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BetaNews.Com (7 non lus)

Will you buy Nokia Lumia 900 Windows Phone? [poll]

Publié: février 6, 2012, 10:54pm CET par Joe Wilcox

Today, Microsoft Store started taking pre-orders for the Lumia 900, Nokia's flagship Windows Phone. There's a $25 reservere for the handset, which, according to my local shop will be available some time in March. Microsoft Store had no official launch date to give.

My question: Will you buy the Lumia 900? Nobody is saying how much the smartphone will cost. That $25 is blind faith the final price will be reasonable enough. Who knows? Given Microsoft's and its partners' marketing commitment, the faithful might see a serious discount for their leap to pre-order. Will you be among them? You can answer the question(s) and give your reasons why or why not in comments below and answer the poll below. Lumia 900 will be available in the United States on AT&T.

What will you get for your 25 bucks plus additional unnamed amount: 1.4GHz Qualcomm APQ8055 processor; 4.3-inch AMOLED display (yes, it's Corning Gorilla Glass), with 800 x 480 resolution; 512MB RAM; 16GB storage: 8-megapixel rear-facing camera with Carl Zeiss lens and dual-LED flash; 1MP front-facing camera; 720p video capture from rear camera and VGA from front camera; GSM 850/900/1800/1900 radio; WCDMA 850/900/1900/2100 radio; 4G LTE; Bluetooth 2.1+EDR; Stereo Bluetooth; WiFi; accelerometer; ambient and proximity sensors; gyroscope; 2 microphones; 1830 mAh battery; Internet Explorer 9 mobile; and Windows Phone 7.5 "Mango" Commercial Release 2.

Any device only needs as much hardware as necessary for your needs and to give operating system and applications ample performance. I say that in qualification before observing how much more is available on many Androids and even iPhone 4S. The Androids are bitchin': All LTE phones currently available from AT&T or Verizon have dual-core processors, more RAM and typically better screen resolution or video capture than Nokia Lumia 900. What they don't have is Windows Phone 7.5 CR2.

A suggestion to Microsoft and Nokia: As part of your launch promotion kitty, put aside some money to pay the carrier subsidy. In other words, make every person who wants Lumia 900 eligible to get one, regardless of where they are in their contract, during, say, the first 30 days of availability. Hey, it's just a suggestion.

Is this the Windows Phone you have been waiting for? Scratch that. Is this the smartphone you've been waiting for?

Microsoft Store is taking pre-orders for Nokia Lumia 900. Will you buy this Windows Phone?
Windows Phone can't save Nokia

Publié: février 6, 2012, 10:00pm CET par Joe Wilcox

All those analysts predicting Windows Phone as No. 2 smartphone OS in 2015, lifted by Nokia magic, need a reality check. Put away the crystal balls and peer into the present. Today, IDC released fourth-quarter smartphone shipment data, whoa, is the data chart scary.

Shocker is Nokia's smartphone death spiral, which no Windows Phone has yet lifted. The once mighty Finnish handset maker ended the quarter with 12.4 percent market share, down from 27.6 percent, and plunging from first place a year earlier to fourth at end of 2011. This is the same quarter Nokia launched its first Windows Phones, the Lumia 710 and 800. Right now, looks like Windows Phone can't save Nokia, which cuts the other way, too: Nokia can't save Windows Phone.

Apple and Samsung were the big beneficiaries of Nokia's nose dive. IDC's data affirms Strategy Analytics findings from late last month: Apple and Samsung ended fourth quarter in near smartphone shipments photo finish. iPhone did better -- 37 million units to Samsung's 36 million. Both vendors saw huge year-over-year gains.

Samsung's shipments rose 275 percent year over year, going from fourth to second ranking -- market share rise from 9.4 percent to 22.8 percent. That's better than Apple, which was no slouch. Shipments grew 128.4 percent, with share rising to 23.5 percent from 15.9 percent. By comparison, Nokia's share fell 30.6 percent -- or nearly three times the other laggard. Research in Motion share fell 11 percent to 8.2 percent from 14.3 percent.

Apple and Samsung largely split the smartphone market's largest portion, shipping 73 million of the quarter's 157.8 million units.

"The launch of Apple's iPhone 4S played a key role in smartphone growth to capture pent-up demand, and smartphone launches from other vendors also provided a broad selection to meet varying preferences and budgets", Ramon Llamas, IDC senior research analyst, says. The majority of "launches from other vendors" were Androids.

"So-called 'hero' devices, such as Samsung's Galaxy Nexus and Apple's iPhone 4S, garner the bulk of the attention heaped on the device type", Kevin Restivo, IDC senior research analyst, says. "But a growing number of sub-$250 device offerings, based on the Android operating system, have allowed Google's hardware partners to grow smartphone volumes and expand the market concurrently". No Android partner benefitted more than the aforementioned Samsung.

Fourth-quarter smartphone shipments exceeded IDC's growth forecast of 40 percent, rising 54.7 percent year over year. "By the end of the quarter, one out of every three mobiles phones shipped worldwide was a smartphone", Llamas says.

For all 2011, smartphone shipments rose 61.3 percent to 491.4 million units from 304.7 million than a year earlier. While growth exceeded IDC's forecast (54.7 percent), it fell below 2010's year-over-year growth (75.7 percent).

While the smartphone market grows gangbusters, Nokia is the biggest loser -- and Windows Phone along with it. If Lumia's launch quarter is any indication, the road back, if there is one for manufacturer or operating system, will be long and arduous. One year ago this week, Microsoft and Nokia announced a sweeping distribution deal where Windows Phone replaces Symbian as primary operating system. So far, the Windows Phone transition is killing Nokia, not that it had a workable smartphone strategy before.

Microsoft has committed $1 billion annually in payments to Nokia, as part of the agreement. The return on that investment is what? Coincidentally, today, Microsoft Store started taking pre-orders for the Nokia Lumia 900; there's a $25 reserve. That handset's success or failure may answer the question, or at least foreshadow it.
Hangout at the Google+ developer page

Publié: février 6, 2012, 7:38pm CET par Joe Wilcox

Well, it took long enough. Google waited until passing 100 million G+ users before opening a platform developer page. What? You think only Facebook has a social network platform agenda? Google has ambitions, too.

Perhaps the big thing will be the weekly Hangouts, where Google+ developers can get the lowdown. It's nothing on the scale of Microsoft's Channel 9 (Say didn't Vic Gundotra have a hand in both Nine and G+?). Channel 9 is more about broadcasting developer information, while Hangouts are live and more interactive.

Hangouts are one of the best Google+ features -- video chat with a bunch of people, whether they're actively or passively participating. (If it's so good, why haven't I, ah Hungout? Got to fix that one.)

"Our team will host regular Hangouts to talk about the +Platform, your experiences with it, and share tips and tricks with the community. Our weekly office hours hangouts take place every Wednesday at 11:30am - 12:15pm PDT, and can be accessed from our Google+ Developers page", Chris Chabot, Google+ developer relations team lead, explains. "The +Platform team will also share Google+ developer events, conferences and hackathons, as well as photos and videos of the events. In addition, we’ll announce and discuss our +Platform launches on our page".
Redbox and Verizon to launch streaming video service this year

Publié: février 6, 2012, 7:09pm CET par Tim Conneally

Coinstar-owned DVD rental kiosk company Redbox was one of the biggest reasons Blockbuster video went bankrupt. Monday, Coinstar announced it has begun a joint venture with communications service provider Verizon to build a subscription streaming video service.

It is a move nearly identical to the one Netflix took three-and-a-half years ago, when it branched out from being a DVD-by-mail service to also being a streaming video provider through a partnership with Starz.

The streaming content is expected to debut in the second half of 2012, available to both residental and wireless subscribers, and will offer "subscription services and more in an easy-to-use, flexible and affordable service that will allow all consumers across the U.S. to enjoy the new and popular entertainment they want, whenever they choose, using the media and devices they prefer."

The Redbox/Verizon joint venture does not yet have a name of its own, but majority ownership is Verizon's. The network operator will hold a 65 percent stake while Redbox will hold a 35 percent ownership stake.

We hear that "Qwikster" is still available!
Dolphin Text Editor Menu -- advanced formatting from most any Windows app

Publié: février 6, 2012, 6:38pm CET par Mike Williams

If you occasionally need to format a text document in advanced ways, perhaps adding line numbers or sorting its lines alphabetically, then your first thought might be to find and install a programmer’s editor. But these can be expensive, and complex, leaving you with a whole new editing interface to learn.

A better idea might be to install Dolphin Text Editor Menu. The program runs in the background, ready to work with virtually any application where you can enter text: Notepad, Wordpad, Word, Excel, Visual Studio, browsers and more. So you can use your preferred application as normal, then when you need some advanced option, just select the text you’d like to format, press Dolphin’s hotkey (Ctrl+Num Pad 0 by default) and the program’s menu will pop up.

The functions on offer here are fairly basic, but provide most of the core functionality you’d expect. There are tools to add numbers or text to the beginning or end of lines, for instance. The program can sort lines in various ways. And you’re able to remove blank lines, duplicate lines, leading or trailing spaces, and so on.

Dolphin also provides various options to change the case of your selected text. It can clean up text by removing hidden formatting, HTML or BBCode tags, say. And assorted other miscellaneous options will do everything from split up paragraphs into separate sentences, to count the words, lines and characters you’ve selected.

What you don’t get here are the more advanced programmer’s editor-type features, such as syntax highlighting or regular expression find and replace: Dolphin is more about covering the essentials. It does this well, however, is supremely convenient (it can even be installed to a USB stick for running anywhere) and free for personal use (commercial licences are $5), so it seems impolite to complain.

If you do think of ways in which Dolphin Text Editor Menu could be improved, though, the developer points out that the program is “being actively developed, so any requests for additional functionality will be seriously considered”. Pass on your thoughts at Animal Software’s forum.

Photo Credit: Laszlo Szirtesi/Shutterstock
Screenshot Captor 3 adds scrolling capture, Windows 7 transparency effects

Publié: février 6, 2012, 6:28pm CET par Nick Peers

Donationcoder.com has announced the release of Screenshot Captor 3 for Windows PCs. The donation-ware screen capture utility adds three major new features to this landmark release, including splicing effects, a scrolling screen capture function and a number of watermarking options for marking screenshots.

Version 3.0 also includes other recently introduced features, such as full TWAIN and WIA scanner support, automatic upload to supported image hosting services and support for partial Windows 7 transparency effects.

Screenshot Captor 3, which is now also available as a separate portable version, adds a “super deluxe scrolling capture system”, which the author claims is the best on the market. This allows users to capture screens that are larger than the display, such as lengthy documents or websites.

Version 3.0 also adds a number of new splice effects, including ragged edge, that are also available via the cropping and border menus. It also adds a simplified watermarking menu and options that allow users to stamp their ownership on screen captures.

Screenshot Captor also builds on major features added in recent months, which include a full set of scanner acquisition and image correction tools. These are disabled by default, but support both WIA and TWAIN scanners and can be switched on via the Edit > Preferences menu.

Another recent addition is support for uploading to various online image hosting services, including Flickr and Imageshack.

Other changes in version 3 are minor -- there are new options when saving modified screenshots for preserving the original date and timestamp, an option to rename files when changing various field information and a loaded file’s creation and modification date and timestamps are now displayed in the program’s Status bar.

Version 3’s installation file has also been repackaged. Prior versions could be renamed as zip files and installed as portable installations, but version 3 now uses a standard setup file, necessitating the release of a separate portable build.

Screenshot Captor 3 and Screenshot Captor 3 Portable are both available as free, donationware downloads for PCs running all flavours of Windows from 95 onwards. A nag screen will appear on each launch which can be supressed by registering for a free key. This free key will expire after six months, at which point a new key can be requested. Donating any sum for continued use of the program produces a registration key that removes the nag screen permanently.
What are the three top-selling US smartphones? iPhone

Publié: février 6, 2012, 5:38pm CET par Joe Wilcox

In fourth quarter, that would be iPhone 4S, 4 and 3GS, in order from one to three, according to NPD. But before the Apple Fanclub does high-fives, Android share among first-time buyers outpaced iPhone, as measured by smartphone operating system, contradicting some other analyst data.

"iPhone 4S outsold the iPhone 4 by 75 percent, and outsold the iPhone 3GS, available for free on AT&T, five to one", Ross Rubin, NPD executive director, says. Well, so much for my theory older, discounted iPhones was a brilliant Apple strategy. Which again raises questions about the power of brand, considering iPhone isn't LTE, while AT&T and Verizon offer real 4G smartphones -- all Androids.

"Android has been criticized for offering a more complex user experience than its competitors, but the company’s wide carrier support and large app selection is appealing to new smartphone customers", Rubin says. "Android’s support of LTE at Verizon has also made it the exclusive choice for customers who want to take advantage of that carrier’s fastest network".

So perhaps LTE matters after all, at least to new buyers -- 57 percent chose Androids and 34 percent iPhone. The math is scary, by the way. NPD didn't publicly release new buyer share for other platforms, but Bada, BlackBerry, Symbian and Windows Mobile split up just 9 percent share. Well, we know what Americans aren't buying.

Additionally, iOS/iPhone closed the distance on Android, capturing 43 percent share to 48 percent share. The numbers are significant for another reason -- NPD tracks actual sales to end users rather than shipments into the channel.

More broadly, smartphone sales considerably outpaced feature phones. Smartphones accounted for 68 percent of sales during fourth quarter, up 18 percent year over year.

Now let me explain something about contradictory analyst reports. There are many out there right now, which makes them all suspect. Last week comScore reported dramatically different share numbers, putting Android way ahead of iOS/iPhone -- 47.3 percent to 29.6 percent, respectively. comScore measures US cellular subscribers ages 13 and above, which is different data methodology than NPD. The one uses a survey (of more than 30,000 Americans) and the other looks at sales.

Then there is Nielsen, which data seemingly directly contradicts NPD's. Android share, as measured in smartphone operating systems among new purchasers, plummeted from 61.6 percent in October to 46.9 percent in December. Meanwhile, iPhone rose from 25.1 percent share to 44.5 percent.

So whose data can you trust? No one's solely, nor any of the New York Post-style headlines trumpeting iPhone over Android, or visa versa. The clearest picture of US smartphone sales may come when Sprint announces holiday quarter earnings later this week. Assuming Sprint reveals iPhone sales, or activations, combined with AT&T and Verizon there will be clearer but not exact sense of what really occurred in the US market. I say "not exact" because iPhone activations don't necessarily mean on new handsets.