Hasta La Gadget!

We’ve already inspected every inch of Samsung’s big bad phone-tablet hybrid, but a soupçon of extra news has trickled out from the Galaxy Note’s bombastic launch event in London yesterday. Those looking for brighter color scheme to match the striking glow of its HD Super AMOLED display are in luck, as the Galaxy Note looks set to arrive in white; the ethereal ying to its companion’s midnight blue yang. Sammy added that the Galaxy Note’s S-Pen SDK will be available to third-party developers starting December, hopefully bringing more uses for that slide-out stick. And that’s despite the latest Android OS offering native stylus support — the Galaxy Note remains a Gingerbread affair. The current smartphone king was unable to confirm if the UK would be getting the white model on the November 3rd launch day, or ever. Similarly, we’re still waiting on Samsung to put S-Pen to paper on pricing and any possible US launch details.

White Galaxy Note appears, developers wanted to pen third-party apps for its stylus originally appeared on Engadget on Fri, 28 Oct 2011 13:21:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Even if you’re not planning on picking up one of Espoo’s latest handsets, Microsoft is also on the scene at Nokia World 2011 giving live demos of the upcoming Xbox Companion remote app for Windows Phone 7. It allows for simple remote control of video playback on one’s console, plus content browsing / search with Bing and other metadata display, as seen in two demo videos from the show floor embedded after the break. Also seen in both of the demo videos? An orange tile suspiciously labeled Vudu Movies, despite the lack of any official announcement that the (currently PS3 exclusive) Wal-mart owned service is coming to Xbox Live. A third demo shows off gaming integration with Kinectimals that lets animals jump back and forth from console to phone. Now that the Xbox 360 will integrate search and playback from more video services than ever after the fall update, we’ll see if the remote app draws Xbox fans to Microsoft’s phone platform.

[Thanks, @AttilaG]

Continue reading Xbox Companion app for WP7 shown off at Nokia World, leaks Vudu integration (video)

Xbox Companion app for WP7 shown off at Nokia World, leaks Vudu integration (video) originally appeared on Engadget on Fri, 28 Oct 2011 12:13:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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They’re creepy, they’re kooky, they’re your favorite Frankengadgets and they’ve invaded the latest issue of Engadget Distro. But fear not, this edition of our fine weekly isn’t all about chopping and screwing the devices you love, we’ve got plenty of other real-life gadgets on hand as well. See that tiny silver sliver on the cover? That’s ASUS’ Zenbook UX31, perhaps the most viable candidate for the Ultrabook throne. It may not be as thin and light, but we’re also bringing you a review of Dell’s lightweight XPS 14z, an ergonomically sound laptop with a sizable asking price. On the mobile front, Myriam Joire says hello and goodbye to Nokia’s N9 MeeGo phone and Zach Honig gets his hands on its brother from another operating system, the Lumia 800. Nokia’s claiming its latest is the “first real Windows Phone,” but Sharif Sakr’s review of the HTC Titan might just prove otherwise. We’ll also bring you a look into Tech News Today host Iyaz Akhtar’s geeky upbringing, our latest installation of In Real Life and an exclusive comic from Ed Piskor. So what are you waiting for? Hop on that iPad or hit the PDF download link below, and soak up all that Distro goodness.

Distro Issue 10 PDF
Distro on the iTunes App Store
Like Distro on Facebook
Follow Distro on Twitter

Engadget Distro Issue 10: It’s alive! And ready for download originally appeared on Engadget on Fri, 28 Oct 2011 09:15:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Remember the display on your first mobile phone? If you’ve been chatting on the go for as long as we have, it was probably barely big enough to fit a complete telephone number — let alone a contact name or text message. And your first smartphone? Even displaying scaled-down, WAP versions of web pages was asking a lot. Now, those mobile devices we couldn’t live without have screens that are much, much larger. Sometimes, though, we secretly wish they were even bigger still.

Samsung’s new GT-N7000 Galaxy Note is the handset those dreams are made of — if you happen to share that dream about obnoxiously large smartphones, that is. It’s as thin as a Galaxy S II, lightning fast and its 5.3-inch HD Super AMOLED display is as gorgeous as it is enormous; the 1280 x 800 pixels you once could only get with a full-size laptop (or in the Galaxy Tab 10.1) can now slide comfortably into your front pocket. Its jumbo display makes it the perfect candidate for a notepad replacement and, with the included S Pen stylus, you’ll have no problem jotting notes on the fly, marking up screenshots or signing documents electronically. But, is that massive display too much of a good thing? You’ll need to jump past the break to find out.

Continue reading Samsung Galaxy Note review

Samsung Galaxy Note review originally appeared on Engadget on Fri, 28 Oct 2011 07:15:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Ready for more dollars and cents earnings news? It’s Samsung’s turn, and when it comes to phones the news couldn’t be better, where it notched an operating profit of $2.3 billion on record sales. Unfortunately, other parts of its massive business selling displays, memory chips, appliances, and more weren’t as profitable, leading a quarterly profit of $3.8 billion, down 13% from the same period last year. We’ll wait for a press release in English for more details, for now you can paw through bar graphs and figures in the accompanying slides.

Update: Now with English language press release included after the break.

Continue reading Samsung’s Q3 2011 overall profit falls despite incredible phone sales

Filed under: Cellphones, HDTV

Samsung’s Q3 2011 overall profit falls despite incredible phone sales originally appeared on Engadget on Thu, 27 Oct 2011 21:57:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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