Samsung Galaxy Gear detailed (Samsung’s Expected Smart Watch)

By Vijay @ 09:19am

There has been a sudden flow of reports talking about Samsung’s upcoming smartwatch Galaxy Gear. Popular technology blogs The Verge and GigaOM have published separate reports in the last 24 hours, claiming some exclusive information about this upcoming accessory.

 

A mockup of Samsung Galaxy Gear smartwatch

According to The Verge, which contradicts recent Bloomberg story on voice calling support in this Samsung smartwatch, Galaxy Gear will definitely not be a phone unto itself. “It works with phones but the watch is not a phone,” the blog noted citing a source with information about Galaxy Gear.

On the other hand, GigaOM’s Om Malilk, who claims to have details about the specs of Galaxy Gear, the Samsung smartwatch will come with a 2.5-inch square display and dual-core processor.  The display is said to be OLED. Om adds a few more details like presence of a camera, NFC chip and Bluetooth 4.0 LE support in Galaxy Gear. “In addition, the watch might also has a built-in accelerometer that makes it possible to switch it on when it is moved up towards the eye. It could be a great way to wake the watch and also the apps and manage battery power,” he noted.

On the software front, he states that the watch will most probably run on Android 4.2 and will pack tight integration with smartphones using Watch Manager app. Samsung is reportedly using a proprietary accessory protocol, which will use Bluetooth LE as the network transport.

This is not all, GigaOM report also includes that the apps designed for this watch will be available via Samsung Appstore not Google Play. So this is watch can fully utilized with Samsung Smartphones only.

To remind you, Samsung Galaxy Gear is expected to be announced on September 4 in Berlin and New York at simultaneous press events along with Samgung Galaxy Note 3.

All About Google Chromecast wireless streaming

By Vijay @ 09:34am

Just as exciting as Android 4.3 and the new Nexus 7 tablet, is Google’s latest device, the Chromecast.

  A tiny HDMI dongle, the size of a thumb drive delivering endless YouTube, Netflix, Google Music, Pandora, and web content to your HDTV for streaming anything and everything. Easily stream content to your big screen for only $35. Andriod Community have had some hands-on. So take a peek after the break.

As you can already tell from the images, the Chromecast is a 3-inch dongle the size of most USB thumb drives. It has micro-USB on one end (for power, FYI) and the other is a full-size HDMI plug to stream 1080p video right to your TV and home theater. You’ll need micro-USB to power it, which wasn’t mentioned. Overall it’s small, and extremely portable, but we’re worried the bubble on the end will waste two HDMI ports, which could be an issue for some.

The size aside, which hopefully isn’t an issue, this thing has some serious potential. Plug in the micro-USB for power and start throwing HD video, Netflix movies and anything you’d like right to the television for the entire family to enjoy. Using a Wifi 2.4 GHz band (no 5 GHz) to talk to your smartphone, tablet, or laptop, the Chromecast will let you instantly stream things to the big screen.

Chromecast has some serious potential, and we’re looking for more details (such as mirroring) but for now it only works with a select set of apps. Those being YouTube, Netflix, Pandora Radio, Google Play Music, TV, and Movies, and of course full browsing using Chrome. The idea is dead simple too.

If you’re familiar with controlling any of those on a smartphone, tablet, or laptop, it will be a breeze on the Chromecast because you use the device for controls. Our Android phones can truly control the entire experience now.

One important aspect is the Chromecast works on all devices, and is built to scale perfectly too. You can go from streaming a video from your Nexus 7, to swapping it out and “casting” a tab from Google Chrome on your iPhone 5 in seconds. It does it quick, accurately, and scales perfect. It works in sleep mode so you don’t waste screen time and battery life. So that’s a plus. It sounds too good to be true, but it’s indeed real!

For $35 this is a steal. Buy this amazing little addition right now for only $35.

Play Store Link

Source: Andriod Community