Android smartphones bested iPhone and BlackBerry devices for the first time in the U.S. in the latest Nielsen Co. survey conducted right before Verizon Wireless began selling Apple’s iPhone.
Android devices made by several phone makers were used by 29% of the U.S. market in the November through January reporting period. That compares to 27% each for both Apple iPhones and BlackBerry devices from Research in Motion, Nielsen said.
In Nielsen’s most recent report from December, the three top smartphone operating systems were in a statistical dead heat, a Nielsen spokeswoman said Friday.
Microsoft’s Windows Mobile and Windows Phone 7 smartphones garnered 10% of the U.S. market from November through January, while the WebOS from Hewlett-Packard gained 4% and Symbian from Nokia earned 2%. Read More…
Comments Off on Google Employees May Get Xoom Tablets
Google employees may be getting new tablets, Motorola’s CEO said earlier in the week.
Speaking at a Morgan Stanley conference, Motorola CEO Sanjay Jha said it’s clear that his company’s focus on enterprise is paying off in that it is having conversations with companies wishing to buy tens of thousands of tablets. Motorola last week began offering its Xoom tablet, the first to run the Honeycomb version of Android, which was developed specifically for tablet devices.
When asked why those enterprises are choosing to go with an Android tablet rather than Apple’s iPad, Jha joked: “One of them is Google so I think I understand why that is.” Google may be more inclined to buy tablets running its own Android software rather than a device from competitor Apple. Read More…
Microsoft has begun updating Samsung’s Windows Phone 7-based smartphones again, after earlier technical problems forced a stop to the process, it said in a blog post Wednesday.
The update was initially announced Feb. 21, and doesn’t provide any new functionality, but rather improves the software update process itself, according to Microsoft.
However, after some users of Samsung phones began experiencing problems, Microsoft decided to temporarily suspend the update program.
The problems have been pinpointed and fixed, the blog post said, but it didn’t provide any details on what the issues were. At the same time, Microsoft has continued to update Windows Phone 7-based smartphones from other vendors. Read More…
Verizon Wireless will join AT&T in implementing data caps in the very near future, probably in mid-summer, Verizon CFO Fran Shammo said at an investor’s conference Tuesday.
The exact timing for the move to a tiered-pricing structure has not been announced, however. AT&T squashed unlimited data plans for new customers last year.
Verizon has been selling the iPhone 4 since Feb. 10 with a $30 unlimited plan, which also applies to other smartphones it sells that are on the Verizon CDMA/EV-DO network.
Shammo said some of the details of the data caps and tiered pricing will come when Verizon launches the HTCThunderbolt on LTE soon. Thunderbolt will have a 4.3-in. screen and run Android, Verizon said in January. Read More….
Comments Off on Hacker Writes Trojan For Apple’s Mac
As Apple’s popularity continues to increase, so too does the malicious interest of hackers in their famed products. Researchers at Sophos say they’ve uncovered a new Trojan horse program written for the Mac.
It’s called the BlackHole RAT (the RAT part is for “remote access Trojan”) and it’s pretty easy to find online in hacking forums, according to Chet Wisniewski a researcher with antivirus vendor Sophos. There’s even a YouTube video demo of the program that details what its capable of doing.
Sophos hasn’t seen the Trojan used in any online attacks -it’s more a bare-bones, proof-of-concept beta program right now – but the software is pretty easy to use, and if a criminal could find a way to get a Mac user to install it, or write attack code that would silently install it on the Mac, it would give him remote control of the hacked machine. Read More….
Globally semiconductor revenue is expected to increase this year, with Samsung gaining noticeable ground on top semiconductor company Intel in market share, Gartner said in a study released Wednesday.
Revenue is expected to reach a “landmark” US$300.3 billion in 2010, up 31.5% from 2009, according to preliminary results released by Gartner. The semiconductor market has been rebounding after the worldwide recession curtailed chip revenue in 2009, when year-over-year revenue declined by 10%.
As the economy stabilized this year, semiconductors manufacturers quickly added capacity to meet the growing demand of parts from system makers. But semiconductor demand started weakening again starting in the third quarter this year, Gartner said. Read More……
According to a study of over 16,000 mobile YouTube users conducted by Google, 75% of respondents said that mobile is their primary way of accessing YouTube. At first glance, that figure may come as no surprise – after all, how shocking is at that a survey of mobile users finds that they watch a lot of YouTube Mobile? However, it’s actually a rather telling number.
For some of us, watching YouTube on a mobile device is an additionalway to watch video, not the primary way. But for a large majority of mobile video users, it’s completely the opposite.
The survey found that 70% of the respondents reported visiting YouTube Mobile at least once per day and, while there, 58% spent more than 20 minutes per visit. 38% even when as far as to report that they feel like YouTube Mobile is replacing their desktop video usage entirely.
As noted by the Google Mobile Ads blog post reporting this data, these figures aren’t really a surprise. It referenced a recent Nielsen survey that found that YouTube Mobile is the number one mobile video viewing site in the U.S., with more than 7.1 million uniques.
Of course, Google is revealing this news to pique the interests of mobile advertisers – the post mentions that advertisers can now buy a “daily roadblock” which allows them to own all available ad impressions for 24 hours. Those ads would run on the Search, Browse and Home pages of the mobile website. Read More……
Comments Off on Apple Previews New Operating System
Apple today released a preview version of Mac OS X 10.7, also known as Lion, to developers, who can download the new operating system from the Mac App Store.
The preview is developers’ first look at the upgrade scheduled to reach consumers sometime this summer.
Included in the preview, and to be bundled with the operating system when it ships, is Lion Server, Apple’s new server software. One analyst saw that move as an admission by Apple that it hasn’t been able to make inroads into the corporate server market.
“They’ve recognized they’re not going to break into the data center,” said Ezra Gottheil of Technology Business Research. “They’re admitting that what server sales they’ve made in the past have been to very small businesses.”
Currently, Mac OS X Snow Leopard Server is sold separately from the general-purpose edition for $499.
Late last year, Apple killed its Xserve line of rack servers, halting sales of the hardware on Jan. 31, 2011. Instead, Apple now steers customers toward Mac Pro and Mac Mini systems with Leopard Server pre-installed. The bundling of Lion Server with Mac OS X 10.7 will save customers hundreds of dollars, said Gottheil, assuming Apple sticks to its traditional $129 price point for Lion next summer.
“A very small server should cost about $700 [this summer], not the $1,000 [a server-equipped Mac Mini] costs now,” said Gottheil.
Comments Off on Windows 7 SP 1 Released Into The Wild
As we have stated in the past, Microsoft officially rolled out the final release of Windows 7 yesterday to the general public.
Microsoft says Windows 7 SP1 includes all the previous security, performance and stability updates, as well as some major improvements to features and services to make Windows 7 perform even better. Microsoft advised users to use the regular Windows update process, although manual download will probably be the faster way to go. Read More……
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Android smartphones bested iPhone and BlackBerry devices for the first time in the U.S. in the latest Nielsen Co. survey conducted right before Verizon Wireless began selling Apple’s iPhone.
Google employees may be getting new tablets, Motorola’s CEO said earlier in the week.
Microsoft has begun updating Samsung’s Windows Phone 7-based smartphones again, after earlier technical problems forced a stop to the process, it said in a blog post Wednesday.
Verizon Wireless will join AT&T in implementing data caps in the very near future, probably in mid-summer, Verizon CFO Fran Shammo said at an investor’s conference Tuesday.
As Apple’s popularity continues to increase, so too does the malicious interest of hackers in their famed products. Researchers at Sophos say they’ve uncovered a new Trojan horse program written for the Mac.
Globally semiconductor revenue is expected to increase this year, with Samsung gaining noticeable ground on top semiconductor company Intel in market share, Gartner said in a study released Wednesday.
According to a study of over 16,000 mobile YouTube users conducted by Google, 75% of respondents said that mobile is their primary way of accessing YouTube. At first glance, that figure may come as no surprise – after all, how shocking is at that a survey of mobile users finds that they watch a lot of YouTube Mobile? However, it’s actually a rather telling number.
Apple today released a preview version of Mac OS X 10.7, also known as Lion, to developers, who can download the new operating system from the Mac App Store.
As we have stated in the past, Microsoft officially rolled out the final release of Windows 7 yesterday to the general public.