Posts by Stephen Schenck
Stephen has been writing about electronics since 2008, which only serves to frustrate him that he waited so long to combine his love of gadgets and his degree in writing. In his spare time, he collects console and arcade game hardware, is a motorcycle enthusiast, and enjoys trapping blue crabs. Stephen's first mobile device was a 624 MHz Dell Axim X30, which he's convinced is still a viable platform. Stephen longs for a market where phones are sold independently of service, and bandwidth is cheap and plentiful; he's not holding his breath. In the meantime, he devours smartphone news and tries to sort out the juicy bits
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by Stephen Schenck | May 21, 2013 5:11 PMYesterday, we got what seems to be our first real look at the Samsung Galaxy S 4 Active, the waterproof version of the Galaxy S 4 that's been the subject of a number of rumors in recent weeks. What we saw looked great, and the rumored specs suggested that the phone would keep much of the original GS4's abilities, only really taking a small hit when it came to camera resolution. As Pocketnow reader Amer Lukac pointed out in the comments, a video of the GS4 Active has surfaced as well, only this time the specs attached to the model aren't quite as grand. The good news first: the video seems ...
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by Stephen Schenck | May 21, 2013 4:35 PMIt's been about six months since Nokia launched Here, its new mapping service. It all sounded very promising, with a rich SDK for letting devs add content to the experience. Of course, Nokia itself continues to tinker away at Here, and today announced a pretty substantial update for the Windows Phone app, adding support for LiveSight augmented reality. We heard Nokia talking about LiveSight back during the Mobile World Congress, when it mentioned the feature being on its way for Here. This should sound like it's very much a take-off on City Lens, because that uses the same LiveSight ...
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by Stephen Schenck | May 21, 2013 3:42 PMMillions of shoppers turn to Consumer Reports for unbiased, in-depth comparisons to help them shop for anything from cars to chainsaws. That includes smartphones, and we've looked at the company's ratings a number of times in the past. CR recently reviewed the Samsung Galaxy S 4, and found itself so enamored with the smartphone that it gave the handset its ranking top-spot. Previously, that first place smartphone slot was inhabited by the the LG Optimus G. Despite being a solid phone, it's not a particularly popular model, so it's really almost surprising to see it hold on to its spot for ...
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by Stephen Schenck | May 21, 2013 2:59 PMShortly after we learned of the special Google edition of the Galaxy S 4 running stock Android, we started hearing rumors about the HTC One getting the same sort of treatment. It wasn't long before HTC took the air out of those claims, announcing that it was "not currently planning a 'Nexus Edition' of the HTC One." In spite of this, the rumors refuse to fully dissipate, and yet another round has sprung up, looking to an end-of-summer release window. The info comes from developer/occasional tipster LlabTooFeR, who has been posting about a "Senseless HTC One" on Twitter. He claims his ...
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by Stephen Schenck | May 21, 2013 1:12 PMFingerprint scanners are one of those weird features that have been around forever, yet have never really found a way to catch on in the mainstream. There are some good reasons for that, as the tech itself is a bit of a paradox: it can feel like a paranoid, high-security burden, while at the same time can be quite trivial for a determined attacker to bypass. We've seen it on the odd phone like the Motorola Atrix 4G, but it's really started finding itself in more and more headlines lately after rumors got started that the next iPhone might incorporate some kind of fingerprint-scanning ...
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by Stephen Schenck | May 21, 2013 12:10 PMThe ruggedized Android dominating our thoughts for the moment may be the Galaxy S 4 Active, and while we're still waiting for much of this info we have on the phone to be confirmed, one item seems like a given: it's going to be expensive. If a reliable elements-proof construction is important to you but you don't have $600 to drop on a new smartphone, you may want to take a look at the Cat B15, which today goes up for sale online to North American customers. We first heard of this guy back at the Mobile World Congress, where we had the opportunity to go hands-on with the sturdy handset. ...
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by Stephen Schenck | May 21, 2013 11:39 AMMuch of the Galaxy S 4 talk over the past week has been about this Google AOSP edition of the phone, but we're also still waiting for it to hit one more carrier in the US: Verizon. Last week we got word that Verizon would no longer wait until the very end of the month to get things started with the GS4, and instead was pushing-up its plans for the handset. As we get ready for the handset to come to the carrier this Thursday, May 23, we're learning of some promotions Verizon is running to usher-in the Android. This may be a tad specific, so apologizes to those of you who are unable to take ...
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by Stephen Schenck | May 21, 2013 10:42 AMEarlier this month, LG distributed invitations to a May 30 event where news about a "G" phone was teased. When first hearing about this, we speculated as to just what LG might hope to reveal, with something like the regional launch of the Optimus G Pro for China high on that list. Still, images of an unknown LG smartphone kept appearing, and we couldn't quite shake the rumor that LG might be planning on getting an early start to announcing the Optimus G II, and would use this event to do so. Well, it now seems like we should have just stuck with our guy on this one, as LG has now confirmed ...
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by Stephen Schenck | May 21, 2013 7:05 AMThose of you who watched along with the Google I/O keynote last week got to witness the debut of what's essentially a Nexus Galaxy S 4. Everything was going great at the time: "it's Google's take on Android – on the Galaxy S 4" *cheers* "it's bootloader unlocked" *cheers* "it will get prompt updates with every Android platform update" *big cheers* "it will go up for sale on June 26 in Google Play for $649" … … *silence*. We're talking pin-drop, cricket-chirping stuff here. Yup, there are no two ways about it: that's a very un-Google, un-Nexus price tag. At the time, I wasn't too ...
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by Stephen Schenck | May 20, 2013 5:38 PMWhen you install an Android app, you're presented with a litany of permissions that the app requires you to accept. Currently, that's an all-or-nothing situation. While that makes things easier for developers, it also takes away a lot of power away from users, and potentially makes Android less secure. We've recently been talking about news uncovered thanks to Google I/O events, and that trend continues now, with Google addressing just this very issue during the Android team "fireside chat." When pressed to answer whether we'd see expanded user control over app permissions come to Android, ...
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by Stephen Schenck | May 20, 2013 4:53 PMReady to start-off the week with a little bit of a smartphone mystery? We've got one for you that crosses paths with a few different lines of Samsung handsets, and really leaves us wondering just what the hardware could really be. Try to follow along with us and learn what we know about the so-called Samsung Melius. According to tipster superstar evleaks, the Samsung Melius will be an upcoming Android phone, model SGH-I527, for AT&T. The first twist is that the name Melius is one that has been previously associated with Samsung's Tizen efforts. A rumor from earlier this month claimed ...
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by Stephen Schenck | May 20, 2013 4:11 PMDespite our expectations, Google I/O 2013 failed to deliver a new version of Android. As we've discussed, that wasn't so much of a big deal, as we got plenty of improvements to services without needing a whole new Android build, but has left us wondering: just when might Key Lime Pie get here? We've seen evidence showing Android 4.3 in testing, and rumors have suggested that it could arrive sometime next month. We wait to learn if that will indeed come to pass, but in the meantime a couple little hints have surfaced in the wake of Google I/O that remind us that Key Lime Pie is still in our ...
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by Stephen Schenck | May 20, 2013 3:30 PMLast week's metamorphosis of Google Talk into the new Hangouts app brought with it an unwelcome blast from the past: users on AT&T in the States were discovering that the app was blocking their ability to conduct video calls over their cellular data connections. This assault on how you use the wireless connection you pay for churned up a whole lot of memories about Apple and FaceTime, and all the rubbish AT&T put iOS users through at the time. Even though AT&T ultimately backed down on many fronts in that case, it failed to yield in every regard, and users on unlimited data ...
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by Stephen Schenck | May 20, 2013 1:35 PMThe Nexus Q is unquestionably the black sheep of the Nexus family to date (yes, more than any CDMA Galaxy Nexus). After making its debut last summer, the project quickly went off the rails and fizzled-out before it really had a chance. This year, we were wondering if Google might take a second stab at the idea of a home Android-based media playback system, but no Nexus Q made an appearance at Google I/O. In fact, when the new Google All Access music system debuted and it specifically didn't support the Nexus Q – an Android built from the ground up for audio playback, it felt like this ...
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by Stephen Schenck | May 20, 2013 12:47 PMIt's sure seemed like Samsung was planning a whole series of Galaxy S 4 models, from the original smartphone to variants like the GS4 Mini, Zoom, and the Active we just got a chance to look at. Over the weekend, some new evidence arrived that just might point to another GS4 family member, taking its name from the manufacturer's new Mega line. A screenshot purporting to show the update details for the latest version of the Samsung WatchON app, arriving yesterday, notes that it "added support for upcoming S4 Mega, S4 mini, and S4 Active." That same line is missing from the "what's new" text ...