IBLOG SPACE

Apple will be introducing an advanced voice command technology with the iPhone 4S called Siri. The technology comes from integrating the Siri Assistant app that Apple acquired last year and allows users to access various features on their phones, such as text messages, calendar, and email, via simple voice commands. But, with the launch of the iPhone 4S on October 14, the original standalone Siri Assistant app will be shut down. Current users of the original Siri Assistant app have been notified that the app will shut down on October 15. They were alerted via the following message from the app: “I’ve been replaced! The new Siri is even smarter and better-looking than me, and waiting for you on the iPhone 4S. I’ll be leaving for home Oct. 15th.” This will likely upset some users that have grown accustom to the convenience of the app, which has already been pulled from the App Store since Tuesday’s iPhone 4S announcement. The integration of Siri with the iPhone 4S includes the abilit

Lenovo has begun taking orders for its IdeaPad A1 tablet, which we first saw in an assortment of candy coated colors back in September. The budget-friendly 7-inch Android 2.3 Gingerbread slate features mid-range specs and is priced starting at $199, right in line with the recently launched 7-inch tablet from Amazon called the Kindle Fire. Although it lacks the fanfare and appeal of Amazon’s offering as well as the ecosystem of products and services, the Lenovo IdeaPad A1 has some hardware components that the Kindle Fire lacks—mainly cameras. The IdeaPad A1 features a 2-megapixel front-facing camera and a 5-megapixel rear-facing camera. The tablet features a 7-inch LED display with 1024 x 600 resolution powered by a TI OMAP 3622 Cortex A8 1GHz single-core processor and has offline GPS and navigation. It measures 11.9mm thin and weighs about 400 grams. It also has Bluetooth, WiFi, micro SD, micro USB, and stereo speakers. The $199 price is for the 2GB version in black, while the 16

HTC released its unaudited Q3 earnings results today, revealing that the company’s net profit had risen 68 percent from last year, reaching NT$18.64 billion or about US$615.3 milion. Despite a 34 percent drop in stock value since July 1, the company’s total revenue has grown by 79 percent to NT$135.8 billion or about US$4.4 billion. The 34 percent drop in HTC’s shares were due to concerns over the growing competition in the smartphone market while the company faced increasing litigation from Apple over patent issues. Although the Q3 earnings are consistent with expectations, there still remains concern over the performance of HTC’s new products, including the HTC Rhyme and HTC Sensation, which will determine its Q4 results. Additionally, HTC has seen a decrease in margins, suggesting that the company is increasing expenses on its new products. The company announced a $300 million exclusive partnership with Beats Audio that would bring the brand and its technology to future HTC hand

The Sony Ericsson joint venture may soon be controlled completely by Sony as the company aims to bring more of the mobile phone operations in house to boost its competitiveness. The WSJ reports that Sony is near closing the deal with Ericsson to buy its half of the venture for around $1.3 to $1.7 billion, which includes the Stockholm-based company’s mobile technology patents. Sony Ericsson’s 50-50 joint venture was created back in 2001 and is currently the world’s sixth largest cellphone manufacturer. However, Sony’s probably not too happy with being left so far behind with Samsung and Apple continuing to dominate the mobile landscape. The Japanese company’s new strategy aims to integrate its mobile phones, gaming devices, and PC businesses to reduce cost and make development faster and more efficient. Sony sees smartphones and tablets as essential components in growing its online network of music, videos, and games. The company has long wanted to feature its Sony PlayStation brand

This week Target will be evolving their mobile selection in several places, most notably in the tablet department, where Android tablets will be much closer to the smartphone selection than the iPad 2. For those of you that follow my analytics of the Target department store chain (whose home is right here in sunny Minnesota), you know that I’ve had more than one conniption fit over both the placement of Android tablets and the arrangement of their entire mobile section in general. Just this morning while picking up some random oddities, I noticed that big red may well have heard my siren call: the Android tablets are now less than 10 feet away from the smartphones. Well wait, you might be saying, isn’t that where they should be? Yes it is! Up until now, as you’ll see in this post from several months ago, the tablet selection for Android was both irritably badly set up AND was 2 whole aisles away (at least) from the rest of the mobile section of Target. What’s happening now, it seems,

RIM today released an important BlackBerry Tablet OS update for its PlayBook to version 1.07.3312. The free update brings the latest version of the Adobe Flash Player to address some potential security issues. There have been no known reports of PlayBooks being affected by the Adobe Flash issue, but it’s recommended to upgrade to be safe. If you currently own a BlackBerry PlayBook tablet, you should automatically get a notification for the software update. You can also check for it under the Software Update section in the settings menu. PlayBook tablets purchased after October 6 will have the update installed automatically during the setup process. Unfortunately, this isn’t the major BlackBerry Tablet OS 2.0 update that’s been rumored. The update is expected to add native email, contacts, and calendar functionality as well as the Android app player. However, it’s believed that RIM will release the update later this month during the BlackBerry DevCon event.

When a device hits the FCC here in the USA, we know that it’s getting MUCH more possible that the hardware will be dropping into stores sooner than later – that’s what’s going on with Toshiba’s next Android tablet. This tablet is the next-generation device after the Toshiba Thrive, a thicker Android tablet that we reviewed some months ago – this newest tablet from big T promises ports galore like its predecessor along with a unique dip around the entire edge of the casing. This tablet is a miraculous 7.7mm thin, making it the thinnest tablet in the world if it’s released before anyone else gets there. And get there it shall if the FCC is to be trusted, today the tablet winning approval with both Wi-fi and Bluetooth capabilities in-tact. An interesting fact to note: the FCC documents from the listing show this device to have been constructed by Quanta, the same Chinese OEM that’s about to be responsible for the Amazon Kindle Fire and the RIM BlackBerry PlayBook – a device which the Ki

Since all the way back in July of 2010 we’ve been talking about this tablet that was supposed to be undeniably affordable at sub-$50 USD and running Android – now it’s basically arrived and, well, it’s a dud. Wouldn’t you know it, the group that’s been hired by the Indian government to create the tablet decided to make the tablet with cheap enough parts to make a profit on it, and boy oh boy is this tablet a piece of junk. But it’s the thought that counts, right? Note that in the past, this tablet had a different name, but now, according to the Wall Street Journal, it has a brand new name – perhaps to re-invigorate the government on the idea. Where you’ll see the name as Sakshat tablet in the two posts listed above, the name has been changed recently to “Aakash,” or “sky.” If the reviews are in for this device on the usability end, especially when compared to the rest of the tablet computers in the world at large today, this “Sky” tablet doesn’t really stand a chance. For example,

All the way back in April if 2011 we first heard of the possibility of a Samsung / VISA device running with an NFC chip to assure it of widespread use. Now it’s October, just 295 days to go until the actual Olympics 2012 events in London, and VISA has confirmed that the device is, indeed, on track to be released in advance (how early yet we still do not know) of the games come next year. This device is set to be widely adopted (in other words, inexpensive) and will be promoted as an Olympics games “must have” device. So you’ve got these Olympic games, right? And you’ve got a device that we must assume has a camera somewhere on it – and NFC for mobile payments. You know what that means? It means that these games are set to be the most socially shared and easily payed-for Olympics of all time! That is, if all goes according to plan. Pocket Lint’s Stuart Miles was at the VISA Europe presentation at the company’s first European security summit in Frankfurt, Germany – there it was Sandra

When it comes to Pantech here in the USA, we’ve not exactly seen the best of the crop for smartphones – all that may be about to change with the Pantech Vega LTE. This device has a 4.5-inch 1280 x 800 pixel resolution display, runs Android 2.3.x Gingerbread, and totes a 1.5 GHz dual-core processor of yet unknown origin. That’s set to go up against the big guns, if I do say so myself. The device itself doesn’t look that unlike a Galaxy S II, will be available in black or in white, and rumor has it, might be coming to the USA before too long. Currently, on the other hand, the device is only slated for release inside South Korea, so don’t get your hopes up TOO high, but check it out here anyway. It’s got a 720p screen, has a gigantic 1860 mAh battery inside, and runs on 1GB or RAM. Inside you’ll also find 16GB of storage with no word on the ability to add microSD cards to bump this up, but by the looks of it there might be a port on the right side of the display – look like that to you?

It was less than a year ago that Android first saw the official Google Docs app, and just this week we’re seeing, for the first time, tablet optimization. When you’ve got a bigger screen, you’ve got much more room to add columns, rows, bigger content, and MORE content. That’s what the folks at Google know, and that’s what they’ve delivered. Experience for yourself the loveliness of the official Google presentation of a large-format Google Docs on tablets. Instead of creating an entirely separate app for Honeycomb, the friendly people at Google in their labs creating sweet creations have infused the functionality into the original app, thus creating an app that has the ability to look and feel great on any sized display. Three panel view exists now, allowing you to see separations between folders, documents, and the contents of those documents all at once. Thumbnail previews are included all the way on the right, while tapping a preview brings you into a much larger view for editing

HTC has announced its latest Android smartphone, the HTC Sensation XL, and we grabbed hands-on time with the first of the company’s phones to be designed with Beats Audio from the ground up. Slotting in alongside the Sensation XE, but packing 4.7-inch WVGA display, 1.5GHz single-core processor and 16GB of integrated storage, the Sensation XL is, HTC is resolute, a multimedia maven first and foremost. Check out our first-impressions, plus video, after the cut. Broadly speaking, the Sensation XL is HTC’s Android version of the HTC Titan. Neither has a dual-core processor, but there’s HTC’s slick unibody styling, some nice brushed metal on the back and an 8-megapixel camera with dual LED flash that’s capable of 720p (though not 1080p) HD video recording. Up front is a 1.3-megapixel camera for video calls. Android and HTC Sense 3.5 are running on Qualcomm’s MSM8255 processor, paired with 768MB of RAM and 16GB of storage (of which 12.64GB is available to the user; that’s all you get, too,

Lovers of fabulous racing games will be glad to know that the world’s greatest mobile-based jetski racing game, Riptide GP, will be flowing across the entirety of Android this month. Up until now, the game had been exclusive to NVIDIA Tegra 2 dual-core processor-having devices because the developers of this game had worked closely with the support team at the chipmaker to optimize it for their current hero chip. Today it was announced that the game would expand beyond those borders and be available for all Android devices, no limitations. While the game will certainly still look best on an NVIDIA Tegra 2 certified ultra-awesome device (no, I’m not biased), the game will be out on every single kind of Android device later inside October of 2011, with only a few limitations including, well, lets just say you probably won’t want to run this game on your HTC Hero. Dual cores a plus! You’ll have to wait about a week (or more, depending on what it’ll take to get the game running smoothly

Red faces and frustrated shoppers at Best Buy today, with the retailer refusing to honor a $99.99 sale price advertised online for the HTC Flyer. Eagle-eyed shoppers caught the Android 2.3 Gingerbread WiFi-only tablet market down by $200 from its regular price, but Best Buy is now claiming it is a SKU error and won’t be offering the Flyer sub-$100. That’s despite the listing still showing up in search results for the Flyer, though the product page itself has been yanked. According to the listing, however, the Flyer was sold out for online sales but could be purchased in-store if stock was available. Unfortunately, when Gear Diary and Droid Life actually went to pick up the cut-price tablet, Best Buy confirmed it was a mistake. It’s unclear if any online sales actually went through at $99.99 – and, if so, whether they’ll be honored – but there’s no deal to be had in stores.

A visionary, a great entrepreneur and the “leading light” of the digital age: some of the most prominent names in the tech industry and beyond have joined in praised Apple’s Steve Jobs, who passed away yesterday at the age of 56. Uncompromising and focused, Jobs was responsible in no small part for a ground shift in computing, and his death has prompted an outpouring of tributes in the hours since the announcement. We’ve gathered together some of the comments that have particularly caught our attention, as we think on what Jobs achieved in his time with us. Microsoft co-founder and current chairman Bill Gates was for many years pitted as Jobs’ arch rival, and points out that he and the Apple founder were “colleagues, competitors and friends” for more than half their lives: “I’m truly saddened to learn of Steve Jobs’ death. Melinda and I extend our sincere condolences to his family and friends, and to everyone Steve has touched through his work. Steve and I first met nearly 30 yea