Hasta La Gadget!

It is believed that Nokia is developing a 6 inch 1080p full HD display touting phablet which it will release around the holiday season. Rumors about this device are slowly trickling in, this phablet is said to have a Qualcomm Snapdragon 800 quadcore processor and a 20 megapixel rear camera. Bluetooth SIG filing reveals that the model number of this phablet might be RM-940. We’ve previously known this phablet by its codename, which is “Bandit.”

Yesterday’s rumor about the Bandit claimed that the device will have a small hump on its back, like the Lumia 925. The hump would be there to accommodate its 20 megapixel camera. The phablet itself is said to be made from polycarbonate, it is also said to be very thin and lightweight. This would actually be the first Nokia and Windows Phone device to tout a full HD 1080p display as well as a quadcore processor. The phablet may become part of the Lumia lineup. Nokia’s Lumia smartphone have done relatively well in the global smartphone market. There’s no concrete information regarding the release of the Bandit or RM-940, Nokia hasn’t even acknowledged the existence of this phablet. As per rumors, Nokia is likely to announce this device in the holiday season.

Nokia RM-940 ‘Bandit’ Phablet Receives Bluetooth SIG Certification original content from Ubergizmo.

Sony is steering its mobile ship into deeper waters with the Xperia Z Ultra. The 6.4-inch device (above, left) slots in the size gap between its former flagship handset, the 5-inch Xperia Z (above right), and its 10.1-inch Android slate, the Xperia Z Tablet. The Xperia Z Ultra might have more sensibly been named the Xperia Z Tablet Mini. Instead, Sony has hedged its bets with a name that doesn’t exclude either possibility: for some people this is a really big smartphone, for others it’s a highly portable small slate.

I got hands-on with the newest addition to Sony’s line up at a press event this morning. First impressions: there’s no getting away from the sheer size of this beast. The Xperia Z Ultra is a mammoth. It’s huge, crazy huge. It looks more like a mini tablet than a phone when you see it wielded in anger, which likely explains why Sony has felt the need to make a dummy handset accessory (powered by Bluetooth) so you don’t have to hold this slab up to your face. Doing that is going to invite ridicule unless you’re one of those Ballmer-sized business men with hands the size of dinner plates.

Even holding the Ultra in one hand feels a little ridiculous if you have smaller hands than average, like myself, but its slender profile (just 6.5mm) helps — meaning it doesn’t feel too palm-stretching. The main offsetting factor is a very lightweight feel. It’s surprisingly light in the hand (212g) for such a large device. You could happily hold it in one hand and not worry about getting wrist-ache. And if you can find a pocket on your person big enough to accomodate the Ultra it won’t feel like a drag, even if it drastically reduces your ability to bend.

Sony says the Ultra is about a third bigger than the Xperia Z (and has a third-extra in battery capacity too, so it’s still good for about one day’s use before needing a charge). And at 6.4-inches it’s considerably larger than Samsung’s 5.5-inch Galaxy Note II, and fractionally larger than Samsung’s newer phablet, the 6.3-inch Galaxy Mega. Rumours around the Galaxy Note refresh suggest Samsung is contemplating adding a 5.9-inch pane on the next iteration. Sony has evidently decided its worth making an even bigger splash with its own phablet foray. But with the Xperia Z already sitting on the cusp of phablet sizing, with its 5-inch pane, supersizing the sequel is the natural next step.

Sony talked up how consumer demand for bigger screens is growing — apparently as fast as the screens themselves are swelling. The likely reason for that, as I have previously argued, is that people are using smartphones for more rich media consumption and visual computing uses more of the time – fuelled by apps and high speed connectivity — rather than for talking on the phone. Screen size is therefore inflating to adapt to shifting use. And Sony reckons it’s well placed to capitalise on the momentum powering media consumption — thanks to its sprawling entertainment empire.

As with its other Xperia devices, Sony’s Android skin foreground access to this media content. Sony is hoping its content empire can become a differentiating force in the mobile devices space — and help it stand out in the crowded Android OEM segment. As with Sony other current Xperia devices, the Xperia Z Ultra is preloaded with its Walkman app providing access to music downloads and its Music Unlimited streaming service; Movies for video content, including access to Sony’s Video Unlimited store for renting or buying films; and PlayStation Mobile for accessing its games app store. There’s also Sony Reader for browsing and downloading ebook content.

Elsewhere, Sony has kept its Android tweaks to a minimum so there’s little getting in the way of enjoying Android 2.2 Jelly Bean as Google intended. The device felt slick and fast during my brief hands on, with no obvious signs of lag. The phone’s engine is a beefy 2.2 GHz quad-core chip (Qualcomm’s Snapdragon 800 processor) — possibly the first device to pack that CPU. It also includes 4G/LTE for high speed cellular connectivity.

The hardware design of the Xperia Z Ultra follows the same mold as the Xperia Z and Xperia Z Tablet. There are no showy embellishments. What you get is a clean, relatively blunt-sided high gloss slab (or at least it’s clean until you touch it, when the high gloss becomes a fingerprint magnet). The user’s eye is clearly intended to fall squarely on the screen — where Sony gets to really strut its stuff, by pulling in IP from its Bravia TV division to amp up the colour clarity and video playback experience on the handset. The Ultra is also the first device in Sony’s Xperia line-up to be badged with its latest Triluminos TV tech, which it said supports a greater range of colours.

The screen looked plenty bright during my hands on but as with other Sony mobile screen it’s not as saturated as Samsung’s high end AMOLED screens typically are. Sony opts for more true-to-life colourings with its display tech. The Xperia Z Ultra’s big, bright full 1080p HD pane obviously comes into its own for consuming video content. You can image the device being a handy travelling companion for watching TV shows and movies on the go, assuming you don’t want to lug around a full-fat tablet. Or for watching TV in the bath — being as the Ultra is waterproof. Gaming is also likely to work well with so much screen space for mashing virtual buttons.

The Ultra’s large physical size (179.4 x 92.2 x 6.5 mm) does mean typing can require two fingers to reach all the keys. But Sony has a software fix for that. It’s added a one-handed keyboard option which allows the user to switch from a screen-filling QWERTY to one which compacts into the right or left hand corner, depending on your choice (so that both right- and left-handed people can use it). So that’s pretty neat. You can of course further augment the Android keyboard experience by downloading alternative third party apps.

Sony has also added support for stylus input on the Ultra — presumably taking another cue from the Galaxy Note — for taking notes, sketching and for handwriting recognition. In a laudable move — especially for Sony, once the king of propriety accessories — there’s no specific stylus required here. You can draw on the screen with a pencil. Or even a fingernail.

To sum up, the Xperia Ultra Z feels like it has a lot going for it. Sony is refining its Android play to zero in on media consumption. And if it’s content you want to consume, then a 6.4-inch screen is exactly the sort of thing you’ll want in your pocket. Or, more realistically, in your handbag/manbag. Flagship smartphone screens aren’t getting any smaller either, so even if the Ultra feels like it’s pushing the screen size envelope a bit far right now, it’s unlikely to remain the biggest phablet in phablet-town for long.

Apple is looking at various changes to its iPhone lineup over the course of the next year, according to a new report from Reuters, including two sizes of larger smartphone devices, in both a 4.7-inch and 5.7-inch flavor. The “phablet” plans are also being considered alongside a less expensive iPhone model, which is slated to begin production next month, according to Reuters’ sources, after a brief delay as Apple attempts to get the colors right for the new plastic-backed device.

The cheaper iPhone would be launching in September following full production kicking off in August, according to some of Reuters’ sources, with an initial shipment target of around 20 million low-cost devices for the holiday quarter next year. The report details echo what we’ve heard from other sources recently, including from fairly accurate analyst Ming-Chi Kuo, who previously shared reports of multi-color options for the cheaper iPhone, with a thin plastic case and the same 4-inch screen as the iPhone 5. Reuters adds that it should cost around $99 when it launches, and that its release timeline might be pushed back by as much of a year.

Reports of the low-cost iPhone have been making the rounds in more or less reliable circles for a while now, which is the more interesting component of this new report. Other sources have reported that Apple is looking at bigger-screened devices, so-called “phablets” to compete with similar offerings from Android smartphone manufacturers, including the Galaxy Note line from Samsung. But even Apple’s flagship smartphone, the iPhone 5, lags behind most competing general-purpose non-phablet devices like the HTC One and Galaxy S4 in terms of screen size at 4-inches.

Apple’s big-screen iPhone plans are less evolved than those for its low cost device, the report claims, with one of Reuters’ sources suggesting that we could still see the plans shift considerably before anything reaches a production stage. Apple has discussed the idea with production partners, but has not set any kind of timeframe for test production or launch as of yet. Reuters says that Apple is considering the different screen sizes comes as there’s increased pressure to field more than one device a year.

Apple CEO Tim Cook suggested that we might see a larger iPhone when the trade-offs of battery life, screen quality, color reproduction and other failings brought about would be possible to counteract, speaking at the recent AllThingsD D11 conference. He did admit that some consumers are interested in those devices, however, so it’s likely that these reports come from Apple’s attempts to overcome those limitations with engineering. Plenty of Apple products don’t make it past the testing phase, however, so while you can be sure Apple is experimenting with big displays for iPhone, you can’t be equally sure we’ll ever see one. Still, Cook’s guidance to consumers and media that they can look for big product launches in the fall and through next year specifically do line up with the timing of possible iOS phablet launches reported by Reuters today.

Several French sites report receiving invites (shown above) to a Sony Mobile press event promising a surprise of size while showing off a device’s slender side profile and a stylus. The reference could be a teaser for the rumored Xperia Z Ultra, believed to be a Sony competitor to the Galaxy Notes of the world featuring a 6.44-inch 1080p display and possibly a Snapdragon 800 CPU inside. The buttons also seem to match another leaked image, and invites have also gone out for events in Germany and China on June 25th, while the message itself encourages recipients to “note” it in their calendar.

Filed under: Cellphones, Mobile, Sony

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Source: FrAndroid, Xperia Blog

If there’s an award for the meatiest leak of the year, then this would make a fitting nomination. The above photo (reformatted for this page) was tweeted earlier today by France-based Dahny El Perro, who claims the blue device in the top right corner is an upcoming Nokia Lumia 1030. While it’s hard to tell the physical features from the blurred shot, the wider spacing around the Windows Phone soft keys suggests this might be a larger device than the existing Lumia 920. More interestingly, its screenshot features an extra tile column, which is a feature rumored to be part of the Windows Phone 8 GDR3 update, according to ZDNet’s Mary Jo Foley.

Next up we have what appears to be the rumored 6.44-inch, 1080p Sony “Togari,” whose front panel was first spotted way back in January. Alas, there’s little to see here, but we were quickly distracted by the much smaller HTC device next to it. Many have simply dismissed this as the One, though if you look close enough you should notice the subtle differences: the frame is white all around the phone, and the speaker grills are shorter. Indeed, this device matches @evleaks’ earlier render of the 4.3-inch M4, thus making this leak its first real-life appearance. But of course, there’s also a good chance that this is merely a very clever hoax involving three unannounced devices, not to mention that the Twitter account is also super fresh, so we won’t be placing any bets just yet.

Update: WPCentral’s sources say Nokia currently does not have plans for this type of over-sized phone, and they’ve confirmed that this image is inaccurate. Upon further research and analysis, we’re leaning towards believing this is indeed an elaborate hoax.

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Via: Blog Of Mobile (Japanese)

Source: Dahny el Perro (Twitter)