Google I/O is all wrapped up and done - the main keynotes with major announcements that is - and we have to say, it was a mind-blowing couple of days and the Mountain View company did not fail to impress us in any way.
Now that Google has unveiled its proper entry into the living room entertainment space, the Nexus Q, is it worth considering against the already established products in the market from Microsoft and Google? Short answer: Unless you want to pay more for less, no. Here's the longer answer.
It really isn’t a big secret that the smartphone and tablet industry is an extremely competitive marketplace to be in. The iOS and Android operating systems are undoubtedly the two major players in this space, with Apple having sold more than 250 million iPhones in the last five years following the original launch and Google currently activating 1 million Android devices every day. The competition between the two platforms has always been a fierce one, but with Apple announcing their own mapping system in iOS 6 to rival the tried and tested Google Maps, the competition has ramped up another notch.
It has taken a day or two, but now videos are beginning to crop up comparing Apple's Siri on the iPhone 4S to Google's new voice options in the just announced Android 4.1, Jelly Bean.
Google is on a roll at I/O, with the second day of proceedings again bringing in a number of notable announcements and releases that will certainly please iOS users. Day two of the event is well underway with delegates and attending developers being informed that Google's Chrome browser has been released for iPhone and iPad and is now available for download immediately.
Whenever something new is announced by Apple or Google, we always secretly hope that the launch switch will be flipped immediately at the end of their keynote presentations, allowing us to get our hands on the new hardware or software soon after. The opening keynote of the Google I/O presentation really got tongues talking yesterday as they went through a number of announcements relating to new devices and the first official unveiling of Jelly Bean, the latest version of Android.
Apart from all the hardware-based announcements, Google is also updating their Maps app for Android with offline maps support, and a big update to Google Earth, which takes it to version 7.0 and features highly detailed 3D maps of cities around the globe. More details after the jump!
The opening keynote of Google I/O 2012 has come to an end, with lots of hardware and software based announcements in tow, Google has really managed to impress the crowd with their new offerings.
Google I/O 2012 has so far exceeded all expectations I had from the event. The number and variety of announcements is enough to rival Apple’s at WWDC. So far, we’ve seen an updated version of Android (4.1 Jelly Bean), a Nexus tablet, a show-stopping Google Glasses demo and, the news we will be discussing in this post, new Google+ apps and features. Check it out after the jump.
Following quite a few rumors suggesting that Google had some sort of TV/entertainment device up its sleeve, the Nexus Q - touted as a "social streaming media player", has now been officially announced at the big Google I/O event today. The Nexus Q is described as a device that can stream all of your content from Google Play - which includes an assortment of HD movies and TV shows - and YouTube, along with your own content to your living room screen and speakers.
