Thread: Anandtech News

Intel's Mooly Eden just ran through a couple of demos running on Ivy Bridge based Ultrabooks. The first demo was a real time Havok render of a troll. The second was supposed to be a DX11 racing demo, however the demo itself appeared to be a video of gameplay looping rather than a live demo (video player controls briefly popped up during the demo, tisk tisk).
There's not much we can tell about Ivy Bridge graphics based on these two demos (especially not the demo that was just a video), but Intel is apparently weeks away from final silicon of Ivy Bridge. We'll see the first OEM notebooks go into production in late March/early April.



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We're at the AT&T Developer Conference keynote where CEO Ralph De La Vega is making announcements about the company's plans and new devices for 2012. Unfortunately our view isn't the greatest so we'll be rolling without photos for a while and updating later.

First off, AT&T announced a new set of payment APIs for android which allow for payments to be made directly to the subscriber's AT&T account. AT&T demoed an HTML5 payment API implementation which worked natively on the HTC Jetstream tablet.

Updating...

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ASUS just announced an updated version of the Eee Pad Transformer Prime, the TF700T. The new tablet keeps the same form factor, dimensions, screen size and weight of the original TF Prime. It also includes the same Tegra 3 SoC running at 1.3GHz, but it now adds a 1920 x 1200 panel. In addition to the new panel is an upgraded 2MP front facing camera and finally a new back panel for improved wireless performance. Battery capacity and the rest of the specs remain identical to the TF201.
ASUS expects the TF700T to be available in North America sometime in late Q2 (I'd assume May/June), with MSRPs between $599 - $699. The original Prime will still be available in the market, the TF700T will simply be a higher end model.



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Out of all of the launched Ultrabooks, we like ASUS' Zenbook UX21 and UX31 the best. While ASUS doesn't have any major Ultrabook announcements at CES, it is updating the UX series to include both pink and rose gold features.
All of the UX ultrabooks are now shipping with an Elan Touchpad (not sure how that compares to what we originally reviewed, will try to find out this week) and updated drivers to improve resume/standby times.
Gallery: ASUS Zenbook UX Series, Now in Pink





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ASUS originally introduced its 7-inch Eee Pad MeMO tablet at CES 2011, but today it is announcing that in Q2 of this year it'll be available in North America. The tablet will feature a 7-inch 1280 x 800 IPS panel, a Qualcomm MSM8260 SoC and it will ship with Ice Cream Sandwich (Android 4.0.1 as of now).
The tablet measures 7.8 x 4.6 x 0.5" and weighs 14.2 oz. A capacitive stylus will ship with the tablet, cementing the MeMO's role as a tablet that's designed for note taking (similar to the HTC Flyer).



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Intel talked about the Nikiski concept PC at Computex last year. The concept is simple: replace the palm rest and touchpad on a notebook with a transparent strip with integrated touchpad. When open the touchpad area should work just like a glass covered touchpad. Intel also includes palm detection that disables the mouse cursor if it detects that you're resting your hands on the transparent strip. Close the clamshell and the transparent touchpad will act as a capacitive window to your display. With some support in Windows 8 Intel claims you'll be able to do things like view your calendar, read emails, even browse the web through this little window. Both sides of the transparent strip support capacitive touch so you'll still be able to interact with your machine when closed.
Nikiski is still just a concept PC but it's now functional. Intel owns the patent on the design, but as is normally the case with these concepts it's unclear when we'll see something like it in the market. Make the design thin enough and I definitely see potential though. It'd be nice to still have access to some of your data even when your notebook is closed.
Gallery: Intel's Functional Nikiski Concept PC: Transparent Touchpad Doubles as a Screen Window




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ION Audio's iCade, the faux-retro Bluetooth arcade cabinet for the iPad and iPad 2, is getting some company this year: the company is currently showing off the new iCade Core, iCade Mobile, and iCade Jr. at CES. All three products are due to show up at some future date in 2012.
The iCade Core is a streamlined version of the original iCade that eschews the first model's arcade cabinet casing, but allows your iPad, iPhone, or iPod Touch to operate in landscape mode. Like the original, the iCade uses Bluetooth to handle communication but provides a dock connector for charging. There's no word on whether the lack of an arcade cabinet will make the iCade Core less expensive than the $99 iCade, but it seems likely.

Slightly more interesting is the iCade Mobile (above), which adds buttons and a directional pad to iPhones and iPods Touch. As mobile gaming becomes more popular, a notable complaint is that traditional shooters and platformers don't always work well without physical buttons - the iCade Mobile (or something like it) could help it play more of the same games that grace systems from Nintendo and Sony. When it launches, it will sell for $79.99.

Lastly, the iCade Jr. is pretty straigtforward - it's a version of the original iCade designed for iPhones and iPods rather than the iPad. Like the standard iCade, it uses Bluetooth for data and includes a dock connector for charging, and has a joystick and eight buttons - four on the front and four on the back. When it launches, it will sell for $49.

When launched, all of these devices should be compatible with all games that support the iCade, an extensive list of which can be found on the original accessory's ThinkGeek product page.

Source: Engadget



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Ahead of their keynote, Samsung and AT&T announced that they would be the first North American carrier to sell Samsung's Phone/Tablet mash-up, the Galaxy Note. Featuring a 5.3" HD SuperAMOLED display, this device pushes the boundaries of what could comfortably called a phone; and the experience is further blurred by a stylus interface called S Pen, that provides functionality similar to the HTC Flyer. The phone currently runs TouchWiz-infused Gingerbread, though Samsung has already released a timeline for the Ice Cream Sandwich upgrade; and it's powered by a dual-core 1.5 GHz processor, most likely the same Qualcomm chipset in the Skyrocket, and will run on AT&T's nascent LTE network.
Gallery: Samsung Galaxy Note Joining AT&T's Stables


The phone ships with 16 GB of onboard NAND, and is expandable by microSD, features 8MP rear and 2MP front shooters, and with a massive (for a phone) 2500 mAh battery, shouldn't have awful battery life. Release date and pricing was not announced, but we'll have a hands-on as soon as we can find one to handle.

The Galaxy S II Skyrocket was released just a few months ago, and has already been replaced in the form of the Samsung Galaxy S II Skyrocket HD. The 4.65" HD Super AMOLED device runs the same internals as the original Skyrocket (and the Note) and is a RAZR baiting 9.27 mm thick. While the Note runs its display at 1280x800, the Skyrocket HD is a narrower 1280x720, and both feature RGBG PenTile displays. We've yet to see an HD SuperAMOLED Plus display, but as we've mentioned before, as subpixel densities increase, the graininess of PenTile displays is much less noticeable.

When AT&T introduced their first two LTE phones, we noted that their line-up was significantly cheaper than Verizon's offerings. With the Samsung Exhilarate AT&T is still putting price pressure on Big Red by driving the entry price of LTE to a surprising sub-$50 price. The 4" Super AMOLED display will no doubt borrow from the original Galaxy S parts bin and is being touted as being built from 80% recycled post-consumer materials. Buyers will also have access to AT&T's IPTV U-verse Live TV service through their phones. Hands-on posts will be inbound shortly.



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HTC CEO Peter Chou took the stage at AT&T's developer conference keynote, and held up the HTC Titan II - AT&T's first LTE WP7 device. This comes just a few hours before Nokia is expected to present its own LTE-enabled WP7 device on AT&T.
The Titan II includes a whopping 16 MP backside illuminated CMOS sensor with a wide angle optical system alongside dual LED flash, image stabilization, and 720p video recording. The Titan II is also powered by a 1.5 GHz Snapdragon S2 SoC, in line with current WP7 devices.

We'll get hands on with the HTC Titan II soon and update with our impressions.



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It has been just 5 months since the launch of the Motorola Droid 3, and today at day 0 on CES, Motorola has announced its 4G LTE-enabled replacement, the Motorola Droid 4. The Motorola Droid 4 appears to marry the industrial design and profile of the Motorola Droid RAZR to a five-row QWERTY keyboard and likewise includes the same 1.2 GHz OMAP4430 SoC.

Motorola Droid 4 (left), RAZR MAXX (right)

Coenciding with the announcement is the rumored RAZR MAXX. The RAZR MAXX is essentially a thicker RAZR which includes a bigger battery (no word on exact size yet) and 32 GB of NAND onboard. The addition of a bigger battery brings thickness up to 8.99 mm from the 7.1 mm of the original RAZR. Both devices will ship initially with Android 2.3.5 and be updated later to Android 4.0.

Source: Motorola (Droid 4), Motorola (RAZR MAXX)

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