Hasta La Gadget!

We’re getting ready to wrap-up coverage for this Wednesday, and what a day we had. First up we had Nokia’s highly-anticipated Windows Phone 8 event, where it revealed both the Lumia 920 and Lumia 820. There was a lot to take in during the event, and you can find everything you need to know in our Nokia wrap-up. It’s there that you can check out product announcements and hands-on posts with Nokia’s new devices, so be sure to give it a look.

After we had finished up with Nokia’s event, it was straight over to Gotham Hall, where Motorola and Google held an event of their own. Google’s Eric Schmidt took the stage first to boast the latest Android numbers, before Motorola CEO Dennis Woodside hopped up on stage to outline the company’s plan for the “The New Motorola.” After that, it was all about the reveals. Motorola revealed three new phones in total: the long-rumored DROID RAZR HD and the DROID RAZR M, which has had its share of rumors as well, along with the surprise announcement of the DROID RAZR MAXX HD. If you were waiting for Motorola’s new devices, you’ll be pleased to know that we have a couple of hands-on posts that cover all three devices.

Woodside also said today that any Motorola phones from 2012 that don’t get updated to Jelly Bean by the end of the year will be a eligible for a $100 voucher, and it was announced that the developer editions of the DROID RAZR M and the RAZR HD will come with unlockable bootloaders. A little bit later on in the day, we found out that the PureView ad Nokia showed during its presentation may be a little bit misleading, and even though there was a ton of Nokia and Motorola news today, there was still time for a new iPhone leak, this time giving us an up-close look at the battery. Windows Phone 8 will be getting screenshot support, and today the EC approved a mobile wallet team up between three European carriers, much to Google’s chagrin.

Sony is putting its massive 84-inch 4K TV up for pre-order tomorrow, T-Mobile has rolled out unlimited 4G data across the country, and Getac has revealed its new Z710 Android tablet, which looks to be capable of taking a few hits. Pre-orders for the Samsung Galaxy Note II have opened in the UK, where the new device has an expected mid-October ship date, and Ubisoft has announced that it will stop implementing always-on DRM in its PC games. Valve has been forced to impose a submission fee for those looking to list something on Steam Greenlight, Epson has unveiled a pair of home projectors, and finally tonight, NASA scientists today delayed the second engine firing of the Juno spacecraft, which will be headed for Jupiter before long.

That’s all for tonight’s Evening Wrap-Up! Remember to check in with us tomorrow, as we’ll be at Amazon’s press event, where it’s expected to reveal a couple of new devices in the Kindle line!

SlashGear Evening Wrap-Up: September 5, 2012 is written by Eric Abent & originally posted on SlashGear.
© 2005 – 2012, SlashGear. All right reserved.

Earlier today, Nokia announced the Lumia 920, which comes complete with a reboot of PureView. During its press event, Nokia gave us a look at the new PureView’s main feature: optical image stabilization. The idea behind OIS is that it stabilizes the video you’re recording, giving you a more professional look instead of the amateur (and sometimes nauseating) shaky-cam effect.

To show off OIS, Nokia played a very impressive ad featuring a lovely couple as they enjoy an evening bike ride. That ad wowed attendees and those watching at home alike, but according to The Verge, it also may have been faked. In the ad, we’re treated to side-by-side comparison reels of the video shot without OIS and the video shot with OIS. Obviously, the video shot without OIS doesn’t look very good, whereas the video shot with OIS activated looks excellent. There isn’t any shakiness, despite the fact that the person filming the scene is riding on a bike.

Or is he? Toward the end of the video, our blonde-haired subject passes by a parked trailer. When she does, we see the reflection of a white van keeping pace with the girl in one of the trailer’s windows. When the video is paused at exactly that point, we can see what appears to be a cameraman recording the scene with something that definitely doesn’t look like a Nokia Lumia 920, along with a lighting rig at the front of the van to make sure that the shot is perfect. Have a look at the screen capture below to see for yourself.

So, it seems that Nokia’s ad may have been helped along by the work of a professional cameraman and crew. Keep in mind though that it’s possible the cameraman was actually using a Lumia 920 in some kind of rig, which would make it appear to be a different type of camera. It’s also important to remember that we’ve already seen optical image stabilization used in other devices, which should give us a good idea of how it functions with the Lumia 920. Still, this revelation does shed a little bit of doubt on the idea that Nokia’s OIS implementation is amazing as it appears in the video. What’s your take on the whole situation?

Nokia’s PureView ad may not be entirely honest is written by Eric Abent & originally posted on SlashGear.
© 2005 – 2012, SlashGear. All right reserved.

Nokia’s new Lumia 920 may have stolen the show this morning while they announced a few new handsets, but the accessories Nokia brought to the market along with their new phones deserve a quick look too. We have wireless charging in multiple ways, NFC speaker docks from JBL and more so check them out below along with some hands-on and first impressions.

First we’ll start with the just announced JBL Power Up wireless speaker. This new speaker doesn’t have a dock, well, because it doesn’t need one. This is as wireless as it gets featuring both NFC capabilities for wireless media playback, and wireless charging with compatible Lumia devices too. JBL partnered with Lumia and the Qi wireless technology to produce a neat accessory here. Just tap the phone and speaker together for some NFC goodness to start streaming your favorite song, or lay your Lumia right on top and charge it at the same time. This is quite the cord-cutting accessory.

Then since we are talking about cord cutting they also detailed multiple other wireless charging systems too. Nokia also announced their own Lumia Wireless charging pads using the same Qi charging we’ve seen from others like HP and Palm. This still hasn’t taken off like many had hoped, but Nokia seems to be putting forth tons of effort in the technology. We have hands-on video showing off their charging system that will be available shortly.

When we said Nokia is going all in on wireless charging we meant it. They partnered with JBL above, and even with Fatboy to announce a wireless charging “pillow”. Yea this is actually a soft microfiber pillow with the Qi charging standard built-in. This will be a nice and comfy place to set your lovely Yellow or Cyan Lumia 920, and they’ve partnered with Virgin Atlantic, Coffee Bean, and Tea Leaf to get these pillows in lounges nationwide. Yes they want you to be able to charge your Lumia while hanging out at the coffee shop — again all wirelessly.

Then while it isn’t an accessory in the usual standards the Lumia 820 also announced today will support a wide array of colors and battery covers. This will add the wireless charging options to that budget smartphone to join the 920, and they’ll be offering multiple colors such as black, yellow, cyan, purple and more. Then lastly just like leaks all last week Nokia has partnered with Monster to offer the same bright colors in multiple NFC capable wireless headphones as you can see below.

The Nokia event has just wrapped up earlier today and we’ll continue to bring you more details and hands-on video as the day continues.

Nokia Lumia accessories and wireless charging hands-on is written by Cory Gunther & originally posted on SlashGear.
© 2005 – 2012, SlashGear. All right reserved.

Nokia’s new Lumia 920 may not be PureView as we’ve known it, but that doesn’t mean it’s not some darned clever camera technology all the same: think springs in your smartphone for a start. A new side-by-side video demo of the stabilization system in play – which you can see after the cut – shows another string of PureView’s catch-all camera bow, relying not on masses of megapixels but on how a more average sensor does its business.

The 808 PureView uses oversampling to construct incredibly detailed, accurate pictures. Each pixel of its roughly 5-megapixel final stills is made up of the combined data from seven pixels on the sensor itself: by averaging out the results, and discounting anything which is obviously an outlier, Nokia can create a more impressive image than you’d get from, say, a regular 5-megapixel (or even 8-megapixel) traditional camera-phone.

In contrast, the Lumia 920 has just that: a regular 8-megapixel sensor. What’s special is how it’s mounted, with what Nokia calls “floating lens” technology, putting it on a set of actual, physical springs inside the 10.7mm thick chassis. As you can see in the video below, the difference is marked: video is smoother, as if your Lumia 920 is mounted on a tiny Steadycam, while stills should show an improvement in low-light performance, as exposures can be longer without introducing blur from shaky hands.

Update: Nokia has admitted that the video demo it put together was not filmed with the Lumia 920, and that it was only intended to simulate what the OIS system could do. The second video, however, shows an actual side-by-side comparison filmed on the new smartphone.

Unfortunately, what it also means is that none of the 808 PureView’s other ambitious enhancements are present: you don’t get lossless zooming on the Lumia 920, and there’s no sign of Rich Recording for higher quality audio in video clips. Whether the market has heard enough about the 808 to know what they’re missing on the Lumia 920 is questionable, though.

Still, as Nokia’s imaging chief Damien Dinning said earlier in the week, there’s more to PureView than just big sensors. We’ve been waiting for Nokia to show us how it will differentiate its Windows Phones from those of other OEMs – in more ways than just software – for some time, and it’s good to see the Lumia 920 finally deliver on that promise.

PureView rebooted: Nokia shows why Lumia 920 camera is special is written by Chris Davies & originally posted on SlashGear.
© 2005 – 2012, SlashGear. All right reserved.

Just five months after grandly returning to the United States with the Lumia 900, Nokia’s switching it out for an even better Windows Phone 8 offering. The 920’s coming with a beefier display, better internals and has wholly embraced wireless charging — but that’s not the feature everyone’s gonna be talking about. No, that’s reserved for the 8-megapixel PureView hardware and the new imaging tech behind it. Still, that shouldn’t distract from the real business at hand: identifying the tiny hardware differences that separate the current and future iterations of the flagship, which we’ve broken down for you after the break.

Continue reading Nokia Lumia 920 vs. Lumia 900: what’s changed?

Filed under: Cellphones, Mobile

Nokia Lumia 920 vs. Lumia 900: what’s changed? originally appeared on Engadget on Wed, 05 Sep 2012 11:35:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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