Huawei's new Ascend P6 touted as world's slimmest smartphone

Bigger is not always better in the smartphone industry, and the brass at Huawei is hoping that notion can help vault its new flagship device into the upper echelon of the mobile market.

Marking its first standalone launch event, the Chinese manufacturers unveiled the Ascend P6 on Tuesday, boasting their new device as the world's slimmest smartphone. The Ascend P6 is a measly 6.18 mm thick; quite a bit thinner than the iPhone 5 (7.7 mm) and the Samsung Galaxy S4 (7.6 mm), two industry-leading devices that Huawei is hoping to rival.

"Huawei P6 is darn thin," tweeted industry analyst Ben Wood shares in a Reuters report.

Much like the iPhone, the Ascend P6 features sleek, aluminum edges along the sides and top of the phone. The device is rounded out at the bottom, adding a little bit of original flair to its aesthetic appeal. The 4.7-inch 720p display, 8-megapixel camera on the back and 5-megapixel front-facing camera make this phone ideal for everyday photos, Skype calls or the ever popular selfie.

Inside the device you will find 8GB of storage, a 1.5GHz quad-core processor and 2GB of RAM. The Ascend P6 also features Huawei's customized version of Andriod's Jelly Bean operating system.

Source: http://ca.news.yahoo.com

Transparent Solar-Cell Screen Charges Phone

Transparent solar cells use materials that only absorb infrared and ultraviolet light and let visible light pass through

Today’s mobile devices are constantly in use—so constantly that battery life is a huge problem. I recently hosted an afternoon barbecue at a community pool; over in one corner, folks jockeyed for a turn to charge their mobile devices at the one available outlet. Meanwhile, the sun shone down brightly on mobile phones scattered across the picnic tables, as the batteries on those idle devices quietly drained.

The SunPartner Group, a 30-employee startup in Aix-en-Provence, France, thinks that’s a real waste. Folks sitting in restaurants, in outdoor cafes, or at their desks typically pull out their phones and put them face up in front of them; put solar cells on the phones and there’d be a lot less scrambling to find a wall outlet. And they’ve built a low-cost transparent panel that does just that. They’re now testing it with a number of manufacturers and expect to see it built into mobile devices early next year.

Sunpartner isn’t the first to think mobile phones should use solar power to charge themselves. A few years ago, several cell phone manufacturers tried putting solar cells on the back of phones—like the Samsung Crest and the Sharp Solar Hybrid. Turns out, though, that people weren’t inclined to put phones face down on the table—they missed alerts, and were worried about scratching the screen. And solar cells on the back of cell phones never caught on widely.

Apple iOS 7 Is Even Better Than We Could Have Dreamed

Today at Apple’s much-anticipated Developer’s Conference, WWDC, CEO Tim Cook announced iOS 7, “the most significant iOS update since the original iPhone.” iOS 7 is packed with new features, from a completely rethought design featuring new typography, brighter colors, and improved functionalities to additions to the iOS app family you’re going to love. Though earlier we live-blogged an overview of new iOS features, here we give you a more in-depth look at the changes coming to your iOS device this fall.

Control Center

Devices running iOS 7 will feature Control Center. Simply swipe from the bottom of your screen to reveal access to controls for Airplane Mode, WiFi, Bluetooth, and or Do Not Disturb. You can also adjust your phone’s brightness and control music playback with buttons for pause, play, and next. Control Center also offers quick access to often-used apps like Clock, Camera, Calculator, and Flashlight.

Notification Center

In iOS 7 Notification Center will be available directly from the Lock screen, displaying all your notifications such as missed calls and recent emails. The new Today feature provides an at-a-glance view of the weather, traffic status, upcoming appointments, and your friends’ birthdays the day-of.

Improved Multitasking

While previous versions of iOS gave multitasking access only to certain apps, iOS 7 will enable developers to enable background multitasking for any app with Apple’s new API. iOS 7 does this without losing battery performance by measuring how you use your apps and, accordingly, using intelligent scheduling to update your running apps in the background. iOS will also respond to push triggers so your most-used apps are always up-to-date.

iTunes Radio

A music streaming service called “iRadio” similar to Pandora’s was long-rumored to be announced at WWDC. Though Apple enthusiasts may have failed at guessing the right name, Apple’s new music streaming service is indeed quite similar to Pandora. iTunes Music features over 200 stations, like “Summer Songs” and “Artists on Tour,” created by Apple supported by iTunes’ music catalog. Just like Pandora, iTunes Music will allow you to create stations based around particular artists, songs, or genres and will feature options similar to Pandora’s for favoriting songs you like and blocking playback of songs you don’t like. When you tap a song in iTunes Radio Apple presents you the option to purchase the song from iTunes, share the song with a friend, or create a new station around that song. What’s more, iTunes Radio keeps track of all the songs you’ve listened to on all of your devices so you can continue to preview songs and, if you like, purchase them through iTunes.

The Brave New World Of Tomorrow's Tablets

Science and techno world topic: Future

Tablets with paper-thin screens that can be folded and tucked into your back pocket, artificial intelligence and augmented reality -- the stuff of science fiction may be coming to a store near you.

                                                 

It's been two years since Apple Inc launched the iPad and spawned rival tablets from the likes of Samsung Electronics Co, Amazon.com Inc, Sony Corp, and now Google Inc and Microsoft Corp.

Much of the competition so far has centered on making smartphone and tablets lighter, slimmer, faster and longer-running than their predecessors, and the trend shows no signs of slowing. The increasingly crowded marketplace is also galvanizing hardware designers and software engineers to explore new technologies that may revolutionize the look and feel of mobile devices in coming years.

"We should think beyond just the touch-screen device," said Lin Zhong, a professor at Rice University who does research on mobile systems. "Why do we have to hold tablets, carry many displays? We should think about wearable computers."

Amazon testing new smartphone: report

Science and techno world topic: Smartphone

The online retail giant Amazon is testing a new smartphone and may launch production later this year or early next year, the Wall Street Journal reported Wednesday.

The story, datelined Taipei, said the company is working with Asian component suppliers to test the new device, which would enter a crowded market dominated by Apple's iPhone, Samsung's Galaxy handsets and LG models.

Amazon, the electronic books pioneer whose Kindle reader has grown enormously popular in recent years, expanded into the tablet market last year with Kindle Fire, which runs on Google's Android software.

The Android platform is used by slightly more than half the smartphones in the US market, while the iPhone accounts for 31.9 percent, according to an industry survey released earlier this month.

In the overall US market for mobile handsets, Korean-based Samsung led with 25.7 percent, followed by LG, another Korean firm, with 19.1 percent and Apple with 15 percent, according to the survey by the comScore group.