Daily Roundup: Surface Pro 2 hands-on, BlackBerry sold for $4.7 billion, Apple sells nine million iPhones, and more!
You might say the day is never really done in consumer technology news. Your workday, however, hopefully draws to a close at some point. This is the Daily Roundup on Engadget, a quick peek back at the top headlines for the past 24 hours -- all handpicked by the editors here at the site. Click on through the break, and enjoy.
Microsoft Surface Pro 2 hands-on
Here it is: Microsoft's Surface Pro 2, the second generation Windows 8-compatible tablet, and yes, it still comes with a stylus. The Pro 2 has gotten a significant 75 percent boost thanks to the 1.6GHz Core i5 Haswell processor inside, which now runs much quieter. Other changes include a new Type Cover 2 -- which is 1mm thinner and backlit -- output of up to 3,840 x 2,160 on an external display, plus 6K video editing capabilities. Click the link above for our full hands-on, and first impressions.
SteamOS: Valve's new platform for playing PC games on TVs
We've been hearing whispers of a new product release from Valve for a while now, and today the company finally showed us what it's been working on: SteamOS. The new OS will function on "any living room machine," and it also streams games straight from your Mac and PC. So what'll it cost? The OS is free and built on Linux, but as of now no release date other than "soon" has been given. This is the first of three announcements from Valve this week, so stay tuned and expect more in the coming days.
Oppo N1 hands-on
Today Oppo announced its photography-centric N1, which comes with a 13MP hinged camera, and runs the CyanogenMod ROM along with the company's own new ColorOS. The software, Oppo tells us, is the result of a 10-month development period involving 243 developers, 20,000 testers, and 43 new patents. Per usual Oppo standard, the N1 comes with a plastic build around an aluminum frame, and a silky matte finish that we dig. For our full hands-on, click the link above.
BlackBerry enters agreement for $4.7 billion sale of company
It's been a rough and rocky road for BlackBerry, with the company moving on a slow decline over the past few years. Faced with tough sales of its new BB10 devices, the company recently reported a projected $950 million quarterly loss, and 4,500 additional layoffs. Today, BlackBerry announced that it's signed a letter of intent for the sale of its company to Fairfax Financial, valued at $4.7 billion. What can we expect in the future? Fairfax Chairman and CEO Prem Watsa believes the transaction "will open an exciting new private chapter for BlackBerry." Read on for more.
