HTC’s 2011 Q4: good summer, bad winter originally appeared on Engadget on Mon, 06 Feb 2012 04:33:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

Permalink   |  HTC (PDF)  | Email this | Comments

Sure, you can draw whatever the heck you want on the front of your Galaxy Note, but what about that blank blue or white canvas ’round back? With north of a million 5.3-inch pocketable slates in circulation around the world, you’ll need to get a bit more creative to truly make it yours — and Samsung is willing to help. If a trip to South Korea is on the books between now and March 31st, you can now deck out your Note with custom messaging on the back, with the company letting customers “engrave wished letters on the backside of their own device with laser beams.” And we can all agree that laser beams boost the appeal of any device — even the Note. So what would you tattoo on your Note’s backside? We’ll share a few staff picks just below, but let us know your plans in the comments.

• “Large is just a matter of perspective”
• “Yes, I can make phone calls”
• “It’s not a STYLUS”
• “Size DOES matter”
• “More to Love”
• “Wide Load”

Samsung brings us more to love, offers Galaxy Note engraving in South Korea originally appeared on Engadget on Mon, 30 Jan 2012 23:04:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

Permalink Android Community  |  Samsung (Flickr)  | Email this | Comments

Fresh off the publication of its latest tablet report, Strategy Analytics has come out with a new batch of statistics on the global mobile market. In a report published yesterday, the research firm crowned Apple as the world’s largest smartphone vendor by volume, on the strength of the 37 million iPhones it shipped during Q4 2011 — good for 23.9 percent of the market. Samsung wasn’t too far behind, though, with 36.5 million smartphones shipped during the quarter, comprising 23.5 percent of the market. Nokia finished in third place, with 19.6 million smartphones and a 12.6 percent market share, though it fared notably better among handset makers on a global (i.e., smartphone and feature phone) level. According to Strategy Analytics, the Finnish manufacturer shipped 417.1 million handsets for the full year, 113.5 million of which were shipped during the fourth quarter of last year. For the year, Nokia accounted for 26.9 percent of the market, followed by Samsung, which shipped 327.4 million units shipped during 2011 and finished with a 23.1 percent market share. As for Apple, it accounted for 8.3 percent of the market in Q4 (its best showing, according to Strategy’s metrics), with 37 million quarterly shipments. You can find more details in the pair of press releases after the break, or at the source link below.

Continue reading Strategy Analytics: Nokia tops global handset shipments, Apple sees quarterly surge

Strategy Analytics: Nokia tops global handset shipments, Apple sees quarterly surge originally appeared on Engadget on Fri, 27 Jan 2012 10:27:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

Permalink PhoneArena  |  Strategy Analytics  | Email this | Comments

There are obvious stats, bizarre ones, and then the good old informative ones. New data from Google revealed by Ad Age, falls into the latter category. According to Goog’s numbers, more people have a mobile internet-capable device than a PC or laptop in the five key markets it tested (US, UK, Germany, France and Japan). In the US, this figure is nearly 10% more, some 76% against 68%. The numbers were taken in September and October last year, which means any impact Christmas may have had won’t be taken into account. The trend away from featurephones towards smartphones is also drilled home, but that won’t be news to many people ’round these parts. No matter how you connect these days, any savvy netizen will tell you: it’s quality, not quantity that counts anyway.

Stat Alert: More connected phones than computers in key markets, says Google originally appeared on Engadget on Wed, 25 Jan 2012 09:56:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

Permalink Textually  |  Adage  | Email this | Comments

Frustrated by the performance of GPS on your current Sony Ericsson phone? Well, if you’ve got the latest software and a device carrying Qualcomm’s Snapdragon S2 or S3 processor, you’re in luck. Alongside bright new darlings like the Xperia S and Xperia ion, all will be able to hook up to GLONASS, Russia’s very own interpretation of GPS. Support on another global positioning network will increase the total of satellites orbiting around you from 31 to 55 — more ways to find exactly where you got lost. GLONASS support has already launched on smartphone luminaries such as the iPhone 4S and the pocket-stretching Galaxy Note, but we’re very happy to hear that the extra functionality will arrive on older Xperia handsets. According to the developer’s own testing, the GLONASS assistance often improved accuracy by as much as 50 percent and should similarly reduce the chances of us being outed as map illiterates. You can grab more info on all the GLONASS goodness at the source below.

Snapdragon-toting Sony smartphones to get extra global positioning help from The Other GPS originally appeared on Engadget on Sun, 22 Jan 2012 03:19:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

Permalink PhoneRPT  |  Sony Ericsson Developer World  | Email this | Comments

Plenty of effort is going into improving smartphone battery life, but only a few individuals are delving into radical realms to achieve the goal. Take for example, Arman Ahnood, a researcher at the London Centre for Nanotechnology, whose latest prototype uses solar cells to capture wasted energy from OLEDs. Similar to Wysips (which uses only ambient light), and equipment from UCLA (designed for LCDs), each project faces the unenviable task of making the smartphone a self-sustaining piece of gear.

Ahnood’s handiwork relies on an array of solar cells that surround and sit beneath the phone’s display. Currently, the system averages 11 percent efficiency in its energy capture, with a peak efficiency of 18 percent. Naturally, there are gains to be made. Of the light generated from OLEDs, Ahnood approximates that only 36 percent is actually projected outward. Critically speaking, this also suggests that similar power savings could be achieved with dimmer, more efficient displays, but we’ll let that slide. As it stands, Ahnood’s system is able to generate approximately five milliwatts of additional power, given a screen size of 3.7-inches. It’s hardly sustainable, but if the creation lets us squeeze in a few more text messages on Friday night, we’ll take it.

Arman Ahnood teases OLED display with solar cells, idealizes the self-sustaining smartphone originally appeared on Engadget on Fri, 20 Jan 2012 01:03:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

Permalink ExtremeTech  |  IEEE Spectrum  | Email this | Comments

Continue reading LG Marquee comes to Boost Mobile on January 23rd for $279

LG Marquee comes to Boost Mobile on January 23rd for $279 originally appeared on Engadget on Fri, 13 Jan 2012 09:45:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

Permalink   |   | Email this | Comments

The Samsung Galaxy Note is just now working its way to the States, but a recent certification by the WiFi Alliance is already stoking the flames of its replacement. Known only as the GT-N8000, it’s thought this device may be the eventual replacement for the GT-N7000. Of course, this isn’t the only plausible explanation, as the new model number may hint at yet another new family of devices. There’s credence to this flow of logic, too, as the Galaxy S II (i9100) was the spiritual decedent of the original Galaxy S (i9000). Whether your preferred method of divination involves tea leaves, crystal balls or Cleverbot, one thing is certain about this new Sammy — it’s gonna be 1,000 more, y’all.

WiFi certification fuels speculation of Samsung Galaxy Note successor originally appeared on Engadget on Thu, 12 Jan 2012 12:19:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

Permalink Phone Arena  |  WiFi Alliance (PDF)  | Email this | Comments

If you’re looking to control more than you’re washer and dryer with your mobile device, Samsung can oblige with a update to its NaviBot line. The latest smart vacuum model, NaviBot-S, can be summoned via the same app that is used with some of the company’s other WiFi-enabled appliances, or the more traditional stock remote control. Featuring Visionary Mapping Plus, it uses a ceiling cam to seek out and remember the best route to and from its charging station. The robovac also uses a dust sensor to determine just how dirty your floors are and the exact location of those dropped Cheerios. Should the tech develop a mind of its own, there are some controls on the top panel that will allow you to get things under control right on the device. Now you can prep for those annoying ‘drop by’ guests while you’re on the drive home from the market — with 90% efficiency. As far as cleaning time goes, you can expect around 100 minutes of work per three hour charge. For a demo of the NaviBot gathering up spillage, hop on past the break and peep the video.

Continue reading Samsung NaviBot-S hands-on (video)

Samsung NaviBot-S hands-on (video) originally appeared on Engadget on Thu, 12 Jan 2012 01:54:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

Permalink   |   | Email this | Comments

While we wait mere days for Sony to unveil whatever it’s got cooking for its smartphone arm, another mysterious phone has leaked ahead of any formal reveal. This prototype black and white handset still carries the full Sony Ericsson branding, and it’s rumored to pack a 3.7-inch screen at 480 x 854 resolution. It’s purportedly packs a dual-core 1GHz processor and is, according to Xperia Blog, the successor to the moderately-priced Xperia Neo. There’s the same three capacitive buttons, with an unspecified front-facing camera and a five megapixel camera rumored on the back. If Sony has deigned it worthy of a Vegas showing, expect to see some close-up impressions very soon.

[Thanks Joseph]

Sony Ericsson ‘Pepper’ MT27i surfaces, has some design spice originally appeared on Engadget on Sat, 07 Jan 2012 18:10:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

Permalink   |  Xperia Blog  | Email this | Comments