According to the latest reports from Digitimes, Apple iPad 3 might have a possible launch somewhere in March – April 2012. Truth is, there is no official word from Apple for even coming up with an iPad 3, let alone a March – April launch. But then, this has been the case always and Apple will lose out a lot of head start if the iPad 3 is launched late in 2012. The iPad 2 is still selling well, but coming out with a new product every March or April has been the tradition with Apple. Let us discuss on why Apple should launch the iPad 3 in quarter 1 of 2012.
iPad 3 has some strong competition in 2012.
Samsung Galaxy Tab 10.1 and similar devices are already more powerful than the iPad 2. The iPad 2 was ahead of the rest when it was launched, but Android tablets have not only matched the iPad 2 but also are way ahead in terms of speed and features than the iPad 2. Apple will have to pull up their socks and claim the top spot again by releasing the iPad 3 in Q1.
iPad 3 should be wary of a cheap competitor – Kindle Fire
Although the Kindle Fire will be nowhere near in terms of specifications of the iPad 3, it has one killer feature, the price. $199 tablets coming from Amazon’s stable means that Apple should already be worried. The iPad 3 will not sell at $199 but still it can launch early with a $500 tag and it might be able to convert some Kindle Fire customers in its favor.
Android is a worthy competitor now to the iOS
Early in 2011, Android was still sprouting and it was almost nothing against the iOS. But thanks to the overwhelming response to the Android operating system by big time manufacturers, we now have some awesome tablets like the Samsung Galaxy Tab 10.1 and the Kindle Fire in the market. The operating system has also matured a fair bit and by all means is certainly on par with the iOS of the iPad 3.
These were 3 very good reasons why the iPad 3 should launch in Q1 2012. Stay tuned for the Part 2 in this series. Until then let me know yours view on this article. Subscribe to the newsletter to
Welcome back to part 2 in this series of discussion where we are trying to understand why it makes sense to launch the iPad 3 in Q1. Part 1gave us some strong reasons to believe that Apple should not delay the launch of the iPad 3 any further than Q1. But that is not all, there are still quite a few reasons why an early launch might help the iPad 3 in terms of staying at the pinnacle of the tablet market. Let us begin with the all important Windows 8.
iPad 3 iOS competition- Windows 8 might launch late in 2012
Windows 8 is under the works and it will probably launch in 2012. Now there is no doubt that there will be a slew of tablets running Windows 8. Windows 8 looks promising in the little tidbits that have come out in the open of the operating system so far. Delaying the launch of the iPad 3 late into 2012, might prove counterproductive to iPad 3’s sales. Although there is no word out on any Windows 8 based tablets but still it will be a worthy competitor and launching the iPad 3 late means that Apple will have more reasons to worry to keep its stronghold in the tablet market.
Global slowdown means the sales number of the iPad 2 will be lower
The global slowdown means that the spending power of people will be less. Some of the projections of early 2012 shows that people will be a little cash strapped and they will think wisely before spending on things. Launching the iPad 3 early on in 2012 might translate into higher sales number for Apple. There is a general tendency of people to spend on new things and people might loosen their purses for the iPad 3 instead of the iPad 2.
Launching the iPad 3 in first quarter will be a good strategic decision for Apple
If the iPad 3 is launched in the first quarter than Apple can space out the launch of the iPhone 5 by a good six months. Apple will be able to launch the iPhone 5 by September or October 2012. There are several advantages of this . For starters, it will give the buyers plenty of time to think what device they want to buy and secondly launching 2 products evenly in a year means that the buzz for Apple products never dies.
Wrapping up this series, I would like to mention that the iPad 3 will be a game changer if it is able to come out with all those features that has been mentioned here and that too in Q1 2012. Subscribe to the newsletter to stay updated with the latest of iPad 3.
Back in September Samsung announced it would release their flagship Galaxy S II device in new flavors. The South Korean exclusive Galaxy S II LTE and the Galaxy S II HD LTE were just released on the local market and guess what, they now have white as an optional color in tune with the holiday season.
The HD LTE comes in all of its 4.65" Super AMOLED 1280x720 glory with a dual-core 1.5 GHz and, naturally LTE connectivity speeds. The Galaxy S II LTE has a 4.5" WVGA (480x800) display, which is about the only difference between the two. They should both be available on SK Telecom as previously told but on HSDPA and LTE, sans the CDMA.
The phones look stunning and do bring a lot of bang for today's standards. Still we're eager to see what the upcoming CES and WMC will bring - they did bring us the Galaxy S II this year after all.
The glass topped design features no moving parts but instead works using acoustic and piezo-electric sensors.
The system compares sounds made by tapping of the screen to a database of signatures determining which key is being used.
The keyboard would still display the traditional Qwerty keys but three sensors within the keyboard would be “sufficiently precise” to triangulate the position of the tap said the patent filing.
It's always a good thing to open our mailbox and get a surprise invite to a hot new event set on announcing something new and exciting. Well we just got surprised today by an invitation to an event held by Prada and LG on Wednesday, December 14 in London.
To get right down to it - we expect to see the chic LG Prada K2. It should feature a 4.3" IPS LCD capacitive display of WVGA (480 x 800) resolution, 8 MP sharpshooter on the back, Android under the hood and a thin profile of 8.8 mm.
We're waiting to see what kind of processor it will utilize and the exact number of cores . The Prada phones were among the first non-Apple devices to use capacitive screen technology back in 2008 and2009, you know.
We'll be there to cover the event, so be sure to check back in 12 days from now.
A group of hackers who have identified themselves as 'Teampoison' have posted more than 100 email addresses and login details that they claim to have extracted from a United Nations database.
Many of the released emails appear to belong to members of the United Nations Development Programme, (UNDP).
The details were posted on the website Pastebin under the Teampoison logo.
A spokeswoman for the UNDP said the agency believed "an old server which contains old data" had been targeted.
"The UNDP found [the] compromised server and took it offline," said Sausan Ghosheh.
"The server goes back to 2007. There are no active passwords listed for those accounts.
A group of hackers has posted more than 100 email addresses and login details which it claimed to have extracted from the United Nations.
Many of the emails involved appear to belong to members of the United Na tions Development Programme (UNDP).
The group, which identified itself as Teampoison, attacked the UN's behaviour and called it a "fraud".
A spokeswoman for the UNDP said the agency believed "an old server which contains old data" had been targeted.
"The UNDP found [the] compromised server and took it offline," said Sausan Ghosheh.
"The server goes back to 2007. There are no active passwords listed for those accounts.
"Please note that UNDP.org was not compromised."
The United Nations Development Programme says i
t is "in the process of validating this claim"
'Leak'
The details were posted on the website Pastebin under the Teampoison logo.
The message preceding the login details accused the UN of acting to "facilitate the introduction of a New World Order" and asked "United Nations, why didn't you expect us?"
Many of the email addresses given end in undp.org, but others appear to belong to members of the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD), the World Health Organisation (WHO) and the UK's Office for National Statistics (ONS).
The poster noted that several of the accounts had "no passwords".
The message ended with the taunt: "The question now is how? We will let the so called 'security experts' over at the UN figure that out... Have a Nice Day."
Credit card attacks
The security company Sophos noted that Teampoison hackers had previously attacked the maker of the Blackberry smartphone's website and had published private information about former UK Prime Minister Tony Blair.
"Teampoison recently announced they were joining forces with Anonymous on a new initiative dubbed 'Operation Robin Hood', targeting banks and financial institutions," the firm's senior technology consultant, Graham Cluley wrote on Sophos's blog.
The groups said at the time that their operation aimed to take money from credit cards and donate it to individuals and charities.
They said people would not be harmed as the banks had to refund fraudulent charges.
Teampoison added a "shoutout" to Anonymous in its UN attack posting, adding a link to a Youtube video with more information about its banking attack plan.
These latest moves serve as a reminder that so-called hacktivists are skilled and willing to collaborate to take down their targets, according to Professor Alan Woodward from the University of Surrey's department of computing.
"One of the big problems is that there is so much data around that people forget about their older systems that still have valuable data on them," he said.
"The lesson here is that anything that holds any data of any value must be protected."
Six months ago we started rolling out a new look and feel for Search, News, Maps, Translate, Gmail and a bunch of other products. Our goal was to create a beautifully simple and intuitive user experience across Google.
We’re now ready for the next stage of our redesign—a new Google bar that will enable you to navigate quickly between our services, as well as share the right stuff with the right people easily on Google+.
Instead of the horizontal black bar at the top of the page, you’ll now find links to your services in a new drop-down Google menu nested under the Google logo. We’ll show you a list of links and you can access additional services by hovering over the “More” link at the bottom of the list. Click on what you want, and you’re off.
To find out more about the new Google bar, take a look at this video or read our Help Center article.
Making navigation and sharing super simple for people is a key part of our efforts to transform the overall Google experience, which is why we’re very excited about this redesign. Enjoy!
The company has started shipping the new Pentium 350 dual-core chip for low-end servers
Intel is giving new life to its Pentium processor for servers, and has started shipping the new Pentium 350 chip for low-end servers.
The dual-core processor operates at a clock speed of 1.2GHz and has 3MB of cache. Like many server chips, the Pentium 350 lacks features such as integrated graphics, which are on most of Intel's laptop and desktop processors.
The iconic Pentium line of processors has been around for more than a decade, but now is mostly targeted at budget laptops and desktops. Pentium was Intel's flagship PC processor line, a mantle now held by the Core chips. The company once offered Pentium III and Pentium II Xeonprocessors for servers.
An Intel spokesman said the chip is targeted at microservers, which are low-power, compact servers for Web serving and content delivery services. Intel already offers Xeon E3 chips and is soon expected to launch new chips based on Atom for microservers.
The new processor is an acknowledgement of the Pentium brand's staying power, said Dean McCarron, principal analyst at Mercury Research. Besides microservers, the Pentium 350 could also be used in inexpensive, task-specific servers for storage, printing or document sharing, according to McCarron.
"What we're seeing is a repurposed part," McCarron said. The Pentium 350 is a cheaper alternative to Intel's PC chips, which could also be used in servers but are more expensive with additional features, such as integrated graphics.
The new processor draws 15 watts of power and there's a remote chance it could be used in blades, McCarron said. The processor is, however, not a replacement to Intel's current low-power Atom processors. These are typically for netbooks and tablets, but are also being used in high-density servers such as SeaMicro's SM10000-64HD to process cloud transactions.
Targeting the new Pentium chip at servers could also be a tacit acknowledgement that Intel wants Pentium to replace the Celeron brand, which is the lowest rung of Intel's processors. Celeron processors are used in low-cost desktops and laptops, and in a few cases, low-end servers.
Intel declined to provide pricing for the Pentium 350.
Technology is constantly improving. New processors, improved memory, massive hard disc space; we're used to hearing about these every changing elements within our PC computers, but what about our consoles? The Xbox 360 is now more than seven years old, and though the developers argue that its full potential still hasn't been realized there have obviously been technological advances since its launch.
It's unsurprising then that rumors are already starting to circulate regarding the next generation Xbox, fondly dubbed the Xbox 720 until the true name is released from Microsoft. This new console from our favorite games manufacturer will arrive packed full of technology to allow for extraordinary graphics and performance. Although the details are still sketchy given Microsoft's tendency to keep their new projects on the quiet side, this overview should give you an indication about what to expect when this new console reaches the high street.
Suspected Specs So first things first, let's think about the specifications that we can expect to see the Xbox 720 offer to us. The very first Xbox 360s were released with triple core 3.2GHz processors, and a separate Graphical Processing Unit (GPU) from AMD. Nothing is confirmed as yet, but it looks likely that the 720 could benefit from a Fusion chip, combining the CPU and GPU into one mega-powerful space. The Xbox 360 slim already features a Vejle all-in-one processor, so it seems logical that Microsoft might continue down the same path.
We aren't sure exactly how we'll be receiving the games for our new console, be it through Blu-Ray (doubtful; Microsoft isn't exactly keen to start using a Sony technology), HD-DVD or even Flash drives. There are even some rumors that gaming could be more Cloud based, working in a similar fashion to the Steam system for PCs.
Although we don't doubt that the classic controller for Xbox will be around for many years to come, it is highly likely that the Xbox 720 will feature improvements to the Kinect technology. Will every unit come with the Kinect built in? This seems likely if the developers can make it affordable.
A New Generation of Games
We've established that the technology powering the new console is going to be intense, but what sort of games can you expect to enjoy with it? No one knows for sure, but here are a few titles we expect to see launched onto this new platform:
Halo 5 (or 6? Or 7?) - Everyone loves a bit of Halo, with sales from Halo Reach topping $200 million on its first day! The announcement that developer Bungie was retreating from the scene left fans devastated, but with new developer 343 Industries taking hold of the reigns we can expect a lot more from this series yet.
Gears of War 4 - Gears of War was initially announced as a trilogy, culminating in the new Gears of War 3 for Xbox 360, but we really don't believe we've seen the end of it just yet. Even the developers have hinted that the world can continue after the culmination of the last game of the original three, strongly suggesting a sequel to come.
Assassin's Creed 3 - We've loved Altair and we've loved Ezio. Soon it will be time for Ubisoft to introduce us to a third character in Assassin's Creed 3. With the new processor for the Xbox 720 boasting the ability to vastly improve the artificial intelligence of individual subjects in a created world, we are keen to see exactly how successful this particular title could be.
These are just a few of our ideas; there will undoubtedly be many more games to hit the Xbox 720 swiftly, along with new and improved games to enjoy with the Kinect motion sensor technology.
Our Hopes for a Release Date
By now we should have whet your appetite for the new and improved Xbox 720, but unfortunately there is still a bit of a wait for its release. The Wii U from Nintendo may be headed for a 2012 launch, but we aren't expecting the 720, and rival the Sony PS4, until 2013 at the earliest. Microsoft is suggesting that there is likely to be an overlap between the 360 and the next model, the 720. As the Xbox 360 did start its life as a bit of a flop, costing the company more than $1.2 billion at its launch, Microsoft will be trying to squeeze every ounce of life from this console.
But don't worry. Our sources suggest that Microsoft has recently upped its intake of staff within its console development wing, so before you know it you'll have an all new Xbox to splash your cash on!
The next generation PlayStation may arrive sooner than we think.. maybe even in 2009! But based on the past release cycles ( 6 years ), it should come out anywhere between 2011-2012, concluded from the study below -
PS1 was released in 1994
PS2 was released in 2000
PS3 was released in 2006
PS4 will be released ____ probably in 2012 ?
However, taking accelerating technology and growing demand into consideration, it's safe to assume that the PlayStation 4 console may very well be released before 2010.
The PlayStation4 could either turn out to be the state of the art All-in-one media center with Blue-Ray disk support, IP TV and direct downloads or it may be angled towards a hardcore gaming machine with much better graphics capabilities by adding more Synergistic Processing Elements (SPEs) using their Cell architecture ; And also increase the storage capacity to something like 1 Terabyte or more.
To imagine what a PS4 might be capable of we should look at what the current PS3 doesn't have or doesn't do well ..
Hardware / Software Integration
According to SCEA's CEO Jack Tretton: "The hardware guys developed the [PlayStation 3] fairly independently, then dumped it onto the software guy's lap, effectively saying 'do something with it.'"
The PlayStation4 could either incorporate multiple cell chips or increase the number of on-ship SPEs.The advantage of recycling the Cell is that Sony could retain a familiar development environment and use existing code libraries.
Technology Upgrades
Some obvious technology upgrades would include -
- 802.11n to replace the existing 802.11b/g chipset.
- An external power supply (to reduce the size of the box and to improve cooling).
- A massive hard disk.
- New graphics processor.
- Increase in the onboard memory.
The memory architecture in the PS3 splits 512MB equally between graphics and application use and this limits developer freedom. We can expect the PS4 to address this issue, giving developers more dedicated memory in which to load game levels. Although it's worth pointing out that the PS3 (and any future Cell-based consoles) can use the SPEs for maths-intensive tasks like physics.
The New Graphics Processor
The PS3 uses the NVIDIA-built RSX graphics processor.Rumours suggest that Intel is trying to sell its Larrabee to Sony for the PS4.
Blue-Ray Capability
While the PS3 was instrumental in helping Blu-ray beat off HD DVD, there's a strong argument for dropping an optical drive from the PS4 altogether.Along with the Cell processor, the Blu-ray drive is one of the PS3's most expensive components. The PS3's high price has forced it into third place behind the Nintendo Wii and Xbox 360. Sony will be keen not to price itself out of the next console battle.Console owners are already downloading gigabytes-worth of game demos, video trailers, full-length movies and TV shows. With a giant hard disk in the PS4, games could simply be piped straight to the console on release day; long install/level load times would be eliminated.
Overall Features
Will the PlayStation4 turn out to be an All-in-one media center or the console where the best games are played. The choice needs to be made as satisfying both the demands will push the PS4 's price tag much higher than its competitors , a mistake Sony Corp. may not be willing to repeat.
