Lava launches its latest budget-friendly smartphone in India
Indian smartphone manufacturer Lava has just launched its latest budget-friendly smartphone, the ‘Iris Alfa’, and rather surprisingly it packs quite a lot with regards to specifications for the money.
The Iris Alfa features a 5-inch IPS display with a resolution of 854 x 480 pixels, a 1.2Ghz Qualcomm Snapdragon processor, 1GB of RAM, 8GB of on-board storage (expandable up to 32GB), a 5-megapixel rear-facing camera and a 2,200mAh battery.
Out of the box, the Alfa will run the latest build of “vanilla” Android 4.4 KitKat, but is expected to receive the much-anticipated Lollipop update later this year.
The handset is available to purchase from the company’s online store starting today for just INR 6,550 ($105).
Source: Lava
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IRL: A closer look at Boosted Boards’ Dual+ electric skateboard
My younger, street-skating self would’ve scoffed at the idea of an electric skateboard, at least one that wasn’t built for tricks while in transit. But having spent less time doing slappies and ollies in recent years, taking to the streets on an electric version finally seemed a viable alternative. For those who aren’t planning stunts along the way, or perhaps have less experience skating, there’s something to be said for an electric that focuses on cruising and getting you from A to B at a controllable pace. So when I was offered the chance to test one of Boosted Boards’ Dual+ 38-inch setups, I decided it was time to take one for a spin. Starting at $999, they’re clearly a luxury item, and it’s not every day you get to take one for an extended test-drive. Sure, winter and its bone-chilling cold were rapidly descending on New York City when it arrived, but that never used to stop me back in the day. I did get to ride it in the warm Las Vegas sun during CES, but I never managed to use it as a commuting alternative with the weather in decline. The time I managed to spend on the board, though, was definitely worth it.
I’ve tried a couple different electric boards recently, including Boosted’s Dual+, the ZBoard 2.0 and the LEIF. While they’re all fundamentally the same, each is a slightly different creature. The Boosted series (which was successfully Kickstarted in 2012) uses a longboard-style setup and a Bluetooth controller that handles movement and monitors battery life for itself and the board. The LEIF is a freeboard with two additional rotating wheels underneath to help you drift like a snowboard; as for accelerating, you’ve got a hand-held radio controller (although it’s still under development). The ZBoard 2.0, meanwhile, is an oversized street/ramp style deck with pads you step on to control forward and backward motion. The hand-held controls aren’t ideal in the cold — wintry weather can quickly freeze your digits and gloves make them awkward to use — but Boosted has the most comfortable user interface out of the bunch, at least for me.
Boosted Boards has three models in its lineup: the $999 Single, the $1,299 Dual and the $1,499 Dual+. All of them come kitted out with a bamboo deck that provides plenty of bounce and a comfy ride, and a set of soft, grippy 80A durometer wheels to give you traction while carving. Both the Dual models are out now and the Single (the lightest of the three) is expected to arrive at the end of January powered by a single 1,000W motor. It offers the most range out of the bunch and is built to be more portable, but you sacrifice some power. The top-of-the-line Dual+ offers two brushless motors totaling 2,000 watts and can tackle a 25 percent incline with gusto.
After decades of riding skateboards, I’m comfortable barreling down the road on one at high speeds, so the Dual+ model is the one I’d recommend. Cruising at 20MPH is fast for a skateboard — I even managed 25MPH at one point — but once you get used to it, top speed will feel pretty casual. Don’t worry, though, it’ll still satisfy your inner Ricky Bobby and this thing has a lot of torque right out of the gate, enough that you’ll have to lean into it or get chucked off. The Dual+ also includes adjustable speed settings, letting you slow it down for newbies or save power when you want to max out the range. If you’re not worried about tearing down the road at top speed, the other models may be worth the savings.
Cruising around the neighborhood, I managed to cover about 5.2 to 5.8 miles until the power was depleted (usually with the pedal to the metal) and since the regenerative “brakes” actually feed energy back into the battery, my hilliest ride also gave me the most distance. Being able to dial back your speed when shooting down a hill is a wonderful thing, especially when it gives you a chance to charge the battery (at least a little bit).
Range-wise, Boosted’s ride falls short of ZBoard’s proposed 24 miles (with its Pearl edition), but the motors and the style of ride you get differ a good deal between the two. With five to seven miles on a charge, you could easily commute to work if it’s in range. The company’s CEO and co-founder Sanjay Dastoor was also quick to point out that while these boards aren’t cheap, if used daily, the money you save on trains and buses could end up balancing out the initial expenditure (and then there’s the fun to be had). Also, once you reach your destination, you won’t even have to worry about locking up or parking.
That portability depends on how much you’re comfortable carrying around, though, which is why the company is releasing the Single. The Dual models both weigh about 15 pounds and while that may not sound like much, they seem to get heavier the longer you carry them. With the battery’s inherent limits, you’ll likely want to sling it over your shoulder or carry it at your side at some point, since pushing this thing when the battery has died is a bit of a pain. You can do it, but you’re going to have to work at it.
On the plus side, if you purchase the additional 120W fast charger to take on the road, you can get the lithium iron phosphate 99Wh battery up to around 80 percent after only 30 minutes charging (the bundled charger takes an hour for 90 percent). It would mean carrying the laptop-style brick in your bag, but plugging in while you grab a coffee is easy enough to accomplish, and you could cruise around for a good part of the day with some planning. It’s important to mention, though, that taking this thing on a bar crawl is probably not a good idea.
So, the elephant in the room here is: Are these electric skateboards worth $1,000 or more? That’s a tough question, but if money isn’t an object, I’d say yes. An electric skateboard certainly won’t have you flashing back to those day-long curb sessions, but for straight-up cruising and tasting a bit of today’s technology, it’s a treat. That’s especially true of the Boosted line, which I’ve found to be well-built and fun to ride. If you live in a sunny and warm climate, this could be a great way to commute — and you’ll barely break a sweat. The flip side is that it barely registers as exercise (you’re mostly standing in one place) and won’t help you reach your daily fitness goals.
Boosted Boards has been known to call its product “Hoverboard 1.0″ and while that honor may already be claimed, it’s certainly close enough. Being able to skate around with some horsepower under your feet is definitely a trip and the onboard motors offer sci-fi sound effects as you’re thumbing the accelerator or slowing to a stop at your next destination.
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Filed under: Misc, Transportation
Looking back at CES: Brands to watch out for in 2015
The heavy hitters in the American and European Android smartphone market didn’t have a great deal to say at CES 2015. Only LG released a big smartphone in the shape of the G Flex 2. We’ll see many more new smartphones in and around MWC, but there were some interesting moves from some lesser known names at CES this year. Alcatel, Asus, Lenovo, BLU, ZTE, the list goes on.
Let’s take a look at the different strategies they’re employing to try and get noticed in an increasingly crowded Android market.
Alcatel sets sights on States
We’ve seen steady progress from TCL, the Chinese manufacturer behind the Alcatel brand, and it has been a whole year since we wrote about Alcatel’s assault on mobile. It has continued to build the Alcatel Onetouch brand since then with a string of affordable budget and mid-range Android devices. Just before CES it unveiled a new smartwatch and the Pixi 3 line of smartphones. There was also news of a new e-commerce website to sell direct to the US public.
But that’s the not the extent of TCL’s play to enter the market Stateside, because it also has plans to rebuild the Palm brand it acquired as some kind of crowdsourced project. It looks like TCL believes a two-pronged attack might be the way forward and the brands will stay separate.
The crowdsourced idea for the Palm brand sounds an awful lot like Xiaomi’s philosophy and it has the potential to be very successful. Can TCL combine its existing budget credentials with a recognized brand, in the shape of Palm, and persuade people to buy in to the idea of designing a new smartphone?
BLU is all about budget
This lesser known brand is headquartered in Miami. It only popped up in 2009, but it has been doing quite well selling budget, unlocked phones in the Americas. BLU unleashed seven handsets at CES, all under $300. The specs aren’t going to wow you, but the prices might. The standout is the Vivo Air, a premium-looking phone that’s impressively slim at 5.1mm.
The strategy here is to reduce overheads as far as possible and undercut the competition. Some of BLU’s phones are re-badged versions from other manufacturers like Gionee. All their smartphones are sold unlocked through Amazon. The question is whether BLU can keep up the momentum when more budget OEMs, especially from China, move in next door.
Asus and Android
The Taiwanese manufacturer Asus has been a major PC vendor for years now. It joined the Open Handset Alliance in 2008, but its biggest success on the Android platform so far has been the Nexus 7. Asus built both models for Google. It has dabbled with its own tablets and smartphones and it started to look serious with last year’s Zenfone.
This year’s CES saw Asus announce the Zenfone 2 which is an impressive-looking, Lollipop smartphone with a really solid set of specs for just $200. There was also the Zenfone Zoom for anyone hankering for 3X optical zoom on their smartphone camera. The Asus strategy for Android looks much the same as its PC strategy – offer a solid experience at a budget price.
Lenovo is third
Already a major player in the PC and tablet market, after acquiring Motorola, Lenovo claimed the third spot in smartphones behind Samsung and Apple. The company showed off a couple of sexy mid-rangers, the P90 and the Vibe X2 Pro, at CES, but neither are aimed at the States.
A number of Chinese manufacturers have been climbing the charts on the back of sales in China and other emerging markets, where the growth rate is still high, but cracking the US and Europe is a whole different prospect. The difference with Lenovo is Motorola. Google seemed to be guiding the Motorola brand back to success with a budget approach that should suit Lenovo.
Motorola may offer a route to success that the Lenovo brand couldn’t manage, and the company has deep enough pockets to make things very difficult for everyone else. It will be interesting to see what develops.
ZTE is a player
The ZTE Nubia Z7 is the new top of ZTE’s range, but it doesn’t look likely to get a release outside Asia. However, ZTE has plenty of bargain wares available across the globe and it seems to have found a home on Cricket in the States. The latest $200 release there is the Grand X Max+ which looks like a solid mid-range phablet. ZTE also showed off the Star 2 at CES.
We also named the ZTE SPro 2, Android projector, in our best of CES 2015.
Saygus says hello
A fresh new start-up that caught the eye at CES this year, Saygus is an American smartphone maker that’s throwing everything, but the kitchen sink into its debut super smartphone, the Saygus V2. It starts out gently with a 5-inch 1080p display with tiny bezels, a 2.5GHz Snapdragon 801, Adreno 330 GPU, and 3GB of RAM.
Then there’s a 21MP main camera with a 13MP selfie cam. 64GB of storage which can be boosted up to 320GB with two 128GB microSD cards. The removable battery is rated at 3100mAh. It has front-facing Harmon Kardon speakers. It’s also waterproof and has a premium aluminum and Kevlar body. There’s even a fingerprint scanner. It has all the makings of a cult classic. The Saygus strategy seems to be to listen to what hardcore Android fans want, which could definitely carve it out a profitable niche.
And the rest
We can’t cover everyone, but it’s worth mentioning that Huawei is still huge. There were no major announcements, but Huawei had more than a hundred different products on show at CES. It’s done well with the Honor and Ascend Mate lines, dropping the Huawei brand in Europe, but it still hasn’t cracked the US.
The Android scene, especially at the budget end of the market, has never been more competitive than it is right now.
Archos and Acer continued their budget lines at CES too. Acer’s Liquid Jade S looks like a decent mid-ranger. Xiaomi waited until a few days after CES to launch the Mi Note and Mi Note Pro, but they may never be released outside of China. There were also a number of hot players that didn’t really have an official presence at CES, such as OnePlus, which is expected to unveil two handsets sometime later this year.
The Android scene, especially at the budget end of the market, has never been more competitive than it is right now. It remains to be seen which strategy will reap the greatest rewards in 2015. Place your bets now.
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C Spire expands its rolling data offer to its 10, 15 and 30 GB sharable plans
Wireless provider C Spire, which serves about 1 million customers in the southeastern US, is now offering rolling data for its 10 GB, 15 GB and 30 GB shared data plans for free. Customers on the company’s other plans can switch over to one of the three rolling share data plans at no additional cost.
The company stated the new plans are available for customers with two-year contracts on their smartphones, such as the iPhone 6 and iPhone 6 Plus, along with users that are under C Spire’s device payment option. Prices for the shared rolling data plans range from $110 a month for two lines with 10GB of data up to $190 a month with four lines and 30GB of data. C Spire says:
Any unused data from the previous month is rolled over to the next month for sharing among all users up to the plan’s monthly limit. Unlike other providers, C Spire does not force consumers to use plan data first or eliminate any unused roll over data at the end of each month. Instead, rollover data can be accumulated, shared and used among all individuals up to the plan’s monthly limit.
The plans also include device tethering for smartphones. T-Mobile and AT&T have both recently launched their own rolling data plans.
Source: C Spire
HTC finally entering the smartwatch space with supposed announcement on March 1st along side One M9
While most major manufacturers have put out at least one smartwatch in the last year, there is still one player that many of us are waiting on; HTC. There were a number of rumors about a watch in the works, but they never amounted to much. The lat major press event from HTC was the […]
The post HTC finally entering the smartwatch space with supposed announcement on March 1st along side One M9 appeared first on AndroidSPIN.
New patent reveals why Google invested in Magic Leap
Back in October, Google invested in a startup called Magic Leap, a company that makes specialized augmented reality hardware. Now a new patent is revealing just what Google saw in this company.
Magic Leap’s new technology is called “cinematic reality” and will offer a 3D experience not offered on any other device. It’s a pair of smart glasses and other than seeing 3D virtual objects and scenery that can be downloaded from the cloud, users will also be able to share the real-life environment around them to another user. Imagine being at a concert, a sporting event, or some other tourist attraction and being able to share exactly what you see with someone else.
There could also be automatic triggers. For example, if you’re in a store and look at a product while wearing the glasses, a game or an interactive demo would start.
All of this sounds cool, but with people still reluctant to wear Google Glass, they are even more unlikely to wear something like this. Still, I don’t think it’s meant to be a 24/7 device, so I can see people using it for certain situations, but they would have to carry it with them at all times so that it’s ready to go.
What do you guys think? Does this sound interesting to you?
source: USPTO
via: Business Insider
Come comment on this article: New patent reveals why Google invested in Magic Leap
Google’s working on a feature for Chrome OS that will let you import files from external hard drives
We’ve known for a while now that Google is redesigning the File Manager application within Chrome OS and today some leaked details have appeared online. If a report published by OMG Chrome is anything to go by, it looks like the search engine giant has baked a new ‘Cloud Import’ feature into its latest build of the app.
This new function will allegedly allow files on MTP, external hard drives or SD cards which have been unearthed by its new background file system scanner to be quickly and easily backed up to Google Drive. The majority of this process will be automatic. The only thing the user will have to do is name the data and select a suitable place to store it.
‘Cloud Import’ will be accessible in Drive’s button bar whenever a supported device is connected to the computer — when an active import is in progress, the number of files remaining to be transferred together with the option to cancel will be shown in the File Manager.
Would you like to see Cloud Import built in to the next build of the File Manager app? Be sure to let us know your thoughts in the comments section below.
Source: OMG Chrome
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Facebook Begins Small-Scale Testing of Voice-to-Text Conversations in Messenger [iOS Blog]
Facebook today began testing a new feature on its Messenger service, automatically transcribing voice messages sent through the service directly into text.
Announced by the Facebook’s VP of Messaging David Marcus on his Facebook page, the update is meant to be more helpful for people who enjoy sending and receiving voice messages but find themselves in situations such as a meeting where audio is less suitable to the environment (via The Next Web).
“Today we are starting to roll out a small test that helps people read the voice clips they receive instead of having to play them out loud. So, for example, if you’re at a concert or in a meeting, and would prefer to read a voice clip from a friend, you now can if you’re part of the small test we’re rolling out.”
Marcus goes on to mention that the current plan for the update is to keep it at a “tiny scale for now” and see how it performs in the wild. After seeing what the small scale of users think of the new feature, Facebook will decide whether to make the feature “more widely available.”
Though the Facebook Messenger app retains a low rating in the App Store due to customer complaints over the company’s continued attempt to separate individual services into various apps, it retained the top spot on 2014’s list of most downloaded apps when results were announced late last month.
Google’s New Calendar App for iOS Shown in Leaked Images [iOS Blog]
Google late last year launched its all-new Google Calendar app for Android with a smarter, more automated version of the platform, with a promise that the app would someday hit Apple’s iOS-enabled devices.
Thanks to a few leaked screenshots sent in to The Next Web, it appears the revamped Google Calendar app is ready for an imminent launch on iPhone and iPad. The images show off an app that looks pretty similar to the Android version, with Calendar pulling photos and map information straight into the app.
When the app debuts, it will be the first time a dedicated Google Calendar app launches on iOS. There’s no confirmation yet as to whether the iOS version will encompass all of the features from its Android counterpart, like Schedule View or Assists, but, as The Next Web points out, with the images leaking it shouldn’t be long until the app launches to find out.
Google has a number of regularly updated apps on Apple’s mobile platform, including fan favorite Google Maps and Google Translate, which was just updated with instant camera-based translation software Word Lens.
Moog revives its massive modular synthesizers
In 1973, Moog first began manufacturing its huge large format modular synthesizers that pack a wall of knobs, patch cables and other controls. The System 55, System 35 and System 15 went out of production as musicians desired to have something a bit more portable, but just before the start of NAMM 2015, the company announced those giant setups are coming back. Last year, the folks at Moog remade Keith Emerson’s (of Emerson, Lake & Palmer fame) modular system, and during the three-year-long process, learned a thing or two about recreating the original 1970s circuitry. Similar to Emerson’s model, the new System trio will be “a true recreation of the original,” using the decades-old schematics to accurately reproduce the specs — right down to all of the hand soldering, traditional wiring and photo-etched front panels.
Why revive those iconic instruments now? Well, as Moog puts it, “Artists had only begun to grasp the vast possibilities of these large format modular synthesizers when they went out of production over thirty years ago.” The interest in classic modular instruments has certainly grown, and it seems a number of folks are anxious to get their hands on one to explore that untapped potential. As you might expect, these instruments will be in limited quantities with 55 of the System 55 ($35,000), 35 of the System 35 ($22,000) and 150 of the System 15 ($10,000). In order to properly celebrate the return of its large format synths, Moog has a short film that discusses the trio’s importance, and you can see it just below.
Filed under: Misc
Source: Moog Music
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