Samsung Galaxy Gear available for $99 with Best Buy’s Deal of the Day
Best Buy has the first generation of Samsung’s Galaxy Gear smartwatch available in all colours for just $99 through their Deal of the Day.
The Samsung Galaxy Gears on offer are refurbished units, but with a $200 saving and free shipping do you really care?
Browse the full selection from Best Buy and grab your bargain of the day here.
The post Samsung Galaxy Gear available for $99 with Best Buy’s Deal of the Day appeared first on AndroidGuys.
HTC One Mini to get Android 4.4 KitKat update starting today
Now that the brand new HTC One is out, it’s high time the rest of HTC’s siblings get updated to Android’s latest, especially if they want to remain relevant. The previous HTC One got the KitKat bump back in February, so now it’s the little brother’s turn at the firmware upgrade. Yep, if you have a HTC One Mini, you’ll likely get your Android 4.4 KitKat with HTC Senses 5.5 update starting today if this post by carrier AT&T is to be believed. The update will bring a number of improvements, like an enhanced dialer app, new navigation bars, a full-screen immersive mode, a new BlinkFeed app and more. So go on, head into Settings and download the latest System Update to get with the times. That is, if you’re not tempted to get a whole new phone altogether.
Source: AT&T
HTC BlinkFeed looks to be coming to other Android devices
Rather unsurprisingly, following the announcement of the new HTC One M8 device yesterday, HTC are planning on opening up their BlinkFeed home screen launcher to other Android devices.
Included in the press release,HTC highlight their plans for the launcher:
Following its popularity with HTC users, HTC will now make HTC BlinkFeed available to other Android devices, launching on the Google Play store soon.
HTC listed their new Sense 6.0 apps in the Play Store prematurely before the release, but as of now they still are only compatible with HTC branded devices.
Opening up their software to a broader Android audience will be a fantastic move and one that is likely to see the uptake of BlinkFeed accelerated.
The post HTC BlinkFeed looks to be coming to other Android devices appeared first on AndroidGuys.
LastPass for Android can now fill your app logins in for you
You may know LastPass, the cross-platform password manager, as a safe haven for website login details and common form info. Now, as well as playing nice with Chrome for mobile devices, the latest version of LastPass for Android can fill in app login data for you, too. Once it’s updated and you’ve authorized this new feature, loading up an app with a username / password prompt will trigger a pop-up with suggested login credentials you can choose to inject. Chances are, however, you’ll need to tell LastPass which of the logins stored in your vault the mobile app wants — you can also share your selection if you’d like to help it learn common associations. Because apps are often mobile portals for services you’d load up inside a browser on your computer, it makes sense. Then again, we can’t say we sign in and out of apps enough to justify $12 per year for the premium service LastPass’ mobile apps require.
Filed under: Cellphones, Software, Mobile
Source: LastPass, Google Play (LastPass)
The next version of Android could be truly business-friendly
Android has a lot of market share, but it doesn’t have a big footprint in the corporate world; outside of special efforts like Samsung’s Knox, the OS isn’t well-suited to business demands. All that may change in the near future, though, as The Information‘s sources claim that the next major Android release will place a much stronger emphasis on office-grade security. The new OS will reportedly allow apps that require their own authentication (including biometrics), as well as data storage on secure chips. It should also offer better remote management controls. If the rumor is accurate, we may not have long to wait to see these suit-and-tie features — Google could unveil them at its I/O conference in late June.
Filed under: Cellphones, Mobile, Google
Via: The Next Web
Lenovo’s new smart TV system grants greater processing power, more memory through swappable modules (hands-on)
Lenovo is best known for its ThinkPad laptops and newly acquired phone business, but the Chinese firm started making TVs a couple years ago, too. And now, it’s the first one to build a set utilizing NVIDIA’s new Tegra K1 chip. It’s that super-powered silicon that explains the TV’s presence at GTC 2014, so naturally, we had to spend some time with it while we were at the show. Called the Terminator S9, it’s a 50-inch 4K smart TV that runs a Lenovo-skinned version of Android 4.2 natively, but the real magic happens courtesy of a small plug-in module round the back called a Smart Card.
It’s roughly the size of a deck of cards (though half as thick), with a micro USB port and microSD slot on one end and a proprietary 70-pin connector on the other. That connector is how it plugs into the TV, while the USB and SD ports are for adding storage or connecting peripherals. Within the Smart Card’s relatively bland exterior lies the aforementioned Tegra K1, and other hardware (currently unknown) needed to run Android 4.4. All Lenovo smart TVs moving forward will ship with a 70-pin port built in, but only higher-end models will come with Smart Card hardware. That means the Smart Card is a way for Lenovo — and any other OEM who licenses the tech — to keep customers running the latest and greatest software and hardware on their TVs.
The Smart Card comes with a slick motion Bluetooth remote that has a pair of physical buttons: a red power button at the end and a spun metal voice control key in the middle, plus a circular touchpad located in a thumb friendly location. Navigation works using gesture control (a la LG’s Magic remote) to make selections, while swiping left and right on the touchpad scrolls through the menus. And, you adjust the volume via touchpad using the Seinfeld/Costanza special: clockwise or counter-clockwise swirl gesture. It’s simple and intuitive to use, and the remote’s shape and soft touch finish make it a pleasure to fondle.
Ready to plunk down your hard earned cash for Lenovo’s new TV system? Unless you call China home, alas, you don’t have the option to do so — though Lenovo’s looking at expanding to other regions should the Chinese market returns supply sufficient incentive to do so. Regardless, for those in the Far East, the Terminator S9 will set you back around 6,000RMB ($970), while the Smart Card costs less than 1,000RMB ($160).
Filed under: Home Entertainment, HD, Lenovo
Multitasking Pro aims to bring more functionality to your device
If you’re a power user like myself, you may notice that stock and most manufacturer versions of Android do not let you have two programs on your screen at once. Multitasking Pro aims to change that by adding a sidebar app that lets you use multiple apps at once.
One of the reasons I envy Windows tablets is because of the Snap feature that Windows 7/8/8.1 brought with it. The ability to do two things at once is something I find myself an expert at. On my laptop, this feature is present and I use it nearly all of the time. In fact, right now I have Hulu on one side and am writing this review on the other side and a work report is sitting in Word on a second monitor. The story with Android is that unless you have a device that has received some sort of multitasking blessing you are pretty much stuck to one item on your screen at a time. Yes, you can switch easily back and forth between apps, but having two apps on the screen at once? Yeah, can’t do that. It is one of the few areas that I believe Android needs further development.
Multitasking Pro gives a fair shot at trying to solve this problem. Using a series of built-in apps, developer OryonCorp lets you have different windows floating around your Android screen. These windows are movable and realizable allowing you to place as many as you want on your screen at a time. In order to make this work, the developer had to create a number of custom mini-apps, including a browser, calculator, calendar, camera, file explorer, gallery, map, music player, news, recorder, video player, weather and YouTube app.
To their credit, the Multitasking Pro app is beautiful and runs very smoothly. The only problem I had on my Sony Xperia Tablet Z was that I wasn’t able to get the YouTube video to load. I was able to search YouTube without any problems, but actually loading the video was a problem. I was able to play movies using the video player, test out the compass, map my house, paint a picture of a dog and look at some beautiful pictures of my daughter in the photo gallery.
The feature I found myself using the most was the browser on one side of the screen with a video playing on the other side. This enabled me to consume some entertainment content while working on the web, something I haven’t been able to do during the last 9 months that I’ve owned my tablet.
There was only one shortcoming that I found in this app, which was that I would really like to have a Facebook or Netflix window that I’m able to re-size on my screen. Despite the missing feature, the app is very well-built and provides a look, feel and functionality that flows naturally with Android.
If you’re tired of doing one thing at a time, you can pick this app up at the Google Play Store in both free and pro versions. The differences between the two are slim, with the Pro version being ad-free, adding slightly more functionality and the ability to hide the icon on the top of the screen.
The post Multitasking Pro aims to bring more functionality to your device appeared first on AndroidGuys.
Portal comes to NVIDIA’s Shield as an exclusive Android port
You won’t have to stick to a PC or TV to play Valve’s iconic games in the future. The developer is teaming up with NVIDIA to bring the original Portal to the Shield handheld — in other words, Portal is coming to Android. The two haven’t said just when the space-defying puzzle title will be available on the Shield, although it unfortunately sounds like other Android devices may be out of luck. We’ve reached out to see if there’s a possibility of a wider release. Still, it’s good to see Valve dip its toes in the mobile gaming waters, unlike certain companies. And hey — it’ll be as good an excuse as any to get reacquainted with your Companion Cube.
Filed under: Gaming, Handhelds, Science, Mobile, NVIDIA
Source: NVIDIA Blog
The new HTC One is available in Google Play and Developer editions
Do you lust after the machined aluminum body of the new HTC One but hate locked bootloaders? Would you rather vanilla Android instead of Sense? Well, good news it’ll be available in both a Developer and Google Play edition. The Developer version is the same device you’re able to get form your carrier, more or less, except that it’ll be SIM unlocked and you’ll be free to flash whatever software or ROM you want. The Play Edition obviously forgoes all that Sense business, and instead will ship with a relatively unmolested copy of Android 4.4.2. We say relatively because it will be able to take advantage of the One’s Duo Camera, which requires tapping into HTC’s APIs. Both will be available for preorder today, March 25th, with the Developer Edition selling for $650 direct from HTC’s site, while Google will be hawking the Play Edition for $699.
Filed under: Cellphones, Mobile, HTC, Google
HTC opens up BlinkFeed, allows apps like Foursquare and Fitbit to push data to your homescreen
Love it or hate it, Sense is growing up. BlinkFeed, the beating tiled heart of the HTC experience is now being opened up to developers through an SDK. That means that third parties will be able to push information to the stream of data that makes up your feed. For example, Fitbit will be able to keep you abreast of how many steps you’ve taken without you having to go into the app. Oh, and the Fitbit app does harvest movement data from the phone’s internal sensors, just like it does on the iPhone 5S, so you don’t really need that separate band. HTC announced one other launch partner for the BlinkFeed SDK — Foursquare. The location-based social network will pop up suggestions for lunch spots while you’re out and about. Of course, the company will have to convince other big names to hop on the bandwagon if BlinkFeed is going to really take off.
Filed under: Cellphones, Mobile, HTC
AIVAnet 