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Android 3.0 Honeycomb emulator has traces of smartphone support
Thought Honeycomb was just for tablets? Well, it's not! Sure, tablets might be Google's main thrust with the release, but we've been able to dig up enough evidence in the preview SDK's emulator released yesterday to suggest that these guys are still keeping their eyes on the smartphone prize. Here's how it works: the emulator can be set to load at an arbitrary screen resolution. By default, that's WXGA, 1280 x 768 -- perfect for tablets, but obviously a wee bit large for even the biggest smartphones. Well, it turns out that setting the emulator to WVGA (like you might find on a modern mid- to high-end smartphone) triggers a moderately different shell UI that lacks most of the whiz-bang home screen stuff Google's shown on the Honeycomb tablets. In fact, the default launcher crashes out entirely, which means you need to install a replacement (Launcher Pro works nicely) just to play around. Once you get in, it's pretty raw, but you immediately notice that the emulator's got some traces of smartphone support. Notably, the status bar reverts to a more smartphone-friendly form, albeit one with pre-Gingerbread background coloration and incorrectly-inverted font colors. The lock screen (pictured above) is back to its old form, not the webOS-esque circular lock in the Honeycomb tablet UI. The browser -- which has been completely revamped in Honeycomb -- works, though without visible tabs; Google might be thinking that they'd take up too much real estate on a screen this small. Again, you can't glean much here, but it's interesting primarily because the emulator knows to revert to a smartphone UI layout at the lower resolution -- a possible sign that Honeycomb will be a true dual-mode, dual-purpose platform from day one. And even if it isn't, it looks like they're setting themselves up for a two-UI strategy down the road. %Gallery-115314% [Thanks, Andrew]
Microsoft announces Q2 earnings: $6.63b profit, Xbox revenue up 55%, Windows down 29%
Microsoft just announced it's had itself a solid second quarter, posting an $6.63 billion profit on record revenues of $19.95 billion. That's more or less about the same as last year, when it racked up a $6.66 billion profit on $19 billion in revenue -- and while the numbers look stable and Redmond managed to slightly beat estimates, things are changing fast underneath the bottom line: strong Kinect and Xbox 360 sales drove Entertainment and Devices Division revenue up 55 percent to $3.6 billion, but Windows and Windows Live revenue fell nearly 30 percent to $5.05 billion. That means the revenue gap between Microsoft's consumer device business and the Windows business is now just some $1.3 billion, compared to $4.8 billion this time last year -- and it undoubtedly explains why Xbox got top billing at Ballmer's CES keynote this year, after traditionally being ignored, and why Microsoft is moving Windows to ARM as the mobile and tablet spaces heat up. As for Windows Phone 7, there's nary a peep, even though Microsoft was just crowing about moving 2 million licenses yesterday -- we're taking that to mean the infant OS hasn't had any meaningful impact on revenue yet. We're going to jump on the call at 5:30PM ET, we'll let you know if anything good happens. Update: Corrected the profit numbers: it's a $6.63b profit and a $8.17b operating income, not a $8.17b profit. Update 2: As noted by our friend Michael Gartenberg, Microsoft's Q210 Windows division revenue was boosted by the inclusion of $1.71 billion in deferred Windows 7 upgrade sales and OEM pre-sales, so if you take those out, the gap between Windows and Xbox went from 3.1 billion in Q210 to 1.3 billion this quarter, and Windows sales are down 8 percent. It's not a huge change for the big picture, but it's worth noting the revenue deferral in context -- Microsoft moved cash around so it would have a huge launch quarter for Windows 7, and now things are evening out.
Nokia smartphone market share shrinks to 31 percent, operating profit takes a beating too
Stephen Elop's first quarterly results as Nokia CEO have just come out, and while the company's still growing, others seem to be speeding ahead of it. Nokia's reporting its converged mobile devices (smartphones, to you and us) reached volumes of 28.3 million during Q4 2010, which is a neat bump from 20.8 million at the same time last year and 26.5 million in the previous quarter. However, in the context of the broader smartphone marketplace, that figure now amounts to only a 31 percent share, according to Nokia's own estimates, which is a major dip relative to its 40 percent slice in Q4 2009 and 38 percent in Q3 2010. Elop's perspective on the matter is as follows: "In Q4 we delivered solid performance across all three of our businesses, and generated outstanding cash flow. Additionally, growth trends in the mobile devices market continue to be encouraging. Yet, Nokia faces some significant challenges in our competitiveness and our execution. In short, the industry changed, and now it's time for Nokia to change faster." When your operating profit goes from €1.47b (€950m net) a year ago to €1.09b (€745m net) this year, the response should indeed be to change and to change fast. Nokia's still not disclosing sales figures of the N8, but given that this was the first full reporting period where the company's Symbian flagship has been on sale, it doesn't seem to have had quite the impact Espoo will have hoped for. Wanna try again with the N9? Update: Nokia's investor relations call has borne a few more interesting tidbits from the new man in charge. Elop is quoted as saying Nokia must "build or join a competitive ecosystem," with the latter verb in that sentence sure to renew discussions of why the Finnish company should / shouldn't switch to an OS such as Android or Windows Phone 7. We still think that'll be the very last resort over in Espoo, but Elop apparently believes Nokia has the brand recognition and operator relationships to make such a move if it wanted to. Which of course it doesn't. Or does it? Let's wait for Nokia's Strategy and Financial Briefing in London on February 11th -- Mr. Elop's expected to be a lot more specific about his company's roadmap going forward on that day.
Sony's next-gen PSP (NGP) has a quad-core ARM Cortex-A9 processor, quad-core GPU as well
You know that crazy next-gen PSP (NGP) with multiple touchpads, dual analog sticks, and quadrupled resolution that Sony just trotted out? Yeah, it's got a quad-core Cortex-A9 and a quad-core Imagination Technologies PowerVR SGX543MP4+ GPU doing the grunt work within. We've never seen a handheld this powerful. Then again, considering the darn thing won't be launching until this holiday season, maybe quad-core parts will be the least Sony will need in order to match up to the "super phones" coming up this year. We're just wondering how long any of these souped-up portables will last on a charge. Full spec sheet after the break.
Sony's next PSP, codenamed NGP
Betcha didn't think this day would come, but it finally has. Sony has just come clean with its next-generation PlayStation Portable. It's actually codenamed NGP and will revolve around five key concepts: Revolutionary User Interface, Social Connectivity, Location-based Entertainment, Converging Real and Virtual (augmented) Reality. It will be compatible with the PlayStation Suite and is backwards-compatible with downloadable PSP games and content from Sony's PlayStation Store. Specs include a quad-core ARM Cortex-A9 processor, 5-inch touchscreen OLED display with 960 x 544 resolution, dual analog sticks (not nubs as on the current generation), 3G, WiFi, GPS, a rear-mounted touchpad, the same accelerometer / gyroscope motion sensing as in the PlayStation Move, an electronic compass, and cameras on both the front and back. Available this holiday season. Wait... what?! %Gallery-115252% Games will come on "new media," not UMD anymore, but we're unclear on what sort of flash memory is being used. Sony's rather proud of the fact it's offering the world's first dual analog stick combo on a portable device, though we're more geeked about the quadrupling of pixel count from the original PSP. Sony's live event has been graced by demos of some pretty popular games, including Killzone, Resistance, Little Big Planet, and Uncharted -- with the latter serving as a demo platform to show off how the NGP's rear touchpad can be used to more intuitively climb up some vines. That touch panel on the back is the same size and positioned directly under the front OLED touchscreen, which allows for some pretty sophisticated controls when using the two simultaneously. The new console's UI will be called LiveArea, which has a bunch of vertically navigable home screens and built-in social networking through PlayStation Network. You can jump between games and the LiveArea without losing your progress and comment on your buddies' great feats of mobile gaming. %Gallery-115187% In closing its presentation, Sony trotted out Hideo Kojima to show off a cutscene from MGS 4 rendered in real time on the NGP. It was pulled directly from the PS3 version of the game and ran at 20fps, which looked very smooth indeed to our liveblogging eyes. Videos and Sony's full PR are now available below. %Gallery-115199%
Sony reveals PlayStation Suite framework, store for Android gaming
Sony just dropped a bomb on the Japanese stage -- not a single PlayStation Phone, but a PlayStation Phone experience for everybody. The company unveiled a cross-platform software framework called PlayStation Suite, which sounds rather boring in those words, but what it amounts to is an official PlayStation Store filled with games for your Android tablets and cellphones. Sound familiar? Sony's starting with an emulator for existing PSOne titles and is promising an Android game store later this year, but soon it might be much, much more: the company's calling PlayStation Suite a "hardware-neutral" development framework to make games portable for all sorts of handhelds, and says that "new and exciting content" is also on the way. Sony will sponsor a first-party licensing and quality-assurance scheme called PlayStation Certified, and provide the marketplace as well, likely hoping to attract major game developers to build top-tier titles for mobile and get a piece of the action too. If your device doesn't have a pop-out gamepad handy, it looks like PlayStation Suite will emulate touchscreen controls, and you won't necessarily need a phone to get in on the action, as Sony says the next-generation PlayStation Portable will be compatible with games developed for PlayStation Suite right off the bat. Doesn't look like we're getting any details on game prices or compatible devices, but we imagine one particular phone will change all that at Mobile World Congress next month. Update: Looks like PlayStation Suite requires Android 2.3 at a minimum, and it's PSOne, not PlayStation Portable titles that will be emulated here, despite Kaz Hirai's quote during the festivities. PR after the break! %Gallery-115181%
Motorola Mobility reports robust growth in last quarter, but predicts difficult times ahead
Yes, we are deep in Q4 2010 financial reporting season, and Motorola's freshly independent Mobility arm is latest to step up and deliver its figures. Total revenue over the past three months reached $3.4 billion, marking a 21 percent increase year-on-year, net revenue from mobile devices was $2.4 billion, up by 33 percent year-on-year, and handset shipments were a seemingly healthy 4.9 million. That figure's disappointed Wall Street estimates, however -- the collective expectation, according to MarketWatch, was 5.2 million -- and the net profit of $80 million is barely (for a company of this size) in the black. More doom and gloom is cast by Motorola itself, which is predicting a difficult first quarter of 2011 that will end with the company losing between 9 and 21 cents per share in net terms. Ah well, let's try to enjoy the sunshine of Moto making money today and forget the rainclouds of tomorrow.
Motorola Atrix 4G and Xoom tablet launching at the end of February, Droid Bionic and LTE Xoom in Q2
Motorola had one of the best CES showings of any company in recent memory, and now we've got some rough ship dates for all that new gear: CEO Sanjay Jha just announced on the company's earnings call that the Atrix 4G for AT&T and 3G Xoom for Verizon will arrive at "the end of February," while the LTE-enabled Droid Bionic and LTE Xoom will arrive at "the end of the second quarter" as previously promised. That sounds good to us -- and with that earlier Best Buy leak suggesting the Xoom will hit on February 17, we're hoping that Moto's taking a long view of when the end of February actually begins. Even better, a late February Xoom release supports those rumors that Honeycomb will be generally released in March, which is when the real Android tablet invasion will begin. It's all happening, folks. Update: Oh boy. Jha followed up his Xoom comments in the Q&A portion by hinting that the Xoom might slip to March, but that he's very confident they'll make their timeline. Fingers crossed.
Android 3.0 Honeycomb SDK preview goes live
It's still going to be a little bit before you can get your hands on a Xoom, but if you'd like to start playing with the Honeycomb SDK right now -- and hey, developers, we'd encourage you to do just that -- Google's now made it possible. A version of the Android 3.0 SDK billed as a "preview" is now available for download, featuring "non-final" APIs and system images that will help would-be Android tablet devs get their feet wet as they prepare for an inevitable onslaught of these things over the next few months. So go on, get it while the gettin's good. Among the more delicious promises from Google are tablet-specific UI elements like "richer" widgets and notifications, a built-in GL renderer that permits GPU acceleration of both 2D and 3D visuals, and support for multicore processor architectures. Yay for making the most out of the available hardware. [Thanks, D]
Microsoft: 'over 2 million' Windows Phone 7 licenses sold to manufacturers so far
Microsoft just dropped a few tidbits of knowledge on us regarding Windows Phone 7's performance in the marketplace so far. Here's what we've got: 'Early research' says 93 percent of WP7 customers are 'satisfied' and 90 percent would recommend the platform to others. We don't know details about the research, though -- number of customers polled, time frame, so on. Average of 100 new apps in the Marketplace per day, and over 6,500 total are available right now. Most importantly, "over 2 million" licenses have been sold to OEMs around the world. What does that tell us? Well, let's get the elephant in the room out of the way: the iPhone 4 sold 3 million units in a little under a month after its launch, so Microsoft clearly has plenty of room to catch up -- but that comes as no surprise to us, analysts, or Microsoft itself. Furthermore, selling a license to an OEM isn't the same as selling a phone to a customer, since many of these manufactured devices are sitting on store shelves; it's unclear exactly how many WP7 devices are actually in users' pockets right now, but the number is certainly less than "over 2 million." Microsoft's earnings call is tomorrow where we expect to get more detail on the platform's performance, but the company is saying today that it sees plenty of reasons to be "bullish about the foundation for long-term success" here -- and considering that they simply can't afford to fail in the mobile game, we hope they're right.
NVIDIA GeForce GTX 560 Ti: second-generation Fermi for the $250 mainstream
Ah, NVIDIA, how far you've come. This time last year we were all wondering if your first Fermi GPUs would operate successfully without a nuclear reactor in our backyards, yet today you're introducing a successor to one of the best value-for-money GPUs the PC gaming world has seen in ages. Yes, the GTX 560 Ti has mighty big shoes to fill, but it's off to a good start with 384 CUDA cores running at 1645MHz, 1GB of GDDR5 RAM running at an effective rate of 4GHz, and an 822MHz graphics clock -- each one a clear and pronounced upgrade over its GTX 460 predecessor. You'll have to check out the reviews below for a detailed breakdown of what those numbers will mean on a game-by-game basis, but there's another way in which this new card is proving its impact already. ATI AMD has (conveniently) chosen to cut the prices of its Radeon HD 6870 and HD 6950 cards today, while also outing an HD 6950 with just 1GB of onboard memory to serve as a direct competitor to NVIDIA's latest. Competition, ladies and gentlemen, it's an awesome thing. Read - HardOCP Read - Tech Report Read - PC Perspective Read - techPowerUp! Read - AnandTech Read - Bit-tech Read - TechSpot Read - TweakTown Read - Hot Hardware
Nexus S OTA 2.3.2 update rolling out now, your SMS relations will thank you
Embarrassing SMS misdirect bug on your Android device? Nexus S owners should start checking their phones now for an over-the-air update that's supposed to fix the problem. It's being rolled out gradually, so just be patient if it's not there yet. How will we know the problem's gone for good? We'll just assume so until we find out otherwise, in some unfortunate manner. [Thanks to everyone who sent this in]
Verizon appeals FCC's net neutrality rules
Verizon's gone to the US Court of Appeals in Washington, DC today to officially take issue with the net neutrality policy that the FCC laid out in the waning moments of 2010, saying that it's "deeply concerned by the FCC's assertion of broad authority for sweeping new regulation of broadband networks and the Internet itself." The company's extremely brief press release on the matter doesn't detail where their issues lie, specifically, but they'd said back in December that they had concerns, so the move doesn't come as a terribly big surprise. If we had to guess, the no-blocking rules surrounding wireless networks are certainly high on that list of concerns -- Verizon and others have long said that wireless needs to be left largely out of the net neutrality debate -- but we won't know until we're able to dig into the court case. Follow the break for the press release.
Larry Page taking over as Google CEO, Eric Schmidt will remain as Executive Chairman
Google's Q4 financial results press release contains a bombshell: as of April 4, co-founder Larry Page (on the far right, above) will replace Eric Schmidt as CEO and assume responsibility for day-to-day operations and product development and strategy. That doesn't mean Schmidt is leaving -- he'll carry on as Executive Chairman and serve as an advisor to Page and co-founder Sergey Brin, focused on external things like "deals, partnerships, customers and broader business relationships, government outreach and technology thought leadership." As for Sergey, he'll now "devote his energy to strategic projects, in particular working on new products," with the simple title of Co-Founder. Schmidt's clarified and explained the change in a blog post, saying that the idea is to make leading Google as efficient as possible, and that "Larry, in my clear opinion, is ready to lead." It's clear the idea is to frame this as a simple organizational shuffle -- Schmidt says that he, Brin, and Page "anticipate working together for a long time to come" -- but there's no question that Schmidt's reign as CEO set a clear tone for Google as the company expanded beyond search and into new markets like smartphones, connected televisions, and operating systems, and we're curious to see what Page's style is like. We're also very curious to hear more about why the change was made -- although Schmidt, Page, and Brin have worked together for over 10 years, there's always been some tension between the co-founders and their CEO, particularly over user privacy. In any event, this is a momentous change both for Google and the industry -- we'll see what happens next.
T-Mobile confirms Galaxy S with 4G, Android-based Sidekick 4G are coming (update: pic)
Whoa, this is kind of out of the blue: on top of the Vibrant 4G that we've already had leaked ad nauseam (though he refers to it as a "Galaxy S 4G"), T-Mobile USA CEO Philipp Humm mentioned at an event this morning that the company is preparing an HSPA+ Sidekick -- yes, a Sidekick -- albeit with Android slotted in place of the defunct Danger Hiptop operating system. For the record, T-Mobile hasn't had any Sidekicks in its lineup since the middle of last year, though it does own the Sidekick brand -- not Danger / Microsoft -- and would undoubtedly love to bring it back to relevance. Coincidentally, Mister Android himself, Andy Rubin, came from Danger -- so the Sidekick's starting to follow him around. Kind of like... you know, a sidekick. Both products are said to be "coming soon." Update: After the break, spot a picture of what the Sidekick might look like, likely courtesy of HTC -- there's no mistaking that QWERTY keyboard layout.
Amazon agrees to buy UK movie streaming and rental service Lovefilm
Amazon has just announced it has agreed terms to buy up all the remaining shares of Lovefilm it didn't already own. The British outfit operates a subscription-based movie rental and streaming service in its home market along with Germany, Denmark, Sweden and Norway, and should give Amazon a very solid base from which to build its presumably Netflix-besting ambitions. Lovefilm has been just about the closest thing Europe has had to the ridiculously successful North American movie distributor and Amazon is arguably getting in just in time, given Netflix's overtures toward expanding into the UK. Customary closing conditions will need to be met before the final stamp of approval is applied, but the acquisition is expected to complete by the end of Q1 of this year. Amazon's wading into yet more content distribution, who'd have thunk it?
Google Voice now lets you port your own phone number, maybe (update)
We'd be lying if we said we hadn't been waiting on this feature since the service's debut. As one reader just notified us (and verified by a number of staffers), Google Voice now lets you port your own phone number into its system -- as in, that 10-digit hometown relic you've been holding onto as long as you've carried a handset can now live in the cloud and grant you freedom to start afresh / forward to your many on-hand devices. Check under phone setting to see if "change / port" is now an option. The cost of porting is $20 and, as you may guess, it'll terminate your current service plan and probably prompt the carrier in question to charge applicable early termination fees, but that's pittance for saving your old line for the indefinite future. You know, just in case your seventh grade crush gets the nerve to call and say, "sorry." Of course he / she will, just give it time. Update: Google just pinged us to note this feature is still being tested and may not be available to everyone. "We're continually testing new features to enhance the user experience. For a limited amount of time, we're making the Google Voice number porting process available to users. We don't have any additional details to share at this time, but plan to offer this feature to all users in the near future." We've seen it go in and out throughout the day, so yeah, just keep checking.
Nintendo 3DS coming to US March 27th for $249.99, Europe first on March 25th (video)
We've known about the 3DS for what seems like ages but now, finally, we have US launch details, courtesy of dueling press events in New York and Amsterdam. The price for Americans is $249.99 and the release date is March 27, while Europeans will get it a few days earlier, on March 25th. European pricing, however, will be decided by retailers, which leaves us feeling a little bit unfulfilled. Courtesy of our chums at Joystiq and various retailers, it looks like £229.99 is the going rate in the UK, while the rest of Europe is looking at €249.99. (Curious how it sizes up with portable's past? Joystiq's got you covered.) Nintendo is promising "30+" games to be available in the US during the launch window, more than 25 in Europe, with that window spanning between the actual launches in March and E3 in June. Sadly we're still in the dark regarding which games exactly will be available when the system drops in March. Many games were discussed, including Super Street Fighter IV: 3D Edition, Pro Evolution Soccer 2011 3D, Dead or Alive Dimensions, Rabbids 3D, Resident Evil: Revelations, a new Paper Mario, and an obligatory Madden game too. There are plenty more mentioned in PR below. This is in addition to titles we already knew about, like Pilotwings Resort and Kid Icarus: Uprising. As for pricing, retailers are showing $40 to $50 per game, so yeah, that's a We're also told that remakes of classic GameBoy and GameBoy Color titles will be hitting the Virtual Console. Meanwhile, European gamers are going to be getting a taste of exclusive 3D video content from a variety of partners, most notable being EuroSport, which will be serve up depth-enabled sports footage to portable consoles. We're also told episodes of Shaun the Sheep, a new series from Wallace & Gromit creators Aardman, will be available as well. For now these deals look Europe-only, but here's to hoping American folks will get something similar. We have European and American press releases embedded below for your reading enjoyment, as well some video we shot from the New York. %Gallery-114714%
Nintendo 3DS gets new friend code system, finds beauty in unification
Ever try to do multiplayer on a DS game? We're really sorry to hear that. It's a mess of lengthy friend codes that does more to discourage online play than enable it. That's going away with the 3DS. At Nintendo's 3DS press event in New York the company announced a new system where there's only a single code, assigned per-console and registered only once. You'll have a single group of friends and, when they pop online in a new game, you'll see them there. No need for multiple lists and, we hope, less of a need for Tylenol.
Live from Nintendo's 3DS preview with Reggie Fils-Aime
We're here live in NYC at Nintendo's 3DS press preview event, where Reggie Fils-Aime is scheduled to give a short presentation to kick things off. We're hoping to learn some pricing and availability details -- and possibly hear a word or two about 3D and the eyesight of younger gamers. After that, it's time to party, right? We'll find out.
