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Samsung announced the first smartphone based on its Linux-based Bada operating system, and the first phone to offer both Bluetooth 3.0 and 802.11n. The Samsung Wave is equipped with a 1GHz processor, a 3.3-inch, 800 x 480 “Super AMOLED” display, plus the TouchWiz 3.0 UI layer, says the company.
ARM Holdings and Globalfoundries have released new details of their upcoming, 28-nanometer HKMG (high-k metal gate) version of the Cortex-A9 processor. Entering production during the second half of this year, the device will improve performance by 40 percent, slash power consumption by 30 percent, and double standby battery life, the companies announced.
Acer announced three new Android smartphones, as well as an Android 2.1 version of its Liquid phone. Acer's BeTouch e400 and BeTouch E110 fall into the mid- and low-end range, while the Acer “Liquid e” and Formula One styled Acer Ferrari smartphone both appear to target the upper ranges of Android phones.
Lumigon Corp. announced three Android 2.1 phones — the T1, S1, and E1 — touted as the first smartphones to use Freescale's 1GHz i.MX51 system-on-chip. Meanwhile, the company also reported contributing to Ulysse Nardin's Chairman, an Android handset that will start at over $13,000, and Freescale announced an Android evaluation kit for the i.MX51.
Sony Ericsson announced two compact, scaled-down members of its Xperia X10 Android smartphone line. The Xperia X10 Mini and the QWERTY-keyboard equipped X10 Mini Pro both offer Qualcomm processors clocked to 600MHz with 2.5-inch QVGA touchscreens, five-megapixel cameras, HSPA, WiFi, Bluetooth, aGPS, and Android 1.6, says the company.
The LiMo Foundation added Adobe, Else Ltd., MobiTV, and SRS Labs as new members to its open source Linux mobile phone consortium. The foundation also announced the “imminent availability” of the new R3 release of the LiMo Platform, adding location-based services (LBS) and contact management features.
Motorola announced an Android smartphone with a 3.1-inch touchscreen, pinch-and-zoom, a touchpad, Adobe Flash Lite, Swype predictive input, and the MotoBlur UI layer. The rubber-gripped phone will be called the “Quench” in unnamed markets around the world, but will be offered exclusively in the U.S. by T-Mobile as the “Cliq XT.”
Texas Instruments (TI) says it is now sampling its OMAP4 mobile application processors, using dual-core versions of ARM's high-end Cortex-A9. The chipmaker is also showing off the Linux- and Android-compatible Blaze, a development platform that sports a pico projector, dual 3.7-inch displays, three cameras, an HDMI output, a compass, plus a barometer and a bevy of other sensors.
Intel and Nokia are merging their open source Linux operating systems to create a MeeGo OS, designed for mobile devices ranging from handhelds to netbooks. Hosted by the Linux Foundation, MeeGo builds upon the core from the Intel-backed Moblin technology and adds Nokia's Maemo middleware elements, as well as Nokia's Qt application framework.
Synology America announced a two-bay member of its DiskStation network-attached storage (NAS) family that can expand via an optional seven-bay expansion enclosure from 4TB to up to 14TB. Aimed at small-to-medium businesses, the DiskStation DS710+ runs Linux on an Intel Atom D410, and supplies gigabit Ethernet and USB connectivity.
Intel says it is now sampling new Xeon processors specifically aimed at embedded, networking, and storage applications. The Xeon C5500 and C3500 CPUs range from a single-core processor with a 23-Watt TDP, to a quad-core processor with a 85-Watt TDP, and include an integrated I/O hub, the chipmaker says.
HP has tipped an Android-based netbook, heading for the Spanish carrier Telefonica, according to several reports. HP's Compaq Airlife 100 is said to run a Qualcomm Snapdragon processor clocked to 1GHz, with 16GB of flash storage and a 10-inch 1,024 x 600 touchscreen.
NEC Electronics announced an ARM Cortex-A9 version of its Linux-ready EMMA Mobile series of multimedia system-on-chips, and it's also shipping a Linux/Android hardware/software kit for its earlier EMMA Mobile 1. The EMMA Mobile/EV SoCs can play 1080p video, and come in single-core (EV1) and dual-core (EV2) versions, the latter equipped with 2D/3D graphics acceleration.
French consumer electronics firm Sagemcom has joined with Belgian software company SoftAtHome to collaborate on an MPEG4-ready HD set-top box combining IPTV, satellite, and terrestrial delivery. The “Universal Set Top Box” offers DLNA-compliant content sharing, removable storage, and an open Linux SoftAtHome development environment.
NetGear announced a Linux-based 3G mobile router developed in collaboration with Ericsson. The NetGear MBRN3300E 3G Mobile Broadband Router combines an internal 3G radio, an 802.11n WiFi access point, an Ethernet swtich, and four Ethernet ports, sharing 3G bandwidth over WiFi and Ethernet, says the company.