Hasta La Gadget!

It’s time to begin counting down to the weekend once again, because we’ve hit Wednesday evening. Today we heard that the iPad Mini could launch on November 2, which makes sense considering that date is just over a week after Apple’s October 23 press event. Later in the day, more sources were mentioning a November 2 release date for the iPad Mini, as well as spilling a few more details about the long-rumored device. The Isis NFC mobile payment system will apparently be launching on October 22, and Microsoft said that Internet Explorer 10 will be coming to Windows 7 in mid-November.

We found out today iOS app size is on the rise, and that the FCC will allow AT&T to take advantage of unused airwaves for mobile broadband. Google is allowing third-party developers to use its plethora of Maps information with a set of new APIs, and Facebook’s new promoted posts feature is undergoing and expansion in Europe. RIM CEO Thorsten Heins had something to say about a recent (and rather negative) write-up about BlackBerry in The New York Times today, and a series of leaked AT&T training videos revealed that the Lumia 920 will be exclusive to the carrier for six months after its release.

Call of Duty Elite won’t be featured in the Wii U version of Black Ops II, and Apple has been granted a patent for an alternative NFC technology. Speaking of Apple, the company will be holding a meeting with the MFI group next month to talk about the future of the Lightning connector, and Foxconn is saying that the iPhone 5 is a difficult device to make, but assures that it’s getting better. Consumers are reporting a decline in overall Internet usage, but Forrester (the company that did the study) has a good explination for that, while V-MODA was busy pulling the veil off its Crossfade M-100 headphones today.

A new video called “Star Trails” shows time-lapse footage captured by the International Space Station, and the Color app that has been gracing Verizon phones lately may be going dark soon. Just a little while ago, Google sent out invites to an Android event that will take place in New York in a couple of weeks, and we got a high-definition look inside the company’s data centers today. The Pirate Bay told us this afternoon that it has switched its servers to the cloud, eBay posted some strong Q3 financial results, and Project Eternity from Obsidian reached its funding goal on Kickstarter (and then some).

Finally tonight, Chris Davies asks why we care about the iPad Mini, and Craig Lloyd brings us his review of the Loop Mummy iPhone case. That does it for tonight’s Evening Wrap-Up, enjoy the rest of your night everyone!

SlashGear Evening Wrap-Up: October 17, 2012 is written by Eric Abent & originally posted on SlashGear.
© 2005 – 2012, SlashGear. All right reserved.

Hopefully AT&T subscribers weren’t spooked when the Nokia Lumia 920 first passed through the FCC in only its non-US guise, and its lower-end 820 cousin only as the (currently unofficial) Verizon-ready Lumia 822. The two Windows Phone 8 flagships have had follow-up approvals in GSM versions that are unmistakably destined for AT&T and Canadian carriers. Never mind the slightly distracting RM-820 model number on the Lumia 920; it reveals the 920’s distinctive curved design, 700MHz LTE in AT&T’s range and AWS-based LTE for both AT&T as well as its Canadian neighbor. The Lumia 820 is equally identifiable as the RM-824, even if it limits the LTE access to AT&T’s network. We haven’t seen any shocking revelations from either device, although we weren’t expecting any from phones that hew so closely to the original templates. The filings mostly set expectations for Microsoft’s October 29th event — now that the likely stars of the show are cleared to make their appearances, the companies involved should breathe more easily.

Filed under: Cellphones, Mobile, Microsoft, Nokia

Nokia Lumia 820, 920 for AT&T swing through the FCC originally appeared on Engadget on Mon, 15 Oct 2012 21:09:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Welcome to Thursday evening, folks – just one more work day and the glorious weekend is here once again. This afternoon we heard that both the iPad Mini and the 13-inch Retina MacBook Pro – neither of which officially exist yet, remember – have been delayed due to problems with component yields, but not long after, analysts were saying that the MacBook Pro with Retina Display is still on track to launch this year. Apple has managed to delay the ban of the iPhone and iPad in South Korea, and we learned that the company’s new dock connector is nearly impossible to mod in a new teardown.

If you’ve been waiting for either the DROID RAZR HD or the RAZR MAXX HD, good news: you’ll be able to pick them up from Verizon in just one short week. The Samsung Galaxy S III Mini was officially unveiled today, though its specs aren’t much to write home about, and we learned that the sales ban on the Samsung Galaxy Nexus has been lifted. Google boss Eric Schmidt expects Android to hit 1 billion activations within the next year, and today Sprint confirmed that it has been in buyout talks with SoftBank.

Apple has released a new iPod ad called “Bounce,” while Nokia was busy delivering prices for its Lumia 920 and 820 accessories in the UK. Apple was awarded an interesting new patent today, and Verizon says that it will keep its 2G/3G service active until at least 2021. Today Acer revealed both the new M5 and V5 lines of Windows 8 notebooks, and we heard that at one point, Nokia was planning to bring an N9 MeeGo tablet to Verizon.

Facebook is looking to improve its apps with stricter Open Graphs policies, and Gearbox announced a new DLC pack for good ol’ Borderlands 2 today. Ubisoft delivered a new trailer showing off the weapons in Assassin’s Creed III, while a new compilation called the Rockstar Games Collection: Edition 1 was announced. Anonymous has apparently gone to war with Facebook, bringing down the social network across Europe today, but thankfully it seems that things are slowly coming back online. Finally tonight, we go hands-on with both the Huawei Ascend D Quad XL and SHADOWGUN: DEADZONE‘s new multiplayer beta, while Chris Burns tells us why the Galaxy S III Mini represents a missed opportunity for Samsung. That does it for tonight’s Evening Wrap-Up, go out and enjoy the rest of your night everyone!

SlashGear Evening Wrap-Up: October 11, 2012 is written by Eric Abent & originally posted on SlashGear.
© 2005 – 2012, SlashGear. All right reserved.

If you’re thinking about getting in on the Windows Phone 8 game, you’ll likely be considering pre-ordering in the latter half of this month, with October 21st being the first of several waves of device pre-order announcements. What we’re to understand from sources speaking with The Verge is that AT&T and Microsoft have shook hands on October 21st for pre-order starts on several devices. The first two of these device releases will be the Nokia Lumia 920 and the HTC Windows Phone 8X, both of which will be popping up on AT&T right out of the gate.

This set of announcements also includes word on the Samsung Ativ Smart PC as well as the Asus Vivo Tab RT, both of which will be appearing with AT&T as well. Both of these devices work with a form of Windows 8, an operating system that’ll be coming out later this month as well. Microsoft is bringing on Windows 8 right alongside Windows RT, the system which will appear on the Asus device, it being a tablet-oriented version of Windows 8 to tie the whole galaxy together.

November will contain a rush of device availabilities for Microsoft’s new set of operating systems, with AT&T carrying several devices and at least one for each different OS. Windows Phone 8 will lead the pack at AT&T of course, but they’ll also be pushing for the whole desktop and mobile experience with several data-connected notebooks and tablet. AT&T’s notebooks and tablets with Windows 8 or Windows RT will be popping up on the 26th of October.

Have a peek at our timeline of AT&T releases working with Windows Phone 8 as well as Windows 8 and Windows RT. They very much appear to be all-in as far as Microsoft’s wave of “8″ software hits the market, several manufacturers coming along for the ride – stay tuned for more!

Windows Phone 8 pre-orders tipped for October 21st is written by Chris Burns & originally posted on SlashGear.
© 2005 – 2012, SlashGear. All right reserved.

Much like the 900 before it, Nokia’s Lumia 920 will be making its US debut on AT&T as an exclusive. Despite not having Microsoft’s “signature” blessing, this Windows Phone 8 flagship is poised to ship sometime this November with all the stuffings of its international counterpart. Inside that vibrant polycarbonate hull, of which there are now five colors (including cyan), is a 4.5-inch PureMotion HD+ 1,280 x 768 display, 1.5GHz dual-core Snapdragon S4 processor buffered by 1GB RAM, an 8-megapixel PureView rear camera and 2,000mAh battery augmented by the inclusion of wireless charging. Naturally, this locked and branded variant will run on the carrier’s 4G LTE network and offer the same “Super Sensitive Touch” panel that we tested extensively at the company’s Espoo HQ.

This being Microsoft’s WP8 game, however, we still weren’t able to go past the live-tiled start screen and into the meat and potatoes of the fuller app drawer, nor could we truly give the OS a spin — that’ll all have to wait until end of October. From the tightly controlled software bits we did demo, though, the 920’s shaping up to be a smooth and solid contender for the beast phone race. Icons and text scroll by without any marked blur thanks to the screen’s 60Hz refresh rate. And colors on that saturated display pop, while viewing angles remain consistently impressive. What also hasn’t changed is the handset’s girth and weight — it’s still chunky and relatively heavy in hand, but we’re willing to overlook it for the PureView rear module alone.

Within the frenzied constraints of events like these, it’s hard to really dive deep into camera performance. But we don’t really have much need for that given our exhaustive coverage of the 920’s optical image stabilization, low light capabilities and Cinemagraph GIF-making magic. Still, expect us to give it a fuller poke when final review units land in our laps (hopefully) later this month.

Unfortunately, the wait for Nokia’s next of high-end Lumia kin isn’t over yet. AT&T’s playing coy and won’t fess up to a concrete date or even on-contract price. That should all change as soon as Microsoft makes things officially official. Until then, sate yourself with the images below and don’t miss the video after the break.

Continue reading Nokia Lumia 920 for AT&T hands-on: a Windows Phone 8 flagship with PureView imaging and LTE (video)

Filed under: Cellphones, Mobile, Nokia, AT&T

Nokia Lumia 920 for AT&T hands-on: a Windows Phone 8 flagship with PureView imaging and LTE (video) originally appeared on Engadget on Thu, 04 Oct 2012 17:35:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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