LG has announced a brilliant new 5.0-inch 1080p Full HD display for smartphones. The awe-inspiring mobile screen will take screen resolution and pixel density to new heights with a 1920 x 1080 resolution and an extremely generous 440 ppi density. This astounding display will also be the first Full HDTV capable smartphone display.

The display employs Advanced High Performance In-Plane Switching (IPS) technology as compared to Apple iPhone 4S’ regular IPS technology. It gives better color accuracy to produce original color with zero distortion, is very energy efficient, gives great viewing angles and packs more pixels than iPhone’s Retina Display. The screen is 1.5-inches taller and 0.5-inch wider than the current iPhone 4S.

The regular IPS technology is the same that’s currently being used by LG for its recent popular smartphones such as LG Optimus L7, LG Optimus Black, LG Optimus 3D and Prada Phone by LG 3.0.

LG will showcase the new 5.0-inch display at SID Display Week 2012 at Boston on June 4, 2012. The screen is also expected to be available in smartphones in the latter half of this year.

Source: TheVerge

LG released their first 4G device last year and the company has just crossed the 3 million mark.  Much of this has to do with their flagship device the LG Optimus LTE that sold 1 million in Korea alone.  The company currently has the LG Revolution, LG Optimus LTE, LG Optimus VU, LG Optimus LTE Tag, and the LG Optimus LTE II in their 4G lineup.  The company is also expanding these devices into 10-20 markets by the end of 2012.

Source:  Mobile Tech Review

If you’re a Motorola RAZR MAXX or Motorola RAZR (Spyder) user / fan and you haven’t yet installed a custom ROM to ‘force’ ICS on to your phone then Motorola has a pleasant surprise for you. It has released video sneak peeks of how the latest Android OS v4.0 (Ice Cream Sandwich) would look on these devices.

The first video shows the new Ice Cream Sandwich lock and home screens for Motorola. You can now swipe to unlock directly to the phone’s camera, text messaging, phone dial or home screen. The lock screen has been upgraded in such a way that music controls are now available on it during music play and there is no need to unlock the phone to pause, play, change tracks etc. There’s also a new more detailed battery indicator on the home screen and the favorites tray now features an app button in addition to four icons for phone, people, messages and camera.

The second video shows two new camera features for Ice Cream Sandwich – Time lapse and high resolution photo snapping during video shoot.

Finally, the third video shows how it’s like navigating around the latest Android operating system. The video is in Japanese since it was released officially on Japanese Motorola website. However, there’s nothing to worry about if you don’t understand the language. You can turn off the sound and let Android do the talking. Yes, it is that phenomenal.

Source: PCMag

Research in Motion put an end to some Blackberry messenger users hopes; the platform would only be available to Blackberry users.  CEO Thorsten Heins discussed with the Wall Street Journal that the company decided they should be pursing any licensing deals.  This could have gone either way as the company could have secured some nice deals to allow other platforms use the messaging system, but it is one of the things that keeps loyal Blackberry users.

According to RIM, there are more than 55 million BBM users worldwide.

Source:  The Wall Street Journal

Nokia Lumia 900, the Finnish manufacturer’s latest high-end flagship and its budget-level smartphone Nokia Lumia 610 have been launched in home country Finland and are reported to be doing great in terms of sales.

Finland’s largest business newspaper Taloussanomat reports that the Lumia devices are clearly in high demand with users which is good news for Microsoft as the phones feature Windows Phone 7.5 operating system.

Market intelligence expert and technology tracker IDC has disclosed that the launch has catapulted Nokia’s share of smartphone market in Finland to 41%, again making it the number one mobile phone company at home. Riding on the success of Nokia Lumia series, Windows Phone operating system has also gained valuable 7.53% of smartphone market share.

Successful launch of the aforementioned Lumia phones at home may well be the beginning of something great for Nokia, the former world number one mobile phone maker. It remains to be seen how these devices will impact the global smartphone market with forthcoming international launches.

Sources: WMPoweruser | PhoneArena

According to the latest statistics released by market intelligence expert IDC, Android and iOS have dominated the global smartphone market in the first quarter of 2012.

The data published by IDC shows that Android and iOS mobile operating platforms boast market shares of 59% and 23% respectively, and a combined total market share of 82%, a sharp increase as compared to previous year’s combined first quarter share of 54.4%.

Out of a total of 152.3 million smartphones shipped worldwide during the first three months of the current year, Android OS accounted for a massive 89.9 million units as compared to only 36.7 million in previous year’s first quarter, showing an impressive year-on-year increase of 145%. iOS, powered by the world’s most valuable brand Apple, was a distant second with 35.1 million units as compared to previous year’s first quarter sales of 18.6 million units, depicting an increase of 88.7%.

Symbian has lost market share and currently stands at 10.4 million unit shipments for Q1 2012. RIM’s BlackBerry OS is in a similar position with 6.4% of market share and 9.7 million unit shipments.

Although, with only a meager market share to show for (at 2.2%), Microsoft’s Windows Phone operating system has shown a fairly decent year-on-year increase of 26% with 3.3 million Q1 unit shipments. The introduction of Windows Phone 7.5 based Nokia Lumia series will surely add to its fortunes in the coming months.

For now we can safely say that it’s smooth sailing for Google’s Android OS and Apple’s iOS. All others are steering through turbulent waters.

Source: IDC via DailyFinance

HTC has released a list of phones that will be getting Android v4.0 Ice Cream Sandwich update. They have also confirmed that updation for HTC Sensation and HTC Sensation XE is already in process and they will be made available within the next few weeks.

Other devices slated to get Android ICS update include the following:

* HTC Amaze 4G
* HTC Desire S
* HTC Desire HD
* HTC EVO 3D
* HTC Incredible S
* HTC Sensation XL
* HTC Raider
* HTC Rhyme
* HTC Vivid

Android v4.0 (Ice Cream Sandwich) is the latest operating system of Android platform by Google. It provides quick multitasking, aesthetically pleasing and customized screens, easy navigation interface, enhanced text input and spell-check, improved voice recognition, cloud-connection, faster browsing and much more.

All listed phones are expected to be updated with Android ICS by August. However, it is pertinent to note here that phones updated with Android v4.0 will still feature the same original versions of HTC Sense UI and thus will not provide the same user experience as new phones offering the latest 4.0 version of HTC Sense, for instance HTC One X.

Source: PCWorld

Microsoft has announced that users of Windows Phone operating system will now be required to upgrade to its latest version, Windows Phone 7.5, in order to buy, download or review apps in Windows Phone Marketplace.

Windows Phone 7.5, codenamed ‘Mango’, was revealed in the first quarter of 2011 and released pre-loaded with handsets later in the year. It is Microsoft’s most recent mobile operating system and is available in Nokia’s brand new flagship smartphone Nokia Lumia 900 and also in Lumia 900 Rogers branded version.

All newly released Windows phones such as Nokia Lumia 800, Nokia Lumia 710 and Nokia Lumia 610 feature Windows Phone 7.5. Users who have a previous version of the operating system installed on their phones will now get an error message when they try to access the Marketplace. They will need to install the latest version and can do so by visiting Microsoft’s Windows Phone Update Central page.

Source: WebProNews

Looks like the folks over at MobiCity are going to be launching yet another give-your-friends-the-gift-of-envy smartphones courtesy of Samsung’s Korean version of the Galaxy SIII uber-phone. What’s known so far is that there is a quad-core powered GSM international version which will be making its way to the majority of countries and an LTE version for the Korean (and presumably US) market. Due to a known incompatibility between LTE and the current crop of quad-core processor the latter version will have a dual-core processor as its heart.

From Left: International version, Korean version

I’ve always felt that the curves on the Galaxy handsets,. including the SIII international version, detract somewhat from the prestige of what is undeniably the uberphone of the moment. If Samsung could see their way clear to building a Galaxy S-designated model with an aluminium unibody and the sharp angles of the proposed Korean version’s design it would set a new benchmark for manufacturers to surpass.

Source: Secret Squirrel

When the first tablet-phones (popularly known as phablets) were introduced in late 2010 and early 2011, many people wrote them off. The tide seems to have turned in favor of phablets now with Samsung announcing recently that it sold 5 million units of Samsung Galaxy Note N7000 within first 5 months of its release. That’s a resounding turnaround.

The ‘phablet’ market is growing so rapidly that ABI Research has forecasted a tremendous 208 million units annual sales threshold by 2015. The exponential rise of phablets has begun with the release of Samsung i9300 Galaxy S III 16GB (S3) three weeks ago, as it has already surpassed 9 million pre-orders around the world.

ABI Research defines phablets as phones featuring a touchscreen falling between the range of 4.6-inch to 5.5-inch. Recently released high profile phones fulfilling this criterion include the super powerful Quad-core phone HTC One X and Google’s Galaxy Nexus.

Phablets or tablet-phones are becoming exceedingly popular because with faster processors and powerful GPUs, they provide seamless internet browsing, make it extremely easy to read and reply to emails and offer great video streaming with convenient screen navigation. ABI Research also reports that popular manufacturers HTC, LG and Sony are coming up with new phablet models later this year, which is probably a very smart thing to do given the growing prominence of these devices.

Source: Engadget | ABIresearch