Snapdragon 810-powered Galaxy Note 4 now in testing

A rumor is currently circulating, stating that the Samsung Galaxy Note 4 will soon be getting with a brand new chipset. The SoC in question is allegedly the Qualcomm Snapdragon 810. Samsung's flagship device currently comes in two hardware flavors - the in-house developed Exynos 7 Octa and the Qualcomm Snapdragon 805. These are both solid chips, but the Snapdragon 805, being by far the more popular and powering significantly more units is lacking in one particular respect - it features a 32-bit architecture. This could potentially cause issues with the phablet's futureproofing, given the strong push to a 64-bit application ecosystem, introduced by Android 5.0 Lollipop. The Snapdragon 810 remedies this issue, as it is a true 64-bit octa-core CPU. It also brings the Adreno 430 GPU to the table, which is also a significant improvement over the current Adreno 420 found in the Galaxy Note 4. The new device is allegedly already being tested by the three major South Korea mobile carriers, but that is unconfirmed either. A Snapdragon 810 Note 4 sounds tantalizingly good, but for the time being all we can do is wait for further development to the...

Source: http://www.gsmarena.com/snapdragon_810_powered_galaxy_note_4_being_tested-news-10433.php

Next Samsung Exynos SoC rumored to feature Cat.10 LTE

LTE Cat. 6 is quickly becoming the standard with new flagship handsets. It delivers quite respectable data speeds of up to 300Mbps on the downlink wherever capable enough networks are available. And while carriers still have a long way to go to catch up to current tech, chipset manufacturers are already preparing to move forward. Recently Qualcomm announced a Cat.10 LTE-capable chip, which boasts speeds of up to 450 Mbps. The chipset in question, however, is not the Snapdragon 810, that will power a lot of next generation flagships, as it features Cat. 6 LTE. But surprisingly enough, Cat. 10 modems might be closer to consumer markets than we thought. According to the Korean media, Samsung will be shipping Exynos devices with the new technology as early as next year. Rumors even extend further and speculate that the Samsung Galaxy S6 might support the new bandwidths in its Exynos-powered version. This marks a huge step forward for Samsung for two main reasons. Firstly if the Korean tech giant does manage to incorporate Cat. 10 LTE in consumer devices in time for the arrival of the next Galaxy S flagship, that would give the company's own SoC a formidable advantage over Qualcomm's Snapdragon series. Perhaps even more importantly this would mark another move towards a full in-house chip manufacturing process for Samsung. Having its own CPU, GPU and Modem would allow Samsung to pursue new development strategies and consumer markets. This, however is still entirely in the realm of speculations and for the time being Samsung will most likely be sticking to the current scheme of offering Qualcomm chips its their own. There are a number of reasons for this arrangement ranging from lower costs to marketing and manufacturing concerns and Samsung might even never achieve, or for that matter want a completly closed production circle. Source (in Korean) | Via 1 | Via...

Source: http://www.gsmarena.com/next_samsung_exynos_soc_rumored_to_feature_cat10_lte-news-10432.php

Kirin-powered Huawei Honor 4X gets listed before announcement

According to an oizoioi report, a Kirin 620-powered version of the Huawei Honor 4X is now available for pre-sale. This is particularly interesting given the fact that the company hasn't yet announced the device - a launch event is scheduled for December 16. The device is powered by the Kirin 620, rather than the Snapdragon 410 used on the original version. The home-baked chipset still offers 64-bit and LTE support, but it features an octa-core CPU and the Mali 450 GPU. Other features include a 5.5 inch HD display, 13 MP rear camera, and 5 MP front camera. In addition, the device packs in a 3000mAh battery, and will be available in two versions: a lower-end version with 1GB of RAM and a higher end version with 2GB of RAM. As for the price, the report says the 1GB version is expected to retail for 799 yuan ($129), while the 2GB version is expected to retail for 999 yuan ($161). Aside from the Honor 4X LTE, the upcoming event will also see the launch of the Honor 6Plus with Dual Rear...

Source: http://www.gsmarena.com/lte_enabled_huawei_honor_4x_goes_on_pre_sale_before_launch-news-10431.php

75,000 Xiaomi Redmi Notes to go on sale in India later today

The Xiaomi Redmi Note was temporarily on sale in India a week ago, but the 50,000 units lasted only 6 seconds. There's a new batch coming to Flipkart, this one a bit bigger - 75,000 units. You still need a registration before sale begins at 2pm local time (you won't have time to make one). The Xiaomi Redmi Note is priced at INR 9,000 (the equivalent of $145 or €118). There's a 4G version incoming that will cost another INR 1,000 on top of the base price, but that one won't be available until later this month. It's also powered by a quad-core Snapdragon 400 chipset instead of the octa-core MediaTek chipset the 3G version uses. The smaller Xiaomi, the Redmi 1S, went back on sale yesterday for INR 6,000, this time no registration required. Source |...

Source: http://www.gsmarena.com/75000_xiaomi_redmi_notes_to_go_on_sale_in_india_later_today-news-10430.php

US Cellular offers Nexus 6 at $200 on contract, $660 off

US Cellular is now selling the Nexus 6, starting at $200 with a 2-year contract, the 64GB version is a $50 upgrade. You can also grab the device with a pre-paid SIM at $660, but 64GB storage will cost you an extra $70. AT&T has already started shipping the device at $250 (32GB) or $683 off contract. Sprint is asking $300 for the Google phablet with a 2-year contract. There's also T-Mobile which is asking $650 for the 32GB model and $700 for the 64GB (no subsidies here though). Verizon is yet to officially offer the device, but the Google Nexus 6 does work on its network. For now though, US Cellular seems to be offering the best deal for the Motorola-made phablet. Source |...

Source: http://www.gsmarena.com/us_cellular_offers_nexus_6_at_200_on_contract_660_off-news-10429.php

Android Studio sees version 1.0 - first stable release

The Android OS has come gone a long way since its modest early versions. Core libraries, features and mostly APIs receive constant updates and redesigns to utilize new and improved hardware and bring better experiences to the user. Android 5.0 Lollipop brought about a brand new virtual machine - ART and a thoroughly reviewed code base. It was only natural that the development tools receive an equal treatment. The Android Studio has been in the works, ever since last year's Google I/O. It is a monumental effort that aims to fully replace the Eclipse environment, which is clunky, unreliable and in later versions simply cluttered with too many modules and extensions. Google's primary objective with the new Android Studio is to offer the Android SDK as a single fluently integrated IDE, with all the bells and whistles to facilitate a new highly streamlined development process to go along with the ever so intuitive mobile OS it powers. A stable build of the IDE can now be downloaded from the Android developer portal. As already mentioned it truly acts like a one-stop tool for all your android projects and promises to put an end to unwieldy emulation, hellish dependency and version management as well as many more developer nightmares. There are some notable and exciting features of the Android Studio 1.0 that definitely deserve to be mentioned. The IDE is now entirely based on JetBrains' immensely popular IntelliJ editor and delivers advanced code completion, refactoring, linting and code analysis. Google have also gone to great lengths to ensure that its own services, platforms and APIs are easily usable within Android projects. The studio comes with extended Google Service template support, seamless GitHub integration as well as simplified integration mechanisms for Google Cloud Platform services, such as Cloud Messaging and App Engine. The new Android Studio is also very much in tune with the fairly recent expansion of Android to a lot of new hardware platforms. The IDE is designed to offer a fine-tuned experience and proper set of tools, depending on what flavor of the OS the application is meant for - from traditional handsets all the way to Android Wear, Android TV, Android Auto and even Google Glass. Every device type and form factor is readily available for ensuring a uniform design and user experience as well as for debugging with the help of the highly-optimized and pre-configured Virtual Device Manager and emulator. Apache Maven is thrown into the mix to put an end to dependency management nightmares. All this and much more comes inside a complete package, neatly tied up and supported by Google. So if you are still battling with Eclipse or are just now starting to explore the Android platform you can't go wrong with the new Android Studio 1.0, which is firmly settling in as the standard all-in-one power tool. Source | Via 1 | Via...

Source: http://www.gsmarena.com/android_studio_sees_version_10__first_stable_release-news-10428.php