As promised, Microsoft updated its high-end productivity tablet lineup today with the Surface Pro 4. The veritable convertible device has retained most of the design of its predecessor and the exact same form factor as well, while bringing some major improvements.

Indeed, the Surface Pro 4 has retained its footprint, but trimming the bezels allowed a more spacious 12.3″ display to replace the 12″ of the Surface Pro 3.

The body was also slimmed-down and now sits at just 8.4mm, while still offering a magnesium build and a kickstand with a full-function multipurpose hinge. The display is impressively sharp with a resolution of 2736 x 1824 pixels and 267 ppi. Naturally, the screen has also retained its convenient ten point multi-touch functionality, now more fluent and precise than ever thanks to Microsoft’s new PixelSense Display technology. This all should amount to a beautiful viewing experience and also quite a lot of screen real estate to get your job done on the go.

Of course, most power users will be buying the Surface Pro 4 for its productivity while docked. The dock still plays a major part of the Surface experience and this new iteration is even convenient enough to be compatible with the accessories of its predecessor, namely the docking station and Type Cover. Now, there is something you don’t see every day.

There is also an upgraded version of the signature keyboard, now complete with a fingerprint reader and a new button design, said to improve the all-important typing experience. The trackpad also got bigger by 40%, along with the promise of an improved scrolling experience thanks to its glass surface.

A big part of Surface is undoubtedly the stylus, which Microsoft has also pushed into the next generation. The Microsoft Pen now comes with a new design, complete with a virtual eraser on the back, which does just what you would think – an analog-style redo for your creations.

The Pen also comes with a wide selection of interchangeable tips that can radically alter your writing or drawing experience, simulation anything from a fine-tip to a HD pencil. The Pen is capable of detecting an impressive 1024 levels of pressure and last, but not least, it now attaches to the side of the surface via magnet, so it is always at your convenience.

But, the Surface Pro 4 wouldn’t be complete without some true horsepower under the hood. This year around, Microsoft has managed to cram an even more powerful sixth generation Intel chip (Core m, Core i5 or Core i7) inside the tablet, kept running cool by a new hybrid cooling system (there’s a fan now).

The tablet comes with an integrated Intel HD graphics chip (515, 520 or Iris 540, respectively). It can easily handle every task you throw at it. The rest of the specs include up to 16GB of RAM and up to 1TB of SSD storage. Of course, Windows 10 runs the show, switching seamlessly between tablet-friendly and PC productivity modes and features.

The new Surface Pro 4 starts at $899 goes all the way to $2,199. As for the Type Cover, it set you back $129.99 extra and $59.99 for the Surface Pen. Full specs sheets are also available at the source links.

Source 1 | Source…

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Microsoft just announced the Lumia 950 and Lumia 950 XL flagship smartphones and the company has outed a video to get you pumped for them.

Check out the clip below to see how the phones work with Windows 10 Continuum, see the triple LED flash paired with the 20MP camera as well as appreciate the engineering that went into the phones.

You can check out our coverage about the Lumia 950 announcement and Lumia 950 XL…

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Surface is now a laptop – the Microsoft Surface Book. Well, to be precise, it’s a hybrid device with a keyboard base and a detachable tablet. “Ounce for ounce the most powerful 13-inch laptop,” says Microsoft’s new head of devices.

Yes, the other Surface tablets have keyboards too, but thanks to the Dynamic Fulcrum hinge the Surface Book handles much more like a traditional laptop, you can safely pick it up by the screen. And if you detach the keyboard, you’re left with a 720g (1.6 pound) tablet.

The screen is bigger – 13.5″ – but keeps the sharp 267ppi pixel density, which means the resolution has been bumped up to 6MP. The screen supports the same pen and touch experience Surface users are familiar with.

For an old-school input, the keyboard offers backlit keys with 1.6mm travel and a glass trackpad with 5 touch points.

The Microsoft Surface Book is massively powerful, Microsoft claims its twice as fast as a MacBook Pro. It comes with a 6th gen Intel Core (i5 or i7), up to 16GB of RAM and up to 1TB of storage. All that and you’re looking at 12 hours of battery life.

The Xbox team was asked to lend its GPU know-how and the Book packs a GeForce GPU. It will be used for gaming, of course, but will help GPU accelerated apps too (the demo was video editing). Note that the GPU is in the keyboard base, when you detach that the Intel GPU takes over.

The Microsoft Surface Book will cost $1,500. Pre-orders start on October 7, while full retail availability will come on October…

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Microsoft announced the Lumia 950 and 950 XL flagship pair and just as we though the devices event was moving from the Lumias towards the Surface, a Lumia 550 was briefly mentioned. An entire ten seconds of the spotlight were enough to announce the affordable smartphone will be available in December for $139.

The list of specs starts with a 4.7-inch AMOLED display of a 720p resolution, which seems to be the best part on paper. Computing power comes from a Snapdragon 210 chipset with a quad-core 1.2GHz processor and 1GB of RAM. Storage is a rather limiting 8GB.

There’s a 5MP/2MP camera combo and full LTE support, courtesy of Qualcomm’s chip. The Lumia 550 will be available in a variety of colors for its detachable polycarbonate back cover, a staple of the lower end…

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Wearable tech is definitely in, no doubt about it, but the battle is still on to define wearable devices as a rightful and meaningful niche with its own purpose and development plan. The new Microsoft Band 2, just announced on stage is yet another attempt, which really blurs the already thin line between smart watches and fitness trackers.

The Microsoft Band remains a device predominantly committed to fitness, but now with the addition of a lot more general usability and features. The Band 2 features a more comfortable curved screen that aims to sit flush on your wrist. It also offers a better Gorilla Glass 4 protection, optimized for a more precise and reliable touch experience.

Naturally, the Band 2 is just as smart as its predecessor and offers the same extensive array of sensors and adds some of its own. Its impressive feature set includes calorie and sleep tracking, guided workouts, US monitoring a built-in GPS and smart and customizable notification alerts.

Microsoft has also gone the extra mile in utilizing all the hardware and sensors in the band, like advanced integrated sport tracking for things like golf, as well as an industry-first VO2 Max estimation algorithm.

The Microsoft Band 2 promises a lot more smart experiences, like the ones you would find on the Android Wear or Apple Watch ecosystem.

As for availability, thankfully, you won’t have to wait long for the Band 2. Preorders start today and availability is set for October 30, for a price of…

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Microsoft announced today the HoloLens Development Edition. With a price of $3000, it’s a hefty investment for developers, but the concept of making holographic content, especially games, is certainly appealing so it might be worth it.

The company spent a fair amount of time to show off an imminently cool HoloLens game demo at today’s conference. Dubbed Project Xray, the game puts you against a swarm of robots, which pop up out of the walls in the room you are in.

Expect the HoloLens Development Edition to become available in the first quarter of 2016. Hopefully, by the end of next year, there will be some content available for the HoloLens and we’ll be ready to tall mass market…

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Owners of a flagship Windows Phone have had their patience stretched thin, but those that held off have been rewarded. The Microsoft Lumia 950 improves on just about every feature of the Lumia 930. About time too, the 930 is a year and a half old.

The Windows 10 Mobile device comes with a 5.2″ QHD screen – the sharpest on a Lumia yet. Like the XL screen, this one is an AMOLED with ClearBlack for flagship image quality, except in a more compact footprint this time.

The camera is basically the same – a 20MP PureView sensor with optical stabilization and Carl Zeiss optics. It can record 2160p video natively with Lumia’s traditional Hi-Fi audio recording. There’s a 5MP selfie camera too, but without the LED flash.

The Lumia 950 is powered by Snapdragon 808 with 3GB of RAM. Gaming performance will take a hit if devs want to use the screen’s full QHD resolution, but for general app usage Windows was never picky about the chipset.

The phone comes with USB Type-C and wireless charging, plus a relatively big 3,000mAh…

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All through this year it felt like Microsoft has cooled off on having its own mobile OS, opting to release apps for Android and iOS instead, but now the passion is back. The Microsoft Lumia 950 XL comes to replace the two year old Lumia 1520 and to restore the PureView name to its former glory.

First things first. Gone is the 6″ 1080p LCD, replaced by a 5.7″ screen with QHD resolution, pitting the 950 XL against the flagship Androids. It’s an AMOLED unit with ClearBlack tech, which promises a top notch viewing experience, especially in the sun.

The Lumia 950 XL namechecks Carl Zeiss and PureView and brings a new iteration of the 20MP sensor, this time with 2160p video out of the box. The camera’s two little helpers are the optical image stabilization (OIS) and a triple-LED flash.

The selfie camera was given attention too, the 5MP shooter is accompanied by its own LED flash.

The Lumia name was synonymous with excellent cameras, but Android and now Apple have caught up and the Lumia 950 XL’s camera does not have the lead the Lumia 1020 enjoyed.

While Microsoft adopted the new wired connector, it kept the Qi wireless charging (unlike the new Nexus phones). The 3,300mAh battery is has a bit extra in its tank compared to other flagship phablets to boot.

Windows 10 Mobile will stretch its legs on the roomy screen. At first glance the UI looks close to WP8, but Microsoft has done a lot to unify the software between Desktop and Mobile. Continuum is part of that – a desktop in your pocket, in part thanks to the USB Type-C connector, which handles triple duties (video out, data and charging).

The OS will run on Snapdragon 810 chipset – four Cortex-A57 cores at 2GHz, four A53s at 1.5GHz, Adreno 430 to bear the load of QHD graphics and 3GB of RAM. Microsoft’s long standing partnership with Qualcomm and the lack of alternatives pretty much meant the S810 was the only option, though we would have appreciated a bit more RAM if this is truly to work as a desktop…

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Microsoft’s #Windows10devices event is underway and the company’s Executive VP of the Windows and Devices Group was the first to take the stage. Terry Myerson was quick to point out that just ten weeks after its rollout, Windows 10 has already reached 110 million devices.

The recap goes on with the 650 billion web pages opened in the new Edge browser and 120 years of gameplay content streamed to Windows 10 devices from Xbox console. Meanwhile, poor Cortana has been forced to answer 1 billion questions. The app store has gotten 1.25 billion visits though that’s not overly impressive as it roughly makes for a once every week per device average.

Social media enthusiasts will be pleased to find out that Facebook will be developing universal apps for its three main services, well, Facebook, Instagram and…

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Sony has officially issued a blog post detailing the list of phones and tablets bound to receive Android 6.0 Marshmallow. Here go the lucky devices:

Xperia Z5
Xperia Z5 Compact
Xperia Z5 Premium
Xperia Z4 Tablet
Xperia Z3+
Xperia Z3
Xperia Z3 Compact
Xperia Z3 Tablet Compact
Xperia Z2
Xperia Z2 Tablet
Xperia M5
Xperia C5 Ultra
Xperia M4 Aqua
Xperia C4

The company didn’t provide a specific time frame for when each devices will receive the update just yet. Sony also warns users that timing and availability of Android 6.0 Marshmallow will vary according to market and service provides.

As usual, we’ll be keeping you informed when the first updates for Sony smartphones start rolling…

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