Acer Plans to Slash Price of its 7.9-inch Tablet

Acer is looking to take a bite out of the tablet market share with its 7.9-inch tablet. Thanks to French online retailer Rue du Commerce, the tablet is ready for pre-order at €199. However, according to sources from the supply chain, Acer is considering lowering the price of its Iconia A1-810 tablet.

To compete with Apple mini, Nexus 7 and Amazon's Kindle Fire HD, the company would take the tablet from $249.99 to $149.99. However, Acer declined to comment about the rumors. The device should be available by the end of this month.

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Yet Another WLAN-fixing Update for Surface

Microsoft rolled out its third software update for Surface, Surface Pro, and Surface RT, focused on fixing WiFi connectivity issues. The three tablets are hit by numerous WiFi glitches that include connection drops, untimely DHCP lease expiry without renewal (the so called "Limited Connectivity" bug), and software crashes that result from these connectivity drops.

Dated April 9, the newest software update for the three Surface tablets, in the words of Microsoft, addresses the following for Surface RT:

• Certain "Limited Connectivity" issues resolved
• Improves WiFi to handle a wide range of access points.
• Resolves system crashes caused by certain WiFi issues.

The update for Surface Pro has its own share of issues addressed:

• Resolves an issue with on screen touch navigation in the UEFI boot menu.
• Resolves some Surface Type and Touch cover connectivity issues.
• Support for 106/109 keyboards on North American Surface devices.
• Resolves an issue where toggling airplane mode would disable the WiFi driver.

Users can either wait for the next automatic updates look-up, or navigate to Settings > Change PC Settings > Windows Update, and manually check for updates.

This is the third batch of "cumulative updates" for Surface this year, addressing WiFi connectivity issues, the previous being February and March.

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ZTE Rolls Out Geek Atom Smartphone

At the IDF 2013 event in Beijing, smartphone maker ZTE unveiled the not so cleverly named ZTE Geek. An IDF launch naturally hints at the device being Intel x86-driven, which it is. An Intel Atom Z2580 "Clover Trail+" SoC clocked at 2.00 GHz, the same chip that drives Lenovo K900. The chip is backed by 1 GB of RAM, and 8 GB internal storage that's expandable with micro-SDHC.

The 5-inch smartphone features an unspectacular yet acceptable 1280 x 720-pixel display resolution, with its display being accented by a curvy Gorilla Glass panel. In the imaging department, you get an 8-megapixel primary camera with LED flash, and a respectable 1-megapixel front-facing one.

Intel's XMM 6260 soft-modem is in-charge of connectivity, which includes UMTS 900/2100, 802.11 b/g/n, Bluetooth 4.0, and AGPS. Android "Jelly Bean" (not sure if 4.1 or 4.2), is at the helm. Looks-wise, the Geek looks similar to the ZTE Grand S, which the company unveiled at this year's International CES.

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Galaxy Note 2 vs iPhone 5 vs Galaxy S4: Which is the better smartphone on the market in 2013?

You may be choosing between the Apple iPhone 5, Samsung Galaxy Note 2 or Galaxy S4 as all three will be arguably the best handsets on the market this year around the globe. So which is the best? 

While the iPhone 5 has enlarged its screen to a 4 inch display screen, the Galaxy Note 2 has a massive 5.5 inch screen.  This could be a great feature for watching videos or reading, however, a complaint with the size is that you have to use two hands to do almost anything on the Galaxy Note 2.  The Galaxy Note 2's processor is twice as fast as the iPhone 5 with more RAM, and has double the battery size at 3100mAh. The iPhone 5 still has a great battery life of 8 hours(talk time) which lasts you a whole day, but I guess if you want to take your phone camping for a whole weekend with no charger, then the Note 2 is the way to go with a remarkable 35 hours of talk time battery life. 

Jelly Bean while the Apple iPhone 5 has its own proprietary OS, iOS 6.  The iOS system is deemed the better functioning of the two by the public. Apple's App Store has apps that tend to be more polished and with a more pleasing appearance. 

The sleeker look and display would go to the Apple iPhone 5 with the Samsung handset looking somewhat cheap with to its plastic materials.  Both phones have 8 megapixel cameras on the back. The Note 2 has with a 1.9MP shooter on the front while the Apple iPhone 5 a 1.2MP.  The Galaxy Note 2 does have a cool feature with split screen, and even triple screen that is very cool.

So in summary the Samsung Galaxy Note 2 has bigger display and battery, storage and processor.  The Apple iPhone 5 has better price tag, looks, design and the camera with better photos in low light and faster image capture.  The Galaxy S4 has a bigger screen, better battery and potentially revolutionary features.  In the end it comes down to which operating system you prefer, Android or iOS. 

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Lenovo K900 Performs On Par With Galaxy S 4

Back at the Consumer Electronics Show 2013, Lenovo announced its flagship smartphone, the K900. Looking at its impressive hardware specifications, the 5.5-incher features the next-generation Intel Atom Z2580 "Clover Trail+" dual-core processor with Hyper Threading technology clocked at 2.0 GHz, 2 GB of RAM and 16 GB memory.

Among other impressive things, the phone has a 1080p (1920 x 1080 pixels) screen resolution, a 13-megapixel primary camera based on Sony's Exmor BSI sensor, and the Android 4.2 Jelly Bean operating system.

When it comes to performance, the first benchmark score reveal the real power of the latest flagship smartphone from Lenovo. Surprisingly, the device edges out the Samsung Galaxy S IV AnTuTu benchmark test by a small margin.

Looking at other smartphones, like the HTC DROID DNA and the Samsung Galaxy Note II which both use a quad core processors, the K900 achieved about 10,000 higher score.

According to latest rumours, the K900's release date is April 17th and could cost just $480.

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iPhone 5S Prototype Pictured

There has been a lot of talking about Apple's next-generation smartphone. Last month, there were rumours that iPhone 5S is already in mass production and that it will run on the same assembly line as iPhone due to similar design.

However, thanks to GSM Arena we have first pictures of the alleged iPhone 5S. Looking at the pictures, the new iPhone is everything but similar to the old one. The pictures match Apple's patent almost perfectly, which shows the use of curved glass and flexible displays.

As there is no official confirmation, and the images could be easily photoshopped or digitally rendered altogether, take this with several pinches of salt. Stay tuned for further information.

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Google Not After WhatsApp

Late last week, rumors surfaced of Google being in talks to acquire WhatsApp, with about $1 billion riding on the deal. Either the deal fell through, or Google really never approached WhatApp, with the latter now claiming that's the case.

AllThingsDigital got in touch with WhatsApp, its business development head Neeraj Arora completely denied rumors of the company ever being in talks with Google over its acquisition to the Internet giant, and refused to comment any further.

WhatsApp is an extremely popular cross-platform instant-messaging service for mobiles, its apps for iOS and Android earn the company $0.99 per user, per annum. It allows people across IM platforms to send each other mostly text, but also photos, videos, and locations.

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