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Top five reasons Apple will survive without an iPhone 5 in 2011
Just how many people are using the iPad 2 camera? (Answer: Not many)
FaceBook LikeFight: Hitler revealed to be more popular than Steve Jobs
HTC Flyer out today! UK price and details
New iPod nano, Acer Iconia Tab review and Chrome on Three: Lunchtime Lowdown
Apple under attack: Microsoft App Store challenge hits the EU
Bungie iOS app rumours: what is Crimson?
Google Chromebooks: free UK 3G coming from Three!
Acer Iconia Tab A500 review: Chubby chassis will have you longing for iPad
Amazon Android tablet: Jeff Bezos teases the world

Top five reasons Apple will survive without an iPhone 5 in 2011

Posted: 13 May 2011 05:04 PM PDT

Sometimes it's just too easy to get caught up in the ongoing spec war currently underway in the Android community. Talks of quad-core processors and 15-megapixel cameras with 3D recording and playback sound great on paper, but at Electripcig we prefer to evaluate technology based on real-world performance. With the iPhone 5 reportedly on the back burner for late 2011 or early 2012, here's your top five reasons Apple will survive without a refresh to the iPhone 4 this year.

Apps
Apple's App Store was first on the scene, quickly becoming the standard for all future mobile operating systems to follow. With more than 400,000 apps curated by the Cupertino camp, the overall quality and volume is both impressive and the industry benchmark. Whether or not you agree with the high commissions, the App Store has proven to be a profitable domain and plenty of developers are making it the focus of their business.

While it is true Google enjoys more Android device activations per day, the number of devices alone does not guarantee a profitable venture. Users must be willing to spend and this my friends is where the App Store excels. As a developer, being able to reach a target audience flush with funds ready and willing to buy is leverage. Leverage which results in most apps coming to iOS first and Android second.

Display
The Retina Display is nearly 10 months old and only recently has the competition been able to come close to matching its quality. In pure sharpness, the display's 960-by-640-pixel resolution exceeds even the qHD (960-by-540-pixel resolution) display on the latest crop of Android smartphones. Even more impressive is the pixel density (326 pixels per inch) achieved by using a 3.5-inch display.

Resolution and pixel density are important, but let's not forget the viewing angles and visibility in direct sunlight. Try taking the HTC Incredible on a run this summer and then do the same with the iPhone 4 and you tell me which you prefer. It is quite rare to find a piece of technology which holds a crown for 10 months, but that is exactly what the Retina Display brings to the table.

Battery life
Even the most incredible hardware on the planet falls prey to the simple fact that mobile phones live and die based on battery life. If there's one thing we've learned from our experience with 4G WiMax and the EVO 4G it's that there's no such thing as a battery too big for our liking. As ifixit.com's teardown of the iPhone 4 revealed, there's a 3.7V 1420 mAh Li-Polymer battery under the glass, providing up to 7 hours of 3G talktime or 14 hours on 2G.

In terms of mAh, 1420 is relatively small compared to the 1930 mAh Li-Polymer battery on the Motorola Atrix or the 3500 mAh extended on our EVO 4G. Ultimately, real-world battery life boils down to the operating system and how well you (and your OS) manage running applications. On Android this requires active moderation with an App Killer whereas iPhone 4 owners can take a passive approach, yet achieve similar or often better results. One of the first things you'll notice when moving from Android to iOS is how much longer your phone lasts.

Camera
Last month the iPhone 4 became the most popular camera on Flickr, beating out the Nikon D90, Canon EOS Rebel XSi, 5D Mark II and T1i. The 5-megapixel sensor might not sound impressive on paper, but as any photo enthusiasts knows — the power of fine optics is in the sensor, not the megapixels. We're sure marketing departments are shaking in their boots knowing we've exposed the evil lie keeping much of the point-and-shoot market afloat, but at Electricpig we're here to trim the fat.

If you need more proof confirming the iPhone 4's prowess as top-notch replacement for your point-and-shoot, simply head over to a photo sharing site and browse images and video taken with the smartphone. The Nokia N8 is without a doubt the best camera phone we've seen to date, but the iPhone 4 remains a close second. As the saying goes, the proof is in the pudding.

iOS 5
In the world of iOS, updates are plentiful and widely available — all countries, all carriers, worldwide and on the same day. This is Android's biggest hurdle and for me personally, Apple's major selling point. When you spend a considerable amount of money on a new smartphone, updates should be expected in a timely fashion. While some may argue that rooting your smartphone and installing an unofficial ROM gets the job done, this is not a prerequisite for success. In fact, it's ridiculous and we deserve better.

Later this year Apple will release iOS 5. Early reports indicate that future updates (iOS 5.x +) will be delivered over-the-air (OTA), but that is a big "if". We expect to see major integration with OS X Lion (also scheduled for a summer release), cloud-based features, and a 'music locker' service. The security in buying into iOS is that most of the upcoming features will be unveiled in an official capacity next month at WWDC 2011. Knowing an update is coming is one thing, but a formal announcement with confirmed features and a release date is on an entirely new level.

Wrap up
As owners of the Nexus One and Nexus S will note, a fresh build of Android can bring a world of change to device performance. It is not uncommon for an iPhone owner to skip an upgrade because they too will soon be enjoying many of the same features included in the hardware refresh. Without a doubt, software updates make a good device great. This in itself is reason alone why many will be perfectly happy continuing to use their iPhone 4, even if Apple releases an iPhone 4S or iPhone 5 in 2011.

Overall when you look at the collection of applications, quality of the display, battery life, camera and upcoming iOS 5 update, life with an iPhone 4 will only get better. Sure, a dual-core processor would be nice, assuming battery life remains strong, but establishing needs and wants is essential for a healthy gadget addiction.

Just how many people are using the iPad 2 camera? (Answer: Not many)

Posted: 13 May 2011 09:30 AM PDT

So remember back when the iPad first launched, and everyone had a good old a moan about the the lack of a camera? Yeah, here’s Flickr‘s current daily average user stats for Apple’s devices with cameras. Just 22 Flickr users out of more than 40 million use their iPad 2‘s camera to grab snaps, making it 200 times less popular than the iPhone 4. Just sayin’. Read on to see the high-res infographic.

Of course, comparing between iOS devices is hardly fair: it’s not as though Apple has sold as many iPad 2s as it has iPhone 3Gs. But taken on its own that number, 22, is still stunningly low for a device that’s already shipped in the millions, and the total number of images on Flickr taken with the tablet is a paltry 12,570. Number of iPhone images? 51,331,761.

Click the image above for the full high resolution graphic. Are you glad your iPad 2 has a camera? Let us know in the comments.

FaceBook LikeFight: Hitler revealed to be more popular than Steve Jobs

Posted: 13 May 2011 06:54 AM PDT

Some ingenious so-and-so has put together a website, LikeFight, that lets you compare how many ‘likes’ Facebook Pages for different organisations, entities and people have accrued – and pit them head to head. Rather worryingly, more people claim to like Hitler than like Steve Jobs. But then, more people like Hitler than either Steve Ballmer or Nick Clegg (OK, we saw that last one coming).

However, what’s slightly strange – and potentially a lot scarier – is the fact that, according to the crowd, David Cameron is one of the lucky few who is considered preferable to the Führer. Still, only just…

Have a go here, or click through our gallery for a couple of surprise ones you might not have guessed. Wave goodbye to getting any work done today!

HTC Flyer out today! UK price and details

Posted: 13 May 2011 05:12 AM PDT

The HTC Flyer Android tablet-cum-easel is on sale at last. After missing its original launch date, HTC has shipped its eagerly awaited slate, and it comes in a variety of flavours. Our own review is in the pipeline, but in the meantime, let’s walk you through your options.

UPDATE: The stylus is included in UK boxes, but some US bundles will be sold without it, we’ve confirmed.

The 7-inch, Android 2.3 and 1.5GHz CPU slate is selling for £479.99. – unfortunately, that’s just for the 16GB Wi-Fi only model. If you’re after 3G as well, you’ll be paying a mighty £599.99 – for that you’ll also get 32GB of storage. This does include the magic stylus pen HTC turned heads with at Mobile World Congress in February – that’s also sold separately for £47.99.

Unusually, HTC is also selling the Flyer through its own website, so if a big name retailer near you doesn’t have ti, hit up HTC.com for one. Of course, whether it’s worth the money when a luvverly Asus Eee Pad Transformer running Honeycomb can be yours for under £400 is another matter, but we’ll bring you our full verdict just as soon as we can.

Will you be buying the HTC Flyer? What about the stylus? Let us know if you plan to get your animation on with it in the comments.

Out Today | £from £479.99 | HTC

New iPod nano, Acer Iconia Tab review and Chrome on Three: Lunchtime Lowdown

Posted: 13 May 2011 04:59 AM PDT

We’re just a few hours out from knocking off for the weekend time, but as ever the tech news continues to pour on through. Read on and see what you missed this AM here in the lunchtime lowdown.

First up, let’s talk Google. On the Android side of things, we got a strong hint that Amazon‘s next Kindle may indeed run the smartphone OS, while we checked out the Honeycomb flavoured Acer Iconia Tab – is it an iPad and Eee Pad killer? Closer to home, Three revealed that it would be providing 3G support for all Google Chromebooks in the UK.

Over on the Apple front meanwhile, we saw a new patent application hinting at what to expect from a new iPod nano, while rumours broke out a Bungie (IE Halo) iOS game. Just what is it?

Still want more news? Roll on over to the homepage and help yourself to it all as it breaks!

Apple under attack: Microsoft App Store challenge hits the EU

Posted: 13 May 2011 03:02 AM PDT

Apple is facing a battle on at least two fronts with Microsoft taking its App Store challenge to the European Union as well as continuing to fight the battle in the US.

For its attempt to chip away at Apple’s claim on the term “App Store” in the EU, Microsoft has teamed up with HTC, Nokia and Sony Ericsson, who’ve joined it in submitting an application claiming Apple’s “App Store” and “Appstore” trademarks are invalid. Uh oh…

In a statement, Microsoft comes out swinging:

“Microsoft and other leading technology companies are seeking to invalidate Apple's trademark registration for APP STORE and APPSTORE because we believe that they should not have been granted because they both lack distinctiveness.

The undisputed facts establish that 'app store' means exactly what it says, a store offering apps, and is generic for the services that the registrations cover."

Both Apple and Microsoft have brought in linguistic experts to fight their corners and Apple has shot back at Microsoft’s claims by pointing out that in its view Microsoft’s claims on words like “windows” and “office” also lack distinctiveness. This one will run and run.

Out now | £NA | Apple/Microsoft

Bungie iOS app rumours: what is Crimson?

Posted: 13 May 2011 02:42 AM PDT

Since Bungie bounced away from Halo development, its been hard at work on other things including a major original project for Activision.

Now eagle-eyed trademark watchers have spotted an application from the developer referring to something called “Crimson”. The mystery title is tagged in the paperwork as a game for mobiles. How intriguing…

That suggests Bungie is prepping an iOS and/or Android app. While the game its working on for Activision is an MMO, there’s no reason for it not to have a mobile component..

Could Crimson be the MMO and is it connected to Bungie Aersospace, the other mysterious trademark the firm acquired last year? We think it just might be. Tell us what you think in the comments.

Out TBC | £TBC | Bungie (via Touch Arcade)

Google Chromebooks: free UK 3G coming from Three!

Posted: 13 May 2011 02:32 AM PDT

While Verizon is handling the 3G for the Samsung Series 5 and Acer Chromebook in the US, Three has stepped in to offer free UK 3G to UK Chromebook owners for, appropriately, three months. Read to find out what’ll you’ll pay after that…

The carrier says it’ll offer a free SIM with 3GB or 3G coverage for three months after which there’ll be a choice of pay-as-you-go deals to choose from. They’ll range from a 500MB day pass for £3 up to a 7GB one-month pass for £25. Hop into the comments to let us know: do those Chromebook deals appeal and will you make the jump to Chrome OS?

Out June | From £free | Three

Acer Iconia Tab A500 review: Chubby chassis will have you longing for iPad

Posted: 13 May 2011 02:28 AM PDT

The Acer Iconia Tab A500 is the third Android Honeycomb tablet we’ve got to grips with here in Blighty. Currently our fave is Asus’ Eee Pad Transformer, thanks to its low price, ace screen and sensible software, but can its Taiwanese arch-rival outdo it? Read our Acer Iconia Tab A500 review and find out.

Bloated build

We’re sorry to come out with a dealbreaker right off the bat, but you should know: the 10.1-inch Acer Iconia Tab is absolutely enormous. It seems thicker than its 13.3mm depth, and the total weight (765g) makes it feel vastly more bloated than an iPad 2 (601g). It’s so massive in fact, that using it in portrait mode without placing it down on a table is almost impossible: it feels like it’s about to topple out of your hands at any second.

Buy the Acer Iconia Tab A500 now

It’s a shame because we quite like the brushed metallic back case of the Acer Iconia Tab A500, there’s a micro HDMI socket to mirror output on your telly (No cable though. to our chagrin), sensibly placed 3.5mm audio port and power buttons on the side, and even a screen orientation switch. On the other side, you’ll find a reset hole that can be triggered with a pin, a micro USB port for sideloading, and a full on USB port for plugging in keyboards and storage: we checked, USB mice don’t work.

As thoughtful as most of these touches are, we can’t beat around the bush here: this is the ugliest high end tablet we’ve ever tested. Admittedly that beefiness does provide for some superb speakers combined with Acer’s typical Dolby Mobile skills, but it’s not worth the trade off. Call us vain, but we’ll stick with the waif-like wonder chassis of the iPad 2 anyway.

Super screen

On the plus side, the Acer Iconia Tab A500′s screen is superb, vastly outperforming the Motorola Xoom’s panel of equal 1280×800 resolution with wider viewing angles and excellent brightness. At a push, we’d say that it doesn’t match the exceptional IPS panel on the Asus Eee Pad Transformer (And the iPad 2, of course), but we think most people would be hard pressed to notice.

See our Best Android tablet Top 5 now

Perhaps more of an issue to consider is the screen ratio. As with most Android tablets, the widescreen 16:9 ratio lends itself well to videos and web browsing, but not apps which involve text input. We’d like to see a bit more choice in future, with 4:3 ratio Honeycomb tablets to choose from also.

One curious note: about once an hour or so when the Iconia Tab was powered off, the screen would glow on again for a second. We’ve no idea why, and it was a bit creepy. Maybe we watched

Android Honeycomb

We’ll keep this short since for the most part we’ve been here before: Android 3.0 is almost identical to what you get on the Motorola Xoom. That’s a powerful OS with impressive multitasking and notifications, let down by a lack of tablet optimised Android apps still, and some frustrating browser crashes.

Acer hasn’t tweaked the keyboard, as Asus did with great results on the Eee Pad Transformer by adding in an extra numerical character row, but it has bunged in a few extras of its own. Some, such as the Media Server, work flawlessly, while others, such as Social Jogger, which shows your Facebook updates in a really laggy app with a rotating scroll mechanism, aren’t worth a look in.

Best Android apps of all time: Top 100

In other words then, our concerns about Honeycomb stand. If you’re a die hard Gmail fan and know you don’t want an iPad, you’ll love it. But for everyone else, slate-sized iOS still delivers a far better experience for the timbering.

Performance and battery life

The good news is that there’s another hidden trick on the Acer Iconia Tab A500. It’s not the front and back cameras, which are still afterthoughts, as they really should be on a huge tablet. It’s the choice of using 1GB DDR3 memory instead of DDR2 paired with the dual-core Nvidia Tegra 2 chip. Whether that’s the sole cause we can’t be certain, but it’s the most responsive Honeycomb tablet we’ve tried so far, easing well ahead in benchmark scores with an impressive 1,990 in Quadrant Standard.

We’re also not sure if this causes a trade off in battery life, but for what it’s worth, the Iconia Tab drops juice in standby at a much swifter rate than the Xoom or the Eee Pad Transformer, lasting four days of standby time. It’s not so noticeable in usage, clearing a good six hours of use with the screen on and Wi-Fi in use, but if you want a tablet you can leave on for weeks and know it’ll still be alive, the iPad is the way to go.

Verdict

At more than fifty quid over the Asus Eee Pad Transformer, we can’t help but feel that the Acer Iconia Tab A500 is something of a raw deal. It’s far too heavy and lacks the killer keyboard integration. Of course Asus’ slate is selling out everywhere right now so it might seem a bit more tempting, but don’t be fooled: it’s far too heavy for a modern tablet. That’s a crying shame, because as ever, we see big things for Honeycomb. Your turn next Samsung!

Review unit kindly supplied by Save On Laptops

Amazon Android tablet: Jeff Bezos teases the world

Posted: 13 May 2011 02:01 AM PDT

The Amazon Android tablet that’s been rattling around the rumour mill for a while now has been teased again by Amazon boss Jeff Bezos. Speaking to Consumer Reports he gnomically muttered that those of us awaiting an Amazon Android tablets should “stay tuned”. But, typically, he had to go and muddy the water…

While those two words (“stay tuned”) will heat up speculation around the Amazon Android tablet, Bezos downplayed the likelihood of such a device taking over from the Kindle: “We will always be very mindful that we will want a dedicated reading device. In terms of any other product introductions, I shouldn’t answer.”

Though the Amazon CEO is being coy, there’s loud chatter from the supply chains that Amazon has been attempting to acquire thousands of LCD screens. It’s not crazy to believe that Amazon will out something later in the year. Now it’s got the Amazon Android App Store, a tablet just makes sense.

What would an Amazon Android tablet need to tempt you? Tell us in the comments.

Out TBC | £TBC | Amazon (via Consumer Reports)