Jun 30 2012
With Google I/O only just barely behind us, the excitement is probably still running through you. Whether you just flashed some Jellybean love for yourself, or you are just overly excited about any of the announcements, odds are you want a new application to check out on your device. Let's hit the break and check out some of our favorites from this week!
 |  |
Jun 30 2012
At Google I/O 2012, we’ve heard and seen so many amazing things that it’s a little hard to keep track of all of them, and most importantly, to put them into perspective.
One such snippet of information that didn’t catch the spotlight is the number of people worldwide that use Google’s Chrome browser: 310 million. Moreover, Chrome has achieved something historical in May 2012. Google’s browser is now the most popular browser worldwide, edging ahead of Microsoft Internet Explorer with about half of percent, according to StatCounter data.
The past few days we’ve also learned that Chrome has shed its beta status on Android, has become the default browser for Jelly Bean, and has reached iOS (in a somehow limited form) where it quickly become the most downloaded free app.
With all these achievements, it’s a bit hard to believe that Chrome is not yet four years old. For a look back to Chrome’s early days, check out this cool video from Google and let us know your thoughts. What is your browser of choice?
Jun 30 2012
After launching its first tablet ever at this year’s edition Google I/O, a device that also happens to be the first one to run Google’s latest Android version, the company decided to release the full OS image for the Nexus 7 and make it available to anyone interested in it.
The image will let Google Nexus 7 owners restore the tablet back to the original Android 4.1 Jelly Bean version (build JRN84D), in case anything wrong happens while meddling with the device. That means you won’t have to be afraid of bricking the tablet while trying out new things, although that doesn’t mean you should go ahead and go wild on your Nexus tablet, especially if you’re not comfortable rooting the device, installing custom ROMs or performing other similar procedures.
The OS image, codenamed “nakasi,” a music form, is available to download from Google’s developers site and measures just under 250MB in size.
Jun 30 2012
One of the main Android 4.1 Jelly Bean highlights is without a doubt the new Google Search, an app that has been completely redesigned to offer Android device users quicker results and an improved overall experience. The new Google Search app now has an advanced voice component and offers a Google Now feature that can be used as a personal assistant when having to deal with various day-to-day activities. Therefore, Jelly Bean has its own voice-assistant, and while it’s not called Majel, as we would have expected it to be named, it definitely does its job.
Piper Jaffray analyst Gene Munster decided to put the two to the test in a Google Search vs Siri battle, by asking both an iPhone and an Android device 1,600 questions: 800 in a quiet environment and 800 in “the busy streets of Minneapolis”. Unsurprisingly, Google won. I say unsurprisingly because let’s not forget that Google’s day job is Search. The company owns a huge chunk of worldwide online searches, because that’s how it makes money. Google’s main revenue stream comes from online ads, and that’s why updating the Search component in Android is so important.
On the other hand, Siri is not Apple’s search engine but a voice assistant that uses various online resources to come up with answers to the user’s queries. According to Munster, Siri gets 60% of answers from Google, 20% from Yelp, 14% from WolframAlpha, 4% from Yahoo and 2% from Wikipedia, and it’s lagging more than two years behind Google “in its learning curve”.
An updated Siri version is supposed to come out this fall when iOS 6 gets official, while the new Google Search engine will be available on all Android devices that will support Jelly Bean – we don’t have official update details for most of them.
With that in mind, here are the results of this Google Search vs Siri battle:
- Google understands 100% of the questions (not surprisingly, since they are keyed in)
- Google replies accurately 86% of the time
- Siri comprehends 83% of queries in noisy conditions, 89% in a quiet room
- Siri answers accurately 62% of the time on the street and 68% in a quiet room.
And here are some of the errors made by Siri during testing:
- What team does Peyton Manning play for? Responded with the answer to the previous query. This was the most common error.
- Where is Elvis buried? Responded I can’t answer that for you. It thought the persons name was Elvis Buried.
- Where am I? Pin dropped in the wrong place.
- When did the movie Cinderella come out? Responded with a movie theater search on Yelp.
- How do I get from Boston to New York? Responded I can only give directions from your current location. I cant give you directions to a place you are not in.
- What spices are in Lasagna? Responded with a Yelp search with lasagna on the menu.
- When is the next Haley’s comment? Responded “You have no meetings matching Haley’s”
- I want to go to Lake Superior? Responded with directions to the company Lake Superior X-Ray.
Anyone looking forward to using the new Google Search on Jelly Bean devices?
Jun 30 2012
After way too many delays and broken promises, as well as a fistful of rumors and speculations that proved to be inaccurate, Motorola has just (barely) made it on providing the much awaited Android 4.0 ICS update for the Droid RAZR and RAZR Maxx by the end of Q2.
Moto promised its customers to have the upgrade live “sometime in Q2” more than a month ago, and, with just a few hours before the official beginning of the year’s third quarter, RAZR and RAZR Maxx owners can now taste their first scoops of Ice Cream Sandwich.
The update’s rollout was announced on Twitter yesterday by Scott Charlston, one of Verizon’s PR representatives, and, based on feedback from several RAZR and RAZR Maxx users, ICS has in fact hit phones a few hours after midnight.
To take the software leap, you’ll have to manually update, so don’t wait for an automatic prompt message from Moto and instead go to your phone’s settings menu. By clicking “about” and then “system settings” you should reach a juicy new software package, which will bring you a whole new UI, a bunch of new and exciting features (including Face Unlock), but also a number of very important bug fixes, improved stability and performance (more details in the video below).
The Twitter announcement from yesterday did however mention that “beginning Saturday, June 30”, RAZR and RAZR Maxx customers will be able to update their phones to ICS, so if there’s nothing new when manually checking for an upgrade, you might still have to wait a few days more.
Have you received the Android 4.0 update? How does your phone feel now? Are you happy that the upgrade finally took place, or are you still disgruntled with Motorola and Verizon for all of the delays?
Jun 30 2012
Today, the Google Glass team announced on Google Plus (where else?) a new way for us to get insight into Sergey Brin’s pet futuristic project, which many of those who experienced it firsthand call the future.
No, the new Glass Sessions project doesn’t involve skydiving, rappelling or other form of extreme sports, at least for now. It’s just a way to show how the Glass “helps you share your life as you’re living it; from life’s big moments to everyday experiences”.
Today’s episode is much more tranquil than Sergey’s surprise moment at Google I/O 2012, and it features June, an adorable two-months old baby, and her mum, Laetitia Gayno, the wife of a Googler.
The two minutes video shows Laetitia using the Google Glasses to capture all the little moments that make parenting so wonderful. You know, good old fashioned family time. No helicopters or mountain-bikes, but still well worth watching.
Tell us. What do you see yourself doing with the Google Glasses?
Jun 30 2012
Website owners and bloggers know too well the importance of knowing precisely how traffic is going, what readers look for, and which keywords garner the highest number of pageviews. For all these questions and for some other important stuff, the best (free) tool around is Google Analytics.
Google Analytics was, until yesterday, only available online. Webmasters could check out the latest traffic stats by visiting Google Analytics from a mobile browser, but that didn’t offer the convenience and ease of use of a native app. The good news for all of you stats maniacs, Google has now released a dedicated Android app for Google Analytics.
I gave the new Analytics app for Android a quick spin, and I must say I am a little disappointed of the scarcity of information provided. You get the Real Time tab, the Dashboard tab, and the Alerts (custom and automatic) tabs. The Real Time feature is an awesome tool (it shows you precisely how many visitors you have online at a given moment), but you have to refresh it manually and it only displays a limited quantity of information about the visitors. And, while you can add your own charts to the Dashboard from the app, it only supports charts view, so you won’t get access to hard figures.
Leaving my gripes aside, I am sure that Google will work to beef up the new Analytics application, and until then, a limited app is far better than no app at all.
Jun 30 2012
“When the dead are not dead, you have to be deadly.” That’s the premise of the new Dead Trigger first-person shooter game which will be released for Android in less than 48 hours. As far as I’m concerned, it says it all about the loads of fun the game will probably provide.
Coming from Madfinger Games, the studio that brought us the hugely successful ShadowGun, Dead Trigger will be made available in Google Play on July 2, for just $0.99. That’ll be an unbelievably small price to pay for what looks like a visually stunning and action-packed game, so, if I were you, I’d watch this link very closely come July 2.
Dead Trigger will come with full 3D characters and environments, as well as high quality 3D audio “by default”, but those of you rocking a Tegra 3-powered device are also in for a special treat. There’ll be a separate version of the game available in TegraZone which will bring some exclusive effects on Tegra 3, including ragdoll physics, volumetric fog, specular lighting, and enhanced fluid and water.
The impressive graphics will most likely be the game’s strongest point, but that shouldn’t be the only reason to buy Dead Trigger. You can expect the controls and the gameplay (said to go for up to 40 full hours) to also be impressive as heck, while the producers claim there’s an engaging storyline there that will challenge you gradually.
I personally don’t need a more complex and engaging storyline than “the world has collapsed and it’s now either you or hordes of bloodthirsty zombies” to try this game on for size, but that’s just me. Check out Dead Trigger’s awesome, blood-filled official trailer below and let us know if you’ll be looking for the game once it will be live over in Google Play.
Jun 30 2012
A few days ago U.S. District Judge Lucy Koh, presiding over an Apple vs Samsung case in California, awarded Apple a pre-trial injunction against Galaxy Tab 10.1 sales in the country. Apple then posted a $2.6 million bond – that’s supposed to protect the company in case the decision gets overturned in an appeal and cover for potential damages incurred by Samsung due to lack of sales of the banned product – and the injunction became effective.
In case that wasn’t enough bad news for the Android device maker, the same Judge awarded Apple another injunction against a different Samsung product yesterday. This time we’re talking about the Galaxy Nexus, a device that’s available from Verizon and Sprint in the region, that has also received a pre-trial sales ban. Koh said:
Apple has made a clear showing that, in the absence of a preliminary injunction, it is likely to lose substantial market share in the smartphone market and to lose substantial downstream sales of future smartphone purchases and tag-along products.
In order for the injunction to become effective, Apple will have to post another bond in the amount of $95 million.
However, hope is not lost for Samsung, as Judge Koh scheduled tow more hearings, on Sunday and Monday, in which she will decide whether to put the injunctions – Galaxy Tab 10.1 and Galaxy Nexus, respectively – on hold pending appeal.
Samsung had little to say about this unsatisfactory ruling but the company will surely appeal Friday’s decision:
We will take all available measures, including legal action, to ensure the Galaxy Nexus remains available to consumers
This is just the last predicament in a complex and tedious legal battle between the two giants, currently the main players in the mobile business when it comes to handset and tablet sales and profits. The two companies are suing and countersuing each other in 10 countries across four continents, in over 30 patent-based trials.
Jun 30 2012
Verizon and HTC’s Droid Incredible 4G LTE was initially rumored to be released a couple of months ago, but unfortunately, the phone’s launch was pushed back several times. However, the future 4-incher is not yet dead in the water, and, after picking up on a leak that pointed towards a July 5 release date a couple of days ago, HTC pretty much confirmed the information on Twitter.
“Next week, we’ve got some special fun headed your way. We hear it’s going to be INCREDIBLE. “said one of HTC USA’s tweets from earlier today. Hmm, what could that “special fun” possibly be? Well, a new “Incredible Hulk” movie seems out of the question, the new Spider-Man is only “amazing”, so we’re willing to put all our money on an Incredible 4G LTE release next week.
The long-rumored and, once upon a time, much awaited flagship phone was officially announced back in May at CTIA, so we’re thinking (or at least hoping) that the new Incredible 4G LTE will actually start selling next week, and not be once again “unveiled” and/or put up for pre-order.
Then again, this doesn’t exactly feel like the smartest move from Verizon, who should start selling the Galaxy S3 just a few days after the Incredible 4G LTE. And while it’s pretty hard to think that S3 sales will budge due to the release of HTC’s new flagship, the new Incredible might actually have a lot to suffer from this “clash”. Especially if the latest rumors, which state that the 4-incher will start selling at $199.99 (the exact same starting price as the S3) will prove true…
If you need a quick refresher on the future phone’s spec sheet, you can’t find it at this link here. Also, don’t forget to let us know in the comments section if you consider buying the Droid Incredible 4G LTE, or if it’s simply too late to be interested in the handheld.
No related posts.
Most Commented Posts