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– via The Verge
Samsung’s earnings this past quarter have been exactly as downbeat as the company predicted: operating profit is down 60 percent and income from sales is now 20 percent smaller than a year ago. In other words, Samsung’s spending more money to generate smaller revenues. This has all been down to Samsung’s most lucrative and important mobile devices business, which has been struggling to adapt to a new competitive environment. Addressing the need for radical change, Senior VP Kim Hyun-joon from Samsung’s mobile division has today expressed the company’s intention to “fundamentally reform [its] product portfolio.” Seeking greater cost efficiency, Samsung will look to standardize components used across devices and will continue to compete “for each price tier.”
Sony recently announced plans to also reorganize its mobile efforts, though its focus appears to be on more premium, high-end devices whereas Samsung looks set to maintain a wide portfolio while taking a different approach to how it structures it. Kim admits that Samsung’s “high-end smartphone sales result was somewhat weak” in the past quarter and the company’s earnings report describes the impact of the new Galaxy Note 4 as only “marginal.” There’s plenty of work ahead for Samsung, but if the company lives up to the promise made today, 2015 will be a fundamentally different year to the repetitively iterative products the company has been serving up in recent times.
– via The Verge
Don’t Burn your hand, the LEDs project flames on pans
Since the dawn of man, we’ve associated flames with heat. But since induction stovetops don’t emit any flames, it seems like they’re just waiting to roast your hand. That’s why Samsung’s latest induction range has “Virtual Flame Technology.” A set of blue LEDs around the edge of each burner projects “flames” onto the side of your pots and pans. In addition to letting you know that the burner’s on, the “flames” actually increase in size to give you an idea of the relative heat. And, of course, since it’s an induction range, the burners only get hot if you actually have a metal pan on them. You will have to pay for the privilege, however: the range is part of Samsung’s pricey Chef’s Collection, and starts at $3,699.
– via The Verge
When Samsung released its Chromebook 2 earlier this year, it shipped with the company’s own Exynos 5 Octa chipset. And you can still buy those 11.6 and 13-inch models — though better Chromebooks exist. Today, Samsung’s adding a third option: a second 11.6-inch Chromebook 2 powered by an Intel processor. To be more specific, it’s a fanless Celeron N2840 chipset that can run at up to 2.58GHz. The Intel Chromebook 2 has 2GB of RAM, whereas the models running Samsung’s own chip feature 4GB of memory, so you may need to occasionally cut back on the number of tabs you’ve got open. If you’re set on an Intel chip, Acer’s C720P with an i3 processor is another option. Storage remains the same at 16GB; obviously Chrome OS places a huge focus on keeping your documents, music, photos, and other content in the cloud.
THIS CHROMEBOOK 2’S MORE DURABLE THAN THE OTHERS
Samsung says it’s made improvements when it comes to the Chromebook 2’s durability and construction. Each of the four corners is now reinforced by metal, as are the USB ports. There’s also a metal frame behind the display, which should contribute to the laptop’s overall rigidity. So the Chromebook 2 should be able to endure daily travels and the occasional bump just fine. But don’t spill anything on it; Samsung’s made it more resilient, but there are still no protections against liquids. That seems like the next logical step — but maybe not for a $250 product. Elsewhere, it’s still the same ugly design we saw before with fake leather stitching intact. (If you’re going for the leather look, then why is it silver?) This one features the 1366×768 resolution display, which has pretty subpar viewing angles and just doesn’t look as nice as the 1080p screen in the 13-inch, non-Intel model.
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Since a lot of consumers remain unfamiliar with Chromebooks, Samsung has collaborated with Google for a new “Google Help” app. It’s essentially Amazon Mayday for Chromebooks; click a button and you’re connected over video chat to a support representative at Samsung’s North Carolina operations center. From there, they can take control of your screen to show you how to accomplish common tasks, change settings, or fix any problems you might be experiencing. Samsung’s reps don’t work around the clock like Amazon’s people, though; you can talk to them Monday through Friday from 10AM to 7PM ET.
Pre-orders for the Intel-powered Chromebook 2 start today and Samsung says it will be widely available through retail channels next week. The company sells a ton of its other Chromebook 2 configurations and says it’s the leading manufacturer of Chrome OS notebooks. I see little reason to doubt those claims. You can bet plenty of people will be buying this one, too. It’s not the most powerful Chromebook out there by and stretch, but it’s built to last and runs for up to 9 hours on a charge. At $250, that’ll suit quite a few people just fine.
Photos by Sean O’Kane
SAMSUNG CHROMEBOOK 2 WITH INTEL HANDS-ON PHOTOS
– via Gizmodo
It’s been a long time since we’ve had a Nexus tablet. 2013’s Nexus 7 was a wonderful if underpowered little device, and there hasn’t been a bigger version since 2012’s Nexus 10. But a newcomer is almost certainly on the way soon, a 9-inch tab that could be the best of both worlds.
Up to this point Google has anointed ASUS and Samsung with Nexus tablet status, but all signs point to HTC this time around.
It’s an interesting choice; HTC’s last tablet was the Flyer, a 7-incher that came out back in 2011, cost $500 at launch, and ran Android Gingerbread 2.0 out of the box. It wasn’t exactly a success, and as a result HTC has stayed out of the tablet game entirely. But while it’s been a while since HTC tried its hand at a tablet, its design sense has come a long, long way in those intervening years. It’s about time to try again.
Reports from the WSJ, The Verge, and Android Police all point to HTC as the maker of the Nexus 9. And if that wasn’t quite enough to convince you, Nvidia explicitly mentions an HTC Nexus 9 in some legal documents that surfaced as part of a patent battle with Qualcomm. And an HTC device just recently passed through the FCC.
Probably “Nexus 9.” Leaks repeatedly refer to the tablet as such, when they aren’t referring to it by a codename “Volantis” or sometimes “Flounder,” a codename once rumored to be for a Nexus 8. And of course “Nexus 9” also lines up with Google’s traditional “Nexus [screensize]” naming scheme for tablets.
That said, if Google wanted to switch things up, now would be the time; there hasn’t been a new Nexus tablet in over a year, and rumor has it that Google’s confusingly conflicting “Nexus [iteration]” naming scheme for Nexus phones might stop short of “Nexus 6” because Blade Runner. So if there’s a time to start from scratch, or just to let a Nexus be a Nexus, full stop, it’s now.
The most we have to go on for looks come from a render from Android Police, created from some (pretty bad photos of) leaked product materials. The leaked press materials show the Nexus 9 looking very iPad mini-y from the front, with some very Nexus 5-ish styling on the back.
The leaked info also mentions zero-gap aluminum construction, and front-facing speakers that aren’t quite visible in the poorly lit leak. But given HTC clearly has a love of front-facing speakers (and rightly so) it wouldn’t be a surprise at all to see them.
When it comes to dimensions, the leak puts the Nexus 9 at 7.9mm thick, and 14.7 ounces for the Wi-Fi only model. That makes it slightly thicker but also about a bit heavier than the (smaller!) 7.5mm and 11.7 ounce iPad mini. It’s almost as heavy as Sony’s 10.1-inch Xperia Z2. Of course, all that says nothing about how it will actually feel, which makes all the difference.
Update: A leaked image from upleaks shows the back of the Nexus 9 sporting that characteristic Nexus 5 design and an HTC logo. It looks a bit more squat than we’d expected, but at 9 inches, it’s going to have to be a a bit wider than the iPad mini. No confirmation on the front-facing speakers, but if you look closely you can see a lack of grills at the bottom. Here’s to hoping!
The Nexus 9 is expected to run on Nvidia’s new Tegra K1 chip, the same brain that makes Nvidia’s Shield tablet so great. This is mentioned in the leak from Android Police, and all but confirmed by the same Nvidia legal documents that reference the tablet by name.
HTC’s fresh new Nexus will probably have 4:3 aspect ratio with a 8.9-inch, 2048 x 1440, 281 PPI screen. That’s a just slightly lower resolution screen than the retina iPad mini, which gets up to a PPI of 326 while using roughly the same resolution, thanks to a smaller 7.9-inch screen. As for the rest of the specs, you can expect 2GB RAM with options for 16GB and 32GB of storage, a 3MP front-facing camera and a 8MP rear-facer with OIS, and an option for an LTE data connection.
It’s worth noting here that the info on Nexus 9 specs come pretty much entirely from a single source: Leaked promotional materials obtained byAndroid Police. That said, they seem pretty reasonable, and the fact that Nvidia’s involvement with the Nexus 9 has been confirmed elsewhere lends some credence to this info.
According to the big Android Police leak, the Nexus 9 could be a $400 for the 16GB Wi-Fi model, and $500 for its bigger 32GB cousin. That sounds like a lot compared to the $230 Nexus 7, but it’s on par with the original Nexus 10 and the retina iPad mini (despite being bigger). It’s also $100 cheaper than 10-inchers like the Galaxy Tab S, Xperia Z2, and iPad Air that all start at $500 for 16GB.
Soon and very soon. Reports from the WSJ and The Verge suggest its release is imminent, and those leaked Nvidia legal docs point to a Q3 release which would put it somewhere at the end of this month. Android Police’s leak, on the other hand, puts the release at early Q4. A few hard dates have bubbled up—including October 8th and October 16th—but neither come from especially reliable sources.
That the Nexus 9 is coming very soon is almost certain though. The final launch of Android L is due for this fall, and it would make perfect sense for the Nexus 9 to accompany it. Not to mention that the Nexus 7 has been out of stockon the Play Store for months now.
We’re definitely due for a new Nexus tablet, and if the rumors are right it looks like the Nexus 9 could land with a serious splash. And considering that Google has established something of a habit of announcing its new Nexus devices in a flurry of press releases with no accompanying event, you can expect it any day now.
– via Briefly dot Today
Microsoft Corp. (MSFT) said in a patent lawsuit against Samsung Electronics Co. that the South Korean smartphone maker paid it as much as $1 billion in royalties last year under a now-disputed 2011 licensing agreement. The seven-year accord requires Samsung to pay Microsoft royalties for phones and tablets that use the software maker’s patented technology, according to the filing yesterday in Manhattan federal court. The payment was disclosed for the first time in a court filing in Microsoft’s complaint alleging Samsung breached an agreement to share patents.
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