Hasta La Gadget!

The latest product from BlueStacks, the GamePop Android-powered gaming console, will retail for $129 once it exists its free pre-order offer, which is ongoing and will continue through the end of June, the company announced today. And it will launch with a solid line-up of paid gaming titles for the all-you-can-eat subscription fee of $6.99 per month, thanks to newly announced partnerships with COM2US, Korea’s largest game developer, which will have its own dedicated channel in the GamePop menu.

Other newly announced partners included Intellijoy, and education developers that boasts three of the top 10 spots in the education app category of Google Play, which will be adding around $30 worth of software to the subscription package on offer from GamePop. At launch, GamePop plans to have 500 top paid gaming titles available to subscribers, with revenue split 50/50 between itself and those game developers chosen to be included in the roster.

GamePop also shared sparse details about its controller system, which will feature dedicated hardware as well as other mobile devices. I spoke with BlueStacks’ John Gargiulo about the new GamePop announcements, and about the controller in particular.

“It is not what people will expect, it’s much better, we will ensure that the experience is high quality game-by-game,” he said. GamePop will also support using Android or iPhone devices as controllers, via a virtual gamepad interface, and also using “new control paradigms that have recently been made possible,” he teased, though he couldn’t go into more detail about what exactly we’d be seeing in terms of unique control schemes. Most likely gesture-based controls that leverage the accelerometer in those devices will be in play, perhaps providing a Wii-style gaming experience. These will also be tailored to titles game-by-game.

Overall, the game-by-game approach is a key competitive advantage for GamePop, Gargiulo argues. Whereas others like OUYA have put the impetus on developers to bring their software to their platform and tweak it to make sure it fits, GamePop is doing the opposite, and making sure that developers can bring their software untouched to its device. That means devoting more resources from its own team to ensuring the experience is a good one on the console, but it’s a necessary step when you’re asking developers to embrace a new business model, and it’s something that will ultimately help lower the barrier of entry and ensure that Bluestacks can offer as strong a library as possible.

That library needs to include games that people already know and love, Gargiulo believes, and delivering that will be the difference between success or failure in this space according to him.

“What’s really helping us win developers is the fact that we’re using our resources, our funding, our engineering to build all of the IP around their apps and games working on GamePop,” he said. “Whereas, the old school console model, and what others are doing in this space, is asking quite a lot of developers. Developers don’t have a lot of bandwidth, and people are asking them to integrate SDKs, special controls, build special menus and that’s not something we’re asking for.”

Instead, developers are helping cross-promote the console through in-app advertising and other channels, which requires relatively no effort, and, depending on subscriber base, they stand to make a lot more money than they can by offering their titles on a pay-per-install basis. Gargiulo also says that in-app purchase mechanics will remain untouched, and that all proceeds from those sales will go direct to developers (minus the standard Google Play store cut), without BlueStacks taking any cut of the action.

The GamePop is still on track for a Winter 2013 release, the company says, and it arrived at the $129 pricing based on a desire to make sure that it has powerful enough hardware to support the most demanding mobile games, and provide some degree of future-proofing. Its 500-game selection may be subject to future expansion, since they company has seen tremendous developer interest, but will also feature a rotating crop of titles, with under performing games being dropped to ensure players always have access to the top titles.

Samsung has officially confirmed the Galaxy S4 Mini, following a brief leak earlier this month. The new handset takes the name of its current flagship smartphone, the Galaxy S4, but couples it with more mid-range specs to extend the reach of the flagship brand to a larger pool of consumers. It’s a strategy Samsung also deployed with its prior flagship, the Galaxy S3, taking the wraps off a Galaxy S3 Mini last year.

Indeed, Samsung’s overall smartphone strategy is about producing scores of iterations at various price points and screen sizes in order to saturate the market with as much of its hardware as possible. A strategy that, coupled with its massive marketing budget, continues to be extremely successful for the Korean electronics giant, making it far harder for other Android OEMs such as HTC to compete with their far more modest device portfolios.

As with the majority of Samsung’s devices, design wise you’d be hard pressed to distinguish the Galaxy S4 Mini from any other recent Samsung device. Its smaller size being the most distinguishing feature vs the flagship S4. The Mini has a 4.3″ qHD Super AMOLED display vs the 5″ pane on the flagship S4. At 4.3″ the Mini is not actually that small, certainly not compared to some of Samsung’s budget devices, but the target here is users who might not be comfortable with the phablet-sized screen of Samsung’s current flagship but still want something flashy enough to look like a flagship.

Under the hood, the S4 Mini has a 1.7 GHz dual-core chip, rather than the quad-/octa-core of its big brother. There’s 8GB of internal memory and 1.5GB of RAM. The rear camera is 8MP and the front-facing lens is 1.9MP.  Samsung says it will be offering a 4G version of the device, as well as a 3G and dual-SIM version — based on what makes sense for each market.

Features wise, Samsung says the S4 Mini supports “many” of the same features as found on the flagship S4 — including Sound&Shot, Panorama Shot and Story Album, on the camera software side. Other confirmed apps include Group Play, ChatON, S Translator and WatchON. The Mini clearly lacks the full gamut of software services poured onto Samsung’s flagship but most smartphone buyers aren’t going to be fussed about a few lacking apps, especially as the Mini’s price-tag should also be a bit more modest.

There’s no official word on pricing or a full list of confirmed market availability — but expect the S4 Mini to land wherever the S4 has, and certainly to head to the U.S. and the U.K.

Microsoft’s Surface Pro, the tablet/laptop amalgam device designed to perfectly showcase Windows 8, is getting a 256 SSD internal storage option, the biggest yet for the device. Previously, Microsoft has shipped the Surface Pro with either a 64GB or 128GB internal drive, but when it arrives in Japan June 7, it’ll come in 128GB and for the first time, 256GB flavors (via Engadget).

The 128GB model will retail for just about $1,175 U.S. in Japan, or just under $200 more than the 128GB version’s current retail price. The beefier version should help address some of the criticism levied at the Surface Pro for actually reserving a big chunk of on-board storage for OS components, which was particularly harmful in the 64GB capacity.

A 256GB option not only makes the Surface Pro more generally useful, it also gives Microsoft another way to compete with devices that consumers might look to instead, like the iPad, which introduced a high-capacity 128GB version shortly after the Surface Pro’s launch, and the MacBook Air, which offers up to 512GB of storage through customization options.

The Surface Pro spec bump will likely make its way to the U.S. and other markets eventually, as it seems like something that Microsoft could use to boost interest in its Windows 8 flagship slate. But there are also rumors of an entirely new Surface to ship in June, with a possible introduction at Build. I’d say it’s more likely we’ll see this spec bump touted at that conference, as the first-gen Surface is barely out of the oven as it is.

The Surface Pro reportedly hasn’t been selling at that well, with figures from March showing it hadn’t even broken 500,000 devices shipped at that point, based on sources close to Microsoft’s supply chain. That’s obviously not good by really any relative measure, so it wasn’t entirely clear that Microsoft would do much with the line in the future. This new storage option is proof that for now at least, Microsoft is still investing resources in the Surface Pro, even if it isn’t on the verge of releasing all-new hardware under the brand.

There are few things as satisfying – and dangerous – as burning through stuff with a laser. Drake Anthony AKA Styropyro is a young man who enjoys making DIY lasers out of things, and he recently completed a 3000mW laser made from the diode of an old DLP projector that can blow out a beam so hot that it burns paper, plastic, and electric tape in seconds.

Considering the most powerful handheld laser you can buy clocks in at 1,400mW, Anthony’s laser is pretty powerful. He has an entire YouTube channel dedicated to his potentially-damaging efforts, although this light-saber-esque laser is probably his most impressive feat yet.

Considering he makes is enclosures and the electronics himself and he’s still in his teens, it looks like Styropyro has a long career ahead of him training his laser cannons on enemy attack ships on fire off the shoulder of Orion.

via Giz

A lot of the gadgets that help people monitor and track their physical health focus on providing feedback related to physical activity for use with tracking workout data and energy expenditure during the day. Now, a new Kickstarter projected called the W/Me band wants to leverage similar data sources, but with the goal of providing a more holistic picture of wellness.

The W/Me wristband is based around a sensor that monitors your body’s automatic nervous system, providing feedback on body activity that you may not be at all aware of, including breathing patterns and heart rate, to let you know about automatic reactions you may be having that are detrimental to your state of health or physical wellbeing. Then, with rhythmic breathing exercises, the idea is that you’ll be able to correct these negative patterns and improve your general health and mood for the better.

The W/Me project is different from most activity tracking in that it takes a very specific goal of managing breathing and describing a user’s mental state. It provides readings for agility score and ANS (autonomic nervous system) age in addition to a general description of your mental state, which provides information that tells you both how good you might be at dealing with stress, and how old your nervous system is, independent of your actual biological age.

The wristband will have Bluetooth 4.0 connectivity, as well as an LED readout that can provide information independent from an attached smartphone. It advertises a full week’s worth of use on a full battery charge, and also has a built-in USB connector for charging. It uses a built-in heart rate variability sensor, combined with the company’s own algorithms to arrive at its various readings, which can be displayed either on the band itself or on a companion app.

Whether or not you believe in the science behind this, this is a clear growth market for quantified-self devices. There’s plenty of opportunity to explore the intersection of these devices and alternative theories of medicine and wellness, so it’ll be interesting to see if these kinds of gadgets can help bring health- and self-monitoring tech into the mainstream.