For Platinum plan subscibers who are signing up for a 24-month contract, Globe is offering free Samsung gadgets in addition to the Galaxy S4 phone. At Plan 3499, customers get a free Galaxy S3 mini; at Plan 5000 a free Galaxy Camera; and at Plan 10000 a free Galaxy Note 2.

Under Globe’s revitalized My Super Plan options, customers can now choose contract periods from 6 months to 30 months to avail of new devices. Globe further goes on to assure their ‘No Billshock’ policy by guaranteeing that customers subscribed to Plans 999 and lower will not pay over P999 a month if they go beyond their data subscription; and other Globe Guarantee offerings that include a 7-day phone replacement; and 24/7 access to Globe customer service channels on mobile, landline, e-mail, online chat, Twitter and Facebook.

“Samsung’s next-generation smartphone is best paired with a next-generation postpaid plan that only Globe can provide with our revitalized best-ever My Super Plan made even more personalized, customizable and flexible than ever, giving subsribers more options to enjoy their postpaid plan bundle,” said Martha Sazon, Head of Globe Postpaid.

The Samsung Galaxy S4 will be available in White Frost and Black Mist. The newest addition to the Samsung Galaxy smartphone family is equipped with a 5-inch HD Super AMOLED display, 1.9Ghz quad-core processor, 13-megapixel camera, and cutting-edge features like Air View, Smart Pause, Dual Camera and Drama Shot.

Techindustriya.com - News reviews features on cameras, mobile phones, smartphones, laptops, tablets, gaming, apps, and modern tech lifestyle.

Samsung really likes big screens as it introduces two Galaxy Mega smartphones at the same time, a 6.3-inch and a 5.8-inch model. Both are larger than Samsung’s already enormous Galaxy Note 2, with low to mid-range specifications.The two gigantic handsets will be available starting in May from Europe and Russia, gradually rolling out everywhere else.

“We are aware of a great potential in the bigger screen for extensive viewing multimedia, web browsing, and more,” said JK Shin, CEO and Head of IT & Mobile Business, Samsung Electronics.

The 6.3-inch Galaxy Mega sports a 1280 x 720 HD LCD, a dual-core 1.7GHz processor, LTE and HSPA radios, and either 8GB or 16GB of internal storage. The smaller HSPA-only 5.8-inch model has a 960 x 540 qHD display, a dual-core 1.4GHz processor, available only in an 8GB model. Both devices have IR blasters, an 8-megapixel rear camera and 1.9-megapixel front camera, with 1.5GB of RAM, a microSD slot, running Android 4.2 Jelly Bean.

Pricing has yet to be finalized but will most probably be lower than the Galaxy Note 2 due to the lower specifications. Samsung has included various proprietary features such as Group Play, Samsung Link, S Translator, ChatON, and more.

Techindustriya.com - News reviews features on cameras, mobile phones, smartphones, laptops, tablets, gaming, apps, and modern tech lifestyle.

Twitter seems to be moving into the music scene as the company confirms its acquisition of the team behind the music discovery site We Are Hunted. According to We Are Hunted “we will continue to create services that will delight you, as part of the Twitter team,” to unveil the music-related service that they’ve been working on.

“There’s no question that Twitter and music go well together. Artists turn to Twitter first to connect with fans, and people share and discover new songs and albums every day.”

The microblogging service has been rumored to be launching a new standalone music service that will use third-party services like iTunes or Soundcloud to provide music clips while videos will be provided by Vevo. The app itself would suggest artists and tracks to users based on their Twitter feeds metadata along with who they follow.. According to sources at AllThingsD, the app may make its debut this weekend at Coachella, a yearly music festival in California that attracts some of the music industry’s top talents. The app seems to be in its final stages as Ryan Seacrest has tweeted about playing with Twitter’s new music app.

playing with @twitter‘s new music app (yes it’s real!)…there’s a serious dance party happening at idol right now

— Ryan Seacrest (@RyanSeacrest) April 11, 2013

Techindustriya.com - News reviews features on cameras, mobile phones, smartphones, laptops, tablets, gaming, apps, and modern tech lifestyle.

Death is something we cannot avoid, but not many of us like thinking about it. But if and when we do, we leave behind a lot of things, including our digital presence. Now Google has introduced a new feature called Inactive Account Manager that takes care of everything if you pass away or can no longer use your account.

You can access the new feature through the Google Account settings page. With the Inactive Account Manager, you can set up a pretty straightforward procedure for what should happen to your data “if your account becomes inactive for any reason.” After a timeout period of three, six, nine, or 12 months of inactivity the manager will activate. You can share the data with a trusted contact or delete your whole account. The data that can be shared include +1s; Blogger; Contacts and Circles; Drive; Gmail; Google+ Profiles, Pages and Streams; Picasa Web Albums; Google Voice and YouTube.

Before it activates though, it will first send you an email or text message before the timeout period ends to make sure you’re actually dead and haven’t just switched to another mail service. What happens when you’ve told Google to delete all your data, but someone wants access to it? A Google spokesperson told TechCrunch that the company “will honor the preference you’ve made in Inactive Account Manager to the extent permitted by law.”

Techindustriya.com - News reviews features on cameras, mobile phones, smartphones, laptops, tablets, gaming, apps, and modern tech lifestyle.

It seems the global Samsung Galaxy S4 3G-only model outperforms the US model according to benchmark tests run by the folks at SamMobile. The international GT-I9500 running a Samsung’s Exynos 5 Octa clocked in at 1.6Ghz has outperformed the US GT-I9505 running Qualcomm’s Snapdragon 600 clocked at 1.9Ghz. The more powerful Korean variant, the SHV-E300S, has an Exynos 5 Octa clocked in at 1.8GHz but has yet to be tested.

On the Antutu benchmarking app, the international Galaxy S4 scored a whopping 28018 points while the US Galaxy S4 scored 23607 points. However, the performance difference will be negligible in day to day tasks. The Exynos 5 Octa difference will only be noticeable during high CPU-extensive app and slightly be more power efficient due to ARM’s big.LITTLE technology. The only disadvantage with the international model would be the lack of 4G/LTE. The Korean variant is expected to score around 30000 points, which could make it the fastest device in the market.

Source: SamMobile

Techindustriya.com - News reviews features on cameras, mobile phones, smartphones, laptops, tablets, gaming, apps, and modern tech lifestyle.

Ubisoft has historically had trouble with its various DRM measures, but this time it has topped the bar.It seems Russian hackers managed to find an vulnerability that allowed users to bypass DRM protections on the uPlay games distribution platform.

The exploit fooled the client into thinking that users already own copies of the games. This gave exploiters access to the company’s whole library of games including those from other publishers including EA and Square Enix along with unreleased games such as FarCry 3: Blood Dragon.

The hackers demonstrated the exploit by posting video footage of the unreleased Far Cry 3: Blood Dragon in action. Copies of the unreleased game have already appeared various BitTorrent tracker sites.

At a time where publishers are debating on the “always-on” DRM scheme, it’s quite confusing where the market will land. Ubisoft has already been burned by various draconian DRM scheme, like “always-on” but such a leak might bring it back.

Ubisoft has issued an official statement on the matter. “We are aware of the issue and are working to resolve it quickly,” it reads. “Uplay’s PC download service will be unavailable until the problem is fixed, but no personal information was compromised and all other Uplay services remain available.”

Source: Gameranx

Techindustriya.com - News reviews features on cameras, mobile phones, smartphones, laptops, tablets, gaming, apps, and modern tech lifestyle.

It seems Microsoft really wants the Xbox to be the center of your home entertainment system. According to a report by The Verge, Microsoft will be introducing a new feature that will let its next-generation console interact with a TV and set-top box, just like Google TV does. With all the always-on controversy, this might actually be where it will be primarily used, instead of as a DRM (digital rights management) measure for games. This isn’t entirely clear yet and now the man who started it all, Adam Orth has apparently left Microsoft.

How this feature will work is by taking the cable signal and routing it through to the Xbox via HDMI, which will let the console overlay a UI and extra features. Microsoft is trying to push the Xbox past just being a gaming console into and entertainment hub and already has established partnerships with various content providers.

Though one has to wonder how it will work outside of the United States, where most of these services won’t be accessible. This seems like a major feature for the Xbox and alienating international users doesn’t seem like a good idea after the always-on fiasco. Microsoft has already announced plans to sell its Mediaroom IPTV business to Ericsson. Moving away from supporting and building software for set-top boxes and fully focusing on its Xbox console.

Furthering the Kinect sensor’s capabilities, it seems that it will be able to detect multiple users simultaneously, while having the ability to detect eye movement to pause content when the viewer turns away. Sounds quite like what Samsung has on its Galaxy smartphones. Previously Microsoft’s research division showed off a few room concepts for the Kinect, expanding the viewing area beyond the TV.

Microsoft is planning an Xbox event in May where the company plans to release details about its next-generation console.

Source: The Verge

Techindustriya.com - News reviews features on cameras, mobile phones, smartphones, laptops, tablets, gaming, apps, and modern tech lifestyle.

WikiLeaks has once again unloaded a large number of formerly confidential information from the United States government. Released over the weekend, the “Kissinger Cables” contain more than 1.7 million US diplomatic record from 1973 to 1976, a number of which relate to former US Secretary of State Henry A. Kissinger. A number of these cables were classified as “CONFIDENTIAL”, “SECRET”, “NOSID” or “no distribution”, and “Eyes Only.”

““The collection covers US involvements in, and diplomatic or intelligence reporting on, every country on Earth. It is the single most significant body of geopolitical material ever published.” stated WikiLeaks’ publisher Julian Assange. 

The United States Department of State has a 25-year declassification process for its documents, though there have been numerous attempts at reclassifying sections of the US National Archives according to WikiLeaks. WikiLeaks gathered all the files from the National Archives and Record Administration (NARA) and brought it to the public eye through a searchable database. Even with its 25-year process, there are no diplomatic records later than 1976.  

At roughly 700 million words, these cables include what WikiLeaks describes as “significant revelations about US involvements with fascist dictatorships, particularly in Latin America, under Franco’s Spain (including about the Spanish royal family) and in Greece under the regime of the Colonels.” The raw “Kissinger Cables” PDF of all 700 million words is more than 380GB in size. A quick search through the database for documents that mention the Philippines come up with 40,262 documents.

One of the cables revealed in the search came from the US ambassador to the Philippines in the 1970s, William Sullivan, who criticized then-Philippine president Ferdinand Marcos for putting on a forced military drag show. In the cable, Sullivan recounted a “two-day blast” of a party for Marcos that was at odds with state-controlled media reports that said Marcos “spend a quiet birthday at his desk.”

The most scathing commentary came when Sullivan recounted when military chiefs were required to perform as part of the palace floor show in “garish female attire,” causing “much grumbling among military hierarchy and wives of service chiefs stood conspicuously in a grim, un-smiling phalanx throughout the hilarity.”

“This whole affair was a saccharine suffusion of sycophancy which reminded me unhappily of the heydays of Sukarno and Sihanouk.” commented Sullivan.

Techindustriya.com - News reviews features on cameras, mobile phones, smartphones, laptops, tablets, gaming, apps, and modern tech lifestyle.

After a series of leaks, Google has officially announced the redesign of the Play Store. The Google’s app marketplace has done away with its dark theme in favor of a more colorful look. With a look quite similar to Google Now, using card based information, the redesign displays a continuous stream of recommendations with larger images and clearer icons while you scroll. Purchasing content on the store has been made easier, in-app Buy window simply floats on top of your app without leaving the app itself.

The redesigned Play Store rolls out today for Android phones and tablets running Android 2.2 Froyo and above, though it be a few weeks before everyone sees it. Now if you’re impatient and want the new simpler, cleaner, and faster version of the Play Store, you can get it from the folks at Android Police.

Techindustriya.com - News reviews features on cameras, mobile phones, smartphones, laptops, tablets, gaming, apps, and modern tech lifestyle.

We’ve had the chance to play around with Samsung’s new Windows 8 tablet/PC convertible running Intel’s Clover Trail Atom Z2760 SoC. To bridge the gap between tablet and PC, Samsung has combined both into the Samsung ATIV Smart PC. The ATIV Smart PC comes with a handy keyboard dock and an S-Pen for pinpoint tasks. Transforming from a handy tablet into a workable notebook at the push of a button, the Samsung ATIV Smart PC is a handy portable device that functions quite well.

The Samsung ATIV Smart PC is a pretty thin and light device. The tablet itself is quite sturdy with the bluish metal casing curving towards the edges, making it look and feel thinner than it actually is. Those with moist hand may have to a bit more careful with the tablet, the back can be a bit slippery and prone to fingerprints. The keyboard dock is quite light and handy, featuring a full chiclet keyboard with a touchpad. A minor inconvenience with the touchpad is the annoyingly loud click noise from the left and right mouse buttons. The keyboard buttons are laid out comfortably and it’s fairly easy to type quickly.

Unlike the tablet itself, the dock doesn’t feel quite as stable. The plastic construction lightens the load, but it may have been lightened too much. At times, tapping too hard on the tablet when in notebook mode at times may rock the device. The dock has a pretty narrow opening angle of around 120 degrees. It could have been made wider but we suspect that the tablet might lift up fairly light dock. The metal hinge is quite stable and the tablet easily undocks with a push of a button.

The 11.6-inch tablet sports a 1366 x 768 resolution with 400 nits brightness. Not surprisingly, the colors were quite sharp and vibrant at full brightness. The five-point multi-touch display was quite responsive most of the time, though it lagged a bit once or twice. If you want more precise controls, you can use the S-Pen tucked in the lower right of the tablet.

Imaging is taken care of through a 2-megapixel front camera with an 8-megapixel rear camera with flash. With the tablet docked, you’ll have access to three USB 2.0 ports, a micro HDMI port, a SIM card slot, and a microSD slot to boost the device’s storage capabilities. Connectivity is handled through Wi-Fi, a built-in 4G/LTE modem, and Bluetooth 4.0.

Inside the tablet is Intel’s dual-core Atom Z2760 SoC clocked in at 1.8GHz with 2GB of RAM and a 64GB SSD. With the Atom Z2760, the ATIV Smart PC runs the full version of Windows 8 instead of Windows RT. Software included is quite sparse, thankfully unburdened with bloatware. You’ve got a few Samsung-specific apps like S Note, S Gallery, S Player and Samsung QR Code. Some other included apps are Evernote, Kindle, Netflix, and Merriam-Webster to name a few. 

The tablet itself functions well enough most of the time, but slows down a bit when tasked with heavier loads. It won’t function as well as a full-fledged laptop but it shouldn’t be a problem for regular web browsing, video playback, and office applications. The front-facing speakers could be more powerful. At times The 30Wh Li-Ion battery should last you a regular day of use, with full brightness it lasted around six hours with video streaming and web browsing. Do note that the keyboard dock doesn’t have any batteries so you’re only relying on the tablets built-in batteries.

Conclusion

The Samsung ATIV Smart PC is a handy device, combining both tablet and PC into a single device. It functions well enough, considering its tablet SoC and can stand up against regular notebooks. The display is quite wonderful, no surprise coming from Samsung. The tablet itself is quite nice, though the keyboard dock could have a tad heavier to balance out the device. Battery life was good enough for a regular day of use. Retailing at Php35,900, the Samsung ATIV Smart PC functions quite well and is cheaper than most convertible tablet PCs.

Pros: Light tablet/notebook combo, bright screen, good battery life

Cons: Keyboard dock balance issues, speakers a bit quiet, slippery back prone to drops

Rating: 8/10

Techindustriya.com - News reviews features on cameras, mobile phones, smartphones, laptops, tablets, gaming, apps, and modern tech lifestyle.

If you’re looking to grab an iPad, it might be good to hold off for a few more months as Digitimes claims that the 5th generation iPad will begin production around July or August of this year. This prediction comes from sources in Taiwan-based supply chain manufacturers. The rumored 9.7-inch iPad 5 is said to be thinner and lighter than the previous generation, sporting a thin-bezel design similar to the iPad mini.

The timeline seems a bit off as Apple has generally released iPads at the front end of the year. Though the late release of the 4th-gen iPad and iPad mini may have shifted Apple’s release timeline, similar to the iPhone 5.

With the Apple-Samsung relationship strained as it is, the new iPad’s display is expected to come from LG Display and Sharp. The photo above shows off an iPad 5 render created by the folks at CiccareseDesign for MacRumors, based off leaked backplate images.

Techindustriya.com - News reviews features on cameras, mobile phones, smartphones, laptops, tablets, gaming, apps, and modern tech lifestyle.

Google is known for periods of spring cleaning and now it has looked towards its own mobile application marketplace, Google Play, culling around 60,000 low-quality apps in February. Quite a large number of apps, considering that the store contains about 700,000 apps. Not all of the apps were deleted by Google though. Some may have been pulled by the publishers themselves, but a majority of these were most probably directly culled by Google.

Unlike Apple who vets apps prior to publication on the App Store, Google scans its app store after the apps have gone live. This sort of post-publication scanning has led to malware apps ending up on the store though its automated systems are constantly being improved.

If apps do get past the automated systems, Google Play has historically quickly deleted applications that violate its Terms of Service, such as those spreading malware, graphic or sexual material, or infringing on copyrights.

This information comes from sources in the mobile app industry who have spoken with TechCrunch. A large number of the culled apps included MP3/ringtone apps, usually from shady publishers. It seems Google Play has grown large enough for Mountain View to improve upon its automated algorithms to handle spam applications.

Source: TechCrunch

Techindustriya.com - News reviews features on cameras, mobile phones, smartphones, laptops, tablets, gaming, apps, and modern tech lifestyle.

Intel has announced the next generation of its Thunderbolt interface that will support 20Gbps transfers, double the speed of the current 10Gbps. Thunderbolt has remained a high-end interface, landing in most of Apple’s Mac product line, though has had trouble gaining widespread traction.

The new Thunderbolt interface (code named Falcon Ridge) now allows simultaneous 4K video file transfer and display, running at top speed. It will support backwards compatibility, so older cables will work just fine. Production is expected to start before the end of the year, ramping up in 2014. The company also revealed an updated version of its current interface, adding Display Port 1.2 functionality, which improves power management and reduces materials cost for the manufacturer.

While there aren’t quite that many uses for high-end interface yet, the company has boasted that it has about 200 licensees. Compatible devices along with thinner cables should be coming out in the following months.

Source: Engadget

Techindustriya.com - News reviews features on cameras, mobile phones, smartphones, laptops, tablets, gaming, apps, and modern tech lifestyle.

Microsoft had originally planned to unveil its next-generation Xbox console at an event in April, ahead of the big reveal at this year’s E3, but now it seems Redmond has pushed the event back to May instead. Microsoft blogger Paul Thurrot revealed that Microsoft is planning an Xbox event for May 21st to reveal a few details about the next-generation Xbox. Sources for The Verge confirmed the rumor, stating that the event will be held in a small venue and focus on providing the very first details on the next Xbox.

The latest drama surrounding the Durango had been the always-on rumors, which meant that the console needed a steady internet connection to load games. A few choice comments from Microsoft Studios creative director Adam Orth wondering why there was so much drama with always-on unleashing a storm of angry comments from netizens. This prompted Microsoft to issue an official apology stating that “this person is not a spokesperson for Microsoft.” However, the statement has not denied the always-on rumor so it might be a possibility.

We apologize for the inappropriate comments made by an employee on Twitter yesterday. This person is not a spokesperson for Microsoft, and his personal views do not reflect the customer centric approach we take to our products or how we would communicate directly with our loyal consumers. We are very sorry if this offended anyone, however we have not made any announcements about our product roadmap, and have no further comment on this matter.

While it might be closer to the full reveal at E3, a few more details about the Durango wouldn’t hurt.

Techindustriya.com - News reviews features on cameras, mobile phones, smartphones, laptops, tablets, gaming, apps, and modern tech lifestyle.

Globe Telecom has announced that it completed the first phase of its $700 million network modernization program. It has replaced all of the company’s cell sites nationwide with state-of-the-art equipment. The first phase included replacing existing hardware such as switches, antennae, and cables to boost mobile and data services.

According to Emmanuel Estrada, head of Network Strategy for Globe Network Technology Group, 54 percent of Globe’s cell sites are already running on 4G HSPA+.

“The first phase of the modernization is practically done. We have immediately moved to the next phase of optimizing our new equipment for maximum performance. This concludes the modernization of our access network,” stated Estrada.

For the next phase of its modernization program, Globe will focus on its customers. “To radically improve our network performance and our customers’ experience, we need to replace more than cell sites.”

Globe Telecom has spent quite a bit modernizing the equipment, but was it all worth it? Can you feel the modernization or is it all just the same?

Source: ABS-CBN

Techindustriya.com - News reviews features on cameras, mobile phones, smartphones, laptops, tablets, gaming, apps, and modern tech lifestyle.