Nokia Lumia Phones Launched in India:TI

Nokia has announced the launch of its top end Lumia 800 and budget oriented Lumia 710 phones. These devices are Nokia's first Windows Phone powered devices, and will be available in India by mid-December. The Finish Mobile giant has not yet announced the pricing for both these devices.

Both the Lumia 800 and Lumia 710 devices run on a 1.4-GHz processor. Also both phones also support HD video playback.
The Nokia Lumia 800 comes in a uni-body design, sports a 3.7-inch AMOLED display and weighs around 142 g. It will also have 512 MB of RAM, 16GB of internal user memory, and will feature an 8 MP camera with 28 mm wide angle lens.

The Nokia Lumia 710, while featuring the same processor as its costlier cousin, the Lumia 800, has a plastic construction. It also features a WVGA LCD display, a 5 MP camera, 8 GB of internal user memory and weighs around 125.5 g.

Nokia has bundled apps such as Nokia Drive, Nokia Music, into both the devices. It remains to be seen how well these Windows phone powered devices will do in a smartphone market that is pretty much dominated by Apple and Google.

TI:Google Releases Ice Cream Sandwich Source Codes

Google has just released the source code for the latest build of Android, deliciously titled "Ice Cream Sandwich." In a Google Groups post, Google engineer Jean-Baptiste Queru says "this is actually the source code for version 4.0.1 of Android, which is the specific version that will ship on the Galaxy Nexus."

The source code is available for download right now from the Android Open-Source Project git servers, though Queru warns that it is a rather hefty file and can take some time to download. If you plan on checking out the source code yourself, I recommend waiting a bit for the servers to calm down.
Clicking on the link from the original post sent me straight to a 404 page so it might be a while before people can actually get their hands on the full file.
Interestingly, the code includes the previously unreleased source for Android 3.0 (Honeycomb). Queru admits that Honeycomb was unfinished and urges all developers to ignore it in favor of Ice Cream Sandwich.
With another Google event happening on November 16th of this week, we can only hope that this source code release signals the imminent arrival of the Samsung Galaxy Nexus. We still have no official release date or price for the Galaxy Nexus, but with the source code out in the wild it's only a matter of time before the phone arrives as well.

Nokia Lumia 800:TI

Nokia recently launched their first Windows Phone powered smartphones in India- the Lumia 800 and the Lumia 710. Both the Lumia 800 and Lumia 710 run on a 1.4GHz processor and support HD video playback.

I managed to get my hands on the Lumia 800 during the Nokia Developer Conference 2011 in Bangalore and tried it out for some time. Here are some of my initial impressions:
1. Beautiful Display: The Lumia 800 sports a large 3.7-in AMOLED display with a resolution of 800x480 pixels. The specs sound pretty good but they don't do justice to how the display looks like in real life. In the little time that I had the device, the display looked like it could stand tall among the best. Colors (especially blacks) looked very rich and made the tile-based Windows Phone UI look even prettier. The only issue was that the display was very glossy which means that it would be a fingerprint magnet.

2. Great Build & Looks: The Lumia 800 felt like one of the best phones I had ever handled. The phone has a polycarbonate body which was unlike anything I have seen on any other phone. The phone's body felt really solid and very smooth to the touch, similar to the aluminum casing on the Nokia N8 and the HTC Legend without compromising on slimness or weight.
3. Windows Phone: The Lumia 800 comes with Windows Phone 7.5 Mango and if you've seen how it looks and handles earlier, there's not much new here. One great addition though is that the always-excellent free Nokia Maps comes pre-installed on the Lumia which means that you don't need to use the default Bing Maps.
4. Touchscreen: The one issue that mostly hounded Nokia's earlier Symbian phones was that touch accuracy was inconsistent. Fortunately, with the Lumia 800 this problem seems to have been dealt with well. Scrolling through the various menus and screens was smooth and the keyboard was also accurate.
The Nokia Lumia 800 and the Lumia 710 are expected to hit Indian markets by mid-December. Expect a more in-depth review by then.

ARM Mali-T658 Eight-core Graphics Chip Introduced Tech Infection

The Mali-T658 graphics processor announced by ARM on Wednesday can be equipped with up to eight cores to help it deliver ten times the graphics performance of the company's existing GPU (Mali-400 MP).

The superior graphics performance is compared to the Mali-400 MP, which is used on a number of smartphones from Samsung Electronics, including the Galaxy S II and the new Galaxy Note. The chip also has four times the computing power of the Mali-T604 GPU, which has yet to appear in any available products.
The performance boost will result in better HD gaming and help usher in new compute-intensive applications, such as augmented reality, according to ARM. Besides smartphones, the GPU will also be used in tablets, smart TVs and automotive entertainment systems.
But don't expect products based on the Mali-T658 GPU anytime soon. Smartphones based on the Mali-T604 GPU will arrive next year, while products that use a Mali-T658 chip with four cores will arrive in 2013. Products powered by a version with the maximum eight cores are expected to be introduced in 2015, according to a chart from ARM detailing the evolution of its mobile processors.
Samsung, Fujitsu Semiconductor and LG Electronics are among the companies that will partner with ARM on products, ARM said.

The chip is compatible with a number of different of graphics and compute APIs, including DirectX 11 and DirectCompute from Microsoft; Khronos OpenGL ES and OpenCL; Google's Renderscript and OpenVG.
Besides the new Mali GPU, this week also saw the introduction of Asus's 10-inch Eee Pad Transformer Prime tablet. It is powered by the ARM-based Tegra 3 processor, which has four cores, and will start shipping worldwide in December.

Download FirstCloud OS

Oracle has updated its Unix-based operating system Solaris, adding some features that would make the OS more suitable for running cloud deployments, as well as integrating it more tightly with other Oracle products, the company announced Wednesday.

"We looked at some of the big challenges that people were having in deploying cloud infrastructure, either in a private cloud or public cloud," said Charlie Boyle, senior director of product marketing. "In the release, we engineered out some of the complexity in managing a cloud infrastructure, and made it possible to run any Solaris application in a cloud environment."
Cloud deployments require even greater levels of automation and streamlining than a standard IT infrastructure would, noted Markus Flierl, Oracle vice president of software development. While an organization may run hundreds of Solaris servers, as it moves its applications to a cloud infrastructure, it may run them across thousands of virtual Solaris instances.
Solaris, a Unix implementation, was originally developed by Sun Microsystems, which Oracle acquired last year. While not as widely known for its cloud software, Oracle has been marketing Solaris as a cloud-friendly OS. In Oracle's architecture, users can set up different partitions, called Zones, inside a Solaris implementation, which would allow different workloads to run simultaneously, each within their own environment, on a single machine.
Oracle Solaris Zones has 15 times less overhead than a VMware implementation, Oracle asserted in its marketing literature. The company also touted that Zones had no artificial limitations set on memory, network, CPU or storage resources.
Many of the new features were designed to ease the administrative overhead of running a cloud-like infrastructure, Flierl said. One new feature, called Fast Reboot, will allow the system to boot up without doing the routine set of hardware checks, a move that can make system boot times up to two-and-a-half times faster, Oracle claimed. This feature can be handy in that an administrator applying a patch or software update across thousands of Solaris deployments can reboot them all the more quickly. "It allows you safely to upgrade your entire environment," Flierl said.

Targus iPad 2 Cases Now Available in India

US based Targus recently announced the launch of Targus 9.7” 360 degrees rotating case and stand for the iPad 2 in India.
"Targus believes in innovation and develops products in line with latest trends in fashion and technology. Targus 9.7" 360 degrees rotating case,is developed using a patent-pending design that will not only protect the users precious iPad2 but also enhance its viewing experience," ­­­says Arun Goenka, Senior Manager - Business Development, Targus India Pvt. Ltd

A patent-pending mechanism that frames the Apple logo rotates all the way around, allowing the iPad 2 to recline in either landscape to portrait mode. The hard-shell outer layer measures 9.84"L x 7.68"W x 0.71"H made to fit the slim iPad 2.


Targus 9.7" 360 degrees rotating case and stand (Black) is now available at leading retail outlets in India and Apple outlets at Rs. 3099.

HTC Phones To Get Android 4.0 Ice Cream Sandwich in 2012

Owners of HTC phones will have to wait until early 2012 for their device's mobile OS to be upgraded to Google's Android Ice Cream Sandwich 4.0. In a post to its Facebook page, HTC wrote not just mobile phones with fast multi-core microprocessor chip architectures would get Android 4.0, but also HTC phones with fast single-core processors, such as the HTC Sensation XL.

The HTC Sensation, Sensation XL and Sensation XE were named as the first HTC smartphones lined up for the Ice Cream Sandwich update early next year, as well as the HTC Rezound, HTC Evo 3D, EVO Design 4G, and Amaze 4G, which will receive the update over the air "through close integration with our carrier partners," HTC says. The new HTC Vivid is also on the upgrade list.

HTC Rezound
That will leave some HTC smartphone owners happy, but several models are missing from that list. Users whose phones aren't on the list shouldn't worry too much, at least not yet, and instead "stay tuned for more updates on device upgrades, timing and other details about Ice Cream Sandwich," HTC said.
Android 4.0 is meant to be Google's OS that bridges the smartphone and tablet gap -- which is currently served by two different versions of the OS. Ice Cream Sandwich refreshes the navigation methods on Android phones by removing the need for the hardware navigation buttons, as well as a sleeve of improvements and gimmicks.
The first phone to run Android 4.0 will be Google's Galaxy Nexus, manufactured by Samsung. The phone sports a dual-core 1.2GHz processor, a huge 4.65-inch curved glass display, and NFC capabilities. Google is also working on the update for the Galaxy Nexus S, but those with a Nexus One are out of luck.
Motorola promised to upgrade the Droid Razr and Bionic, as well as its Xoom tablet to Ice Cream Sandwich, but the exact timing is unclear -- some six weeks after the official release of the update from Google. LG and Sony also hinted at Android 4.0 updates for their high-end phones, but no solid details are available on that yet.

Tech Infection Best Buy

Best Buys 2011

Along with meeting friends and family, eating tons of sweets and bursting a megaton of firecrackers, Diwali is a time when you will probably want to buy a new gadget (for yourself or as a gift). While you may be in the mood to shop, we know that you want every purchase you make during the festive season to be completely worth your money and time.

Over the year Tech Infection review hundreds of gadgets from the most high-end gaming laptops to the most basic 2GB USB drives. Every so often we come across products that impress us with their looks, features, performance and with their overall value-for-money quotient. These are the products that we think are worth your money and this is us doing what we are best at- giving you technology advice you can trust. Read more after the jump.

Here are the 15 products across 5 categories and 12 sub-categories that make up the 2011 Tech Infection Best Buy list:

Mobile Phones

High-End Phones

If you aren't particularly shy of spending the big bucks on the best smartphone in the market, then these are the best choices for you:

Samsung Galaxy S II: Undoubtedly, the best smartphone in the market, the Galaxy S II combines a massive screen, ultra-speedy processor and fantastic usability in a single device. If you're also looking for excellent multimedia performance in terms of audio and video playback and imaging, then the Samsung Galaxy S II won't disappoint you.

Killer Features:
- Very fast performance
- Beautiful massive 4.3-in display
- Probably the slimmest & lightest phone in the market
- 8MP Camera doesn't disappoint
- Impressive battery life

Best Price: Rs. 27,790

Apple iPhone 4S/iPhone 4: With the new iPhone 4S hitting stores in the U.S. and other countries, it is clearly the best iPhone to buy. Unfortunately, Apple doesn't offer universal warranty on iPhones which means that buying an iPhone 4S from abroad is a risk without warranty cover in India. However, the iPhone 4 is officially available in the country and is still a damn good phone to own.

Killer Features:
- Unmatched usability
- Probably the best looking display on a smartphone
- Access to the Apple App Store and thousands of quality apps
- iOS 5 unlocks great new features in the iPhone 4
- Excellent battery

Price: iPhone 4 (16GB)- Rs. 34,500, iPhone 4 (32GB)- Rs. 40,900; iPhone 4S (16GB Unlocked)- USD 649, iPhone 4S (32GB Unlocked)- USD 749, iPhone 4S (64GB Unlocked)- USD 849

Mid-Range Phones

The mid-range segment of smartphones gives you the perfect mix of performance and value. That's why we think the best phone in this segment should be reasonably priced without compromising on performance. Here's our choice:

Samsung i9003 Galaxy SLCD: The more tempered version of the original Samsung Galaxy S, the Galaxy SLCD represents superb value for money for features, specs and performance that belong on a phone much more expensive than it. The Galaxy SLCD has everything going for it including a great display, a powerful processor and a price-tag that's not going overboard.

Killer Features:
- 4-in SLCD display
- Very Slim
- 1GHz processor gives great performance
- Very capable video playback
- Good battery life

Best Price: Rs. 16,790


Budget Phones

The primary objective of budget phones is to make you feel the least possible pinch when buying a new phone. These phones may not offer you the best performance in the market, but they certainly give you excellent value for money. This phone is a perfect example:

LG Optimus One P500: At one point the Optimus One was just a good mid-range smartphone but now with a new anorexic price-tag, we can't help but recommend this phone. The Optimus One is a great example of how Android can work on inexpensive phones without taking a massive chunk out of usability. 

Killer Features:
- GPS, Wi-Fi and 3G support
- UI looks good and has decent usability
- Good camera
- Build quality is solid

Best Price: Rs. 9,700