Android

At an event in Taiwan today, HTC lifted the veil on its latest flagship, the Butterfly s, a revamp of the Butterfly, the world’s first smartphone with a Full HD display, which launched in late 2012. The new HTC Butterfly s features a 5-inch 1920 x 1080 Super LCD 3 display, just like its predecessor, and is powered by a Snapdragon 600 processor, clocked at 1.9GHz. In this respect, the Butterfly S outshines the HTC One, which is powered by a CPU running at 1.7GHz. The 2GB of RAM and the 16GB of storage complete the picture of what is mostly standard fare for current high-end Android phones. The good news is the Butterfly s boasts a microSD card slot, unlike its One brother. HTC transplanted many of the One’s most popular features to the new Butterfly s, including the stereo BoomSound speakers and the UltraPixel camera, capable of recording Zoes, HTC’s proprietary short animations format. In addition to the 4UP main camera, the wide-angle front shooter of 2.1MP should be a boon for selfie addicts. While most of the hardware features of the HTC Butterfly s are similar to what we’ve already seen on other devices, the device’s strong suit seems to be the battery. HTC managed to cram a massive 3,200mAh battery into the Butterfly s, which is a huge improvement over the 2020mAh battery in the original Butterfly and the 2300mAh unit on the HTC One. The HTC Butterfly outguns even the mammoth Note 2 and the Optimus G Pro, which both have about 3100mAh batteries, but larger screens. We’ve yet to receive the dimensions of the Butterfly s, but even if the beefy battery adds a couple of extra millimeters to the girth of the device, many users will be happy to put up with it. In terms of software, the HTC Butterfly s features Android Jelly Bean with HTC’s Sense 5 overlay on top, just like the HTC One. The popular BlinkFeed homescreen replacement also makes an appearance. HTC stated that the HTC Butterfly s would become available in Taiwan starting with July at a price of NT $22,900 (about $766). The company didn’t specify if or when the device would be made available in the rest of the world, but looking at the evolution of last year’s Butterfly, we expect to see variants of the  Butterfly s released in Japan and Europe, at the very least. As for the United States, a noted HTC leakster recently tweeted that Sprint, not Verizon, would carry a variant of the Butterfly s. This would be surprising, considering that Verizon launched the Droid DNA (a rebranded Butterfly) stateside and that it skipped the HTC One, which is being carried by all the other major American carriers.

Earlier this month, we heard of a rumour that a successor to the HTC Butterfly (also known as the HTC Droid DNA) called the HTC Butterfly S, slated for release in late June. Well, HTC has just unveiled that Butterfly S at their launch event in Taiwan, showing off some impressive specs. Engadget reports that the HTC Butterfly S will house a quad-core Snapdragon 600 clocked at 1.9GHz, 2GB RAM, 16GB internal storage with additional microSD slot and a 3,200 mAh battery. For the record, that is bigger than a Galaxy Note 2 battery. Along with the nice innards, the Butterfly S will feature a 5-inch, 1080p screen, and the HTC staples of Sense 5.0, UltraPixel camera and BoomSound Beats speakers. A pretty impressive package, making it ever so more attractive than the HTC One. Unless of course you like the feel of aluminium. The Butterfly S is due out in Taiwan in July for the nippy price of around $750 USD, but as always with phones in this region, it’s unknown if they’ll make the jump worldwide. Would you think about a HTC Butterfly S, even so far as picking it over the HTC One? Let us know what you think in the comments below. Source: engadget

A worthy successor to the original Butterfly with some HTC One influences HTC has just unveiled the successor to its flagship Butterfly device from last year at an event in Taiwan, and it is indeed named the Butterfly S as previously rumored. As the name would lead you to believe, this is a mild refresh to the original handset, borrowing many features from its cousin the HTC One. The Butterfly S is packing dual front-facing BoomSound speakers as well as an UltraPixel camera, keeping the same 5-inch 1080P display. On the inside, the specs have been bumped to a 1.9GHz Snapdragon 600 processor, alongside 2GB of RAM, 16GB of storage and a notably large 3200mAh battery. This Taiwanese version has a simple quad-band HSPA+ radio on-board. read more

While speaking with reporters prior to the UK debut of the Ascend P6, a top-level exec from Huawei mentioned that the Chinese handset manufacturer would be “open-minded” about buying Nokia. His exact comments were, “we are considering these sorts of acquisitions; maybe the combination has some synergies but depends on the willingness of Nokia. We are open-minded.” This resulted in a lot of speculation and even some movement in Nokia’s share price. However Huawei was quick to point out that the exec, Richard Yu, was speaking hypothetically and that the company had “no plans” to buy Nokia. The comments, which although may have been less guarded than required of a top-level exec,  underline the company’s ambitions to take on Samsung and Apple at the high end of the smartphone market. Yu also predicted that the number of major players in the smartphone market would reduce to just three or four. As for mobile operating systems, Huawei is a big Android proponent and Yu considers Windows Phone as “weak.” Whether Windows Phone (will be) successful is difficult to say – it has a very small market share. (Windows Phones) are weak but still require a licence fee. That’s not good. Android is free. Huawei is in a good position to think about acquisitions since becoming the third-largest manufacturer of smartphones by volume. In fact Huawei is doing so well that the company expects to sell around 60 million smartphones this year and could have sold more if it wasn’t for a shortage of components! Since Huawei is an Android supporter and Nokia has made a clear decision to focus on Windows Phone, it is unlikely that the two would be in talks about a possible merger or acquisition. Combined with Yu’s comments on Windows Phone being weak, it does truly seem that he was speaking hypothetically. What do you think, would Huawei and Nokia make a good match?

HTC Butterfly S - First Look Loaded with features such as a Super LCD 3 display, Micro SD card slot, incredible browsing speed and an UltraPixel camera, the HTC Butterfly S delivers a pr... From: HTC Views: 0 0 ratings Time: 00:51 More in Science & Technology

New network equipment going live in new markets across the U.S. As it regularly does, AT&T is keeping us up to date on the rollout status of its LTE network. This week, the carrier is lighting up or expanding its network in 9 different markets, listed below: New Bedford, Massachusetts Gallup, New Mexico Rio Grande Valley, Texas Tuscaloosa, Alabama Florence-Muscle Shoals, Alabama Providence and Kent Counties, Rhode Island Logan, Ohio Tri-Cities, Washington Salinas, California read more

HTC Sense update brings "System Enhancements" The unlocked HTC One is in the midst of getting a small (17.55MB) OTA update this evening, bringing the version number to 1.29.xxxx.17. The device has hit our developer edition HTC One, and is tagged only with the obscure but ever-present "System Enhancement" bullet point in the update prompt. HTC hasn't posted any change log at this hour, but we know you Android junkies needed to know about any OTA, no matter the time. If you want to grab this one -- rooted users consider any consequences -- grab it through your system settings. No word on when we'll see anything similar for carrier branded devices, we'll reach out tomorrow when our HTC folks get out of bed. read more

Looks like Huawei wants to bring out the WOW factor, by dropping this new demo video showing off their new device with “Emotion UI”.It definitely feels emotional with the music and gorgeous visuals you will see. What they are trying to do here, I imagine, is trying to go a step further from Samsung’s “Life Companion”. They really want to bring your emotion out with your homescreens and features. There is even some stock Android shots in here, which is always lovely to see. So check out the video below, and let us know what you think. Would you us “Emotion UI”?

Cruising around Reddit, I came across this Last of Us/Scott Pilgrim mashup that just so happens to make the perfect wallpaper for your Android device. Enjoy.

Mark Zuckerberg is an interesting fellow. If he’s not living on what he catches, or scouting the world for new talent, then he’s heading out to South Korea to talk to Samsung execs about finding ways to better promote Facebook through their product portfolio. Sadly for us, not many details can be made, but we can make some educated guesses as to why he’s there in the first place. Sadly for Zuckerberg, the shares in Facebook he put up to market in May of 2012 haven’t really soared as much as he had planned to. So it’s likely with some diligent decision making that he’s headed out to the land of the most successful mobile phone company in the world, to actively seek ways to secure his investments and gain market share. Or at least we suspect. Although Zuckberg himself didn’t make a statement while being caught leaving Samsung HQ, Samsung President Shin Jong Kyun did talk about “the state of the information-technology industry”, according to the President himself. Then, if that wasn’t enough, Zuckerberg was scuttled over to the President of South Korea herself, Ms. Park Geun Hye. Talking to her, he reportedly theorized about ways that Facebook can make a bigger impact in the international mobile market, and what kind of effect it can have on business and trade relations. Samsung and HTC were the first to feature the Facebook application on their Android OS respectively, however Facebook itself has struggled to maintain stability in the financial market. Its share has seen a massive drop of 9.8 this year alone, which has investors and users alike worried. SOURCE: Edmonton Journal Story Timeline Samsung GALAXY S 4 Review Facebook Home reaches 1 million downloads, usage on the rise HTC First 'Facebook Phone' gets Sense by way of custom ROM Facebook invite teases arrival of a "new product" next week