumer side that we clearly have a taste for the tablet form factor at the moment: they are small and lightweight, and that’s convenient. And while PCs are often shared commodities in a household, perhaps because of their size or price, or for the fact that they are not exactly designed to be shared, tablets occupy a personalized position more akin to the mobile handset: some 45 percent of respondents said they “do not share their tablet at all”.

Gartner also provided some survey feedback on how other devices are used. It noted that if tablets are dominant at home, mobile phones are the most dominant when considering day-long use. They are used eight times per day on average, the survey found. As a point of comparison, tablets are only used twice per day on average, and mobile PCs are used three times per day (although the hours spent in those times will, of course, vary). In terms of what they’re used for, it’s a spread similar to tablets, except that music is added in as a top-five activity (weather drops out).

Like tablets, mobiles are used most of all in the living room (78 percent). Gartner’s conclusion: TVs are fighting for users’ attention, which is also being captured by these portable devices. Mobile TV remains a very niche activity: only five percent of users said they watched mobile TV on their phones. On-demand content scored somewhat higher at 15 percent.

A bit on gender differences, too: while both use Internet at home more than outside the home, men say they use their devices for gathering information, while women say they use them for entertainment like gaming and socialising on sites like Facebook and Twitter.

Additional information is available in the Gartner report “Survey Analysis: Early Tablet Adopters and Their Daily Use of Connected Devices.” The report is available on Gartner’s website at.

* Note to Editors
In November 2011, Gartner interviewed 510 consumers via an online survey in the U.S., the U.K. and Australia. Respondents had to own a media tablet and at least two other connected devices.