Apr 20, 2011


T-Mobile G2x (LG Optimus 2X) Review by MobileCrunch


Devin Coldewey:

I found the screen to be nice but ultimately unimpressive. 800×480 at 4″ is plenty sharp, but it’s lacking in brightness. I regularly thought it was at medium brightness when in fact it was at full. For comparison, I’ve regularly thought the opposite of the Defy (thought it was on full when it was only on medium, that is), which really has my favorite screen on a non-iPhone handset right now. That said, if you’re not in too bright of lighting conditions, the screen is vibrant and contrasty.

The touchscreen was responsive and quick, though I felt that it was not always responsive to quick taps. I touched the screen at the same rate and with the same pressure as I’ve done with the last few phones I’ve reviewed and used, so I don’t think it’s me, though I haven’t seen the issue in other reviews. That said, most of the time (and especially with “normal” touches as opposed to the light taps used on “next” buttons and such) it tracked beautifully.

I’m seeing a trend: the display isn’t bright enough and the touch response can be laggy at times.





Toshiba to be Sole Supplier of iPhone LCDs?


That’s the title of a Cult of Mac post:

A report in Japanese newspaper Nikkan Kogyu Shimbun claims that “Sharp was no longer a candidate for Apple’s investment,” and that the company wishes to avoid placing full dependancy on one country for the production of iPhone LCDs. It is believed the Tohoku area earthquake – which could have effected component production – may have persuaded Apple to think twice about its investment in two suppliers located in Japan.

Apple is currently fully dependent on LG Display and Samsung for its iPhone 4 Retina Display. Both of the companies are located in South Korea.





Apple: Supply or Cost Impact in Second Quarter?


Bloomberg:

The Japanese earthquake and tsunami will probably weigh on Apple Inc. (AAPL)’s forecasts for third-quarter profit, sales and gross margin because of higher component prices and disrupted manufacturing, analysts said.

At least seven analysts expect the disaster to affect the company’s outlook later today.

Who are these seven analysts? And why were they so wrong?

MobileBeat:

COO Tim Cook also dispelled assumptions that the Japanese earthquake had anything to do with Apple’s iPad supply trouble, saying on the call that the company “did not have any supply or cost impact” over the last three months. Cook went on to say that Apple will “produce a very large number [of iPads] for the quarter,” but he’s still unsure if that will meet consumer demand.

From how Cook worded his response, I think Apple may have a supply or cost impact going forward.





Bang & Olufsen BeoVision 4-85: 85-inch 3D 1080p Plasma TV


Bang & Olufsen:

Not only does the BeoVision 4-85 plasma panel qualify as ‘Full HD’, which means razor sharp details, rich, lifelike colours and smooth movement of objects on the screen; it is also Bang & Olufsen’s first TV concept that includes 3D technology using active shutter glasses. In addition, with the help of Automatic Colour Management to counter the effects of age, it delivers exceptional picture quality, ensuring the same high level of performance year after year.

Good design: check. 85 inches: check. Full HD: check. Plasma: okay. 3D: mmm. Active shutter glasses: Eh.





DLC Projection Screen


DigInfo TV:

Only light from the projector is diffused towards observers, and excess external light is reflected away from observers, or it is absorbed, so there is no influence from external light, and the screen can display images to observers with the black solid just the way it is emitted from the projector.

Uchida Research Laboratory at Tohoku University demonstrated a projection system based on Diffused Light Control (DLC). A DLC-based projector can be easily seen in brighter environments than your typical projector.





Apple Second Quarter 2011: 18.65 Million iPhones


Apple:

Apple sold 3.76 million Macs during the quarter, a 28 percent unit increase over the year-ago quarter. The Company sold 18.65 million iPhones in the quarter, representing 113 percent unit growth over the year-ago quarter. Apple sold 9.02 million iPods during the quarter, representing a 17 percent unit decline from the year-ago quarter. The Company also sold 4.69 million iPads during the quarter.

Except for iPods, blockbuster quarter for Apple: in particular, 18.65 million iPhones.





Infographic: How Green is The iPhone?


Geekaphone: A “tasty inforgraphic” explaining how green the iPhone is. There is one minor error though. The LCD screen is shown as coming from Japan but actually the 3.5-inch IPS TFT LCD Retina Display used in the iPhone 4 primarily comes from LG Display, a South Korea-based company. The second source is Samsung, also based in South Korea.





iPhone, 3G iPad Tracks Your Every Move


O’Reilly Radar:

All iPhones appear to log your location to a file called “consolidated.db.” This contains latitude-longitude coordinates along with a timestamp. The coordinates aren’t always exact, but they are pretty detailed. There can be tens of thousands of data points in this file, and it appears the collection started with iOS 4, so there’s typically around a year’s worth of information at this point. Our best guess is that the location is determined by cell-tower triangulation, and the timing of the recording is erratic, with a widely varying frequency of updates that may be triggered by traveling between cells or activity on the phone itself.

This sucks, especially since consolidated.db is unencrypted. Now I understand the need for iDevice full disk and system encryption, something the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA) is working on for federal agencies.





iPad: 85% of Tablet Market in 2010


The Loop:

Apple’s iPad garnered 85 percent of the tablet market share in 2010, according to new research released on Wednesday.

ABI Research said that Samsung’s Galaxy Tab came in second place with a distant 8 percent market share. Archos’s Internet Tablet came in with just 2 percent of the market.

Those three companies account for 95 percent of the total tablet market share.

These results are not that surprising since Apple rebooted the tablet market with its iPad with no competition in sight for many months. 2011 should be a little different with many more companies, thought late, jumping in with premature tablets both in terms of hardware and software.





AT&T Sells 3.6 Million iPhones in First Quarter 2011


AT&T:

iPhone activations increased nearly 1 million year over year to 3.6 million, with 23 percent of subscribers new to AT&T; iPhone subscriber churn unchanged year over year

The overall smartphone market is growing and I’m sure all carriers including AT&T will continue to benefit from selling one of the most popular smartphones, the iPhone. This quarterly announcement by AT&T does not mean the carrier was effective in keeping current iPhone customers or that Verizon was ineffective in taking them away. I expect Verizon to announce strong iPhone sales, too.




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