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LG G2 User Manual Leaks, Reveals Removable Battery And Expandable Memory

LG hasn’t been shy when it comes to teasing its upcoming flagship G2. We’ve seen LG drop the ‘Optimus’ name from its marketing, unload various teaser videos, and even announce official cases. In addition, a plethora of leaked images and hands-on videos revealed its design and unique features – mainly the back volume buttons.

A new post on Nowhereelse, by the way of a user manual, confirms previous rumours and a few missing specs of the LG G2 :

– Android 4.3
– 5.2-inch display 1920 × 1.080
– 2.3Ghz quad-core Qualcomm Snapdragon processor with Adreno 330 graphics chip
– 2GB of RAM
– 32GB internal storage (no micro-SD slot)
– 13MP rear-facing camera
– 2.1MP front-facing camera
– uses a nano-SIM
– 4G/LTE capabilities
– back volume buttons
– 138.5mm x 70.9mm x 8.9mm thin
– 143 grams
– 2,610mAh removable battery

The manual appears to be legit and reveals the phone will be using the nano-SIM standard like the Motorola Moto X and the iPhone 5. This leak also gives confirmation of the 2610 mAh battery, which will also be user-removable.

The leaked shots show that the LG G2, or at least this Korean LG-F320 version of it, will measure in at 138.5mm x 70.9mm x 8.9mm and weigh 143g.

The LG G2 will officially be unveiled in New York on Wednesday, August 7th and we’ll bring you all the details.

[Via]

August 5, 2013
Report : Sony Xperia Tablet Z Receiving Android 4.2.2 Update

Even though the Sony Xperia Tablet Z was released in early July in India, it came preloaded with Android 4.1.2 Jelly Bean, retaining some of the legacy Android tablet features that Google did away with in Android 4.2 and the Nexus 10.

It appears that some variants of the Tablet Z are already being updated to Android 4.2.2, though it seems that the Indian version is currently not among them.

The most immediately obvious change in Android 4.2.2 is the relocation of the onscreen navigation buttons to the centre middle on the Xperia Tablet Z, mimicking the Nexus 10. The notification bar has been moved to where phone users would expect it: the top of the screen. While this isn’t stock Android 4.2, it’s the closest you’ll find in a non-Nexus tablet.

It’s not clear what else Sony added to the new version, but one can expect standard features found in 4.2 like lockscreen widgets, performance improvements and a number of bug fixes.

August 5, 2013
Android 4.3 Will Keep WiFi Always On

The latest Google Android 4.3 upgrade brings all new features and also offers great performance. Google has also made a new change to the WiFi settings in Android 4.3.

To improve location accuracy and for other purposes, Google and other apps may scan for nearby networks, even when Wi-Fi is off ” – describes Google.

It has been seen that the new version of Android will keep the WiFi radio always on, even after the user has manually turned it off. This feature is probably designed to save one’s battery life instead of wasting it, given that the only other way for one’s smartphone to discern one’s location is to drain the battery using GPS.

To check and see whether your phone has this feature enabled by default (a number do not), you’ll have to navigate through the Android operating system’s settings. Here’s how:

Open up the Settings app and tap your finger on the Wireless and Networks option. Tap on the WiFi option, and then tap on the Menu button on your phone’s lower-right-hand corner. When the list pops up, tap your finger on the Advanced option. From there, you’ll want to make sure to check the “Scanning always available” option if you want to participate in the new Android 4.3 feature. Otherwise, if it’s checked, you need merely to uncheck it to ensure that “WiFi off” really means “WiFi off.”

However, many now expressed their concern that malicious applications might exploit this new functionality.

Various user reports indicate that this feature remains off by default when they’ve updated their devices to Android 4.3. That means, it’s more important that you know about this potentially useful setting than to freak out about it, but it’s also worth checking this, and many of Android’s other “Advanced” wireless configuration options, when you’ve upgraded your mobile OS.

Now will Google resolve this or add something to counter the issue is to be seen, but for the time being users must carefully read the application access and if they feel something suspicious they should avoid installing that application.

August 5, 2013
Facebook Pays Bug Hunters $1 Million, India Second Biggest Recipient
The social media giant ‘Facebook’ has paid over 1 million USD to security researchers who report bugs on their website, with India being the second biggest recipient among other countries. India has over 78 million Facebook users, and now is one of the fastest growing in the Bug Bounty program. The social networking major said 329 people have received rewards, including professional researchers, students and part-timers. The youngest recipient was 13 years old.

A software bug is an error, flaw, failure, or fault in a computer program or system that produces an incorrect or unexpected result, or causes it to behave in unintended ways. Most bugs arise from mistakes and errors made by people in either a program’s source code or its design, and a few are caused by compilers producing incorrect code.

As per Facebook To qualify for a bounty, you must:
- Adhere to the Responsible Disclosure Policy of Facebook.
- Be the first person to responsibly disclose the bug
- Report a bug that could compromise the integrity of Facebook user data, circumvent the privacy protections of Facebook user data, or enable access to a system within the Facebook infrastructure, such as:
  
  Cross-Site Scripting (XSS)
  
  Cross-Site Request Forgery (CSRF/XSRF)
  
  Broken Authentication (including Facebook OAuth bugs)
  
  Circumvention of our Platform/Privacy permission models
  
  Remote Code Execution
  
  Privilege Escalation
  
  Provisioning Errors
- Use a test account instead of a real account when investigating bugs. When you are unable to reproduce a bug with a test account, it is acceptable to use a real account, except for automated testing. Do not interact with other accounts without the consent of their owners.
- Reside in a country not under any current U.S. Sanctions (e.g., North Korea, Libya, Cuba, etc.
Facebook offers great prize money which is a minimum of $500 and there is no maximum amount they have quoted, as each bug is awarded a bounty based on its severity and creativity.

Our Bug Bounty program allows us to harness the talent and perspective of people from all kinds of backgrounds, from all around the world,Two of the bounty recipients have taken up full-time jobs with the Facebook security team” Facebook Security Engineer Collin Greene said
August 5, 2013
Yahoo Buys Rockmelt Social Browser And Shuts Down App

Yahoo’s summer shopping spree has claimed another company. This time it’s former social browser turned Flipboard clone, Rockmelt.

According to Rockmelt, its products will be completely shut down at the end of this month. Current users will be able to export their existing content as an OPML file.

Reports indicate that the Internet giant shelled out between $60 and $70 million (€45 and €52 million) for the company. Rockmelt’s team will head for the Yahoo mobile and media departments.

“The parallels between Yahoo! And Rockmelt are obvious: we share a common goal to help people discover the best personalized content from around the web,” Yahoo’s Mike Kerns and Adam Cahan said in a blog post.

Rockmelt has a well-regarded team that was surely attractive to Yahoo CEO Marissa Mayer as she continues to build out her team. But the acquisition was not a pure acqui-hire, as Rockmelt had built a variety of media-related mobile technologies that could be useful to Yahoo.

Yahoo posted the following :

Thirty-two Rockmelt employees have joined our media and mobile organization. We aren’t going to discuss specifics on what they’re working on, but we plan to integrate the Rockmelt technology into our media platform in order to deliver content in new and exciting ways. Stay tuned!

[Via]

August 3, 2013
Inventor Of Hashtag Chris Messina Leaves Google

As The Next Web reports, Chris Messina has left Google to join the digital collectibles platform NeonMob. The former developer advocate and UX designer for the search company announced in a blog post that he will be working to build the new startup’s community and service, something he describes as “an important, new platform for digital creatives and art enthusiasts.”

An advocate of open social Web technologies, Chris Messina had first joined Google to lead developer relations for the short-lived Google Buzz product. In recent years, he had worked on user experience design on the Google+ team.

Since creating hashtags back in 2007 as way of grouping online conversations, he’s spent his time focusing on design and the open web at Google. Perhaps more accurately, redesign. Chris Messina is responsible for the search giant’s revamped brand badges, profiles and +1 button, as well as helping create the Google Developers knowledge base.

Based in San Francisco, NeonMob is building a market for digital art. He will be the head of the company’s community and growth starting next week.

NeonMob describes itself as : NeonMob is a platform and community for discovering and collecting awesome, original, limited-edition, digital art. For those who grew up collecting comic books, cards, stamps, coins or other collectible paraphernalia, the concept of collecting online doesn’t stretch the imagination. The difference is, NeonMob is online, which makes finding fellow collectors and trading partners much easier – and on NeonMob, anybody can create stuff for others to collect!

[Via]

August 3, 2013
Vine For Android Updated With Push Notifications

An updated version of the Vine application is now available for download for the owners of Android-based devices, namely version 1.3.3, with some appealing improvements packed inside.

With the newest version, Viners now have the ability to share user profiles through more than just the SMS app (hopefully all Android apps with sharing capabilities will be available). Users can also look forward to push notifications, so they never miss a mention or re-Vine.

Furthermore, the new application release provides the possibility to share any public post to Twitter or Facebook, while also delivering a variety of other bug fixes and improvements.

For those of you who don’t keep up with the social media, Vine is an app that allows you to create 6 seconds of video in a looping feed that you can tag and then post. Owned by Twitter, consider this the video version of the social messaging app, if the messages continued to repeat over and over again.

Vine for Android is available through the Google Play store for free and it is compatible with devices running Ice Cream Sandwich and later platforms.

August 3, 2013
Google’s New Android Device Manager Will Help Locate Lost Phones

Apple’s Find my iPhone has been a very useful feature for those who frequently misplace their gadgets. Or, for those who just enjoy the peace of mind that comes with knowing that Apple has a piece of technology dedicated to securing a lost phone.Android and iOS have been going back and forth battling over feature inclusions for some time now, and it looks like Google’s the follower in this case. The company just introduced the Android Device Manager, which as you may suspect, will help Android users track down lost devices in a similar manner.

If you discover you’ve lost your phone, you can go to any computer and log into the Android Device Manager, which will be part of the Google Play Store. All that is required is your Google account login, the same one you used to activate your Android phone.

Choose your registered phone and push out a signal to ring at full volume, even if your lost phone was last put on vibrate or silent mode. If this doesn’t do the trick, find the phone as a blip a Google Map.

If you discover that your lost Android phone is on the move and you don’t feel safe going into full-on vigilante mode (or are worried it will get turned off soon), delete all data on the device using a special built-in wipe mode in the Android Device Manager, to keep your data safe from prying eyes.

August 3, 2013
Google Play Edition Galaxy S4 And HTC One Now Receiving Android 4.3 Update

After updating all the Nexus devices this week, the two Nexus 7 tablets, the Nexus 4 and the Samsung Galaxy Nexus, search engine giant Google’s Android division on Friday rolled out the Android 4.3 Jelly Bean update for the two Google Play Edition smartphones, the HTC One and the Samsung Galaxy S4.

When Google announced the Google Play edition of the S4, they promised quick updated along with a stock Android experience. These are two of the main reasons to get these devices over their standard versions that come with OEM customizations and are bound to receive the 4.3 update much, much later.

These phones’ updates include most of Android 4.3’s key features—Bluetooth 4.0 and OpenGL ES 3.0 support among them—plus a few handset-specific enhancements. AnandTech reports, for example, that the Google Play edition HTC One’s IR blaster has now been enabled, as has Bluetooth pairing for the Galaxy S 4. Both phones were already using the new stock Camera app included with Android 4.3 on the Nexus devices, but they each come with a few minor cosmetic tweaks of their own.

Do you think Samsung and HTC will capitalize on this momentum to help them release the Android 4.3 update for their mainstream devices in a more timely manner? Let us know below!

[Via]

August 3, 2013
Blackberry A10 will be called Z30 according to Blackberry 10.2 files

Blackberry Aristo has always been referred to as the A10, but recent revelations by Crackberry team have found that the first big phone by the company will actually be called Z30. A few tutorial videos of the device running Blackberry 10.2 have also been found.

Z30 is said to be a big phone, the first ever by Blackberry, featuring a 5-inch OLED display with a pixel density of 295 PPI, 1.7GHz dual-core Snapdragon S4 Pro CPU, quad-core GPU, 2GB of RAM, an 8-megapixel rear camera and will have a microSD card slot that will be able to support 64GB of storage. Internally,N

Battery is said to be kept at 2,800mAh battery and will support NFC and wireless charging. The Z30 will be a bigger version of the Z10, that means a Z20 could be in the works to fill in the Gap.

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August 3, 2013
iBerry AUXUS Nuclea N1 Gaming and Benchmarks – iGyaan

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August 3, 2013
Xolo Play T1000 Nvidia Tegra 3 phone Unboxing and Hands On Review – iGyaan

August 3, 2013
Microsoft’s Augmented Reality Gaming Glasses Patent Revealed

Microsoft is jumping on the wearable display bandwagon, but don’t expect a Google Glass competitor. This week the company patented a head-mounted display aimed at bringing augmented reality to gaming.

The fact that Microsoft is planning to make AR goggles was leaked last year, when a 56-page ‘roadmap’ for the Xbox One (pictured below) found its way onto the Internet. Microsoft subsequently confirmed that the roadmap was genuine, but outdated.

Beyond mimicking some of the functions of Google Glass though it was never really clear what exactly the AR glasses, codenamed Fortaleza, were for.

“In one example, a potential player invitation program receives user voice data and determines that the user voice data is an invitation to participate in a multiplayer game,” the patent request continues. “The program receives eye-tracking information, depth information, facial recognition information, potential player head-mounted display device information, and/or potential player voice data. The program associates the invitation with the potential player using the eye-tracking information, the depth information, the facial recognition information, the potential player head-mounted display device information, and/or the potential player voice data.”

Apart from acknowledging that the roadmap leak was real Microsoft has never mentioned the glasses officially and it’s unclear if and when they will do so. Many of the projects rumoured in the roadmap have since been revealed by Microsoft, including new Kinect, Xbox One, and forthcoming entertainment services.

The patent though, which was only published yesterday, suggests the idea is still well underway.

[Via]

August 2, 2013
iOS 7 Beta 4 Fixes Charger Hack

Apple is said to have fixed a powerful charger-based hack, which previously allowed iDevices to be compromised by hackers using a modified power charger in under a minute.

As Reuters reports, Apple said the issue had been fixed in the latest beta of iOS 7, which has already been released to software developers.

“We would like to thank the researchers for their valuable input,” Apple spokesman Tom Neumayr said. The researchers were Billy Lau, a research scientist at the Georgia Institute of Technology, and graduate students Yeongjin Jang and Chengyu Song.

Andy Greenberg, Forbes technology and information security reporter explains that the researchers took advantage of a security flaw in Apple’s developer model, which allows anyone with a developer license to install third-party apps on a registered device.

iOS 7 prompts a new warning message to the user when they plug their iOS device to any device that attempts to establish a data connection informing them that “Trusting this computer will allow it full access to your device and all its data.”

Of course, this leaves iPhones and iPads that won’t get the iOS 7 update vulnerable. According to the researchers, all other versions of iOS can be hacked in this manner.

However, end users will have to wait for iOS 7 before the fix arrives.

August 2, 2013
Microsoft Boosts Xbox One GPU Clock Speed

Microsoft will boost the clock speed of the Xbox One’s AMD graphics processor from 800 MHz to 853 MHz, Marc Whitten, Microsoft’s corporate vice president for Xbox, said during the Major Nelson podcast. He also noted that game makers are now working with final Xbox One development kits.

Perhaps Xbox One engineers found that the GPU is most efficient at the said clock speed. The new “mono driver” is also a new “100% optimized for Xbox One” DirectX driver, Microsoft’s proprietary API.

In the podcast, Whitten also stated that Microsoft “dropped” the Xbox One GPU after E3 2013, allowing them to tweak and fine tune the hardware to match their vision of the experience that they wanted the Xbox One to provide the gamer/user with.

The Xbox One is slated to launch later this year, and the next-gen console will sport an 8-core CPU, 8 GB of system memory and a 500 GB hard drive. Sony’s PlayStation 4 will sport a similar system-on-a-chip architecture. Both semi-custom APUs will be manufactured by AMD.

The move comes after Microsoft’s console has been criticised for having significantly less raw performance compared to Sony’s PlayStation 4.

What do you think of Microsoft upgrading the Xbox One’s GPU? Does it matter to you at all? Why or why not? Let us know below!

[Via]

August 2, 2013