Playstation Vita release update: Amazon.com confirms PS Vita US release date to be December 31 2011

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So around the web people are still debating as to whether or not the Amazon.com release dates for the PS Vita are in fact real. Amazon.com however seem to be quite certain of their info:


User:When i preorder the playstation vita today, when exactly will you ship it? the listed release date is dec 31, so is this a placeholder date or actual release date? Thank you.
Amazon:If the date is listed as "This item will be released on December 31", the item will be released on that date.
If you preorder this item, we'll ship it to you as per the shipping method you chosen.
User:Ok do you have this info directly from Sony?
Amazon:Yes, this information we got directly from Sony.
Amazon:Because Sony is our supplier.

PS Vita to be released 31 December 2011 according to Amazon.com

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The highly anticipated Playstation Vita, Sony's new handheld console, is to be released in the US on 31 December 2011 according to Amazon.com. Seems like Amazon is in the know whereas the rest of the world is not!

I believe the PS Vita will become a great succes. The game line up is huge and many games have actually been demoed and are playable. This is exactly where Sony is doing better than Nintendo. The abundance of PS Vita games, in combination with, in my humble opinion, some amazing tech in the handheld gives Sony a huge advantage over Nintendo.

All a hype, just like the 3DS? Yeah probably, but at least Sony's device will actually have content, whereas the 3DS until recenly was just some interesting yet unusable tech, leaving early adopters (like yours truly) empty handed and selling their 3DS's early enough to escape Nintendo's price drop.

The Playstation Vita boosts some incredible tech, like front and rear touch panel, gyroscope (ok so that's no so new) and an OLED screen. To my knowledge this device will actually be the first mass production device with an OLED screen.

I for one am looking forward to getting my hands on a Vita as soon as I can.

Froyo 2.2 rolled out to Benelux HTC Desire owners, Tasty Frozen Yoghurt

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As of today owners of the HTC Desire are finally made happy with Android 2.2 aka Froyo.

Seems like HTC spoke only a little too soon, but instead of what happened in the debacle surrounding the Hero, HTC this time came forward really fast with the update. Dutch users are widely reporting the update being available. Seems like a couple of presses on the "check for updates" button does the trick. If that fails, you can download the update right here!

Thanks HTC, for not letting your users down this time! Now let's continue the rat race to Android 3... :p

Froyo 2.2 update HTC Desire, Mark Moons makes Yoghurt go bad

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Mark moons (Director at HTC Benelux) yesterday announced the roll out of Froyo Android 2.2 for HTC Desire handsets. But after a while his statements on twitter and Facebook have turned from really sweet into bitter and sour. HTC Germany denies the roll out (at least for Germany) and says that Froyo is still in final testing stage. Hundreds, if not thousands of happy campers were anticipating the roll out at various (gadget)forums, where after many hours the anti climax became clear. HTC why would you do this to your users, first there was the very bad update scheme for the Hero and now this. HTC has a rep to keep up, but it is slowly deteriorating. Oh well, will have to wait and see I guess.

Motorola event: Motoblur

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Motorola's Sanjay K. Jha acknowledges that mobile broadband has become ubiquitous and he even expects more growth worldwide. Well that's surely agreeable, but what role does Motorola see for itself in these developments? Well Motorola has a line of devices coming up, but has only announced a single device during the keynote on the event. That device is the Motoblur, an Android device that merges all of your information streams to make it accessible when and where you like. Motoblur actually seems like an HTC Hero interface. It has live widgets like the Hero and home screen is customizable. In addition, during the event, T-mobile announced the Click, a Motoblur Android phone.

Pretty dissappointing so far if you ask me. This phone is definitely not the long awaited Sholes which will probably be announced in a few weeks. If at all that is. Because I don't really see why they would wait with the announcement. So that could mean that all of the exciting rumours in the past months may have been bogus. Let's hope not though.

We'll keep you posted!

HTC Hero coming to Sprint

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"Sprint and HTC Corporation today announced the upcoming arrival of the much-anticipated HTC Hero™ from Sprint, the first wireless device offering the combination of the open and innovative Android platform with the high-speed connectivity of America’s most dependable 3G network1 (EVDO Rev. A.) Offering a rich mobile Internet experience, the much-anticipated HTC Hero offers synchronization for built-in Google mobile services, including Google Search™, Google Maps™, Gmail™, and YouTube™ as well as access to thousands of applications built on the Android platform."

So here it is, finally customers in the US have clarity on where to get the beloved Android phone. Availability is set on October 11th. Oddly the phone will look very different from the European version, as can be seen on some leaked pictures from the web. I wonder what Americans will like better though. I also wonder what version of Android will ship with the US Hero, as Android 1.6 was announced today. It would make sense for the update to be preinstalled but I guess you just never know.

Augmented reality for Android getting a boost

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A variety of Android applications featuring augmented reality have hit the market recently. Although technically in my opinon tagging an object in camera vision with a dot is not really augmented reality, nor does it reach its full potential that way, it is certainly interesting to see programmers get enthusiastical about the concept.

The latest addition in AR is a traffic program that allows users in Toronto to see real time images of traffic on their route, thus enabling users to avoid traffic jams, or to avoid getting on certain roads even before leaving the house.

Watch a video of the app in action:



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Nokia introduces Atom based "Booklet 3G" with 3.5G, a-gps and HD screen

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Nokia has announced a netbook based on the US15W-chipset. That means it will have an Intel Atom Z530 processor. The netbook will be capable of HD playback and sports a 10 inch, high resolution (HD) screen.

It is impressive to see the amount of netbooks emerging capable of HD playback. It seems like Tegra netbook producers are facing some fierce competition in the future. The Nokia netbook is expected in December and it is rumored to ship with Windows 7, meaning that Nokia is not counting on Maemo for a netbook breakthrough.

I think this netbook can be very interesting, however I am a bit disappointed that it doesn't have a touchscreen, which would have been quite interesting with Windows 7 installed.

Press release

TomTom application coming to Android, Android navigation to step up to the next level

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Exciting news for Android fans longing for quality navigation: TomTom executives have indicated that it will not be long before a TomTom app for Android becomes available.

"We cannot ignore such a successful platform as Android. HTC is an important partner of ours and Android is becoming increasingly important too."

This is good news for the Android navigation market. Not only will this encourage the competition to produce better software, having a TomTom app is in itself an awesome deal. TomTom is still considered the pinnacle of navigation software and using my HTC Hero with TomTom will definitely convince me to leave my old N95 at home when navigating to, say, inner city Berlin.

Via: Pocket-lint

The Ultraportable MSI Wind12 U200, World's first Penryn ULV/GMA4500MHD netbook

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MSI has released a 12,1 inch beauty of a netbook. This little powermachine sports up to 4GB of RAM controlled by the new Intel Penryn SFF ULV processor. Now if that is not unique enough for a netbook: The new MSI prodigy comes with the Intel GMA4500MHD chipset which supports 1080p playback. The screen has a 1366 by 768 resolution which is really good and will let you enjoy HD playback for what it's supposed to. Of course 1080p will be scaled down, but hey, what netbook out there lets you watch HD at all? The only let down is the lack of an SSD. But then again, HDD will give you more space at a lower cost, so with HD playback in mind, this is a reasonable choice.

The price range of this tiny monster is set between 500 and 700 euros. Boy, I am getting really excited to see netbook technology progress this fast. This might in fact be a serious competitor to the new Tegra based netbooks. Of course, the MSI U200 will have to make a bit of a price drop in order to become a true threat to cheap low power Tegra netbooks, but it's a start!

Press release

HTC Hero ROM update in action

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Paul O'Brien at Modaco.com has briefly demoed a so called ROM update to the HTC Hero. The video below shows that the HTC Hero is smooth indeed, but truthfully, I can't really tell a difference from my device as it is right now. What would be really interesting, is to see what the update does for flicking through photo albums and the likes as that right now presents the most, albeit very minimal, lag.

Here's a look at the update: HTC Hero ROM update in action

Interesting alternative to Mac Tablet

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A forum member at Liliputing has found an interesting way to kill time before the ghost Mac Tablet comes out of the realm of spirits. The forum member converted an HP Mini into an HP Mini tablet by ripping of the keyboard, sticking a touchpanel to the screen and sticking the screen to the mainboard. This makes for some fun pictures.. Apple beware..!

Via: Liliputing

Flash and Silverlight coming to Blackberry

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Research in Motion will integrate full Flash and Silverlight software into Blackberry devices. The newest Blackberry 9700 will be the first to actually see it implemented. Downside is that RIM is pretty early with the news as they do not expect to see support for such rich web experience until next summer.

Via: Boygeniusreport

Microsoft Office introduced on Nokia handsets

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Who saw this coming? Microsoft and Nokia have reached an agreement in which Microsoft promises to deliver its Office software to Nokia handsets. Microsoft sets out to expand its presence in the mobile world and both Nokia and Microsoft will try to counter threats coming from other platforms, like Google. Google offers extensive online office software and is gaining more ground in the mobile internet market with Android becoming mainstream. Companies like Nokia and Microsoft are feeling the heat and their agreement seems to be aimed at gaining foothold while battling fierce competition.

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Virtual or real? Augmented Reality with Layar for Android

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Who ever thought, like me, that going online and researching stuff meant never getting out in public again, is now proven wrong. A new Android App called Layar provides a sort of augmented reality browser that will display information in real time while filming the outside world, which obviously means you need to be in the outside world.

The latest and greatest Android program provides tons of information on tons of subjects like real estate, ATMs, twittering people and more. Of course I have my doubts on what this will do to battery life, as a phone is not really meant for constant filming, plus I have serious doubts on efficiency, compared to, say, googling a certain subject. But still this could make for a fun app when you're lost and need to find a public bathroom. I'll speak no more, go check it out for yourself:

SEE
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Before I forget: An iPhone version is on its way.

HTC Sense UI now available on iPhone, smile

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Some genius from RedmondPie has made HTC's Sense UI available to jailbroken iPhones. Now I think this is truly awesome. Not just because the HTC Sense UI is great as it is, it actually allows iPhone owners to be something they hadn't been until now: Free. Of course the jailbroken part has something to do with that freedom. But still, being able to customize your iPhone homescreen is pretty cool I'd say. Either way, one can of course skip the cumbersome part of jailbreaking one's phone by getting an Android in the first place, but not so many people out there are that lucky, that they can switch contracts right away. Check out the UI in action here:



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Samsung Reclaim hits shelves

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The eco friendly Samsung Reclaim went on sale yesterday for only $49.99. Below find a list why you might want to get one yourself:

How is the Reclaim environmentally friendly?
Key green attributes include:

1. The Samsung Reclaim is 80% recyclable
2. The Reclaim meets European standards for RoHS compliance, which means the device contains no cadmium, mercury, hexavalent chromium, polybrominated biphenyls and polybrominated diphenyl ethers.
3. The Reclaim contains no polyvinyl chloride (PVC), phthalates, or brominated flame retardants (BFRs), except for the Qualcomm chipset.
4. The casing is a blend of bioplastics sourced from corn (40%) and polycarbonate (60%)
5. The charger, approved by Energy Star, consumes 12 times less power than the Energy Star standard for standby power consumption and once the Reclaim is fully charged, a visable alert lets the user to unplug the phone charger.
6. Because of the use of bioplastics, the manufacturing process of the device produces fewer greenhouse gas emissions than typical devices.
7. The outer packaging and inner tray are made from 70 percent recycled materials. The images and text on the box as well as the phone warranty information are printed with soy-based ink. The full user guide is online with just a brief guide in the box

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Acer to bring three touchscreen netbooks to market

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According to Digitimes, an Acer project manager has stated that Acer will deliver three Windows 7 powered Touchscreen Netbooks. The interesting thing about this is that Acer is looking into in-cell touch technology. In-cell touch technology builds directly on TFT-LCD panels and is cheaper than regular touch solutions.

It is expected that in-cell touch panels will go into mass production second half of 2009. With Windows 7 coming up it is likey that netbook manufacturers will turn to touchscreen functionality en masse. Competetion will most likeley focus on price, since specs are limited by Microsoft. In-cell touch technology may very well deliver an excellent price quality ratio. Of course other netbooks, like the Tegra powered ones, will not be bound by Microsoft per se and thus come up with even better performance, especially in terms of HD playback.

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SSD comparison Super Talent Ultra Drive ME SSD big winner

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Sascha at Netbooknews.de has tested four SSD drives and the graphs leave no doubt. Super Talent's Ultra Drive ME is super fast with 125/122 R/W speeds. Sascha installed Windows 7 RC1 in only 15 minutes on this little monster. Second came the Runcore Pro IV, third PhotoFast Monster V3 and fourth A-Data S592. Head out to the article for the test.

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T-Mobile G1 will not receive anymore updates

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Early adopters that were brave enough to jump into a completely new platform now face some disappointment. According to Androidandme, Android engineers have stated that the G1 is too limited in space and speed to run Android updates like Donut and Eclair. Of course the disappointment may be relative. Early adopters are named like that for a reason and it will not be long before they've adopted Android's latest and greatest handsets (with according software). Though those who are still tied to a two year contract will pay a little more to have the newest goodies.

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