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The Week That Was: India Getting 4G, N900 Arrives
Techtree News Staff, Aug 30, 2009 1136 hrs ISTTake a look at what tech stories hogged the headlines last week!
It's time for yet another edition of Techtree's weekly news roundup! Here we go as we explore what kept the tech world busy all of last week!
Motorola to Test 4G in India
What? 4G, In India? We have had a torrid time implementing the 3G spectrum and license and now that first of the 3G Services have started trickling in, Motorola wants to do a trial run of 4G in India! And the company seems to be extremely optimistic about it. According to reports, the company will soon approach the Department of Telecommunications (DoT) for a trial spectrum allotment for testing LTE (Long Term Evolution) services in India. Now, the worrying thing about this is that the implementation of 4G will shed water on the Government's plan to raise Rs. 35,000 crore by selling spectrum for 3G Services.
Nokia's Netbook is Here: Booklet 3G
It was in the past week that Nokia went on to announce its very first netbook. Dubbed the Booklet 3G, the device has an Intel Atom processor and is comparable to the current crop of netbooks with its 10.1-inch display. It has a pretty good battery life we hear. 12 hours! Now, we'd really love to see how true this is in real world conditions (as in when you really use the system). It's an HD display (1366 x 768 pixels) and comes with a HDMI port as well - and tipping the scales at 1.25 kgs, this one should be a breeze to carry around.
Microsoft's OneApp Released
Microsoft seems really interested in the mobile phone segment of late. If it announced a major partnership with Nokia a few weeks ago, its now time to announce its OneApp service which promises to bring smartphone like abilities to feature phones. The OneApp happens to be a "do it all" application that will enable users to run various subsidiary applications under it's umbrella. These include mini Facebook, Windows Live Messenger, Twitter and Mobile Wallet applications. It's a pretty light on the resources, "weighing" in at just 150KB. The add-on apps are just 30KB in size and hence should fit in most feature phones of today.
Sony's New Cameras Fight Low-light Woes
Sony has announced to new cybershot digicams with Exmor R image sensoers last week. The Sony Cyber-shot DSC-TX1 will be available in gray color for Rs. 20,990 while the DSC-WX1 will be available in black color for Rs. 19,990 across all Sony stores and authorized retail partners in India.
Net Search for Jessica Biel Dangerous
A search on the internet for Jessica Biel may cause serious damage to your computer, according to Internet security company McAfee. The company has said that Jessica Biel has overtaken Brad Pitt as the most dangerous celebrity to search in cyberspace. McAfee researched Hollywood's glamorous stars and pop culture's most famous people to reveal the riskiest celebrities on the Web. An Internet search for Jessica Biel or Jessica Biel downloads, Jessica Biel wallpaper, Jessica Biel screen savers, Jessica Biel photos and Jessica Biel videos have a one in five chance of landing at a Web site that's tested positive for online threats, such as spyware, adware, spam, phishing, viruses and other malware.
Yahoo peps Search, Mail and Messenger
Yahoo has added slew of new features and updates to its three core offerings - Mail, Search and Messenger. Yahoo Mail, one of the top leading email services, gets more social features as one of the key milestone in Yahoo Open Strategy. Along with that, Yahoo Messenger 10 will also bring social tinge like showing status updates, photo sharing, video calls and other notifications.
Yahoo Mail gets the long deserved attachment limit raise to 25MB from 10MB per mail. New Application box combines Calendar, Notepad, and several other third party apps for streamlined single window Inbox. The Application box will contain third party apps like Picnik, ZumoDrive or PayPal along with several others coming in future.
Opera 10 RC Arrives, Final on Sept 1
Opera has rolled out the release candidate of its Opera 10 web browser and has announced that the Final version will be released on Sept. 1. The second beta of Opera 10 was released in mid-July. The release candidate isn't different from the Opera 10 Beta and has few cosmetic changes. Opera 10 Release Candidate can be downloaded from here for Windows, Mac and Linux platforms. Windows and Mac users should note that Opera 10 RC will update the preferences to old Opera 9.64 preferences (if it was installed). Quite a number of bug fixes have been made along with new application icon and several speed as well as performance enhancements. One visible change is the Tab options button to the right of the Panel's button.
Sony's Walkman S Series, E Series Player
Sony has announced new S series and E series Walkman MP3 players. The new Walkman S series packs stereo speakers, and sports a 2.4-inch QVGA LCD display supporting 30fps video playback. The E series Walkman players are the entry level portable music players with smaller 2-inch display. Sony will ship both new series of Walkman music players in U.S. next month.
The Walkman S series 8GB and 16GB models are priced at $110 (Rs. 5,300 approx.) and $130 (Rs. 6,240 approx.) respectively. On the other hand, the entry-level Walkman E series 8GB and 16GB models cost $80 (Rs. 3,840 approx.) and $100 (Rs. 4,800 approx.) respectively.
Nokia Music Store Arrives in India
Nokia officially launched its Music Store in India at a function held in Mumbai yesterday. With more than 3 million tracks across various genres available for download, it is easily one of the largest stores of its kind designed for Indian users. The store is loaded with heavy localized content and to achieve this, the company has collaborated with local music labels including Tseries, Yashraj Music, Saregama, BIG Music and Venus. Along with the Music Store launch, Nokia is expected to launch its Comes With Music service in India as well, later this year. On the sidelines of the Music Store launch, Nokia also announced the launch of three new devices in India. These include the Nokia 5630, 5530 XpressMusic and the 5230.
Nokia N900 is Finally Official
So far, Nokia N900 was seen only in spy shots and leaked official pictures. So, a week before the Nokia World event, the N900 is finally official! It is the first Maemo 5 based Internet tablet and the successor to the Nokia N810 Internet tablet. The device has an impressive hardware spec sheet that begins right from the processor - an ARM Cortex A8 that provides 1GB of application memory and Open GL ES 2.0 Graphics acceleration support.The OS is Linux-based Maemo 5 that provides the device comprehensive multitasking ability. All these combined with the powerful processor gives the Maemo 5 the oomph to compete with the likes of the iPhone and trump it comprehensively. This time even matching iPhone on the UI front, where it was the traditional laggard, thanks to Nokia's dependence on S60.
Facebook Updates Privacy Terms, Again
Facebook, the world's most popular social networking site, has announced a set of changes to its existing privacy terms. This was done in order to comply with Canadian Privacy Laws. However, once applied, the changes will be applicable to Facebook users all over the globe.
The changes were announced in a press release issued by Facebook. The new updates to the policy are not active with immediate effect and it might take 12 months before we actually see all of them to be implemented. Facebook, it seems, is still busy with making the website compliant with the new set of policies.
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