Just in case you guys haven’t heard, a recent article over at geek.com revealed a rumoured unified messaging service from Google called Babble. This service is meant to roll all of the messaging, voice and video chat options of Google into a single service, combining Google Talk, Hangouts, Voice, G+ Messenger, etc. Of course since that times there’s been a couple of leaks of supposed screenshots of the upcoming Google Babble, however we know that both of those are fake, for the simple reason that both of them are using the icon that Shen Ye made for the original geek.com article. Still, it doesn’t stop us from fantasising about what an upcoming Babble will look like:

For anyone who …

So here it is, what you’ve been waiting for people. The Samsung Galaxy S IV has officially been announced and now we know all the goodies it has stashed within.

The Galaxy S IV announcement means that we now have a clear idea of the titans of the Android ecosystem for 2013, with the sole exception of the flagship from Motorola, which is rumored to be announced around July.

So how exactly does the Galaxy S IV stack up? We’ve pitted the S IV against what we feel are its two strongest competitors for the the Android crown of 2013, the Sony Xperia Z and the HTC One, as well as its undisputed strongest competitor from outside the Android world, …

Samsung Galaxy S, BMW M3, Halo, Apple iPhone, Sony Playstation, and I’ll throw in Mario Kart too. Each of these names represents a product that has been updated numerous times; names that have grown in stature, and represent some of the best work each company produces in that specific segment. Each of these products adds value and desire to other products in the company’s lineup. And importantly, all of these names have been used sparingly and strategically by the parent company, and not squandered. (Note: some may claim that recently Sony has been a bit liberal with the Playstation name in regards to the Playstation Suite of mobile games, but given Sony’s recent financial woes, and the low penetration of …

Terrible Lord of the Rings references aside, HTC have just announced their new flagship model for 2013, and it is a bit of a monster.

Getting rid of the multiple “One” phones of 2012, HTC has launched a single “One” phone as their flagship model, the HTC One. This phone brings a lot to the table, so let me run it all down for you. Warning: HTC threw more marketing catch phrases and new names for things than you can shake a stick at.

SCREEN AND BUILD

The HTC One keeps the same 4.7″ screen size as its predecessor, the One X, which should be welcome news for those fearing that 2013 would be the year of the 5 inch …

So, we’ve been hearing this one for a while, but now the update has dropped, and the rumors are true.

An update to the Google Search App (which includes Google Now, for all you people toting Jelly Bean) has brought a few improvements to Google Now. Perhaps the biggest change is that there is now a Google Now Widget, which predictably shows your Google Now cards in Widget form. The widget has a stripped down, minimalist look to it, matching up with Google Now in general.

The other updates that are brought to the table is movie listings that are provided by Fandango, and Real Estate listings provided by Zillow. I think the movie screenings idea is fantastic, the biggest …

It seems we’ve been writing and reading articles about Android’s increasing market share forever, and it has been literally years now. Logically this run has to end, and with Windows Phone 8 and Blackberry OS 10, surely it has to be soon right? Well, perhaps, but Android is still firmly in charge.

The latest numbers are out from analyst company Canalys for Q4, 2012 and I don’t think many people will be surprised. Android has long been dominating the smartphone market, with increasing market share for three quarters each year, whilst Apple’s iPhone has traditionally gained back a few percent in the 4th quarter of each year following the release of the latest iPhone. This trend has continued, with Android’s …

For those of you who may not know, Vertu is a deluxe mobile phone company, up until last October wholly owned (though separately run) by Nokia, before it sold it off in an attempt to turn around it’s long string of negative quarters. As a Nokia-owned company, Vertu had previously produced Symbian-powered phones, though they tended to focus not so much on the specifications but the precious metal and gemstone-encrusted exterior, with the cheapest (?) phones starting at around £3,500 (~$5,300) and heading up the heady heights of £213,000 (~$324,000).

But now it’s the new age, and with even Nokia abandoning Symbian, it was only a matter of time before Vertu started to look elsewhere for the operating system to …

Only a few days ago we posted a leaked render of the rumored upcoming HTC M7, the replacement and successor of the One X. Well it seems that when it rains it pours as far as leaks are concerned, because now we have something even better, photographs of the rumored device!

There’s no change to the list of specifications, so in case you don’t feel like looking back to our old post here it is again:

• 4.7 inch, 1080p display (468 ppi!)
• Quad-core 1.7 GHz Snapdragon processor
• 2GB of RAM & 32 GB Internal Storage
• 13MP Rear Camera, capable of super slow motion, HDR all in 1080p
• 2MP Front-facing Camera, also capable of recording in 1080p
• 2300mAh Battery
• LTE support

…

One thing Google can never be accused of is being conservative when it comes to trying out new features and services. New online services or products continue to spew out of the Google headquarters in a bewildering torrent. Some of these services are destined to go on to greatness (Gmail and of course Android itself are two great examples) whereas others arrive to minimal penetration and are quietly put down in the back yard once it’s apparent that they’ve gone lame (everyone used Buzz, right?). In fact the list of dead Google products is so long that there’s a Pinterest board dedicated to them.

It could be argued that this “see what sticks” policy is what has made Google great. …

Well, NVIDIA just threw a new contender into the mobile processing ring, and this one’s a bit of a beast. As already mentioned in our post concerning Project Shield, NVIDIA has announced the successor to the Tegra 3, unsurprisingly called the Tegra 4.

So what does this chip bring to the table, and how does it stack up against the competition? The short answer is, very well. The Tegra 4 uses the same battery-saving 4 plus 1 arrangement as the Tegra 3, having 4 main processing cores for the heavy lifting with a 5th low-power core for the more menial tasks and for sitting in standby. The big difference is that each of the cores in the Tegra 4 …

Over at CES 2013 the curtains are being raised on a staggering range of products, we here at Android Australia are struggling to keep up. Among the first off to unveil their goods is NVIDIA, and boy did they unveil.

Project Shield is an upcoming Android-powered gaming device that doesn’t really fit into the traditional Android moulds of phone or tablet. Looking at it, it looks like what would happen if you sticky-taped a Galaxy Note sideways onto an XB’ox controller, creating an Android clamshell gaming device.

The specification list is headlined by the also just-announced NVIDIA Tegra 4 chip, which is being touted as the “world’s fastest mobile processor” and 72 GPU cores might help a bit with …

Everyone loves an update, especially when that update brings your phone of choice up to the deliciousness that is Android Jelly Bean.

Now all those people that are using an HTC One X with Vodafone may have some Jelly Bean of their own, as Vodafone has released the 4.1.1 update for the One X.

Jelly Bean may not have been the huge step over Ice Cream Sandwich that Ice Cream Sandwich was over Gingerbread, but it still brings with it a range of new features to be excited about. Just a few to mention are:

• Project Butter: an effort by Google to improve frame-rates, everything about Android is now smoother.
• Google Now: Google’s answer to Siri, but much much more

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