Back in November 2011 I highlighted just why the Apple patent war needed to stop. Well nonetheless that war is still going on. So this week we have some news that is good, bad and just ugly. Where to begin? Well lets start with bad, in the land down under, Australia. Apple has brought a whopping 278 claims against Samsung in an Australian court – 278! The Australian reports the Apple has added 278 complaints against Samsung. 72 involve patents and 10 involve Smartphone and Tablets products Samsung has yet to release in Australia . Although Apple won an injunction against Samsung back in November 2011, it has since been overturned. Samsung’s top lawyer involving the suits, Neil Young (anyone else suddenly picture the American rock singer?) says that do to the short notice of the latest law suit, Samsung will not be able to file defense until the middle of May 2012 at the earliest. This could have a major negative impact on Samsung’s sales in Australia.

Now for some good news – or ugly news, depending on how you look at it. Motorola has won a permanent injunction against Apples iCloud product in a German court. The decision was handed down in the Mannheim Regional Court by judge Andreas Vass. Apples iCloud being a cloud-based service, infringes on a ”multiple pager status synchronization system and method,” owned by Motorola. Motorola also won a case against Apple involving one of Motorola’s European 3G/UMTS patent. Since then, Apple has pulled the iPhone 3G, iPhone 3GS, and iPhone 4 from its German online store along with any 3G/UMTS enabled iPad’s it has. This move came from a ruling handed down in December 2011. Motorola went all out against Apple to ensure the ruling was enforced. This will  hurt Apples sales in Germany.

VIA: Engadget 

©2012 Technology Blogged, News. All Rights Reserved.

Well it has been quite the week for AMD. It started with a bang, the release of its second 28nm based GPU, the Radeon HD 7950. Following that release have been a number of announcements by the company on future plans, upcoming products, products that wont be coming out, and how badly some of those upcoming products will be sticking it to their closest competitor, Intel. So without further ado, lets start with some numbers. More specifically, purported 3Dmark benchmark numbers.

AMD claims it’s next generation Trinity APU (which is aimed at ultra-thin and light notebooks, Ultrabooks in Intel’s case) beat the current generation Intel Ivy Bridge CPU by a score of 2355 in 3Dmak with Ivy Bridge scoring a paltry 1158. AMD used an Ultra Low Voltage (ULV) A6-series Trinity with a Thermal Design power of just 17 watts. They compared it to an Intel Core i5 ULV 2537m. AMD claims  the next generation of Ivy Bridge CPU’s will score just 30% better then the current generation. Furthermore, the future AMD  platform is claimed to provide 7 hours of battery life while playing a DVD with 4 hours for a Blu-ray movie. Last I checked, most ultra-portable notebooks skimped out on having built-in optical media drives, so using a portable- DVD drive would be the only way to watch DVD’s. It would also draw a noticable amount of power – much more then if you were just watching the same content directly off the computers built in storage. AMD hopes to have its own Ultrabook competitors out by the middle of May, at a starting price of around $600.

Engadget was lucky enough to get to take a few pictures of a proof-of-concept by Compal that features the new Trinity APU. Although they did not get any hands on time with the ultraportable, they did get a feel for just how thin AMD wants to take these new machines  especially against Intel as the chip giant is currently leading the pack in ultra-thin computing.

Photo Credit: Engadget

VIA: Fudzilla

©2012 Technology Blogged, News. All Rights Reserved.

Oh you lucky chaps (and chapettes). Yes, the Nokia Lumia 900 is now up for pre-order in the US  at one of Microsoft’s fifteen retail stores to be found across the United States, and to secure yours you need only deposit $25. According to most recent rumours, the Nokia Lumia 900 will be in customers hands by March 18th in the US, whilst UK folk will have to wait for any news regarding a release date as non have been specified at this moment.

The Nokia Lumia 900 adds LTE to its Lumia line up and features a bigger screen than the beautifully crafted Lumia 800, Nokia’s current flagship smartphone. Other specs include a Qualcomm Snapdragon system on chip clocked at 1.4GHz (an APQ8055 + MDM9200), an eight megapixel camera, WVGA screen resolution, 16GB onboard storage and a 1830mAh battery that can power the phone for up to seven hours.

©2012 Technology Blogged, News. All Rights Reserved.

It’s no secret that major U.S. tech companies have a strong presence in the developing world, China in particular. These countries are used to source materials, manufacture products, and provide server hosting capabilities at discount cost. The lower costs, in turn, allow technology companies to build new products quickly and expediently in order to stabilize margins and react to changing market trends. Even in the tech industry, this phenomenon of outsourcing is certainly nothing new.

But most major tech companies have been immune in recent years from criticism related to their outsourcing policies. That changed in the past couple weeks, when the New York Times published a string of articles exposing Apple’s manufacturing practices in China. According to the article, Apple has repeatedly ignored and overlooked signs of dangerous working conditions, worker maltreatment, and harmful chemical use in its Chinese factories. These factories are largely operated by Foxconn, a contract manufacturer that also works heavily with Hewlett-Packard.

The New York Times articles use worker interviews to describe a string of incidents at the Chinese factories. Over the past year, the articles report, there have been two similar explosions at Foxconn factories that killed several workers and injured numerous more. Although both explosions stemmed from unsafe ventilation practices, and although the second one almost identically mirrored the first in cause and circumstance, Apple took no concrete action to change its practices after either one.

The articles go on to discuss the working conditions at the plants, where employees are subjected to extremely long work shifts, cramped and rat-infested living quarters, meager wages, and physical abuse. Apple, it was argued, encouraged these practices by making worker, production, and cost demands that could not otherwise be fulfilled. When Apple needed an immediate shipment of iPhones, workers were forced to use a hazardous chemical so that the phone’s screens could be cleaned in an efficient manner.

The report included anonymous quotes from Apple insiders who questioned the company’s commitment to its workers in the face of widespread cases of mistreatment. Publically, however, Apple has responded angrily to the Times article. In an email, CEO Tim Cook wrote that the company cares about each and every worker, and that allegations to the contrary were “patently false and offensive.”

Reaction to the report in the technology world has fall on both sides of the spectrum. A large number of bloggers, consumers, and analysts have rushed to defend Apple, arguing that the company conducted an audit whenever maltreatment was reported and that it is simply getting singled out from among the numerous American corporations that do business in China. Furthermore, supporters have argued that we should not judge Chinese working conditions based upon Western standards.

On the other side of the debate are those who believe that Apple’s mission statement, corporate identity, and brand name all require that the company be held to a higher standard. As a company known for its perfectionist attitude and desire to always do everything in a flawless manner, they argue, Apple’s oversight of worker deaths and repeated abuses reflects that its executives care more about the bottom line than about the people who make its products. Regardless of whether this criticism carries any validity, it should surely be concerning to Apple. After all, the company relies largely on a dominant brand name and on an energized (and politically liberal) fan base for support. Signs of maltreatment could throw that dominance into question.

Will the tech industry begin receiving the same scrutiny overseas that shoe companies got during the 1990s? Apple’s current case should stand as a revealing benchmark. Stay tuned.

©2012 Technology Blogged, News. All Rights Reserved.

Mobile phones – they’ve undergone a strange design path since their inception. From massive blocks of limited ability, through increasingly smaller and smaller frames and then one day, suddenly, they started getting bigger. Arguably starting with the introduction of the first generation 3.5″ iPhone, smart phones have steadily taken over the limelight, driving the screen sizes sky high, questioning the very definition of usability. Enter the HTC Sensation XL, packing a 4.7″ screen on its face. So then, just how big is too big?

Hardware/that screen

Any discussion on the hardware of the XL is likely to be dominated by that screen, which is understandable. But let’s put that aside for just a moment, and talk about the rest of the XL. Well, it’s big. Measuring 132.5 x 70.7 x 9.9 mm mean’s its relatively slim frame feels even slimmer in comparison to its gigantic proportions. Meanwhile, the front of the phone is largely bare, on the white model we were given the front visage is little more than a black expanse, some capacitive Android buttons, a front facing camera (1.3mp, if you must know), a light sensor and the customary silver speaker earpiece. Along the left, a micro-USB charging port whilst the right hand side claims home to a reasonably stiff volume rocker. The top features not only a 3.5mm headphone jack but also a secondary microphone for noise cancellation, you lucky thing. Rounding things off is a slightly protruding 8MP sensor, dual LED flash and speaker on the back.

The entire phone is wrapped in a mixture of white plastic and aluminium which detaches in much the same way as the original, smaller, Sensation. The back plate is closer to a shell than a cover, giving great build quality whilst giving the end user a chance to get at that precious battery. We’re fond of it over here, and well, it works well, despite us being able to find a few tiny creaks on our review model.

Let’s talk about that screen. First things first, it’s huge. So huge you’re going to have to consider just how big your hands actually are. I, with my average-ish hands (okay, they’re a tiny bit small, what of it?) struggled to use the phone comfortably in day to day use, and that’s a problem. Don’t get me wrong, I loved having all that extra screen real estate when browsing the internet, playing games and watching movies but when I wasn’t doing those things, when I was just sending a text or answering a call, it became a burdon to handle.  Which is a shame, because the panel itself is pretty great. Continuing the fine HTC tradition of Super-LCD screens, the XL packs one of its own and it’s several shades of gorgeous with lovely, vivid colours and decent black levels. Sadly, it’s resolution isn’t so much to shout about with a 480 x 800 resolution, equaling to a less than glorious 199ppi, a number which is already old hat, and due to be further overshadowed the the forthcoming wave of hi-res screens. One clear plus though is just how closely the LCD is mounted to the front of the phone, it lends the phone an impressive, high end feel.

Performance/call quality/software/battery

If we had to describe the performance of the XL in one word (believe me, we don’t), it would be capable. That is to say, extremely capable. In day to day operation that tag team of a 1.5 GHz Scorpion and Adreno 205 GPU comes together to power the big screened beast with nary a hint of lag. I loaded up some of my favourite mobile games (Reckless Racing, Zombie Dash) and the XL never once stuttered under the weight of them, true also that while handling every day mobile tasks we noticed just how zippy the phone is. For example, loading this very website with no cache took a darn right impressive 8 seconds (including flash elements) , we could find very little that held back the XL from doing its thing. Quadrant scores came in around the 2100 mark while GPU benchmarking tool brought in a score of 48.7pfs, these should always be taken as a secondary point, at this stage in the mobile game benchmark scores aren’t always a reliable indicator of prowess.

Call quality on the XL was reasonably impressive, those at the other end found us clear and crisp for the most part while we found the earpiece on our end simply average, producing decent sound in a reasonably tinny way. Needless to say though, you’re not going to be struggling to hear people, it just could be better.

Hello, HTC. Once again the Taiwanese giants have loaded their hardware with Sense, their custom mobile skin atop of Android 2.3.5 “Gingerbread”, this is Sense 3.5, bringing all the visual whizz bang of 3D style effects and spinning homescreens that you’ve been crying out for in your life. The continuing problem with Sense is that it just doesn’t make sense anymore, back when Android 1.0 was released, Sense was a beautiful attempt at making Android less ugly, and it worked rather well. As time drove on, and Android versions jumped up quicker than we could count, the entire operating system got prettier and prettier, leading up to the frankly beautiful Android 4.0 “Ice Cream Sandwich”. In the 2012 mobile landscape, all HTC appear to be doing is putting a pig on lipstick. Sense is not a fashion disaster, it’s just an unnecessary resource hog atop of an already beautiful bit of software.

The larger problem comes with that screen resolution, it’s the same as the HTC Radar and Desire S, both of which clock in at a full inch smaller than the XL. Other than HTC’s special efforts at fitting more information on the screen (the settings panel works very well in this regard) all we’re getting here is a bigger version of what you can see on those other phones with more big icons than you can shake an oversized phone at. Until the XL is updated to ICS, we’re doomed to this kind of super-sized UI treatment, unlike the Galaxy Note which brings more information alongside it’s larger screen.

The XL comes loaded with a surprisingly small 1600mAh, which is even more surprising given just how long the XL lasts on a charge. Now, I wouldn’t go a whole weekend without giving it some juice, but your day to day life shouldn’t be interrupted by too many low battery notifications

Camera

HTC used to be very bad at cameras, then they stopped being very bad. The 8MP camera on the XL should, by all rights, work every bit as well as it’s contemporaries – it doesn’t. We had real trouble getting the sensor to focus properly in almost any lighting situation, large amounts of noise creeped in at almost every level and shots were generally unimpressive across the board. 720p video fared slightly better, but did suffer from large amounts of rolling shutter. Generally, the less said about the camera here, the better.

A small rant on Beats Audio

 The XL is Beats branded, one of the first phones from the joint partnership between Monster Cable and HTC to bring the overwhelmingly popular headphone brand into the mobile realm in a big way. This branding stretches to a animation in the boot up and a red B on the back of the phone, other than that we get a special EQ setting and a set of Beats branded headphones. Firstly, I don’t like Monster Cable. At all. They’re unethical, overpriced and overhyped. Their consumer range of Beats ‘phones aren’t worth the materials they’re crafted from, with awful mids, loose bass and muddled highs, they are enjoyed primarily by consumers who’ve never had the chance to experience good quality headphones. True, the jump from standard iPod headphones or very low end headphones is huge, but to anybody who’s had the pleasure of sampling good quality headphones they’re an abomonation, especially for their hugely over inflated price.

The headphones that come included with the XL, designed to match with white plastic and aluminum, are marketed at one of the main selling points of the XL. “Why buy Beats headphones when you can get some free with your new phone?”, the marketing men ask as they rub their filthy mitts together. Now, obviously, the free headphones we’re getting with our new phones won’t be up to the quality of the normal range, so how do they sound? In a word? Horrible. They are every bit as bad as standard iPod headphones, only with better sound isolation. If you like music, at all, disregard these headphones and move on with your life.

Wrap up

Ignoring the Beats, the XL is a fairly capable mobile. With it’s speed, nice quality screen and good build quality it adds up to a pretty decent package (aside from that abysmal camera), you’ve only to ask yourself. Just how much screen can I actually handle? I fear the XL might be a little too much for most mere mortals to handle. We fear there are better options in the large screen market than the XL, the Samsung Galaxy S2 will serve you much better with a nicer screen, faster processor and thinner frame if you can suffer the plastic build and ugly, ugly skin.

Rating: 6 out of 5 stars (6/10)

©2012 Technology Blogged, News. All Rights Reserved.

Two things are certain in life; tomorrow the sun will rise as per usual, and sooner or later Microsoft will release their next generation gaming console. To the dismay of millions however, that next generation console will not be released this year.

Fighting off recent rumors of a 2012 release for the Xbox 720 and not adapting to Nintendo’s Wii U coming to the world this year, Cedrick Delmas the marketing director of Microsoft France has brought some bad news to gaming fans, stating that ”We’re in an industry that talks a lot, that likes telling stories. I am not convinced that things will happen this year. The Xbox 360′s cycle is not over at all. The proof is that we haven’t price cut this year.”

Moving on to Nintendo and their Wii U imminent, Delmas said ”We’re not here to counter Nintendo and they’re not here to fight the other manufacturers. Nintendo has put itself in a different cycle, it’s going forward to its own rhythm, with success as we have seen with the Wii, and now it’s their turn to present their innovation.”

©2012 Technology Blogged, News. All Rights Reserved.

Sky has just very recently announced that they are to be bringing out a brand new internet based TV service primarily targeted at providing premium content to customers and people who do not currently have/want a satellite dish based service. The new internet based TV service is a bold move from Sky, and will enable people with laptops, computers, tablets and smartphones to watch content far beyond what the Sky Player offers currently.

The service, which at first will offer Sky Movies content and later move on to sport and entertainment, should be available sometime in the middle of this year according to Sky themselves.

Offering Sky’s most popular content

“This exciting new service will offer some of Sky’s most popular content through a wide range of broadband connected devices,” said Sky chief executive Jeremy Darroch. “Alongside the continued growth of our satellite platform, this will be a new way for us to reach out to consumers who love great content, but may not want the full Sky service”.

Overall, this new Sky service does seem like a pretty nifty move from the current satellite TV leader, however whether they will be able to compete effectively with Lovefilm, Blinkbox and Netflix for movie content is another matter altogether.

We will update this post if there are any further developments / announcements regarding pricing.

©2012 Technology Blogged, News. All Rights Reserved.

AMD is really leading the pack this year with the release of its second 28nm based GPU. The Radeon HD 7950 offers gamers on a budget most of the processing power of its big brother, the Radeon HD 7970 ($550) but at a slightly more affordable price point of $450. The new GPU powerhouse has an 800MHz clock speed, 3GB of GDDR5 RAM, runs on the latest DirectX 11 standard and of course uses the new 28nm manufacturing process. With AMD Eyefinity technology up to six displays can be run off this card. Thanks to AMD App Acceleration, this card can perform faster video encoding, decoding, and transcoding. Of course this card also excels in its ability to playback HD content, whether its from a Blu-ray DVD or an MKV file. Unlike the 7970, this card only draws 200 watts of power as apposed to 250 watts!

The new card is available right now in Maingear’s Shift and F131 line of desktops. If used in conjunction with Maingear’s Epic 180 liquid cooling and Epic Audio Engine, users will get the maximum possible performance out of their high performance gaming computer.

VIA: Maingear

©2012 Technology Blogged, News. All Rights Reserved.