Epic video explains how the 41-megapixel Nokia Lumia 1020 camera works

The 41-megapixel camera on the Nokia Lumia 1020 is an engineering marvel that took years of research to realize, but the end result is the bestcameraphone out there. 

Have you ever wondered how does Nokia get those stunning images, though? Digging through technical documentation and PureView white papers will answer your questions, but in a somewhat tedious way involving a lot of reading. Now, there is a video that is so simple yet so epic, you have to watch it for a very condensed explanation of Lumia 1020 and cameraphone photography in general.

Made by Nokia sales rep Salvador Padilla, the video tracks the way of light from the moment it hits the Zeiss lens throught its journey via lenses to its arrival on the cameraphone sensor where tiny wiring transports that signal to the PureMotion HD+ display. The epic music on the background adds a cinematic twist, and we definitely recommend you seeing this one, it’s right below.



source: Salvador Padilla

Microsoft launches four new Bing apps for Windows Phone

Back in October we launched a collection of Bing Apps for Windows 8 including News, Finance, Weather, Sports, and Maps. The apps provide you with gorgeous, comprehensive and customizable experiences powered by Bing that showcase world class content from leading outlets. Today we are bringing many of those experiences to Windows Phone 8 users around the world*.

Let’s take a look at what’s included.

Bing News

Want to keep tabs on what’s happening in the world? The Bing News app for Windows Phone has you covered. With the new app, you have one comprehensive experience to keep tabs on the latest headlines and videos of breaking news. And the app is customizable so you can track specific story categories, topics, or news sources that matter to you. You can even rearrange the headline clusters so that the news that matters most to you is at the top. Download it

We’ve partnered with leading editorial and news agencies including Associated Press, Reuters, Gizmodo, The Guardian and more, including local and regional sources from around the world, so you can choose which sources you’re most interested in—all in one app.

With Live Tiles on Windows Phone, you can see what’s happening at a glance. You can also pin a favorite news source or a personal topic to your Start screen to get quick access to the news that matters most to you.

You can watch the latest news videos as they appear within the headlines, or in the dedicated video section. 

Bing Sports

The Bing Sports app is your personal sports companion letting you stay on top of the sports and teams that you care about. You can swipe through to see recent scores, top sports headlines, videos, photos, schedules, standings, statistics and much more across most major sports, including soccer, football, baseball, cricket, racing, tennis, hockey, and basketball. Download it

Care about the NFL and more than Formula 1? Or maybe the other way around? You can personalize the experience to track the leagues and teams you follow. Tap into a specific league or team and the app color theme changes depending on the sport, such as green turf for NFL, brown dirt for MLB, grey asphalt for Formula 1 racing, etc.

Have a favorite team? For quick access to team news, scores and league standings, you can pin the team to your Start screen, and tap the tile to go straight in.

From NBA live game tracking statistics to Chinese Super League soccer results, the Bing Sports app is a one-stop shop to keep up with your favorite team.

Bing Weather

Want to know to know whether you need to grab an umbrella? Now you can stay a step ahead of the weather with up-to-date current conditions including temperature, precipitation and wind. The Bing Weather app also dynamically updates your live tile based upon your current location . Open the app to get more detail on the present location or others you’ve saved as favorites. Download it

You can follow the weather with dynamic maps for your city or region in a number of categories including satellite, temperature, precipitation, cloud cover and radar. You can also drill down in to the daily weather conditions, explore historical data and view charts for temperature and precipitation.

You can pin the app to your Start screen for instant access to today’s conditions for your current location as well as your favorite cities. Once pinned, tap a location to get detailed information, including hourly and 10-day forecasts, along with monthly averages.

Bing Finance

Keep tabs on the financial markets and gauge performance of your stocks at a glance with the Bing Finance app which includes financial news, market info, currency conversions, timely US stock updates and customizable interactive charts.Download it

You can set up a watchlist to track your stocks and pin individual stocks to your Start screen for Live Tile updates.

Tap a stock in watchlist to get an overview of the stock’s performance, news about the company, stock statistics and a company overview.

Looking to stay on top of breaking business news? You will see top stories arranged by topic in the Bing Finance app. Simply tap to read an article or jump straight into the latest financial news directly from your favorite source, including Bloomberg, CNBC, and Fox Business.

With a swipe of your finger you can access market information for currencies, commodities, bonds and more, plus a currency converter tool.

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*Features and content may vary by country.

Official teaser for Sony ‘Honami’ leaked?

A new picture deemed to be an official teaser image of the upcoming Sony ‘Honami’ flagship has leaked. What is immediately apparent to us is that if this picture is real, it looks a little different to the Honami images recently leaked.

The edges are more rounded, much like the Xperia Z Ultra, compared to the straight edges of the leaked images which looks very similar to the Xperia Z. Although, this may just be down to the angle of the picture. Either way, take the picture with a grain of salt.

The picture shows a teasing glimpse of the right side of the phone where you can see the power button, flap and volume rocker. This purple-coloured Honami seems to show that the frame will be of a different material – perhaps aluminium much like the Xperia Z Ultra?

However, in other purple Sony Xperia phones, the frame is normally coloured too, whereas this is not the case here. So this could be a departure of recent trends or maybe this image is not final (or even not real). The image then has “September 4 2013 – Berlin” in reference to its likely reveal at IFA in early September. Just under a month to wait for official details.

Sony ‘Honami’ Teaser

Sony ‘Honami’ Teaser – Magnified

Here you can see Sony’s signature power button, as used in all of the 2013 Sony Xperia range. This pic is important as the direction of the power button gives us the orientation of the handset i.e. the display is on top.

Above the power button sits a flap.

Below the power button sits a purple volume rocker

Here you can make out the edge of the display, just above the purple strip. The faint white strip you see here could even be the shatter-proof screen protector that Sony places on most of its smartphones.

Via Digi-Wo.

Spoiler alert: Got the hots for the Sony Honami? Have a look at this extensive UI showdown

'Meh' is the word on the mind of a select number of our readers for whom the launch of smartphones the like of the LG G2 or the Motorola Moto X has failed to tickle their particular fancy. Of course, upon seeing the actual real deal, this is probably less the case than previously, at least on the count of the LG G2.

Sony and its upcoming Honami smartphone is where it's at for those people, and we certainly get it. If we go on a limb and trust the rumors, the Sony Honami will, similarly, come with some bleeding edge internals, and to tell you the truth: the software is no laughing matter, either. How do we know? Well, some of you may remember that not too long ago, a system dump of the Sony Honami's software made it possible for a developer to port the ROM for theSony Xperia Z. The more dedicated among you may have even given it a shot.

Even though the actual ROM thread over at XDA-Developers is mightily informative (you'll know what we mean if you have meddled with custom ROMs before), the video below helps us better visualize what is coming up with the Sony Honami. We have to say, we're kind of impressed with Sony's eloquent and rather minimalistic tweaking of the stock experience. At this point it's probably safe to say that some OEMs are starting to see the benefit of a more stock Android-like experience, and we consider this good news.

Without any further ado, check the video and source link below should you find your interest ignited.

source: XDA Developers

Chinese company proves it's possible to put a 5000mAh battery in a thin phone

Advancing the state of chemistry is hard. Mass producing new discoveries is hard. So how does one solve the dilemma of smartphones kicking the bucket right around the time you leave the office? Brute force. A Chinese company by the name of Changhong, better known for their televisions in China than their smartphones, are going to launch a phone called the “Z9″ that has a 5.5 inch 720p screen and a 5,000 mAh battery. Best of all it’s not even that thick, sub 9 mm (likely 8.99 mm).

How big is 5,000 mAh battery? The 5.5 inch Galaxy Note II has a 3,100 mAh battery. The 6.3 inch Galaxy Mega has a 3,200 mAh battery. The 2013 Nexus 7 has a 3,950 mAh. So yes, 5,000 mAh is pretty ridiculous.

Will this thing ever launch outside China? No. Why am I bothering to write it then? Because I want Samsung to pay attention. I want Motorola to pay attention. I want every large company to see this phone and ask their product managers to copy it. Because why not? If someone wants a phone that’s impossible to kill with 16 hours of hardcore use, they should be able to buy one.

[Via: Unwired View]

OS X Mavericks Developer Preview 5 Release

The OS X Mavericks release approaches as Apple rolls out Developer Preview 5 to users that are testing the new version of Apple’s OS X system.

This release is essentially the OS X Mavericks beta 5 release, which puts it on par with the iOS 7 beta 5 release that landed earlier this week for the iPhone and iPad. Both IOS 7 and OS X Mavericks are on track for a release later this year.

We could see the OS X Mavericks release date arrive in line with rumorednew MacBook Pro models which could come in October.

OS X Mavericks Developer Preview 5 is now available as an update in the Mac App Store for users running OS X Mavericks.

The OS X Mavericks Developer Preview 5 release is here.

One of the biggest additions to OS X Mavericks Developer Preview 5 is the new iBooks app for Mac. With this release users can now view their iBooks on a Mac, syncing progress between devices and even opening multiple iBooks at once on a Mac.

OS X Mavericks beta 5 delivers an iBooks app for Mac.

Apple suggests trying the following iBooks for Mac features;

• Open and read a variety of books, including your favorite novels, picture books, and multi-touch books.
• Add bookmarks, highlights, and notes, and verify that they sync to iBooks on iOS and other Macs. Note that you must have the Sync Bookmarks preference enabled.
• Sync books to your iPad, iPhone, or iPod touch using iTunes.
• Download books and samples from the iBooks Store in iBooks.
• Download books from the iBooks Store in iTunes and verify that they appear in iBooks.

OS X Mavericks beta 5 also includes a new version of iPhoto which is in place to help test iPhoto with the new operating system. Users may need to turn Photo Stream off and back on to get everything up and running after this update. There are also other enhancements to the operating system which users will likely discover as they spend more time with the system.

Apple warns that Adobe After Effects CS 6 may not function properly in this release and Aperture may crash when exporting photos in full screen.

The release comes as Apple recovers form a Developer Center outage that took software downloads offline for a little over a week. Apple released the Developer Preview 4 during the outage, so it does not appear to have slowed down the release schedule.

OS X Mavericks is slated for a release later this year and will be compatible with Apple computers as far back as 2007 for some models, while others require a MacBook Air, Mac Mini or Mac Pro that is newer.

Apple did not announce OS X Mavericks Update pricing when it first showed off the new operating system, but it could arrive as a $20 update in the Mac App Store.

Apple to Soon Support Night Owls With 24-Hour AppleCare Chat Service

Apple may soon a 24-7 chat service that would provide 24-hour support for customers with Apple products ranging from iPhone to desktop Mac computers through an online chat service to help resolve any problems. Though the 24-7 support service may be limited to online chat, it may help Apple continue to grow its customer service reputation as consumers may be eyeing competing products running Google’s Android operating system as Android continues to dominate sales in the mobile space.

The new service could go live as early as Monday, August 12th, according to information reported by 9to5 Mac, though delays could force Apple to push back the launch date.

Also, Apple is said to be working on a redesigned support portal that may be more appealing to iOS device owners.

The move could hep Apple to retain iOS customers from defecting to Android and also attract new smartphone customers who may be using a smartphone for the very first time with the new 24-7 service. Apple already has set itself apart from rivals in the industry when it launched its retail stores that provide service through the Genius Bar and its AppleCare service has been praised by many.

More recently, when Microsoft had launched its retail stores, the Apple rival is offering Microsoft Complete to cover tablets and PCs and Microsoft Assure as an insurance program for Windows Phone to compete with AppleCare. Google doesn’t offer any Google coverage for any Android phones other than the standard manufacturer warranty.

Next iPhone to Be Called iPhone 5G

Though it’s been widely believed that Apple will be calling its next generation flagship iOS smartphone the iPhone 5S, a new leak suggests that the device could bear the iPhone 5G moniker instead. 5G, in this case, would not refer to 5G mobile broadband wireless technology in the same way that the iPhone 3G was associated with Apple’s upgrade to supporting 3G GSM network technologies. Whatever the name of the next iPhone flagship, that device will continue to support the 4G LTE mobile broadband technology that continues to deliver fast Internet upload and download speeds with minimal latency where available.

The new iPhone 5G name comes by way of a leaked packaging from China, according to Phone Arena, that contains what is believed to be the display of the next flagship phone. The leak should be taken with a grain of salt at this time. The packaging could easily be faked.

In addition to the flagship iPhone 5S or iPhone 5G, Apple is also rumored to be releasing a low-cost iPhone as well in the form of the iPhone 5C. Though the iPhone 5C’s name initially came by way of a leaked retail packaging for the device, the packaging was said to be a fraud though industry observers says that the name is accurate and that the “C” in 5C refers to the colorful plastic casing that the model will ship with.

Both the iPhone 5C and the flagship successor to the current iPhone 5 are expected to be announced and released in the fall, so we’ll continue to hear more about the devices through leaks in the coming weeks. The iPhone 5S has been described to keep the same design as the iPhone 5 while adding in a fingerprint sensor.