Daily Roundup: LG leaks the G4, Amazon predictions and more!
In today’s Daily Roundup, read all about how LG accidentally leaked the G4, its new flagship phone. In other news, Amazon’s web services are getting smart enough to make predictions for you and the PC market is shrinking because customers are no longer upgrading as frequently. Get your fill of these stories and more below.
LG inadvertently reveals its leather-clad G4 phone a little early
Oops. LG is supposed to be unveiling its range-topping G4 smartphone on April 28th, but well-known leaker Evan Blass has discovered an unannounced product site that reveals a ton about the new Android flagship a couple of weeks in advance. A lot of the text is clearly placeholder material, but there are a few noteworthy revelations here. The G4’s back will have several color options (including multiple shades of real leather), and that super-fast f/1.8 camera is helped out by an infrared color accuracy sensor, second-generation image stabilization and a full manual mode.
Amazon’s web services are smart enough to make predictions
You no longer have to run a tech giant (or work in a lab) to take advantage of learning computers. Amazon has launched a machine learning feature for Web Services that lets any developer use this computer intelligence to make predictions. Instead of having to sift through data yourself and spend ages fine-tuning algorithms, you let Amazon’s servers comb through the info and create predictions largely on their own. This potentially saves you a ton of time, especially if you’re running a small outfit that can’t afford a lot of servers – Amazon claims that it took 20 minutes to solve one problem that previously took 45 days.
The PC market is shrinking again as companies stop upgrading
It’s not a good time to be a PC maker… especially if you cater to the corporate crowd. Both Gartner and IDC estimate that the computer market shrank between 5.2 to 6.7 percent in the first quarter of 2015, in part because many companies stopped upgrading from Windows XP. Simply put, many of the businesses that wanted to modernize already have – they’re not propping up the market like they were for a good chunk of 2014. IDC goes so far as to claim that this was the lowest volume of PC shipments since the start of 2009, which is no mean feat given that the world was still reeling from an economic collapse at the time.
ASUS’ fitness-centric VivoWatch has a 10-day battery
In our review, we became quite fond of ASUS’ rather handsome ZenWatch except, perhaps, for its two-day battery that most Android Wear watches are getting these days. Apparently the company heard us loud and clear, and it’s now prepping the launch of its VivoWatch to offer a more compelling 10-day battery life. While details are scarce at the moment, ASUS has so far revealed that its new fitness-centric wearable has a tough stainless steel body, an IP67 rating against dust and water, heart-rate monitoring and sleep tracking. Judging by the above picture, this new device – which will likely not run on Android Wear – appears to feature a power-saving black-and-white display, along with some sort of colored light indicator bar below it.
HP’s Omen Pro is a slim laptop meant for serious work
Tempted by HP’s svelte Omen gaming laptop, but need even more horsepower? Say hello to the Omen Pro. It shares the same aluminum 0.78-inch, 4.68-pound frame as its gaming sibling, but it packs in faster Core i7 processors and an NVIDIA Quadro K1100M graphics card. It also shares the original Omen’s unibody aluminum case and 15.6-inch 1080p touchscreen, and it sits right alongside HP’s ZBook workstations, except it balances style and hardware prowess. The Omen Pro is available today, but at $2,199, it’s clearly targeted at the graphics-hungry professionals actually making games, and not just people looking for their latest Far Cry fix.
DARPA creating software that won’t need upgrades for a century
Software upgrades and outdated applications that don’t work on new platforms are just a fact of life for people who use computers and other devices. DARPA, however, wants to change that by making software systems that can run for over a century without getting updates from their developers and despite upgrades in hardware. Pentagon’s mad science department has recently announced that it has begun a four-year research to figure out what algorithms are necessary to create software that “can dynamically adapt to changes.” The agency calls the project “Building Resource Adaptive Software Systems or BRASS,” and it knows it won’t be easy. In fact, DARPA’s expecting to build everything from the ground up. In return, though, we could see a whole new list of programs with longer lifespans that are easier to maintain.
3D Robotics takes on DJI with Solo ‘smart drone’
If you’re in the market for a camera drone, things just got real. Last week, DJI updated its ubiquitous Phantom series with a 4K video version. Today, 3D Robotics (makers of both consumer and professional craft) ups the ante with Solo – a stylish “ready to fly” quadcopter that challenges the Phantom (on the ‘copter side of things) in quite a few ways. You’ll need to bring your own camera though.
Filed under: Misc
Google’s Android One program hasn’t had a major impact on emerging markets
Google initially launched their ambitious Android One program to get low cost devices in the hands of as many people as possible in emerging markets, all while securing the smartphone and tablet market with Google services. Unfortunately, it looks like Android One hasn’t quite gotten the results Google was expecting.
Android One definitely hasn’t been a failure, but devices shipped by local manufacturers haven’t really caught fire as far as sales go. Among those manufacturers, and some of the bigger OEMs that jumped on board with low-cost program, interest has dipped quite a bit from when it was announced.
Android One launched right on the cusp of device prices falling out. Google wanted to introduce tons of devices that were easily purchased for less than $100 without any kinds of contracts, but it’s not tough to find quality sub-$100 devices from other devices anymore. While Android One devices are much more likely to stay updated, that’s not a big enough selling point for many customers.
Even if Android One numbers aren’t doing exceptionally well, the program does fit into Google’s bigger plan to get as many as people as possible connected to the internet and, hopefully, using Google services and seeing Google-served ads. It’ll be interesting to see how much attention Google gives Android One going forward, though.
source: Fierce Wireless
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Android 5.1 OTA now officially available for Nexus 4
If you’re still using a Nexus 4, Google appears to finally be updating the device to the latest version of Android. The 5.1 Lollipop update is rolling out OTA, although the factory image is still MIA.
Fortunately, installing the OTA file on your device isn’t too hard, and we’ve got a solid guide to get you up and running if you don’t want to wait for the update to hit your device.
If you don’t mind being a little patient, though, the notification should hit your device pretty soon.
source: Nexus 4 Android 5.1 OTA
Come comment on this article: Android 5.1 OTA now officially available for Nexus 4
The new Asus VivoWatch offers fitness tracking and 10 days of battery life
Asus has unveiled their newest VivoWatch (that’s actually not part of the Zen family of devices) that’s focused on fitness tracking. The watch is water and dust resistant, offers a heart rate monitor and several other health services, and features a stainless steel frame. Asus is also making a pretty bold claim with this watch, saying it will last 10 days on a single charge.
Other details are pretty scarce about the device, such as pricing and how Asus is going to squeeze that much battery life out of the this thing. We do know that it won’t be an Android Wear device, so maybe Asus has their own extremely power-efficient software on the VivoWatch to keep it going. It’s supposedly going on sale later this year, so we should hear more sooner rather than later.
source: Phone Arena
Come comment on this article: The new Asus VivoWatch offers fitness tracking and 10 days of battery life
BerryFlow Upstream Podcast – EMM
And we’re back! After taking a bit of a break for the Easter weekend, Upstream and is back and this week there was lots to talk about. For this episode, we decided to take it to BBM Meetings and give that go instead of using Google Hangouts but Google must have somehow sensed we were using different service because, YouTube decided it wanted to encode the video perpetually. However, we got it all sorted out and although it’s here later than anticipated, you can now watch or listen to Upstream as you see fit. Jump down a bit to see the topics, guest list and downloads!
Cyanogen OS 12 is here, and the OnePlus One gets it first
Cyanogen and OnePlus aren’t as close as they once were, but the wide open Android variant finally has a release-ready version of Lollipop and it’s rolling out to the OnePlus One today. Cyanogen OS 12 has all the improvements Google could pack in to the fifth iteration of Android — you’ll need to wait for 12.1 for the 5.1 tweaks — plus a couple of special additions with app theming, a built-in Gmail replacement and more. If you’re not seeing the rolling update on your device yet, the factory image should be available to download here soon. Of course, OnePlus has its own OxygenOS version of Android to offer owners of the devices, so in the space of nine days, anyone carrying a One has gone from no official avenues for installing Android Lollipop to two. Choose wisely.
https://www.youtube-nocookie.com/embed/_NIsv0aHbOw?rel=0
Filed under: Cellphones, Mobile, Google
Source: Cyanogen
Moto 360 drops to $165 on Google’s store
If you’ve been toying with getting an Android-powered smartwatch but have been turned off by the $200-plus price tags, now’s a good time to dive in. Google’s device store is offering the Moto 360 with a leather strap for $165, or $85 off — not bad for wristwear that’s several months old. And should Google run out, you can score the wearable for a slightly higher $180 at Amazon and Best Buy. Motorola is likely just clearing out stock ahead of a sequel, but that’s not a bad thing if you’re more interested in putting a device on your arm than owning the latest and greatest.
Filed under: Wearables, Mobile, Lenovo
Via: Droid-Life
Source: Google Store
Verizon Gives EDGE To Loyal Customers To Get The Galaxy S6
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For those of you who are on Verizon, and on the last stages of an EDGE payment plan, you may have already received an email regarding this story. If you haven’t seen it, you might want to check that inbox a few times more than usual.
Verizon is rewarding “loyal” customers, to have the opportunity to upgrade to a Samsung Galaxy S6 or a Galaxy S6 Edge. For a limited time only.
The definition of loyalty, in this case, is that you must be at least one year into the EDGE contract, and you should’ve received the email or text message from Verizon. This is known as an early edge upgrade. While you can upgrade, you will have to trade in your current smartphone to get the upgrade. You will also have to pay activation fees, however if you are in good standing with the carrier, then you can put that on the bill.
An EDGE contract has the following: you pay full price for the device over a two-year period, but after 75 percent of the device is paid you can upgrade again. The monthly cost is about 30 dollars more than the normally subsidized contract. Once you pay the phone off, the price drops back to normal. However, EDGE plans enable more frequent upgrades. So if you’ve got that magical email, and you want to upgrade your smartphone, head over to a Verizon store near you.
Source: SamMobile
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Cyanogen OS 12 starts rolling out to the OnePlus One
Starting tonight, Cyanogen OS 12 has officially started rolling out to all OnePlus One owners.
This marks the official arrival of Cyanogen‘s take on Android 5.0 Lollipop for the OnePlus One.
Bezel-less Oppo R7 smartphone caught in a new leak
Oppo’s upcoming flagship, the R7 has just leaked out in a new image, giving us a very good glimpse of the display. At first glance, it seems like the R7 will have a very slim or practically no side-bezels at all. It’s quite a looker from what we can see, although we would have preferred to check it out from all the angles rather than just a portion of the front.
But we can be assured that more leaks will be coming our way in days to come. The handset has been rumored to feature an edge-to-edge display, thus giving it that unique look. Although the likes of the LG G2 and the G3 have shown us how the side bezels can be minimized to a great extent, what we have here seems to be one of a kind.
The Oppo R7 is believed to be sporting a 5.5 inch display, a 20.7-megapixel camera, an octa core processor (probably from MediaTek) and a thickness of just 4.85 mm. The smartphone is also believed to be equipped with a 4G LTE chip on board.
Source: @Cinquetacche – Twitter
Via: Fone Arena
Come comment on this article: Bezel-less Oppo R7 smartphone caught in a new leak
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