Android and Me |
- Cyanogen: AT&T’s Galaxy S 4 bootloader locked down
- Samsung Galaxy Tab 3 announced and benchmarked
- HP working on a pair of Android devices powered by Tegra 4
- Video Highlights are the killer feature of the HTC One
| Cyanogen: AT&T’s Galaxy S 4 bootloader locked down Posted: 30 Apr 2013 01:01 PM PDT It’s a sad day for hackers and modders. In a post on his Google Plus page, Steve Kondik, AKA Cyanogen himself, has stated, “It’s confirmed. The AT&T S4 authenticates the recovery and boot images before executing them.” In other words, the AT&T variant of the Galaxy S 4 will feature a locked bootloader, preventing owners of the device from installing custom third-party ROMs like CyanogenMod. Where Veizon is well known for locking down the bootloaders of any phone they carry, AT&T has generally seen fit to leave Samsung devices alone. The fact that Samsung has, in the past, been developer-friendly leaves Cyanogen to speculate that “their hand was forced” in this situation. He then goes on to provide some words of wisdom to not only AT&T, but would-be Galaxy S 4 owners as well: The only outcome I see here is stacks of bricked devices being sent back for warranty replacement due to the ease of causing a permanent boot failure, especially since the device is trivially rootable. If you really care about having an unlocked bootloader on your device, the best way to make yourself heard is to vote with your wallet. Don’t buy an AT&T S 4 with the hopes that someone will find a way around it. You might not get that lucky. 
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| Samsung Galaxy Tab 3 announced and benchmarked Posted: 30 Apr 2013 12:37 PM PDT If you thought Samsung was done announcing products for a moment after the Galaxy S 4, think again. This week, Samsung unveiled the next entry in their budget-friendly 7-inch tablet line: the Samsung Galaxy Tab 3. Compared to previous models the Samsung Galaxy Tab 3 looks thoroughly disappointing, at least on paper. The product information sheet on Samsung Mobile’s website leaves some questions to be answered when it comes to the processor and GPU; what is listed is nothing to get excited over. What’s pushing the Tab’s the 7-inch 1024 x 600 display, 1GB of RAM, 4000 mAh battery 1.3-megapixel front-facing camera and 3-megapixel rear camera is a lowly 1.2 GHz Dual Core processor — clocked only slightly higher than the dual-core TI-OMAP found in the Galaxy Tab 2. Thankfully, a benchmark listing on GLBenchmark has shed some light on that dual-core processor powering the Tab 3, and detailed how it stacks up against the Tab 2 as well. According to the benchmark listing, the Tab 3 is using a Marvell PXA986 paired with Vivante GC1000 GPU. The thought here is that by looking to Marvell, Samsung will be able to keep the cost down while still improving performance. In every category benchmarked the Tab 3 shows nearly double the performance of its predecessor. This performance boost, along with Android 4.1 Jelly Bean, should make the Galaxy Tab 3 feel like quite the capable tablet. If you can look past the screen resolution, the Galaxy Tab 3 is already shaping up to be surprisingly impressive. There are quite a few people out there who like TouchWiz, and if rumors of a $150 price tag prove true, the Tab 3 could turn out to be a successful little tablet. 
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| HP working on a pair of Android devices powered by Tegra 4 Posted: 30 Apr 2013 09:40 AM PDT Several months ago we revealed that HP was working on a family of high-end Android devices powered by NVIDIA’s Tegra 4 chip, and this week we are learning the first details of these upcoming products. A couple of leaked benchmark details reveal that HP has a 10-inch notebook and 21-inch all-in-one computer that are currently in testing. We are expecting to see the first devices with Tegra 4 appear in the coming months, so HP could announce these interesting devices at any given time. HP SlateBook 10 x2 The HP SlateBook x2 should feature a similar design to the Envy x2. First up we have the HP SlateBook 10 x2. Details are limited, but the device is rumored to include a quad-core 1.8 GHz Tegra 4 chip and run Android 4.2.2. Based on the name of the device, we believe the SlateBook 10 x2 will be a 10-inch version of the HP Envy x2 Windows notebook. The first Android device to feature a Tegra 3 chip, the ASUS Transformer Prime, featured a similar tablet design with detachable keyboard, so it’s interesting we could see a repeat with the first device with Tegra 4. The HP Envy x2 has a suggested retail price of $649, which is similar to where the Transformer Prime debuted ($500 tablet + $149 keyboard dock), but we hope that HP can bring the price down a little for the SlateBook 10 x2. HP Slate21 AIO An example of the HP AIO family of devices. Next up we have the HP Slate21 AIO. Once again the details are limited, but the device is rumored to include a quad-core 1.8 GHz Tegra 4 chip and run Android 4.2.1. Based on the name of the device, we believe the Slate21 AIO will be a 21-inch all-in-one desktop computer. We haven’t seen too many Android devices that are designed for the desktop experience, but the Tegra 4 chip should certainly have the horsepower to drive the large display. We are slowly starting to see more desktop productivity Android apps that are designed for larger displays, and we are curious if HP will include any custom Android apps that take full advantage of this design. Which form factor are you more excited about? Another tablet with detachable keyboard or a full on desktop computer with keyboard and mouse? 
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| Video Highlights are the killer feature of the HTC One Posted: 30 Apr 2013 09:00 AM PDT Spoiler alert! The new HTC One has the best camera experience of any smartphone I have tested. I’m still working on our comprehensive review of the device, but I wanted to share my favorite feature of the new HTC One Ultrapixel camera — Video Highlights. As you can see from my previous videos (like the HTC One unboxing), I suck at filming and editing things. I still enjoy capturing video, but I hate spending time on editing. HTC has solved this problem with a new feature called Video Highlights. It might be difficult to relay the pure joy and wow-factor, but I’ll do my best to describe the Video highlight experience. There are three basic steps to creating a highlight video:
If that sounds overly simple, it’s because making these videos is really that easy. HTC allows you to manually control which content goes into a video, and there are multiple theme packs to control the music and effects, but all those tweaks are optional. To give you a sample of what to expect, I created a couple of Video Highlights that feature the HTC One in action (yes, two devices were used in this experiment). I spent around 10 minutes capturing video, 0 minutes composing the videos, 1 minute to save and export a video, and then another 5 minutes for the video to upload. The results are below. As you can see, each video has its own look and feel even though they share the same content. HTC provides you with six theme packs to choose from, but we are told that more should be available in the future. Once the videos are saved on your device, they can be uploaded to any social network of your choice. Each video is around 30 seconds long and they have file sizes of 9-12 MB. HTC has also provided their own service called HTC Share, but the videos are only available for 90 days. Here is a sample video on HTC Share that I created. In total, you could create and share a professional looking video in under 15 minutes if you wanted. Power users can take all the time they want composing their shots and selecting what content goes into a video, but I love that the entire process can happen in minutes if you choose. There are lots of ways that people will use Video Highlights, so it will be interesting to see what people come up with. We think they will be great for capturing a family outing, reliving a night on the town with friends, or sharing a personal moment at home. Last week I made a quick highlight video of my son crawling around. My parents live out of town, so I shared it with my Mom via Google+. This morning she sent me a message saying, “I just watched it and had to step out of a meeting because I started crying. Thank you so much for making those.” Not every video will be that emotional, but HTC has created something truly special that is only available on their flagship device. I’m sure that other companies will eventually copy the experience, but HTC should be commended for what they have achieved. Brought to you by the new all-metal HTC One®. It’s everything your phone isn't.
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