From left to right: Samsung Galaxy Note, Samsung Exhilarate, HTC Titan II and Sony Xperia ion.
LAS
VEGAS — You knew it was coming. A huge wave of new smartphones,
crushing last year's measly models with their impressive display,
processor and camera specs.
AT&T announced new
4G smartphones from Samsung, HTC and Sony, unveiling a lineup of large
displays, dual-core devices (sound familiar?) and ever more capable
cameras.
If you're looking to buy a smartphone in 2012, here's a
peek at the big-screen stunners you can look forward to pocketing. Don't
worry — we'll have more photo, video and hands-ons as the week
progresses.
HTC Titan II
This is the sort of handset Windows Phone fans have been waiting for.
HTC
announced the world's first 4G LTE Windows Phone today, the Titan II.
The Titan II is the supercharged sequel to the original Titan announced
this fall.
The Titan II gets its name from its mini-tablet-like 4.7-inch super LCD capacitive touch display.
It
packs a whopping 16-megapixel digital camera with features like image
stabilization, a wide-angle lens, dual LED flash and red eye reduction.
You can kiss that $100 point-and-shoot goodbye — this phone can shoot
720p HD video, and boasts a 1.3 megapixel front-facing camera (something
most current Windows Phones are lacking) for video chatting.
A
Qualcomm 1.5 GHz Snapdragon S2 processor is the brains behind this
beastly phone, while a 1,730 mAh battery will keep that display shining
bright.
The HTC Titan II will be available “in the coming months” through AT&T, HTC said.
Samsung Galaxy Note
The 4G LTE Samsung Galaxy Note bridges the gap between smartphone and tablet with its 5.3-inch Super AMOLED screen.
An
interesting thing about this smartphone-tablet hybrid is that it
includes a stylus (what Samsung calls an “S Pen”) for drawing on the
screen in a finer resolution than your index finger can manage. The
stylus can be used in collaboration with Samsung's S Memo app, which can
capture images, voice recordings, handwritten notes and drawings, and
typed text. Using the stylus, you can tap the screen of the device to
take a screen shot, which you can then edit, draw on or annotate as
needed.
We first got a peek at this device and the rest of its
specs back in September, which include a 1.5 GHz dual-core processor,
16GB of on-board storage and a 2500 mAh battery. It's got a 2-megapixel
front facing camera and 8-megapixel rear-facing camera.
The Note will run Android Gingerbread, and will be available through AT&T in two colors: carbon blue and ceramic white.
Sony Xperia ion
The Xperia ion is Sony's first foray into 4G LTE in the smartphone space, and it is absolutely loaded on just about every front.
First
up, the Xperia ion has a 4.6-inch 1280×720 pixel display, and is
powered by a 1.5 GHz dual-core processor. It's got 16 GB of internal
flash storage.
The Xperia ion has not one, but two HD cameras,
shutterbugs: a 12 MP rear-facing camera that can shoot 1080p, and a 720p
capable front-facing camera. The camera can go from standby to first
shot in 1.5 seconds.
With that high def screen and high def
video-taking capabilities, you don't want to keep all that bottled up on
your phone. DLNA, HDMI and Bravia Sync let you share and stream content
to other displays.
Unfortunately, it runs Android 2.3
Gingerbread instead of Google's brand spanking new Ice Cream Sandwich
OS. But the ion is PlayStation Certified, for those of you who want to
continue your PlayStation gaming experiences on your smartphone.
AT&T HTML5 App Store
AT&T
also unveiled something completely new today: an HTML5 Android app
store, perhaps the first viable alternative for developers and users
looking to be freed from the constraints of native mobile app
development.
AT&T's new HTML5 AppCenter will be a “new kind
of app store” according to senior vice president Jeff Bradley. The store
will be filled with a collection of pointers to apps in the Android
Market or to developer websites.
AppCenter will let developers
get their apps into Android users' hands faster by allowing them to
submit “unwrapped” HTML5 apps. AT&T also has a tool called the
Application Resource Optimizer (ARO) that developers can use to minimize
their app's battery usage. Devs can start playing with ARO now.
AppCenter
is available for Android devices as a beta starting today, and other
platforms — possibly including iOS — will follow later this year. |
