Tag: smartphones

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Experts Q&A 02: Android Boogaloo! We’re answering YOUR Android questions LIVE!

experts round table androidROUND 2!
If you missed it live last night, our SECOND Experts round table is now available on Youtube, and this time we’re chatting ALL things Android! Your questions answered by some of the best minds on the web! Tablets, phones, OS updates, Chromecast and more!

The Experts this week:
Andrew Kameke from Mobile Burn – @AndrewKam
Warren Bowman from BWOne – @BWOneDotCom
Enobong Etteh from Boored at Work – @BooredAtWork
Russell Holly from Geek.com – @RussellHolly
Tshaka Armstrong from Fox LA – @TshakaArmstrong

Links to specific questions after the jump!

Continue reading “Experts Q&A 02: Android Boogaloo! We’re answering YOUR Android questions LIVE!”

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PlusUs unveils LifeLink cable for Apple and MicroUSB devices, smallest fold-able charge cable.

LifeLink in Hand PhotoLooks like ChargeCard has a little competition…

There’s just never a cable around when you need one, right? You use your phone to its fullest, and the battery will probably be dead by dinner time, if you’re lucky. LifeLink looks to help ease some of those usage issues. A small plastic card unfolds, allowing you to connect your phone to a computer, battery, or charger. If you’re losing your charge cables, forgetting to take them with you, or they’re becoming a rats nest of tangles in your bag, Lifelink could be a nice peace of mind solution to help insure you can recharge your phone on the go.

Available in Apple Lightning connector or MicroUSB flavors, they’re currently pre-order only, and should ship “early next year”. Grab one now for $19 during the pre-order period. The price jumps up to $24 when it goes full retail. A portion of every LifeLink sale will go towards a charitable cause of the customer’s choice. A very nice sentiment indeed.

Full PR after the jump.

Continue reading “PlusUs unveils LifeLink cable for Apple and MicroUSB devices, smallest fold-able charge cable.”

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Want to use a Flash Drive on a phone or tablet? Sony launches drive with full sized and Micro USB connectors!

Sony-2-in-1-USB-open-1024x866This one’s pretty much for the Android users.

Did you know that most modern Android Phones support USB host to some degree? That means you can often connect low power USB devices to your phone or tablet, and the device will recognize them. Does your phone lack a MicroSD? You can probably augment your storage with a USB Flash Drive. Of course this often means have to keep track of an adapter cable, one that will convert your phone’s Micro USB port into a full sized USB port.

Sony’s new 2-in-1 drive offers up a potential solution for this issue. With a full sized USB 2 jack on one side and a Micro USB on the other. This should make sneaker-netting your files between computer and mobile device much easier. While Cloud Storage can help expand our gadget’s capabilities, sometimes it’s just faster and easier to go old school Plug & Play.

Sony says the device will work on most Android devices starting with Android 4.0.3 and newer. Prices start at $20 for an 8GB drive and scale up to $63 for 32GB. Drives should be available starting January 2014.

Full PR after the jump!

Continue reading “Want to use a Flash Drive on a phone or tablet? Sony launches drive with full sized and Micro USB connectors!”

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Sprint debuts Samsung Galaxy S4 with support for Sprint Spark enhanced LTE

sprint_galaxy_s4Sprint has been working on improving their network through their Network Vision initiative, consolidating and removing outdated legacy technologies so they can push forward with faster and more powerful connections. Sprint Spark is the next stage of their LTE network. To over simplify, cannibalizing the old Nextel 800MHz spectrum and slapping LTE on it. Part of Sprint’s network woes in the past, their LTE was broadcast over higher frequency bands with poor building penetration. Moving LTE to 800MHz should mean much better connections for customers indoors and farther away from their towers.

Sprint currently offers limited Spark connection in five cities: LA, New York, Chicago, Tampa, and Miami. They will be adding an additional 100 markets to this list over the next three years. Network consolidation takes a little time apparently. Spark aims to deliver up to 50Mbps connections, and there’s the potential for it to support up to 2Gbps in the future.

Of course, what good is new network connectivity if your phone can’t use it? 

In the “coming weeks” a new version of the GS4 will be made available with tri-band support for Sprint’s various LTE channels, and it will be able to hand off connection between those bands with little or no interruption to the user. As far as the customer is concerned, it’s just a normal GS4, but with faster data in select markets. Whenever it’s actually made available, it’ll drop for $200 on a two year contract.

Hit the jump for the full PR!

Continue reading “Sprint debuts Samsung Galaxy S4 with support for Sprint Spark enhanced LTE”

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Qualcomm announces 64-Bit Snapdragon 410 chipset with World Mode 4G LTE

Qualcomm-Snapdragon-410 lte worldA bit techie, but stick with me.

We’re watching a smartphone revolution happen. It’s a little quiet now, but it’ll heat up very quickly. The exciting growth sector next year wont be in premier and high end phones. It’ll be in emerging and developing markets. We’ve seen hints of this with the popularity of the Nokia Lumia 520 and Moto G. Now Qualcomm is pushing forward with a new chipset designed to improve the mobile data experience for low-cost smartphones.

The Snapdragon 410 chipset is a 64-bit quadcore with integrated world mode LTE. We’re struggling to crawl out of the “chicken or egg” problem of delivering faster bandwidth to emerging markets. If they don’t have devices to support LTE, why build out the network? If there’s no network, why include expensive radios? The 410 aims to solve part of this problem by including LTE in a package which is designed for phones around the $150 off-contract price point. That’s Lumia 520 and Moto G territory.

The 64-bit addition could be interesting as well. Apple struck first, and we can take that as a clue or a cue that they might start merging the iOS and OSX ecosystems. We know Microsoft is working towards that with a planned release of “Threshold” in 2015, bringing Windows Phone and Windows 8 together. Qualcomm is now offering up hardware which might better facilitate that kind of software integration. Imagine Windows Phones, which can offer a robust computing environment like Windows RT for $200 or less powered by LTE data. Remarkable.

Read the full PR after the jump.

Continue reading “Qualcomm announces 64-Bit Snapdragon 410 chipset with World Mode 4G LTE”

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Google adds Sony Z Ultra to Google Play Edition stock Android Portfolio

sony z ultra google play editionNo sooner do we post on the LG GPad 8.3 GPE, then we discover the Sony Z Ultra is also playing ball.

Yup, we now have a proper phablet offering for those who want a true-blue stock Android experience on a larger screened phone. Offering up a 6.4″ 1080p display, it’s also the first GPE device to rock Qualcomm’s screamer Snapdragon 800 quad core. 16GB of storage on board with a MicroSD card slot, and the Z Ultra is also water resistant. A nice little touch there, helping the survivability of a somewhat pricey gadget.

Speaking of price, you’ll drop $649 for a Z Ultra of your very own. Not a bad price at all for a proper phablet, and it looks like handsets should be shipping out in 1-2 days. Get at it folks!

Sony Z Ultra GPE on Google Play

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Long Term Review: The LG G2 on AT&T – Look, Feel, and Function from LG’s premier Smartphone

LG G2 Camera reviewOnly my second LG review!

The G2 is a MONSTER phone on paper. Incredible screen, huge battery capacity, big camera specs, and a brilliant tablet-grade processor. Having used the phone out in the wild for a couple weeks now, does real world performance live up to the specs on paper? Does this phone live up to LG’s promises?

Let’s take a look!

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Top 5 for the week starting Dec 1st, 2013 – LG G2 news, Batteries, and Cases!

ballistic hydra waterproof case iphone 5s test review somegadgetguyThese were the top read and most shared stories from SomeGadgetGuy last week! LG ruled the week, but we also got in a few accessories. Nice little round up as we wrap up 2013 and the holiday buying season!

Let’s jump in!

5 – Using a Ballistic Hydra Rugged case for iPhone 5 on an iPhone 5S

The nice thing about how Apple updates the iPhone with a tick-tock system, cases for the iPhone 5 largely work with the iPhone 5S. If you’ve been looking for a rugged case for the 5S, this waterproof case might do the trick!

4 – Review: Ravpower Lipstick Charger and Flashlight

003This week, Chris took a look at a handy little portable charger + flashlight combo. RAVPower has become a favorite here at SGG, offering up very good mobile charging solutions at great prices. Looking to extend your phone’s run time out in the field, maybe this gadget will help?

3 – Ask Juan: Why won’t my Moto X show up as a USB drive on my Mac?

An opportunity to play a little tech support? On a tech blog? Who’d have thunk it? Robin has a problem with his Moto X and his Mac playing nice together. Seems this is a pretty common problem seeing how popular this post was last week…

2 – Real World Battery Test: The LG G2 – 47 hours to “Critically Low”

LG G2 Camera reviewI don’t do a lot of battery bench marking. It’s very time consuming, and usage is very relative. What’s heavy to one person is light use for another.  That said, when a phone comes along with exceptional battery life, I at least need to point out how it handled real world activities.

1 – Camera Test: The LG G2 on AT&T – video samples from a 13MP Android with Optical Image Stabilization!

And the number one story from last week was a doozy! LG made some pretty bold claims surrounding the camera on the G2. It’s only the second Android with optical image stabilization, and it has three times the resolution as the HTC One. Did the G2 camera live up to the hype?

We’re nothing without you readers, and we certainly can’t compete against the big blogs by ourselves. We always greatly appreciate not only the likes, but the sharing on social sites like Google Plus, Twitter, Facebook, and Reddit. The more we get to talk with other tech fans, the better we get, and soon we’ll be able to reward that participation with some fun contests coming up soon!

Thanks for reading, and if you feel we missed a big story this week, or you have a hot tip, please drop us a line on our Contact Page!

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