Sony Xperia Z5 to be launched in September to compete with rivals
Sony is prepping yet another flagship phone. In early July we heard a rumor that the company was preparing a new flagship, the Xperia Z5. Now it appears that these rumors are true.
According to tipster Leaksfly, Sony is getting ready to release its new flagship, the Xperia Z5, for the second half of 2015. Allegedly, the specifications will include a Full-HD 5.5-inch display, 3GB of RAM, and 32GB of internal storage in a slim profile. The phone will most likely be powered by Qualcomm’s Snapdragon 810 chipset.
Being that Sony has so much experience in imaging, it should be no surprise that both rear and front-facing cameras on the Xperia Z5 will be impressive. On the rear is a 20.7MP camera, a common component for Sony’s high-end devices, while the front camera is 8MP.
The device is expected to launch as a direct response to compete with what is coming from Samsung, HTC, and Apple this fall. The Xperia Z5 should launch in September, perhaps with the company’s new concept software.
Via: MobiPicker
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Sony Xperia Z5 may have 5.5″ display and fingerprint scanner, September launch
We haven’t seen much in the news regarding Sony’s next Xperia smartphone, especially with Samsung and Motorola stealing the spotlight lately. But we can’t forget that Sony is due for a refresh soon, which typically occurs at the IFA trade show in September.
As it naturally goes when an announcement closes in, leaks become more revealing. Today we have alleged details on the Xperia Z5, courtesy of Mobipicker.
It looks like Sony may be finally giving the Xperia screen size a bump, up to 5.5″. The Xperia line has had a 5.2″ display since the Z2. However, the resolution is said to be staying at 1080P. This would not be too far-fetched, Sony did express that they thought QHD was frivolous. But because the recent Xperia Z4v sported a QHD screen, I can see how many would be disappointed that this would not be the flagship standard from now on.
We may be looking at the Snapdragon 810 chipset being utilized again, which may not be a smart move. The 810 SoC has accumulated a bunch of negativity through its overheating controversy, and the 820 was supposed to be Qualcomm’s redemption. But to give Sony the benefit of the doubt, the extra time with the chip could have allowed them to figure out how to run it more efficiently. They did the same thing last year when they reused the Snapdragon 801 on the Z3.
Other suggeseted details include 3GB of RAM, 32 GB of internal storage (no word if it’s still expandable or not), 20.7 MP rear camera (no word if the same Exmor RS sensor is back for yet another round) and 8 MP front camera. Also, Sony may be adding a fingerprint reader this time. I’m really interested to see how they implement it. We’ve been seeing OEM’s unattractively add in a button to accommodate the scanner.
Are you excited to see what the Xperia Z5 will bring, or do you tune Sony smartphones out due to minuscule changes and limited US availability?
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Best Buy to Begin Selling Apple Watch on August 7
Best Buy today announced it will begin selling the Apple Watch in some its U.S. retail stores and online on August 7, marking a substantial expansion of retail availability for the device. Starting with 100 stores and expanding to 300 over the next few months, he company will offer 16 models from the aluminum Apple Watch Sport and stainless steel Apple Watch collections, as well as nearly 50 accessories including stands and watch bands.
Starting Aug. 7, Best Buy will be the first national retailer, other than Apple Stores, where customers can buy the Apple Watch. It will begin to arrive in more than 100 Best Buy stores and will also be available on BestBuy.com. Another 200 of our stores will have the Apple Watch in time for holiday shopping.
“The Apple Watch is an important addition to an emerging product category, and we know our customers want it,” said Jason Bonfig, senior category officer at Best Buy. “We are excited to bring Apple Watch to more consumers, especially with the holidays coming up.”
Apple has provided a statement to iMore, noting the focus on expanding availability for the holiday shopping season.
“Customers love Apple Watch, and we are thrilled to begin offering it at Best Buy locations across the U.S. starting August 7,” an Apple spokesperson told iMore. “More than 300 Best Buy stores will carry Apple Watch and Apple Watch Sport models in time for the holiday shopping season.”
The Apple Watch is currently available in 19 countries with Apple gradually expanding availability as supplies have allowed, and an additional three countries — New Zealand, Russia, and Turkey — will be added to the list this coming Friday.
Scientists make a transistor from a single molecule
You’re looking at what could be not just one of the smallest semiconductor parts ever, but one of the smallest semiconductor parts possible. A worldwide research team has built a transistor that consists of a single copper phthalocyanine molecule, a dozen indium atoms and an indium arsenide backing material. The trick was to abandon the usual mechanics of a transistor, which normally controls current by modulating the gate voltage, in favor of a field effect. Here, you only need to vary the distance of the gate (in this case, the atoms) to modulate electricity.
Don’t start preparing for a world full of tiny-but-complex gadgets just yet. The scientists created their transistor in a near-total vacuum, at a temperature barely above absolute zero. That’s a far cry from real-world conditions, and it’ll take much more research before transistors this small are in devices you can actually buy. Nonetheless, the breakthrough is promising — it shows that there’s still a long, long way to go before we hit the physical limits of electronics.
[Image credit: US Naval Research Laboratory]
Filed under: Science
Via: IEEE Spectrum
Sony Xperia Z5 tipped for September announcement with 5.5-inch 1080p display
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The Sony Xperia Z5 has gotten its fair share of rumours over the last few months, but everything has seemed a little tentative. However, with September and IFA bearing down on us, a time when Sony traditionally makes an announcement, the rumours are starting to seem a little more concrete. The latest rumour suggests that the Xperia Z5 is going to get a bit of a size boost, increasing its screen size to 5.5-inch from the 5.2-inch of the Xperia Z4/Z3+ (but keep the 1080p resolution), and that it will use a Qualcomm Snapdragon 810 processor, not the Snapdragon 820 that was originally rumoured.
Along with all that, the Xperia Z5 is expected to have 3GB RAM, 32GB storage, a 20.7MP rear camera, 8MP front camera, and will also have a fingerprint scanner. Based on what we know of competing devices that are coming out around this time, i.e. the Samsung Galaxy Note 5, the Xperia Z5 could have its hands full in the market. However there is also some cross-marketing that is rumoured to be happening between the Xperia Z5 and the new Bond movie, Spectre – we’ll have to see if that has any effect on its popularity.
What do you think about the Sony Xperia Z5 with these specs? Let us know your thoughts in the comments below.
Source: MobiPicker via Phone Arena
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Lava Pixel V1 Android One device specs and pricing leaked
Google created the Android One movement to ensure developing markets have access too affordable devices with updated software. It looked great on paper, but the truth is most of these phones didn’t offer great bang for your buck. With so much competition and great options in the affordable smartphone market, Android One devices simply couldn’t keep up. Something’s gotta give!
The latest Android One leak may prove Google and its partners are getting ready to really step up their game. According to Indian retailer MySmartPrice’s post, the Search Giant has partnered with Lava Mobiles to create the Lava Pixel V1. With this handset, Google enters a new generation of Android One smartphones, with an improvement to design and specs unlike what we have seen before, coming from this project.
The Lava Pixel V1 is said to feature a large 5.5-inch 720p display, a 1.3 GHz quad-core Qualcomm processor, 2 GB of RAM, 32 GB of internal storage, an 8 MP rear camera, a 5 MP front-facing camera and a 2650 mAh battery. In addition, it is made to suit many types of users by offering dual-SIM capabilities and storage expansion via microSD card slot.
In terms of software, we are looking at Android 5.1.1, which makes total sense. Google is making sure these devices stay well updated.
By the way – is that metal on the sides and back? Indeed it is, which makes this a huge jump for the Android One venture. Most other phones have features cheap plastic bodies that leave much to be desired in terms of aesthetics. I have to say the Lava Pixel V1 is very sleek and refined. The bezels are thin and the phone manages to look very sophisticated.
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Furthermore, the phone will priced very well considering what it seems to offer, as it should cost ₹11,349 (about $177 USD). This places the Lava Pixel V1 right next to competitors like the Moto G, Xiaomi’s devices and other affordable handsets. And with the promise of timely updates, it just may catch a good amount of customers.
What do you guys think? Would you buy a phone like the Lava Pixel V1 if you were in need of an affordable handset?
The Big Picture: U2’s tour art takes a page from particle physics
Who said that science can’t be pretty? Certainly not artist Jeff Frost. When U2 asked Frost for tour art that reflected a “neural net of humanity,” he went to CERN’s Large Hadron Collider to capture timelapse footage and otherwise treat the particle smasher as a creative tool. As you can see above, the result is dazzling — it looks like the internet made manifest in a painting. And while you’d think that physicists would be annoyed by this kind of interruption, they actually went out of their way to give Frost access to areas that even they couldn’t always see. This doesn’t quite make up for U2 foisting an album on millions of people, but it does give Bono and crew some extra geek cred.
Filed under: Science
Source: The Creators Project
Yelp CEO takes Google to task over mobile app ad issue
Earlier this week Google announced the results of a study they conducted on ads that appear on your screen while using one app trying to get you to buy some other app, ads known as “interstitials.” Most users see them as annoying, a finding confirmed by the Google study. However, Google also found they were highly ineffective and has decided to retire them while asking others to follow suit. This announcement has brought a rebuke from Yelp CEO Jeremy Stoppelman who says Google is being hypocritical and may be trying to flex some monopolistic tendencies.
According to Stoppelman, Google continues to run its own app ads while at the same time shutting down others. This is a double standard that Stoppelman sees as being used to replicate its success offering web search to users to the mobile app market. The Yelp CEO has asked via his Twitter account, “is this about protecting consumers or protecting their search monopoly?”
One should keep in mind that Yelp makes money from mobile app ads, so the company does have a vested interest in seeing them continue to be used. Yelp has also been a vocal critic of Google in the EU and the ongoing antitrust case surrounding Google’s shopping service. The company has no love for Google after the tech giant acquired Yelp competitor Zagat back in 2011.
The study recently completed by Google found that only 9% of users clicked through to check out apps based on the full screen splash ads that pop up. Meanwhile, when ads were presented as small banners on screen, Google found response rates improved by 17%.
source: Jeremy Stoppelman (Twitter)
via: Re/code
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New leaked photos of the Samsung Galaxy Note 5 S-Pen seemingly puts auto-eject debate to bed
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Over the last few weeks, I’ve been getting entirely too excited at the prospect of the Samsung Galaxy Note 5 S-Pen having an auto-eject mechanism – Samsung did patent the design for one after all. Early leaked renders of the Note 5 also suggested this, showing the S-Pen flush with the bottom of the device. However, rumours started coming in that said that the S-Pen would not have an auto-eject mechanism, and the latest leaked photos of the Note 5 today look to have put this debate to bed – check them out below:
As you can pretty clearly see, the housing for the S-Pen has a small gap which looks like it would be used to dig the S-Pen out with your finger – while the pictured device is obviously a prototype, it seems unlikely that Samsung would change an integral part of the design once it was in physical form. Apart from this S-Pen revelation, there’s not much to see in these photos as there is a case on the device hiding many of the features. If the rumours are true, however, the Note 5 itself should be announced on August 12th when we’ll know the full story.
What do you think about the Samsung Galaxy Note 5 S-Pen not having an auto-eject mechanism? Let us know your thoughts in the comments below.
Source: nowhereelse.fr via SamMobile
The post New leaked photos of the Samsung Galaxy Note 5 S-Pen seemingly puts auto-eject debate to bed appeared first on AndroidSPIN.
Police think even a holographic Chief Keef concert is too risky
Midwestern authorities really don’t like Chief Keef — there are warrants for his arrest in the region, while Chicago Mayor Rahm Emanuel has gone so far as to say the young man “promotes violence” when he performs. And apparently, that public safety concern also covers virtual performances. Police in Hammond, Indiana shut down a surprise holographic Keef concert (technically, a Pepper’s Ghost trick) this weekend despite the flesh-and-bone star being 2,000 miles away in Beverly Hills, California. Officials had warned that they would clamp down if they saw Keef play, but a festival promoter argues that they didn’t have a “real reason” why a hologram wasn’t allowed — especially since the musician was fundraising for victims of violence.
The shutdown raises questions about not just free speech (is it illegal to show a hologram because of who’s in it?), but whether or not a digital stage show really merits the same kind of police response as an in-person gig. Even if Keef’s goal had been to rile up the crowd, there was only so much he could do as a 2D image. One thing’s for certain: whether or not there’s a solid legal foundation for the bust, ‘dangerous’ artists can’t count on remote projections to avoid trouble.
[Image credit: Arnold Turner/Invision for Interscope Records/AP Images]
Via: New York Times
Source: Chicago Tribune
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