Samsung Confirms about SIM Card Lock on European Galaxy Note 3 and Other Handsets

Today, South Korean mobile phone maker Samsung Electronics has confirmed that some of its smartphones sold in Europe come with a local SIM card lock.

The info emerged yesterday, and an official word on the matter is now available from the handset vendor, with additional info on what all that involves. According to the company, some of its current devices sold in the European Union with SIM cards from carriers in Europe work as usual. Furthermore, the company explains that users can continue using these devices outside the European Union with the SIM card of their carrier via roaming service to appropriate roaming charges to their wireless service provider. What’s more interesting is that Samsung suggests that the device could be unlocked to be used with any other carrier worldwide if a SIM card was not placed inside it, as SamMobile reports.

“If purchased in the European Union and not yet been put into use to be activated for the first time abroad, users can unlock their device for the region free from local Samsung service partners,” the company notes. Samsung has also unveiled that the regional SIM card lock has been applied to models that have been produced starting with the end of July 2013, and that they will be marked with corresponding stickers. The list of affected devices includes Samsung GALAXY S III, Galaxy S II, GALAXY Note, GALAXY S4, GALAXY S4 mini and the GALAXY Note 3.

Additionally, the company explains that this is a functionality of devices sold with SIM cards from mobile carriers in specific countries in the European Economic Area (EEA) and non-EU markets. The list of EEA countries includes: Austria, Belgium, Bulgaria, Cyprus, Czech Republic, Denmark, Estonia, Finland, France, Germany, Greece, Hungary, Iceland, Ireland, Italy, Latvia, Liechtenstein, Lithuania, Luxembourg, Malta, the Netherlands, Norway, Poland, Portugal, Romania, Slovakia, Slovenia, Spain, Sweden, UK, Switzerland, and Croatia. At the same time, the move was put in effect for devices in Albania, Andorra, Belarus, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Macedonia, Moldova, Monaco, Montenegro, San Marino, Serbia, and Vatican City.

It’s yet unclear what the SIM card lock implies, but the general consensus here is that users in Europe who will purchase any of the aforementioned devices won’t be able to place inside them SIM cards from carriers operating in countries that are not mentioned above.

Samsung Galaxy Note 3
Image credits to Samsung

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Nexus 5 Spotted in GFXBench Next to iPhone 5s and Xperia Z1

Google and LG have been long rumored to plan the release of the next device in the popular Nexus lineup, and some more info on the handset is now available.

Supposedly set to land on shelves as Nexus 5, the smartphone has been spotted in the GFXBench benchmarking website, where its performance capabilities were compared to those of iPhone 5s, Xperia Z1, and other devices. As it turns out, the Adreno 330 graphics processor that the smartphone is expected to pack inside can deliver great performance capabilities, at least this is what the results in the GFXBench T-Rex HD off-screen test show. This is a graphical-intensive test meant to show how well devices can perform when it comes to maximum workloads that games can put on them. The unannounced Nexus 5 scored as high as iPhone 5s, while leaving the Sony Xperia Z1, LG G2, Samsung Galaxy S4 and HTC One behind, as the graphic published on PhoneArena shows.

Of course, the Nexus 5 GFXBench results haven’t been verified as of now, and it might take a while before they are, given that the device is not official just yet, so we should take this with a grain of salt. Even so, Nexus 5 was long said to be built based on the LG G2 flagship smartphone but to pack a series of improvements inside, and the above info might pan out in the end. Rumor has it that the new mobile phone will feature a Snapdragon 800 processor inside, paired with the aforementioned Adreno 330 GPU, and with at least 2GB of RAM. The smartphone is also said to arrive on shelves with the next version of the Android platform, namely 4.4 KitKat, which should deliver various performance improvements of its own as well.

What remains to be seen is whether Nexus 5 will manage to perform at the same level once it becomes official. Given that it might have been tested with a development build loaded on top, it could deliver even better test results.

Nexus 5 GFXBench test results compared to those of iPhone 5s, other devices
Image credits to PhoneArena

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Sygic India Navigation App for Android Now Available for Free

Sygic, developer of navigation applications, has just announced it India: GPS Navigation app for Android devices is now available for free via Google Play Store.

According to AndroidOS, Sygic discounted the navigation application a few times before deciding to offer it for free. Sygic India: GPS Navigation is one of the most downloaded offline applications available on Google Play Store. As developers point out, this app works with the built-in GPS and does not require an Internet connection at all. It also features turn-by-turn voice navigation and drag & drop for simple route editing.

You can now download Sygic India: GPS Navigation for Android for free via Google Play Store. The application is fully compatible with all devices powered by Android 2.0.1 and up. Keep in mind that the graphics has been optimized for tablet display as well.

Sygic India: GPS Navigation for Android
Image credits to Sygic

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ZTE Geek Arrives in China with Nvidia Tegra 4 Inside

A new Nvidia Tegra 4-based smartphone is now available for purchase in China, namely the ZTE Geek, which features a price tag of only 1,888 Yuan ($308 / €229).

The mobile phone comes with appealing hardware specifications, starting with the 1.8GHz Tegra 4 chipset inside it and going all the way to the 5-inch 1920 x 1080 pixel touchscreen display. Furthermore, the device was launched with 2GB of RAM packed inside, as well as with 16GB of internal memory, as GizChina reports.

ZTE Geek features a 13-megapixel photo snapper on the back and a 2MP front camera. It also includes Wi-Fi, Bluetooth 4.0, GPS receiver, Glonass, and a 2300mAh battery. The handset was launched in China with support for the TD-SCDMA 3G network of China Mobile. It runs under Google’s Android 4.2 Jelly Bean operating system at the moment.

ZTE Geek
Image credits to GizChina

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Oppo N1 Pre-Orders Kick Off Today in China

Starting today, users in China can pre-order the new Oppo N1 smartphone with a special 99 Yuan ($16 / €12) booking price attached to it.

The price tag for the new mobile phone has been set at 3,498 Yuan ($571 / €423). Users interested in being among the first to grab the device will have to pre-order it by October 10, GizChina reports. The Oppo N1 was announced earlier this week with a 5.9-inch full HD touchscreen display and with a quad-core Snapdragon 600 processor packed inside.

The handset also sports 2GB of RAM, 16GB / 32GB of internal memory, and Oppo’s Color OS (based on Android 4.2) loaded on top. A CyanogenMod-powered version of the device will also be available. The most appealing feature of the new smartphone is its 13-megapixel camera, which can rotate 206 degrees.

Oppo N1
Image credits to Oppo

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Radeon R9 280X First Sight, Really a Rebranded HD 7970 GHz Edition

It might sound sad, but other than the Radeon R9 290X graphics card, Advanced Micro Devices hasn't actually made anything new for the RX collection.

Verily, we've already seen that, barring the new and interesting cooler shroud, the AMD Radeon R7-260X is just a relabeled Radeon HD 7790, albeit possibly featuring a better "Curacao" or "Bonaire XTX" chip. Now, we find out something similar about the Radeon R9 280X, that it is a rebranded Radeon HD 7970 GHz Edition. Possibly with a better GPU clock.

Rather disappointing, but it fits AMD's decision to move away from the age-old Radeon HD formula. That said, Hawaii Pro and Hawaii XT GPUs will appear in October, so some better R9-series boards could make their debut then. Only non-reference designs will be available, as opposed to the 290X, which will be tightly controlled by Advanced Micro Devices.

AMD Radeon R9 280, just a rebranded HD 7970 GHz Edition
Image credits to AMD

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Samsung Releases Samsung Galaxy Note 10.1 (2014 Edition) First Official Firmware

It hasn’t been long since Samsung posted its Galaxy Note 10.1 (2014) Edition kernel sources. Now the Korean tech giant is making the official firmware available on the KIES servers.

SamMobile claims firmware for the Wi-Fi only (SM-P600) and the Wi-Fi+3G (SM-P601) variants are included in the roll-out. Samsung seems eager enough to provide such information ahead of the official launch, and that’s a good thing.

Samsung Galaxy Note 10.1 2014 will offer users a pretty amazing Super Clear LCD screen featuring an impressive 2560 x 1600 resolution. The Wi-Fi+3G model comes packing an Exynos 520 Octa-Core CPU, while the LTE version benefits from a Qualcomm Snapdragon 800 Quad-Core CPU clocked at 2.3GHz plus an Adreno 330 GPU. Both models support 3GB of RAM. Underneath it all, Samsung has slipped a Li-Po 8,200 mAH battery.

Samsung pushes out official firmware
Image credits to SamMobile

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Nokia to Launch Six New Devices on October 22

Nokia World 2013 has been recently confirmed for October 22 in Abu Dhabi, but we have yet to learn what devices the Finnish company plans to announce next month.

While we have suspected that Nokia will launch the Lumia 1520 phablet and the Lumia 2520 tablet, the folks over at The Verge claim that there will be no less than six different devices unveiled at Nokia World 2013 event. According to the cited source, there will be at least two Lumia devices announced next month, along with a new range of accessories, one of them being tagged as “pretty special.”

The Verge also reports a source familiar with Nokia’s roadmap, who claims that the Finnish company plans to unveil a “large range” of form factors and devices. Obviously, most of them are expected to be powered by a Windows Phone platform. Stay tuned for more updates on the matter.

Nokia World 2013 ad
Image credits to Nokia

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Leaked Picture Showcases Super Slim Upcoming Lenovo Ultrabook

The race for the thinnest Ultrabook possible is on, as companies race to produce designs that are similar to tablets in terms of bulk.

According to a new picture leaked by Weibo.com, Lenovo already has a prototype that can compete with the sleekest of slates. The device is probably still in its experimental stage, but the photo showcases its thickness being measured and the results are pretty amazing, it’s apparently just 9.77 mm / 0.38 inches thin.

Sources familiar with the matter also add that the elusive ultrabook will also feature a 13.3-inch screen that will come with a whopping resolution of 3200 x 1800 pixels. The Ultrabook amazes even in terms of weight, which is said to be just 999 g / 2.2 lbs. The device will be made of carbon reinforced polymer. We’ll certainly keep an eye for it.

Lenovo could be working on a super slim Ultrabook
Image credits to Weibo

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Intel Gladden CPU Released

Clearly, Intel is not sitting idle. Even though it doesn't seem to have prepared much in the way of a counter to AMD's impending Hawaii announcement, it is definitely keeping up the stream of new CPU releases, having launched the Gladden line.

Intel actually seems to bring a new CPU or two – or three or a dozen – every other week. The ones consumers get their hands on don't appear so frequently (Intel always makes a fuss about them when they do), but that doesn't make the other any less relevant. For that matter, the previous generation of CPUs hasn't lost relevance yet either. Sure, Haswell is all everyone thinks about these days when saying Intel, but Ivy Bridge still has a role to play. Case in point, the corporation has unleashed a Pentium CPU, a Core i3 unit and two Xeon E3 v2 processors. Together, they compose the Crystal Forest Gladden Platform. Gladden, in a nutshell, is the mobile Ivy Bridge core without the integrated graphics processor (iGP), but retaining Hyper-Threading, Virtualization, SSE4 and AES instructions, DMI 2.0 (to interface with Cave Creek / 89xx series chipset) and PCI Express 3.0 support.

The weakest chip in the lot is, unsurprisingly, the Pentium B925C, with 2 cores, 4 threads, 2GHz frequency, 4 MB L3 cache memory, 15W TDP, and DDR3-1333 MHz memory controller. Its price is unknown. Next comes the Core i3-3115C, also a dual-core with 4 threads, 4 MB cache and DDR3-1333 memory, but 2.5 GHz clock and 25W TDP. Its price is $241 / €179. The Xeon E3-1105C v2 is the third, a quad-core with 8 threads, 1.8 GHz clock, 8 MB cache and DDR3-1600 MHz. It manages to survive on just 25W as well, and has a price of $320 / €237. Lastly, the Xeon E3-1125C v2 is almost identical to the E3-1105C v2, but has 2.5 GHz clock and a TDP of 40W. Its price is $448 / €331.

Intel Ivy Bridge Gladden CPUs released
Image credits to Intel

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