Nokia Asha 501: Colorful Smart Phone to Officially Arrive at the Worldwide Market with RM315.00 Price

Nokia has officially declared that the colorful Nokia Asha 501 smart phone will arrive this week at the markets of Thailand and Pakistan while availability in India follows shortly as well as in countries across Europe, Middle East, Africa, Asia-Pacific and Latin America. The Nokia Asha 501 will sell for a suggested retail price of US$99 or RM315.00 before taxes and local subsidies in six available colors.

Nokia Asha 501 is the first in the new generation of reasonably priced smart phones to run on the new and fast Asha platform. "The new Nokia Asha 501 helps people quickly access everything they love with just a simple swipe. Coupled with beautiful design, it's a smart phone with both style and substance offered at a great price," stated Timo Toikkanen, the Executive Vice President of Nokia Mobile Phones.

The smart phone is noticeable due to its compact design with a tough removable shell and scratch-resistant glass display. Another standout feature is the available color choices of cyan, bright red, bright green, yellow, black and white but these hues will differ by market.

 

Consumers can choose from the available single or dual SIM feature on the Nokia Asha 501. The smart phone has a 3.2MP camera with EDGE EGPRS (2.75G) connectivity and 17 hours of battery life backup.

The accessories available for the Nokia Asha 501 are the Nokia Stereo Headset WH-108 and the CC-3070 back covers that can be interchanged to reflect the owner's personality. The Nokia Asha 501 back covers are available in eye-catching colors with a recommended retail price of €8.90 (US$12).

Nokia Asha 501 owners can simply swipe the smart phone to unlock, close apps or change between the Home and Fastlane screens. The Home screen fully utilizes the 3-inch showing the established application launcher.

The Fastlane screen is the exceptional second screen that adjusts to put on view the user's recent activity on the phone as well as upcoming events such as birthdays, song or apps downloads and schedule of meetings. Fastlane helps the user to multi-task as well with its support to social network sites like Facebookand Twitter where they can share directly from the Fastlane screen.

Asha's latest smart phone has the pre-installed Nokia Xpress Browser app that can compact Internet data up to 90% so mobile browsing becomes faster. Nokia Asha 501 users can use the available chat services such as Line, Nimbuzz and WeChat.

Close to 40 free EA games can be downloaded on the Nokia Asha 501. More free apps available on the Nokia Store can be downloaded as well such as HERE Maps and the fresh Nokia Xpress Now content discovery web app.

Why Samsung S4 Mini?

Reversing its march towards creating a phone that requires a wheelbarrow to tote around town, Samsung has announced the 4.3-inch S4 mini.

Though smaller than the regular S4, the mid-range S4 mini’s screen is still larger than the iPhone 5′s 4-inch display. Unfortunately, Samsung is mum on the price or actual release date of the tinier version of its hit Android phone. What we do know is that the company is entering the mid-market territory with a less expensive device.

The S4 mini is crammed with an 8MP camera, a qHD Super AMOLED screen, 8GB of storage, 1.5GB of RAM, and is powered by a 1.7GHz dual-core processor. The phone runs Android 4.2.2 (Jelly Bean) with Samsung’s Touch Whiz skin. It will be available with 4G LTE, 3G HSPA+ or 3G dual SIM radios, depending on the market.

Basically, it’s less exciting than the larger S4, but more than enough for most smartphone shoppers. The news is also the second “budget” piece of electronics announced today, joining Apple’s release of its cheaper iPod touch.

Sony's mammoth Xperia Z Ultra smartphone sports 6.4-inch screen

 
Sony unveiled one of the largest smartphones of all time Tuesday: the Xperia Z Ultra, with a 6.4-inch screen.

The latest device to blur the line between smartphones and tablets, the phone features the largest 1080p HD display ever on a smartphone, according to Sony.

A year ago, phone makers were pushing size boundaries with 5-inch screens, but 2013 has seen 6-inch-plus screens. One of the first was the 6.1-inch Huawei Ascend Mate, and that was followed by Samsung's 6.3-inch Galaxy Mega.

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These large smartphones are getting very close to the size of tablets. The Nexus 7, the Amazon Kindle fire HD and other popular small tablets come with 7-inch screens.

In addition to a large screen, the Sony Xperia Z Ultra packs top-of-the-line hardware. The LTE phone features a powerfulQualcomm Snapdragon 800 2.2GHz quad-core processor and uses Android 4.2 Jelly Bean. It also features an 8-megapixel rear camera and 16 gigabytes of storage, all in a device that is just 0.26 inches thick.

And as with all of the latest Sony smartphones, the Xperia Z Ultra is described as waterproof and dust-proof. It can go nearly five feet underwater for a half hour.

Sony did not specify when the Xperia Z Ultra will come out in the U.S. It is scheduled to make its global launch some time in the next few months. 

Samsung tablets to mimic Galaxy smartphones

Samsung is expanding its lineup of tablet computers and making them look more like its Galaxy smartphones, as it hopes to translate its success in phones to the tablet market, where Apple is dominant.

Samsung Electronics Co., the second-largest maker of tablets after Apple, Monday said it is putting three new tablets in the Galaxy Tab 3 series on sale in the United States on July 7. The least expensive, a $199 device, will have a screen that measures 7 inches diagonally. An 8-inch model will go for $299 and a 10-inch one for $399.

"Our goal is to attract Galaxy smartphone users, and to make it the ultimate smartphone accessory" said Shoneel Kolhatkar, director of product planning at Samsung Mobile.

The "Tab" line is Samsung's value brand, undercutting the price of similar Apple models. Samsung's premium tablets are in the "Note" line, which include styluses. The 7-inch and 10-inch tablets had "Tab 2" equivalents, but the 8-inch model is new, and coincides closely in size with Apple's iPad Mini, which came out late last year.

The new tablets have the same three buttons on the front as the Galaxy smartphones. Last year's Tab 2 had no physical buttons on the front, as encouraged by Google, which supplies the Android software.

The 7-inch Galaxy Tab 3 has 8 gigabytes of storage memory, while the larger models have 16 gigabytes. All of them have card slots for memory expansion.

Samsung and Apple are in a heated tussle when it comes to smartphones and tablets. Each company would like to dominate both markets. Samsung had 18 percent of the global tablet market in the first quarter this year, according to research firm IDC. Apple had 40 percent. In smartphones, the figures are reversed, with Samsung dominating, largely because of its Galaxy line. Apple came in second with a 17 percent market share for the iPhone. In the United States, however, Samsung is outsold by Amazon.com Inc., with its Kindles.

Forrester Research analyst J.P. Gownder said a hit smartphone traditionally hasn't led buyers to get a tablet from the same manufacturer. He believes Samsung will get a bigger boost from its new mini-stores inside U.S. Best Buy locations. Having a retail environment it can control bridges some of the gap with Apple, which has its own stores.

"Whether you buy it online or in person, people want to touch and feel these products," Gownder said.

Umeox X5 Takes Thinnest Smartphone In The World

Less than a week ago Huawei launched the Ascend P6 to much fanfare in London. This 6.9mm thin device was claimed to be the thinnest smartphone in the world at that time. Turns out Huawei’s latest Android flagship couldn’t keep its crown for a long time. A new smartphone coming out of China steals the title from it, called Umeox X5, it is just 5.6mm thin and runs on Android as well.

The Umeox X5 is said to have a 5.3 inch display, an 8 megapixel rear facing camera, a 3 megapixel front facing camera, a dualcore processor and Android 4.2.2 Jelly Bean. The specifications are notably lower than Ascend P6 but an increasing trend in Chinese manufacturers is the shaving off of thickness and the Umeox X5 achieves that by a comfortable margin.It is not known as yet when this smartphone will go on sale in China, there are only a few Chinese manufacturers that sell their smartphone outside of the People’s Republic. However it is expected that Umeox X5 will be available in Europe, it will reportedly release in France first, this summer.