Tizen-Based Samsung ZeQ Leaks in New Photos, Might Never Arrive

One of the handsets that has been rumored several months ago to arrive on the market this year was a Samsung smartphone running under Tizen and featuring model number SC-03F, which has emerged in newly leaked photos, but might never be officially released.

The smartphone passed through the FCC certification process about six months ago, and photos of it have emerged from the feds now, as the confidentiality period for the filing has expired. As SammyToday notes, the handset was expected to become available for purchase in Japan on the network of NTT DoCoMo sometime in January, yet it has been delayed indefinitely. Some suggested that it could never materialize into a commercially available product. The handset is allegedly called Samsung ZeQ and, as the leaked images show, it sports a design highly similar to that of the Samsung Galaxy S4. In fact, the hardware specs announced for it suggested that it was nothing more than a Tizen-based flavor of last year’s flagship.

For those out of the loop, we should note that the mobile phone was expected to arrive on the market with a 4.8-inch touchscreen display capable of delivering a 720p resolution, as well as with a Snapdragon 800 processor inside. Moreover, the mobile phone was said to include a rear camera with LED flash and to be powered by a 2600mAh battery. As you can see from these specs, the unannounced Tizen smartphone was indeed poised to land on shelves as a new flavor of the Galaxy S4, featuring only a small set of design changes, along with a brand new OS loaded on top.

Samsung ZeQ
Images credits to FCC via SammyToday

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Huawei Honor 6 Now Official with 5’’ Screen, 6.5Mm Thin Body

Chinese mobile phone maker Huawei has been long rumored to plan the release of a new flagship handset in the popular Honor series, and the company has finally made the move today.

The handset, spotted online a few times before under the codename of Mulan, has gone official today as Huawei Honor 6, packing all of the features and capabilities the flagship is expected to include. The smartphone has been made official with a 5-inch touchscreen display capable of delivering a full HD (1080p) resolution, as well as with a very thin aluminum body, which is only 6.5mm thick (it is 139.8mm tall and 68.8mm wide). Considering the fact that some of the latest flagship handsets out there have been announced with Quad HD displays, the new Honor 6 might seem handicapped right from the start, but things are actually not that way, especially since its maker will manage to bring it to shelves at an affordable cost. Just as previously rumored, the new Huawei Honor 6 is powered by an octa-core Kirin 920 processor, which includes a quad-core Cortex-A15 CPU and a quad-core Cortex-A7 one, while being complemented by Mali-T628 graphics.

At the same time, the chipset features an integrated LTE modem, which should be able to provide data transfer rates of up to 300 Mbps, as GforGames notes. Overall, the new Kirin 920 processor, which is developed in-house by Huawei, should be able to provide users with about the same performance levels that the Qualcomm Snapdragon 805 CPU has to offer. The specifications list of the new Huawei Honor 6 also includes 3GB of RAM, along with 16/32 GB of internal memory, which is complemented by a microSD memory card slot for expansion purposes. On the back, the new device sports a 13-megapixel camera with support for full HD video recording, which is complemented by a 5MP front camera for making great video calls while on the go.

The usual set of connectivity capabilities and sensors will also be present on the new device when it arrives on the market later this year. Apparently, the Chinese vendor still hasn’t offered specifics on the handset’s availability and pricing, though it might not be too long before it reveals such details. The one thing that it has unveiled, however, is the fact that Huawei Honor 6 will run under the Android 4.4.2 KitKat operating system right out of the box. The company’s own Emotion UI 2.3 software will be also loaded on top of it, just as previously rumored.

Huawei Honor 6
Image credits to Huawei

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Microsoft Talks Nokia X2 Design and New Features

Today, Microsoft Mobile (aka Nokia’s former devices division) has made official a new handset running under Android, in the form of Nokia X2, the successor of the already highly popular Nokia X smartphone that made a debut at the Mobile World Congress in Barcelona in February this year.

The new device arrives on the market with a nice rage of enhancements over the predecessor, including a larger, 4.3-inch screen, a faster processor, a better camera and the like, but also with an enhanced design and with a series of new software features. Jussi Nevanlinna, vice president, product marketing, Mobile Phones at Microsoft, explains that the company built the Nokia X2 based on what Nokia X had to offer, while also adding exciting new features and services to it, so as to appeal to even more users. The outer design of the handset was improved with a secondary layering effect, though it kept the basics of the first-generation Nokia X phones, so as to offer continuity.

“In design alone, we’ve built on the beautiful first generation devices, and have injected something a little different and new, as you can see by the second layering effect. It just glows,” Jussi Nevanlinna says, a recent post on Nokia Conversations explains. However, this was not the only thing that got a bit redesigned in the new handset, as the Nokia X platform also received its own share of improvements and new functionality, especially with the addition of a home button to it. “The home screen experience has really evolved with extra room for additional tiles. There’s also the new home button; you can long-press the back button for easier multitasking; the new apps list view; and Fastlane has gotten richer too, with more app detail exposed,” Jussi explains.

Nokia X2 has been announced as immediately available for purchase on certain markets around the world, the same as it happened with the Nokia X handset before it. The phone will be priced at less than €100. The same as previous phones in the series, the new Nokia X2 lacks Google services, yet it replaces them with Microsoft’s own products, including Outlook, OneDrive, Skype, and OneNote, along with the Nokia Store, for access to a great deal of other applications. In fact, Microsoft notes that it is focused on ensuring that the app portal can deliver a great experience to its users, and that apps are moderated and tested to deliver high quality. Developers have great opportunities when it comes to Nokia X devices as well, as they can tap into one of the largest operator billing networks in the world, while also taking advantage of developer programs such as DVLUP, which is available in over 190 countries.

“Developers are hugely important and we’re out there working side by side, holding developer events, challenges and competitions to create great apps,” Jussi says. At the same time, he notes that the Lumia series of devices remains the company’s primary smartphone strategy.

Nokia X2
Images credits to Nokia

Jussi Nevanlinna holding Nokia X2
Image credits to Nokia Conversations

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How to Jailbreak iOS 7.1.1 Untethered on iPhone, iPad and iPod touch

We’ve tried out Pangu from the Chinese hacking group we mentioned earlier today and it seems it really does the trick, as in it can jailbreak iOS 7.1.1 on the newest of Apple devices, including iPhone 5s, iPad Air, and iPod touch fifth-generation. So here’s how to do it.

Normally, jailbreaking using unproven solutions is ill-advised, but in the case of Pangu it seems it’s right on the border. The software doesn’t contain any malware, but it does come in at a hefty 70MB and it does promote piracy. But we’ll show you how to do a clean and nice jailbreak. Without further ado, these are the actual steps you’ll be taking on your Windows PC and iOS device to perform the hack. A Mac version of the tool will be supplied in the future, and if the steps are any different, we might post another guide for Mac heads as well.

How to Jailbreak iOS 7.1.1 using a Windows Computer

Step 1

Back up your device using iTunes. In case anything goes wrong, you’ll always be able to restore your device to that backup file with no harm done.

Step 2

Visit pangu.io on a Windows computer (or in a virtual machine) and download the Pangu jailbreak tool.

Step 3

Launch Pangu on your computer and allow the software to recognize your device.

Pangu User Interface

Step 4

Uncheck the box in the middle and over to the left-hand side of Pangu’s interface, as shown in the screenshot above. This ensures that no third-party software is installed on your iPhone during the jailbreak process.

Step 5

Click on the black button over to the right-hand side

Step 6

At this point you’ll be prompted to go to the Settings panel on your iDevice and change the time and date. Go to Settings > General > Date & Time, turn off Set Automatically, and then set your phone to June 2, 2014.

Changing the date and time on the iDevice

The jailbreak process should begin automatically. If it doesn’t, just relaunch the app on your computer and start over.

Step 7

When the process gets half way through, it will appear as stuck but in reality it will have already installed Pangu on your iDevice, which is essentially the jailbreak waiting to blossom.

Step 8

Grab your device, find the Pangu icon on the Home screen and tap it. Then tap Continue, if you want to proceed with the jailbreak, of course. If not, tap Quit.

Step 9

Pangu will prompt you to keep the device connected and refrain from closing the app. At this point, the halfway process on your computer will automatically pick up where it left off and finish jailbreaking your handset.

Pangu picks up where it left off to finish the job

Your device will reboot twice, and then your jailbreak will be installed along with Cydia.

That’s it!

Disclaimer:Jailbreaking is not a practice condoned by Apple, so proceed at your own risk, especially considering that Pangu is not a proven solution just yet. If you’re itching to get a jailbreak, Pangu is currently the only solution available, so if you’re going to use it, at least use it properly. 

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