SlashGear Morning Wrap-up: September 24, 2012

We had a busy and exciting week last week with the release of the iPhone 5, and that continued right into the weekend and now today. While we hope everyone enjoyed their weekend (watching the NFL) it’s time to get back to those gadgets we all love and depend on. First up is the Samsung Galaxy S III getting updated to Android 4.1 Jelly Bean, the international model that is.

Samsung just started the update rollout of Jelly Bean for their new flagship Galaxy S III, and we can expect carriers here in the US to start issuing the update here shortly too — but that could still be a few weeks away or more. That isn’t all from Samsung either. They then issued a Jelly Bean update timeline for multiple (15) of their devices, but oddly enough the original Galaxy Tab 10 wasn’t included. A device only a year old.

Then next up this week is already looking up with talk about Apple Maps, and iPhone 5 sales. Yup, talk is brewing that Apple is aggressively seeking out and looking to hire past Google Maps staff. Then Apple announced they sold 5 million iPhone 5 smartphones over the weekend. While that is a big number, analysts predicted much higher sales, and are blaming Apple’s lack of stock for the missed prediction. Then we have two more pieces of Apple news. One being that more than 100 million devices have been upgraded to iOS 6. Speaking of iOS 6, Google Maps has been hacked to work again on the latest OS.

Then to round off the wrap-up with some other important bits and pieces of news Intel detailed 4G LTE and quad-core plans for later this year, Nintendo’s Wii U will be region-locked, and then we have something weird for you all. You can get a brain controlled kitty tail by a company called Shippo. Yea, that’s weird!

Then to end on a good note the amazing Space-shuttle Endeavour made its final flight this weekend, flying high over California as people across the state enjoyed the site from their rooftops. You’ll be able to see it at the California Science Center starting October 13th on display.

Have a great week folks!


SlashGear Morning Wrap-up: September 24, 2012 is written by Cory Gunther & originally posted on SlashGear.
© 2005 – 2012, SlashGear. All right reserved.


Netflix extends new user interface experience to Android phones (Update)

Netflix extends new user interface experience to Android phones

Netflix’s new user interface experience popped up on Android tablets last year before progressing to the iPad and finally iPhones just last week, but now the company officially announced it’s completing the circle by pushing it to Android phones. As seen on other devices, it’s focused on larger artwork, and offers the ability to scroll through many more titles, as well as search its streaming library from anywhere within the app. Users can tap once on a title to see more info about it or double tap to start playing immediately. The new UI is available on hardware running Gingerbread and above. It may already be appearing on your device but if not, check out the video preview embedded after the break.

Update: We downloaded the app and started poking around and have discovered a rather unfortunate detail left out by Netflix — the new UI is not optimized for high-res displays. Icons, thumbnail images and even the company’s logo are noticeably pixelated on our Galaxy Nexus. Even on the qHD panel of our Droid RAZR M things are pretty fuzzy looking. Hopefully Netflix will address the issue soon and maybe, just maybe, make it look like an Android app instead of an iOS one..

Update 2: We’ve heard from Netflix on the issue, and are told that certain screen resolutions + certain flavors of the OS are resulting in “suboptimal” rendering. Currently it’s doing more testing and making tweaks to improve the experience across the board, we’ll let you know when they arrive.

Continue reading Netflix extends new user interface experience to Android phones (Update)

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Netflix extends new user interface experience to Android phones (Update) originally appeared on Engadget on Mon, 24 Sep 2012 08:54:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Samsung rolling Jelly Bean out across most of its smartphone, tablet lineup ‘soon’

Samsung Jelly Bean

Now that Samsung has commenced beaming Android 4.1.1 Jelly Bean OTA toward deserving Galaxy S III customers, it’s announced a raft of other devices set to receive the buttery OS in the near future. On the list are the Galaxy Tab 2 7.0 and 10.1, Galaxy Note 10.1, Galaxy S II, Galaxy Note, Galaxy Tab 7.0 Plus, Galaxy S Advance, Galaxy S II LTE, Galaxy Music, Galaxy Chat, Galaxy Ace 2, Galaxy Beam, Galaxy Ace Plus, Galaxy mini II and Galaxy S Duos. That should bring a bit of extra speed and smoothness to those devices, along with Google Now for search and Samsung’s own flourishes from the latest TouchWiz UX. As for the rest of us, there’s more than one way to skin a Smartphone — or avoid skinning one, as the case may be.

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Samsung rolling Jelly Bean out across most of its smartphone, tablet lineup ‘soon’ originally appeared on Engadget on Mon, 24 Sep 2012 08:28:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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First official Jelly Bean OTA update for the Samsung Galaxy S III lands in Poland

First official Jelly Bean OTA update for the Galaxy S III lands in Poland

The long-awaited roll-out appears to have commenced, with lucky GS III owners in Poland being among the first to get an early official taste of Android 4.1.1. If you hadn’t heard, the update will bring a host of subtle yet powerful improvements, including Google Now for anticipating search queries, smooth UI improvements from Project Butter, as well as some Samsung extras already seen on the Galaxy Note II, such as a resizable Pop-up play screen. Hopefully this means the update will soon be sent on its merry way to GS IIIs in other parts of the Old World, and maybe at some point — dare we suggest it — those in the US too.

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First official Jelly Bean OTA update for the Samsung Galaxy S III lands in Poland originally appeared on Engadget on Mon, 24 Sep 2012 04:33:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Refresh Roundup: week of September 17th, 2012

Refresh Roundup week of September 17th, 2012

Your smartphone and / or tablet is just begging for an update. From time to time, these mobile devices are blessed with maintenance refreshes, bug fixes, custom ROMs and anything in between, and so many of them are floating around that it’s easy for a sizable chunk to get lost in the mix. To make sure they don’t escape without notice, we’ve gathered every possible update, hack, and other miscellaneous tomfoolery we could find during the last week and crammed them into one convenient roundup. If you find something available for your device, please give us a shout at tips at engadget dawt com and let us know. Enjoy!

Continue reading Refresh Roundup: week of September 17th, 2012

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Refresh Roundup: week of September 17th, 2012 originally appeared on Engadget on Sun, 23 Sep 2012 20:42:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Showtime’s second screen iPad app hits 2.0, goes from Social to Sync

Showtime's second screen iPad app hits 20, goes from Social to Sync

With its season premieres of Dexter and Homeland (trailers are embedded after the break) on deck for next Sunday evening, Showtime has refashioned its second screen iPad app in version 2.0 and even changed the name to reflect new features. Now dubbed Showtime Sync, it follows other network branded apps (AMC, MTV, NBC and Syfy come to mind) by focusing on pushing relevant content, viewer polls and the like to the tablet while the show plays. It syncs up automatically from the show’s audio, which should make things simple when watching via DVR, VOD and even DVD / Blu-ray or streaming (could you have Showtime Anytime streaming on one tablet synced to another one?), while promising lots of photos plus behind the scenes content when the episode ends. Hit the source link to grab the free app, how you come by the episodes you’ll have to figure out on your own.

Continue reading Showtime’s second screen iPad app hits 2.0, goes from Social to Sync

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Showtime’s second screen iPad app hits 2.0, goes from Social to Sync originally appeared on Engadget on Sun, 23 Sep 2012 15:57:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Redbox app for Android updated with a new UI and better filtering, no Instant streaming yet

Redbox app for Android update brings a new UI and better filtering, no Instant streaming yet

The official Redbox app for Android hasn’t seen many changes since it was first introduced early last year, but that’s changing with version 3.0. Now available in Google Play, it brings a new look that should make browsing a bit easier, plus enhanced filtering (you can sort Blu-ray discs by genre) and the ability to sort by date or alphabetical order. Finally, support for push notifications could mean unsubscribing to those weekly texts for coupon codes, and users report you can now input the coupon codes in the app while making reservations. We poked around but couldn’t find any references to its Instant streaming service, so there’s at least one thing to expect for the next update. Android powered kiosk renters can grab the app at the source link below.

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Redbox app for Android updated with a new UI and better filtering, no Instant streaming yet originally appeared on Engadget on Sun, 23 Sep 2012 04:15:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Facebook releases Activity Log update, adds search history

Facebook has just announced a new update for its Activity Log, saying that it will soon show your search history along with all of your other activity on the social network. Activity Log is already pretty creepy in that it keeps track of everything you do on the social network, but now things just got a touch creepier. Soon, you’ll be able to see a record of everyone and everything you’ve searched for on Facebook, with the company saying that the feature should be available to all users in the coming weeks.


The good news is that your Activity Log can only be seen by you, so even though it will display your search history, no one else will be able to see who you’ve looked for. You can delete past search queries from within Activity Log, though to be honest, we’re not sure why would need to if you’re the only one who can see your Activity Log records. One thing is definitely certain, though: it’s time to get a little more guarded when it comes to where you access Facebook – having your Facebook search history out in the open could prove to be quite embarrassing, after all.

In fairness, there could potentially be some instances where having your search history logged comes in handy. For instance, if you ever forget the name of one of your favorite groups, you could use your Activity Log to quickly find it again. Aside from that, though, we’re kind of at a loss when it comes to the benefits of having your search history available (and the group example is already a bit of a stretch).

This update was released today, which means that some Facebook users should already have access to their search history in the Activity Log. It will be rolling out to everyone over the next few weeks, though Facebook doesn’t say specifically when everyone should have the feature active. What do you think of Facebook’s latest Activity Log update?

[via Facebook Newsroom]


Facebook releases Activity Log update, adds search history is written by Eric Abent & originally posted on SlashGear.
© 2005 – 2012, SlashGear. All right reserved.


Apple users updating to iOS 6 122% faster than iOS 5

Apple’s new baby in the iPhone 5 and iOS 6 has been getting plenty of attention, and with good reason. Aside from a few hiccups with Maps, iOS 6 has been doing extremely well across the board. When it started rolling out as an over the air update earlier this week, Apple users were excited and updating by the millions.

Earlier this week we reported that over 15% of devices had been updated within the first 24 hours, which may sound like a small number, but compared to updates on Android — is actually quite high. Add in the fact that it was just the first day, iOS 6 has been doing exceptionally well.

Today reports are coming out from multiple analytics companies, and reports from TechCrunch state the overall upgrade and adoption rate for iOS 6 is massive. iOS 6 adoption rate is significantly higher than iOS 5, to the tune of around 122% faster. This time around it’s also an over-the-air update, making it a much simpler process for the millions and millions of iOS users.

Finally being able to update OTA and not requiring a cable and iTunes makes this a very simply and easy processor for the masses. If you’re already enjoying iOS 5 you simply can update right on your device. This could be a large part of why the adoption and update rate is seeing such massive numbers — but that isn’t all either. iOS 6 brings tons of fantastic features to everyone. If you sadly can’t get the latest and greatest with a 4-inch screen, you’ll surely want all those new Siri, Passbook, Maps, and other features that makes the iPhone and iOS 6 so excellent. We are also hearing many developers praise the update, saying the transition has been smooth and support for iOS 6 has been easy.

If you haven’t bought the iPhone 5 today or are rocking an older device, have you updated to iOS 6 yet?


Apple users updating to iOS 6 122% faster than iOS 5 is written by Cory Gunther & originally posted on SlashGear.
© 2005 – 2012, SlashGear. All right reserved.


Hulu Plus, HBO Go and Max Go apps for Android updated with support for closed captions

Sound familiar? Just days after the mobile apps for HBO, Cinemax and Hulu added closed captions support on iOS, a similar slew of upgrades have come to their apps on Android. Unfortunately, there doesn’t appear to be any change in the number of supported devices for any of them at this time. Hulu’s upgrade also adds on the option to share videos via Twitter, Facebook and other services, although the 10 second rewind button added on iOS does not appear to have made the cut. As usual you should see the new versions rolling around in the app store, hit the source links for more info.

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Hulu Plus, HBO Go and Max Go apps for Android updated with support for closed captions originally appeared on Engadget on Fri, 21 Sep 2012 12:39:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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