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Sony Xperia Sola Phone Preview

11:48 PM Lecor Martineau


Sony has announced the latest addition to the Xperia smartphone range - the sola. The new handset will offer features like floating touch navigation, Xperia SmartTags and NFC to name a few.

Sony Mobile Communications has announced Xperia sola as the latest addition to its portfolio of Android powered Xperia smartphones.  Complete with Sony technology, premium entertainment and innovative floating touch navigation, the NFC enabled Xperia sola comes equipped with Xperia SmartTags, allowing consumers to change their smartphone’s settings and applications to fit their lifestyle in an instant. Xperia sola will be available to consumers globally in black, white and red in the second quarter. 


A floating touch of magic
Making its smartphone debut exclusively on Xperia sola, Sony’s unique floating touch lets consumers navigate the web by hovering their finger above the screen so it acts like a moving curser, without actually having to touch the screen.  Once the desired link is found it can be highlighted and a simple tap will load the page.  Floating touch will evolve with new user functionality and applications through software updates and engagement with developers.

Colin Williamson, Marketing Manager for Sony Mobile South Africa commented; “Xperia sola comes with the power of Sony and a sense of magic with floating touch, giving consumers a fun new way to browse the web and latest technology to show off. With Xperia SmartTags out of the box and access to the latest content through Sony Entertainment Network, Xperia sola is perfect for consumers looking for ease of use and the best in entertainment in a smart and innovative smartphone.”

Simplify the everyday with SmartTags
Xperia sola is NFC enabled and comes with two NFC Xperia SmartTags in the box as standard to simplify consumers’ everyday smartphone experiences. By touching an NFC Android smartphone on a SmartTag, a pre-configured profile in the smartphone will launch. The two SmartTags included with Xperia sola can be personalized with up to 10 commands. Out of the box one is ready for the living room to turn on Wi-Fi and launch Google news and weather apps, and the other one for the bedroom, which turns on the alarm and switches to silent mode. Xperia sola supports NFC pairing, allowing consumers to enjoy great connectivity with other NFC smartphones, applications and services by tapping their smartphones together. 

Powerful entertainment anytime, anywhere
Xperia sola uses a Reality Display powered by Mobile BRAVIA Engine, xLOUD and 3D surround sound audio technology delivering crisp and loud sound, and a 1GHz dual-core processor for fast performance.  Xperia sola also comes with fast capture to take the camera from sleep to snap in a little over a second with a single key press. 

Consumers can also access premium entertainment experiences with Sony Entertainment Network, where they can watch the latest Hollywood blockbusters on Video Unlimited or listen to millions of songs through Music Unlimited. 

Key features for Xperia sola
  • Floating touch navigation for an easy web browsing experience
  • NFC enabled and Xperia SmartTags in the box to enable quick app loading and easy content sharing
  • 3.7” Reality Display with Mobile BRAVIA Engine gives razor sharp clarity
  • Powered by a 1GHz Dual Core Processor for super fast browsing
  • xLOUD and 3D surround sound audio technology for crisp and loud listening
  • Direct access to Sony Entertainment Network with pre-installed Video and Music Unlimited apps
  • Launches on Android platform 2.3, upgrade to Android 4.0 during summer 2012

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Russian Student Cracks Chrome at Google Hackathon

9:00 PM Lecor Martineau


Well, I guess Google Chrome isn’t impenetrable after all. A total of $1 million in prizes was recently offered by Google to anyone who could exploit the Chrome browser and, for the most part, people failed. That has now changed. At the Google Pwnium hackathon, a Russian university student has been able to hack his way through the cloud OS and earn himself the top prize.


Sergey Glazunov is now $60,000 richer for having successfully hacked a PC running the Chrome browser. What has prevented earlier attempts is that Chrome has something called a “sandbox” that is designed to stop hackers from accessing user data even if they compromise the browser. Glazunov found an exploit to get around that, bypassing the security and successfully hacking into the PC.

As part of the competition, all successful hackers must tell Google how they did it, effectively giving Google the opportunity to patch up the security flaw before real hackers take advantage of it in real life. Interestingly, a security firm also hacked Chrome at HP’s Pwn2Own event, doing so in just five minutes. Chrome is still pretty secure, but this does show that it’s not invincible.

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Sneal Peek on iPad Gen. 3 (iPad HD)

10:27 PM Lecor Martineau


Well, seems like the rumors were true (some of it anyway) and today we’re finally seeing the official specs of the third generation iPad. As expected, the main draw here is its beautiful 9.7-inch, 2048 x1536 resolution display, that quite frankly, blows everything else out of the water. That’s 264 pixels per inch, and Apple says that the new iPad has 44 percent better color saturation than before. To put that in perspective, the new iPad has more pixels than current full-HD TVs. Powering the entire thing is the new A5X quad-core processor, and Apple says that the new processor is twice as fast as NVIDIA’s Tegra 3.


The new iPad also uses a 5-megapixel backside illuminated sensor and boasts slightly better specs than the camera on the iPhone 4S. The device also features 1080p video recording, which is on par with most hi-end smartphones currently out in the market.

The new iPad now features Siri-like functionality in the form of a dedicated microphone soft button at the bottom of the virtual keyboard (right beside the spacebar). Also a surprising feature: 4G LTE connectivity. We guessed that the new iPad wouldn’t have it, well, we guess we were wrong. The new iPad will feature 4G LTE right out of the bat, though how that’ll work in multiple countries with different LTE spectrums, we don’t know (you can’t just bring an LTE device provisioned for a certain carrier to another place and expect it (LTE) to work). You can of course just buy a version without the LTE capability built-in (or just use 3G), but were’s the fun in that? As an added bonus, the new iPad can be used as a personal hotspot too.

Probably the best thing about the new iPad is that it’s able to squeeze out 10 hours of battery life – 9 on 4G. The device is about 9.4mm thin and weighs in at 1.4lbs.

The new iPad will cost you $499 bucks for the 16GB version, $599 for the 32GB and $699 for the 64GB version. LTE versions of the device will retail for  $629, $729 and $829, respectively.

First countries to get dibs on the new device will be US, Canada, UK, France, Germany, Switzerland, Japan, Hong Kong, Singapore and Austria on March 16, with other countries getting theirs on March 23.

For more detailed iPad specifications, visit: http://www.apple.com/ipad/specs/

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Android Ice Cream Sanwich on Galaxy S II This March 2012

11:40 PM Lecor Martineau


The Samsung Galaxy S II is still one of my favorite Android devices, despite it being succeeded by the Galaxy Nexus and Galaxy Note. And it’s about to get a lot sweeter too, since we’re hearing that Android 4.0 Ice Cream Sandwich will be rolled out to the Galaxy S2 by March 15, if not earlier.


Yes, it was only last month that we had heard about a March 1st rollout of ICS for the Galaxy S II, but that date has come and gone. The new date of March 15 comes by way of a Samsung Israel post on Facebook, suggesting that Ice Cream Sandwich will arrive on that date for that phone. Even so, it could come out even earlier for certain European markets, based on what history has taught us thus far.

This doesn’t give much of an offiicial indication as to when the Galaxy S II (in all its variants) will get the ICS update in North America, but if you’re not opposed to some manual updating, I’m sure the European ROM will find its way onto the Internet soon enough.

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Yandex Shell 3D Tablet Edition for Android

11:36 PM Lecor Martineau

SPB Software have released a new version of the Yandex Shell to allow manufacturers to create glasses-free 3D tablet interfaces.

Yandex-owned mobile software developer SPB Software launched a glasses-free 3D user interface for Android tablets, at Mobile World Congress 2012 in Barcelona this week. 

With Shell 3D Tablet Edition, mobile operators and device manufacturers can now create customized 3D tablet interfaces for their clients.


Yandex Shell 3D Tablet Edition uses auto-stereoscopic technology that creates an immersive 3D experience without the need for specialized tablets screens. Representing entirely new way of interacting with tablets, Yandex Shell 3D Tablet Edition makes it easier for users to navigate and personalize their devices. The tablet edition follows the launch of smartphone-based Shell 3D, one of the most successful premium apps on the Android Market.

According to estimates from industry analysts Gartner, sales of tablets are expected to reach 326 million by 2015 and will be roughly on par with PC sales.

"Mobile operators are now offering tablets with mobile broadband packages alongside mobile and smart phone deals. We recognise that they want to differentiate the offerings they make to their tablet subscribers from what they can offer to their mobile phone clients," said Sebastian-Justus Schmidt, General Manager and EVP Mobile at Yandex. "The Yandex Shell 3D is available for operators to pre-install on their Android tablets, adding a new element of attraction for potential customers. We believe that 3D interaction will become the norm on tablet devices."

The tablet UI home screen features an intuitive carousel design which allows users to see panels of all of their apps and widgets in three dimensions, as they swipe from panel to panel. Each panel is easily customizable, giving users an opportunity to create the right combination of apps, widgets and folders. Shell 3D Tablet Edition also contains special widgets including a clock with 60 different skins and a 3D calendar. It also has a widget that allows users to 3D-enable other widgets.

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Unlocking Hotel Room Using Your Smartphone

11:24 PM Lecor Martineau

At the Mobile World Congress, NXP Semiconductors announced that its OpenWays Mobile Key lets guests unlock their hotel room door using a NFC capable smartphone.

NXP Semiconductors has announced that its identification technology enables a new enhanced version of the popular OpenWays mobile hotel key service. OpenWays Mobile Key accelerates the check-in process allowing the guests to bypass the check-in, receive their room number and use their mobile phone as the hotel room key. Through its work with NXP OpenWays can now include NFC technology into their service, enabling hotel chains to provide their guests with an ultramodern, future proof access solution. The OpenWays Mobile Key DUAL© with Pure NFC will be incorporated into the Mobile Key service offered by major hotel chains starting with Nordic Choice Hotels in Scandinavia.

OpenWays, a provider of mobile key solutions, recognised the convenience of NFC and selected NXP for its superior end-to-end solutions expertise to help create the Mobile Key DUAL with Pure NFC service hotel key system. The smartphones will securely transmit hotel key credentials to the room door lock via NFC. The OpenWays door lock utilises the flexible NXP PN512 NFC transceiver IC and software stack while the OpenWays application is based on NXP’s open source NFC operating stack integration for Symbian, Android and other operating systems.

NXP helped to add NFC support with optimized antennas to the previously introduced CAC (Crypto Acoustic Credential) technology within the power efficient and compact OpenWays reader. This brings OpenWays into the unique position to operate across all phones, carriers and lock systems today. The result is a simple, reliable, secure and intuitive NFC key service that is cost-effective to deploy in new hotel development and hotel upgrades. The OpenWays NFC reader is available in form factors allowing both an upgrade to existing hotel locks and in a OEM version for embedding into new locks.


“We selected NXP because of its NFC and contactless leadership position as well as its expertise in embedded mobile security. As top hotel chains deploy mobile front desk bypass services, they demand solutions that are truly deployable today while being future proof. As NFC phones continue to appear on the market it was logical to add NFC support to our Mobile Key offering while remaining fully interoperable and ubiquitous,” said Pascal Metivier, founder and CEO of OpenWays. “Having on our side a technology provider with long-standing, end-to-end NFC and security expertize is very important to us. NXP’s position as the co-founder of NFC and potential to collaborate and bring new secure NFC innovations to market with short design in cycles made them the ideal partner.”

“New innovative services such as OpenWays Mobile Key are exactly what we envisioned as the value add of NFC enabled mobile solutions,” said Henri Ardevol, vice president and general manager, secure transactions, NXP Semiconductors. “We are happy to contribute our expertise across the contactless and security ecosystems as well as our extensive NFC domain knowledge to OpenWays.”

NFC is a market proven, standardised technology co-invented by NXP and Sony in 2002. NXP is at the center of this ecosystem, fueling its development by partnering with almost all major handset manufacturers, mobile OS providers and applications developers. NXP is the No1 supplier to the Identification market globally, and leverages its leadership in contactless and security technologies to provide complete Mobile Transactions solutions: NFC controllers, Secure Elements in all form factors, NFC tags and infrastructure reader ICs. Currently OEMs have selected NXP’s NFC technology for more than 130 mobile devices.

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Jelly Bean and Key Lime Pie: Next To Serve Hot From Android Kitchen

11:14 PM Lecor Martineau


At first, people thought it was silly that Google would decide to name its different versions of Android after sweet treats in alphabetical order, but that was half the fun. And the fun is continuing after Ice Cream Sandwich with Jelly Bean. And now we’re learning that Key Lime Pie will be the Android that comes after Jelly Bean. 

The version numbers of Jelly Bean and Key Lime Pie aren’t quite so clear, since Google jumped from 2.3 Gingerbread to 3.0 Honeycomb to 4.0 Ice Cream Sandwich. Even so, a “reliable source” is saying that Key Lime Pie is being prepared in the Google kitchen as the next iteration of its mobile operating system. I’d imagine that both Jelly Bean and Key Lime Pie will continue down the Ice Cream Sandwich path of being both smartphone and tablet friendly. 

It’s also hard to say just how far down the timeline we’re looking here. The Verge is guessing that Key Lime Pie won’t be dished out until some time in 2013, which makes sense if Jelly Bean won’t show up until the end of this year. Then, we have to start thinking about “L” names for the next Android. Lemon Meringue Pie? Followed by Marzipan or Macaroon?

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