Firefox for Android gets revamped tablet interface, HTTP/2 support

SHARES

BY Unknown 15:00 0

Firefox for Android gets revamped tablet interface, HTTP/2 support

Mozilla is rolling out an update for the Android version of Firefox on the Play Store. This update brings with it a new tablet interface and HTTP/2 support.

Firefox now has a revamped tab layout on top that looks just like the tab design on the desktop version of Firefox. There is also now a fullscreen tab panel, which shows a grid of open tabs with thumbnails for a better view of your open sites.

Along with that, Firefox on Android also gets support for the new HTTP/2 standard, which was added in its desktop counterpart recently, that promises to be faster, more efficient and secure than HTTP 1.1.

Most of the other changes are under the hood. You can check out the complete changelog in the link below.

iBall tops the Indian tablet market, Samsung slips to second: IDC report

SHARES

BY Unknown 02:13 0

iBall tops the Indian tablet market, Samsung slips to second: IDC report

Samsung has slipped to second place in the tablet segment of the Indian market and the local company – iBall rose to the top position. According to the research firm IDC, iBall climbed to the top with triple the market share in the Q4 2014 when compared to that in the previous year.

In the Q4 2013, iBall had only 4.5% tablet market share which rose to 15.6% in Q4 2014. On the other hand, Samsung’s market share dropped from 17.9% in Q4 2013 to 12.9% in Q 4 2014. Samsung lost the battle to iBall on the ground of variety and cost of the tablets. The Korean giant had introduced six tablet models – Tab 3 neo, Galaxy Tab 4, Tab 4 8, Tab 4 10.1, Tab S 8.4 and Tab S 10.1 in India last two quarters of 2014. Compared to that iBall introduced about ten tablet models, mostly focusing low-cost and 3G network support.

The Wi-Fi only tablets faced a steep decline against the Wi-Fi and 3G supporting tablets which made clear that Indian consumers had a higher inclination towards the 3G connected tablets.

Apart from that, the Indian market saw a decline in visibility of unbranded tablets since late 2013. “The market saw a correction post the introduction of BIS regulation in July 2013. Unbranded tablets were wiped off from the market thereby contracting the bubble of growth witnessed in 1H 2013 and hence resulting in year-on-year decline in growth,” says Tanvi Mann, Market Analyst, Client Devices IDC India.

The IDC report on Indian Tablet Market in Q4 2014 noted that 7-inch tablets priced at less than $150 reigned the market and Android based tablets still enjoyed larger share. While the low-cost Android-based tablets continue to reign, the tablet markers are exploring the 8-inch to 9-inch form factor for tablets running Windows platform.

NVIDIA Shield Tablet successor might debut on March 3

SHARES

BY Unknown 18:29 0

NVIDIA Shield Tablet successor might debut on March 3

NVIDIA sent out invites for a March 3 press event. The gaming hardware manufacturer promises to “redefine the future of gaming.”

It will not be a surprise if NVIDIA takes the wraps off the successor of the 8” Shield Tablet. A report from a few days ago, suggests that the slate will debut before mid-March with a beefy NVIDIA Tegra X1 chipset.

Tegra X1 silicon offering floating point performance of 1 teraflop, which is similar to a desktop-class GPU. Therefore, a mobile device with the chipset will surely help NVIDIA fulfill its bold promise about the future of gaming. We will be keeping an eye out for more details on the device in the days ahead.

Tablets’ processing power could probably overtake consoles in four years as said by EA CFO

SHARES

BY Unknown 13:57 0

Tablets’ processing power could probably overtake consoles in four years as said by EA CFO

Given the rate at which mobile processing power is growing, handheld devices like tablets could soon overtake consoles to become an integral part of gaming, according to EA chief financial officer Blake Jorgensen.

Speaking at the 2015 Technology, Internet & Media Conference, Jorgensen said, “what that might mean is that a tablet, three or four years from now, has more power than what a typical console has. And that will open up a whole new set of people to console-style games that are much more immersive, much deeper, much more character-driven than simply a static mobile game that you might play for a small burst of time while you’re waiting for the bus.”

Keeping that in mind, Jorgensen said, they are now looking for ways to blend those two models in order to come up with a movable game experience, something he claimed would be much more portable than it is today. He also touched upon the issue of decline in iPad sales, saying the reason could either be the rise of alternative tablets or the growing popularity of phablets.

Talking about control issues, Jorgensen said even if those issues mean “we won’t be playing Call of Duty 2019 or FIFA 19 on our iPad 5 tablets, I bet we’ll be playing some sort of extended persistent universe tie-in – like FIFA Ultimate Team.”

NVIDIA Shield Tablet successor tipped with Tegra X1 chipset

SHARES

BY Unknown 18:16 0

NVIDIA Shield Tablet successor tipped with Tegra X1 chipset

According to a new report, NVIDIA is hard at work on the successor of the Shield Android tablet. The sequel of the 8” gaming slate is rumored to launch in mid-March or earlier.

Unsurprisingly, the biggest highlight in the upcoming tablet will be its NVIDIA Tegra X1 chipset with Maxwell GPU. Announced during CES in January, the X1 is the first mobile processor in the world capable of 1 teraflop floating point performance.

Chipset aside, there is no other information available on the yet to be revealed slate. However, the 8” screen size of the current generation is likely to remain unchanged, as will the optional LTE connectivity.

During the Tegra X1 unveiling, NVIDIA announced that devices with the new silicon will launch in the first half of this year. As always, we will be on the lookout for more info on the upcoming device. Until then, take the above report with a grain of salt.a

Strategy Analytics says tablet market grew 1% in Q4, 2014

SHARES

BY Unknown 01:21 0

Strategy Analytics says tablet market grew 1% in Q4, 2014

A total of 78.3 million tablets shipped in Q4 2014, up 1% from 77.2 million in the year ago quarter, according to the market research firm Strategy Analytics. This in contrast with an IDC report that says worldwide tablet shipments in the quarter were down 3.2% year-on-year.

The SA report notes that Apple captured a 27% share of the tablet market in the quarter, compared to 34% a year ago. It also saw a 6.6% growth for the market for all of 2014.

"Android market share slipped slightly at the expense of strong iPad seasonality and recorded a share of 66% of the Tablet market," said Tablet Service Director Peter King, adding that Android tablets shipped a total of 51.8 million units in Q4, 2014, up 8% from 47.8 million a year earlier.

He also revealed that Windows 8.1 Tablets showed an 89% growth annually, while iPad saw an year-on-year decline of 18%, with shipments totaling 21.4 million. "The iPhone 6 products are putting pressure on the iPad Mini and the continued success of the Mac could be inhibiting some iPad Air 2 growth" said Eric Smith, a Senior Analyst in the Tablet Service.

Worldwide tablet shipments fall for the first time since 2010

SHARES

BY Unknown 23:47 0

Worldwide tablet shipments fall for the first time since 2010

Total worldwide shipments of tablets as well as 2-in-1 devices stood at 76.1 million in Q4, 2014, down 3.2% compared to the 78.6 million figure registered in the year ago quarter, according to a latest report from market research firm IDC.

This is significant given the fact that this is the first time that tablet shipments have declined since the market's inception in 2010.

As for tablet manufacturers, all major vendors saw their shipments decline - at 21.4 million units, Apple iPad’s shipments were down 17.8% year-on-year, while Samsung saw its tablet shipments decline by 18.4% to 11 million units.

While Asus also saw its shipments decline 25%, worst hit was Amazon, whose shipments tumbled a whopping 70% to 1.7 million units. Among the top five vendors, Lenovo was the only company which wasn’t in red - its tablet shipments increased 9.1% year-over-year to 3.7 million units.

IDC says part of the problem is that the tablet market relies mostly on Apple and Samsung. "Although Apple expanded its iPad lineup by keeping around older models and offering a lower entry price point of $249, it still wasn't enough to spur iPad sales given the excitement around the launch of the new iPhones,” said Jitesh Ubrani, Senior Research Analyst, Worldwide Quarterly Tablet Tracker. "Meanwhile, Samsung's struggles continued as low-cost vendors are quickly proving that mid- to high-priced Android tablets simply aren't cut out for today's tablet market."

Despite the decline in the fourth quarter, the report notes that shipments for the full year 2014 increased 4.4%, totaling 229.6 million units.

Windows 10 will bring FLAC support on phones and small tablets

SHARES

BY Unknown 04:07 0

Windows 10 will bring FLAC support on phones and small tablets

Joe Belfiore, Corporate Vice President, Operating Systems Group at Microsoft has been busy on Twitter answering a lot of questions around the future of Windows 10. Ever since last week’s event, when Microsoft showcased a lot of exciting details about the future of its popular OS and the tech world users have been impatient to receive answers to a few pressing question, mostly regarding Windows 10 on mobile devices.

The smoke was already clear around legacy app support on smaller devices and today Joe has shared another much anticipated piece of information – namely that Windows 10 on mobile devices will have native FLAC support.Built-in lossless audio playback in desktop distributions of the OS has been discussed on numerous occasions and was confirmed relatively early in Windows 10′s lifecycle. However users were not exactly sure what to expect on the mobile front. As it turns out every eligible Windows mobile will receive FLAC support as well, but in later build. Insiders will perhaps have a chance to take a sneak peak first, but even they still have some waiting to do.

Microsoft confirms desktop apps and experience only on 8-inch and larger Windows 10 tablets

SHARES

BY Unknown 18:30 0

Microsoft confirms desktop apps and experience only on 8-inch and larger Windows 10 tablets

Last week all eyes were on Microsoft and the announcement-rich event, held on January 21. A lot of groundbreaking and game-changing plans were unveiled to make the next installment of the OS a truly revolutionary experience. But perhaps the thing that excites us the most is the future of Windows on mobile devices.

Microsoft has made it clear that it will spare no resource in following its One Windows strategy and unifying the user experience across all devices. This, of course includes the unification of the app ecosystem, allowing developers to write code that works seamlessly across PCs, smartphones, tables and even Xbox consoles.

Today Joe Belfiore, Corporate Vice President, Operating Systems Group at Microsoft mentioned on Twitter that the company has rethought its mobile strategy and will now include a full desktop experience and Win32 apps only on devices with screes of 8 inches and more. This is not the case with Windows 8.1 which allows for a full desktop version to run on 7-inch devices. The US tech giant apparently found that to be rather inconvenient from a user standpoint and is slashing the support in the name of a better overall user experience.

But with all this talk of apps and different apps on different devices and a unified platform things often get a little confusing so what does this announcement really mean? Well to try and put it simply Windows 8.1 currently has two main set of apps. One the one hand we have traditional win32 applications, that have been the norm on PCs and then we have Microsoft’s new RT shell, or the touch optimized, tiled, Metro UI interface, which offers its own set applications.

Some software packages, like Skype and most browsers for example, are available in both variations, but they are still different apps. This was primarily done to target early generation Windows tablets and to some extent Windows-powered smartphones with a new set of apps, tailored specifically to them.

Windows 10 want to bridge this gap even better by making sure that any app written to comply with the new app ecosystem will run across PC’s, tablets, smartphones and even Xbox, but this still only concerns the aforementioned new kind of applications. The traditional PC style win32 apps are a totally different breed and will not be affected by this new change.

What Joe Belfiore is essentially saying is that manufacturers will be allowed to put full versions of Windows 10 which include a desktop and consequently win32 application on devices with 8-inch screens and above. Anything below that, be it a small tablet or smartphone will essentially be limited to using only the new unified application platform and the apps it provides.