Samsung Galaxy Note 8 - close competitor to iPad mini or just a upsized Galaxy Note II

Are you a fan of iPad Mini, then you just got your closest competitor in the 8 inch tablet market -  the Galaxy Note 8; regards uncle sammy. After lots of rumors and leaked snaps, the device is finally up in Samsung's gadget portfolio. Although the price of Note 8 is not officially announced, it is quite sure that Samsung will tag a price to draw the attention of iPad Mini lovers. The Mini currently starts at $329, a price that's considered expensive for a tablet of its size

Samsung has given the Galaxy Note 8.0 an S Pen and the slew of Touch Wiz-exclusive software features to help it in its battles. Driving them is the company's Exynos 4 Quad 4412 chipset with four 1.6GHz Cortex-A9 CPUs, Mali 400MP4 GPU and 2GB of RAM.

You might be thinking, wait, that's quite similar to the specs of Note II and as a matter of fact it is. Whether you call it an up-sized Galaxy Note II or a downsized Galaxy Note 10.1, that depends.

Here is a quick brief of the specifications of the Galaxy Note 8.

• General: Optional 2G/3G/4G connectivity
• Form factor: Tablet
• Dimensions: 210.8 x 135.9 x 8 mm, 338 g
• Display: 8" 16M-color TFT capacitive touchscreen with a resolution of 800 x 1280 pixels (189ppi)
• Stylus: S Pen, 1024 pressure levels, hover functionality
• Chipset: Exynos 4412 Quad
• CPU: Quad-core ARM Cortex-A9 1.6 GHz processor
• GPU: Mali-400MP
• RAM: 2GB
• OS: Android 4.1.1 (Jelly Bean)
• Memory: 16/32GB storage, microSD card slot
• Still camera: 5 megapixel auto-focus camera, face detection and Best faces feature, touch focus and image stabilization; 1.3MP front facing camera, video-calls
• Video camera: Full HD (1080p) video recording at 30fps
• Connectivity: Wi-Fi a/b/g/n, Wi-Fi hotspot, Bluetooth 4.0, standard microUSB port with MHL features (TV Out, USB host), GPS receiver with A-GPS and GLONASS, 3.5mm audio jack, NFC
• Battery: 4600 mAh
• Miscellaneous: Nature UX, Extremely rich video/audio codec support, built-in accelerometer, multi-touch input, proximity sensor, gyroscope sensor, Smart stay and Smart rotation eye-tracking, Reading mode

To be honest, without a price, it's difficult to have a strong, concrete opinion of the Note 8. In 8-inch tablet segment, it'll compete directly with the 7.9-inch iPad Mini. The notable difference in the tablet experience might be the app offerings between the two. Apart from the highly applauding form factor, the iPad Mini has the blessings from the Apple's App Store; while the Note 8 is still reliant on the Google Play store. The Play store continues to improve its offerings every day, it's still nowhere near as compelling as Apple's App Store. But don't forget the S-Pen stylus packed with the Note 8, which offers a level of functionality the iPad can't match, and those looking for a highly functional electronic daily planner will want to give it an edge over the iPad Mini.

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HTC Sales figures bouncing back: November sales up 23%

The Taiwanese company is bouncing back for the first time in 4 months of gloomy sales revenue, Market-Analysts say. Although they predicted earlier, HTC revenue would drop drastically during Q3 and Q4 of 2012; the windows 8 line-ups, HTC 8X and HTC 8S could have helped HTC to see whole 23.3% increase in November sales. According to reports, November revenues were at NT$21.2 billion (US$730 million), where as October revenues were NT$17.2 billion (US$ 592 million).

During April/May HTCs One Android phone portfolio (HTC OneX) was not able to turn things around for them when it launched prior to Samsung's Galaxy S3. It seems 8X and 8S must have played significant role in this scenario. Its quite uncertain though whether newly announced OneX + would incur any help. The only other significant Android launch for HTC was its 5 inch Butterfly J/Droid DNA smartphone. But it’s only available on Verizon and that too since November 21. Its for sure, HTC will need to do lot better because cumulative revenues from January to November 2011 were actually a 39% decline from the same period in 2011 and that’s a pretty huge gap.

Well, Ups and Downs are part of the smart-phone market-war; lets hope the Taiwan born HTC bounces back soon with all their brilliancy.

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Microsoft says "Don't get Scroogled !"

Microsoft's new anti-google ad-campaign says "Don't get Scroogled !" Sounds interesting ? “Scroogled,” a portmanteau of “Google” and “screwed,” seems to be a major focus of Microsoft's search giant Bing's holiday advertising, and frankly, it isn't baseless either. In May of this year, Google Shopping made a new initiative using a search algorithm similar to how other Google searches work to a system where listed merchants pay to be included in the results, either on a pay-per-click or pay-per-transaction basis. Moral is that, regular users are prey to this practice of Google's advertising.

Microsoft says that this practice isn't fair, but Google sees it differently, saying that “ads are just more answers to users’ queries.” As with Microsoft's criticisms, this isn't as easy to write off as it may seem. Those who use Google Shopping are doing so because they are looking to buy something, and companies paying to make sure that they are seen first in search results isn't that different from placing other ads.

Google has been relatively transparent on this matter, but this is where Microsoft is really playing its hand. By suggesting that customers are being “Scroogled,” they are also suggesting that Google is breaking its “Don’t be evil” policy. The most prominent text on Microsoft's Scroogled website reads:

In the beginning, Google preached, “Don't be evil”—but that changed on May 31, 2012. That’s when Google Shopping announced a new initiative. Simply put, all of their shopping results are now paid ads.

In their under-the-radar announcement, Google admits they’ve now built “a purely commercial model” that delivers listings ranked by “bid price.” Google Shopping is nothing more than a list of targeted ads that unsuspecting customers assume are search results. They call these “Product Listing Ads” a “truly great search.”

We say that when you limit choices and rank them by payment, consumers get Scroogled. For an honest search result, try Bing.

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