Techwatch News March 2012 EditionLatest Technology News Issue 1

RETRO TECH: Spectrum 48K

THiRd gEnERaTiOn

ipad launCHEd

SMaRTpHOnES: Best of 2012

FACEBOOK SCAMS: Top Ten

to Avoid

COnTEnTS

A run down on this month’s featuresEditorial

Features

News

Most Promising Smartphones for 2012

Top Ten Facebook Scams to Avoid

iPad the Third: Long Live the TabletKing?

Retro Tech: Spectrum 48k

News in Brief

Google Play announced, gunning foriTunes

Windows 8 Preview released byMicrosoft

Ubuntu for Android combinessmartphone and desktop

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EdiTORial Why the iPad matters

No doubt many will be bemused by the media hype building up to the launch of the

new version of Apple’s iPad.

After all, it’s just a tablet PC, and these are luxury items only, right?

People said the same about the iPod, once. And the iPhone. After all, there are cheaper MP3 players, and cheaper smartphones, but in the UK alone, 30% of all smartphones sold are iPhones, while the iPod has as much as 78% of the UK’s music player market.

And Apple is now valued as one of the biggest companies in the world. In fact, the stock market sees Apple as worth more than Microsoft, Dell, Google, and Adobe, all combined.

On the one hand, people can call it hype, and they may be right. But the really clever thing Apple has done is provide hardware not for its own sake, but in order to support other Apple paid services.

The iPod would be nothing without iTunes, and yet the iPod and iTunes can exist independently. And that’s the clever hook: once you buy one Apple product, you naturally explore the garden of products and services laid out, and inevitably, buy something else. Perhaps continually.

That’s why the stock market values Apple so highly (and the fact the company has an estimated $100 billion in cash reserves).

Because Apple is a company that continues to dominate markets it touches, and continues to innovate into new markets.

Precisely as the iPad has done. For all the accusations of it being a luxury, it has single-handedly created a market for tablet PC’s.

The massive range of tablet’s now on offer shows both the expectation that is likely to be the future of mobile computing, and also the panic from manufacturers that they are being left out.

Again, Apple has taken the lead in this area. And people who have never owned an iPod or iPhone but buy an iPad are exposed to one of the cleverest cross-sells in marketing history.

Apple has even taken the step of making the software it produces as apps instead of boxes on shelves, to make the entire mobile experience work across its desktop PC’s, laptops, as well as iPad, iPod, and iPhone.

Sometimes I find myself rubbing my chin in disbelief at the hype that surrounds Apple product launches. But I simply have to remind myself this is a company that is still a trailblazer in the making. Every time Apple launches something new, even if just an upgrade, the rest of the technology world stops and takes note: because they know they are being shown the future they must follow.

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nEWS in Brief

Skyrim wins big at IAA 2012 awards

Apple and Samsung lawsuits continue

Google gears up for “entertainment device”

Tesco “unlimited” broadband for £2.50

Freeview HD reaches 4.5 million mark

iPad in repetitive strain fears

Skyrim won game of the year at the 2012 Interactive Achievement Awards (IAA), along with four other trophies. Portal 2 and Uncharted 3 also took various bags of honours, too.

Google are rumoured to be developing a hardware product to wirelessly stream music to other devices using Android. It would likely integrate with Google Play, and mean the company attacking Apple product territory again.

Tesco has launched a new “unlimited use” broadband package bundled with line rental. At £16.25 for broadband and line rental, it also offers free weekend and evening calls. However, the price increases in the second year, and expect some throttling regardless.

Apple is chasing Samsung for a new set of alleged patent violations, this time relating to word completion and search. Apple is trying to block the sale of the new Galaxy Nexus in the USA, while Samsung is trying to block the iPad from South Korea.

Freeview has announced that by the end of Dec 2011, 4.4 million Freeview HD boxes had been sold. Sales of HDTV’s equipped with Freeview HD have also doubled since last year. No doubt the digital switchover helps – but more HD channels, please.

UK tabloids have jumped on recent reports of RSI (repetitive strain injury) being linked to iPad use. While using computing devices will necessitate RSI risks, touchscreen tablets are being linked to certain types of neck strain from people looking down for too long.

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Samsung has launched a new premium home cinema system. The HT-E6750W has 7.1 surround sound, and uses the company’s 3D Sound Plus technology. Coming in at around the £1,000 mark it’s targeted at the more serious film buff.

Samsung HT-E6750W 7.1 system hits the UK

Google set for new patent attack

ZTE Light Tab II out this month

66% of the UK suffers from Nomophobia

Samsung spins-off LCD, looks to OLED LG Optimus Vu unveiled

nEWS in Brief

ZTE is launching an Android tablet that aims to compete with the Kindle Fire – when that is finally released here – by retailing at £235. The ZTE V9A Light Tab II will have a 7” screen and 4GB memory, with 3G support and twin cameras.

Google is bringing out the big guns in the ongoing patent war over Android. Google’s purchase of Motorola, and its armoury of patents, means the corp is unveiling wave after wave of legal protections aimed to help Android manufacturers.

Nomophobia is the fear of being out of mobile phone contact, and apparently two-thirds of us have it. Women were reportedly more worried about being without their mobiles than men. Men apparently fear losing internet connections more.

Samsung is aiming all barrels on OLED display technology. The company announced it was spinning off its LCD TV division, and set its focus on moving to OLED, which is seen as more profitable.

LG is releasing a phone/hybrid tablet called the Optimus Vu. With a 5” screen with a 4:3 ratio display, it will also come with a stylus. It aims to compete with the Galaxy Note released by Samsung.

Sky Go now available on Android

Government plans blanket snooping system

Sky Go is now available for Android. The free app allows subscribers to access and record Sky content remotely. However, it currently only works for a limited number of more popular Android handsets.

The UK government wants to officially extend its snooping powers, calling it the “Communications Capabilities Development Programme”. It revives Labour’s unsuccessful attempt to push for ISPs to store all data for a year.

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Google has decided mapping the world’s streets wasn’t ambitious enough – the company has announced Seaview, and attempt to map the seabed itself. Not the entire seabed at this stage, just 360 views of the Great Barrier Reef for the moment.

Half of UK now owns a smartphone

Microsoft’s SkyDrive strategy for Windows 8

BlackBerry PlayBook OS 2.0 released PlayStation Vita launched

nEWS in Brief

The UK is rich enough for half the population to own a smartphone, according to latest data. Breaking down the figures further, 50% are on Android, 29% on iOS, and 15.5% on Blackberry.

Microsoft will offer cloud storage with Windows 8 as standard, according to the latest releases. Integrated Skydrive will offer syncing between devices, and be as easy to use as saving to the hard drive.

Everything Everywhere plans to roll out its 4G LTE service nationally later this year. It comes as the company tests its latest pilot in Bristol, over the 1800MHz spectrum. The roll out will likely start small, but gratefully received by new iPad owners.

Everything Everywhere promises 4G this year

A third of UK has slow broad-band

Google dives with 360 degree “Seaview”

Starview team jailed over card sharing

Rim has pushed out the new 2.0 version of its OS for the Playbook tablet. Finally, it gets email integration as well as other enterprise functions considered essential, but previously missing.

The Playstation Vita mobile handheld has launched in the UK, and so far the reaction is positive, even at its £200 price (more than an Xbox). However, despite similar early sentiment in Japan, Vita sales have fallen sharply.

A study suggests a third of the UK’s broadband is less than 5Mbps, with the average speed across the country as 6.7Mbps. This comes under Ofcom’s estimate of 7.6Mbps. 10% have less than 3Mbps, according to the study.

A cable theft ring known as Starview team was broken and its ringleaders imprisoned for a total of 11 years. The team offered modded cable boxes, which shared a small number of legitimate Virgin cable subscriptions via online servers.

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Vodafone and Visa are planning to launch a mobile payment service in the UK. Using NFC phones and pre-paid Voda-branded Visa cards, it will deal with transactions below £15. As an added security measure, a PIN will be required for payments above this.

Facebook conducting “test” SMS snooping

Vodafone and Visa to roll out mobile wallet

nEWS in Brief

Facebook was accused by the Sunday Times of snooping on text messages, when Android phones connect to the social networking site. Facebook claimed it was just a test, and that the Android app declared its intentions in version 1.7.

Warner Bros and Fox reveal “Project Phenix”

Xbox 720 is codenamed “Du-rango”

Warner Bros and Twentieth Century Fox have teamed up to provide a rival to iTunes when it comes to film downloads. Called Project Phenix, the companies have teamed up with SanDisk and Western Digital to promote consumer friendliness.

The next Xbox is under development, with the codename of Durango, according to rumours from a developers conference in London. Let slip from a developer via Twitter, the Tweet was quickly removed.

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Facebook has changed its pages to act more like profiles. This means pages will have the Timeline feature, and more admin tools are promised. One for reaching out to corporate users, no doubt.

Asus to produce Google’s Nexus Tablet? Facebook changes pages

Raspberry Pi pre-orders get snapped up

Virgin begins broadband speed doubling

nEWS in Brief

Asus is rumoured to be developing a 7” tablet to carry the Google Nexus brand – running Android of course. There has been no official announcement from Google on the rumoured Asus tie-in – expected to go head to head with the Kindle Fire.

The Raspberry Pi, the budget PC on a ... erm slot, has completely sold out on release. Costing £22 and boasting Linux running on an Arm processor, it sold at a rate of 700 units per second.

Virgin has begun its next round of broadband speed upgrades, with 1.5 million homes to be targeted over 18 months. 20Mbps packages should automatically upgrade to 60Mbps, and existing 100Mbps users reaching 120Mbps.

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The next version of Android will be called Jelly Bean, according to comments made by ASUS, while crowing about its close relationship with Google. No details on what Android 5.0 may offer yet, only that it follows the food naming convention of previous releases.

Many free Android apps are spying on you: call logs, personal contacts, text messages, media, camera, and location data, are all being targeted by advertisers on rogue apps. With no quality control over Android apps, expect privacy issues to continue.

EA Games has released a statement confirming that it will not be supplying GAME direct due to the chain’s credit problems. Ubisoft, Capcom, and Nintendo also refuse to csupply the chain now.

Smartphone use more dangerous than drink driving?

Asus confirms Android Jelly Bean

Free Android apps under privacy fire

New 1080p Apple TV launched

EA issues statement regarding Game

Toshiba 55ZL2 4K 3DTV now out

nEWS in Brief

Using your smartphone while driving is more dangerous than you think, with research showing reaction times down by 38%. That compares to 12% for legal alcohol limit, and 21% for cannabis.

Apple has refreshed its Apple TV set top box. It has a new user interface, intended to be more streamlined, and now offers full 1080 support. iCloud available as standard.

Toshiba has launched a 55” 3DTV with a massive resolution of 3840x2160 pixels, with no need for 3D glasses. It’s a monster set with a monster price: £7k from John Lewis. Early adopters only.

Chrome stagnates in latest browser stats

After a meteoric growth in take-up, chrome is no longer gaining, according to stats. It held a market share of 19% over Jan and Feb, the first time it had not seen at least a 1% increase in take up.

Ofcom plans to deal with “bill shock”

Ofcom has finished a review of bill shock – unexpected mobile bills – revealing that 1.4 million mobile users in the UK were affected last year. Ofcom wants roaming charges limited, and opt-in limits.

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nEWS

On the same day as the launch of the latest incarnation of Apple’s iPad, Google made

an announcement in an attempt to steal some of the Cupertino company’s tablet thunder.

That announcement was the launch of Google Play – a name which had been previously linked as a possible moniker for the search company’s rumoured upcoming Nexus budget tablet.

It’s not a tablet name, though, and in fact Google Play is a cloud-based entertainment content library to rival Apple’s iTunes.

Play pulls together Google’s various entertainment services under one umbrella – the apps and games from the Android Market, Google Books, a movie rental platform and Google Music will all be part of the overarching service (except for the latter in the UK, where it still hasn’t been wheeled out).

The whole caboodle will be tied together in the cloud, with syncing available across all your devices from Android smartphones through tablets to your desktop computer.

Google Play announced, gunning for iTunes

Google noted that Play allows you to purchase and store up to 20,000 music tracks (not for the UK, though, as we’ve mentioned), choose from thousands of movie rentals, the Google e-book library and 450,000 odd apps for Android.

All this content and functionality was, of course, previously available, but not under one cloud-based banner.

All purchases a customer has previously made on these standalone services will be available to them under Google Play, naturally.

The integration of all these services in the cloud is not just an exercise in convenience for the consumer, but is also reinforcing the Google brand, particularly when it comes to Android and its meteoric success in the smartphone world. It isn’t the Android Market any more, but Google Play.

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nEWS

Windows 8 emerged blinking into the sunlight at the start of this month – albeit

in the form of an early consumer preview version, with all the usual disclaimers that come with a test build.

Microsoft’s fresh OS offers an all-new Metro-style interface, and an operating system which works across all devices, bridging the gap between mobile and desktop.

Not to mention keeping Microsoft relevant when it comes to the tablet explosion driven by Apple and the iPad juggernaut.

Windows 8 is designed with touch in mind, so it functions not just on desktops and laptops, but also tablets. The current preview version is designed to work with Intel chips, with a somewhat different version that’ll run on Arm-powered tablets due later in the year.

The new interface is built using tiles and will be familiar to those who’ve seen Windows Phone 7 in action.

You’ll be able to customise your desktop with the tiles you want, which link to services and apps and are essentially “live” icons. They’re live because real-time information is displayed within them, for example the Facebook tile will flash up new messages arriving.

Those who prefer the traditional desktop experience rather than the tiles can, however, switch back at the touch (or indeed click) of a button.

Tying in with the cloud is also an inevitable

Windows 8 Preview released by Microsoft

facet of a modern OS. Windows 8 carries cloud syncing across devices, and back-up of system settings and preferences, to make installing on new devices (or reinstalling) as painless as possible.

Great power efficiency is promised, of particular interest to laptop and tablet users, and Internet Explorer 10 comes bundled offering an “edge-to-edge” user interface with the navigation controls hidden.

In a press release on the subject of apps, Microsoft noted: “The Windows 8 Consumer Preview marks the beta opening of the Windows Store, which is filled with a variety of new Metro style apps from both third-party developers and Microsoft. During the Consumer Preview, these apps are available to try and experience at no cost to users.”

“The Windows Store will offer personalized recommendations, and Windows 8 gives users the ability to take their apps and settings with them across multiple PCs, making it easy to discover and try new apps while offering developers the greatest opportunity of any platform.”

The full release of Windows 8 is expected to emerge later this year, perhaps this summer and certainly by the time autumn has arrived.

The operating system pretty much carries Microsoft’s hopes for the future against the likes of Apple with its iGadgets and Google with Chrome/Android.

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nEWS

Canonical has announced that it plans to give Android smartphone owners the

chance to turn their handset into a fully-fledged desktop PC.

The idea is to merge Ubuntu (Linux) with the Android mobile OS, the latter being used for normal smartphone operation.

The Ubuntu OS, which apparently fits “cleanly alongside the rest of Android”, can be switched to when you dock your phone.

The user will need to plug in a display and keyboard along with a mouse, but most higher-end Android phones have an HDMI out and USB port to facilitate this desktop conversion process.

A seamless integration of desktop and mobile will mean you don’t have to worry about syncing anything such as contacts, emails or bookmarks across your devices, as you’ll only have the one device.

And today’s Android phones have powerful multi-core processors, GPUs and enough horsepower to easily run a desktop PC environment. In fact, Canonical believes that the desktop option is one of the most productive ways to use all that smartphone power which is, let’s face it, rarely tapped by checking Facebook while queuing for a bus.

Canonical further added that the Ubuntu desktop could also be a driver not just for faster processors in phones, but also 4G LTE support.

Ubuntu for Android combines smartphone and desktop

Canonical noted: “Ubuntu for Android is a complete desktop with a full range of desktop applications including office, web browsing, email, media and messaging. Personal information like contacts, calendars, photo galleries and music can be accessed from both the phone and the desktop interface.”

“SMS texts arrive on your desktop if you are docked when they show up, and calls are handled like VoIP if you want to stay working while you chat. Ubuntu for Android brings the desktop world together with the phone world, seamlessly.”

We should see Android-Ubuntu devices arriving later on this year, or that’s the current plan.

Of course, Canonical isn’t the first company to try this combined solution approach. Motorola’s Atrix phone was designed around it, although that features a “webtop” or web-based desktop experience.

Canonical sees this as the wrong approach, however. The company noted: “Markets have not responded to web-only environments. The desktop is a high-productivity mode, not a media consumption mode or a browsing mode. That’s why we’ve brought the full power of a native desktop to this solution.”

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FEaTuREMost Promising Smartphones for 2012

The smartphone landscape is a swiftly changing one. Android pitched up at the

close of 2008, and only really made itself felt later in 2009, but since then its rise has been meteoric. And now, just over half the smartphones in the world run Google’s robotically themed OS.

And that 51% share could be set to grow bigger, as analysts such as Deloitte have predicted the global rise of the cheap smartphone over 2012. There were 200 million budget smartphones costing less than $100 in use at the end of 2011, and that figure is set to grow to 500 million by the close of this year. Android will take its fair share of that market – and of course, Apple doesn’t do low-end phones. Not yet, anyway. Could it have something up its sleeve for later this year?

Apple has had a buoyant time with the iPhone 4S and is in second place in the worldwide smartphone market with a 24% share, according to Gartner’s Q4 2011 figures. Symbian is still in third place, but has slid massively from a top dog 32% share in Q4 2010, to just 12%. By the end of this year, it will have all but disappeared.

Rim’s BlackBerry is in fourth position with 9% of the market, which is down from 15% and expected to slide more this year as the company continues to flounder. Despite

Microsoft only having a 2% share at the end of last year (near equal to Samsung’s Bada), Windows Phone is expected to seriously pick up this year (finally).

Some analysts have conjured figures of Windows Phone 7 climbing to near a 10% share by the end of this year, which would see it overtaking Symbian and BlackBerry to become the third biggest platform. While we’d take that with a pinch of the white stuff, there are already signs that the Nokia partnership and Lumia phones are making some headway.

And with Tango on the way for more budget oriented WP7 handsets, along with Apollo destined to land with multi-core processors later this year, Microsoft’s mobile gambit could yet pay off.

Naturally, a great deal of the success of these operating systems throughout 2012 will depend heavily on which phones are carrying them. Will Android push even further in its dominance with new budget models and the fact that it already has quad-core smartphones ready to go? Does Windows Phone have the strength in line-up to best Rim? And what about the next iPhone – or indeed iPhones?

Read on as we take a look at the individual smartphone models which have got us the most excited, and which are the best prospects for ruling the mobile roost this year.

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Most Promising Smartphones for 2012 FEaTuRE

iPhone 5

When it comes to individual phone manufacturers,

Apple is the top smartphone vendor (although when feature phones are brought into the equation, it’s still some way behind Nokia and Samsung).

And the iPhone 5, which should be out this autumn, is likely to be one of the defining devices of 2012, and more revolutionary given that the iPhone 4S was very much an incremental upgrade.

Current rumours point to 4G LTE being introduced, which is pretty much a certainty, as is NFC support. Possibly the biggest changes, though, will be a fresh quad-core processor, quite possibly powering a bigger display, with Apple finally expanding from its 3.5 inch territory.

This is all very much speculation, though. You can pretty much guarantee the unit will be slimmer still, have a tweaked camera, and there has been talk of a Liquipel coating (water-proofing which will protect your phone from a brief dip, if not a deep-sea diving excursion).

Might we even see a lower-end iPhone? That’s been a rumour for a long time now, but with that budget smartphone market expanding so swiftly, perhaps it’s a move Apple might finally consider.

Samsung Galaxy S III

There are two smartphones which dominated sales last

year, one of course being the iPhone, the other the Galaxy S II. Hence Samsung’s Android three-quel is as keenly awaited as the iPhone 5 – particularly given the rumoured spec.

Due out this spring, the S III supposedly comes with a mammoth 4.8 inch super AMOLED plus 1080p display, no less, and a 1.5GHz quad-

core processor. Some sources have pegged it with a 12 megapixel camera, others with an 8 megapixel affair, but you can bet it’s been worked on and takes some pretty smooth pics.

Another rumour is that the display will be a glasses-free 3D affair as seen on LG and HTC phones, but we’re doubtful of that one. 4G LTE support is also going to be on board. If Samsung can get this out come around April time as expected, it’s going to shift a lot of units before the iPhone 5 arrives on the block.

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Most Promising Smartphones for 2012 FEaTuRE

LG Optimus 4X HD

Quad-core phones are becoming all the rage,

and LG has its own four-core handset in the Optimus 4X HD. This device should hit stores around June, probably just after Samsung’s Galaxy S III makes its entrance.

The 4X HD will boast a 4.7 inch IPS touchscreen, another big display, with a 1.5GHz Tegra 3 quad-core CPU. The clever bit about the Tegra 3 is that it also comes with a “companion” single core, and under light usage, only this is employed with the quad-cores idling. That saves chewing through battery life.

LG’s smartphone has DNLA and HDMI support, an 8 megapixel camera and 16GB of storage. It will run Android 4.0, albeit with an overlaid custom LG UI.

The phone also does some clever stuff such as upscaling 2D to 3D content when hooked up to your 3DTV. A number of other “secret” features have yet to be revealed by LG. Initial estimates have the RRP pegged at £450, which seems pretty reasonable considering the spec.

Nokia PureView 808

The Nokia PureView 808 runs Symbian, the rapidly

sliding OS which is now on its way out and unlikely to endear it to many. Its core spec – a 1.3GHz single core CPU, and a 640x360 resolution 4 inch display (admittedly super AMOLED, though) – isn’t

particularly spectacular either.Until you come to the camera. On board it has a 38 megapixel photographic beast, which ensured the phone scooped the Best of Show award at the recent Mobile World Congress (MWC). This uses an f2.4 Carl Zeiss lens and oversampling, which means it can be set to shoot at the standard 5 or 8 megapixels, then combine multiple pixels into “pure” pixels for a far sharper, higher quality picture. Or you can snap a full 38 megapixel shot, then zoom in and crop out the area you want.

The camera is highly innovative and also does

1080p video recording with 4X lossless zoom, along with CD-quality audio recording. The PureView 808 (due out April/May) might not be a killer device in itself due to those Symbian shackles, but when this sort of tech meets future Windows Phone 7 handsets, Nokia’s prospects are definitely looking up.

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Most Promising Smartphones for 2012 FEaTuRE

Nokia Lumia 610 The latest Lumia to be revealed at MWC might not

be a particularly exciting piece of hardware, but it’s notable for one reason.

The Lumia 610 will sport the Tango version of Win-dows Phone, which has been tweaked and streamlined to ensure it runs smoothly on lesser hardware.

Panasonic Eluga Power

Panasonic has returned to the European mobile

market with this new offering, the Eluga. While the name isn’t great (and sounds like some kind of seventies sports coupe), the phone has an expansive 5 inch 720p OLED touchscreen, yet is pretty sleek and thin.

The design also incorporates a water-proof and dust-proof nature.

Specs include a 1.5GHz dual-core chip, twin cameras (the main one being an 8 megapixel, 1080p capturing affair), NFC and “super-fast” charging. The latter juices the battery to half power in thirty minutes. Panasonic’s new

The Lumia 610 will have a 3.7 inch display, 800MHz processor, 8GB of memory, a 5 megapixel camera and a social network focus. But most of all it will cost under £200, hopefully a fair chunk under, and that should allow Microsoft’s OS to tackle the budget end of the smartphone market where Android is currently doing well. The 610 is expected to land in Q2.

Android hope could definitely be one to watch for those who like bigger-screened phones.

HTC One X

HTC has struggled since the initial success of

the Desire, falling well into Samsung’s shadow in terms of Android devices. The company’s great new flagship hope is the HTC One X, another 1.5GHz quad-core toting smartphone, with a 4.7 inch super LCD 720p display.

The One X features a slim, lightweight build, and comes with a generous 32GB of

storage. There’s a quick-starting 8 megapixel 1080p capable camera (with burst mode) and a front-facing camera, along with Beats audio technology on-board for those who like their music. Due out in the second quarter, the danger is this HTC offering, while undoubtedly a quality handset, will be overshadowed by the Galaxy S III.

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Most Promising Smartphones for 2012 FEaTuRE

Honourable Mentions

Here’s the best of the rest. Samsung’s universe

doesn’t just contain the S III, of course, but also the Galaxy Beam. This Android handset has a 4 inch screen, but moreover a built-in mini-projector capable of throwing a 640x480 resolution 50 inch image onto a nearby white wall. Now that’s pretty novel.

For those who can’t stand sun glare making a phone’s display unreadable, Sony’s freshly unveiled Xperia P employs WhiteMagic technology. Essentially a super-bright mode which is intelligently switched to in well-lit conditions, Sony claims it conquers any sun glare issues.

Huawei has a 1.2GHz quad-core Android handset coming out, the Ascend D Quad, with a 4.5 inch 720p display. It should be interesting to see how that performs, and how competitively the price is pitched.

There are also smartphones on the way powered by Intel chips, such as the Orange Santa

Clara. It runs a 1.6GHz Intel Atom Z2460 processor, with a 4 inch display and Android Gingerbread. Unfortunately, the display has been criticised as lacklustre in previews, as has the aged OS – but it should give us an indication of how Intel will stack up in terms of processing power and battery life for future devices.

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FEaTuRETop Ten Facebook Scams to Avoid

Facebook now has around 850 million users. And despite the fact that growth in nations

such as the UK and US has now reached saturation point, more or less, the likes of India and Brazil are stepping in to pick up the slack with rapid user base expansion. Mark Zuckerberg’s social empire is expected to hit

the magic 1 billion global membership mark before the summer of 2012 is out.

And anything that’s as huge as Facebook attracts not just attention of the good kind, but also the negative. Cyber-criminals can’t resist those sort of numbers when it comes to targeting their ploys and scams, and so as Facebook has grown in popularity, it has become a more dangerous place.

From fake applications laden with malware, to spammed posts containing links to dubious websites, the content of social networks has become increasingly populated with such dodgy material. Even trusted friends can have their account breached and used to distribute malware links, so it pays to be careful what you click on.

With all that in mind, we thought we’d list the top ten Facebook scams and hoaxes to beware of; forewarned being forearmed, as they say.

1 Removal of the Facebook Timeline

The Timeline is the new style layout for the profile page which switches the emphasis to chronological categorisation of the user’s life, and a more immediately image heavy front page. It’s expected to be made compulsory in the near future, and like most Facebook changes, it has angered many users, more so than the average update.

Once you’ve switched over to the new Timeline scheme, you can’t change back to the old profile. However, one of the latest scams to emerge claims it can roll back your account to the way it was.

These scams come in the form of posts which advertise links to a web page with instructions on how to perform the alleged roll back. Those

instructions generally include clicking Like on the hoax page in question, to lure more Facebook friends in. Fake apps are also available which are supposed to revert your Timeline, but once installed will only proceed to spam your Wall.

Currently, it simply isn’t possible to roll back your account and get rid of the Timeline, so anything claiming to do so is a scam.

2 Ex-Girlfriend Sex Scam

This one involves a video link, advertised by a saucy looking still frame of a naked man and woman engaged in – well, let’s just say they’re not playing Scrabble. It’s accompanied by text to the effect of “OMG! Look what happened to his ex-girlfriend” in a crude attempt to stoke curiosity and get the viewer to click the link.

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Top Ten Facebook Scams to Avoid FEaTuRE

Of course, Sophos Security warns, if you do click the link, you’ll be asked to install a DivX plug-in to play it. Naturally the plug-in is nothing of the sort, rather a script is installed to your browser, leading to a scam survey page. And definitely not an “OMG” naked romp, surprise, surprise.

Anything which promises a “sexy” video of some form or another on Facebook – another recent variant promises to show an Italian model’s wardrobe malfunction on live TV – should be regarded with extreme suspicion and not clicked upon. These sort of scams can attempt to be clever as they can even use the names of your Facebook friends to lure you in, but the dodgy looking plug-in installation box should be (but evidently isn’t) enough to put most people off.

3 Who’s Viewed Your Profile App

“See who’s stalking you! I just installed this app to see who had viewed my page the most this year, and the results were shocking!!” Add a few extra exclamation marks for flavour, and you get the general idea of this scam, which has been around forever.

The thought of being able to spot your stalkers/secret admirers and so forth is far too much of a temptation for many, which has made this a particularly successful and therefore enduring scam.

However, Facebook does not allow page viewed data to be collected by any app, so any promise along these lines is most definitely a false one. You’ll just have to spot your stalkers the traditional way – by looking back over your shoulder a lot on the walk home of an evening.

4 Friend Stranded Abroad

Just because a message comes from a friend, doesn’t necessarily mean that it really is from that friend. Accounts can be compromised and hijacked, with scammers then sending out messages in the guise of the owner in an attempt to con their pals.

One of the more common instances of this involves the scammers sending messages out to friends, pretending that they’ve been stranded out of the country, having lost their wallet (or been robbed) and needing some money to catch a flight home.

While many folks will know that their friend isn’t away – having seen them playing darts down the pub an hour ago, perhaps – others might not. And the more gullible might be persuaded to transfer some money across in order to help out.

Obviously, common sense is the order of the day here, and if you’re ever asked for money on Facebook, or indeed anywhere online, actually speak to the person in question first.

5 The Dislike Button

Facebook has a Like button, of course, but many users would like to see the opposite enabled – a method of hurling virtual tomatoes at a page you don’t appreciate.

However, such negativity wouldn’t be tolerated on Facebook, because Mark Zuckerberg doesn’t want any bad vibes or hurt feelings on his site. Or especially not any global mega-corporations taking their advertising elsewhere, following a protest barrage of a million dislikes

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Top Ten Facebook Scams to Avoid FEaTuRE

at their treatment of Asian sweatshop workers (or similar).

There will never be a Dislike button for exactly this reason, yet this hasn’t stopped the promise of such a tool being one of the most prevalent scams on the social network for several years now.

If you see a purported app or link to a site offering a Dislike button, ignore it. You can stop liking something on Facebook, but you can’t dislike it, and you’ll never be able to.

6 Fastest Like in the West

Another one which is based around the Like button, this scam (flagged up by security firm BitDefender) uses a different angle in challenging the Facebook user to a test. This is, in some cases, presented as a simple speed clicking test where you’re challenged to click 72 Like buttons while being timed.

You then find out “how fast you can click”. And also that you’ve subscribed to like 72 random pages which probably contain more spam than the Hotmail and Gmail servers combined.

Alternatively, this scam can be presented as a security test, despite the fact that how fast you can click has about as much bearing on security as whether or not you can successfully gargle the full eight minutes of Ride of the Valkyries.

At any rate, if you’re security conscious enough to click really fast, the test promises to reveal those friends of yours who have a fake profile (whatever a fake profile is). Except of course, should you take the security test, it won’t reveal

anything except for the aforementioned fact that you’ve just subscribed to 72 pages of spam (more than enough to kill a Monty Python sketch).

7 Lose Weight Fast with HCG

Any common headline grabbing fad can be used by Facebook scammers as it obviously generates immediate interest, and weight loss is a subject guaranteed to do that.

As ever, though, any miracle diet which promises the pounds will melt away is unlikely to live up to its promise. And indeed on Facebook, it’s very likely to link not to a magic weight loss pill of some form, but to an external site which carries the usual surveys to be filled in (which spammers make money from).

The main fad diet cyber-goons are currently exploiting to peddle their dodgy pages is the HCG diet, which stands for human chorionic gonadotropin, a substance produced by pregnant women in fact. So be wary of any HCG promises.

8 Celebrity Scandals

Celebrities are another obvious lure for scammers, with gossip keen social networkers eager to click on a promising looking link to a bit of scandal. Normally these will use the names of massive stars, and often they will play off the death of a celebrity.

Most recently, Whitney Houston has been the centrepiece for many scammer’s efforts, attempting to get folks to visit an external web

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Top Ten Facebook Scams to Avoid FEaTuRE

page and purchase a Whitney ringtone, or to watch a “shocking” video of her autopsy.

Scammers aren’t beyond inventing celebrity deaths, either, as was the case with Lady Gaga last year. Some of the celeb related scams will offer a scandalous video clip, but of course these will be the usual trick of attempting to get the user to install a dodgy plug-in to play the footage.

Where celebs are concerned on Facebook, the best advice is to carry a giant salt shaker, and think twice when you’re promised footage of the Chuckle Brothers being decapitated by a flying Waltzer car. You can always independently check-up any purported stories with Google.

9 Facebook to Start Charging

This is another venerable hoax which keeps on returning in various different guises. The essential theme is always the same – Facebook is about to start charging a subscription fee, starting from tomorrow. And, the message informs you, the only way to avoid paying is to cut and paste the message text into your profile.

If you do this, your Facebook icon will turn a different colour, birds will start to sing in the trees again, and your Facebook will remain free

forever. Plus a leprechaun might land at the foot of your bed in his steam-powered moon rocket, and offer you a lucky dip in his pot of gold.

Of course not. The only thing that will happen should you cut and paste the message is that you’ll look a bit of a plank. While this one doesn’t do any harm as such, it doesspread disinformation.

10 Free Stuff

Lady Gaga’s giving away iPads to some lucky fans! Er, no, she isn’t. That was one of the more recent scams on Facebook purporting to offer free stuff to anyone who clicks the link and fills in a survey (earning the scammers commission, and/or access to personal details).

Granted, planting the scam on Lady Gaga’s page was a more sophisticated attack, but you’ll see these type of tricks pulled on Facebook quite regularly. Often they’ll offer free expensive gadgets such as iPads or iPhones, gift cards or Facebook credits.

Let’s roll out the clichés at this point: There’s no such thing as a free lunch; if it sounds too good to be true, then it probably is; and the best things in life are free (but not given away on Facebook)

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iPad the Third: Long Live the Tablet King? FEaTuRE

Apple has 362 retail stores across the globe. They saw 110 million visitors through their doors in the final quarter of 2011.

The Cupertino company might be a hype machine, but it’s a very successful one that definitely has the sales figures to back up that standing.

315 million iOS gadgets sold to date, 62 million of them in Q4 2011. 585,000 apps are to be found in the iOS app store, 25 billion having been downloaded in total.

It’s little wonder then, when Apple launches, the tech world stops and listens.

55 million iPads sold to date, 15.4 million of them in the last quarter.

So when the third-generation iPad launch came to town, we were watching like a pretty attentive bird. A hawk, you could say.

What new features does the latest piece of tech-wizardry from Cupertino boast? What sets the device apart from the competition? Will it be crowned monarch of the slate kingdom? We’ll give you our opinion over the next couple of pages.

The New iPad Spec

Pundits thought the tablet would be called the iPad 3 or perhaps iPad HD, but in the end Apple decided to simply call it the iPad – much in the vein of the iPod, which isn’t numbered, either. A bit daft in our book, but never mind. Anyway, we’re not judging the name, but rather what’s different about the tech spec from the iPad 2.

The major upgrade is to the display, which has had its resolution doubled up to a 264ppi “retina” quality 2048×1536 panel with over 40% improved colour saturation compared to the iPad 2.

Retina quality means that it’s such high resolution, the human eye can’t distinguish individual pixels when held at a “normal” viewing distance, which in the case of the iPad is 15 inches away. Although Apple noted it qualifies when held a bit closer than this, anyway.

The processor has been upgraded to an A5X (dual-core) chip with quad-core graphics, providing double the performance of the iPad 2’s CPU, Apple reckons.

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iPad the Third: Long Live the Tablet King? FEaTuRE

The 5 megapixel camera has been improved with new optics to ensure better quality photos, and backside illumination to help in low-light conditions. It’s also 1080p capable when it comes to video recording.

4G LTE support has also been added, although that’s of no relevance to the UK market for the time being.

Battery life remains the same (rated at 10 hours), as does the price of the tablet.

However, the battery has had to be increased in size to power the new CPU and display, meaning that the downside with the third iPad is that it’s a touch thicker and heavier than the iPad 2.

State of the Upgrade

So once again, Apple has produced an incremental upgrade to its slate rather than a piece of hardware which is a quantum leap forward from the previous device, very much like they did with the iPhone 4s.

In fact, some pundits are cheekily calling the new iPad the “iPad 2S” because of this.

However, sans Siri, it is a decent upgrade, though no doubt some people wanted more.

The retina display exceeds 1080p HD resolution, with 50% more pixels than an HDTV (3 million in total), which is no mean feat. High definition video, games and apps, not to mention e-magazines, are going to look very clean, sharp, and vibrant thanks to the enhanced colour saturation.

Stock iPad apps have already been optimised, and third party apps will be upscaled for now. Of course, in the future developers will be able to program with the new retina resolution in mind.

At the iPad launch event, several games were shown off including Infinity Blade: Dungeons, which looked quite impressive. Apple was bandying the phrase “console quality” about when it came to the visuals.

Naturally, we’ll have to reserve full judgement on the display until we actually see it in action ourselves, but given critical reaction, and the preview material we’ve seen, it looks very promising. And we’re betting the shiny graphics are possibly going to tempt those who didn’t upgrade from the original iPad to number two. Not to mention a potential whole host of new buyers finally picking up a tablet when they see its crisp display in action.

There are downsides to the new iPad, though. Much of the video content on the web isn’t 1080p, so won’t benefit from the fancy display goodness. The screen is only as good as the source video, and lower resolution material will look distinctly ropier on the retina display.

While the new iPad has introduced voice dictation support, some have expressed disappointment that Siri wasn’t ported over from the iPhone 4S to the tablet. It certainly would have been good to see, although in the UK Siri has been something of a disappointment anyway (it still doesn’t have location services for this country, and there’s the problem of harsher British accents).

Old bugbears remain, too. Why has the iPad still not had a USB port introduced? There’s no

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iPad the Third: Long Live the Tablet King? FEaTuRE

SD card slot for easy memory expansion, which is more of a consideration with HD movies of course (Apple seems to be looking more towards the cloud for storage). We won’t even mention the “F” word (Flash, that is – though mobile Flash is being killed off, it still isn’t dead yet).

And the new bigger battery has made the third-gen tablet a tad chunkier, which isn’t ideal either. We doubt the average consumer would notice this, though. Or the lack of Siri and USB ports, for that matter.

Not when dazzled by that screen. After all, it has more pixels than your fancy Sony/Samsung/Panasonic/Toshiba/Philips HDTV, you know…

Android Competition

Yes, we’re banging on about the retina screen, but we think Apple has been pretty clever here.

When it goes on sale this coming week, the iPad will be the only tablet on the market to offer a true HD – well, actually in excess of 1080p – display. At the same price point the iPad has always been on sale for. The basic

16GB wi-fi model has been maintained at £399.

HD competition is coming. Android tablets with true full HD displays coupled with quad-core processors are in the pipeline. Acer has its Iconia Tab A700, and Asus has the Transformer Infinity. There will be others, too, such as Huawei’s full HD effort; but they aren’t here yet.

Spec-wise, the Infinity will have a 1920×1200 super-IPS+ display driven by a 1.6GHz quad-core Tegra 3 CPU, LTE support, and an HD recording capable 8 megapixel camera. Acer’s A700 will boast the same as the Infinity in the display department, and likely the same processor, too, with a 5 megapixel camera.

However, the A700 isn’t due for release until June, a full quarter after the new iPad – and that’s assuming the date doesn’t slip. The Infinity won’t be out until later in the year still, with a release date to be confirmed.

And when these tablets do emerge, the rumoured pricing for the basic A700 is pitched at the £450 to £500 mark. There’s been no speculation about the Infinity’s price, but the Transformer Prime is currently £500. It seems very unlikely that either Acer or Asus will be able to keep their offerings down at the £399 mark of the new iPad.

So Apple will likely have a price advantage, perhaps of £100, coupled with at least a three month head-start on the HD tablet market. Just as with the original iPad, the company is in there first, and can expect to grab early market share.

Perhaps talking of HD tablets as almost a new market seems like quite the exaggeration, and we accept that. But we do believe Apple’s

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iPad the Third: Long Live the Tablet King? FEaTuRE

hype machine can push that line effectively, particularly when, by all accounts, those who have seen the iPad in action have enthused about how excellent that display really is.

The Telegraph newspaper noted that you have to see the display in the flesh – and the speed the A5X processor imparts – to appreciate the new model. Everything zips along and looks truly superb, the paper enthused. Engadget called the display truly beautiful, sharp and accurate, with “ridiculous” wide viewing angles.

The potential apps and games which are going to be crafted for this display will ultimately make or break its utility, and we won’t know what they’ll be like for a little while yet. But if there’s one thing the iPad does well, it’s apps.

The app ecosystem is another powerful reason to buy into Apple rather than Android, given that some 200,000 iOS apps are optimised for the iPad. The software has always been widely varied, slick and smooth running on the device; something which Android tablets can’t always claim.

Final Word

The new iPad is an incremental upgrade. It isn’t a huge jump forward. No one’s going to argue that. Some have jokingly labelled it the iPad 2S.

Other folks have expressed the opinion that Apple deliberately holds back upgrades each time, and releases features in a slow drip fashion. Why does the iPad still not have a USB port? Because they’re saving that for the iPad… erm, whatever the next one will be called.

There’s likely an element of truth there, certainly. However, the new iPad has an attractive enough centre-piece in the retina display to make it a compelling purchase for consumers – and enough of an upgrade for original iPadders who didn’t think the second iPad was worth splashing the cash for.

So yes, the iPad will sell. And when the HD quality apps and games start to flood forth – folks are already raving about the iPhoto app – it’ll probably sell more. Android HD tablets are coming, but not soon enough, and they’re not likely to be cheap enough to gouge away a meaningful market share, either.

The budget tablet market – the likes of the Kindle Fire and rumoured Google Nexus slate – will gobble more market share this year. Windows 8 slates are also looming. However, for the moment, the new iPad is indeed King of the tablets.

We predict that it’s going to reign supreme throughout 2012, and broadly maintain Apple’s dominant market share, perhaps even increasing it slightly. Just wait for those first quarter sales figures, which will doubtless be the proof in the Apple pie.

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Retro Tech: Spectrum 48k FEaTuRE

The Spectrum 48k had an amazing 48k of RAM. Amazing in those days, because

previously machines tended to only have 16k of RAM.

It became the first truly mass market home computer in Britain, and parents across the country - feeling computers were the future - bought their kids them, hoping to create a wave of programmers and analysts who would no doubt get high-paying computing jobs.

Except for a little experimentation with BASIC commands, such as RUN, GOTO, and BEEP, most kids just played games on the Spectrum, astonished they were allowed to, instead of having to travel to pocket money-eating arcades.

However, the games were pretty limited by the low hardware specs, and the first few showed this. Spectrum gamers soon had to learn to be pixel-perfect with their jumps and other moves.

Developers were pushed to find novel ways to get so much out of so little, and many game genres were defined at this stage: platformers, shoot ‘em ups, adventure, arcade, etc.

Early successes such as Manic Miner, and Jetpac, were followed up by sequels such as Jet Set Willy, Atic Atac, and Sabre Wulf.

If you owned a ‘speccy’, you’ll already recognise a number of these titles were from publisher Ultimate: Play The Game, who were one of the main innovators. While there had been attempts at making games look 3D with Isometric graphics, such as Ant Attack, it was Ultimate’s ‘Knight Lore’ that really broke the boundaries, creating an adventure game with simulated 3D graphics that broke sales records for the company.

By keeping their future releases secret, they managed to build up not only a sense of hype, but also a general demand for news on coming releases in general.

Magazines such as Crash aimed to do this every month, and quickly became the iconic Spectrum user’s magazine, not least because of the awesome covers by Oliver Frey. It provided news, reviews, previews, and Robin Candy’s cheats andgame maps.

For a number of years through the mid-80’s, all was heaven for Spectrum owners. Games were developed by a myriad of companies trying to feed every conceivable need.

The only rankles were constant arguments with owners of the new Commodore 64 as to which

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Retro Tech: Spectrum 48k FEaTuRE

machine was better, which still continue to this day.

And the increasing price of games, which led to large-scale game piracy developing, which remains a less savoury feature of modern computer gaming.

Often laughed at for its rubber keyboard, the Spectrum 48k really did have a good run, and managed to dominate home computing through most of the 1980’s. When it came into decline towards the end of that decade, despite being upgraded to 128K, it was as much because owners grew up and out of it.

The Spectrum, for all its early triumphs, failed to properly develop into a general home computing experience, and for the most part remained a glorified games console, if that expression can ever be used to describe a 48k machine.

The Spectrum 48k was a true computer of its time, and by using it, created a generation of kids who would not be intimidated by them in future - helping make the jump to Windows and Apple computing much easier.

Here’s a free emulator with a number of classic games if you want to dare challenge any rose-tinted nostalgia you ever felt for them!

http://www.twinbee.org/hob/index.php