Saturday, March 8, 2014

Samsung Milk Music launches as free streaming radio service that's exclusive to Galaxy phones

Samsung Milk Music screenshots
There are already a number of streaming music options available to smartphone users, including PandoraSpotifyRdio and the recently-launched Beats Music. Apparently Samsung thinks that we can use one more, though, because today the company took the wraps off of its Milk Music service.
Milk Music is a Slacker-powered radio service that offers more than 200 stations that pull from a catalog of 13 million songs. Users don't need to log in to the app to begin listening to music, with an option available to just select one of nine genre-based music stations. Milk Music also offers a "Spotlight" section that will include curated playlists, and for those times when you feel like you're in the mood for something specific, a "My Stations" feature allows you to create your own radio station based on a song or album. Users are given six song skips per hour per station.
Samsung Milk Music more screenshots official
Once you're listening to some tunes, you have the option to fine-tune the station to fit your mood. A genre dial is able to be customized to only display types of music that you're into, while a "Fine-Tune Station" tool lets you tweak a station based on popularity, novelty and song favorites.
Milk Music is free to use and, for a limited time, ad-free as well. The app is now available for download from Google Play, but it's worth noting that the service is only compatible with select Galaxy devices. Those include the Galaxy S 4, Galaxy Note 3, Galaxy S III, Galaxy Note II, Galaxy Mega, Galaxy S 4 mini and the soon-to-be-released Galaxy S5.
Two of the big features that Samsung seems to be touting with Milk Music is the speed at which users can begin listening to music and its lack of distracting elements. The lack of a required login and the app's genre dial, which allows users to scan through stations and begin listening to music instantly, both cut down on the time between launching the app and outputting jams. Samsung also touts that its app is ad-free for a limited time and that it offers "significantly fewer" repeats than its competition.
Samsung's Milk Music service and app seem decent enough, and both the genre dial and instant playback sounds like nice ways to jump between stations when you're not quite sure what you'd like to listen to. That said, I'm not sure if the world needs another music streaming option, especially since its Galaxy exclusivity means that not everyone can give it a go. Because Milk Music is both free to use and free of ads (for now), though, it could be worth a look if you call one of the compatible phones your daily driver. If you do decide to give it a go, be sure to drop your first impressions in the comments section below!

Motorola launches Moto X College Collection with new colors, also offering student discount

Moto X College Collection
Motorola may be busy transitioning from being a Google company to a Lenovo one, but that hasn't stopped it from announcing new colors and another promotion for its flagship Moto X.
Motorola today introduced the College Collection for the Moto X, which includes a series of customization options that give consumers the opportunity to show their school spirit with their smartphone. As part of its College Collection launch, Motorola has added nine new back colors and three new accent colors to MotoMaker to help buyers find their university's perfect color combo. A design gallery includes pre-configured Moto X models for 43 schools as well as Uncommon clear cases with the college's logo printed on it.
That's not all that Motorola is doing for college students today. The company also launched a student discount that allows anyone with a valid .edu email address to snag an off-contract Moto X for $339. The regular price for a Moto X starts at $399 with no contract or $49 with a two-year commitment.
Motorola hasn't been shy about doling out the Moto X discounts in the past, but it's nice to see the company rolling out another one for folks that still haven't pulled the trigger on an X. The addition of nine new back colors and three new accents are also welcome sights, especially since they broaden the customization options for any consumer that's interested in a Moto X, not just college students. For a peek at Motorola's pre-configured college designs and the new MotoMaker color options, hit up the College Collection link below.

Nokia Lumia 930 coming on April 19

Nokia announced its Android-powered phones at the Mobile World Congress, but the rumored Lumia 930 and Lumia 630/635 were nowhere to be seen. Nokia might be saving those for a separate event on April 19.
News of the event comes from popular rumor source @evleaks. The date might not be a coincidence – two weeks earlier, Microsoft will be holding the BUILD conference. It is expected to bring Windows Phone 8.1 with the Cortana virtual assistant and Start screen backgrounds.
According to rumors, the Lumia 930 will be similar to the Lumia Icon / 929 but for GSM networks and possibly with a 4.5" screen instead of a 5" one. The Lumia 630/635 will succeed the Lumia 620 and offer slightly higher-end specs than the 525, including dual-SIM (WP8.1 is supposed to add support for it).

HTC Desire 310 launching April 10 at €160

HTC unveiled the Desire 310 earlier this year – an affordable dual-SIM phone. Exact price and launch date weren’t known until now but HTC filled in the blanks – the Desire 310 will cost €160 and launch on April 10.


The phone is an alternative to the Moto G – its 4.5" screen has only FWVGA resolution (that's 480 x 854), but there are advantages like 1080p video from the 5MP camera and expandable storage. Note that the Moto G has a dual-SIM version too.
The phone will be available in Germany, the Netherlands, Austria and Switzerland (that we know of so far). The price for Germany is €160, while in the Netherlands it's €170. The Swiss price is CHF 180 (€150).

Game over: Samsung to pay Apple $930M, sales ban denied

Apple vs Samsung largest-scale patent lawsuit, taking place in the US, is now over. Apple was awardedjust under $930 million in damages, but its request for judge Koh to ban the infringing products was denied. This means that Samsung is free to continue selling the infringing devices in the US.
The first huge patent trial between Apple and Samsung started in 2012 and its first verdict was for Apple to receive $1.05 billion for the damages caused by its infringed patents. Samsung argued there were some discrepancies between the numbers the jury awarded Apple and after a new trial Samsung's fine was reduced to $929.8 million.


Now this case is officially closed and while Apple has won $930 million its request for permanent sales ban against Samsung was denied.
Apple has already started a new lawsuit against Samsung adding more relevant devices such as the Galaxy S III. Both sides failed to reach an agreement outside the courtroom, so the new trial will be starting in the end of this month.
We are yet to see if Samsung has taken the necessary measures to side-step the infringing technologies or if it will be facing another huge fine.

Samsung Galaxy S5 priced at €500 in India

The Samsung Galaxy S5 has reached India and in anticipation of that the price of its predecessor dropped sharply. The Galaxy S5 was shortly available for sale on Saholic but has since been removed.


Anyway, the important thing – the price – is known. Samsung's new flagship will set users back INR 45,500 ($745 / €540), which is a little more than what the Galaxy S4 cost when it launched (INR 41,500).
The former flagship has since been dropped to around INR 30,000 ($490/€355). Note that this is the I9500 (Exynos chipset), the I9505 (Snapdragon) is hard to find.
Anyway, since the product page has been pulled down it's not clear when the S5 flagship will actually go on sale. When it goes back up, it should appear here.
In Europe the target launch date is in April and the device costs €600 or more, although this latest posting suggests that these pre-order prices might be over-inflated. If interested you can book the smartphone in multiple European countries.

Counterclockwise: Nokia 808 and Retina iPad appear, Android rises

With the Mobile World Congress over, it's time to go back to Counterclockwise – our weekly article that looks back in time at what happened in the last few years. Few as in five or less, but as we'll see this small period of time is a millennium in tech terms.


Say "cheese"!

HTC had just announced the One X and One S at the MWC 2012 and was showing off the new ImageSense technology. Back then HTC used regular 8MP sensor, the time of the UltraPixel came only the following year.


Meanwhile, Nokia had launched its 41MP beast but that ran Symbian rather than the company's new OS of choice, Windows Phone. Of course, rumors had already begun of a PureView Lumia device. It wasn’t until the middle of last year when the Lumia 1020 made that happen though.


Still, both companies went in very different directions – HTC chose to step down from 8MP to 4MP but bump up pixel size, while Nokia committed to large, high-resolution sensors. Granted, the sensor in the Lumia 1020 is smaller than the one in the 808 PureView (1/1.5" vs. 1/1.2") and the new standard is even smaller, 1/2.5" at 20MP.
It's worth noting that Sony has joined Nokia in the pursuit of imaging excellence through large sensors – the Xperia Z2, Xperia Z1 and Z1 Compact all have 1/2.3" 20.7MP sensors, though no optical stabilization like Nokia or HTC.
That's in the past now, still resolution is no longer the battleground of mobile cameras – it's video resolution. Two years before MWC 2012 Sony Ericsson had released an update for its Satio cameraphone to enable WVGA (854 x 480) video capture.


For reference, that's only 20% of the pixels of 1080p video. Compared to the new 2160p standard for flagships, it's twenty times fewer pixels. See just how much difference four years made?

Android picks up speed

We still feel like 2013 was yesterday, but a look back at Android OS version charts quickly dispels that illusion. Jelly Bean was still the latest version of Android in March 2013 and we're talking 4.2, 4.3 wasn’t unveiled yet.


Back then, 2.3 Gingerbread powered nearly half of all Android devices and the OS was really showing its age (it was announced in early 2011).
Android was a force to be reckoned with even before Gingerbread – in March 2011 ComScore ran the numbers and found that Google's operating system had just surpassed the dominant BlackBerry OS. BB OS still enjoyed huge popularity back then and kept iOS in third place.
Another major milestone came in March 2012. Google announced that the Android Market is no more – Google Play Store would take its place and add music, videos and books on its virtual shelves. Amazon had already launched the Kindle Fire tablets, which served to push Amazon content to consumers quicker and this was Google's response.


iOS leaps ahead too

While Android was still trying to shrug off Gingerbread and companies were trying to figure out phone cameras, Apple unveiled a new iPad tablet. The 2012 iPad, or as it became known "iPad with Retina display" had the biggest screen resolution we had ever seen.


Following the jaw-dropping sharpness of the iPhone 4 display (which came in 2010), Apple's tablet had the quote-unquote "mind-blowing resolution of 2048 x 1536 pixels." To this day iPads have some of the most beautiful displays around, but Android's thirst for big numbers helped it catch up and surpass the resolution quickly.
Just before the MWC we were hearing that this or that 5.x inch smartphone will have a QHD display, but that didn’t pan out. Still, the first QHD devices are a reality with several 5.5" phablets. Again, putting pixel counts in perspective QHD (2,560 x 1,440 pixels) is 17% more pixels than the iPad Retina screen covering a much smaller surface.
Meanwhile, iOS 5.1 started rolling out. It was a relatively minor update, bringing Japanese support to Siri and refining Photo Stream in iCloud. Much like the Gingerbread days, iOS was still running the now outdated skewmorphic UI rather than the hot, new flat design.


Galactic rumor mill

If you were following the pre-MWC rumors this year you witnessed the barrage "Galaxy S5 this, Galaxy S5 that" rumors first-hand. Last year it wasn’t much different, except it was the Galaxy S4 that was in the spotlight.
The chatter from early 2013 suggested odd things like Samsung using two different chipsets and some sort of futuristic (or gimmicky?) way to scroll with your eyesight.
Both things are now a reality and in fact standard – Samsung uses Qualcomm Snapdragons for LTE devices and its own Exynos chips for Wi-Fi only or 3G/Wi-Fi devices. Smart Scroll and its other Smart Screen companions are found on a wide range of Galaxy devices too.


Going on sale

We've talked about them before here on Counterclockwise – the Toshiba TG01 and HTC Magic. Both devices will have a great impact on the smartphone industry and launch details for the two became available in early 2009.
The Toshiba TG01 was the first slim, powerful, large-screened smartphone, it's the phone that started the trend. Anyway, O2 had scored exclusivity on the "uber-smartphone" but unfortunately sales never quite pushed Toshiba to where Samsung and HTC are now.


Speaking of, HTC was just starting its Android adventure – the T-Mobile G1 was already out, butVodafone was just announcing the launch date of the HTC Magic (another exclusive deal). It was only the second HTC Android device to carry the company's name and dropped the hardware QWERTY of the G1.


Hardware keyboards sprouted a few more times in Android's history, but growing screen sizes and touch sensor accuracy meant better and better on-screen keyboards. Eventually, it became unavoidable – hardware keyboards became extinct, but it's surprising to see the trend start so early in Android's history.