AT&T Preps for Early Fall iPhone 5 Launch

As time passes, more and more information regarding the apparent upcoming launch of the iPhone 5 arises. Unfortunately, none of the information coming out is official. So far, the tech world has been bombarded with rumors from different sources and no comment from Apple. While some sources are far from believable and mostly hide behind anonymity, others give information which seems more plausible. An example of the latter is the latest from AT&T. It seems that the carrier is currently preparing for the eagerly awaited launch of the latest Apple phone.

Apparently, AT&T management has required retailers to finish any employee training as quickly as possible and be ready for the supposed high client influx coming in September. More than that, there is information which points to Apple looking to hire additional Apple store personnel in order to cope with the predicted deluge when the device finally comes out.

As has been the case in the past period however, this is still unofficial. While the sources inside AT&T which leaked the information are trust-worthy, an official announcement to confirm couldn’t hurt.

This corroborates the ever-growing rumors which indicate that the iPhone 5 will be announced in August, with a September launch date. These prior retailer preparations also confirm that Apple is bracing for huge success and accompanying sales of the new phone

iPad market share soaring – UBS confirms

For the past few years, Apple has seen skyrocketing success and ever-growing market shares. Fueled by the ever-popular iPhone line, which has been constantly upgraded and always leaving customers wanting more, the company has come back with huge sales and estimations. Another big help for Apple’s growing profits has been the launch and upgrade of the iPad.

And things seem to keep going more than well for the tech giant. Yesterday, the UBS’s analyst Maynard Um has released a statement where by he estimates a continuous growth of Apple’s market share. According to Um, Apple is looking to sell some 37.9 million units of the iPad alone by the end of the year, giving them a 63% market share. Apparently, the tablet market has been driven almost solely by the iPad so far. While competitors have been battling to gain their own place on the tablet market, none has even gotten close to the iPad’s success.

UBS’s analyst has forecasted that the two direct Apple followers, Samsung and Asustek will see sales of 5 million and 2.2 million units respectively for their tablets. This, as anyone can see, is a far cry from Apple’s massive lead. Further predictions take us into 2012. It seems that the numbers for next year are a little lower for the iPad, as Um announced some 53 million units to be sold, which will decrease Apple’s market share to a “mere” 58%.

Other findings are a little more surprising than this. According to the analyst, PC sales will drop this year. His first estimation brought forward a 6.3% increase in sales, but he has now adjusted that to only 4.5%.

iPhone Rumors Suggest September 5th Release

When it comes to Apple’s upcoming iPhone release, rumors never cease to appear. So far, most of them embrace the same story: that iPhone 5 will most likely be released this autumn, September to be more precise. Just last week, Apple’s CFO, Peter Oppenheimer dropped the words ”future product transition” during the company’s earnings call, and the majority agreed that his words very likely refer to the upcoming iPhone 5, supposed to be released this fall. But Oppenheimer added that the product transition is a matter “we will not talk about today” and Apple, as usual has provided no further official info regarding a possible release.

Exactly one week later, another rumor hits the net waves, pointing to the exact date of iPhone 5 US launch : September 5. September is something we’re already familiar with, but this time we also have the day : 5th of September, Monday. However, this is only the US release date, since US is Apple’s main target market. European customers won’t be as lucky. As rumors point, Europe will have to wait another month for the iPhone 5 to reach the market, the official Europe launch date appears is, apparently, October 5.

Given the source of the rumors, a senior Swisscom executive, there is a high chance that it is a reliable info. The Cupertino-based company, of course, refrains from providing some official information. 5th does seem to be the proper date, since Apple’s next generation iPhone is expected to be called iPhone 5 and along with its release, the company will also launch a new version of its operating system, the iOS 5.

The latest version of the Netflix Android app released today added 16 new devices to it's support list. No one expected it to work on tablets but thanks to Droid-Life who got confirmation that this latest version does in fact work on Honeycomb Tablets. Are you excited yet? Click the download link below to grab it!

If you wander into one of your local Verizon stores, you may be surprised to find all the new marketing posters for the Verizon Samsung Galaxy Tab 10.1 4G LTE already in place. This has apparently happened without anyone at Verizon actually getting a firm release date. We can probably guess that it should be very soon, and some rumors peg it for Thursday, which would make it tomorrow. This seems unlikely, but at the very least we should be able to expect it within the next few days. For those who want to pick up the 4G LTE version of this excellent device, we can keep our fingers crossed...

[Download] Netflix 1.3 working on Honeycomb Tablets

The latest version of the Netflix Android app released today added 16 new devices to it's support list. No one expected it to work on tablets but thanks to Droid-Life who got confirmation that this latest version does in fact work on Honeycomb Tablets. Are you excited yet? Click the download link below to grab it!

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Verizon Officially Confirms Samsung Galaxy Tab 10.1 4G LTE Launch on July 28th

SAMSUNG GALAXY TAB™ 10.1 WITH 4G LTE AVAILABLE AT VERIZON WIRELESS

4G LTE and Wi-Fi Models Available; 8.6 Millimeters Thin and Weighing in at 1.25 pounds

BASKING RIDGE, N.J. – Verizon Wireless and Samsung Telecommunications America (Samsung Mobile) today announced that the Samsung Galaxy Tab™ 10.1 with 4G LTE will be available July 28 in either Metallic Gray or Glossy White in Verizon Wireless.

Key features:

· 4G LTE – customers can expect download speeds of 5 to 12 Mbps and upload speeds of 2 to 5 Mbps in 4G Mobile Broadband coverage areas

· Wi-Fi 802.11 b/g/n

· Android™ 3.1 Honeycomb platform – supports Google™ Mobile Services including Gmail™, YouTube™, Google Talk™, Google Search™, Google Maps™, Google Movies™, Google Books™ and Android Market™

· Adobe® Flash® 10.3 technology

· NVIDIA® Tegra2 dual-core 1 GHz application processor

· 10.1-inch HD touchscreen display with WXGA 1280 x 800 resolution

· 3-megapixel rear-facing camera and 2-megapixel front-facing camera for video chat capabilities

· 1080p HD video playback on a HD TV or other 1080p HD device

· Samsung Media Hub – offers a vast lineup of critically acclaimed films and TV programs for rent or purchase. Media Hub has been redesigned, allowing customers to playback Media Hub content on their TV through an HDMI adapter (sold separately). Purchased content

Sprint Premier Customers can Order the Motorola Photon 4G Early, Starting Today!

It's really cool to see how Sprint goes out of their way to reward their loyal customers. Their newest offering for Sprint Premier customers is that you can order the brand new superphone, the Motorola Photon 4G, today, which is a couple days earlier than the actual release. Premiere customers can now order the device before it is made publicly available on July 31 for $199 on contract.

This is pretty cool if you just can't wait, but don't forget that frequently the third party retailers like Amazon and Wirefly end up selling new devices for significantly cheaper on or shortly after launch day. Sometimes a little extra patience can stuff another $20 bucks in your pocket.

Nissan Releases Official Android App for their EV 'The Leaf'

Nissan has just released a pretty nifty Android app for owners of the new Nissan Leaf Electric Vehicle (EV). The app has some fairly impressive features and basically allows you to remotely control several aspects of your EV. Here's a quick quote from the AndroidPolice article detailing some of the more notable features,

If you have an active CARWINGS subscription, then you can view the battery's current charge level and even begin charging the car remotely from your phone if it's connected to a power source. The application will also be able to tell you how long it is until the charge will be completed. Other features made available through the app include the ability to remotely control the climate control system in the car, so you can have it all warm and toasty by the time you get in to drive. You can also see the remaining driving range.

This level of interactivity is only the "tip of the iceberg" when it comes to this burgeoning new EV market. In the future, it is likely we will have apps that allows us to use navigation systems to determine where the closest charging station can be found. What other app ideas can you guys come up with that would interact nicely with EV's of the future?

Newest Nielsen Report Indicates Android OS is U.S. Top-Dog with 39% of Market

The newest Nielsen marketing data tracking report has been released, and it has some good news for both Android and Apple. According to the data, Android now accounts for the highest percentage of smartphone operating systems with 39% of the market. Apple is in second place with 28% for iOS, while Microsoft comes in at 9%, and Palm and Nokia’s OS both round out the bottom at 2% each. It's not all gloom for Apple, as they actually take the top crown as far as hardware manufacturing goes; however, that is also because they only build their own device for their iOS, whereas Android has several companies building Android phones.

Of course all of these companies will soon be releasing newer products later this year, so these numbers could fluctuate some this fall. It'll be interesting to see how the newer Android variants, like the Droid Bionic and the Samsung Galaxy SII fair against the new iPhone 5. Of course, it's always fairly interesting to read these kind of statistical charts, but really, we'd like to hear more from you, our readers. Anyone have any predictions?

[Rumor] AT&T May Begin Throttling Data for their top 5% of Heaviest Users

This is unconfirmed at this time, and there are no details regarding which plans could be affected, but there is a possibility that AT&T could soon start throttling the data bandwidth for their top 5% of heaviest users. This is probably designed for people who have been grandfathered into one of the older unlimited plans, because it doesn't make sense to throttle users with tiered data plans. If we find out any more details, or if any of you hear anything, let's post them in this thread.

Sprint News: LightSquared Deal Officially Announced; Q2 Financials Loss Reported

Today is a good news/bad news day for Sprint. We'll share the good news first because it is really great news, and the bad news isn't really that awful. First, Sprint officially announced today that the deal with LightSquared will go through. This is something that wasn't really a well kept secret in the industry and had been reported on for quite some time now, but it's still really great news to see if officially confirmed and that everything is good for the deal to move forward.

Interestingly, it looks like this deal is very "forward-thinking", in that Sprint doesn't plan to offer LTE immediately. Primarily, this deal allows LightSquared to begin building their LTE network on top of Sprint's infrastructure, and eventually begin offering LTE to customers in the future. This means that Sprint will continue to offer WiMAX to customers and continue to support it for the foreseeable future. For the interim, this deal basically allows LightSquared to grow their company while renting spectrum from Sprint. This will ultimately boost Sprint's operating capital, and eventually allow them to leave the eventual dead-end of WiMAX for future LightSquared powered LTE service.

The bad news for Sprint right now was their second quarter financials. Sprint actually added an additional 1.1 million subscribers (prepaid and wholesale) to their base. Unfortunately, they lost 101,000 in their postpaid contract customer sector, which is their primary "bread and butter" for revenue. Because of this, they were not able to post a profit this quarter, and actually posted a loss of $847 million on revenues of $8.3 Million.

In the long run, this won't be terrible news, as Sprint has been rapidly gaining an improved image in the community. They have the best deals on smartphones & data plans, they offer the most incentives for new and existing customers, and they were recently rated a tie for number one with Verizon for excellent customer service. As the saying goes, "sometimes it's darkest, just before the dawn." Perhaps, we are simply seeing the dawn of a new decade of success for the Now Network.

Samsung Galaxy S II U.S. Sign-Up Page is Now Live

The Samsung Galaxy S II U.S. sign up page is now LIVE!
Head on over to Samsung’s site now then and register to receive word on when this beast of a phone will be landing on our shores

Be sure to check out Tech News Blog - covering Samsung Galaxy Family of phones.