Samsung Faces New Challenger to Galaxy Note in LG

Samsung is a battle-tested developer, and while the focus has apparently been with Apple and its iPhones, iPads and lawsuits, it was only a matter of time before someone else bubbled up to the forefront with products that might make inroads against Samsung’s offerings.

Of course there are a host of Android-driven devices that already compete with Samsung and you can now add LG Electronics and its Optimus G Pro smartphone to that growing list. The difference here is that the company is directly challenging Samsung and its popular Galaxy Note 2.

Introduced today and available now in South Korea and expected in the U.S. market in the second quarter the new device will have a 5.5-inch screen with a resolution of 1920 x 1080, better than the resolution available from the Note’s 1280 x 720.

It will be interesting to see how much additional competition the Samsung Note 2 draws. When the company released it initially I believed that it was a novelty item and would not last, shows what I know. Now that the form factor has been increasingly widely accepted I expect addition companies to enter the space to try and wrest some market share away from Samsung.

Archos Goes Platinum With Latest Tablet Lineup

archos

Archos has beaten the World Mobile Congress crowd to the starting line by introducing a trio of tablets prior to the show as it has taken the wraps off of its Platinum lineup that will have tablets that range in size from 8-inches to 11.6-inches.

The three tablets start with the Archos 80 Platinum, an 8-inch model, the Archos 97 Platinum that is a 9.7-inch device and the Archos 116 Platinum that is a 11.6-inch tablet. All three share many f the same internal features.
All of them will run the Android 4.1 operating system and will be powered by a 1.2GHz quad core processor and feature a 8-core GPU that is capable of driving 1080p video decoding. They include 2GB of RAM and both a mini-HDMI and Micro SD ports for expansion.

The 8-inch Platinum tablet features a 1024 × 768 resolution screen and will be priced at $199, while the 9.7-inch Platinum HD tablet will have a high resolution 2048 × 1536 resolution display and will sell for $299. The company said that both of these tablets are expected to be available by the end of the month.

The largest of the three, the Archos 116 Platinum will have a 1920 × 1080 resolution screen and is expected t ship in April with a for $349 price tag.

The tablets look sharp and appear to be a solid offering, yet the company has not yet made available how much storage the devices will have makes it impossible to give a solid assessment of them at this time. With Apple and Microsoft offering 128GBs and others have or will follow suit, it is an important factor when making comparisons.

Friday Grab Bag: Apple Watch, Smaller Surface Tablets?

The New York Times has reported that Apple is developing a watch that will run the same operating system as its popular iPhones and iPads, iOS. That is about the sum total of the information provided but it is fun to think of all of the interesting things that you can do with such a device. I suspect schools will not be looking forward to students having access to answers via such a device.

Smart watches have been in vogue for the last few years, with Kickstarter favorite Pebbles probably leading the pack. There is also a range of task specific watches for activities such as golf, biking and other outdoor activities.

Changes in 2020 Olympic Sports

What do wrestling, softball and baseball have in common? Well for one they have all been dropped as Olympic sports, with a final vote now pending to drop wrestling starting with the 2020 games. The other two sports were dropped in 2005.

Still there is a line of sports seeking to be allowed at the Olympics including baseball and softball, which are seeking reinstatement. Others include karate, roller sports, squash, sport climbing and wakeboarding while rugby and golf have made the cut and will be played at the next games in 2016.


Nike says no to Android

Users of Nike’s Nike+ Fuelband are being left out if they are also users of an Android smartphone as the company has said that it will not be developing apps for that platform in the near future, but will stay the course by continuing to support Apple’s iOS.

Nike tweeted the news, which was reported by a number of outlets such as Engadget, and said that it will be focusing both on the Apple side of things and that users can also use nikeplus.com to sync their activity.

Microsoft to have smaller sized Surface tablets?
Microsoft’s chief financial officer Peter Klein hinted that the company was looking at developing next generation Surface tablets in a wide array of new sizes at the recent Goldman Sachs Technology and Internet Conference, according to geek.com.

He said that the company was prepared to meet demand from its customer base and that anything from 4-inches to 13 inches are on the table. The company had slow sales for its Surface RT models but appears to have strong sales in the Surface Pro lineup, particularly at the high end.

Apple has iOS fix in the works

Users of Apple’s iPad and iPhone devices that have its iOS 6.1 operating system might have noticed that the operating system appears to have issues with Microsoft’s Exchange servers. Well it looks like Apple is acknowledging the issue and has a fix in the works.

Issues such as reoccurring calendar items and excessive calling back to the servers and thus killing battery life were two of the principal issues associated with the bug.

Watching Golf this Week: Northern Trust Open

Northern Trust Open logoWill it be Phil, Keegan, Bill… or Freddie? Those are the questions about possible winners at the Northern Trust Open, which is underway today at the famed Riviera Country Club outside of Los Angeles. Phil, Bill and Keegan, if you recall, were all in a playoff last year, the best part of which came at the end of regulation when Phil dumped a long putt on 18 and Keegan responded in kind. Then Kill Bill came through in the extra time.

The dark horse here is the “old guy,” Boom Boom Couples, who loves Riviera just like he loves Augusta. Since we were a little late getting this post up today we already know that Freddie is -3 for his first round, not bad for a Champions Tour kinda guy. This is a Golf Channel/CBS weekend, so online video is available for Comcast subscribers only.

NORTHERN TRUST OPEN

(all times Eastern)
TV COVERAGE

Thursday, Feb. 14 — Golf Channel, 3 p.m. — 6 p.m.
Friday, Feb. 15 — Golf Channel, 3 p.m. — 6 p.m.
Saturday, Feb. 16 — Golf Channel, 1 p.m. — 2:30 p.m.; CBS, 3 p.m. — 6 p.m.
Sunday, Feb. 17 — Golf Channel, 1 p.m. — 2:30 p.m.; CBS, 3 p.m. — 6:30 p.m.

LIVE ONLINE COVERAGE

Thursday and Friday, Golf Channel coverage via PGATour.com and GolfChannel.com; Saturday and Sunday, CBS coverage at CBSSports.com. Right now only Comcast cable subscribers can watch live online video on weekdays. NOTE: If you are using the PGA Mobile app to watch the CBS or Golf Channel online video, be advised that it only works with iOS phones and with some (not all) Android phones. There is no fix planned for the immediate future.

RADIO
SIRIUS XM (Satellite) Thursday-Friday-Saturday, and 12 p.m. to 6 p.m. and 1 p.m. to 7 p.m. Sunday. The live broadcasts are also available to subscribers on the SiriusXM Internet Radio App and online at SiriusXM.com.

FACEBOOK
The tournament has its own Facebook page. Like it.

SMS ALERTS
Text NTOGolf to 94253 for tournament updates.

TOP TWITTER FEEDS TO FOLLOW

The Northern Trust Open Twitter feed.
Geoff Shackelford — well known golf writer. If you’re not following Geoff you are missing the online boat.
Golf Channel — official Golf Channel feed
@PGATOUR — official PGA Twitter feed
@StephanieWei — great golf writer who is a Twitter fiend.
Doug Ferguson is the lead golf writer for AP. Good Twitter insights that often aren’t part of your wire-service lead.

WHAT’S THE COURSE LIKE?
Pros and those who follow the PGA love the Riviera Country Club. We’ve never been there but the history is solid and the place looks great on TV.

WHO WON THIS THING LAST TIME?
Bill Haas, the least exciting member of the three-man playoff. Best part of last year was Phil Mickelson and Keegan Bradley with their back-to-back long putts on 18 to get into the playoff… which they both then lost to the steady Eddie, Bill Haas.

Microsoft Surface Pro Sells Out — More this Weekend

surface

After the lackluster news about the holiday sales of its first generation tablet, the Surface RT, and then more bad news about its Pro version just prior to shipping Microsoft has some good news to report. It’s sold out!
It was reported that just a day into its widespread availability Microsoft was out of its 128GB version of its Surface Pro tablet, although its 64GB version remained on the shelves for prospective customers.

Well that might not be so great since it could mean loss of sales but it looks to be a short term issue as the company has a new round of tablets on the way and they are expected to hit store shelves as well as Microsoft’s own online store by this weekend.

Some have questioned if the tablets actually sold out, or if it was an artificial shortage designed to get solid publicity for the company by showing demand for the tablet. PCWorld posed that question and has provided similar comments from others.

Still it is hard to say for sure since it is doubtful that Microsoft is going to provide its roadmap and strategic plans for use to look at. The question I have is if the demand for the highest capacity tablets was driven by the news of how little space was actually available for users?

I guess we will see the true popularity of the tablets, both from Microsoft and others when IDC releases its next quarterly tablet report. Other Windows tablets have received popular acclaim, such as the most recent offering from Lenovo. This should help break open the market even more, providing Samsung, Apple, Google and Amazon with a new generation of competition.

Wi-Fi Whispers: AT&T Beefs Up Wi-Fi and Cellular for Pebble Beach

AT&T social media sign at the tourney. Credit: @James_Raia.

AT&T social media sign at the tourney. Credit: @James_Raia.

With a field full of entertainment and sports celebrities in addition to pro golfers, the AT&T National Pro-Am in Pebble Beach this weekend is a fan-snapshot nirvana — and AT&T has beefed up its wireless coverage yet again to make sure all those pictures, tweets and Facebook updates can get posted.

“Every year, the data volumes [from the event] go up significantly,” said Chad Townes, vice president of AT&T’s Antenna Solutions Group, in a phone interview last week. “Between the celebrities and the beauty of the course, there’s definitely a lot more [wireless] traffic than at other golf tournaments.”

According to Townes, AT&T has provided fans at the tourney with several Wi-Fi hotspot areas where AT&T customers can get a high-bandwidth signal for Internet connection. This year, AT&T also deployed three additional COWs, or cell towers on wheels, to augment the existing cellular infrastructure.

Bringing wireless signals to a golf course, Townes said, is always a challenge, due to the very nature of the venue, with hills, trees and other obstacles to surmount. There are also aesthetic challenges, such as the fact that most of these courses don’t want any cables to be visible during the TV broadcasts.

Townes said there is also the whole discussion about whether phones should even be allowed at golf tournaments, given the possibility of fans distracting players with loud calls or with camera noises. Still, he said, providers need to figure out how to bring better coverage to courses, since fans want to be able to use phones to communicate with friends and family at the event, say using text messages to say “meet us at the next hole.” The PGA seems to be on board with this idea, since it just introduced a course-finder app that not only shows players and scored superimposed on a Google map, but also adds in locations for amenities and concessions — meaning the PGA expects fans to have phones at events.