Samsung Galaxy Note 8.0 hits UK, prices start from 339 pounds

    The Samsung Galaxy Note 8.0 is up for sale in the Samsung’s Experience Store in the UK’s Westfield Stratford City.

    The model in question is the 16 GB Wi-Fi-only and will set you back £339 (around 400 Euro or $516). However waiting for April 15 and onward will let you purchase the slate with additional £20 voucher for Samsung’s Learning Hub, free use of Samsung’s Music Hub, two-month subscription to The Times, etc.

    The 3G version is expected to arrive soon but there’s no concrete date or any pricing details.

    The Galaxy Note 8.0 is a direct iPad mini competitor and has an 8″ 800 x 1280 display, quad-core Exynos 4412 (found in the S III, Note II and bigger Note 10.1 slate among others) with four cores clocked at 1.6 GHz. It has a 5 MP snapper and runs a TouchWiz’ed version of Android 4.1 Jelly Bean.

Samsung starts rolling out Android 4.1.2 update to Galaxy Tab 7.0 Plus

    Good news for Samsung Galaxy Tab 7.0 Plus owners. According to SamMobile, Samsung has started rolling out the Android 4.1.2 Jelly Bean update to this tablet.

    The first country to receive this update is Austria, however, other regions should be getting the updates shortly. As usual, the Jelly Bean update would bring features such as Project Butter, Google Now and several other improvements under the hood.

    If you are a Tab 7.0 Plus owner, check to see if the update is available in your region.

Press image of Nokia Lumia 928 for Verizon Wireless leaks out

    A press image of the previously tipped, long-awaited Nokia Lumia 928 for Verizon Wireless has made the rounds on Twitter. The Big Red's upcoming Windows Phone 8 flagship will likely be officially released by the end of this month.

    As its name mildly suggests, the Nokia Lumia 928 will be closely related to the AT&T exclusive Lumia 920 - it is expected to share the same CPU and display. The Verizon offering however, will one-up its AT&T counterpart by packing a xenon flash in addition to the standard LED one. It is also expected to ditch the 920's polycarbonate unibody for an aluminum outfit.

Images of an alleged Nokia tablet, running Adidas micoach app leak out

    Alleged images of a mysterious Nokia slate have emerged on the web, thus revealing what could be the company’s upcoming entry into the tablet race. The images we quickly taken down from its original source link, thus suggesting that the pictured device is indeed the real deal.

    The images reveal the tablet, running an unannounced, soccer themed Adidas micoach app. The application is set to utilize the chip implants in Adidas products, therefore allowing coaches to monitor every aspect of the athletes’ development.

    There are no details on the Nokia tablet’s specs or release date just yet. We’ll surely keep a close eye on any developments on the subject.

The latest iOS 7 concept reveals an enhanced lock screen and connectivity toggles

    Apple’s next major version of the iOS has been enjoying quite a lot of time in the spotlight lately. After iOS 6 was criticized for lacking real innovation and causing the platform to lose market share, iOS7 is looked upon to bring Apple back on top of the smartphone game.

    While it’s still pretty much a mystery what exactly does Apple have in store for the next major release of its platform, its fans have come up with a pretty sweet idea that we wouldn’t mind becoming a reality.The latest iOS 7 concept we got shows an enhanced lockscreen and improved notification center and generally looks pretty great.

    The concept comes courtesy of a designer named F.Bianco and you can see it in action in the video below:

Apple slide-to-unlock patent invalidated by the German court

   

   It seems Apple is going to lose its slide-to-unlock gesture patent, at least in the EU, since a German court has declared it invalid.

    Everything started last year when Apple won an injunction against Motorola Mobility and attempted to ban the sales of certain devices. Encouraged by its victory Apple tried to sue Samsung over the same technology, but the case was suspended until German Patent and Trade Mark Office decides about the validity of Apple's patent.

    Meanwhile Motorola Mobility appealed the court's decision and this time around it won the case. As it turns out the court ruled the Apple's slide-to-unlock patent is invalid because it doesn't meet the necessary technical requirements.

    Motorola's victory will save Samsung the same lawsuit. This takes the whole lawsuit drama in Europe another step closer to its end. Here's hoping that the US cases follow suit so everyone can stop with this madness and get back to the development race?

Firefox, Chrome beta versions updated

    The beta versions of the most popular browsers, Firefox and Chrome have been updated with performance improvements and other tweaks.

    Firstly, the Firefox beta of the Android app has been updated with open-source fonts Charis and Open Sans, which replace the default fonts in the browser. The latest addition will give you a clear reading experience and is visually appealing. The update also comes with minor HTML 5 compatibility tweaks. On the other hand, the updated desktop version of the browser now allows you to re-open the tabs that was previously closed.

    The latest Chrome 27 beta now loads the web pages a lot faster than the earlier versions. The changes in the resource scheduler, the code which takes care of the order in which HTML, CSS, JavaScript and other things likes images are loaded by the browser.

    The latest version of the resource scheduler is more aggressive and uses an idle connection to preload the images. The updated scheduler also pushes the images back to its point to prioritize painting and then displays the content in the browser, which makes the browser load 5% faster than the previous versions.

    The Chrome 27 beta also comes with a new offline storage API, which synchronizes stored data across its clients via Google Drive automatically. However, the files are stored in private sandboxes and can be changed with the help of HTML 5 file API and FileSystem API. The browser now has the ability to use live audio as an input for the web Audio API, which allows low-latency audio playback and changes.