Angry Birds has been the runaway success of the mobile era, and having started as a simple game for the Apple iPhone, now spawns every major platform with numerous adaptations of the original title. We learned early on last month that Angry Birds Friends, a social take on the popular format, would soon be debuting over at the App Store, and today, creator Rovio Entertainment has delivered a double whammy of avian-slinging madness by releasing the title for both iOS and Google's Android.
As well as the popular Galaxy S range, Samsung also has a semi-flagship device in the larger-than-life Note, often described as a "phablet" due to its sizable display real estate. As well as looking similar to each other in terms of form factor, the devices tend to use many of the same components, and according to a specs leak, the Galaxy Note 3 could be following in the footsteps of the Galaxy S4 by offering an octa-core processor.
Iron Man Fever is currently gripping fans of the Marvel series in light of the theatrical release of Iron Man 3 worldwide, and having recently spawned a full-size Iron Man suit for the real-die hard fan to drool over, the merchandise mill continues to barrage us with daily updates. In the offing for today is a delightful Iron Man 3 case for the all-new Samsung Galaxy S4, and while it's not going to tempt me away from getting an HTC One, I have to admit, it's pretty darn cool.
The HTC One has made waves in its very short lifespan, with commentators tripping over each other to praise the beautiful, simple design and wealth of features. As we've seen with Samsung and other big-name vendors, releasing a cheaper, less feature-rich equivalent handset for those with less extravagant budgets is never too bad a call to make, and having begun retailing the One for upward of 800 bucks off-contract, it would appear as though HTC is going to be doing exactly that.
iOS, much to the dismay of many of its loyal users, has remained relatively unchanged over the past few revisions, but one feature which has been given a visual update fairly recently is the Music app. The iPhone and iPod touch versions have been skinned to look like their iPad counterpart, and the newer uniform look has certainly improved the overall aesthetics, if not the functionality. If you're an Android user, and would like to enjoy the look and feel of this evolved app on your Samsung or HTC, then you may be interested in a new app called iMusic, which readily helps you achieve this goal.
Having established that a significant portion of those adopting the Windows Phone platform will be doing so from Google's Android, Microsoft has created a ‘Switch to Windows Phone’ app which aims to make the process as painless as possible. I must admit, when I first saw it, I thought it was shameless plugging bordering on propaganda, but having delved beneath the surface, it does appear that the Redmond's main objective here is to lay the foundations for a smooth migration over to the tiled realms of Windows Phone 8.
When Samsung set about designing the Galaxy S4 as the replacement for its flagship Galaxy S III, there were no doubt all manner of targets that it wanted to meet. Bigger screen, same footprint, improved durability and more will quite possibly have been written on a whiteboard somewhere in Samsung HQ. But not all were met, especially that durability one.
If you found the Samsung Unpacked launch event of the Galaxy S4 to be somewhat cheesy, what you witnessed was actually theatrical mastery compared with what the poor folks of India have been burdened with from the Korean company. Now granted, the company is feeling a bit patriotic having seen compatriot PSY's 'Gangnam Style' become the most-watched, most-liked video in the history of YouTube and indeed, t'internet, but the smartphone vendor really shouldn't have gone as far as to bring it's own, ahem, 'Samsung Style' adaptation for the Indian launch of the new flagship. But regrettably, it did.
Samsung is beginning to ship its new flagship Android smartphone to millions of users around the globe. And with that, in typical Samsung fashion, the company is offering an insight into its design process by releasing a new customary video explaining some of the decisions that went into planning for the Galaxy S4. Check it out after the jump!
Samsung has just announced the Galaxy Tab 3, a 7-inch successor to the Galaxy Tab 2, and although the new numbering suggests a reasonable level of upgrades, the device looks almost identical to its predecessor and is scarcely much more advanced when you peek at the specs. The slate, which runs on Android Jelly Bean 4.1, is perhaps more of a refresh than anything else, although in yet another move by the Korean company to blur the line between smartphone and tablet, a 3G model will emerge next month with calling capabilities.
