The Galaxy S5 surpasses the Galaxy S4 in terms of adoption rate in the USA

In two days' time, on May 11, Samsung's current flagship will have been available on the market for exactly a month. We do know that the first day sales of the Galaxy S5 were significantly higher than the first day sales of Samsung's last year forerunner, the Galaxy S4. At the same time, the launch weekend sales of the device also beat the ones of its greatest rival, the Apple iPhone 5s. All of these facts indicate that although it received a fair amount of critique, the Samsung Galaxy S5 would probably break a sales record or two and become one of the best-selling gadgets of 2014, just like its predecessor.
The Galaxy S5 will undoubtedly be one of the hits on the smartphone market this year, but Samsung's rivals won't stay idle – on the contrary, their smartphones are going to fight tooth and nail with the Galaxy S5 for a bigger share of the market.




 source: Chitika via BGR

Ari Partinen, one of Nokia's PureView camera gurus kisses nokia goodbye for Apple

Ari Partinen. He is one of the camera experts who are responsible for the Nokia N8, which came with a spectacular camera for its time period, the Nokia 808 PureView, which featured a stellar 41MP snapper on its back, and almost every PureView-equipped Nokia smartphone, such as the Lumia 920, 1020, 1520, and the Icon.
All in all, Mr. Partinen is one of Nokia's gurus in the field of mobile imaging technology, but sadly, May 9 is his last work day at the Finnish company, which sold its Devices & Services division to Microsoft. But Ari Partinen won't remain unemployed for long. In fact, he has already settled for a new job. In Cupertino, California. That's right, one of Nokia's biggest experts in the mobile camera department announced that he will work for Apple from June onwards. This was announced by Ari Partinen himself on Twitter. He expressed his satisfaction of the outcome by stating that he will be starting "a new chapter in Cupertino". Hopefully, Ari Partinen's involvement with Apple will result into future iDevices with even better imaging capabilities. Partinen is not the first member of the team behind the PureView technology to leave the Finns. Back in November 2012, another prominent photo guru - Damian Dinning - kissed Nokia goodbye and moved to Jaguar Land Rover.Alas, it is pretty sad to witness that key experts are leaving Nokia, which was once the dominant player on the mobile phone market. However, times are changing and one should expect a high-ranking expert such as Ari Partinen to desert the sinking ship and look for better opportunities.

Ari Partinen @Partinen 

 

Today will be my last day working for the amazing #Lumia family. In June I will start a new chapter in Cupertino, California. Much love! 

1:23 AM - 9 May 2014 

 

 

 

 source: @AriPartinen via Engadget

The dark side of the Samsung Galaxy S5: 4 (plus one) mighty annoying features

The Samsung Galaxy S5 came amidst sky-high expectations, and Samsung mostly delivered with top of the line hardware in the form of the Snapdragon 801 system chip, and a brand-new ISOCELL 16-megapixel camera for very sharp images. 

The Galaxy S5, however, is not perfect, and after you use for a while it you start noticing some annoying details. Don’t you wish you knew about those things before you actually bought the phone? None of them is a deal-breaker, but combined, they just spoil the impression of an otherwise great smartphone. Plus, even if they don’t derail you from your decision to buy Samsung’s latest and greatest, it’s still good to make an informed purchase.

1. Fingerprint scanner: will it ever register your fingerprint from the first time? 

The more you use the Galaxy S5, the more you realize that the fingerprint scanner would rarely ever recognize your paw's unique signature from the first time. Try it again, then again, then again, and then just when you're ready to give it up, it recognizes it. Do you have the nerve for that many tries, though? 

 

 

2. Vibration that could wake up the dead 

The default vibration for the Galaxy S5 is set to be so strong that it could literally wake up the dead. Well, maybe not literally, but boy, does it get close to it. Luckily, there's actually a solution for that: go into settings -> sound -> vibration intensity, and set it to lower. 

 

3. Phonebook and contacts app still lags, thank TouchWiz for that 

Can you believe that TouchWiz still stutters here and there? Even with the newest and most powerful quad-core Snapdragon 801 system chip on board. The slowdown is especially noticeable in contacts app when you try to call someone. 

 

4. UI design is a mix of everything 

TouchWiz is evolving, but on this path of evolution it does not scrap old features - it simply accumulates them one over the other, and the end-result is a UI that has more different elements than there are items in a garage sale. 

iPhone app + accessory tested to accurately detect skin cancer

An app called DermoScreen and a $500 dermoscope attached to iPhone’s camera, along with a magnifying lens and a light are currently being tested by the University of Houston to detect skin cancer. The app takes a photo of any suspicious mole or lesion in a patient, and after a few seconds will confirm if the skin condition is likely cancerous or not. The app is currently being evaluated for further testing at the University of Texas MD Anderson Cancer Center, with the hopes of making this a more practical and less painful medical tool for doctors and patients.
Considering other cases where cases and apps are built around the iPhone in order to solve medical needs, and with the devastating effects of cancer in our society, this is clearly something great in the works.

Source: University of Houston

Apple and Samsung now own 106% of the smartphone profits?

Even though Apple and Samsung are constantly attacking each other in the courtrooms, both companies do have two things in common. On one hand, both companies build smartphones with parts made by Samsung, and in the other, both companies own the smartphone markets at the moment. What’s interesting is when you have a look at exactly how much of the market these companies own, which according to a recent study, even exceeds the amount of profit available, once you consider that there’s no such thing as profits above 100%, right?
A new report by Canaccord Genuity claims that between Apple and Samsung, both companies own 106% of the global smartphone profits. Obviously the first thing that comes to mind, is how can you have a profit number that goes beyond 100%? According to the study, competing companies like HTC, Nokia, Motorola, & Blackberry are all losing money, and that would account for that extra percentage we’re still trying to find some sense into. According to the report, the company that makes the most profit is Apple, owning a 65% of the industry profits, while Samsung owns 41%. The study also mentioned that the reason why Apple is making more money is due to the device operating margins it has of 37% compared to Samsung’s at 22%.
Again, we’re still finding that 106% to be kind of impossible, not just because of it’s not a possible number in profits, but also because we know how companies like Lenovo dominate China. It’s far-fetched to consider that only Apple and Samsung are making money, but we’re sure they do own a big chunk of it.
 



Via: Cult of Mac

The difference between iOS and Android users

All these differences between the platforms end up attracting different kinds of users, and today we look at one survey that attempts to reveal some of the traits that are more likely to apply to iOS users than Android fans, and the other way around.
According to this study by Battery Ventures, iPhone users seem to have more white collar jobs, travel by air, and enjoy wine.
Android users, on the other hand, are more likely to be blue collar, rely on public transportation, and prefer beer. We also see an interesting relationship with vices: Android users eat more often at McDonald’s and represent a larger share of smokers, yet at the same time they’re more likely to identify as religious.
But for those differences, the groups still share some commonality. There’s no clear difference between iOS and Android users when it comes to where they live and whether they rent or own their homes. Political leanings seem to cover both platforms, as well, and neither iOS nor Android users are more likely to own guns or be Fox News watchers than the other.
Notably, when this user data is filtered to only compare iOS and Android users of similar income levels, many of these differences start to go away.


 Source: Re/code

iPhone 6 dates August for 4.7-inch and September for 5.5-inch variant

A 4.7- and a 5.5-inch iPhone 6 are both expected to make an appearance later this year. According to the same “unnamed sources”, the 4.7-inch iPhone 6 will reach stores in August, which is one month earlier than what Apple used to announce the iPhone 5s last September. The larger, 5.5-inch iPhone 6 will likely be announced in September, about a year after last year’s flagship. The Economic Daily News, who broke the report cited by India Times, has also estimated that a total number of 80 million iPhone 6 devices will be produced this year, combined.



Source: India Times