Microsoft has officially announced that Windows 10 will be available for consumers starting July 29th. Cortana, a new browser called “Edge”, Continuum, new photo and Office apps will all be available for free for people on Windows 7 and Windows 8 PC’s.
We can also expect to see new hardware running Windows 10, and many have their fingers crossed for new Windows Phones to be launched at the same time.
You can read Microsoft’s full press release below.
Borrowing inspiration from Apple Photos and Lumia Storyteller, Google has given their Photos app a fresh coat of paint. Combined with Unlimited storage for compressed photos and videos, it’s a nice step in the right direction for cleaning up the disparity between Manufacturer photo gallery apps and Google Plus. Let’s take a full tour through all the new features and tools!
At their developer conference today Google unveiled a new Photos app focused on improving search and organization.
Without having to tag or manually identify faces, the new Photos app will group photos for users automatically based on people in the photos and locations pictures were taken.
Editing tools will be built in to the experience, and users can produce videos out of the content shot from their phones easily.
New sharing features will deliver full resolution pics to anyone regardless if they use Google Photos or Google Plus with no restrictions on who or where you can share those photos.
Most exciting is the support on the back end for these cloud sync services. Starting today Google Photos will enable unlimited storage for free on iOS, Android, and on the web. Pictures are saved at up to 16MP quality and video will be saved at 1080p.
This makes Drive and photo sync on Android a lot more valuable and makes Google Photos more competitive against OneDrive and Flickr photo sync.
You can see Google’s teaser vid, and read their full press release below!
We’ve already spent some time with the international version of Microsoft’s newest budget phablet, but if you’re looking for a big screen at little price here in the States, AT&T just delivered a “Coming Soon” page for the Lumia 640XL.
Now official word yet on pricing or availability, but you can catch our full review, camera review, and speaker test below!
If you were shopping the LG G4 on AT&T, pre-sale starts tomorrow.
Big Blue lands the G4 with either plastic or their exclusive black leather rear plate. The upgrade to premium leather will cost you though. The plastic G4 will cost $199 on two year contract or $630 outright. The leather G4 will bump you up to $239.99 on contract or $669 off contract.
The only special advertised with the G4 is a $0.99 sale on the LG G Pad F 8.0 which is normally $150 on two year agreement. Though if you buy the G4 through AT&T you can still take advantage of LG’s killer free memory card and battery promotion.
We have a full round up of G4 reviews and comparisons, and you can catch AT&T’s press release below.
Lenovo wrapped up their Tech World conference by talking about the future and showing off some concept products.
As we throw around buzz words like “Internet of Things” the tech industry is actually facing it’s next major hurdle in how we can better integrate data and services into people’s daily lives. Products like smartwatches are another step in that conversation.
Lenovo’s Magic View concept takes the standard smartwatch face we all understand (which looks a lot like the display found on the Moto360), and adds a second virtual screen. That small rectangular patch below the watch face is a virtual privacy display which can project content up to 20 times larger than the watch face.
Projection was a hot topic for phones too. Smart Cast is the world’s first laser projector in a mobile phone. Not only will it display the contents of your screen onto a flat surface, but it will also allow you to interact with the UI through the projection.
Lastly, Lenovo announced a partnership with Microsoft to bring exclusive features to Cortana on Lenovo PC’s. REACHit will provide cloud search and sync access to Cortana for popular services like DropBox and Google Drive. Files in the cloud and on various PC’s, Tablets, and Phones will all be accessible to users regardless of where they are or which device they’re using.
As Lenovo continues their lead in the PC space, most of the talk at Tech World focused on a future where services and information are a bit more fluid than the traditional PC experience. Buying Motorola was certainly a step in expanding their influence in the mobile market, and now “Internet of Things” is looking like the next arena they want to play in.
Big screen! Little Price! The advertising campaign pretty much writes itself. Microsoft has refreshed the hardware and design of their entry level line. Let’s take a look at the Lumia 640XL!
