HTC One to Bring Dual-SIM Capabilities to Europe Soon

Following its official launch in China, the dual-SIM flavor of the HTC One flagship smartphone is expected to become available in various European countries as well, including Russia.

According to a recent post on Hi-tech.Mail.ru, the smartphone will arrive on shelves in Russia with a price tag of 29,990 rubles (around $960 / €720) attached to it. The smartphone is also said to hit shelves with 32GB of internal memory, and with all the features and capabilities that the international flavor of the HTC One arrived on shelves with, UnwiredView reports.

This means that users will enjoy its 4.7-inch Full HD screen, along with a 1.7GHz quad-core processor, 2GB of RAM and the 4MP UltraPixel photo snapper on the back. HTC One runs under Android 4.1 Jelly Bean at the moment.

HTC One
Image credits to HTC

Read more »

XOLO Q600 with 1.2GHz Quad-Core CPU and Android 4.1

A new smartphone is expected to become official from XOLO in the not too distant future, namely the XOLO Q600, which should pack a 1.2GHz quad-core MediaTek processor inside when made official.

The new device is also said to pack 512MB of RAM, a 4.5-inch FWVGA touchscreen display, along with a 5-megapixel photo snapper on the back, and a front camera for video calling. As Android Nova notes, the handset will also pack 4GB of internal storage, microSD card slot, a 2000 mAh battery inside, and Google’s Android 4.1 Jelly Bean OS loaded on top.

The phone was already spotted on the Nenamark benchmarking website, with some of its hardware specifications being confirmed through that listing, yet no official announcement on it has been made as of now. The XOLO Q600 might land on shelves in a matter of weeks, priced at INR 8,499 ($150 / 115 Euro), a post on AndroidOS reads.

XOLO Q600
Image credits to Android Nova via AndroidOS

Read more »

Lenovo K900 Announced for More Asian Markets

Today, Intel and Lenovo officially announced the availability of the Atom Z2580-based Lenovo K900 smartphones in more markets in Asia, including Thailand and Malaysia.

Available or set to become available in eight countries at the moment (China, India, Indonesia, Malaysia, Russia, Thailand, the Philippines and Vietnam), the smartphone is also expected in more markets before the end of summer, the two companies unveiled. The handset arrives on shelves with a 2.0GHz dual-core Intel Atom Z2580 processor inside, which uses the Intel Hyper-Threading technology to deliver increased performance to its users. Furthermore, the smartphone packs Intel Graphics Media Accelerator engine running a PowerVR SGX 544MP2 GPU, which offers increased graphics performance. The Clover Trail+ platform packed inside the device should provide users with smooth Web browsing, vibrant, glitch-free, full HD movies, and a great multi-tasking experience.

The Lenovo K900 comes to the market with a 5.5-inch IPS display capable of delivering a 1080p full high-definition resolution, which is protected by the touch-capacitive Gorilla Glass 2. The mobile phone also packs a 13-megapixel photo snapper on the back, with support for full HD video recording, as well as a front camera for making video calls. Running under Google’s Android operating system, the smartphone features a 6.9mm thin body and weighs 162g. It sports a durable casing, made of stainless steel alloy and polycarbonate in a Unibody mold. "Many of the world's fastest-growing smartphone markets are in Asia," said JD Howard, vice president, Mobile Internet Digital Home business operations and business development.

"Lenovo has built a strong smartphone base in China, and last year we began offering our smartphones in additional markets. The Lenovo K900 is a world-class smartphone, which will compete well around the world. Intel has been an ideal partner for developing the K900 and ensuring an outstanding user experience for our customers." According to Lenovo, the handset will arrive in 10 new markets before the end of the year, in addition to those in which it is already launched, such as China, India, Indonesia, Russia, the Philippines and Vietnam.

Lenovo K900
Image credits to Lenovo

Read more »

Intel Merrifield-Based Smartphone Reference Design

Chip maker Intel is moving forth with its development of mobile processors, and is moving closer towards the release of the first smartphones powered by its latest such solution, namely the Merrifield CPU.

The company came to Computex in Taiwan this week with a smartphone reference design to showcase the next-generation 22nm Atom SoC, along with its forthcoming 4G LTE multimode solution, latest reports on the matter suggest. For the time being, however, it is uncertain whether the LTE radio will be integrated inside the new Atom chips, or will come separately, though it’s certain that Intel plans on implementing the capability in the silicon.

Based on the Silvermont architecture, the Merrifield chip should provide increased performance over previous CPUs from the company, while also delivering important battery savings, Intel announced. According to Engadget, the first consumer devices powered by the new chip will land only in 2014.

Intel showcases Merrifield reference design smartphone
Image credits to Engadget

Read more »

Watch the Windows 8.1 Start Button in Action [Video]

Microsoft has already confirmed that the Start button would return in Windows 8.1, but the company has revealed only few details about it.

Now a clip posted on YouTube and revealed by Tom Warren on Twitter shows what seems to be the future Start button in action, even though no other specifics have been provided. The video was recorded on Windows 8.1 Enterprise build 9410 and, as we can all see, the Start button is not turned on by default when working on the desktop. Of course, clicking the button instantly gets users to the Start screen, so it doesn’t launch the popular Start Menu available in Windows 7 and its predecessors.

More details, however, will be provided later this month when Microsoft is set to officially unveil the public preview of Windows 8.1. Until then, take all unconfirmed reports with a pinch of salt as they can very well be fake.

This is the Windows 8.1 Start button. Note that this will always be visible in desktop mode, this is an early build being demonstrated with the support.
Video credits to Tom Warren

Read more »

ASUS ROG Maximus VI Formula Motherboard Has CrossChill Cooling

ASUS pulled out all the big guns when it made the latest member of the Maximus series of motherboards. As expected when designing something bearing the Republic of Gamers (ROG) brand.

The new product, predictably enough, bears the LGA 1150 socket, which can hold Intel's fourth-generation Core Series chips. Haswell as they are widely known. The Z87 chipset drives the platform, which is the high-end option, unlike the H87 and B85 made for the mid-to-performance segments and low-end boards, respectively. An 8-pin connector, it turns out, isn't enough to power the CPU socket. And with the PWM supply layout similar to the one on the Z87 Maximus VI Extreme, the decision was made to add a 4-pin plug too. The motherboard also has four DDR3 memory slots (DIMM), as well as three PCI Express 3.0 x16 slots, plus three mini PCI Express 3.0 x1 slots. Ten SATA ports are present as well, all with compatibility with 6 Gbps transfer speeds.

ASUS also tossed in 8.1 channel audio (Supreme FX technology), a jack featuring OP AMP tech, and the CrossChill Cooling technology. That last asset is quite important, as it enhances the prowess of liquid cooling, making the VRM cooler through heatsinks placed on the PWM supply phase. As anyone can see, everything on the Maximus VI Formula that doesn't need to interact with anything is covered by a black shroud. Then there's the Extreme Engine Digi+ III power delivery design. It consists of 10K Black Metallic capacitors, 90% efficiency NexFET MOSFETs, and 60A BlackWing chokes.

Finally, the newcomer is bundled with an mPCIe Combo II card that provides customers with Bluetooth 4.0 and, more importantly, 802.11ac Wi-Fi connectivity. The M.2 interface for ultra-compact NGFF (Next Generation Form-Factor) SSDs is just a small bonus. Sadly, no price or exact availability date has been revealed yet.

ASUS Maximus VI Formula
Image credits to ASUS

Read more »