Technology Effect

The Above image is not an iPad 2, just a third-party mock-up that was spotted at CES The iPad 2 may be much closer than we think. We've all been expecting the product line to refresh around April, which would make it one year after the release of the original iPad (Time flies, doesn't it?). Apple is known for releasing updates to their various products at least once a year. Typically, they hold a special event for each of those updates. Over the past several months, there has been plenty of speculation and reporting on what the next iteration of Apple's popular tablet computer may include. We've looked into it a bit in the past (iPad 2: 5 Rumored Specs). Recently, we were all given a bit more information, thanks things buried within the iOS 4.3 Beta, which just became available about two days ago. This is probably about as close to confirmation of any of these specs we're going to get until Steve Jobs stands up on stage and presents us with the ...

Before the CES 2011 ended, Inside BlackBerry sat down with Ryan Bidan, Senior Product Manager on the BlackBerry PlayBook team, for a Q&A session about the BlackBerry PlayBook. Some of the questions that most people have been wanting to ask are answered in this video. What I found cool about this video was his explanation about the “ BlackBerry Bridge “. If you don’t know what it is yet, listen to Bidan’s explanation of what it is for yourself. On a side note, on behalf of BlackBerryInsight, I want to thank Ryan Bidan for being there at the CES 2011 this weekend and for demonstrating and explaining all the features of the BlackBerry PlayBook this week. You can see how “happy” and “excited” he was in some of the videos we’ve posted earlier. He must be so exhausted by now… Thanks Ryan!

Just found out from the BlackBerry DEVCON Asia 2011 , BlackBerry Messenger 6 with social features is going to be released in May at the WES/BlackBerry World event. I can’t wait to get it on my BlackBerry. This might be the next hottest thing after Facebook.

While other BlackBerry blogs are also reporting about the BlackBerry Devcon but reporting about Devcon apps and stuff… BlackBerryInsight is AT the BlackBerry Devcon Asia 2011! We’re having a great time over at here Bali and already spotted Mike Kirkup, RIM’s Head of Developer Relations Worldwide. We just had a great meal; the food, the drinks and everything is great. It feels like I am taking an early vacation over here at Bali. Tomorrow all sessions start – let’s what kind of shots we will get from there. Check out the pictures we took today. BlackBerry Devcon Asia 2011 My pass for the Devcon Everyone rushing over to get food Food!!! And of course, the lovely ladies the performed for us during dinner that no one noticed except for me… We will definitely keep you updated with what’s happening at the Devcon for the next few days. Stay tuned to BlackBerryInsight for more!

This is cool! The BlackBerry Dakota picture and specifications just got leaked. The smartphone kind of looks like a BlackBerry Bold. I suspect it’s going to be in the Bold series. Some say it also looks kind of like the first BlackBerry Bold . I am not here to argue, so you can judge for yourself. This BlackBerry will be a 2.8-inch capacitive touchscreen with a VGA resolution of 640×480 pixels and a full physical QWERTY keyboard. It also rocks a 5 MP camera with flash capable of recording HD video. Also available are 4GB of internal storage and 768MB of RAM. What processor will power it is still unknown. We’ll have to wait and hear about more news about this BlackBerry Dakota.

All you Hongers out there, the BlackBerry Bold 9780 is coming to town! The BlackBerry Bold 9780, that comes with OS6, is going to be available in Hong Kong next week. Can’t wait to see it in the stores of Hong Kong carriers. The smartphone will be available in both black and white colors for $4,988 HKD. The monthly plan varies depending on what carrier you go with and which plan you choose.

The Motorola Xoom tablet, unveiled last week at the Consumer Electronics Show in Las Vegas, has a few features not seen on many other tablets -- no buttons, 4G capabilities and even a barometer. The barometer, which measures atmospheric pressure and can help forecast the weather, is a unique inclusion and might make the Xoom the tablet of choice for meteorologists. The Xoom, set to release in the first quarter of the year through Verizon stores, will also be the first tablet to ship with Google's Android 3.0 Honeycomb operating system, Motorola Mobility said. A price hasn't yet been announced. Honeycomb is the first build of Android tailored for tablets, in contrast to previous versions that were built for smart phones and ported over to the larger slate devices. Motorola is expecting the Xoom to be a big hit, according to reports. Taiwan-based suppliers Catcher Technology and Foxconn Technology have said that orders placed with them and other ve...

ComputerWorld has published a study that sheds some light on which manufacturer and wireless carrier in the U.S. provide Android users with operating system updates in the most timely fashion. Data was collected on handsets released by AT&T, Sprint, T-Mobile, and Verizon from 2009 through 2010. The report examines how many phones were upgraded to Froyo (Android 2.2), how many days it took to receive this upgrade, and what percentage devices are still waiting. The study indicates that HTC has delivered the most Android 2.2 updates to its handsets (50%) while Motorola updates its devices the fastest (54.5 days after 2.2 announcement). In terms of carriers, Verizon took the top spot — taking just 58 days on average to push out 2.2 updates — and was followed by Sprint, T-Mobile, and AT&T respectively. The report notes, “Between June and December, AT&T failed to upgrade a single one of its nine Android phones.” Ouch. What do you think? Any surprises here?...

A rumor's popped up that Apple's planning on relying on Qualcomm silicon inside its next-gen iPhone, and that the device will be powered by Apple's own ARM-based A8 chip. Will this prove true--or is it just a muddling of what will actually happen? The rumor has arrived courtesy of Taiwan's Kinsus, an industrial-scale silicon substrate supplier, which is saying it's delivering between 30% and 40% of the raw materials that Qualcomm, the famous cellphone chip-maker, will use to make chips for the iPhone 5. Kinsus is reported to be delivering its part of the deal soon, by March certainly, and this suggests a Spring delivery date (at the soonest) for the 2011 iteration of the iPhone. Meanwhile, the same sources are saying the CPU tech inside the iPhone 5 and iPad 2 will be a "new A8 application processor," also built on silicon supplied by Kinsus. This has prompted speculation that Apple's next CPU advance from it...

This week we have already seen two new BlackBerry smartphones leaked, the BlackBerry Dakota and the BlackBerry Curve 2, now it is the turn of the new BlackBerry Storm 3. The guys over at the BGR have once again obtained some leaked images and specifications on the new BlackBerry Storm 3, and it looks like it will come with a 3.7 inch capacitive touchscreen display with a resolution of 800 x 480 pixels. Other features on the new BlackBerry Storm 3 include a 1.2GHz processor, a five megapixel camera with can record HD video in 720p, 8GB of built in storage and 512MB of RAM. The BlackBerry Storm 3 will also come with a microSD card slot, a proximity sensor, accelerometer, magnetometer, Bluetooth 2.1+EDR, WiFi, and can also be used as a 3G mobile hotspot. There are no details as yet on pricing but it looks like it may launch some time in September of this year.

The FCC has just approved an LG tablet called V900. Although there are no photos to show the tablet yet, the Federal Commission informs us that the device features Wi-Fi and AWS connectivity. The latter feature makes the tablet compatible with T-Mobile USA’s network, so it’s probably safe to assume that the V900 is the G-Slate Android 3.0 Honeycomb tablet announced on January 6 at CES 2011. We still don’t know much about the G-Slate – not even its screen size. Even more, LG and T-Mobile have not said when the G-Slate would become available, and neither for what price. If I had to guess, T-Mo will launch the LG G-Slate at about the same time with Verizon’s Motorola Xoom – so we might see it in stores as early as March.

We just talked to Nike last week about its Nike+ GPS app for the iPhone, and there's another update to the already full-featured app. A new feature called Tag brings competition into Nike+ GPS. After you finish a run in the app, you can press the Tag button to invite as many of your friends or contacts to the game as you want; each user invited has to complete a certain goal within three days. The goal can be set for distance, time, or the last person to actually go running. At the end of the game, everyone gets to know who was "IT" -- whoever went the shortest or whoever ran last. It's all meant in fun, but it seems like a cool, social way to keep your friends running, a little competition between fellow runners. There's a video, embedded after the break, that Nike put together to show how it all works. The Tag feature is a free update to current owners of the app, but new users will have to pick it up for the usual price of US$1.99.

Do you want to disable the pausing of video playback while your iPhone is in Sleep Mode? Well, You can do it easily by using a new tweak available in Cydia. The name of this tweak is VideoLock. Using this tweak you don’t have to restart your playback each time you turn off the screen. Whether your iPhone goes in sleep mode or not it does not matter still you can resume the video playback. If you are facing problem with video playback or listening to music through MobileSafari then VideoLock will fix this problem. Videolock is available in Cydia. This tweak is available at a price of $0.99 USD. After installing this tweak you will not found any icons on the homescreen of your iPhone. VideoLock is compatible with iOS 4.0 or later. You will need to have a jailbroken iPhone in order to install this tweak. You can watch the video embedded below to see it in action. You can follow the step by step instructions posted here to jailbreak your iPhone on iOS 4.2.1 with Redsn0w. Don...