Apple is reportedly making a significant move to further reduce its reliance with bitter rival Samsung by moving production of the A6X processor away from the South-Korean based company. Speculation has been rife over the last few months surrounding a possible shift in manufacturing partnerships, with suggestions being made that Apple has the end-goal in sight of removing all of their business away from Samsung for obvious reasons.
We are expecting a great range of tech to be released this year, but it seems that Samsung has taken the first step by announcing a couple of new Series 7 monitors, one of which will support different orientations, with the other being specifically optimized to work flawlessly with Microsoft's Windows 8 operating system.
For the last few years, Apple and Samsung have been on a legal battle over smartphone patents, demanding massive cash settlements and attempting to ban the sale of each other’s devices. According to the European commission, Samsung might now be issued fines for attempting to use standard-essential patents in its lawsuits, unlike Apple’s, which refer to less restrictive patents.
In the Android ecosystem, the first ever tablets (other than the first experimental builds like original Galaxy Tab and HTC Flyer) ran on Honeycomb, Android 3.0, which was tailor-made to suit the tablet devices’ larger screens. Unfortunately (or not), Android 3.0 didn’t really see much glory for two reasons. One, it was rather buggy in itself, and two, when Ice Cream Sandwich was released, it unified both tablet and smartphone versions of the Android ecosystem, making it redundant to have a separate OS in the first place. For the same reasons, the said Android version didn’t see much developer love, either.
Samsung’s Galaxy Camera is a truly remarkable device. To begin with, it’s the first of its kind, offering a truly powerful and capable camera running Android 4.1 Jelly Bean. The connectivity options on board are truly a tech-enthusiast’s dream come true. Then, you can do a lot more on the device than you’d be able to on any traditional point and shoot camera. Despite being priced rather steep, there’s a lot of love that the unorthodox Android device has received. You have root access on the Galaxy Camera whilst running Android Jelly Bean, and then there’s an unlocked boot loader, too. Is there more to wish for? Yes, you certainly can, because XDA member Adam Outler has discovered some neat Samsung internal codes that can be executed even on the Galaxy Camera to gain access to hidden menus and secret areas.
Just as we are approaching the final run-in to the wonderful festive season where everything should be all about smiles and joyful memories, it seems that a mysterious illness has started affecting Samsung's wonderful Android powered Galaxy S III smartphone. We all know how great the S III is, with it widely being regarded as the best Android device currently available on the market, but a rising number of users are reporting that their beloved Samsung smartphones are starting to give up and die with no prior warning or reason given for their digital suicide.
A couple of days ago, we learned a new software vulnerability within Samsung's hardware courtesy of a member of the thriving XDA-Developer forums, and at the time, it was classed as a kernel level exploit providing the perfect breeding ground for malicious apps to access physical memory of devices affected. Today, Samsung has stepped out and confirmed the existence of the vulnerability, stating its intent to address the situation as a matter of urgency.
Apple and Samsung seem only to take a break from filing lawsuits against each other to - and this is rare - release a new gadget. However, the Korean company appears today to have taken the first steps to some form of mediation by dropping a series of patent infringement suits against its bitter rival in nations across Europe.
In the smartphone spectrum, Samsung has been the market-leader for a while now, but for the first time in fourteen years, the Korean company has piped rival Nokia to the summit of the overall cellphone market in 2012. As Samsung has continued to grow in the smartphone realm thanks to releases like the Galaxy S III and Galaxy Note II, the cellphone crown - held almost indefinitely by Nokia since the widespread use of mobile phones - has this year been snatched by Samsung.
The Samsung Galaxy S III takes pride of place as the biggest selling Android device this year, like the Galaxy S II did last year, and similarly to the manner in which we expect the Galaxy S IV to next year. With that said, it's quite an expensive gadget, and those with slightly less in the way of disposable cash will be looking for alternative products. The Galaxy S III Mini is a good option for those with expenditure constraints, but if your main attraction to the S III is its sheer size, you'll likely have overlooked the smaller alternative version. If you want a cheaper S III that doesn't compromise on the size, you'll be enthused to learn of the Samsung Galaxy Grand, which while less-powered than its flagship cousin, looks almost identical, and packs a healthy 5-inch display.
