Motorola and Apple are currently involved in a court case in Germany which saw Apple remove its 3G enabled devices from sale on Friday for a short period, the device in question which included the iPhone 3GS, iPhone 4 and iPad 3G went back on sale after Apple managed to appeal the injunction.
Now some details have been revealed by Foss Patents, on what Motorola wants from Apple in order to license the patents in question to them, 2.25 percent of Apple sales.
It isn’t clear whether the 2.25 percent is related to all Apple’s sales or just the 3G enabled devices, even if it is the 3G enabled devices it could be a sizable amount.
Apple’s iPhone sales have totaled $93 billion since 2007, and if Apple agreed to the license fee they would have to pay Motorola around $2.1 billion on just the iPhone alone, this figure doesn’t take into account sales of the iPad 3G.
Apple has also filed a range of motions to access the licensing agreements that Motorola has for these 3G patents with other companies like Nokia, HTC and more.
If Motorola is offering these patents to the other companies for free under FRAND, and then trying to charge Apple for the patents, it could spell trouble for them.
On the other hand if Motorola has similar deals of 2.25 percent in place with the other companies that it is attempting to impose on Apple, then Apple could end up having to pay the licensing fee.
We now know it won't be at Mobile World Congress, but that hasn't stopped the steady trickle of rumors relating to the Samsung Galaxy S III. The latest round of unconfirmed, unverifiable info comes from Korean site ETNews, which cites its own "industry insiders."
According to these sources, the phone includes such previously-rumored specs as Android 4.0, a quad-core CPU and LTE support -- none of which is particularly unsurprising for a Samsung flagship product in 2012. However, the most interesting rumor concerns the device's dimensions -- it's said to measure just 7mm thick, thanks to the introduction of thinner internal components. At 7mm, the Galaxy S III would still be a hair thicker than Huawei's P1S, but considering its souped-up internals, it's still incredibly impressive. That figure would see Samsung shave almost a millimeter and a half off the girth of the Galaxy S II, which measured 8.49mm.
Other rumored specs for the Galaxy S III include a 2MP front-facing camera and 8MP rear-facing shooter, which apparently protrudes slightly from the back of the device.
Looking further ahead, ETNews suggests that Samsung, apparently undeterred by lukewarm uptake of other 3D phones, may be planning to launch its own 3D smartphone later in the year.
Today's rumors indicate a possible May 2012 launch for the Galaxy S III, which certainly wouldn't surprise us, and would fit within the Samsung's previously-announced timeframe. In any case, we're expecting to hear more about the Galaxy S III sometime after Mobile World Congress
Samsung has officially confirmed the Galaxy Nexus White, the pale color variant of its Ice Cream Sandwich smartphone collaboration with Google. Functionally identical to the existing Galaxy Nexus – the GSM model, in this case, rather than the 4G LTE version – the new Nexus will go on sale in the UK from February 13 2012.
Pre-order listings for the Galaxy Nexus White were spotted early last month, with official images cropping up shortly after. Like previous white Samsung phones, the fascia itself is still black, with the edge and rear of the handset the new color.
“After much speculation, we are pleased to announce the availability of the Galaxy Nexus White which follows the great reception the phone has received since it was launched back in November” Samsung UK telecoms exec Simon Stanford said this morning. ”One of the things we at Samsung pride ourselves on is the choice we offer customers, and we’ve enjoyed huge success to date by introducing white variants of our most popular models to our product portfolio.”
Samsung has confirmed that both 16GB and 32GB versions of the white Galaxy Nexus will be offered; the smartphone will have the same 4.65-inch 720p Super AMOLED HD display, 5-megapixel 1080p-capable camera and HSPA+ connectivity as its black sibling. No word from the company on pricing, but online listing suggest around £500 ($789) unlocked for the 16GB model.
There's plenty of SSD options out there, but Intel's NAND drives are among the most well thought of, simply because they're so reliable. But, with the top speed of competing SSDs spiraling higher, Intel's rock-solid reputation may not be enough for some enthusiasts. Enter the SSD 520, with a performance SandForce SF-2281 controller and custom firmware (codenamed Cherryville) on board to ensure the 520 meets Chipzilla's demanding standards for stability. It's the result of a year and a half long collaboration between Intel and SandForce, and is available in both 7mm and 9.5mm thin form factors to fit any machine -- Ultrabook or otherwise. Aside from the SandForce chip, the 520 packs Intel's finest 25nm NAND Flash, a SATA 6GB/s connection and its 550MB/s reads and 520MB/s writes can be had for $149 in 60GB garb and prices escalate up to a grand for 480GB. Naturally, as this is Intel's effort to snatch back the performance market, a raft of reviews have been written about the SSD 520.
So, how does the 520 stack up? Well, Intel's so confident in the 520 that it's backed the SSD with a five-year warranty. Though its performance doesn't drastically outpace its competition, Storage Review found the drive to be on par with the current speed king, OCZ's Vertex 3 in its benchmarks -- and also found performance and stability to be quite good in both enterprise use and in RAID arrays. Meanwhile, AnandTech found that the 520's peak random write speeds quite similar to its sequential reads during testing, which shows how well the optimized firmware works with the NAND. Hot Hardware thought the 520 to be comparable to other SandForce-equipped SSDs, but in terms of power consumption, Tom's Hardware found Intel's latest to be a power hog. Generally, all the reviewers were in agreement: the 520 is a speedy SSD, but you pay a hefty premium for Intel's reputation for churning out reliable drives. Only time will tell if the 520 can deliver the reliability we want, but there's plenty of performance info to be had in the reviews listed below.
We've seen Nikon's successor to the D700 slip out a few times this past winter, but this latest leak and its bevy of press images might just be the real deal. According to Brazilian site ZTOP, the company's set to officially debut its 36.3 megapixel D800 tomorrow. So, what's on the spec list? Well, it looks like those rumors were true, as this high-end DSLR apparently boasts that aforementioned CMOS sensor capable of 7360 x 4912 resolution and the ability to toggle ISO from 100 - 6,400. As you'd imagine, this high-end, digital light box also comes equipped with the ability for full 1080p30 HD video capture, recording content in either H.264 or MPEG-4 formats. Naturally, there's also a 3.2-inch LCD screen onboard so you can sift through your sizeable gallery of stills. While we still caution you to take this news with a nigh invisible grain of salt, it's likely all will be revealed in one day's time. Check out the source below for additional shots.
While Toshiba's stateside reps had us convinced its 14-inch Ultrabook wouldn't see the light of day until sometime in June, that message of withholding apparently didn't make it Down Under. Outed by its Australian arm today, that would-be Portege is actually the company's Satellite U840. We already knew the electronics giant had intended on shuffling this Windows 7 machine out under that brand umbrella back at CES, but now we have a $1,500 AUD (about $1,608 USD) price tag to go with a list of confirmed specs. Officially on deck for this aluminum-bodied laptop are an Intel Core i5-2467M processor and HD Graphics 3000 GPU, 720p-capable 1366 x 768 LED display, 8GB of DDR3 RAM, 320GB of storage, in addition to ports for HDMI, mic, headphone and USB (1x USB 3.0 and 2x USB 2.0). We still don't know much about the capacity of the six cell battery powering this svelte notebook entry or a concrete landing date for that matter. But from the looks of this Aussie product page, that release is creeping mighty close.
Thought Canon was done with the point-and-shoot updates after refreshing its ELPH lineup last month? Think again, as the company is updating its PowerShot A-Series shooters with six new models in a variety of colors. All the cameras pack a 16-megapixel sensor, 28mm wide angle lens and can take 720p video. First up is the A4000 IS, which brings image stabilization, 8X optical zoom and a 3-inch LCD for $200 later this month. The A3400 IS and A2400 IS make their debuts in March, and bring the same image stabilization as the 4000, but have a lesser 5X optical zoom. Additionally, the 3400 packs a 3-inch touchscreen LCD and costs $180, while the 2400 gets a smaller non-touchscreen 2.7-inch LCD and retails for $150. Meanwhile, the A2300 has the same specs as the 2400, minus the image stabilization, and will cost ten bucks less than its brother when it drops next month. Finally, the PowerShot A1300 and A810 each come with 5X optical zoom and a 2.7-inch LCD when they debut in April, with the A810 priced at $110 and the A1300 available for $120.
