Nvidia

In a Blogpost today, Google announced the Open Automotive Alliance (OAA). The move seems to indicate that Google is hoping to repeat its Open Handset Alliance but with cars. It currently has Audi, GM, Honda, Hyundai and Nvidia signed up but is open to anyone who wants to join.

The OAA would bring open source Android to cars and a common platform that could go from tablets to phones to cars and back again. For Google, it gets to spread its influence to yet more places and in turn gather more data for advertising and other purposes. 
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During its press conference to officially kick off CES 2014, NVIDIA has announced its latest next-generation mobile processor. Dubbed the NVIDIA Tegra K1, the processor is the world’s first “192-core Super Chip.” The K1 will begin to make its way into mobile devices, more than likely several Android ones, sometime this year. In addition to mobile Android devices, NVIDIA also plans to implement the Tegra K1 into cars, gaming consoles, and 4k televisions.

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As the world prepares for the arrival of the XBOX One and Playstation 4, NVIDIA’s CEO reminds us that Android still has a role to play in the future of gaming. Speaking on an investor call, NVIDIA CEO Jen-Hsun Huang pointed at the company’s Shield gaming product as its means of growing the Android gaming ecosystem.

“Shield is our initiative to cultivate the gaming marketplace for Android,” Huang said, as quoted by ZDNet. “We believe that Android is going to be a very important platform for gaming in the future, and to do so we have to create devices that enable great gaming to happen on Android.”

Speaking to that tune, Huang called Android the “most versatile operating system that we’ve ever known.” NVIDIA hopes that the Shield, the small Android tablet connected to a game controller will continue to stare down the portable gaming hardware released by Nintendo and Sony. A recently released software update added more functionality for the device to run games via larger screens including televisions, making it something more in lines with standard living room gaming machines. NVIDIA obviously hopes that it can push developers to build gaming experiences designed specifically for its Tegra platform.

With Qualcomm seemingly dominant in the mobile space, Huang’s comments about Android and gaming may be correct, but the question remains whether or not the Shield is the right product to capitalize Android and its gaming future.

via ZDNet

The Frankenstein-like NVIDIA Shield, the handheld games console whose size and weight (1.5 pounds!) makes it seem like something invented in the 1990s, has been given the tear-down treatment by ifixit.

One thing is for sure—with its shields disabled, this device looks nothing like any tablet we’ve ever taken apart … or game console … or anything

Teardown photos and review roundup below the fold … 
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Reuters has some vague new information on the Nexus 7 successor from Google today. Rather than being available at Google I/O in May (which would have been my guess), Reuters thinks it won’t hit the mass market until July. Perhaps a limited run will be available to developers in May?

As far as specs…

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Last month, Nvidia CEO Jen-Hsun Huang hinted that we might see a $199 Tegra 3 quad-core tablet hit the markets out of Nvidia this summer. Luckily, it looks like that idea is rolling. Nvidia VP Rob Csonger revealed the company’s project to start developing $199 tablets last week, as The Verge first reported. As you can see in the slide above, which was shown at its investor meeting, the platform is called “Kai”. It will focus on developing tablets priced at $199, while featuring Nvidia’s blazing quad-core Tegra 3 system-on-chip.

At $199, the obvious competitor that comes to mind is Amazon’s Kindle Fire, which is arguably one of the best selling Android tablets on the market right now. The Fire is said to have taken up more than 50 percent of Android’s tablet market share, and while the company has not released any official sales numbers, Amazon said the Fire is one of its hottest selling items available. Csonger explained to investors how the tablets out of Kai would be low priced to compete with the Kindle Fire:

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During Google’s conference call with investors that took place this afternoon, Chief Executive Officer Larry Page asked about the success of Android tablets during a Q&A session.

Page, perhaps hinting at a 7-inch tablet branded by Google, said: “I think there’s also, obviously, there’s been a lot of success on some lower-priced tablets that run Android — maybe not the full Google version of Android. But we definitely believe that there’s going to be a lot of success at the lower end of the market, as well, with lower-priced products that will be very significant. It’s definitely an area we think is quite important and that we’re quite focused on.”

The most popular 7-inch tablets to date are Amazon’s Kindle Fire, which looks to be the hottest selling Android tablet, and the Barnes and Noble’s Nook. Both tablets are priced very competitively around $200.

Google is rumored to launch its own branded tablet, manufactured by Korea-based ASUS, this June. The tablet is reportedly priced at roughly $200 and features Android 4.0. Both the Fire and Nook feature a custom version of Android—almost to where you cannot even tell it is Android. NVIDIA also talked about its plans to launch a similar tablet. While there is not a lot of Android tablets out there, it is interesting that most of them are lower priced.

Source: Android Central

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For those of you who think a 10-inch tablet is too small, Toshiba just announced a new 13-inch tablet this morning to add to its Excite tablet line. Along with the 13-inch version, Toshiba also introduced smaller 7-inch and 10-inch versions, all set to launch in May and June.

Each version of the tablet features a quad-core NVIDIA Tegra 3 processor and 1GB of RAM. Toshiba will also ship each version with Ice Cream Sandwich.

Toshiba is set to launch the Excite 10 in May 2012 for $449 for the 16GB model, $529 for the 32GB model, and $649 for the 64GB model. The Excite 7 is launching in June 2012 for $499 for the 16GB model and $579 for the 32GB model. The Excite 13 tablet launches in June for $649.99 for the 32GB model and $749.99 for the 64GB model.

Our own Seth Weintraub played with the 13-inch version at this year’s CES and said he was pretty impressed. What do you think about a 13-inch tablet?

Check out the full press release after the break:

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Last month, we heard from Google’s Senior Vice President of Chrome Sundar Pichai who told Cnet that new, faster Chromebooks are on the way. Today, we might be getting our first look at a new Sony VAIO Chromebook thanks to a Federal Communications Commission filing for the “Sony VAIO VCC111 Series” that references the ability to “start Chrome OS” (via Laptop Reviews). Adding more proof that this is a Chromebook —and not a Windows machine— is the lack of a Windows key and chrome accents on the back cover. However, the VAIO Chromebook does feature an 11.6-inch Samsung display, HDMI port, microphone and headphone jacks, SD card slot, and two USB 2.0 ports. The filing also mentioned a “T25” CPU. Laptop Reviews speculated the CPU could be NVidia’s Tegra 250 T25 ARM-based processor, which would mean it is the first non-Intel processor in a Chromebook.

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We have talked about the HTC Endeavor a lot lately as a rumored Mobile World Congress announcement draws closer. However, a new report from Economic Daily News (via DigiTimes) indicates that the Endeavor will be announced by HTC on Feb. 26, just one day before MWC kicks off.

HTC will unveil Endeavor on February 26, one day before the opening of the 2012 Mobile World Congress in Barcelona, the paper indicated.

The HTC Endeavor will reportedly pack a 1.5GHz Tegra 3 based Quad-Core processor, 4.7-inch 720P HD screen, 8-megapixel camera, 1.3-megapixel front-facing camera, 1GB of RAM, Wi-Fi, and Bluetooth 4.0. The handset will also feature Beats audio experience onboard, as well the Sense 4.0 user interface that was shown off today. So, stay tuned!

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A new device called the “HTC Edge” leaked. It was the world’s first rumored quad-core handset. Fast forward to last month, and PocketNow reported that HTC renamed the HTC Edge to the “HTC Endeavor.”

A new report from MoDaCo, said HTC is announcing the HTC Endeavor at Mobile World Conference in Barcelona in less than three weeks. If you are not familiar, MWC is the CES for phones and tablets.

MoDaCo’s sources confirmed that the HTC Endeavor will ship with a 1.5GHz Tegra 3 based Quad-Core processor, 4.7-inch 720P HD screen, 8-megapixel camera, 1.3-megapixel front-facing camera, 1GB of RAM, Wi-Fi, and Bluetooth 4.0. The handset will also feature Beats audio experience onboard, as well as Sense 4.0…

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[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FbtxoCCFbfo]

Nik Software, the company behind Snapseed, the popular image editing app for Apple’s iPhone and iPad, announced yesterday that it will “soon” port the program to Tegra-powered Android tablets running Ice Cream Sandwich for $5 a pop.

Nik Software President and CEO Michael J. Slater said:

We’re thrilled with the success and worldwide recognition of our popular mobile app and are excited to bring the Snapseed experience to Mac users for the first time. By bringing Snapseed to the Mac App Store, we’re able to quickly extend our reach to a worldwide audience of creative amateur photographers while offering our existing mobile users the fully-featured Mac experience they’ve been asking for.

Nik collaborated with Nvidia on the project so expect some snazzy visuals and smooth performance, which is the hallmark of the iOS version. Snapseed sports cool filters and tools like grunge, vintage and drama to make the best out of your photographs. The full list of features follows…

[slideshow]

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A busy “Press Day” on the show floor of CES 2012 just wrapped up. Today was busy with announcements from AT&T, Intel, Samsung, Nokia, Panasonic, NVIDIA, Sony, and more. While we only covered the Google-oriented side of things, there was also a lot of news around HDTVs. Samsung unveiled it’s’ rocking 77-inch TV that just looks plain amazing, and Microsoft wrapped up its very last CES keynote ever. However, we are here for the Google news.

We will be on the floor tomorrow, showing you cool gadgets and a few hands-ons of the products announced today.  CES is just kicking off so do not go anywhere! Without further ado, here is a round up of today…

NVIDIA and ASUS jointly announce 7-inch Transformer Prime Ice Cream Sandwich tablet, priced at $249 with Tegra 3 processor

Nvidia CEO Jen-hsun Huang doesn’t typically shy away from making bold claims regarding the future of the tech industry. Just yesterday Huang claimed gaming consoles would reach “tens of teraflops” (according to MacWorld approximately a trillion floating point operations a second) by 2019. He is also, however, making some predictions about the industry on the short term, claiming non-Apple tablets (Android) will see significant growth over the next year due to increased compatibility and improved performance between hardware and software.

According to DigiTimes, Huang, not so surprisingly, expects a new wave of Android tablets and ultrabooks to experience growth during 2012, while noting that hybrid devices like the Transformer Prime from Asus will also experience increased demand. He doesn’t, however, expect the choice between various tablets, ultrabooks, and notebooks to be a huge concern for consumers with each device having its own advantages and thus its own market.

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Skype today updated its Android client with the ability to share videos and images over 3G cellular networks or WiFi hotspots. According to a blog postannouncing Skype for Android version 2.6, the company also improved battery life while the owners of devices using Nvidia’s Tegra 2 chipset, such as the Samsung Galaxy Tab 10.1, Motorola Xoom and Acer Iconia Tablet, will notice better video quality on a bigger canvas. Additionally, the app now supports video calling on new devices, including the HTC Amaze 4G, Motorola Droid 4 and Motorola Droid Razr. Skype 2.6 for Android is a free download from Android Market.

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Samsung is thought to be at work developing a quad-core chip to power the Galaxy S III, an addition to the Galaxy smartphone family expected to be unveiled at Mobile World Congress which runs February 27-March 1 in Barcelona, Spain. According to PocketNow, based on the source code at kernel.org, the new chip will be marketed as the Exynos 4412 and will feature four processing cores.

Samsung recently launched the 32-nanomenter Exynos 4212 chip with a dual-core ARM Cortex-A9 processing core clocked at 1.5GHz and ARM’s quad-core Mali-400 GPU. Like Apple’s upcoming A6 chip (said to be manufactured by Samsung) and Nvidia’s Tegra 3 silicon, the rumored Exynos 4412 chip should take advantage of the four cores of the Cortex-A9 processor from ARM Holdings. Its closes competitor, however, will be a 2.5GHz Qualcomm Snapdragon quad-core beast allegedly debuting early next year in the HTC Zeta smartphone.

Unlike the Tegra 3 chip which employs Nvidia’s own GeForce graphics processor or Apple’s A6 that is likely to tap Imagination Technologies’ next-generation PowerVR GPU, the Exynos 4412 could use the recently introduced Mali-T658 graphics unit which delivers up to ten times the graphics performance of the Mali-400 GPU and four times the GPU compute performance of the Mali-T604 GPU.

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Engadget has leaked the specs of a new handset from HTC called the Zeta (rendered above). The HTC Zeta is rumored to pack a 2.5GHz quad-core processor, 1GB of RAM, 720p 4.5-inch display, 8-megapixel rear camera (1080p HD), and 1.3-megapixel front camera. With specifications optimized for power, the HTC Zeta makes itself favorable over its previously leaked brethren the HTC Edge.

The 2.5 GHz S4 processor will be manufactured by Qualcomm, a competitor to Nvidia’s Tegra 3 that is finding its way into devices by next year. This device is sure to be a speed demon.

Engadget doesn’t say which version of Android the Zeta will run, but with the Ice Cream Sandwich source code released yesterday, we’re hoping the device will see ICS on launch day if not shortly after. HTC’s custom Sense UI will also most likely earn a spot on the Zeta. There is no word on pricing or availability, but Q1 or early Q2 of 2012 sounds about right.

We got our first peek at the potential of the upcoming Asus Eee Pad Transformer Prime when it was benchmarked late last week, but today Asus has officially announced the world’s first quad-core Nvidia Tegra 3-powered Android tablet.

While the 1.3GHz quad-core Tegra 3 processor with 12-core GeForce® GPU is definitely the star of the show, the rest of its insides are just as impressive. Transformer Prime will include a 10.1-inch SuperIPS+ Gorilla Glass display, 1GB RAM, 8-megapixel main cam w/ LED flash (1.2 front), microSD slot, microHDMI, and come in 32GB and 63GB variants. Asus is also promising 12 hours from the tablet and 18 hours when docked.

If you’re familiar with the Transformer Prime’s predecessor, the new model utilizes the same concept by allowing you to transform from tablet mode into a notebook form factor by docking the main tablet device into an optional keyboard dock ($149). When it comes to the new design, the backside of the Transformer Prime sports a “metallic swirl design”, a hydro-oleophobic coating on the display to prevent fingerprints, and will come in two colors– Champagne gold and amethyst grey.

Its measurements are equally as impressive coming in at 8.3mm, thinner than both the iPad 2 and Galaxy Tab 8.9, and other than the Samsung Galaxy Tab 10.1, it’s the lightest Android tablet in the 10-inch category at 586 grams.

The device was originally supposed to debut on November 9th, but word has it we’ll have to wait until December to pick one up. While the delay was originally thought to be in anticipation of an Ice Cream Sandwich release, today’s press release confirms the device will ship with Android 3.2 (with an ICS update shortly after). You’ll be able to grab it for $499 (32GB) or $599 (64GB) when it finally lands. More images and full press release after the break.

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[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Dp6MZupUq78]

ASUS just released a teaser for their next generation tablet (Honeycomb? ICS?) which should be released in the coming days.  What’s inside?  Perhaps a Tegra 3 Kal-El chip, which also got its own video below:
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At the Innovation Qualcomm event in Istanbul, Qualcomm outlined their new line of “S4” mobile processors (following their new naming scheme). The new single, dual, and quad-core processors will be able to pack up to 2.5 GHz’s in speed, almost doubling what’s available on the current market. Spec wise, the new processors will bring the ability for Adreno Graphics, 3D, 1080p HD, and 3G and LTE connectivity as a standard.

Qualcomm’s quad-core processor will compete directly with Nvidia’s “Kal-el” quad-core processor due out around the same time. CES and Mobile World Conference should be about the time we see phones announced with these processors underneath.Expect these phones to be fast! (via Pocket-lint)

[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_sxBvpEwgGc&]

It’s official…Today Samsung and NVIDIA have outed their latest Android 2.3 Gingerbread-powered device in the Galaxy smartphone (superphone?) family, which we now know will sport a 900 x480 4.19-inch “Super Clear” LCD display, Tegra 2 dual-core processor, front-facing 1.3mp camera, and a 5mp rear camera with LED flash that supports HD video recording. Full specs from the press release after the break.

The press release describes the Galaxy R as a”lightweight, slim and sleek metallic design, the GALAXY R Smartphone delivers incredible performance thanks to its Dual Core processor”… which is all true, but we can’t help but feel this device is specifically for those that don’t require everything packed into the obviously superior, but very similar, Galaxy S II. Either way, we aren’t complaining about having another powerful Android-based device on the market that resembles the S II.

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