After Hours Tech with John Abraham

If you though John Abraham was just about Bollywood, bikes and Bips, think again. We say this because this heartthrob is a tech lover too! 

John says he uses multiple phones all for different purposes. Since he endorses LG, he obviously owns one. RIM s BlackBerry takes care of his professional work. He has joined hands with UTV New Media to start a unique voice blog service through which his fans can know him better. For this purpose, he uses a Nokia N79. He is also very excited about his revamped website www,johnabraham.com where users can get a lot of dope on John s activities and life. However, John warns his fans that he is not on social networks like Twitter and Facebook and asks them to not fall for the fake Johns out there.

Take a look at the video to know which is the one gadget that tops his wish list and the machine he cannot live without.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CUpfxr5VO7g&feature=player_embedded

Samsung's Cheapest Touchscreen Phone Out in India

Samsung has quietly launched its smallest and cheapest touchscreen handset in India. The Samsung Champ (C3300), as the phone is known, is a very tiny touchscreen handset.

It features a 2.4-inch resistive touchscreen that has a QVGA resolution. It has a 1.3 megaixel camera at the rear and also boasts of various connectivity options including Bluetooth and USB.

The phone, as expected, doesn't support 3G but is good enough for GPRS/EDGE based Internet usage. It has a 3.5 mm music jack as well and packs in an FM radio.

Like other Samsung feature phones, this one too is social networking friendly and comes with a load of social networking tools. Memory is expandable using microSD cards and with a 1000 mAH battery, the phone should offer decent battery life as well.

The phone costs Rs. 4,100 only, making it arguably the cheapest touchscreen you can buy from one of the mainstream phone makers out there. 
 

Mozilla Firefox 4 Beta 2 Released

Mozilla has released the second beta of the Firefox 4.0 web browser with few interface and feature improvements. This beta brings the tabs-on-the-top placement for the Mac OS X users just like Windows. Also, it brings a new "App Tabs" feature to keep a close eye on the most commonly used web apps and services. 

Following the release of Firefox 4.0 beta 1, this new beta brings a slight facelift for Mac users who like to have tabs on the top. Apart from that, Windows 7 and Windows Vista users get to see a single Firefox button just like the one found on Opera.  

The most interesting feature of Firefox 4.0 beta 2 is Apps Tabs that pins the selected tabs on the left side of the browser permanently. So, you can pin your Gmail, Google Apps, Twitter, Facebook or any other service there. For that, you'll have to right click on the tab and select "Make an App Tab".

Nvidia launches Fermi based Quadro cards

Nvidia has unveiled a new breed of Quadro graphics cards based on its next generation computational graphics architecture - Fermi. The new line-up of Fermi-based Quadro cards includes Quadro 4000, Quadro 5000 and Quadro 6000 series GPUs along with Quardro Plex 7000 array. The new range of Quadro cards promise better performance compared to its predecessors with native support for DirectX 11 and other current technologies. These cards are targeted at computational graphics and animation professionals using workstations. 

These Quadro Cards are based on Fermi GPUs and have more processing cores. They are used for running applications for graphics, animation, science, medicine and oil-gas exploration. The Quadro 4000 graphics card will have 256 processing (CUDA) cores and 2GB GDDR5 memory. The Quadro 5000 graphics card will have 352 processing (CUDA) cores with 2.5GB GDDR5 memory. 

For the mobile workstation laptops, Nvidia brings Quadro 5000M with 320 processing (CUDA) cores and 2GB GDDR5 video memory. Top of the line Quadro 6000 card has 448 processing (CUDA) cores and 6GB GDDR5 video memory. And finally, the Quadro Plex 7000 features 896 processing (CUDA) cores and 12GB GDDR5 video memory. 

Fermi-based new Quadro graphics card support DirectX 11 graphics APIs, Open CL, OpenGL 4.0 and Nvidia's 3D Vision Pro technology. Yes, Nvidia has brought its 3D technology to the workstations as well. 

Nvidia has priced Quadro 4000 at $1199 (Rs. 56,100 approx.) and Quadro 5000 at $2,249 (Rs. 1,05,200) which would be made available from August 2. While Quadro 6000 priced at $4,999 (Rs. 2,33,750 approx.) and Quadro Plex 7000 at $14,500 (Rs. 6,78,000 approx.). 

BlackBerry OS 6, Bold 9800 Coming Next Week

Bloggers and tech journalists around the world are looking forward to an upcoming press announcement made by RIM for an event scheduled for August 3. While the invitations for the event doesn't reveal much, it is largely thought to be the event where RIM would officially debut its BlackBerry OS 6. Apart from that, many also expect the announcement of its Blackberry Bold 9800 smartphone that is set to arrive later this year. 

The announcement of these two things would obviously need to coincide because the Bold 9800 is set to be the first BlackBerry phone to run its OS 6. The phone, also known as the Torch 9800, shares the same old BlackBerry look but with one major difference. It would sport a vertical slide out keyboard like the Palm Pre. It will also sport a touchscreen display apart from having  4GB of memory and a 5 megapixel camera for imaging. Now, imaging and multimedia in general hasn't exactly been BlackBerry's forte. Let's see if that changes with OS 6.

As for OS 6, this latest version of RIM's latest smartphone Operating System is thought to be a major upgrade over the current iteration of the same. Promotional videos revealed by RIM do make the OS 6 quite desirable. However \, we might have to wait for a while till we get a hands on.

Anyway, let us all wait and watch what unravels next week!

Motorola Takes a Jab at Apple Again

Apple, who has had a history of poking fun at its competitors now finds itself at the receiving end - thanks to its infamous iPhone4 reception issue. In the latest addition to this forgettable chapter Motorola has fired a jab at Apple with its latest ad for its flasgship Android smartphone, the Droid X.

The ad is a second in a series of campaigns that Motorola seems to be preparing. An earlier ad reminded people that they could hold the Motorola any way they like without issues. Apple, not to take all this lying down, came back with an ad of its own that showed the Droid X showing similar signal issues to that of the iPhone 4 - albeit when held in the right hand.


In round 2, Motorola is at it again with its latest ad which says users can be assured of great reception "without a bulky phone jacket". Looks like along with its competitors, ad agencies too are having a great time making hay while Apple reels under its "antennagate" episode.

Let us wait and watch how Apple responds to this latest one by Motorola.

Safari 5.0.1 arrives with Extensions

Apple has released Safari 5.0.1 update for its desktop web browser with Extensions Gallery along with a number of other fixes. The Extensions Gallery features add-ons created by third-party developers that can add to improve the overall web experience and browsing. For the Mac version, Safari 5.0.1 also brings better stability while using shortcuts with Safari Reader and while using MobileMe Mail. Both Mac and Windows version of Safari 5.0.1 will bring better Cascading Style Sheet animations while browsing the web. 

Apple had released Safari 5.0 with an ability to add extensions just like the ones for Mozilla Firefox and Google Chrome. So now, you can access Safari Extensions Gallery where several extensions that include one for Twitter, Facebook, Gmail, and many more are listed. These extensions are built with HTML5, CSS and JavaScript. 

With this update, the previously reported AutoFill exploit also got fixed. 

Here's a quick list of fixes that come with Safari 5.0.1 update: 

• More accurate Top Hit results in the Address Field
• Fixes display of multipage articles from www.rollingstone.com in Safari Reader
• Fixes an issue that prevented Google Wave and other websites using JavaScript encryption libraries from working correctly on 32-bit systems
• Fixes an issue that prevented Safari from launching on Leopard systems with network home directories
• Fixes an issue that could cause borders on YouTube thumbnails to disappear when hovering over the thumbnail image
• Fixes an issue that could cause Flash content to overlap with other content on www.facebook.com, www.crateandbarrel.com, and other sites when using Flash 10.1 (Mac)
• Fixes an issue that prevented boarding passes from www.aa.com from printing correctly
• Fixes an issue that could cause DNS prefetching requests to overburden certain routers
• Fixes an issue that could cause VoiceOver to misidentify elements of webpages (Mac)

Download Safari 5.0.1 via Apple Software Update or directly from here. 

Get Answers at Facebook Questions

Facebook has introduced a new feature - Facebook Questions, that allows user to post questions and get answers from the entire Facebook Community. This feature is similar to Yahoo Answers, Answers.com and Mahalo. Currently, Facebook Questions is being made available only to a few beta testers who are providing feedback. It isn't sure when this feature would be made available to all users. 

Just like you can post an update in your Facebook timeline, you can ask any question and get answers from the swarm of over 500 million Facebook users. However, it should be noted that Facebook Questions is an application that needs to be added in order to use it. You can ask about anything - from details on ice cream parlors to book stores, from food joints to parks. As per the description on the official Facebook blog, anyone from the Facebook Community can answer the question. Thus, we hope that the activity for that question remains in a separate tab. If it gets into the regular Activity News Timeline, then we hope it comes with 'Hide' Option.

Once the 'Ask Question' question tab appears next to Update Status tab, you can post your questions anytime. As of now, we don't know how and where the 'Ask Question' tab will appear in the mobile web interface of the service. You can also post questions on your friends and contact's wall just like you post regular text and links. 

Here is a list of distinct features of Facebook Questions. Users can

• Post photos in Photo Questions
• Create Polls
• Add meaningful tags so that it is easily discovered and quickly answered
• Stay updated with updates and answers by following the questions
• Explore the topics by different topics view options - like all questions, category-wise, etc.

Do note that the questions you post are visible to everyone over the Internet so you better don's post obscene and profane questions. In a way, this feature can be a good knowledge source tool but it also involves a high risk of getting more spam added to the Interwebs. 

All you have to do now is to wait till some morning Facebook will start rolling out Facebook Questions feature. 

Simmtronics Rolls Out Slim Desktop PCs

Simmtronics Semiconductors has announced its new range of slim desktop PCs that are available in two variants: SDC 2711S and SCD 2911S. The desktop PC range comes with 15.6-inch, 18.5-inch and 20-inch LCD monitor options. 

The SDC2711S comes with Intel Pentium Dual Core (E5400, 2.7 GHz, 2MB Cache, 800 FSB) processor, 1 GB of RAM (can be upgraded up to 4GB) and 500 GB SATA HDD. Simmtronics has also equipped the machine with DVD R/W Dual Layer, Multimedia Keyboard, Optical Mouse and slim cabinet. Simmtronics SDC 2711S comes preloaded with Ubuntu.   

On the other hand, Simmtronics SCD2911S comes loaded with Intel Core 2 Duo (E7500, 2.93Ghz, 3MB Cache, 1066 FSB) processor, 1 GB RAM (upgradeable up to 4 GB) and 500 GB SATA HDD. The other features of the desktop include Multimedia Keyboard, Optical Mouse, Slim Cabinet. Even this desktop comes loaded with Ubuntu. 

The desktop range is available across India through the company's authorized channel partners. Simmtronics SDC 2711S is available for Rs. 13,490 and Simmtronics SCD 2911S is available for Rs. 15,990. The price does not include the cost of the LCD monitors. The SDC 2711S comes with a three-year warranty, while the SCD 2911S comes with a three-year onsite warranty. The company provides after sales support through its authorized service providers across India.

Motorola Rambler, Bali Announced

Even though we have been mostly talking about Motorola's Android smartphones these days, let us not forget that it also has a line-up of feature phones - a decent one at that.

That line-up has been expanded with the addition of two more handsets to its portfolio known as the Rambler and the Bali.

The Rambler is a very rare clamshell device - with a QWERTY keyboard. The device boasts of a very basic 1.3 megapixel camera, support for video recording, web browser, e-mail support, A2DP Bluetooth and GPS support. The phone seems to be a messaging oriented device. It will be available in U.S. starting August 11 and will be priced at $99.99 (Rs. 4,700 approx.) excluding taxes.

As for the Bali, it is quite similar to the Rambler - except that it comes sans the QWERTY keyboard and packs in a T9 version instead. Features include a 1.3 megapixel camera on board, GPS and stereo Bluetooth. You might also notice the dedicated, external controls for the music player. Memory expansion is taken care of by a microSD card slot. 

The pricing of Bali is a tad surprising. It will set the user back by $149.99 (Rs. 6,900 approx.) and would be available starting August 11 in U.S. 

Note that these are CDMA phones - but we don't mind Motorola bringing these to countries like India - albeit in a GSM avatar.

Details of 100mln Facebook Users Out on Torrents

We've heard about popular social networks like Twitter and Facebook suffering from hacking attacks. Sooner or later, those holes got fixed. This time, Rob Bowes, a security consultant, has uploaded details of about 100 million Facebook users in form of a torrent. This file is a list of Facebook users with their profile link, user name and unique ID. Bowes said that this data was put up in public domain to highlight security issues. 

First of all, DO NOT panic. Facebook told BBC UK that the information was already public. The list, in form of a torrent, was uploaded at the popular torrent file sharing website - The Pirate Bay which always attracts major user attention.

Facebook also sent a statement saying: "People who use Facebook own their information and have the right to share only what they want, with whom they want, and when they want."

Bowes, in a blog post, wrote that he was able to index information only about the searchable users but not their friends. And in the torrent, he also added the software used to acquire the information from Facebook. 

If you don't know yet, Facebook has already kept this information public - www.facecook.com/directory. In an official statement, Facebook has clarified, "No private data is available or has been compromised. Similar to the white pages of the phone book, this is the information available to enable people to find each other, which is the reason people join Facebook." 

From time to time, Facebook has been blamed for weak security and each time, Facebook has come up with a bold reply. Facebook already offers Privacy Settings which can be used to keep your personal information secure. 

EA releases SimCity Deluxe for iPhone

Electronic Arts has released yet another Sims game for Apple's iOS based iPhone. Any casual, yet dedicated Sims fan would love to play urban planners to build his own cities. EA is selling this game for $6.99 at the Apple App Store (iTunes link). 

New SimCity Deluxe for iPhone claims to be more portable and brings a number of improvements over the original SimCity game. With improved graphics and much easier controls, SimCity Deluxe surely brings the required enhancements any casual gamer would want. Improved scrolling for smoother movements across the city will make your task easier. 

This enhanced graphics laden game also allows zooming in and out with a better user interface. It also brings four different seasons along with the seasonal disasters. You can build cities inspired by different world famous locations and you get more power with control to look over your city. 

Get started with building your own wonderland with SimCity Deluxe. 

2010 To See 136 mln Mobile Phones in India

Research firm Gartner has, in a latest study, set the forecast of the total sales for mobile devices in India at 138.6 million for 2010.

This marks an increase of 18.5 percent in sales compared to the overall sales of 117 million handsets in 2009. The sale is expected to hit 206 million units by 2014 if the current growth rates continue.

Gartner noted that the Indian market, which was until now dominated by the major players in the segment - like Nokia, Samsung, Sony Ericsson, LG and the likes, is slowly seeing these firms being challenged by less established players and Chinese phones. "Established global device manufacturers are losing ground due to fierce competition from local and Chinese manufacturers in the low-cost segment," said Anshul Gupta, principal research analyst at Gartner. He added, "Price remains the main criteria when buying any consumer electronic device in India, including a mobile device. Carrier strategies, lower tariffs and/or third-generation (3G) data plans will continue to shape the mobile device market in India."

Mobile phone sales in India account for almost 10 percent of worldwide phone sales and for the same reason, India is a very lucrative market for most phone makers. Currently, there are over 50 brands in the Indian market who sell their devices via legal channels. India also has a very much "active" grey market. While India is traditionally a market for low-end mobile phones, there is a highly competitive market here for mid range phones as well, Gartner noted.

Apart from this, even in the days of 3G and data, the Indian cellular market is highly voice-centric. In fact, just 10 percent of the carriers' revenue come from data services. SMS is the leader here accounting for 85 percent of revenue. Another fact which separates India, though not the only one, from other markets is that it is a prepaid market, with approximately 95 percent of existing subscribers on prepay schemes, and 98 percent of new subscribers choosing the prepaid option. This all corroborates the fact that the Indian mobile device market is driven by the lowest call rates in the world and dominated by low-cost devices, which account for 80 percent of overall sales in India in 2010.

Apple Giving Away Free Cases for iPhone 4

As promised, Apple has launched iPhone 4 Case program to give away free cases to customers. Do note that the free Bumper aka case will be given only to those customers who purchase iPhone 4 before September 30. 

At the recent Antennagate press conference, Apple had announced that it will give away free iPhone 4 Bumpers to make up for the network reception issues the iPhone 4 was facing. That was indeed a smart step by Apple to spur sales and make up for the possible damage of iPhone 4's reputation. 

The customers who will buy iPhone 4 before September 30 would be eligible for free iPhone 4 Bumper. After buying the phone, users will have to download the iPhone 4 Case Program app from the App store. You need to sign in with iTunes Store ID or Apple ID to select the Bumper of your choice and then order it.

The app reads - if you're experiencing iPhone 4 reception issues, then you're eligible to receive an iPhone 4 Bumper or other select third-party case from Apple at no charge. However, those who've purchased iPhone 4 before July 23 must apply before August 22 or within 30 days of the purchase. 

Also, if you have bought the iPhone 4 Bumper via credit card, the respective amount will be refunded automatically. The status of the refund can be checked at iPhonebumper.apple.com. Customers who bought the Bumper from AT&T Store will be reimbursed for the purchase price. You can download this rebate form (PDF) and submit before September 30. 

Those who have bought the Bumper (with cash or cheque) have to produce receipts to the Apple Store. Those who bought Bumper with gift cards would be sent a new gift card via mail. 

Finally, if you still don't feel satisfied and wish to return the phone back, you can always return the phone back. Apple will give full refund you for an undamaged iPhone 4 purchased from the Apple Retail Store or Online Store within 30 days of purchase. 

Motorola Milestone XT720 in India Now

Folks over at FoneArena have reported that Motorola is silently launching its Milestone XT720 in India. The device, which is apparently available at least in Bangalore as of now, is priced at Rs. 30,000. Motorola, however, is yet to officially announce the launch of this one.

Note that Motorola already has a "Milestone" on sale in India which is known as the Motorola "Droid" elsewhere. We are talking about another Milestone here - the XT720. This phone does have similar hardware to the existing Milestone including a 3.7-inch screen, 8 megapixel camera, (up from 5 megapixel on the Milestone), 720p HD video recording. This one, however, comes sans the slide-out QWERTY keyboard. The XT720 comes with Xenon flash - probably the first Android handset to sport one. The XT720 also comes with an HDMI port supports HSDPA, Wi-Fi and Bluetooth. It currently comes loaded with Android 2.1 - a stock version at that. So, those of you who were waiting for the Nexus One and were disappointed that it never came to India now have another chance at getting a stock Android phone.

While the specs do sound quite contemporary, you might be somewhat let down by the 720 Mhz ARM Cortex A8 processor. Here's an advertisement of the XT720

We tried contacting Motorola to check the veracity of the reports regarding the XT720's purported arrival to India. Our efforts were, however, met with statements like "Stay Tuned" and "We cannot say anything about it right now" as Motorola's corporate communication Arati Mukherjee put it. Another of our sources has hinted at an official launch of the phone by the first week of August.

Warner Interactive announces Green Lantern Game

Warner Interactive and DC Entertainment have announced a new superhero game - Green Lantern: Rise of the Manhunters. This game would be released along with the superhero feature film - Green Lantern. Inspired by the movie itself, this game would be released alongside the movie in summer 2011 for Xbox 360, PlayStation 3, Nintendo Wii and DS platforms. 

Green Lantern: Rise of Manhunters is being developed by Double Helix Games for PlayStation 3, Xbox 360 and Nintendo Wii. Double Helix has also developed reputed movie-to-game titles from Star Wars series, The Matrix and Indiana Jones. Griptonyte is developing the game for Nintendo DS handheld. 

In this game, players will get a chance to experience the era of comic book action superhero Green Lantern. In the movie, Green Lantern possesses a ring that gives him super powers and helps him maintain intergalactic peace and order. New enemy Parallax is out to destroy the balance of the universe. 

In the past, hardly any movie-based game has performed well. So let's not keep any high expectation on the game but anticipate only fun with superpowers of the superhero - Green Lantern. 

Karbonn's K25 Dual SIM Phone with QWERTY Keypad

India based Karbonn Mobiles has announced the launch of its latest dual SIM handset. Known as the K25, this device joins one of the many QWERTY keypad laden dual SIM phones available in India these days.

The device boasts of a 2.3-inch QVGA display and features like GPRS, Bluetooth, 2.0 USB port, support for WAP, SMS, MMS and e-mail. It also comes with an FM radio. Like may other devices in its price range, this phone is also social networking ready and comes pre-embedded with social networking applications like Twitter and Facebook.

The phone weighs 95 grams and features a 2.0 megapixel camera with digital zoom. The model has an internal memory of 80 MB which is expandable up to 8 GB.
 
The K25 offers 4 hours of talk time and has been priced at Rs. 4,400.

HTC promises Sense UI on Windows 7, Android 3.0

Microsoft has taken a bold step to standardize the Windows Phone 7 user interface to the core level. Taiwanese handset maker HTC is excited to put its Sense user interface on the upcoming devices based on Windows Phone 7 and Android 3.0 update, reported Forbes. Yes, HTC Sense is the same intuitive UI that brings rich widgets introduced with Android phones.

Drew Bamford, head of HTC's user experience design team, said that the company would be applying the HTC Sense UI to first line of Windows Phone 7 devices due in October. Bamford said, "Microsoft has taken firmer control of the core experience [in Windows Phone 7], but we can still innovate. The future version of Sense UI won't look the way it does on current Windows Mobile (6.5) phones, where it basically replaces all the core applications and is fully integrated into the phone." He added, "We won't be able to replace as much of the core Windows Phone experience, but we will augment it." Obviously, we won't see some dazzling differences but the Windows Phone 7 interface would be skinned.

Furthermore, HTC, in a way, has confirmed that Google is indeed working on Android 3.0 update reportedly dubbed Gingerbread. Google is said to polish Android phones with Gingerbread 3.0 update and make them more user-friendly. Bamford stated, "Google may focus more on improving the user interface on the stock Android [software], but I don't think they'll preclude manufacturer customization." Clearly, Google isn't going to take away the possibility of HTC Sense UI on it.

So, we'll get to see more of HTC Sense, Motorola motoBLUR and Samsung TouchWiz interfaces in the upcoming devices.

Bamford put some light on the future versions of Sense and what one can expect from them. The Sense UI will make discovering and sharing multimedia easier, enable better syncing of data to cloud servers and stream data over the air. Looks like HTC is working hard to put some extra muscle on future versions of its devices. 

Mafia II Demo to be out on August 10

2K Games has confirmed that it will release the second gangster game Mafia II demo on August 10. The game that is set in the 1950s will be released for PC, Xbox 360 and PlayStation 3. It will be a golden chance to get your hands on this gangster game and set some accounts straight; we hope you get what we mean. 

Sandbox-style action gangster Mafia II game demo will have a level called Buzzsaw where two guys, Joe and Henry, are on a task to take out mob boss - The Fat Man. You can explore the Empire Bay area and "type of vibrant edge-of-the-seat action". 

2K Czech has developed this game keeping control over the serious story and key elements like the day-and-night cycle. Once again, do note that the full game is set to release on August 24 in the US for PC, Xbox 360 and PlayStation 3 platforms.