Samsung Galaxy S 4 goes official with a new screen and CPU

Samsung just released its latest flagship - the Galaxy S 4. It packs a new 4.99" Super AMOLED screen with a resolution of 1920 x 1080 pixels, which adds up to a pixel density of 441ppi. The screen still a new PenTile matrix, though it probably won't matter much at this kind of density.
         
Samsung Galaxy S 4 in White Frost
The international version of the Samsung Galaxy S IV is going to be powered by the Exynos 5 Octa chipset, which features four Cortex-A15 cores clocked at 1.8GHz, four Cortex-A7 cores running at 1.2GHz and the PowerVR SGX 544MP3 GPU. There will be a second version for some markets, which will be powered by the Qualcomm Snapdragon 600 chipset with its 4 Krait 300 cores and Adreno 320 GPU. Both versions will offer LTE connectivity and 2GB of RAM.
         
Samsung Galaxy S 4 in Misty Black
At the back, the Samsung Galaxy S IV will feature a 13 MP sharpshooter, while on the front a 2.1MP camera will take care of video chats and a host of new features that involve eye-tracking and hand-tracking.
The Samsung Galaxy S IV is slimmer than the Galaxy S III at 7.9 mm and even though its screen has grown it's actually narrower than its predecessor thanks to the slimmer bezels. The smartphone features a similar hyperglaze finish to its predecessor, though it has a different pattern on the back. At 130g the Galaxy S IV is also lighter than the Galaxy S III, despite featuring an ampler 2600mAh battery.
The new Samsung flagship will have three options for its internal storage (16GB, 32GB and 64GB) and they will all feature a microSD card for further expansion.
Just like the HTC One the Galaxy S 4 incorporates an IR blaster so you can use it as a remote control with your TV and various other home appliances.

Samsung Galaxy S 4 live photos
Samsung Galaxy S 4 runs on Android 4.2.2 Jelly Bean and has several cool new software features to go with. There's Sound and Shot, which captures 9 second clips with sound (similar to the HTC Zoe), Drama Shot, which captures a burst of photos and combines them into a single image. Cinema Photo mimics Nokia's Cinemagraph and lets you shoot a video and then select which part to be animated and which static, resulting in a GIF image.
You can erase objects from a picture and record video simultaneously from the front and back camera (1080p).
Samsung has included S Translator, which works with email and ChatON. It can translate all major languages at launch with further ones coming later on.
Smart Pause pauses the video you're watching if it detects that your eyes are away from the screen, while Smart Scroll can scroll a web page if you tilt the device while looking at it.
Health and Wellness is part of the Samsung Galaxy S 4 improved TouchWiz package too. The S Health app can measure steps, calories and even the confort of your surroundings - temperature, humidity, etc. These features require the S Band and Heart Rate monitor accessories.
The Samsung Galaxy S 4 will hit shelves in April in two colors - White Frost and Black Mist. Pricing is yet to be confirmed.

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HTC One goes official with 4.7" 1080p screen, quad-core CPU

Just as we expected, the HTC events turned out to be about the company's new flagship - the HTC One.
HTC One features a 4.7-inch Super LCD 3 display of 1080p resolution (that's 469ppi). It should be able to match the image quality of the Butterfly's unit.



The One is powered by the latest Qualcomm Snapdragon 600 chipset (the same ticking inside the LG Optimus G Pro) utilizing a quad-core 1.7GHz Krait 300 processor, Adreno 320 graphics and 2GB of RAM.
The camera of the HTC One sports a 4MP sensor and 1080p@30fps video recording (with HDR). The sensor has what HTC calls Ultrapixels, which are much larger than the regular smartphone pixels and promise vastly improved per-pixel quality and low-light performance. The smartphone also offers gyroscope-based Optical image stabilization which should come in handy for video recording.


HTC One

The HTC One will have 32GB or 64 GB of non-expandable storage and rich connectivity settings including LTE, NFC, Wi-Fi a/b/g/n/ac, Bluetooth 4 and GPS with GLONASS.
HTC One will launch running on Android 4.1.2 but the 4.2.2 update is already in the works.
The new flagship is made out of aluminum and is about 9.3 mm thick. It has stereo speakers at the front with impressive 93db loudness and a 2300 mAh non-removable battery. Also, its Power/Lock key on top is transparent and doubles as an IR port to control home equipment.
HTC One will be available in black, red and silver colors and will launch in March this year. HTC has already made deals with 185 carriers worldwide including USA's AT&T, T-Mobile and Sprint; all major UK carriers and many more. There is still no info on its retail price, though.
You should check out this article for live photos of the HTC One, garnished with our first hand impressions of the device.

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Google Opening Stores in Major Metropolitan Areas, Preparing to Sell Nexus Devices, More

Microsoft may have its own cool stores, but that didn’t quite trigger an invasion of Surface Pro purchases. It’s hard to imitate the Apple Store success without also giving the public appealing products. Google will apparently try its hand with a bunch of retail stores, according to some inside info.

The search engine giant has already experimented with selling Nexus devices for itself and now it wants to open its own locations. There are already a bunch of Chrome stores integrated into other big commercial shopping areas in UK and USA. Best Buy holds such area, for example and so do PCWorld/Dixon locations. However, this time the new stores will be focused on Google and the Nexus devices especially. It would be a good idea to have such a space, since we could actually get to play with devices before we buy them.
Just look at the Nexus 4 and how hard it was to find an unit to purchase or play with, because of the low stocks. The Nexus 10 also had similar problems, so a Google Store is in order. There are Android stores in China, but they’re not quite official, as far as I know. The decision to open the stores is apparently associated with the Google Glasses, that certainly need an in store specialist to do the demo, since you are spending a lot of cash for them after all and you need to know what you’re buying.

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HTC M7 to hit shelves in France on March 8, priced at €650

At the rate these HTC M7 leaks and teasers go, we are afraid HTC will have little to announce at its February 19 event. Today we got to learn the pricing and release date of the smartphone (or at least in France), courtesy of a listing from a local retailer.
According to the leak, the HTC M7 will be launched on March 8, and it will be using that exact name. This refutes earlier rumors that M7 was merely a codename, which won't be used any more once the smartphone gets official.


The SIM-free HTC M7 will be priced at a whopping €649.99(about $879) and is expected to be available in different colors.
The listing also confirms the specifications of HTC M7 to sport a 4.7" Full HD display, 1.7 GHz Qualcomm Snapdragon quad-core processor along with 2GB RAM, 32 GB internal memory with microSD support, 4G, NFC, Android Jelly Bean and 2,300mAh battery
Furthermore, HTC M7 will be using a 13-megapixel camera with stacked sensor and ultrapixels for the first time and it will be interesting to see how the camera performs. M7 is also confirmed to feature the latest HTC 5.0 sense and Double HP techno Beats Audio.

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HTC to hold pre-MWC 2013 press conferences on February 19

HTC is holding a press conference on February 19, a whole week prior to the MWC 2013's kick off. The event will take place in London and will start at 10:00AM local time.

Unlike Nokia, which has already confirmed its pre-MWC press event for February 25. HTC's press conference will take place outside the MWC host city Barcelona, as HTC tries to have more of the spotlight for itself.

And it will most likely succeed, considering the strong possibility that the Taiwanese will announce its M7 future Android flagship there. The smartphone will boast the smallest 1080p screen on the market. As such the 4.7" display will have the mind-blowing pixel a pixel density of 468 ppi.

Parts of the the smartphone have already posed for the camera, so the M7 is all but officially confirmed at this point. It's highly likely the M7 to run HTC's latest Sense UI 5.0 on top of Android 4.2 Jelly Bean.

Update: In addition to the London press conference, HTC has also confirmed there will be a parallel event in New York on February 19.

Whatever the case may be, we'll be your eyes and ears for the event once February 19 comes.

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