Samsung Gear Live available on Google India Play Store priced at Rs 15,900

The Android Wear powered Samsung Gear Live is now on sale on the Google Play Store in India, priced at Rs 15,900. The smartwatch was unveiled at Google I/O last month, and within 12 hours was listed on the Indian Play Store as ‘Coming Soon’. The smartwatch however will only start shipping in two to three weeks.

The Gear Live features a 1.63-inch 300×300 pixel Super AMOLED display, 1.2GHz processor, 4GB internal storage and a 300mAh battery. It also features a heart rate monitor, as well as water resistance capabilities.

Alongside the Gear Live, Google also unveiled the LG G Watch, which features a 1.65-inch 280×280 pixel IPS display, a 1.2GHz processor, 4GB of internal memory and changeable watch straps. LG’s smartwatch is available on the Indian Play Store for Rs 14,999.

You can buy both the Samsung Gear Live, as well as the LG G Watch here.

Samsung four new Galaxy devices running Android 4.4 for low-end User

Samsung new Low-End Galaxy Core II, Galaxy Ace 4, Galaxy Young 2, and Galaxy Star 2 affordable Android KitKat smartphones

Samsung a quartet of new budget-focused Galaxy smartphones, that in reality, are pretty forgettable. Firstly, the South Korean company unveiled the four new smartphones called Galaxy Core II, Galaxy Ace 4, Galaxy Young 2, and Galaxy Star 2. All these new smartphones run on Android 4.4 KitKat, and feature Samsung’s latest TouchWiz UI that it rolled out on the flagship Galaxy S5.

Starting with the Galaxy Star 2, it features a 3.5-inch HGVA TFT display, 1GHz single-core processor, 512MB of RAM, 2-megapixel fixed focus camera, 4GB expandable memory, and a 1,300mAh battery. Just above is the Galaxy Young 2, which has the same features, albeit with a better 3-megapixel fixed focus camera.

The Galaxy Ace 4, which features a 4-inch WVGA display, 1.2GHz dual-core processor, 1GB of RAM, 5-megapixel rear camera, VGA front-facing camera, 4GB of expandable internal memory, a 1,800mAh battery.

The Galaxy Core II, on the other hand, features a 4.5-inch WVGA display, 1.2GHz quad-core processor, 768MB of RAM, 5-megapixel rear camera, VGA front-facing camera, 4GB internal storage that can be expanded up to 32GB using a microSD card, and a 2,000mAh battery.

All four of these new Samsung devices run Android 4.4 KitKat with the latest version of Samsung’s TouchWiz overlay on top. Samsung is certainly planning these devices as low-cost alternatives to its flagships

Samsung four new Galaxy devices running Android 4.4 for low-end User

Samsung new Low-End Galaxy Core II, Galaxy Ace 4, Galaxy Young 2, and Galaxy Star 2 affordable Android KitKat smartphones

Samsung a quartet of new budget-focused Galaxy smartphones, that in reality, are pretty forgettable. Firstly, the South Korean company unveiled the four new smartphones called Galaxy Core II, Galaxy Ace 4, Galaxy Young 2, and Galaxy Star 2. All these new smartphones run on Android 4.4 KitKat, and feature Samsung’s latest TouchWiz UI that it rolled out on the flagship Galaxy S5.

Samsung Galaxy S IV costs $244 for mostly Samsung inside

Samsung’s latest flagship Android smartphone, the Galaxy S 4, costs $244 to make, a preliminary virtual tear-down by IHS reveals. The research firm estimates that the build of materials cost $236 with an additional cost of $8.50 to manufacture and assemble the smartphone. This is 15 percent or $30.40 higher than the equivalent version (16GB HSPA+) of the Galaxy S III.

The higher cost in build of materials is being attributed to a larger and higher resolution display, an array of new sensors and Samsung’s new Exynos 5 Octa processor. “While many brands have released smartphone models using full-HD LCD displays, the S4 represents the first with an AMOLED display at this resolution,” said Vinita Jakhanwal, director for small & medium displays at IHS. “Reaching a true pixel density greater than 300 ppi has been a challenge for AMOLED display makers. However, Samsung was able to enhance AMOLED display performance by implementing new technologies that also drove up the cost of the display.”

The cost of the Galaxy S 4’s Octa processor with ARM’s new big.LITTLE architecture is estimated at $30.00, compared to $17.50 for the chip in the Galaxy S III. The Galaxy S 4 also has new humidity and temperature sensors along with an IR gesture sensor, which drove the sensor subsystem price up from $12.70 to approximately $16, the research outfit claims.

The big story here, however, is most of crucial and expensive components that go into the Galaxy S 4 have been manufactured by Samsung itself, which is one of the biggest advantages the Korean electronics giant has over its rivals, including Apple and HTC. Samsung manufactures the display and touchscreen module, NAND memory, processor and power management integrated circuit that gives the manufacturer flexibility in terms of component availability and customization. This gives Samsung an significant edge over HTC, which is struggling with component availability for its flagship One smartphone, which is reported to have been delayed and has now been pushed back to end-March and even April for most markets.

Samsung will launch the Galaxy S 4 across the world starting from the last week of April.

Samsung Galaxy Nexus and Ice Cream Sandwich Launch High-quality video

If you watched the stream last night, you know the quality was almost unwatchable.  Luckily, Google has posted a high quality video that helps show the quality of the screen and the design of the new OS.  Make sure to crank it up to 720P.

Life with the Google Nexus S by Samsung Smart Phone

We used to think that the Nexus One was going to be the first and last phone in a series. A noble experiment at providing a pure Google phone to those interested in the experience. Roughly one year later, we have the Google Nexus S built by Samsung. This phone does not set the tone in hardware like the Nexus One did, but it does bring a totally new version of the operating system at a time when manufacturers are more invested in their custom UIs than ever before.   

We used to think that the Nexus One was going to be the first and last phone in a series. A noble experiment at providing a pure Google phone to those interested in the experience. Roughly one year later, we have the Google Nexus S built by Samsung. This phone does not set the tone in hardware like the Nexus One did, but it does bring a totally new version of the operating system at a time when manufacturers are more invested in their custom UIs than ever before.We've spent some quality time with the Nexus S over the last few weeks, read on to see what we think of this curious device. 

The Hardware

If you have ever touched a newer Samsung smart phone, you can probably imagine what the Nexus S feels like. It is a completely plastic design, and feels a little less expensive than some other handsets. We hesitate to call it cheap feeling, because frankly, it isn't. It is plastic-y, but feels solidly put together. When you squeeze the phone, there is no give and the casing emits no creaking noises. On the outside and in, the Nexus S feels mostly like a Galaxy S phone.The phone feels very good in the hand actually. Because of that plastic body, it is very, very light (only 129g). It is really unexpected when you pick it up. The back has a gentle curve that makes it more comfortable than some of the Galaxy S phones. There is a slight bump at the bottom, but it doesn't get in the way. Our only complaint about this part of the construction is that the plastic body is prone to scratching. We already have a few on the back of our unit. The front is dominated by the screen. When the phone is off, you cannot even see the buttons, which are only visible when the individual backlights are on. The button labels are not printed on the phone at all. It gives the handset a "2001 monolith" vibe when off, and we kind of dig it.The power button is on the right side of the phone, and the volume rocker is on the left. Overall, we love having the power switch on the side of the phone. It is the most convenient placement of any we can imagine. The bottom of the phone is where the USB port, mic, and headphone jack is. This is unusual placement for the headphone jack, but we've gotten used to it, and it's actually convenient when you're listening to audio while using the phone as the cord doesn't get in your way.Everything you've heard about the so-called Contour Display is true. It's kind of neat, but we don't really notice a big boost in usability. Similarly, it does not conform to your face in any meaningful way. The display itself is Samsung's fabulous 4-inch Super AMOLED screen at 800x480. We like these screens more than standard AMOLED. Despite using the pentile subpixel arrangement, they do not seem as blurry up close as standard AMOLEDs. Also, the colors are not as blown out. Reds and oranges are still a little warm, but overall the screen is very accurate to our eyes. All this with the amazing black levels is a real win.

Other specs include a 5MP rear camera, VGA front-facing cam, 1GHz Hummingbird SoC, 512MB of RAM, 16GB of internal storage, and an NFC reader. The phone has 3G frequencies for T-Mobile US and most international carriers. It runs on 2G only with AT&T.  The 3G radio does not support HSPA+, but tops out at the traditional 7.2Mbps. Some phones like the G2 are capable of 14.4Mbps. In practice, we are seeing speeds closer to what we see with HSPA+ phones than T-Mobile would probably like. Over 4Mb down in speed tests is not uncommon with the Nexus S. The G2 is usually not much faster than that. We also feel like the radio holds signal fairly well. It is noticeably better than the Nexus One at sticking with a 3G signal.The front facing camera takes reasonable images and video for its purpose and we have no complaints. We also like the rear-camera, though the lack of 720p video is a shame (especially considering the sensor is probably capable). The stills we get are of high quality, though. The phone acquires focus quickly and in highly variable light conditions. There is also a macro mode in the software, but no digital zoom.The lack of an SD card slot is upsetting; no two ways about it. We wish it was here. That said, the 16GB storage is managed smartly (more on that in the software section). We are also noticing a speed bump in moving files around and accessing the internal storage. Having memory soldiered to the motherboard seems to make it more snappy. Not really a surprise.One concern we have with the hardware is related to the capacitive buttons. This is probably a rare issue, but we had to swap phones because of it, so it bears mention here. On the original unit, our home button liked to trigger itself. Just by holding the phone while touching the lower right corner (sides and back, not near the button), it would register the home button as pressed. This got worse over time, and eventually happened every few minutes.

The Software

The real star of the show here is the software. The simple, understated hardware seems designed to melt away in your hand to bring Android 2.3 Gingerbread to the forefront. This phone is about the software, and Gingerbread delivers for the most part. Like with Froyo, there are some cosmetic and UI changes, but a lot of behind the scenes changes have been made too.One thing users will notice right away, is that the home screen has been tweaked a bit. The launcher at the bottom now has a slate gray background with sharper corners. The icons for phone and browser are now green and black. That same color scheme is carried on in the status bar. It is now black with green icons for signal and battery. Though, the color of the icons can change, more on that later. The black theme here makes  a lot of sense with the Super AMOLED display. Since these black pixels are just off, the status bar blends into the phone's bezel and produces a really cool effect of icons floating on the phone's surface. The notification panel is now redone in darker grays and black as well.The color of the icons in the status bar are now used to relate some important information. Green signal bars and connection icon (cell data or Wi-Fi) indicate that you are connected to Google servers, and can access services like Talk, Market, and Gmail. If those icons turn gray, something is wrong. You could be on a Wi-Fi network that only allows HTTP access, or your connection quality is too poor to maintain a connection to The Big G. This is a great user experience tweak that we find very useful.

One thing that doesn't get a lot of attention is the look of the buttons and popup menus. These have been heavily tweaked in Gingerbread. The buttons now have sharper corners and the gradient effect is gone. Similarly, the menus use darker headers, and sharper edges. The result is a flatter and more modern look in Gingerbread. Since these system elements are used in many apps, it really helps spruce up the OS as a whole. When you are scrolling in Gingerbread, you will also get a visual queue when you're at the end of a list. The end of the scroll will glow orange. This is a nice addition, but it's more eye candy than anything else.

The new keyboard in Gingerbread might be our favorite feature. The stock Android keyboard was just always a little too slow and inaccurate for us. With Android 2.3, Google has completely redesigned it adding multi-touch, a better layout, and handy shortcuts. It adopts the gray on black visual style seen in a few places in Gingerbread. In our testing, it is dramatically more accurate than the Froyo keyboard, and totally bests all the third-party keyboard replacements out there. The autocorrect system feels much smarter now. We can type at full speed and get very few autocorrect fails.With the new keyboard, also comes new text selection and cursor control. This improvement has made us almost forget the phone lacks a trackball. By tapping in a text field, you get a handle to move your cursor around. Stopping in any word will give you autocorrect options for it as well. If you want to select text, Android will give you two handles to drag to select the block of text you want. These handles are a little unattractive, but they work much better than the old method. Since trackaballs/trackpads were really the best way to perform either of these actions, we really wanted phones to have them with Froyo. Now, we could take them or leave them.There's been a lot made of the new Manage Apps menu option. Contrary to popular belief, Google did not add a task manager to Android. It's always been there. They just spruced it up, stuck it in the main app management interface, and added a link to that menu on the home screen menu. Manage Apps will automatically bring up the tab with all your apps listed. This is a good place to take stock of all your apps, and the space they use. A little bracket at the bottom gives you a visual of how much memory the apps you're viewing take up. Over on the USB storage tab, the story is much the same. The last tab here is the Running apps (task manager), but it is mostly unchanged from Froyo.

The USB storage is your internal 16GB block of storage. About 13GB of it is user accessible. The remainder is used for the 1GB of app storage, and the OS. This interface is much better for moving apps to the USB storage (on other phones with will be the SD card). You get all the apps listed with app2sd enabled, and a checkbox next to them if they are actually storing data on USB storage. You can organize them by size, and we find this really handy. This is all managed very well. Gingerbread treats the USB storage just like an SD card, so we got up to speed quickly. It's easy to forget these are just partitioned bits of the same storage.In daily use, Gingerbread is fast on the Nexus S. part of this is thanks to the Hummingbird SoC, which when unencumbered by TouchWiz, can really fly. It may not be a Tegra 2, but The Nexus S feels like the fastest Android phone we've used. Everything from the app list, to the menu feels very smooth. Gingerbread does "concurrent garbage collection", which means it is constantly moving unneeded code out of memory. The result is fewer weird system hangs. We almost never get the hiccups common on older Android builds in Gingerbread.Clearly there's a lot to like about Gingerbread. But we did encounter some off-putting issues. First, the browser has some lag problems. It's so strange that a phone as snappy as the Nexus S is occasionally brought to its knees by a webpage. We're not sure what's causing it, but it doesn't happen on every page. We suspect Google just needs to do a bit more optimization for the Hummingbird SoC on Gingerbread.We're also getting some home screen crashes that are presenting themselves as, well, non-crashes. About once every few days, the home screen gets very laggy. Laggy to the point of seeming frozen almost. It seems like the home screen wanted to force close after encountering an error, but it doesn't. It just stops working properly. Long-pressing on a few icons will usually get it to force close. Then it pops right back up, good as new. We've seen this happen on multiple units, so it is definitely a Gingerbread bug.

Is it right for you?

The Nexus S is a great phone. It is missing some features that people might expect these days, but it is pure Google. You can't buy another phone with Gingerbread right now, and it's that sort up bleeding edge software that you get a Nexus for. The hardware is certainly competent, but the software is where it's at. Gingerbread is a solid experience. It cleans up the UI, adds some new features, and runs smoother than Froyo.Despite a few bugs, we would recommend the Nexus S to most Tested Android fans. When Google rolls out one more OTA bug fix, it could be great for an Android novice as well. People that want the fastest updates on their Android phone would do well to look at the Nexus S seriously. If you've had any hands-on time with the Nexus S, let us know how you liked it.

Galaxy S II in India on April 13

Samsung likely to launch the Galaxy S II in India on April 13

Samsung seems to be all set to launch the Galaxy S II in India on April 13 as one of the many announcements expected to be made during its South West Asia Forum in Delhi. We have received multiple inputs from the street confirming the same. The Galaxy S II along with the Nexus S will ensure that Samsung has a good footing in the high-end Android smartphone race.The Nexus S will be priced around Rs 28,000, while the Galaxy S II can be expected to be priced above Rs 30,000 owing to its 1 GHz dual core processor, a slightly larger display (4.3-inches) and an 8.0 MP camera rather than the 5.0 MP found on the Nexus S. However, the Nexus S will have the advantage of getting regular OS updates. Which one would you pick?


Update: Samsung has announced the Galaxy S II launch in India. The dual-core processor toting smartphone will be available in May and will be priced between Rs 30,000 and Rs 35,000.