Hologram Projectors: Coming Soon to a Smartphone Near You - Webmaster News

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When Coachella’s organizers decided to have a hologram of late rapper Tupac appear onstage during the 2012 dates of the music festival, they used a high-powered projector to create the uncanny “performance.” Now, in 2014, a startup called Ostendo is taking that kind of technology and shrinking it down until it’s small enough to fit inside your iPhone.

Ostendo is working on computer chips capable of projecting 3D holograms that will be tiny enough to fit inside a smartphone. The Carlsbad, Calif.-based company, which has raised $90 million from Peter Thiel and venture capitalists, is already prepping 2D project units for sale in 2015. But the company wants to start manufacturing a version of the chip with 3D capabilities for the second half of 2015, with an expected price of $30 a pop. The chip, which the Wall Street Journal describes as the size of a Tic Tac, can project an image on up to 48 inches of display; multiple chips working together can project far larger and more complicated images.

Founder Hussein S. El-Ghoroury has big plans for his company, which is currently 115 employees strong. He sees his chips becoming commonplace in all sorts of electronic displays.

This headwear-free version of 3D imaging may ruffle Facebook’s feathers, considering the social media giant spent $2 billion buying virtual reality company Oculus, which created a phenomenal but undeniably clunky VR headpiece called the Oculus Rift. While the Rift and its ilk may still provide better 3D immersive gaming experiences, Ostendo’s far less invasive smartphone projections could offer a sleeker alternative for non-gaming 3D imaging purposes.

This holds immense promise (which is probably why the the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency is already awarding the company government contracts). But if this means an uptick in will.i.am holograms or ghoulish personalized Michael Jackson performances, I’ll hold Ostendo responsible.

This article originally published at The Daily Dot here

Source: http://mashable.com/2014/06/04/smartphone-hologram-startup/?utm_medium=feed&utm_source=rss

Motorola Slashes $100 Off Its Moto X Smartphone for 48 Hours - Webmaster News

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Motorola is knocking $100 off the price of its Moto X smartphone for just 48 hours.

The company announced the deal on Twitter Tuesday night, but it’s applicable to only those in the U.S.

The sale, which began at 12 a.m. Wednesday and will run through 11:59 p.m. Thursday, is good for the 32GB Moto X and its Developer Edition — the latter comes with a woven white design on the back.

There’s no contract attached to the discount.

Typically, the Moto X costs around $349, according to Motorola’s website, so $249 for a no-strings-attached upgrade is a pretty good deal.

The user also has the ability to custom design his or her own phone, choosing from a selection of body and accent colors. It’s possible to inscribe a personal message or name on the back of the device too.

48-HOUR FLASH SUMMER #SALE. 32GB #MotoX or #devedition for $100 off (US Only): http://t.co/Fb9YbRoXsx pic.twitter.com/Tl1ijwu8Ra

— Motorola Mobility (@Motorola) June 4, 2014

The sale comes one day after Motorola announced it is bringing the Android 4.43 KitKat operating system to more Moto devices. The software comes with a better camera and a cleaner interface.

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Source: http://mashable.com/2014/06/04/moto-x-48-hour-sale/?utm_medium=feed&utm_source=rss

Vertu"s Signature Touch Smartphone Is Ridiculously Pricey - Webmaster News

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British manufacturer Vertu, infamous for creating phones more expensive than your first car, just released its newest model, the Signature Touch.

The phone comes with a $11,300 price tag for the basic model, according to Vertu’s website. Each one is made by hand by a single craftsman, which is supposed to convince us that it’s worth emptying your child’s college fund. The Signature Touch is also equipped with noise-cancelling capabilities, virtual surround sound and ringtones from compositions by the London Symphony Orchestra.

Armed with 64 gigabytes of storage, the Signature Touch can hold its own against smartphone staples like the iPhone 5S. It runs on Android’s 4.4 KitKat operating system. In addition, Signature Touch blows iPhone’s photo-snapping cred out of the water, boasting a 13-megapixel main camera to iPhone 5S’ measly 8MP. However, the camera lacks the autofocus function, a major boon to the iPhone.

More isn’t always better. The nearly 5.7-inch screen is bigger than the iPhone by nearly an inch, making it barely pocket-sized and therefore bulky to carry around. There’s also a small matter of the price difference between the two: the Vertu phone is 28 times the cost of an iPhone 5S, without a contract.

Vertu began in 1998 as part of Nokia, but branched off from the Finnish phone company in October 2012. Its most recent phone was the Vertu Ti, which cost $10,569. The Signature Touch will be released at an unknown date later this month.

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Source: http://mashable.com/2014/06/03/vertu-signature-touch/?utm_medium=feed&utm_source=rss

Samsung"s First Tizen Smartphone Has Some Serious Game - Webmaster News

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You may have heard about Tizen as a platform for Samsung’s smartwatches, but the company has bigger plans for the OS, if the new Samsung Z smartphone is any indication. Unveiled Monday in advance of the Tizen Developer Conference in San Francisco, the Samsung Z is the world’s first commercial smartphone to run on Tizen.

Let’s back up: What the heck is Tizen? It’s yet another mobile operating system, this one based on Linux, and its principally operated by Samsung (Intel and a few others support it, too). Tizen was created with multiple kinds of devices in mind — not just phones — and it’s capable of powering cameras, wearables, smart TVs and even laptops. It’s currently the OS in most of Samsung’s Gear watches and some of its cameras.

While the Samsung Z isn’t the first phone to run Tizen (version 2.2.1), it’s the first one aimed at the mass market. It certainly has the features to appeal to a wide audience: a large 4.8-inch SuperAMOLED display with 1,280 x 720 resolution, an 8-megapixel rear camera and even a fingerprint sensor that’s just like the one on the Galaxy S5. It also includes S Health, Samsung’s health hub-app that comes with some of the company’s Galaxy phones.

The phone packs a 2.3GHz quad-core processor and 2GB of RAM. Storage is just 16GB, but you can get more via a microSD card.

The Samsung Z also has an LTE radio, and it features another of the marquee abilities of the Galaxy S5: the download booster that lets the phone combine both the LTE and Wi-Fi connections to accelerate download speed.

The great specs as well as the presence of advanced features suggests Samsung has big plans for its first real Tizen phone. Far from being just a model for developing markets, the Samsung Z is likely intended as a top-line model that developers can build to — similar to how Google regards its Nexus devices. The company only said it would come to Russia first, as predicted, but that releases in other countries would soon follow.

Samsung is the No. 1 Android phone manufacturer in the world, but the Samsung Z could be the beginning of a long-term strategy to undermine Android with Tizen, which Samsung has much more control over. That would take some doing considering Android has 1 million+ apps, and Tizen has very few, but software exists that will quickly let developers convert their Android apps to Tizen versions.

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Source: http://mashable.com/2014/06/02/samsung-z-tizen/?utm_medium=feed&utm_source=rss