Today’s smartphones are certainly fun. All the fast processing, the apps and games, the high speed data, and the ability to take good snaps wherever we go; all that power in the palm of your hand. And then, the battery dies. But there’s good news for folks in New York City, they will be able to use solar-powered Street Charge stations starting this month, all thanks to AT&T and Goal Zero.

Designed by Pensa, each station has six USB connectors for iPhones and iPads, 30-pin and Lightning plugs, micro-USB for Android and Windows devices, and three female USB connectors. It has three 15-watt solar panels and a 168 watt-hour battery, and each of those cables can provide up to two amps of 5V power.

Street Charge will be launched at Fort Green Park on June 18^th, and in the coming weeks will be available at Brooklyn Bridge Park, Coney Island, Riverside Park, Rockaways, Summerstage in Central Park, Randall’s Island, Governor’s Island, Union Square, and Hudson River Park.

So who’s up for some street charging? Check out the video and share your thoughts below.

[Source]

The post Solar Powered Street Charge Stations in New York City (Hands-On Video) appeared first on Mobile Magazine.

The Windows 8.1 Start Button is certainly coming, whether you like what it does or not. As for what all other things we can expect, we have for you folks leaked screenshots of redesigned Windows 8.1 applications.

The image above shows the new look for Xbox Music. You will be able to check out your collection on the side, and there are “explore” and “radio” buttons. The radio service is expected to be powered by Microsoft’s Smart DJ. Meanwhile, “explore” will reportedly show artists you might like and recently released albums.

In the video below, you can take a peek at updates which will be arriving for the news, weather, travel, finance and sports apps.

The new design for Windows Store features an application “shelf”, and there will be more text in the interface.

The Store will also finally start showing apps recommendations based on what you are searching for.

And new applications are coming including a voice recording application, a new metro styled calculator, and a good looking alarm app you see below.

So, what do you think about these updates that are coming? Will these be appealing to those who weren’t fond of Windows 8?

[Source]

The post Windows 8.1 Screenshots Leaked (Video) appeared first on Mobile Magazine.

The week is ending, Friday has arrived! For those that regularly stay tuned to my Friday “Best Apps of the Week” feature – I’m doing things a bit different this week.

I’ve had a few comments and suggestions in the past asking me to include other platforms besides Android and iOS. Unfortunately gathering details for 5 apps for each platform would make this piece much longer (and harder to navigate) than we’d like.

So I’m switching things up at least for this week, and introducing the “Mobile Mag App ShowCase”. The idea here is much the same as the “Best Apps” format, the biggest difference is that we instead focus on just two of the “best rated/most highly anticipated” apps for the week and extend to covering Android, iOS, Blackberry 10 and Windows Phone 8.

Typically that will mean 1 game, 1 productivity/entertainment app.

So without further ado, let’s get started:

App ShowCase – Android

App ShowCase – iOS

App ShowCase – Windows Phone 8

App ShowCase – Blackberry 10

Summing it all up….

So that’s it, our first “Mobile Mag App ShowCase”. What did you think? Did I cover good enough apps, or was there something that you felt was more deserving for the list? Also – since this was more of an experiment than anything, what did you think?

Do you like the idea of showcasing the two BEST apps of the week for each of the primary four mobile platforms, or do you feel the model of 5 iOS and 5 Android apps is better approach? Let us know what you think, your comments could affect whether or not MM App ShowCase replaces the older “Best Apps of the Week” format!

The post MM App ShowCase (6/14): A look at Android, iOS, BB10 and Windows Phone Apps! appeared first on Mobile Magazine.

What do you do when you have a cash cow? You milk it, my friends! That’s exactly what Rovio has been doing with the Angry Birds series for a while now, not that we’re complaining.

We’ve seen countless reiterations of the Angry Birds mechanics, including Angry Birds Star Wars. We have even seen the franchise take a whole new approach with Bad Piggies. What’s next? Angry Birds Go.

Today Rovio began teasing the latest title, telling us:

“Those birds and piggies are getting ready for their most thrilling and action-packed game yet.” “All your favorite characters are returning for a brand new title that will bring you closer to Piggy Island than ever before. It’s Angry Birds, but not as you know it!”

So what is this game? Based on the teaser information (and the GO in the title), this is looking to be some kind of racing title. What we don’t know is whether or not this is a true kart-style racing game (think Mario Kart) or simply a Temple Run-like endless runner that is somehow themed around racing. We are hoping for the former, not the later.

We have no clue when Angry Birds Go is coming, other than its due for release sometime this year. We also aren’t certain what platforms this is for. While mobile makes sense, it’s not impossible to think that Rovio could consider a console game.

Are you ready for yet another Angry Birds game, or are you burnt out by the franchise already?

[ source ]

The post Rovio Teases “Angry Birds Go”, Promises To Be Something New appeared first on Mobile Magazine.

Symbian is dead. I know it, you know it. Nokia knows it.

Whether you loved Symbian or not, the OS has fallen behind over the years as Nokia has instead pushed hard into Windows Phone territory. While it has been obvious for a while now that Symbian wasn’t a priority, Nokia is now reportedly killing off the OS this summer.

Part of this change is because while Nokia still sold 500,000 Symbian smartphones in 1st quarter 2013, Windows Phone 8 is finally starting to outsell the aging platform. There has also been several high-quality Nokia handsets that are low enough in cost to compete in the developing space in the way Symbian previously has — the Lumia 520 series comes to mind.

While the days of Symbian might be winding down, we can’t help but applaud the OS for a good, long run. After all it was only around two years ago that Symbian still retained its position as the best-selling smartphone platform in the world.

Do you feel that Nokia made the right decision by pushing away from Symbian and moving over to Windows Phone? Anyone still clinging to Symbian OS, other than for possible financial reasons? Share your thoughts below.

[ source ]

The post Report: Nokia Finally Plans to Kill Off Symbian This Summer appeared first on Mobile Magazine.

You are probably well aware of that Apple has now introduced its latest version of their mobile operating system, iOS 7. This update brings with it a massive overhaul to the design of the OS, and also introduces several new features along the way.

Some of these features are new to any mobile OS, while others have existed in competing platforms for a while now.

For those that are curious about what iOS 7 introduced, and how they compare to features found on existing operating systems, CNET has created a pretty awesome comparison chart that tells you just that:

* As mentioned by a reader below in the comments, BB10 also has an “Update All” feature. *

As you can see, most of what is introduced with iOS 7 can be found on competing platforms.

You could take this to mean that iOS 7 is playing catch up when compared to its competitors. In some ways, this is true. While iOS is a smooth-performing OS with a lot to love, feature wise it isn’t always at the bleeding-edge.

Of course in typical Apple fashion, they didn’t just take what competitors did and directly copy it. All the new features in iOS 7 are uniquely Apple in implementation, even if Apple wasn’t the first to introduce such a feature. This includes items like AirDrop, multitasking previews and the new, improved notifications center.

At the root, iOS 7 is more of a cosmetic change than a major revolution, but it’s modern design is certainly a welcome change.

You will notice that at least one of the new features listed in the chart doesn’t have any listed alternative outside of iOS, and that’s the password-protected reset, which is part of Apple’s new Activation Lock. What does this do exactly? Basically it is designed to make it harder for thieves to do anything with your phone, once it is stolen. If a thief tries to mess with your phone, wipe it and reuse it, they won’t be able to do so without the proper credentials (such as iCloud login).

Of course similar methods exist for Android, through 3rd party security software, but this is fully integrated solution.

So is iOS 7 a worthy upgrade for those coming for iOS 6? Yes, it certainly seems that way. It is fast, fluid and has quite a few changes in store. That said, no it isn’t necessarily worlds above the competitors when it comes to features, as shown by the chart.

Still, if you like iDevices and iOS, you are going to love what Jony Ive and team has in store for you. What do you think of iOS 7 based on what you’ve seen so far, like it or not?

Source: CNET

The post How Do iOS 7 Features Compare to Android, WP8 and Blackberry? appeared first on Mobile Magazine.

We will see smartphones running Tizen OS starting to hit the market in the coming months. The OS is backed by the Linux Foundation, Samsung, and Intel. Now it seems the chip maker has been busy developing the company’s own UI overlay, codenamed “Obsidian”, for Tizen. There is also talk that it could eventually be used on Android devices as well.

A leak has brought out pictures and videos which allow us to take a peek at Obsidian. The work on it is certainly not finished, but we can see some of its unique features.

As you will see in the video below, there’s slide-to-unlock on the lock screen and also “Life magazine” text. We saw the same thing on a Samsung reference Tizen device earlier. The apps are seen as boxy, closely-packed icons. It is similar to the flat designs of Windows Phone and Android (no iOS skeuomorphism here).

There will always be three buttons at the bottom of the screen: phone, messages and people. A single swipe left from the apps screen will take you to a single contact screen, and one more left swipe and you get to the contacts list. To alert notifications an app icon will be rotated 45 degrees and there will be a red notification at its bottom. Opening clock and settings or other apps will reveal a quick-view pane at the screen’s bottom with a button to fully open the app.

The Obsidian UI will reportedly run over Tizen 2.0 and the company’s reference device with the UI will be codenamed Josephine. But keep in mind that nothing is official at the moment.

[Source]

The post Intel Obsidian UI Leaked (Video) appeared first on Mobile Magazine.

It’s doing this through something called Looking Glass, which works at the API level. “It’s not quite virtualization or emulation as you’ve known it,” says company CEO Rosen Sharma. “We recreate the API that iOS provides, but we don’t use any Apple bits to do it. So we skip iOS altogether.”

What this means is that when an app developer submits their iOS game to Bluestacks, the game will run as if the GamePop was running iOS. But it’s not, because GamePop is still totally based on Android and will continue to support Android games. They’re trying to make it as easy as possible for developers to port over titles, because they don’t have to recode their games; they just have to “change their payments backend so it works with our subscription model.”

That’s the other big difference that makes GamePop unique. Whereas Ouya will sell you individual games like how you’d expect from the Google Play Store, Bluestacks is taking a Netflix-style subscription model for GamePop. You pay $6.99 a month to play as many games as you want. And they’ve already got several heavy hitters on board, including Glu, Halfbrick, Jawfish Games, Gameloft and Fieldrunners maker Subatomic Studios.

There’s still a lot more to learn about GamePop. They’re not being specific about hardware, for example, but we hear that Intel, Qualcomm and AMD are involved. We also don’t know about the controller, but we hear they’re shooting for launch this winter. What’s more, if you sign up for the pre-order before the end of June, you’ll get the GamePop for free as long as you agree to subscribe for one year. After that, it’s $129. Extra controllers will be $20, but you can use your Android or iOS device via the planned app.

[Source]

The post Play iOS Games on Your TV with Android-Powered GamePop by Bluestacks appeared first on Mobile Magazine.

While, AMD is just venturing into the world of Android, Intel has had big plans for the OS for a while now. What we have here is a new reference tablet from the company dubbed the Bay Trail-T, and it features the company’s “Silvermont” quad-core Atom processor.

The device with the Bay Trail chip, which weighs 611 grams and has about the same thickness as the 3rd/4th generation iPad, has a 10-inch 2560×1440 resolution display. The guys over at AnandTech were lucky enough to play with the slate which apparently was running both Windows 8 and Android 4.2.2 Jelly Bean.

According to Intel, Bay Trail’s capabilities include 2X the CPU and 3X the GPU performance compared to Clover Trail and very improved battery life. And of course they have also promised cheap tablets most of which should fall between $200 to $300 price range.

We will certainly be waiting for a product from tablet makers with Silvermont Bay Trail CPU. What about you?

[Source]

The post Intel’s Bay Trail-T Silvermont Quad-Core Tablet appeared first on Mobile Magazine.

AMD has may be finally ending their Windows OS exclusivity and could eventually design chips to run Google’s Android and Chrome OS in PCs and tablets. The chips will likely be based on x86 and ARM architecture.

We have seen Windows tablets with AMD’s Z-01 and Z-60 tablet chips. But those slates didn’t perform well on the market. Moving to Android is certainly good for the company. Earlier AMD said that they had no interest in Android, but it appears like they have recognized how quickly the tech world is shifting away from Windows.

Lisa Su, AMD senior vice president and general manager of global business units, said “We are very committed to Windows 8; we think it’s a great operating system, but we also see a market for Android and Chrome developing as well“.

There have been no hints regarding when the Android tablets will be launched, but AMD’s latest comments make it clear that they are actively interested in working on such devices. Meanwhile, cheap Windows 8.1 and Android tablets with Bay Trail chips from AMD’s rival Intel will be available sometime in the near future.

[Source]

The post AMD Android Tablets Could Be Coming Soon appeared first on Mobile Magazine.