ASUS raises sales expectations to 30 million smartphones in 2015
ASUS has been ramping up its mobile strategy in the past few months, announcing cost effective products in both the smartphone and wearables markets. As the new Zenfone 2 range makes its way out around the world, ASUS has just updated its sales expectations to 30 million units for 2015.
This is a remarkable figure for a company that shipped just 10,000 units back in the first quarter of 2014. Sales expectations have been revised repeatedly this year, starting at 17 million in February, 25 million in March and now the company estimates 30 million shipments. ASUS has amassed over 10 million shipments already this year.
The recipe for ASUS’ success is likely down to the affordable nature of its hardware. Although not battling for the most premium tier, ASUS has a compelling line-up with the Zenfone 2 and Zenwatch, which both substantially undercut the price of its major competitors. The news is also a boon for Intel, which provides the CPU inside the Zenfone 2 and had been struggling to break into the smartphone market.
In an interview with the Chinese media, ASUS Chairman Jonney Shih stated that the Chinese market would account for one third of the company’s smartphone shipments for 2015, around 10 million units, suggesting strong growth from other regional markets. In addition to the rollout in Taiwan and parts of Europe, the Zenfone 2 will be heading to Hong Kong, Russia, Singapore, Japan, Indonesia, India and the United States in the coming months.
That said, ASUS will be relying on the booming Chinese market as it hopes to break into the top 10 smartphone manufacturers list in 2015 and into the top five in the coming years.
EE powers new and existing customers with a free Power Bar to charge smartphones
UK mobile operator EE today announced that new and existing customers will be able to claim a free Power Bar on qualified plans.
To be eligible for this Power Bar mobile charging kit (which will be made available in the coming weeks), you’ll need to be on a 30-day, 12, 18 or 24 month contract, be it mobile, fixed line or broadband. PAYG (Pay As You Go) customers are also eligible, but they need to have been with EE for at least three months. All you need to do is text “POWER” to 365.
Those of you who are only broadband customers, the instructions differ slightly. You’ll need to text “JOIN” and your EE landline number to 60005. This will result in a redemption code being provided, which can be used to collect a 2,600mAh Power Bar. This charger can provide some much-needed juice to your smartphone when a power outlet is not available.
As well as acting as a mobile charger, the Power Pack also features an LED torch and indicator lights to show how much power is currently available. Not only can the portable battery be charged at home, EE will swap a depleted Power Bar for a fully-charged replacement bar at any EE store nationwide – for free and as many times as you like.
As noted already, this offer will kick off in the coming weeks. See the press release below and contact EE for more details.
London, 2 April 2015 – EE, the UK’s most advanced digital communications company, has announced the launch of EE Power – a free portable smartphone charger with unlimited swaps in store – available to all active* customers on mobile and broadband plans in the coming weeks. The innovative scheme is designed to ensure that EE customers stay charged at all times with ‘never ending power’. EE Power is the latest initiative to demonstrate the brand’s commitment to reward all new and existing customers and forms part of EE’s plan to become the number one network for service.
From launch, EE customers will be able to pick up a free Power Bar in any EE store by requesting a unique code via text. Once the EE Power Bar has been used to charge a device, customers can recharge the portable battery themselves or, if out and about, they can swap it for a fully-charged replacement bar at any EE store nationwide – for free and as many times as they like.
It has been just over two years since EE introduced 4G to the UK and network usage has grown exponentially in this short period. Video streaming and social media engagement now accounts for over 50 per cent of all data use on EE’s network as customers access more content on the move. However, this increased activity comes at a cost to battery life and recent research2 shows that there is a genuine consumer need for more power –
Nearly 60 per cent of UK smartphone users claim their battery doesn’t last a full day
Over half of all smartphone users wish there were more ways to charge their phone in public places – this rises to over 70 per cent of 18-24 year olds
Pippa Dunn, Chief Marketing Officer EE, said: “Almost everyone’s experienced the frustration associated with running out of battery and it always seems to happen when you need your phone the most. With EE Power, we’re trying to help by giving our customers a Power Bar that can simply be swapped for a fully charged one at any of our stores, at any time, for free.”
All eligible* customers can get their free EE Power Bar when the promotion launches in the coming weeks by texting ‘POWER’ to 365 to receive a promotional code. Texts cost 35p and customers can collect their free EE Power Bar by redeeming this code at any EE store across the UK. Each Power Bar typically gives one full smartphone charge per use.
For more information about EE please visit http://www.ee.co.uk
How to stop Facebook from making your iPhone run like crap
If I had to name one App Store app that can negatively affect the performance of your iPhone, it’s Facebook.
Not only can it eat tremendous amounts of storage, some of the things it does in the background also seem to chew through battery, and make your iPhone run like crap in general. It’s an issue countless friends and family members run into over and over again. From freezing issues to out of storage messages to constant battery drain, Facebook almost always seems to be the culprit.
So in this very special edition of iOS Help, we’re going to take a look at why Facebook makes your iPhone do strange things as well as what you can do to keep it in check.
This how-to is part of our iOS Help feature, where every week I try and help you fix the problems you’re having with your iPhones and iPads. If you have a question or need help with something iOS related that you just can’t figure out, I encourage you to drop a question in our iMore forums, no registration required, or send me an email at ioshelp@imore.com
Over the past several months I’ve been trying to figure out why my girlfriend’s mother keeps having issues with her iPhone. The issues started with her iPhone 5 last year. She kept complaining that it was freezing up on her randomly. We backed up all of her stuff and did a restore. For a while the problem seemed to go away.
A few months later, the same issue. This time we decided to give her my girlfriend’s old iPhone 5s since we had upgraded recently to the iPhone 6. Only a few weeks went by and again, she was having issues with her iPhone freezing. We restored again and sent her on her way only to have the issue come back a few weeks later. This is an iPhone we knew was in working order since it had been used for an entire year with zero issues. Either way, she decided she was going to upgrade to an iPhone 6, partially out of frustration.
Several weeks later, you guessed it, even more issues. This time when she brought the phone to me, I could barely unlock her iPhone without noticing how slow it was to respond. Animations, menus, everything.
When I looked under storage settings, Facebook was eating almost 6GB of storage space!
I started thinking of what she uses her iPhone for, and asked her what apps she uses most. There was zero question that her most used app by far was definitely Facebook. So I launched Settings and started poking around. When I looked under storage settings, Facebook was eating almost 6GB of storage space! Are you kidding me?! On a 16GB iPhone, that is almost half of what’s even available to you!
I immediately deleted Facebook and re-installed it. I then went into Settings and disabled anything Facebook could be doing without her knowing about it. And guess what, she’s had zero problems with her iPhone since then.
I’m not sure what Facebook does in the background that would cause iOS to freeze up like that, but I do know she isn’t the only person to complain about this after a quick search online. Yes, Facebook caches stuff to storage occasionally but why is it caching 6 GB worth?
That’s absolutely unacceptable and Facebook needs to get its act together, fast.
While I can’t make the Facebook app better, I can give you some tips on what you can do to make sure Facebook isn’t taking your iPhone hostage like it did hers.
See how much storage Facebook uses on your iPhone
The very first thing you’ll want to check is how much storage space Facebook is using on your iPhone. I checked another friend’s iPhone recently and the main photo on this article shows what I found. It seems to be a problem for a lot of people that frequently use the Facebook app.
So if you want to potentially free up a few GIGABYTES of storage space, I highly suggest following these steps:
- Launch the Settings app on your iPhone.
- Tap on General.
- Tap on Usage.
- Tap on Manage Storage.
- Tap on Facebook.
- If it’s eating a good amount of storage, tap on Delete App.
How to easily use Facebook on iPhone without the actual app
Now I suggest never downloading the Facebook app again and using the web version via Safari instead. Using Facebook with Safari instead of the official app gives it zero control over your iPhone and therefore eliminates all the issues that come with it.
If you add a bookmark to your Home screen, you’ll barely notice the difference anyways:
- Launch Safari on your iPhone.
- Go to facebook.com and sign in.
- Tap on the Share button
- Tap on Add to Home Screen.
- Tap on Add in the upper right hand corner.
You now have easy access to Facebook on your iPhone without any of the issues the app is causing. Sure you won’t receive notifications anymore but honestly, we all could use some more time interacting with real life people and less time socializing on Facebook.
However, if you insist on using the Facebook app, there’s some things you need to do…
How to limit what the Facebook app can do on your iPhone
Background app refresh and location settings are a huge issue with the Facebook app. The first thing you should do is completely turn these things off by following the steps below. You should also be checking the two areas mentioned below regularly to make sure no apps that shouldn’t have constant access to resources are disabled. You may be surprised how much battery life you save.
How to disable location services for Facebook
- Launch the Settings app on your iPhone.
- Tap on Privacy.
- Tap on Location Services.
- Find Facebook in the list and tap on it.
- Tap on Never.
How to disable background app refresh for Facebook
- Launch the Settings app on your iPhone.
- Tap on General.
- Tap on Background App Refresh.
- Turn Off background app refresh for Facebook.
Keeping Facebook in check in the future
If you still feel you need to use the Facebook app instead of a web clip, you’ll need to check your storage space and make sure Facebook isn’t eating into it again — which it most certainly will over time. You’ll regularly have to repeat the process of deleting and re-installing the app to claim back your storage.
The only permanent solution here, at least until Facebook gets its act together, is deleting the Facebook app and not re-installing it. So take your pick and then let me know in the comments what you decided to do. And as always, if you’ve run into similar issues and have found any other solutions, be sure to let me know about them in the comments or by sending me an email.
Microsoft shows off the subsurface magic powering the new Surface 3
Microsoft held a party in Los Angeles, US this week to celebrate the launch of the new Surface 3. The new tablet from Microsoft was on display with one model showing its insides, revealing inner magical properties. An attendee of this party managed to capture some footage of this display.
Scanbot gets Slack and Wunderlist integration in latest update
Scanbot is a fully-featured mobile scanner app that allows you to scan documents up to 200 dpi and QR codes, with the latest update bringing added functionality.
Scanbot’s differentiating feature is its automatic upload feature, which as it suggests allows you to upload your scans automatically to a cloud service of your choosing. Most popular cloud services are supported, including Box, Dropbox, Evernote, Google Drive, OneDrive, Amazon Cloud Drive as well as the WebDAV standard. The update to version 3.7 adds team communications utility Slack to the list, letting you upload your scans directly into a conversation.
There’s a reminder service through which you can set reminders to your scanned documents, with the update bringing Wunderlist into the fold, with Evernote integration already included. Ability to add location data as well as calendar events to file names is also new in the update.
Scanbot is free, although there’s a $4.99 pro version that brings additional themes, document editing within the app, OCR mode and Touch ID integration.
- Free, $4.99 upgrade – Download now
Airbnb arrives in Cuba with US-only listings
Airbnb has joined Netflix and other US companies in Cuba, which “could become one of (our) biggest markets in Latin America,” according to the company. The move marks the most significant US business expansion to the Caribbean island since the Obama administration began normalizing relations with the nation, according to the Associated Press. For the last half-century prior to that, the US enforced a strict trade embargo on Cuba. Over 1,000 listings are now up on the site, with 40 percent of those in Havana and the rest in nearby tourist spots on the Southern coast.
The service will only be available to American tourists for now, even though they’re technically still barred from traveling to Cuba without special permission. However, US companies can now offer trips without any paperwork or inspections, and many tour operators expect American visitors to just ignore the rules. Ironically, tourists from nations like Canada and France who’ve traveled to the island for years can’t yet book an Airbnb property, and the company has yet to say when that policy may change.
Havana Airbnb listing for $23 per night
Private housing rental has been going on in Cuba since the 1990s, providing an alternative to private resorts for tourists who want to be immersed in local culture. Charming, renovated spaces can be found for as little as $20-30 (above), with more luxurious houses running $150 or more (not including Airbnb’s fees, of course). Local operators are hopeful that the listings will be a boon for both tourists and Cuban businesses, since the nation’s shortage of internet access makes booking private rentals difficult. One Havana apartment owner told the AP that “I think this is going to help our business prosper, to definitely improve, not just private business, but everything here.”
[Image credit: Associated Press/Desmond Boylan]
Filed under: Internet
O2 SIMs will switch to public WiFi if its network can’t cope
O2’s public WiFi hotspots can be useful in a pinch, but filling out the obligatory registration forms to gain access has always been a pain. To speed up the process, the network is introducing O2 WiFi Extra, a service which automatically connects customers with an O2 SIM card. That means no SMS codes, or even looking through your network settings for the correct hotspot. The catch? Once the feature has been enabled, you’ll be connected to the hotspots automatically if “the WiFi signal is stronger than O2’s 3G or 4G network.” It’s not clear exactly how the company is defining signal strength, and if you don’t like the service, O2’s recommendation seems to be disabling WiFi entirely. O2’s free public hotspots are available in 11,000 locations across the UK, including McDonald’s, Costa Coffee and Debenhams stores. The new service will be rolled out over the next eight weeks, so keep your eyes peeled the next time you’re struggling to refresh Twitter over 3G or 4G.
[Image Credit: Bloomberg via Getty Images]
Filed under: Networking
Via: Pocket-lint
Source: O2
New invites tease more of the HTC One M9 Plus, including its physical home button
On April 8th, it’s been made pretty obvious that HTC is going to announce a new device, the HTC One M9 Plus. We’ve seen plenty of this device already through leaks, but HTC has decided we haven’t seen enough yet and has put even more explicit hints on some invites spotted in China, one of which […]
The post New invites tease more of the HTC One M9 Plus, including its physical home button appeared first on AndroidSPIN.
HTC One M8s to launch in Europe with Snapdragon 615 CPU and 13MP rear camera
The HTC One M9 was officially released on March 1st, and you could be forgiven for thinking that the M8 would be eased into retirement. HTC has taken a bite out of someone else’s apple though and decided to refresh a few components and sell it as the HTC One M8s in Europe.
The most notable change in specification involves the processor, and here HTC have swapped over from the Snapdragon 801 to the 64-bit Snapdragon 615 Octa-core processor. The very same CPU you can find powering the Desire 820.
The battery has received a jolt in capacity to 2,840mAh, putting it on an equal footing as the M9. The camera has also seen some changes, moving from the much-maligned 4MP UltraPixel sensor to the more conventional 13MP, although it still includes the secondary camera that enables HTC’s Duo Camera effect. Size-wise the HTC One M8s is 0.2mm thicker than the outgoing M8.
The HTC One M8s is still constructed out of metal, with the signature BoomSound speakers present as you would expect. The handset will be available in the same silver, gold and gun-metal grey flavours as the M8 before it. The HTC One M8s will be priced at £379 ($560) in the UK and will be available in Europe although a launch date has not yet been released. What do you think of the M8s? Is it all becoming a little confusing?
Source: AndroidCentral
Come comment on this article: HTC One M8s to launch in Europe with Snapdragon 615 CPU and 13MP rear camera
Moto G Google Play edition is getting Android 5.1, OTA link available
The differences between the regular Moto G and the Play edition version are minimal, but fans of Google’s firsthand vision of Android undoubtedly prefer the latter. If you are rocking a Play edition Moto G, you’ll be happy to know that Google has begun pushing the Lollipop 5.1 update to the device.
The update is rolling out in stages over-the-air, and, as usual, that means you may have a little to wait. With that said, there are probably not that many units of the Moto G Play edition in the wild, so the wait shouldn’t be too long.
The update brings the build number to LMY47M and weighs 171MB.
Android 5.1 has been unveiled last month, following more than a few leaks spotted in the wild. This version is supposed to fix and tweak various issues found on 5.0, but it also adds features like multi-SIM card support, device protection (the device will remain locked even after a factory reset), and HD voice calls support, as well as various small enhancements to the user interface.
If you can’t wait, you can install the OTA file manually, as long as you’re on the latest firmware (LRX21Z). Download it from here.
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