New Gadgets

When it comes to fashionable gadgets Apple has largely been at the helm of the pack but that is quickly changing. Now that consumers care more about what their devices look like (in some cases, more than how they actually function) that ever before, manufacturers are taking note and producing truly beautiful hardware.

Samsung, for one, has been known to take some design cues from Apple (as made evident by the string of legal issues between the two) and add in their own flair for some great looking products. Their recent tablet offerings, for example, including the Galaxy Tab 10.1 and Galaxy Tab 7.0 Plus are arguably some of the best looking Android powered tablets on the market – and it seems that they are only going ot get better.

The reason I say this is because pictures have just hit the web that show both the Galaxy Tab 10.1 and Galaxy Tab 7.0 in white, as shown above. According to our sources these photographs came from Vietnam where quite a bit of high profile leaks have come from in the past. Unfortunately we have virtually no information in regards to what markets these devices are set for nor do we know when we’ll find out more. Lucky for you, we’re on the case and will report back with any future findings.

Source

Nokia has recently launched their Nokia Lumia 800 Windows Phone devices in markets other than the US, so how are they holding up? Well, according to Nokia’s CEO Stephen Elop, the response to these new Windows Phones from Nokia have been pretty good so far.

“The reaction is remarkably positive,” Elop said in Barcelona at a conference organized by Morgan Stanley yesterday. “We need to introduce the experience to consumers to get them to try it because we know once they try it they will like it.”

Stephen Elop also predicts that demand for Windows Phone devices will start to pick up once Microsoft begins rolling out their Windows 8 platform, which will also feature the trademarked tile system that many Windows Phone users have come to know. Granted Windows Phone devices aren’t as powerful in terms of hardware compared to Android and the iPhone, but given that Nokia is a well established brand for mobile phones, coupled with Microsoft’s backing and funding for marketing, it would be very disappointing to see Nokia and Windows Phone flop.

We know that AT&T and Nokia are in talks about bringing Nokia’s Windows Phone devices to the US next year, so hopefully with the possibility of 4G LTE connectivity on Windows Phone devices will make adoption of the platform and handsets more favorable in the US. In the meantime you can check out our review of the Nokia Lumia 800 here.

Here are a few facts that we have established concernign the PS Vita – it will be region-free (although that means the burden of learning a new language now lies in your hands), it will come with an external battery pack, and it has been confirmed to roll out this coming December 17th in Japan. You can add another item to the bucket list – the PS Vita will be able to communicate with its older cousin, the PSP, via ad-hoc mode.

This means early adopters to Sony’s latest portable console need not worry about not being able to communicate with one another, thansk to the Wi-Fi Ad-Hoc mode. You can even download similar games on either machine, enjoy a session of gaming in ad-hoc mode after that followed by downing a pint of booze. Too bad there just aren’t too many ad-hoc games which are available to those living Stateside compared to Japan.

Will you be an early adopter of the PS Vita?

Instead of announcing more news about the upcoming PlayStation Vita, Sony decided to announce the launch of a new PlayStation Portable: the PSP E-1000 at Gamescon today. Designed for folks on a budget, the PSP E-1000 will only be available in Europe and will cost 99 Euros. It functions just like a regular PSP with one major caveat: it won’t have any WiFi connectivity. Games will be played on the E-1000 through UMDs or transferred from the PlayStation Store via Medi Go using a computer.a Go using a computer.

With a large catalog of PSP games available for purchase, it looks like Sony doesn’t want it to disappear by letting folks get their hands on a cheaper, inexpensive console to play them on. Following the budget theme, Sony will also be releasing a new rage of PSP Essential titles: basically games with a budget price tagged on (9.99 Euros).

While it does sound like a good idea, crippling the device by removing its WiFi is going to have a lot of folks complaining. No internet surfing, multiplayer gaming or even downloading games straight onto the device itself. I guess some people can live with that, but is the exclusion of a WiFi radio really worth the low price tag? What do you guys think?

Previously, on Apple Versus Samsung: Cupertino’s finest sued Samsung for making “similar” products — a legal spectacle that most recently culminated with an injunction blocking the sale of the Galaxy Tab 10.1 across Europe (with one exception). The case hinges on Apple’s assertion that Samsung is ripping off its designs, but tech site Webwereld spotted signs that perhaps Apple’s claims are exaggerated, and that the outfit might have even gone so far as to alter images of the Galaxy Tab 10.1 to suit its case.

The comparison shot you see up there is lifted from page 28 of a filing made by Freshfields Bruckhaus Derringer, Apple’s European lawyers. Both devices look pretty identical with an aspect ratio of 4:3 — except in reality, the Tab has a 16:9 16:10 aspect ratio and is far narrower than Steve’s magical slate. Of course, we might never know if this was actually a malicious move on Apple’s part — certainly, Samsung’s legal team isn’t saying anything. For now, though, if you’re game to play armchair attorney, head past the break for a comparison shot of the competing tabs as we actually know and love them.

The humble alarm clock has certainly come a long way from being your average waking up tool – these days, the irritating din of metal clanging against each other is a thing of the past. Your ears instead will be greeted by your favorite ringtone, an MP3 file of your choice, or for the connected model, how about an Internet radio station with your favorite shock jock digitally playing tunes in your bedroom?

That is what the Altaz Internet Clock Radio offers, and I managed to spend some time with it. One thing I can say though – if you are ever going to get to work on time, it is best not to switch alarm clocks overnight like me, chances are, you might not even wake up to be on time for work, as your ears have yet to be conditioned to the new sounds. Read on about the Altaz Internet Clock Radio hands-on after the jump.

But I digress. Just how did I this new gizmo in the bedroom? Well, it is hard to recommend it as a “must buy”, although it would make for an interesting trinket to own. I would suppose if you know of any modern day luddites, getting this might be a way to warm up their toes to the consumer electronics revolution. Seriously, your smartphone ought to be able to do what Altaz’s offering does with the right app, and much more, but if you’re the type who prefers to leave specific functions for dedicated devices, then it might be worth your while.

With a 3.5” touchscreen display at 320 x 240 resolution, it is not going to win any awards for being the best looking screen around, although it does its job rather well. Other hardware specifications include MP3 playback capability, an SD memory card slot, 128MB of internal memory, a mini USB input, a 1-watt speaker, a JPEG viewer and Wi-Fi connectivity to get you connected.

Audio quality is decent – although it isn’t recommended to sleep with this alarm clock too far away from your bed, otherwise a pillow covering your head might just drown the sound out during those drowsy mornings, resulting in you missing an important appointment or even worse, getting the sack for being late for the umpteenth time.

You will be able to use the touchscreen display to manipulate all the settings inside, and sometimes the clock seems to hang – but if you wait long enough (more than 5 minutes for me), the software didn’t freeze, it just took a really, really long time to sort things out, especially when you are searching for specific radio stations. Setting up a list of radio station presets is painless, and you can also opt to do it when the Altaz Internet Clock Radio is connected to a computer via USB if you find the touchscreen a wee bit hard to use.

Actually, inputting characters via the touchscreen display was an extremely frustrating experience for me no thanks to the virtual keyboard that seemed to be less than impressive. You would be better off hooking it up to a computer and getting the job done via a real keyboard instead. Setting up the Wi-Fi connection can also be quite the frustrating experience – entering your WPA key wrongly would require you to delete the whole string instead of the offending character, which should not happen in this day and age. Apart from that, there is no option for you to view your password in plain text as you are entering it in order to prevent mistakes, so practice makes perfect here. Hopefully a future firmware update will fix these issues. On the bright side, firmware updates give the clock a longer shelf life in your home, don’t you think so?

Apart from the touchscreen display, there is the play/pause button, volume control and power button at the side which are pretty much self-explanatory. A large snooze button at the top does its job well,

The alarm clock has two default audio files to get you out of bed – a crowing rooster, and that of chirping birds. Of course, you can always upload your own MP3 files to replace those, and for folks who prefer to wake up to a morning Internet radio station talk show, you’re able to do that as well.

I actually let the Altaz Internet Clock Radio run for around 4 hours straight, being connected to my favorite Internet radio station, and playing it back at 50% volume loudness. This is a decent return, but I would recommend you just leave it plugged into a power outlet.

The asking price of $99.99 makes it hard for me to recommend it to anyone, but if your want to dip your toes into the world of Internet alarm clocks and digital photo frames, there might be better ways to begin. A little bit too late to the game, I must say. Hopefully a future version (if ever) from Altaz will be able to address all of its issues and make good then.

Thanks to a hefty $5 million that was collected for stimulus funding in Owensboro, Kentucky; public schools will be getting 2,200 MacBook Air notebooks for students between grades five and twelve, as well as teachers and staff in those schools. This means a MacBook Air for every student and teacher in the district. The notebooks are meant to help the teachers in teaching, and help the students with learning in classes.

As of now, it has been reported that teachers have already received their notebooks, but students will have to wait about a month or so into the school year before they get theirs. Regardless, it sounds like a nice break from having regular paper textbooks, not to mention the laptops can be used to other purposes during after school hours. Don’t you wish you were back in school and living in Kentucky now? I’d love owning a free MacBook Air without having to pay a dime.

Apple will refresh its MacBook Air line of computers on July 19th, iClarified reported on Wednesday. We began to suspect the update was imminent when early reports suggested that global supplies for the computer were in short supply in late May. Those reports were solidified earlier this week when stock of the MacBook Air at Best Buy and Amazon was depleted.

The device is expected to pack the new Thunderbolt I/O port in place of DisplayPort, Intel’s new Sandy Bridge processors, and the brand new OS X Lion operating system. 9to5 Mac said that Apple will likely offer Intel’s 1.8GHz Intel Core i7, 1.7GHz Core i7, and the 1.7GHz Core i5 in its new machines. We love the current design of the MacBook Air, and rumor has it that there won’t be any hardware tweaks. We suppose that could mean the rumored anodized black version will never see the light of day. The good news is the long wait is nearly over.

We brought you news last month that the Fujitsu TH40/D tablet will be arriving sometime in Q3 this year, but it seems that another delay is on the cards. According to Fujitsu, the convertible TH40/D tablet that will be powered by the Windows 7 operating system will experience a delay instead of the initial late June release date in the Land of the Rising Sun. All right, so we do know that said convertible tablet is not going to arrive anytime soon, but will there be any follow up – say, a future release date so that we can re-mark our calendars? Unfortunately, the answer is a resounding no, so we will just have to sit tight and wait for an official word from Fujitsu sometime down the road.

According to Fujitsu, the delay is due to “development delays.” Yeah, that’s extremely vague and it could be attributed to many factors. Ah well, let us look at this delay in a positive light and hope that Fujitsu fully intends to release a 100% working version of the tablet instead of rushing it to the market gimped.

Right on schedule, Hewlett-Packard’s first webOS-powered tablet is now available for pre-order. The HP TouchPad becomes available on July 1st but those who want to ensure they get their supersized webOS fix as soon as possible can pre-order the device through a number of different retailers.

Best Buy and Amazon, among others, have the TouchPad available for pre-order at $499 for the 16GB model and $599 for the 32GB model, as expected. BGR took a hands-on look at the TouchPad when it was first unveiled back in February, and we were impressed. WebOS translates very well to a large form device, and the interoperability with HP’s upcoming Pre 3 smartphone is fantastic, though we still have no word on when HP might launch the Pre 3.