According to the Wall Street Journal, Google could be brewing a new strategy for its Android mobile operating system. A source familiar with the matter allegedly told the WSJ that Google is planning to grant mobile device manufacturers an early access to new releases of Android in a bid to prevent wireless carriers from controlling the devices. That was pretty the plan with the Nexus S, and although it was a great device, the plan was basically a commercial “flop”.

Based on what it has done in the past, Google will usually give one manufacturer an early look at the latest version of the OS to help build a Google-branded Nexus device. You can see that with the Nexus One in 2010 with HTC as its partner, and then the Nexus S announced the same year with Samsung as its partner, and finally the Samsung Galaxy Nexus. (more…)

Just a week after Bing underwent a major update which included the availability of a social sidebar feature, Microsoft is now releasing the new Bing in the U.S. Beginning today, people in the U.S. can give the new Bing a try at www.bing.com/new. The newly revamped Bing search engine now integrates search and people in social networks through a dedicated social sidebar. The sidebar, according to the team behind the search engine, will bring together the best of the web – what experts and your friends know – hence, giving you the confidence to act. Road warriors might also find Bing appealing, thanks to its layout that has been optimized for smaller screen sizes and touch input.

The social sidebar will also suggest friends in Facebook who might be knowledgeable about what you are searching. Bing uses public Facebook information and content, including what your friends “like” and the photos that they have shared as the basis for the social sidebar feature. But Bing assures that it won’t match friends based on other Facebook contents such as status updates or check-ins. “Bing also respects you and your friends’ privacy settings so you won’t see friends who have opted out of Facebook instant personalization or blocked the Bing app,” Derrick Connell, Vice President of Bing, said.

According to The Verge, imports of the HTC One X and Evo 4G LTE have been delayed at the U.S. Customs for an investigation involving a previous patent infringement with Apple. “The US availability of the HTC One X and HTC EVO 4G LTE has been delayed due to a standard U.S. Customs review of shipments that is required after an ITC exclusion order. We believe we are in compliance with the ruling and HTC is working closely with Customs to secure approval,” HTC said via an official statement. If you can still remember, Apple has won an exclusion order banning the imports of HTC Android devices at the International Trade Commission last December, particularly the patent involving “personal data and mobile communication devices” (Apple patent #5,946,647).

It’s important to note that the U.S. Customs is investigating the One X and Evo 4G LTE with due respect to its previous ruling. So, it is then comprehensible for the U.S. Customs to block the imports temporarily. HTC, on the other hand, is assuring eager One X and Evo 4G owners that they will have the devices soon. “The HTC One X and HTC Evo 4G LTE have been received enthusiastically by customers and we appreciate their patience as we work to get these products into their hands as soon as possible,” HTC said. In case you missed our review of the HTC One X, check it out here.

MindWave has just introduced NeuroSky MindWave Mobile for both the iOS and Android platforms, which makes this the first brainwave-reading device for iOS and Android platforms. Just in case MindWave Mobile sounds familiar, it is actually different from its sister-product MindWave, where it will transfer the user’s RAW brainwave data over Bluetooth, ensuring a greater degree of data integrity, and will play nice on the PC and Mac platforms in addition to the aforementioned iOS and Android operating systems. No doubt this will expand the reach of this app across different groups of users. (more…)

There is just something about cockroaches that unnerve me – I don’t know if it is because of their ability to survive a nuclear fallout, or the fact that they are super creepy – especially when they fly around. Here is something that will induce a minor heart attack of those who have a fear of cockroaches – the Gokiraji robotic cockroach. Trust Technology Japan are the ones behind the Gokiraji, where it comes with a simple remote control to help you make sure your most recent prank can be executed to perfection. This compact controller allows you to steer this robotic insect in four directions, but I wonder how you would feel if someone chivalrous in the group gathers the courage to stomp on this $20 toy or swat it with a roll of paper – who is going to pay for the “damages” then? At least there is no gooey mess for you to clean up after with some of the larger sized roaches. Not only that, this is one roach that even the most potent can of aerosol cannot kill.

RunCore, the Chinese company specializing in high-performance solid-state drives, has officially launched its InVincible Solid State Disc drive. According to RunCore, its SATA SSD is a state of the art data security that features two buttons that will activate either two of its cool features. RunCore said that its InVincible SSD will allow users to protect sensitive data from third party access in two ways: intelligence destruction and physical destruction. The intelligence destruction is a security feature that will eliminate all the data on the disk by overwriting it with a code. “This overwrite-deletion method ensures that there is no way to potentially recover previous data stored on the device, effectively setting your SSD back to factory default,” RunCore said. If you think that feature is cool, let’s talk about the physical destruction feature. Check out the InVincible SSD in action after the jump. (more…)

Apart from the very interesting VAIO S series that Sony announced today, the Japanese consumer electronics company has also announced its new VAIO Z series, reported to be the ultimate notebook in terms of mobility, speed and convenience. Let’s find out why. Sony said that its new VAIO Z series is crafted from tough and lightweight carbon fiber and aluminum material with a so called  ‘hexashell” design. Sony prides its work on the VAIO Z series, particularly for its weight and thin design – just under 1.2kg in weight and only 17mm thin. Furthermore, Sony claims that its VAIO Z series will be the fastest notebooks around, thanks to their third generation Intel quad-core processor. Its 13.1-inch Full HD VAIO Display Premium will bring rich colors and wide viewing angle to its users. (more…)

Sony has just launched its new VAIO S series. The company prides its VAIO S series for their versatility and mobility. The new VAIO S series offers power and portability to its users. It comes in two sizes – 13.3-inch and 15.5-inch displays. Both notebooks feature a slim, full-flat design that’s perfect for road warriors and frequent travelers. The VAIO S Series 13 and 15 are made from tough, lightweight materials including magnesium, carbon fiber and aluminum. The new S series also features a new slot-in optical drive that contributes to its slim design, and VAIO Display Plus which features enhanced scratch resistance and anti-reflective coating that minimizes glare. (more…)

A group of scientists from the U.S. Department of Energy’s Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory have developed a way to generate power using harmless viruses that convert mechanical energy into electricity. Basically, it works by tapping a finger on a postage stamp-sized electrode coated with a virus. The virus converts the force of the tap into an electric charge. They did it by creating a generator that produces enough current to operate a small liquid-crystal display. This generator is the first to produce electricity by harnessing the piezoelectric properties of a biological material. Piezoelectric materials are powered by electricity generated by exerting pressure on crystals. These materials build up charge when squeezed. Check out the video after the break. (more…)

Today, the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office officially published a series of twenty-one newly granted patents for Apple. One out of the 21 patents filed is for a remote control design that works by clipping it to a steering wheel. The said patent, which has never been seen before, essentially looks like the iPod click wheel.

But according to Apple, the notable difference is that its faceplate is touch-sensitive. According to PatentlyApple, what’s even more interesting is that one of the engineers working on this project was a principal designer at California’s famous Frog Design. Frog Design is a global innovation firm that has been working with Apple, starting with the case of the portable Apple IIc, the fourth model in the Apple II series. (more…)

Of course, the main issue when dealing with game streaming games is latency. It’s not a new problem, and we’ve talked about this when OnLive was first demonstrated. To reduce the latency, there’s no secret: NVIDIA or their partners (Gakai was on-stage) need to build data-centers closer to customers. So far, the first one is located in Sunnyvale, so Bay Area residents may see network latency as low as 5ms to 10ms. (more…)

These days, GPUs are fast enough to add a thin hardware layer that translates virtual addresses to physical addresses, along with virtualizing every graphics hardware commands.  (more…)

Splash is a single-track evening event and startup competition. Splash gathers leading entrepreneurs, innovators, venture capitalists and angel investors across technology to inspire and energize the audience about entrepreneurship and innovation.

Get onstage! Applications for the competition are being accepted until Tuesday, May 22^nd. It’s free to enter. Even if you’re not raising funds, it’s a great stage to get exposure in front of an incredibly high-profile group of investors and entrepreneurs. Apply to the competition.

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Toy expert Peter Jenkinson said,”The image suggests that the moving facial parts have been entirely replaced by an LCD screen. This will prompt lots of talk, not all of it intelligible, on Furby forums.” Other speculations made concerning Furby 2012 include Wi-Fi connectivity built right into the Furby itself so that it can transmit a livestream of video content while interacting with other friends’ Furbys online. I think if parents had their choice, they would not want to go through the crazy scramble all over again for a toy, preferring instead for a more muted Christmas celebration.

Apart from Error 3006, we also have those living in Europe experience Error 37, which translates to the login servers being overloaded – something that is expected considering the sheer volume of gamers who have waited for years for Diablo 3, and are now trying to get their Barbarian’s career jumpstarted. A handful of gamers have also reported “Error 75 temp outage of BNET”, too. Well, all I can say is, once the dust surrounding Diablo 3 has settled (which might take some time to happen), life ought to return to normal, and you should be able to login without any further issues.

Google has just updated their Chrome browser for Windows, Mac, Linux and Chrome Frame, bumping up the version number to 19 in its latest iteration. Apart from the slew of bug fixes as well as performance improvements, the spotlight is being pointed at built-in tab synchronizing, enabling Chrome users to open up a slew of tabs across a range of devices, ranging from tablets to smartphones which are powered by the Android 4.0 Ice Cream Sandwich operating system. Basically, this enables one to continue browsing on a different device with all the tabs opened elsewhere to appear. To sweeten the deal, Chrome will also make sure that your browsing history is synchronized, allowing you to take advantage of the Back and Forward buttons. This borders on the magical, and will certainly make plenty of power Chrome users smile as well as casual users finding the user experience to be a whole lot more optimal. The tab syncing feature is said to roll out “gradually over the coming weeks”, so being patient would be the keyword here.