The Apple In-Ear Headphones with Remote and Mic are engineered for superior acoustic accuracy, balance, and clarity. So you hear details you’ve been missing with other, lesser headphones. And the biggest breakthrough? They’re just $79.

Two is better than one.

Unlike many small headphones, each earpiece of the Apple In-Ear Headphones contains two separate high-performance drivers — a woofer to handle bass and mid-range sounds and a tweeter for high-frequency audio. These dedicated drivers help ensure accurate, detailed sound across the entire sonic spectrum. The result: you’re immersed in the music and hear details you never knew existed. Even when listening to an old favorite, you may feel like you’re hearing it for the first time.

Hear, hear.

The Apple In-Ear Headphones deliver a truly immersive sound experience by drastically reducing unwanted outside noises. The soft, silicone ear tips fit snugly and comfortably in your ear, creating a seal that isolates your music from your surroundings. Three different sizes of ear tips are included so you can find a perfect fit for each ear. Also included are a convenient carrying case for the ear tips and a cable-control case for the headphones themselves.

Keep it clean.

Inside each earpiece is a stainless steel mesh cap that protects the precision acoustic components from dust and debris. You can remove the caps for cleaning or replace them with an extra set that’s included in the box.

Be in control.

The control capsule located on the cable of the right earpiece includes a microphone and three buttons. With this convenient remote, you can adjust the volume, control music or video playback — including play/pause and next/previous — record voice memos, and answer or end iPhone calls. (See compatibility information below.)

The HTC Windows Phone 8S is the second budget Windows Phone 8 handset we've seen, and goes up against the Nokia Lumia 620. They're both around £215 SIM-free and free on a £15-£18 contract, but the 8S is more expensive on prepay, at £210 on O2 rather than £150.

The phone looks and feels very much like the more expensive HTC Windows Phone 8X. Its rubber rear extends round to the sides of the phone, so it's easy to grip and should survive the odd tumble. It doesn’t feel as beautifully engineered as Nokia's Windows 8 handsets, but it's a far cry from the creaky plastic you get on some cheaper Android phones.
Like the Lumia 620, the HTC 8S has a slightly cut-down specification compared to the high-end Nokia Lumia 820 and 920 and the HTC Windows Phone 8X. You get 512MB RAM instead of 1GB and a 1GHz dual-core processor instead of a 1.5GHz model. We did notice the speed deficit, due to an occasional slight stutter when opening applications. It's nothing major, but as Windows Phone is usually so silky smooth the slowdown is more noticeable. The phone's slower performance is also borne out in our Sunspider JavaScript benchmark, as it and the Lumia completed the test in around 1,400ms, while the 1.5GHz models hovered around the 900ms mark.
We had few complaints about the 8S's screen. Its 800x480 resolution is perfectly acceptable for a 4in model, and while blacks weren't as deep as on AMOLED screens we’d seen, icons, web pages and pictures were all pleasing to the eye. However, when we put it next to the Lumia 620 we could see that Nokia's screen was superior, with more saturated colours and higher maximum brightness.

We've covered the main features of Windows Phone 8 before, but in short it offers everything you'd expect from a modern smartphone operating system. It's fast, good-looking, has a competent browser and excellent email client, and makes it simple to create and edit Office documents. Your documents and photos will sync automatically with SkyDrive, too; while this still isn't as simple to use as sync services such as Dropbox, it works well with Windows 8's Skydrive app and is particularly useful for editing Office documents in your web browser.
There's one key thing missing from Windows Phone 8, even now, and that's app support. While the number of apps is increasing all the time, we're still missing some important ones. There's no official Dropbox client, for example, no Sky+, no Sonos, no Rightmove, no Spotify and no iPlayer. While apps aren’t everything, and the operating system's core features work well, if you rely on any of these services the lack of support will be a dealbreaker.

BlackBerry has been all over the news recently, and not usually for the right reasons. The once-dominant smartphone manufacturer has seen its stock sink in recent years as it struggled with the competition from Apple and Android.

The company's certainly not going down without a fight, though. After a rebrand from RIM to BlackBerry, two new handsets have appeared running the new BlackBerry 10 OS: the keyboard-equipped BlackBerry Q10 and this, the touchscreen-only Z10.
Initial impressions of the Z10 aren’t brilliant, as it's a fairly uninspiring black rectangle with rounded corners; the Z10 was all too often described as a "poor man's iPhone 5" during our time with the handset.

The non-slip rubber back is a winner
However, it feels like it would survive plenty of abuse. There's no flex at all in the body, and the rubber rear means you're unlikely to drop it. It feels reassuringly heavy, but 136g isn’t out of the ordinary for a modern smartphone.

OUT WITH THE OLD

The new BlackBerry 10 OS is the big selling point for this phone, and it's a huge step forward from previous touchscreen BlackBerrys. You can banish memories of the horrendous BlackBerry Storm, as the Z10 feels like a slick and modern smartphone.
Navigating BlackBerry 10 is all about swiping from left to right. The OS is arranged in a series of panels, for messaging, open apps and your main app tray.
When you make the 'home' gesture, which involves swiping up from the bottom of the display, you go to a screen of currently-open programs, each represented by a thumbnail. When you switch between apps, the previously-used program stays open in a frozen state, which makes it very quick to open it again. This means that once you've been using your phone for a while, you rarely need to go back to the app tray to find and open an app again, as if you've used it before it will still be running.

The homescreen shows your currently-running apps as a series of cards, Palm OS-style
BlackBerry 10 also has a standard app tray containing several screens of icons, which you can rearrange by long-pressing and dragging apps to where you want them.
So far the OS feels like a mix of Android and the defunct Palm OS. However, this is a BlackBerry, so messaging is never far away. Swipe left from the home screen and you'll find the BlackBerry Hub. This is a well-designed interface for all your messaging, from your email accounts through text messaging through voicemail. The accounts are displayed in a list, complete with a number denoting the number of unread messages in each and an asterisk for any new email.

The messaging hub is a great way to keep track of multiple accounts
The asterisk is a particularly neat touch; while many smartphones just show you the number of unread messages, which may include a number you have just chosen to ignore, BlackBerry OS 10 lets you know if your collection of 685 unread messages contains a new one. The BlackBerry Hub also has an aggregated inbox, which brings all your messages into one place, together with any upcoming appointments if you swipe down from the top of the screen.

posted on21 Mar 2013 at 11:48, by David Ludlow

Our iPhone 6 release date, features and price rumours article is updated on a regular basis, so check back to keep up with the latest information
If there's one thing that everyone seems to be certain on, it's that Apple plans to release its next smartphone in spring 2013. However, there's some confusion over whether the new phone will be the iPhone 6 or the iPhone 5S. This article deals with the iPhone 6, although there's naturally some crossover with our iPhone 5S rumours article.

iPHONE 6 NAME

There's a lot of debate over what the new iPhone will be called. If you follow Apple's naming strategy, then the iPhone 5S would be the most likely choice. Typically Apple keeps the same case (or very similar) for two generations, improving the internal specification. So the iPhone 3G was followed by the iPhone 3GS. It was the iPhone 4 that introduced a new design, followed by the improved iPhone 4S. By that regard, the iPhone 5, which introduced the widescreen display, should be followed by a spec upgrade in the iPhone 5S.
However, things aren't quite as clear cut anymore. While Apple used to do yearly (or there about) updates, the iPad 4 was something of a surprise release, coming just six months after the iPad 3. If that's a sign that Apple's moving to a six-monthly release schedule, then it could be that the iPhone 5S gets released as a more budget model, while the iPhone 6 is released as a brand-new phone.
There's plenty to suggest that Apple needs something new, as the iPhone 5 wasn't met with the same rapturous applause of the previous releases, both because of the hardware and the problems with Apple Maps. With the competition getting a lot tougher, such as with the excellent Samsung Galaxy S3 and the soon-to-be-released Samsung Galaxy S4, it could mean that Apple needs to up its game with a brand new phone.

iPHONE 6 FEATURES

With its Retina display, Apple says that you can't see individual pixels on the iPhone's screen when used at a normal distance. That effectively means that upping the resolution on the same size screen makes no sense. The only way to add more pixels, then, is to produce a slightly bigger phone with a bigger screen.
It's now thought that the iPhone 6 will have a Sharp IGZO (Indium Gallium Zinc Oxide) screen. This new technology allows for screens that use less power and are considerably thinner. Rumours certainly picked up when the Sharp IGZO technology was demonstrated at CES 2013.
Reports have appeared that the iPhone 6 will have a Super HD screen, but no details of screen resolution or size have appeared. We'd assume that the Apple will stick with the new widescreen format it introduced with the iPhone 5, though.
In terms of storage, 64GB has been the top model for a couple of years, so we'd expect the top model to now be 128GB. This has been predicted by Misek, who believes that the iPhone will offer more storage than before. Whether or not this means a new top-end model or whether the entry-level 16GB model hasn't been confirmed, but we'd expect Apple to ditch the low-end and stick with its current pricing.
UPDATE: NEW STORAGE INFORMATION The rumours of a 128GB version would seem to be true, as we know that Apple now has that capacity, thanks to the recent launch of a 128GB iPad 4.
Recently quite quietly, the new model doubled the maximum capacity of the previous high-end iPad (64GB). This update was said to be about increasing the variety of uses for the tablet, with Apple stating that more storage was good for large files for use in applications such as CAD and music production. It's also a more useful amount of storage for photos and videos.
The update to the iPad 4 was a completely new model with a new price, so we'd expect the same range of capacities and prices to be available from the iPad 5: 16GB, 32GB, 64GB and 128GB. With Apple now using 128GB storage in its tablets, the question is whether or not it will provide the same range of capacities in its iPhone and iPad Mini range, too.
Given that the capacity is now available to Apple and that the smartphone market is even more competitive, we'd say that a 128GB version of the new phone is more than likely.
NFC
One of the omissions from the iPhone 5 was NFC, but with the technology starting to appear in most new Android phones, we'd expect this in the in iPhone 6. With Apple pushing its Passbook App, for storing store cards, tickets and coupons, integrating this with NFC would make a lot of sense. An Apple phone with NFC would also help push the technology, as retailers are more likely to take it seriously with this handset on board.

iPHONE 6 SMART BEZEL

One of the things that attracts people to the iPhone is its ease of use and simplicity. However, iOS has barely changed since launch, so Apple could well introduce new ways to interact with its phones in order to stay ahead of the competition.
Patently Apple managed to dig up information on a new patent for a smart bezel. This will use a secondary display system, which could be embedded around the primary screen or even on the back of a device to provide new controls that light up when needed.
According to Patently Apple, "Apple intends to use the secondary display to introduce a new set of illuminated indicators that would be able to morph into various controls for work and play. Illuminated gaming and productivity controls could be built into the face-side of the bezel and/or selected back-side areas of iOS devices like the iPad."

Smart bezel will use a secondary display system that illuminates controls when they're needed
That sounds pretty cool to us and could negate some of the negative point of iOS, such as having to scroll all the way to the top of an SMS thread to call the contact.

iPHONE 6 PROCESSOR

Judging what Apple will do with the processor is harder, but we'd expect an updated model in the iPhone 6. Currently the iPhone 5 has a dual-core Apple A6 processor, but a quad-core Apple A7, using ARM Cortex A15-based cores, sounds plausible to us.

There are already quad-core phones from Apple's competitors and there's now the Samsung octa-core Exynos 5 chip. However, it's important to note that more cores doesn't been better performance and the iPhone 5 is still the smoothest and fastest smartphone that we've used, despite having 'only' two cores.
With that in mind, Apple will only use the hardware that its phone requires, rather than going all-out to get the most number of cores into a phone.
UPDATE: NEW PROCESSOR INFORMATION
The latest information suggests that the [a href="http://www.expertreviews.co.uk/mobile-phones/1298617/iphone-6-a7-processor-being-built-not-for-iphone-5s"]Apple A7 processor[/b] is now being finished by the Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing company. It appears as though, the final design will go in March, then move to risk production in May-June.
With that kind of schedule production of the new chip would happen in 2014, meaning that this processor will definitely be for the iPhone 6, while the iPhone 5S is more likely to get some kind of tweaked A6 processor.
Recent rumours have suggested that the [a href="http://www.expertreviews.co.uk/news/1298701/iphone-6-may-get-intel-manufactured-processors"]iPhone 6 process will be manufactured by Intel[/b], rather than Samsung.
With Intel's core market of desktop and laptops contracting, the company is looking to expand its business by offering contract manufacturing. It makes a lot of sense, as Intel has the capital investment in global fabrication plants, which means it should be able to offer competitive prices. It also means that Apple can move away from Samsung, reducing its reliance on its main competitor.
This shouldn't be read as a move to Intel-based technology, though. Although Intel has a smartphone chip, it hasn't been used in a lot of phones, with manufacturers preferring ARM. ARM has the dual benefits of low power requirements, which are important on battery-powered devices, and the fact that it licenses its technology, so manufacturers can easily build their own custom chips.

iOS 7

One of the constants of the iPhone has been iOS 6, which as barely changed. In fact, with iOS 5, which was introduced with the iPhone 5, the OS barely changed, bar the introduction of the disastrous Apple Maps app.
With Android offering Widgets and Windows Mobile 8 a cleaner interface, it's fair to say that iOS is starting to look a bit dated. We'd bet money on Apple working on a successor with a different interface, but whether or not this is iOS 7 and whether or not it will be released with the iPhone 6 is yet to be seen.

iPHONE 6 CONCEPTS

Working off the discovered patents and leaked information, a lot of iPhone 6 concepts have been released. At the moment, the most interesting one is from InventHelp's Nickolay Lamm.
"I feel that the sales success of the iPhone 5 overlooks the fact that it was a pretty boring phone," Lamm said. "I looked at all of Apple’s recent patents and chose four which Apple may include in the iPhone 6 or later version. I then hired a 3D graphic designer to illustrate each of these patents so that the illustrations were as realistic as possible. I gave him very specific guidelines to follow."
The shot below shows a possible version of the phone, along with the Smart Bezel highlighting controls on the screen. The finished iPhone 6 will most likely look different, but it's interesting to see how Smart Bezel could work.

This iPhone 6 concept shows how the new phone could look, complete with its smart bezel

iPHONE 6 RELEASE DATE

The next iPhone, whatever its name, is most likely to come out in Spring 2013. According to Topeka Capital analyst Brian White, reported on Business Insider the next iPhone is going to come out in May or June. This fits with all the other reports that we've read.
Mac Rumours has a similar report, with Peter Misek, analyst at investment firm Jeffries & Co, reporting, "Our checks indicate that preliminary builds for the iPhone 5S will start in March for a launch in June/July."

iPHONE 6 PRICE

Apple typically releases its new models at the same price as the old ones, and we can't see it introducing a more expensive phone into this tough market. If that holds out, then, and assuming that the 16GB model is dropped, we'd expect the 32GB model to cost £529, the 64GB model £599 and the 128GB model £699.

Walt Mossberg says the Nexus 4 is a good phone, with especially good prices for unlocked versions, but Android buyers should consider other models with LTE, better speakers, more memory expansion, and the ability to use all carriers. (Photo: Google)

Google's GOOG -0.42% Android operating system is used on hundreds of smartphones and tablets. But the flagship Android devices, the ones the company calls "the best of Google," are labeled Nexus. They are meant to show the world all that an Android device can be, and are designed and sold directly online by Google. Next week, the company will begin offering the latest phone in this line, the Nexus 4.
This new phone is part of a Google-designed portfolio that now includes two other devices: the Nexus 7 and Nexus 10 tablets. The phone, which features a new version of Android, hits the market at a time when Apple AAPL +0.14% has had early success with its iPhone 5, and as Nokia NOK1V.HE -1.52% and HTC are bringing out devices with a fresh version of Microsoft's MSFT -0.72% phone software, Windows Phone 8.

Smartphone Wars

Explore and compare smartphone features and specifications, including the Nexus 4.

View Interactive

I found the Nexus 4 more evolutionary than revolutionary. It has some nice features and carries on Google's recent tablet tradition of low pricing. But there's no knock-your-socks-off stuff in the new phone. Even the new version of Android is just a further iteration of the current variant, called Jelly Bean, rather than an all-new edition, such as Google introduced last year at this time with the prior Nexus phone.
And the Nexus 4 is missing two important features: the ability to use LTE, the most consistently speedy 4G network in the U.S.; and a memory capacity greater than 16 gigabytes, the amount most smartphones start with. The new phone also lacks a memory-expansion slot. The phone's most touted new capability, the ability to capture 360-degree pictures, worked poorly in my tests.
Otherwise, I found the latest Nexus to be a solid, reliable, phone and a good value. On Nov. 13, Google will begin selling it starting at $299 for an unlocked version—one that has no carrier plan or contract—with a puny 8 gigabytes of internal storage. A 16 gigabyte unlocked version will cost $349. You'll have to add the cost of a contract or prepaid plan from T-Mobile, AT&T T -0.11% or carriers that use the same network technology to those prices (the phone won't work on Verizon or Sprint). T-Mobile will be offering the 16-gigabyte version for $199 with a two-year contract. To grasp how inexpensive the Nexus 4 is, consider that Samsung's popular Galaxy SIII is about $550 unlocked; $199 with a two-year contract.

Enlarge Image

Google

The Nexus 4's Photo Sphere feature shows a 360-degree image, in which you can pan around to see up and down as well as side to side. Blue dots guide the photo taker.

The Nexus 4, built for Google by LG of Korea, has a large 4.7-inch screen with high resolution, higher than Apple's 4-inch Retina display on the iPhone 5, though with slightly fewer pixels per inch because it's spread over a larger display. The new Nexus is 20% thicker than the iPhone 5 and 24% heavier. But its curved rear edges made it feel comfortable in my hand.
It's made of plastic, but is clad in relatively sturdy Gorilla Glass 2 on both front and back. There's a 1.3 megapixel camera on the front and an 8 megapixel camera on the back. These cameras took sharp, vivid pictures and videos and you can apply filters to snapshots.
While I didn't do a formal battery test, the Nexus 4 lasted a full workday in mixed use, including Web surfing, lots of app use, email, texting, viewing of short videos, occasional music playback and voice calling.
A new feature in the Nexus 4 allows you to charge the battery, which is sealed inside, without plugging in an adapter, by merely placing it on a charging pad plugged into the wall. These pads, which Google doesn't sell, must comply with an industry standard called Qi. I had mixed results trying this. I tested it on two Qi pads and only one worked with the Nexus 4.

Mossberg's Mailbox

• Walter S. Mossberg answers readers' questions about technology

Instead of LTE, the Nexus 4 relies on a 4G standard called HSPA+, which is more common outside the U.S. This network standard can be as fast or faster than LTE in places, but in my tests comparing the Nexus 4 on HSPA+ with an iPhone 5 using LTE, the differences were often stark. In one location, the two were about the same, at just under 15 megabits per second for downloads. But in two others, in two cities, the Nexus 4 on HSPA+ managed average download speeds of just 2.8 mbps and 3.8 mbps, while the iPhone 5 on LTE averaged nearly 30 mbps. Some other phones offer both LTE and HSPA+.
I found voice calls to be clear and reliable, but the external speaker sounded weak and it's worse when you aren't holding the phone because it's located on the rear.
The phone's fast processor, coupled with improvements in the new version of Jelly Bean, called Android 4.2, made the Nexus 4's touch screen fast and fluid. One new feature of the latest operating system is called Gesture Typing, which allows you to compose text by swiping from key to key, rather than tapping them. This worked fine, but is similar to a system called Swype, which has long been available on other Android phones. Another nice feature in Android 4.2 is improved auto-correction. It now tries to anticipate the next word likely to be typed. So, if you type "Monday," it suggests "night" and "morning."
However, I found the most touted new feature on the Nexus 4, an enhanced panorama photo feature called Photo Sphere, disappointing. A Photo Sphere is a 360-degree image of a scene, in which you can pan around to see up and down as well as side to side. Google has made it easy to take such a picture, guiding you with blue dots as you move from around a starting point, automatically adding more of a scene in all directions until you decide to stop.
However, in all four of my Photo Sphere tests the results were poor. Objects like chairs, roofs and even people came out distorted and uneven. Google officials said they couldn't explain my results.
Also, you can only fully share these Photo Spheres with others, for now, via the company's Google+ social network. If you email them, they arrive as static scenes.
The new version of Android introduced on the Nexus 4 also has an enhanced version of Google search, which yields more answers, rather than just links, and speaks some of the answers back to you when you search by voice rather than typing. But the same new features were just released in a new version of Google search for the iPhone. In my tests, the iPhone version sometimes gave richer answers, such as hourly temperatures on weather searches, missing from the Android version.
Overall, the Nexus 4 is a good phone, with especially good prices for unlocked versions. But I'd advise Android buyers to consider other models with LTE, better speakers, and the ability to add more memory and work on all carriers

	Samsung's Galaxy S 4	Apple's iPhone 5	RIM's BlackBerry Z10	Nokia's Lumia 920	Google's Nexus 4
Key Facts		WSJ review >>	WSJ review >>	WSJ review >>	WSJ review >>
U.S. carriers	AT&T, Sprint, T-Mobile, Verizon, U.S. Cellular, Cricket	AT&T, Sprint, Verizon	AT&T, T-Mobile, Verizon	AT&T	T-Mobile (also via Google Play)
U.S. release date	End of April 2013	September 2012	March 2013	November 2012	November 2012
Starting price (with contract)	Not disclosed	$199	$199	$99	$199
Staring price (without contract)	Not disclosed	$649	$599	$449	$299
Operating system	Android 4.2.2 (Jelly Bean)	IOS 6	BlackBerry 10	Windows Phone 8	Android 4.2 (Jelly Bean)
Wireless	LTE	LTE	LTE/HSPA+	LTE	HSPA+/3G/GSM
Measurements
Dimensions	5.38" x 2.75" x 0.31"	4.87" x 2.31" x 0.30"	5.12" x 2.58" x 0.35"	5.13" x 2.79" x 0.42"	5.27" x 2.70" x 0.36"
Weight	4.59 oz	3.95 oz	4.78 oz	6.52 oz	4.90 oz
Display
Diagonal length	5"	4"	4.2"	4.5"	4.7"
Pixels	1920 x 1080	1136 x 640	1280 x 768	1280 x 768	1280 x 768
Pixels per inch	441	326	356	332	320
Camera
Rear	13 MP	8 MP	8 MP	8.7 MP	8 MP
Front	2 MP	1.2 MP	2 MP	1.2 MP	1.3 MP
Video capture	1080p	1080p	1080p	1080p	1080p
Memory
Internal storage	16 GB, 32 GB, 64 GB version + micro SD card up to 64 GB	16 GB, 32 GB, 64 GB	16 GB	32 GB	8 GB, 16 GB
RAM	2 GB	1 GB	2 GB	1 GB	2 GB
Battery
Capacity	2,600 mAh	1,440 mAh	1,800 mAH	2,000 mAh	2,100 mAh
Maximum talk time	Unavailable	8 hours	10 hours (3G)	10.8 hours	15 hours
Maximum standby time	Unavailable	225 hours	305 hours (3G)	460 hours (3G)	390 hours
Processor
System chip	*Qualcomm Snapdragon Fusion Pro or Samsung Exynos 5 Octa	Apple A6	Qualcomm S4	Qualcomm S4	Qualcomm S4
Processor core	quad	dual	dual	dual	quad
CPU speed	*1.6 GHz (Samsung chip) or 1.9 GHz (Qualcomm chip)	1.3 GHz	1.5 GHz	1.5 GHz	1.5 GHz
Special Features	Eye movements control the screen and pause video; simultaneously use front and rear cameras; 'Group Play' allows users to share content, such as simultaneously playing the same song; change music, scroll pages or accept calls by hovering fingers over device	Siri voice assistant, iCloud storage	Time-shift photos, double-layer keyboard that adjusts to typing, 'Hub' for easy access to emails and messages	Camera with optical-image stablization, City Lens augmented reality app	Data transfers by touching two phones, wireless charging

*Chip and CPU speed are dependent on market.

Sources and images: the companies

Walt Mossberg tells us the Nokia Lumia 920 is a great phone for a great price as long as you are ok with it being extremely heavy and thick. (Photo: Nokia)

Both Nokia NOK1V.HE -1.44% and Microsoft MSFT -0.72% were once titans in the smartphone world, but the pair have struggled to find favor with consumers, carriers and developers in the iPhone-Android era. Now, the two companies, which have become close partners, hope they've finally found the formula for success. The product on which their hopes rest is Nokia's new flagship smartphone, the Lumia 920, running Microsoft's revamped operating system, Windows Phone 8.

Nokia's new Lumia 920 smartphone is a quality phone with attractive features and twice the typical memory, but it is thick and heavy, Walt Mossberg discusses on digits. Photo: Getty Images.

I've been testing the Lumia 920 and consider it a handsome, high-quality phone with attractive features that worked well for me. Not only that, but it costs half of what most other top-of-the-line smartphones set you back, and yet gives you twice the typical memory. It is greatly improved from the first flagship Lumia, last spring's Lumia 900.

Nokia

The brightly colored Lumia 920 is 65% heavier than Apple's iPhone 5.

The Digital Solution

• Using a Self-Made App for Family Ping-Pong

While this isn't a review of the new Windows Phone 8 software, I can say that it also has improved in the past year. Its underlying architecture has been rebuilt, it is faster and more reliable, it now has smaller icons so you needn't scroll as much to find what you want, and it still offers a fresh, engaging interface that sets it apart.
But the Lumia 920 has two big drawbacks: It is heavy and thick and, like all Windows Phones, it has a much smaller app selection than the iPhone or Android phones.
This new Lumia, which costs $100 with a two-year contract from AT&T, T -0.11% has a sharp, vibrant 4.5-inch screen, a very good 8.7-megapixel rear camera, and is fast and fluid. It supports LTE, the most consistently speedy U.S. cellular-data technology, and has 32 gigabytes of memory for storage. It is made of plastic, but it is a solid-feeling plastic in bright colors—including red, yellow and blue—that are injected into the material.

Enlarge Image

The phone also has some unusual features. Its screen responds to fingernails and even fingers clad in regular thin gloves (though winter-weight gloves didn't work for me). And it can be charged without plugging in a cable, by merely placing it on a charging plate that plugs into the wall. (The charging plate, normally a $49 option, is being included with the phone for an unspecified period.)
While I didn't do a formal battery test, this Nokia lasted me through a day of mixed use. Voice calls were reliable and clear, and the phone's speakers sounded great. Photos and videos looked very good.
In my tests, the LTE speeds were very good, averaging 17 megabits per second downstream. But AT&T's LTE network is only in about 100 cities.
However, the Lumia 920 has a few characteristics that may turn off potential buyers. The biggest downside is its sheer size. This may be the heaviest modern smartphone I've tested, and it's one of the thickest.
To give you an idea, it's 65% heavier than Apple's iPhone 5, and 40% thicker. We're in an era of smartphones with larger and larger screens, but most phone makers take care to keep these bigger-screen phones relatively light and thin, something Nokia didn't do here. For instance, compared with the latest high-end Android phone, Google's GOOG -0.42% Nexus 4, which has an even larger 4.7-inch screen, the Lumia 920 is 33% heavier and 17% thicker.

N

looks just like a 10-inch tablet

 

The Asus 10-inch Android tablet has resurfaced with leaked press shots and a new name.

Now called the Asus MeMo Pad 10, it looks to be the same tablet as the ME301T model hinted at earlier this year.

Based on previous information, the Pad 10 should sport a 10.1-inch 1280 x 800 resolution display, Android 4.1 Jelly Bean and Nvidia's Tegra 3 quad-core processor.

If earlier reports still hold true, inside of the tablet is a mere 1GB of RAM and 16GB of internal storage, though at least the latter can be expanded through a microSD card slot.

A 10-inch alternative tablet

The MeMo Pad 10 is hardly a powerhouse by any stretch of the definition, but that may work in the tablet's favor.

After CES, Asus announced the similarly underpowered 7-inch MeMo Padwith an attractive US$149 price tag to offset its specs.

Asus could use the same strategy to position the MeMo Pad 10 as a budget-friendly 10-inch tablet. Early reports from smaller European shops disagree though, with listed prices ranging from €329 (US$449, UK£286, AU$431) to €386 (US$526, UK£335, AU$506).

The leaked press shots look like the genuine article, and show the tablet in gray, white, and pink, but there is still no official word from Asus confirming the MeMo Pad 10.

The tablet may make its official debut at MWC 2013 later this month, though Asus seems just as keen on announcements the day after a big event these days.

That's true in tech, too!

This week, we saw the circle of life in full effect: one noble platform died, and a new one was born - and we found ourselves wondering whether the company formerly known as RIM would run from the past or learn from it.

New shoots at BlackBerry

RIM used to be the king of Pride Rock, the go-to phone firm for road warriors, executives and email addicts, but as Mufasa says, "a king's time as ruler rises and falls like the sun" - and in recent years RIM's sun appeared to be setting. The BlackBerry platform has lost market share to Apple and Android, and its brand new BB10 operating system, which is designed to see it through the next decade, has been plagued by delays.

Now, though, BlackBerry's back! There's a new OS, BlackBerry 10. There's a new, flagship, touchscreen phone, the BlackBerry Z10. There's a new QWERTY phone, the BlackBerry Q10. There's a new company name - it's BlackBerry now, not Research in Motion - and even the poor oldBlackBerry PlayBook is getting an upgrade.

It's exciting stuff, so exciting that RIM-sorry-BlackBerry's European MD made himself look like Rafiki's backside during a BBC interview when he was so excited he couldn't answer any questions.

Back in 10?

BlackBerry might not be good at answering questions, but we are - and the big one is, of course, "are the new devices and the new OS any good?" Reviewing the BlackBerry Z10, John McCann is cautiously impressed. While the BlackBerry Z10 is "an unassuming slab of black glass and plastic which mimics the general aesthetic design of many a smartphone" and feels a bit plasticky, it is "a decent all round phone" with a good camera, a decent messaging hub, lightning fast web browsing and other goodies. However, "the jury is still out on BlackBerry 10." It's nice to see a new OS, but not everyone wants to learn yet another system. In a word, it's "decent" - pretty good, but not jaw-droppingly brilliant.

That's a worry, says Gareth Beavis, because BlackBerry faces "an almost impossible task to win over smartphone users". There's "a massively understocked app store compared to rivals", it isn't cheap, and there aren't any must-have "killer apps". Here's the d-word again: It's a "decent enough product", but it doesn't offer "a game-changing experience".

"Five years ago that would have been enough," Gary Marshall says, "but today many are wondering whether a good-enough phone is good enough to save the BlackBerry platform. What happened? Ten things spring to mind." Marshall's list of major strategic mistakes, idiocy and sheer bad luck reads like a Carry On film - Carry On Losing Market Share, perhaps - featuring Bono, twin CEOs, riots and massive network outages. However, as Pumbaa the warthog points out, "you got to put your behind in your past" - and by binning the RIM name and its old OS, the newly anointed BlackBerry has done just that.

But it will also confront a much more competitive market than it faced during previous BlackBerry launches—one in which smartphone- market leaders Apple Inc. AAPL +0.14% and Samsung Electronics Corp. 005930.SE -0.14% have rocketed ahead of RIM in both market share and sales. The two also have significantly more cash than RIM to maintain their leads, meaning RIM may no longer be fighting to be a smartphone leader but rather to simply keep a place at the table.

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Bloomberg

Thorsten Heins, chief executive officer of BlackBerry, attends the launch of the BlackBerry Z10 smartphone in Sydney, Australia, on March 18.

Related Video

Will the new BlackBerry devices be able to entice consumers to turn away from the competition? Engadget editor-in-chief Tim Stevens joins The News Hub with a forecast. Photo: BlackBerry.

Research in Motion CEO Thorsten Heins talks with WSJ's William Connors about what to expect from the BlackBerry Z10, how much RIM is staking on the launch, and what's in store for company beyond the new phones.

• Mossberg Reviews the BlackBerry Z10 & BB10 OS

RIM executives acknowledge the gap. They have also refrained from setting specific sales goals for the launch, which starts Friday, when AT&T Inc. T -0.11% will begin selling the Z10, the first of two new BlackBerrys running on RIM's new BlackBerry 10 operating system. But the Z10 sells for roughly the same price as the iPhone 5 and Samsung's Galaxy SIII, pitting it head-to-head with those devices. The Z10 is already available in such markets as the U.K. and India.
"Our objective and that of our carrier partners is that very quickly we emerge as a strong No. 3," says Frank Boulben, RIM's chief marketing officer . "I expect to see a lot of excitement in the coming days in the U.S. market."
RIM's hold on the lucrative U.S. smartphone market has fallen from close to 50% in early 2009 to 5.9% this year, according to comScore. This week Gartner estimated that even if RIM's new phones are well received, the company won't reach 5% world-wide market share by the end of 2016. A series of delays pushed the Z10's launch a year past its expected date, and the U.S. launch comes two months after other markets got the phones.
But RIM is now spending lavishly. It rolled out a Super Bowl commercial for the first time, and it has plastered newspapers and billboards with ads and hosted parties with celebrities and musicians in cities like Austin, Texas, and Los Angeles in a bid to win back a toehold in the U.S. market.
"They've got an attractive device and a good operating system, but ultimately for them to succeed they've got to get some excitement and buzz in the consumer segment again and it's an open question whether they can do that," says Gartner analyst Van Baker. "I don't think they have any chance of getting back to where they were, but if they can get 5%-6% market share, ultimately that's a successful business model for them."

More on BlackBerry

• A New BlackBerry—But More Delays 1/30/13
• Mossberg: BlackBerry Reinvents Itself 1/30/13
• CEO Heins on BlackBerry's U.S. Delay and Marketing Costs 1/30/13
• Digits: BlackBerry Z10 Review Roundup 1/30/13
• New BlackBerry on Sale in U.K. 1/31/13
• New BlackBerrys Go on Sale in Canada 2/05/13
• Live Coverage of BlackBerry

Analysts' estimates vary widely—from 300,000 to 1.5 million—for how many new BlackBerrys RIM shipped in the month they were available during the fiscal fourth quarter, which ended March 2. This month RIM announced that an "established partner" had ordered one million Z10s, but it didn't identify the partner or specify the time period of the order. RIM will report earnings March 28, but analysts aren't expecting a clear picture of how sales are going until the following quarter.
Apple, by comparison, sold five million iPhone 5s on their first weekend of availability last year, and Samsung shipped 10 million Galaxy SIII phones in their first two months last summer. Few expect RIM to ship that many phones, but a round of modest analyst forecasts have helped double RIM's stock over the past six months.

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Bloomberg News

Potential customers examined the BlackBerry Z10 last week at its consumer launch in Jakarta, Indonesia. It goes on sale in the U.S. on Friday.

RIM also isn't likely to match Samsung and Apple's marketing heft. Earlier this year, Chief Executive Thorsten Heins said RIM would spend "in the hundreds of millions" of dollars on world-wide marketing for the company's new phones. In 2012 Samsung spent $401 million and Apple spent more than $333 million on U.S. marketing alone, according to consulting firm Kantar Media. RIM spent around $35 million in both 2011 and 2012.
RIM is spending more than it did on previous launches. It hosted parties at a recent technology conference in Austin, Texas, and in Los Angeles Wednesday night. Also on Wednesday, Mr. Heins appeared on CNN's "Piers Morgan Tonight," touting the phone.
But RIM's window for grabbing attention may already be closing. Last week Samsung unveiled its latest Galaxy smartphone, the S4, at a lavish event in New York. Macquarie Securities analyst Kevin Smithen said he spoke to several smartphone buyers there from "large financial and consumer-products companies" who said they were considering the Z10. But "they appeared to be impressed by the [Galaxy] S4," he said in a note to clients, and may delay their Z10 decision until they can evaluate the S4.

It's Apple vs Steam Box in the eyes of Valve's co-founder

It's Apple vs Steam Box in the eyes of Valve's co-founder

It's full-steam ahead for Valve's Steam Box console, but the company's transition from the PC room to the living room may find Apple standing in the way of its success.

"The threat right now is that Apple has gained a huge amount of market share," said Valve Co-Founder Gabe Newell to a recent University of Texas' LBJ School of Public Affairs class.

According to the comments picked up by Polygon, the Half-Life 2 developer feels as if "[Apple] has a relatively obvious pathway towards entering the living room with their platform."

Whether it's Apple iTV or another Trojan Horse video game device, Newell sees a scenario in which the Cupertino company introduces a "dumbed-down living room platform."

Seeing the 'Big Picture Mode'

Once again, Apple is seen by a company as a major contender, despite the fact that it doesn't have any video game hardware in a single gamer's living room yet.

"I think Apple rolls the console guys really easily," said Newell, backing up the Steam Box's console-killer potential even if we see Xbox 720 andPS4 launch in the next several months.

"The question is can we make enough progress in the PC space to establish ourselves there, and also figure out better ways of addressing mobile before Apple takes over the living room?"

Valve's progress has already begun with the launch of Big Picture Mode(BPM) for its Steam service. BPM optimizes the PC game-running software for the living room.

Likewise, Steam is already an indie-friendly platform for aspiring video game developers. This is something Apple has done well, too - albeit with a $100 (UK£63, AU$95) annual iOS developer program fee.

Steam Box vs. Nvidia Project Shield

Apple isn't the only competition that Newell sees for Valve's Steam Box. He specifically names Nvidia as a PC hardware company that's also looking to gain a living room foothold.

"I think a whole bunch of hardware companies are going to be releasing products in the next 12 months," predicted Newell. "You'll hear it referred to as Miracast, [Project] Shield from Nvidia, or lots of other people."

"There are going to be a huge set of products that say, 'If you want something that's incredibly cheap, at a price point well below anything that consoles will be able to reach, you're going to take advantage of the PC that's running somewhere in your house.'"

It's at this point that Newell makes his strongest argument for the Steam Box being the best grown-up gaming device for the living room.

"[Gamers will] say, 'Well, I could buy a console, which assumes I'll re-buy all my content, have a completely different video system, and, Oh, I have a completely different group of friends, apparently.'

"'Or I can just extend everything I love about the PC and the internet into the living room,'" Newell said of a gamers' thought process - making the choice seem so one-sided and easy.

LG's trio of second generation Optimus L-series smartphones has made an appearance before their official announcement. The LG Optimus L3 II, L5 II, and L7 II have received expected hardware upgrades over their predecessors, while keeping the same design language which lead to over 10 million units sold.

The entry-level LG Optimus L3 II from the image above will feature a beefier 1GHz CPU and improved IPS display panel, compared to what its predecessor had to offer, while keeping the same size and resolution. The camera will be a 5MP unit - up from 3.2MP for the older model.

The LG Optimus L5 II on the other hand, will pack a 1GHz Cortex-A9 CPU and PowerVR SGX531 GPU - a serious update over the 800MHz Cortex-A5 silicon of the first generation. The display is tipped to be a 4" WVGA unit, while the OS on tap will be Android 4.1.2 Jelly Bean.

Finally, we have the LG Optimus L7 II, which is scheduled to add an extra CPU core compared to the original. Reports point at a Qualcomm Snapdragon MSM8225 1GHz dual-core unit, Adreno 203 GPU, and 768MB of RAM. A 4.3" WVGA display, 8MP camera, 2,460mAh battery, and Android 4.1.2 Jelly Bean are also expected at launch.

Dual-SIM versions of the LG Optimus L5 II and L7 II are also expected, given the L-series' popularity in developing markets.

We are all but certain that the new LG Optimus L-series trio will break cover during MWC in Barcelona later this month. We will be out there in full force, so we will tell you all about the new devices.