Amazon in the UK has confirmed that the Nintendo 3DS is their most pre-ordered console ever. This was confirmed in a tweet sent out yesterday:
Nintendo 3DS, biggest pre-ordering console on Amazon.co.uk ever! Pre-order for just £187 now,
Archives for March 2011
Amazon Confirm Nintendo 3DS is Biggest Pre-Ordering Console
March 18, 2011 by Leave a Comment
Angry Birds HD for iPad Updated – Annoys Downloaders
March 18, 2011 by Leave a Comment
Rovio updated Angry Birds HD for the iPad last night and along with that, a number of new levels, 15 to be precise, were added. The updates normally go down very well, but this time around, version 1.5.3 was hit with some criticism due to Rovio putting ads in the paid version of the game.
I would have rated this game with 5 stars if the latest update didn’t have ads. I can’t get rid of them. I buy apps to get rid of ads not to get bombarded with more.
Added “News” section when paused- this impacts the time to restart the level and continuous fade-in animation is very distracting. Now we’re forced to wait until the news loads EVERY SINGLE time the game is paused before restarting. Serious players will now have to wait an extra second or so each time a level restart is required.
Come on, Rovio!! You’ve made spam more important than playability. Bad move.
Firefox 4 Release Date is March 22
March 17, 2011 by Leave a Comment
Mozilla has announced that Firefox 4 will be officially launching on March 22. In a message posted on Google Groups, Damon Sicore, the Sr. Director of Platform Engineering at Mozilla Corporation, announced in a meeting held yesterday that the new version of the browser was ready and will be launching on that date.
Today’s triage session concluded with all systems go for a Firefox 4 launch on March 22nd. We will continue to have triage sessions on a daily basis to watch for major issues; however, at this point, we’ve concluded RC1 will become Firefox 4 final.
Gmail for iPhone Updated with new Connection Bar
March 17, 2011 by Leave a Comment
Google has updated Gmail for the iPhone. When loading up Gmail in the Safari browser, it now includes what is called a Connection Bar. The connection bar is an unobtrusive message bar that sits towards the bottom of the screen, resting on the controls. What it does is lets you know the status of your connection to the Gmail server and also provides details of emails that might not have been sent due to connectivity problems.
When information is needed, the connection bar pops up, but quickly gets out of the way when not needed to stay as far out of the way as possible, while being useful when needed. [Read more…]
Amazon App Store Briefly Leaked
March 17, 2011 by Leave a Comment
We’ve known for a while that Amazon is launching its own App Store. The website for it actually was put online for a few hours it seems as users entering www.amazon.com/apps were taken to a web page showing 48 available apps, although each app redirected back to the homepage. Before you check it, we not note that /apps also redirects to the homepage now although there is a screen shot below.
Within the app store, a number of apps were found, some of which are a bit cheaper than the official Google Android Market and some were a little more expensive. We also note that a few apps were found to be exclusive to Amazon. [Read more…]
Nokia Updater for Mac Launched in Beta
March 17, 2011 by Leave a Comment
Nokia has released the Nokia Updater for Mac that allows Nokia users to get the latest updates for their smartphones. Previously, the software was only available on Windows.
It’s important to note here that the new version for Mac is still a beta version and very much in testing. [Read more…]
HTC Flyer Goes up for Pre-Order in the UK – £600
March 17, 2011 by Leave a Comment
Clove has announced that it will be launching the HTC Flyer in mid April and that it has the tablet available for pre-order right now. Pricing is confirmed at £600.00 inc VAT in the UK although this is likely to change once official pricing is announced. Clove comment that all pricing for pre-orders are updated once confirmed and once stock is ready to be shipped out.
The specs, which we have seen before, are showing the Flyer to have a 7 inch screen. The screen uses the HTC Scribe Technology allowing you to write on the screen and have the text read. The operating system is a step between Android 2.3 and 3.0 and is version 2.4. It brings some 3.0 Honeycomb features to a slightly smaller display. [Read more…]
NAVI Indoor Navigation Kinect Hack for the Blind
March 17, 2011 by Leave a Comment
NAVI is another Microsoft Kinect hack that pushes the boundaries of what the popular hands-free gaming controller can achieve.
NAVI, meaning Navigational Aids for the Visually Impaired, is a student project that helps navigate a blind person around a room. Although it looks a bit cumbersome now, we could possibly see something like this in the future when all the components are made even smaller than they are today.
It works by using a Kinect sat on the users head (another reason it needs to be worked on a bit), and when walking around a room, obstacles can be detected and are then fed to a computer which in turn, feeds information to the user by a bluetooth headset. Vocal instructions received could include, “obstacle ahead, stay left”. [Read more…]
Android 2.2 Takes the Lead in Android OS Share
March 17, 2011 by Leave a Comment
Every couple of weeks, Android Developers releases details about the various versions of Android and which is the most popular. The reason for the release of this data is so that developers can see which version is most popular and then target either a specific OS, or perhaps decide it’s time to focus on the higher end of Android versions. The data was updated on March 15 and shows the percentage of Android versions with data gathered from devices that connect to the Android Market.
Seven versions of Android are tracked in the chart which includes 1.5, 1.6, 2.1, 2.2, 2.3, 2.3.3 and Android 3.0 Honeycomb. What we see is that Android 2.2 now dominates the landscape and is installed on 61.3% of all devices. [Read more…]
iOS 4.3 Personal Hotspot Passes GPS Details to iPad
March 17, 2011 by Leave a Comment
Apple rolled out iOS 4.3 recently and with that came the ability to use the iPhone 4 as a personal wireless hotspot for up to 3 users (generally a paid extra on your contract). What we didn’t know is that when connecting up to the wireless hotspot with a WiFi iPad 1 or 2, the GPS data is shared with the iPad and allows you to pinpoint where you are on a map.
Prior to being able to do this, the regular WiFi iPad could not get GPS information due to the A-GPS module only being included on the 3G model. Having this feature bundled in is quite handy, especially for those wanting to see quickly where they are on an iPad. [Read more…]
Could ASUS Ship a $200 Netbook? Perhaps with the Help of Google!
March 17, 2011 by Leave a Comment
Although it has never succeeded in getting prices down to $200, we now hear that ASUS are yet again attempting to get the netbook down to the $200 to $250 price point.
ASUS is attempting to drop the price due to competition from the new generation tablets such as the Galaxy Tab, iPad and Motorola Xoom to name a few. Since the launch of the iPad, netbook sales have slowly dropped as people seem to prefer the mobile phone type operating system on a 7 to 10 inch screen for “lazy time browsing”. By pricing a netbook at $200 to $250, it would position the 10 inch netbook at just below the price of regular tablets and in doing this, could help boost sales so that the company hits its 6 million goal this year. [Read more…]
Internet Explorer 9 Hits 2.3 Million Downloads in 24 Hours
March 17, 2011 by Leave a Comment
Microsoft released Internet Explorer 9 on Monday evening. Within the first 24 hours, the new browser had been downloaded 2.35 million times which works out at 27 downloads per second for that period of time.
To make a comparison with the beta version, Microsoft commented that IE9 when launched in beta was downloaded 1 million times within the first 24 hours which makes the 2.35 million a step up in the right direction. [Read more…]
