Daily Archives: January 5, 2016

Fitbit Blaze is a rectangular smartwatch for the active folk

Posted on by

Over at CES, Fitbit has announced a proper smartwatch for fitness buffs, the Blaze. More than just an activity tracker, though, the Blaze wouldn’t be out of place in a less sweaty environments, or at least, that’s the idea.

The Fitbit Blaze features a color LCD touchscreen display (no diagonal specified) built into a quite larger case and a bold, sharp-edged one at that. The case, or more like the frame, is made of stainless steel while the straps are made of an elastomer material like that found on other sports watches. The Blaze will be available with a choice of Black, Blue or Plum wristbands, but you can also pick up leather straps in three different colors ($99.95) and a stainless steel bracelet ($129.95).

Fitbit Blaze with different colored bands

In terms of functionality, you’re getting heart rate monitoring, all-day activity and sleep tracking, on top of call and text notifications and other alerts, and music control. Connected GPS requires your phone to supply the positioning data for your workout stats.

MultiSport lets you select an activity like running or biking and give you the relevant data while SmartTrack will recognize exercises even if you’ve gone all old school and not told your wearable what you’re going to be doing.

Fitbit promises a 5-day battery life out of the Blaze (no capacity), with a charge time between an hour and two hours. Connectivity takes place over Bluetooth 4.0. The smartwatch is “sweat, rain and splash proof” (no rating), but not swim proof and the company advises against showering with it, stating skin care reasons. Hmm.

The Fitbit Blade is available for pre-order right now at a price of $199.95, a good $50 less than the Surge’s MSRP. It won’t ship until March, though.

Source |…

from GSMArena.com – Latest articles http://ift.tt/1OKSAXe
via IFTTT

The Nexus 6P is now available in Matte Gold from the Google Store

Posted on by

It’s official folks, the color you’ve all been waiting for. As a part of its CES 2016 announcements, Huawei and Google have just released the Nexus 6P in Matte Gold, the color of winners.

The Matte Gold Nexus 6P is available now, January 5, on the Google Store and should be available soon on Best Buy’s website and in select retail stores. At its launch, the Gold Nexus 6P was only available in Japan. Unfortunately you cannot buy a Matte Gold Nexus 6P with 128GB of storage, but like other models, it starts at $499.

from Android and Me http://ift.tt/1ZMjWEp
via IFTTT

Huawei becomes No. 3 smartphone manufacturer in the world in Q3 of 2015

Posted on by

Huawei has started its press event at CES today by boasting about its smartphone market share, among other things. The Chinese company has told us that its brand recognition has improved dramatically over the past few years, and the trend is for it to become even better in the future.

But that’s not all. Not only do more people know about Huawei now, but more and more people are buying its smartphones. According to the company, it’s been the world’s No.3 smartphone maker in the third quarter of 2015, with 9.7% market share.

That’s almost twice as much as the next contender has managed (which, surprisingly, is Oppo). Huawei’s aim is to one day be No.2, and it thinks it may actually achieve that in a few years. One thing is clear, though – the company is very much focused on…

from GSMArena.com – Latest articles http://ift.tt/1OKkYPD
via IFTTT

HTC Vive is almost ready, Pre version showcased at CES

Posted on by

HTC Vive Pre is the next step in the HTC’s VR headset development and it was revealed at CES with refined design and strap, a newly integrated camera, and better controller.

The Steam VR headset developed with HTC and Valve was officially revealed back at MWC in Barcelona last year. Its target is to become the best VR headset on the market, sparing no resources and making no compromises. This, of course, means the price won’t be kept low and it won’t target the mainstream users just yet.

So, the HTC Vive Pre, the ‘Pre’ moniker marking the penultimate iteration, is now smaller than the initially introduced Vive, yet it features a more comfortable strap that allows people with glasses to use it as well.

The Vive Pre also comes with better displays, brighter and sharper, and featuring the so-called mura correction, which should fix “unevenness, irregularity, lack of uniformity, nonuniformity, inequality”.

The Vive Pre has been upgraded with a camera, which will allow the VR headset users to peek in the real world, while staying in the virtual one hassle-free.

The controller has been tweaked, too – HTC worked to improve on the handling, the balance and the battery life (now up to 4 hours). There is a dual-stage trigger support, too.

The one thing HTC is not ready to talk about is the HTC Vive price. The company says it cares more about making it the best, rather than mainstream.

HTC Vive should hit the shelves in April, so we’ll know about the pricing and availability very…

from GSMArena.com – Latest articles http://ift.tt/1OKOyy2
via IFTTT

Automakers, Not Silicon Valley, Lead in Driverless Car Patents: Study by REUTERS

Posted on by


By REUTERS

Automakers, not technology companies, are in the driver’s seat in developing self-driving, “autonomous” cars, and Japan’s Toyota Motor Corp is best positioned to lead the way, according to a new report on patents for the…

Published: January 5, 2016 at 07:05AM

from NYT Technology http://ift.tt/1Z3rEb1
via IFTTT

¿Sirven para algo las apps de ahorro de batería?

Posted on by

batería

Google Play Store está abarrotado de aplicaciones que claman a los cuatro vientos ser capaces de alargar notablemente la vida de nuestra batería. Hablo de esas apps con nombres tan rimbombantes como; Power Save Defender, Juice Saver, Power Up Battery…
Al usar Android por primera vez, seguramente, tentados por la posibilidad, de tener unas horas más de autonomía en nuestro terminal, bajamos e incluso pagamos por alguna de estas, pero, lo único que recibimos son un montón de notificaciones molestas y publicidad.

La respuesta a la pregunta es no, estas aplicaciones no valen para nada, en su mayoría son malware y spam. Hay excepciones, pero ninguna que realmente merezca la pena. La única manera de ahorrar batería, es usando el modo ahorro de nuestro dispositivo, o a través de módulos Xposed especializados, cómo, por ejemplo, Greenify.

Cada día la gente de Google elimina miles y miles de apps maliciosas de su tienda online, y, un gran porcentaje de ellas, son algunas de estas, dado que, los malos saben que los usuarios buscan esas palabras. Sabiendo esto, piénsalo dos veces antes de instalarlas en tu móvil, y, si decides hacerlo, informate un poco sobre ellas y sus desarrolladores, os sorprendería saber el gran negocio que hay con estas apps falsas.

No todas son así, ni mucho menos, pero, la mayoría acaba administrando mal el dispositivo, desactivando las notificaciones push, o, haciendo tareas tan simples como bajar el brillo, y, obviamente no necesitamos una aplicación (que además ocupa espacio, otro dilema), para eso, podemos hacerlo por nosotros mismos.

Al final lo mejor es aprender un poco y saber utilizar nuestro sistema Android. Mantener en uso las apps que realmente utilizamos, limpiar un poco de vez en cuando eliminando archivos en la caché (Tampoco os olvidéis de las fotos y audios de Whatsapp) y desactivar servicios de notificación de aplicaciones cómo juegos, launchers, etc.

Quien sabe, quizás algún día, aparezca alguna app de este tipo que realmente merezca la pena, ese día seremos los primeros en mostrártela, pero, hasta entonces, avisado quedas. Siempre nos quedará el powerbank, aun así, de momento, ten a mano el cargador.

¿Y tú que piensas? Pásate por ¿Sirven para algo las apps de ahorro de batería? para dejar tu huella.

Puedes unirte a nosotros en Twitter, Facebook o en Google+

Publicado recientemente en Andro4all

from Andro4all http://ift.tt/1OKlsoN
via IFTTT