Maimpok

Well, well, well, what do we have here? It’s the final day of Google Play’s 25 billion app download celebration, and talk about Google stepping up its game! After a lukewarm start to the promotion which only saw a couple of already cheap and decent games discounted to $0.25, the price cuts grew and grew only to explode today.

Two very awesome Android games lead today’s list of top apps 75+% off, both of which should be purchased ASAP by any part-time or full-time mobile gamer out there. First up, it’s my personal favorite, the Dark Knight Rises from Gameloft, one particular title that I hoped to see included in this sale from day one.
Released just a couple of months back, the final chapter (or is it?) in the Batman saga was available until now for a pretty hefty $6.99. Doing some quick math, we can now get TDKR for Android for over 96% off, which is outstanding. The game’s plot and storyline might not be very original or groundbreaking (the movie itself was mediocre at best), but at a quarter of a buck this is one purchase that you won’t regret, if not for anything else but the awesome visuals.
Horn from Zynga is the (very close) second in my book of awesome Google Play deals today, the third person adventure game being also available until now for a luxurious $6.99. Optimized for Tegra 2 and Tegra 3 devices, the epic game has been released around a month back, but does have one major downside – it lacks support for several high-end Android devices, including Samsung’s Galaxy S3 and Galaxy Nexus.

As usual these past five days, it’s not all about games in these awesome promotions. If you’re therefore on the hunt for some utility tools on the cheap, you should definitely check out Nova Launcher Prime, the highly customizable and very user-friendly home screen replacement for Android 4.0+ devices. You can still get the base version of Nova Launcher for free, but the paid app offers you access to a ton of extra features, gestures, effects and customizations.
Here’s the full list of Android apps available in Google Play today for just $0.25:

• Horn
• The Dark Knight Rises
• Haunted House HD
• Smart Tools
• Nova Launcher Prime
• Great Big War Game
• Scramble With Friends
• Kids Numbers and Math
• Guns’n’Glory WW2 Premium
• Gravity Guy
• Air Control
• Air Control HD
• SketchBook Pro
• SPY Mouse

Still on the fence about any of the above discounted apps? Hurry up and decide, because today’s deal, as well as the entire promotion, will end in just a few hours. Don’t forget to also check out the other Google Play deals, for books, magazines, music and movies while you still have time.

The Sony brand might not be the most popular in today’s Android universe, but you can’t say that the Japanese are not going to the great lengths to change that perception.
In fact, Sony has probably been one of the most active mobile tech manufacturers of the past couple of months, unveiling three new global phones (the Xperia T, J and V), not to mention one well-received 10-inch tablet.

But the company’s launch bonanza doesn’t seem to be ending, with yet another phone announced today. The Xperia AX is not an absolute newcomer to the market, being a special Japanese variant of the Xperia V, but it will come with a couple of original features.
Like the global Xperia V, the AX will sport a beautiful 4.3-inch TFT capacitive touchscreen with a 1280 x 720 pixels resolution and 342 ppi pixel density. There’ll be the same 13 MP fast-capture camera with autofocus and LED flash on the back of the device, and, unfortunately, Android 4.0.4 Ice Cream Sandwich.
We say unfortunately because the AX, again like the V, doesn’t have an official launch date announced and might only hit stores in late November or early December. By then, chances are that the first phone with Android 4.2 will see the light of day.


If you’re willing to get past this inconvenience and wait for a Jelly Bean update that should hit the AX “soon”, you should know that the new Japanese phone will come with 4G LTE speeds, “the highest levels” of dust and water resistance, and the highly acclaimed arc design.
Other features will include some Japan-specific treats like infrared port data exchange, mobile wallet and mobile TV, but also NFC. No word on the AX’s processing speed, though we’re guessing the dual-core 1.5 GHz Qualcomm Snapdragon Krait powering the Xperia V will be found inside this phone, too.
It’s also fairly predictable for the Xperia AX to come with 1 GB of RAM, 8 GB of on-board memory, microSD support, Wi-Fi 802.11 a/b/g/n, Bluetooth 4.0, DLNA, a VGA front-facing cam, and a 1,750 mAh battery.
Finally, we’re expecting the handheld to be made available in several color schemes, including but not limited to the black, white and pink already announced for the Xperia V. The pricing is of course another mystery, though if earlier rumors around Europe are to be trusted, it should start selling for the equivalent of $650 or so.
Anyone excited about the Xperia AX? How about its international counterpart, the Xperia V? Would ICS really be a deal-breaker come November or December?

FreedomPop is aiming to bring high-speed 4G internet to the US masses for free. The service is entering Beta now, on a first come, first served basis, and it offers every user 500MB of free data per month. That data will be delivered via the Clearwire WiMAX network right now, but FreedomPop is due to start using Sprint’s 4G LTE spectrum in 2013.

The company claims there are no gimmicks here, no caps or throttling, just 4G wherever you go, on any device, without a contract. When you go past your free 500MB, you’ll pay $10 per gigabyte. Current speeds are touted at 4 to 10 Mbps download, and 1 to 2 Mbps upload.
How do you take advantage? Well, you need the Freedom Spot or the Freedom Stick. The Freedom Spot is a hotspot that can serve up to eight devices and you can get one by putting down an $89 refundable deposit. The Freedom Stick is a USB dongle and you can get it with a $49 refundable deposit. Apparently the company has iPhone and iPod cases, or “Freedom Sleeves”, that double as hotspots in the works. They’ll be available in the next few weeks for $99 and the iPhone version also works as a charging case.
If you’re wondering how FreedomPop expects to turn a profit, the plan is to offer various premium services. These will include faster 4G, device protection, and data cap alerts. The company is also going to run promotions that allow you to earn more data each month. You can earn up to 1GB by referring friends to the service and there will be rewards for signing up to partner services or watching an advert.
Sound tempting? It certainly looks like FreedomPop is seriously undercutting the competition, but can its business model work? Only time will tell. You can find out more at the FreedomPop website. If anyone gets onto the Beta let us know how it goes.

Many years ago, in what feels like another lifetime, I was a hardcore PC gamer. My computer weighed more than my girlfriend, it sounded like a Boeing 747, but I didn’t care because I built it with my own hands. Now just because I decided to build my own PC to play videogames, that doen’t meant I thought everyone else should have done the same thing.
Lots of people opt to buy systems from Alienware, Voodoo, Dell, and several other boutique gaming companies. Those of use who knew how to build computers laughed at how over priced those pre-built systems cost, but at the same time we understood that one doesn’t need to know how to route cables under a motherboard tray to enjoy an all night Unreal Tournament gaming session.
Which brings us to Android. You and I know that rooting our phones and flashing them with a custom ROM can provide an experience that’s far better than what the original manufacturer or operator intended, but what about people who don’t want to go through that? Put yourself in the shoes of a person who isn’t tech savvy. They need to search for a ROM, follow a 20 step process that was written in a forum post somewhere, said forum post comes with multiple warnings about breaking their device, and to top it all off when they ask for “help” they’re often just pointed back to that “easy” 20 step process.
People shouldn’t need to know how to build a computer to enjoy videogames, and similarly people shouldn’t need to know how to flash a ROM to enjoy the most that their smartphone can offer. So I want to find out, why isn’t there a company out there that sells people devices that are already rooted and flashed with CyanogenMod or MIUI or something else?
These “pre-pimped” phones would cost maybe 50 Euros more than a retail device, but they’ll be that much better because they’ll ship without any skins, they’ll probably run the latest version of Android, and they’ll be backed by a real business instead of a couple anonymous forum members who may or may not prove useful should something go wrong.
Update: One of our readers, Dave Moehle, sent me a link to a story about a man in Houston, Texas who does exactly what I described in the article above. He charges $30 for rooting/flashing. That’s more than fair!

“In the past there was a huge gap between the best of breed and second best. Now, maybe there’s still a small gap between a Sony high-definition screen and an LG screen, but most consumers can’t see it. And if most consumers can’t see it, it’s not there. Japanese companies have been too busy defending old business models that the world simply bypassed.”

SOURCES washington post

In less than three weeks, Google’s current Nexus phone, the Galaxy Nexus, is going to turn one year old. That means we’re due for an upgrade. Back in May, The Wall Street Journal said that we’re going to see multiple Nexus smartphones launched during the holiday shopping season, but that rumor is now being challenged.
According to Android and Me, Google is going to announce just one new Nexus phone this month. And the next version of Android, allegedly called Key Lime Pie, isn’t going to be version 5.0, but instead 4.2. Their server logs already show several hits from a device running Android 4.2, and while it’s easy enough to fake Android version numbers, we don’t think someone would go through all that trouble just to punk the Android community.
What do we know about this next Nexus? The three sources who spoke to Android and Me say the phone has already leaked. That could mean the Galaxy Nexus II, but it could also mean the LG Optimus G.
What do we at Android Authority think about all this? Our gut says that the next Nexus will be a minor update to the Galaxy Nexus. The next “major” version of Android will likely be shown off early next year because that’s when we can expect to see next generation hardware. By “next generation” we mean new chips that use ARM’s Cortex A15 processor such as the Texas Instruments OMAP 5. Qualcomm’s quad core Snapdragon S4 is going to start shipping in phones this month, but not in any meaningful quantities. It’s going to take a while for production to ramp up, so it makes sense for Google to host a major event in 2013 instead of this year.
Remember the first Nexus, the Nexus One? It was announced in early January. We could see a repeat of that sort of timing, and maybe that’s when Google will unveil this so called “portfolio” of Nexus smartphones.

“GPS in America has become ‘too big to fail… Like Wall Street, the manufacturers of GPS devices have spent years profiting off of vulnerable technology and are now seeking protection from the government instead of implementing the necessary reforms.”

SOURCES CNN Money ComputerWorld