With three SIM slots, Acer’s Liquid E700 is a phone for frequent travelers
Not that you’d know from its formulaic product name (seriously, Acer, you’ve gotta switch things up), but the 5-inch Liquid E700 Android smartphone has an interesting feature geared toward travelers: three SIM slots. Dual-SIM phones are one thing, but why would anyone need space for three? Acer envisions you having separate work and personal cards, with trips abroad requiring one more. And though it’s mostly a matter of convenience – you can keep your home SIM in the phone while also popping in one at your international destination – the setup has the side benefit of preventing you from losing any cards as well.
Still, it’s not like you’ll be able to use multiple SIMs at once; if you receive a call on the AT&T card you use at home, for example, the other two will be left in standby mode. It’s a little like KnowRoaming’s sticker, which sits on top of your SIM to offer global data; when it’s in use, your regular SIM won’t be active. And while we’re at it, it’s worth mentioning that several other companies, including LG and Motorola, have announced triple-SIM phones of their own, but many of these have been confined to a specific region or country. The Liquid E700, on the other hand, will be available in Africa, Europe and the Middle East.
To take advantage of all those SIMs, the Liquid E700 is a quad-band phone, which means you’ll be able to use it virtually anywhere in the world (or anywhere there’s GSM, at least). And beyond the handset’s travel-friendly features, there’s a hefty battery rated for up to 60 days of standby and a full day of talk time. The E700 is light and thin, too, though you definitely wouldn’t buy this device for its design alone. Look for it in August, with a price tag of €199 attached.
Zach Honig contributed to this report.
Filed under: Cellphones, Mobile, Acer
Valve’s simplified VR prototype ditches the QR code-laden room
We’re pretty excited about Valve getting into the virtual reality game. What we weren’t excited about, was the cumbersome solution used by the original prototype to track head movement. Basically it required you sit in a special room painted with QR codes since cameras mounted directly on the unit were used to track your movement. The latest edition, which made a brief appearance a Boston VR Bender, has dots all over it that presumably are tracked by an external, just like the Crystal Cove prototype demoed by Oculus Rift at CES earlier this year. This model is also a little more polished looking, with much fewer exposed components hanging off of it. It’s still not ready for prime time, but at least now it’s a self contained system that can be moved from place to place.
[Image courtesy of @maryannerodis]
Source: Road to VR, Reddit
What’s on your HDTV this week: NBA & NHL Finals, Orange is the New Black
This week we’re finally ready to kick off the championship round of playoffs in both the NBA and NHL. Meanwhile, Netflix has loaded up its streaming library with a new season of Orange is the New Black, plus the latest seasons of Luther and Sherlock are arriving this week. 50 Cent’s new TV show Power debuts on Starz Sunday night (hint: it’s not about baseball), and we’ll say goodbye to this season of Cosmos, Turn and Veep Sunday night. A different Breaking Bad Blu-ray boxed set hits shelves this week without the collector’s edition casing, along with Robocop and Workaholics. Check after the break for a list of what’s new this week plus a few trailers, and drop a note in the comments if you see any highlights we’ve missed.
Blu-ray, Streaming movies & Games
- Lone Survivor
- RoboCop
- Son of God
- True Blood (S6)
- The Birdcage
- Kissing Jessica Stein
- Breaking Bad (The Complete Series)
- The Man with No Name Trilogy
- The Nutty Professor (50th Anniversary)
- Workaholics (S4)
- Falling Skies (S3)
- Murdered: Soul Suspect (PS4, PS3, Xbox One, Xbox 360, PC)
- Ultimate Street Fighter IV (PS3, Xbox 360)
Monday
- Fugget About It (S2), Hulu
- Sherlock (S3), Netflix
- Whose Line Is It Anyway?, CW, 8PM
- WWE Raw, USA, 8PM
- Masterchef, Fox, 8PM
- Years of Living Dangerously, Showtime, 8PM
- 24: Live Another Day, Fox, 9PM
- Beauty and the Beast, CW, 9PM
- American Ninja Warrior, NBC, 9PM
- Longmire (season premiere), A&E, 10PM
- Louie, FX, 10 & 10:30PM
- Mistresses (season premiere), ABC, 10PM
Tuesday
- Inside US Soccer’s March to Brazil, ESPN, 7:30PM
- America’s Got Talent, NBC, 8PM
- Riot, Fox, 8PM
- I Wanna Marry “Harry”, Fox, 9PM
- Deadliest Catch, Discovery, 9PM
- Top Gear (US) (season premiere), History, 9PM
- Heroes of Cosplay, Syfy, 9PM
- Growing Up Fisher, NBC, 9:30PM
- The Wil Wheaton Project, Syfy, 10PM
- Comic View, BET, 10PM
- Freakshow, AMC, 10 & 10:30PM
- Fargo, FX, 10PM
- Awkward, MTV, 10PM
- The Listener, ION, 10, 11 & 11:59PM
- Wild Things with Dominic Monaghan, BBC America, 10PM
- The Night Shift, NBC, 10PM
- Inside Amy Schumer, Comedy Central, 10:30PM
- Faking It, MTV, 10:30PM
- Small Town Security, AMC, 11PM
Wednesday
- NHL Stanley Cup Final Game 1: Kings vs. Rangers, NBC, 8PM
- Rogue, DirecTV 101, 8PM
- Melissa & Joey, ABC Family, 8PM
- So You Think You Can Dance, Fox, 8PM
- Baby Daddy, ABC Family, 8:30PM
- Rake, DirecTV 101, 9PM
- 60 Minutes Sports, Showtime, 9PM
- Dual Survival, Discovery, 9PM
- The 100, CW, 9PM
- Motive, ABC, 10PM
- Catfish, MTV, 10PM
- The Ultimate Fighter, Fox Sports 1, 10PM
- Deal With It (season finale), TBS, 10:30PM
Thursday
- NBA Finals Game 1: Heat vs. Spurs, ABC, 9PM
- Hollywood Game Night, NBC, 8PM
- The Sixties, CNN, 9PM
- Undateable, NBC, 9 & 9:30PM
- Gang Related, Fox, 9PM
- Anger Management, FX, 9:30PM
- Last Comic Standing, NBC, 10PM
- Maron, IFC, 10PM
- Comedy Bang! Bang!, IFC, 10:30PM
Friday
- Orange is the New Black (season premiere), Netflix, 12:01AM
- Luther (S3), Netflix
- WWE SmackDown, Syfy, 8PM
- Brian Williams: D-Day, NBC, 8PM
- D-Day in HD, History, 9PM
- Crossbones, NBC, 10PM
- Continuum, Syfy, 10PM
- Real Time with Bill Maher, HBO, 10PM
- Vice, HBO, 11PM
- The Half Hour: Chris Distefano, Comedy Central, 12AM
- The Half Hour: Michael Che, Comedy Central, 12:30AM
Saturday
- NHL Stanley Cup Finals Game 2: Kings vs. Rangers, NBC, 8PM
- Power (series premiere), Starz, 9PM
- D-Day in HD, History, 9PM
- Orphan Black, BBC America, 9PM
- Sing Your Face Off, ABC, 9PM
- In the Flesh, BBC America, 10PM
Sunday
- NASCAR Sprint Cup Series @ Pocono, TNT, 1PM
- Canadian F1 GP, NBC, 2PM
- Enlisted, Fox, 7PM
- NBA Finals Game 2: Heat vs. Spurs, ABC, 8PM
- Miss USA 2014, NBC, 8PM
- Red Sox/Tigers, ESPN, 8PM
- The 68th Annual Tony Awards, CBS, 8PM
- IndyCar Firestone 600, NBC Sports, 8:30PM
- Anthony Bourdain: Parts Unknown, CNN, 9PM
- Cosmos (season finale), Fox, 9PM
- Game of Thrones, HBO, 9PM
- Catching Hell, Weather Channel, 9PM
- Nurse Jackie, Showtime, 9PM
- Turn (season finale), AMC, 9PM
- Californication, Showtime, 9:30PM
- The Hunt (series premiere), History, 10PM
- Halt and Catch Fire, AMC, 10PM
- Crisis, NBC, 10PM
- Penny Dreadful, Showtime, 10PM
- Veep (season finale), HBO, 10 & 10:30PM
- Last Week Tonight with John Oliver, HBO, 11PM
Filed under: Home Entertainment, HD
Grab the awesome I VOID WARRANTIES shirt from CyanogenMod today!
It’s easy to sport CyanogenMod on your phone, but what about on your clothing? The folks at CyanogenMod have created an awesome shirt, available for purchase at the CyanogenMod Shop.
The shirt features Cid, the official CyanogenMod mascot, wearing a cape. The text underneath reads “I void warranties and so can you” – an awesome addition to the company’s first shirt. The shirt should also be pretty decent quality, seeing as how it’s an American Apparel shirt. If you’re interested, you can grab the shirt for $20 from their store.
Source: +CyanogenMod
The post Grab the awesome I VOID WARRANTIES shirt from CyanogenMod today! appeared first on AndroidGuys.
Android 4.4.3 Factory Image for Nexus Devices Released
Earlier this morning T-Mobile support page listed Android 4.4.3 updates were heading out to the Nexus 4, Nexus 5 and Nexus 7 (2013). It brought up a lot of questions, like, will the unlocked versions be getting it. It is a given that the unlocked versions for those devices would be receiving the update, the news was centered around T-Mobile’s carrier versions. For those that might be a little bit more than irritated by the news, there is some other good news out there for you guys. Google has just released the Android 4.4.3 factory image for the Nexus 4, Nexus 5, Nexus 7 and Nexus 10. It does seem to be missing for the Nexus 7 LTE version though. The file size rolls through at 444MB’s and you’ll need fastboot set up to to get it installed.
If you know what you are doing and just can’t wait for the update to roll trough to your device, then head over to developers.google.com and pick up your image and get to work.
Source: Android Central
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Google+ for iOS updated to make your photos look better, create videos with them
You don’t have to wait for iOS 8 to edit your photos in the cloud: Google is giving the option to its iPhone-toting users right now. The latest build of Google+ for iOS has been outfitted with the usual assortment of Snapseed-sourced features, including a ton of filters, enhancements and basic crop and rotate tools. Naturally, these edits are stored in Google’s own cloud, so you can continue tweaking images on new devices. The update also gives iOS users access to Google+ Stories — giving you something to do with those newly edited photos.
Not familiar with Stories? It’s pretty simple: its a tool that creates “Auto Awesome” travelogue videos, automatically curating content from your albums and mashing them together into a easily sharable format. The feature debuted on Android last month, and is slowly making its way to other platforms.
Filed under: Cellphones, Apple, Google
Source: Google
Watch Apple’s WWDC 2014 keynote in full
For those of you who have been living under a rock for the past few hours, Apple had a number of things to announce on the first day of WWDC 2014. And in case you weren’t paying attention to our liveblog from Moscone West, or able to keep up with the livestream, there’s now archived footage of the event for you to watch. The presentation was kicked off by CEO Tim Cook, though it was Craig Federighi, Apple’s Senior Vice President of Software Engineering, who led the charge most of the way — so much so that his boss referred to him as “Superman” during the keynote. Once you press play on the 118-minute video, expect to see anything from the unveiling of OS X Yosemite to the revelation of iOS 8 — plus a lot, a lot more.
Filed under: Home Entertainment, Internet, HD, Apple
Source: Apple
Up close with ASUS’ quirky Windows laptop / Android phone hybrid
Computex hasn’t even officially started, and we’re already blown away by ASUS’ rather eccentric Transformer Book V from this morning. The name doesn’t tell the whole story; it’s actually a Windows 8.1 hybrid laptop that lets you dock a Android phone on its back — a bit like the PadFone concept except the tablet has its own brain. That’s right, you can use both the 12.5-inch tablet and the 5-inch LTE phone simultaneously with their own brains. When docked, you’re shown the phone’s live Android phone interface within Windows (as pictured above), but you can also toggle the full Android tablet interface. It’s easily the most versatile product we’ve seen of late, but is it practical?
First of all, we should note that the Transformer Book V is apparently still about six months away from market, which may explain why ASUS only had one prototype available for hands-on. The design wasn’t even final; it’s supposed to look very much like the ZenFone 5. Understandably, the early software didn’t perform that well at the time: I couldn’t swipe between Android home screens in the windowed mobile interface, for instance. That said, I could launch Android apps just fine in the window, and it didn’t take long for the Android mobile interface to pop up in Windows after docking. It’s like Motorola’s Webtop implementation but much more powerful. On a similarly positive note, switching between the Android tablet interface and Windows was just a matter of pressing one button on the keyboard.
Since the docked phone is recognized as an external device in Windows here, you’ll still have to handle file transfer the usual way via Windows Explorer, rather than through a more seamless experience with some sort of drag and drop action over the Android interface (at least not for now, anyway). On the bright side, you can transfer files and charge the docked phone without a cable nor having the phone lie around the laptop. Another plus is with tethering enabled, you also have yourself an LTE-enabled Windows or Android laptop.
For a tablet of such size, 800g is a pretty nice weight, and this means you’re still under 1kg in total when you dock the 140g phone. There was no mention on the weight of the keyboard dock, but I found the full package to be of acceptable weight — my guess is somewhere just around 1.6kg. This is based on the fact that the slightly larger 13.3-inch Transformer Book T300 has an 800g keyboard dock with a built-in battery, so the Transformer Book V’s battery-less dock should be slightly lighter.
Due to the prototype nature of the device we played with, we’ll save our hardware comments for a mass production unit. The only complaint we have so far is that the tablet’s 1,366 x 768 display is an eyesore for those who are used to much sharper screens; though if — and it’s a big “if” — this product does take off, there’s a good chance that the displays will be upgraded.
Regardless, we think ASUS is at least headed in the right direction: the tablet dock is no longer dependant on the phone; and in fact, it’s a full-fledged Windows PC on its own but with the versatility of having Android run in Windows or run natively. But as with many products, this concept’s success will ultimately depend on the pricing. We also hope this Windows/Android hardware combo doesn’t mean ASUS has given up on the idea of a Windows Phone-powered PadFone.
Hands-on photos by Zach Honig.
Filed under: Cellphones, Laptops, Tablets, Mobile, ASUS
Kickstarter project lets you print eerie 3D x-rays for $99
If your average 3D-printed paperweight isn’t morbidly realistic enough, then here’s an interesting alternative. It’s an object that consists of thin layers of plexiglass, each of which has been printed with regular ink before being stacked in a vacuum chamber and drenched in machine oil. It’s a relatively simple process, with no actual 3D manufacture or etching involved, but it offers an unusual degree of control over color and transparency. This makes the technique perfect for biological specimens, and especially ones that benefit from some x-ray detail. A Kickstarter project is currently offering its own choice of “Looking Glass” curiosity for sale (an elephant inside a boa constrictor’s belly, inspired by The Little Prince) starting at $39, or you can get your own 3D object file turned into a personalized trinket for $99, with delivery expected in November if the funding target is met. And yes, you can opt for a 3D x-ray of one of your body parts — in fact, somebody already has — but it probably helps if you choose a part with bones in it.
Source: Looking Glass (Kickstarter)
Sony teasing upcoming smartphone on Twitter, likely Z2 Ultra
Sony Xperia Z Ultra was announced a year ago, a 6.3″ behemoth from Sony’s workshop. That phone was (and still is) huge, you need to use it in order to realize how huge that device is. And now it seems Sony is going to bring us the Z Ultra’s refresh.
Sony released a following statement on Twitter alongside an image above: “Shh… do you want to know a secret? Stay tuned for the next big thing this season.” If you ask us this is obviously a teaser for the upcoming Xperia Z Ultra 2 (just look at that picture), or whatever they intend to call this thing. Z Ultra had rather high-end specs at the time of the announcement, so we don’t doubt its successor will too.
We’ll let you know as soon as we get some more information regarding this. Do you own a Z Ultra? Would you buy its successor?
SOURCE: Sony Xperia (Twitter)
The post Sony teasing upcoming smartphone on Twitter, likely Z2 Ultra appeared first on AndroidGuys.
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