Hasta La Gadget!

We still don’t know for sure that the new iPhone will be launching on September 21, but today we received more convincing evidence for such a release date. An unnamed Verizon employee has told TechCrunch that Verizon has blocked all employees from taking vacations between September 21 and September 30. This move was apparently made in anticipation of the new iPhone’s launch.

It’s widely speculated that the new iPhone (or the iPhone 5, whichever you prefer) will be revealed at an Apple event on September 12, go up for pre-order on the same day, and then launch a little more than a week later on September 21. That expected schedule is similar to the reveal/launch schedules of iPhones past, and this move by Verizon seems to confirm that the new iPhone will indeed be launching on September 21.

That’s because carriers likely know all about the new iPhone already – when it will be revealed, when pre-orders will open, and when it will launch. It’s hardly surprising to see Verizon restricting vacation time around the new iPhone’s launch, as past iPhone launches have produced massive lines and, of course, a ton of money in sales. If September 21 is the launch date of the new iPhone, Verizon will need all hands on deck to handle the sheer volume of customers coming in to buy one.

So, while we’re still a little hesitant to call it confirmed, this is some pretty convincing evidence that we’ll have our hands on the next iPhone by the end of September. This rumored Apple reveal event is only a few weeks away, so if it’s actually going to happen, we’re expecting Apple to make an announcement soon. Stay tuned, folks.

Verizon restricts September vacations ahead of new iPhone launch is written by Eric Abent & originally posted on SlashGear.
© 2005 – 2012, SlashGear. All right reserved.

If you’ve embraced Motorola’s vision of tablets warmly enough to have picked up a Xyboard 8.2 or 10.1, your loyalty is being rewarded. Both the WiFi versions and Verizon’s Droid Xyboard variants should be receiving their Android 4.0 updates starting now, with everyone onboard over the course of the weeks ahead. Don’t anticipate a Droid RAZR-style visual revamp: much like Google’s regular jump from Android 3.2 to 4.0, the changes involve subtler components like the improved built-in browser and Face Unlock. The release is no Jelly Bean update, but we’d still call it a big step forward for fans of sharply-angled slabs.

Filed under: Tablet PCs

Motorola Xyboard WiFi, Verizon 4G models get Android 4.0 updates originally appeared on Engadget on Mon, 20 Aug 2012 17:39:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Not that we were on pins and needles wondering what Motorola’s September 5th event would contain, but what vestige of mystery was left may just have been sapped away. A quartet of Motorola tutorial videos newly uncovered by YouTube user revowii walk users through the unannounced XT926, better known in unofficial circles as the Droid RAZR HD. It’s all about the looks in this leak: other than the conspicuous link to Verizon, what’s mostly validated here is the expected use of a customized Android 4.0 with on-screen navigation keys, much like the Atrix HD in AT&T’s corner of the universe. Earlier murmurings have the Droid RAZR HD carrying the same Snapdragon S4, 720p screen and LTE as well, which could leave the CDMA voice network, NFC and possibly increased storage as the only real differences. We’ll know the full truth in about two weeks’ time, but those who don’t mind a peek into the possible future can hop past the story break to indulge in some video time traveling.

Continue reading Motorola Droid RAZR HD guides slip out to the web, pop the hype balloon (video)

Filed under: Cellphones

Motorola Droid RAZR HD guides slip out to the web, pop the hype balloon (video) originally appeared on Engadget on Sun, 19 Aug 2012 17:20:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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As Thursday winds down, we’re finding that we’ve got a lot of news to recap. Today Samsung used the MERL touchscreen table to show that Apple doesn’t have much of a claim, before resting its case and asking the Judge to award it $421.8 million in the suit. Later in the day, we caught word that Judge Lucy Koh had asked Apple’s counsel if they were smoking crack when they presented an extremely long document filled with witnesses they wanted to call for rebuttals. Yes, that really happened.

In other news, Bloomberg has declared that Facebook’s IPO has become the worst on record, while we’re getting reports that Android malware has tripled in Q2 2012. Instagram 3.0 has arrived, and it brings photo mapping history with it. Google has some Google Play gift cards on the way (and the holiday season is only a few short months away!), the FCC and Department of Justice have approved Verizon’s request to use AWS spectrum for mobile service, and Lenovo is planning to beat Microsoft Surface by offering better hardware. In other words, Lenovo is planning doing some good old fashioned competing.

Today the NVIDIA GeForce GTX 660 Ti began shipping to retailers, complete with codes for free copies of Borderlands 2. Electronic Arts may be “quietly” looking for a buyer as physical game sales continue to decline, and none other than Elon Musk has pledged his support to the crowd-funded Nikola Tesla Museum. Hackers have managed to unlock the Verizon Galaxy S III’s bootloader, and speaking of the Galaxy S III, firmware for the phone’s update to Jelly Bean has been leaked. Samsung also announced today that it has sold 10 million Galaxy Notes in the past 9 months, which isn’t too shabby by any means.

Nokia and Microsoft have a Windows Phone event coming up on September 5, and ahead of that, Nokia got in a shot at Samsung on Twitter, telling the massive Android manufacturer to “take note” of the next generation Lumia coming soon. Reuters has apparently been hacked twice in the past two weeks, and sorry folks, but you won’t be seeing a PS Vita price cut anytime this year. One is coming though, which makes us think that it’ll be discounted starting sometime in early 2013. Stay tuned for more on that one.

Finally, we have a review of the Lenovo ThinkPad X1 Carbon Ultrabook and a column explaining why Apple doesn’t want to offer a full TV set for you to check out tonight. Enjoy the rest of your evening folks, and we’ll see you tomorrow for Friday’s edition of the Evening Wrap-Up!

[Image via Vicki Ellen Behringer]

SlashGear Evening Wrap-Up: August 16, 2012 is written by Eric Abent & originally posted on SlashGear.
© 2005 – 2012, SlashGear. All right reserved.

Last December, Verizon struck a deal with several cable companies, including Comcast and Time Warner, to be able to leverage their AWS spectrum for wireless services. The deal has been pending approval from the FCC and DoJ, and today the regulatory bodies gave the gohead on the sale. The move is deemed to be “pro consumer” due to Verizon’s spectrum swap deal with T-Mobile in addition to making plans to allow other carriers to roam on its network.

The Chairman of the FCC, Julius Genachowski, detailed how Verizon’s acquisition of the wireless spectrum wouldn’t be anti-competitive as a result. He went on to say, “Approval of the substantially modified transaction will promote the public interest and benefit consumers in several ways. By advancing U.S. leadership in 4G LTE deployment, the transaction marks another step in our effort to promote the U.S. innovation economy and make state-of-the-art broadband available to more people in more places.”

Verizon paid a total of $3.9 billion for the spectrum access, with $2.3 billion going to Comcast, $1.1 billion  to Time Warner, and $189 million to Bright House Networks. All the companies involved have agreed to license spectrum to each other as part of the sale, and the cable companies will also gain the right to resell some of Verizon’s wireless services in the future.

There is a catch, however: all four companies have agreed to restrict cross-marketing agreements until December 2016. That gives the FCC some peace of mind, and means that all four will still compete against each other in the meantime. Verizon still needs to divvy up some of its own spectrum as part of the agreement.

[via The Next Web]

FCC and DoJ approve Verizon’s cable spectrum deal is written by Ben Kersey & originally posted on SlashGear.
© 2005 – 2012, SlashGear. All right reserved.