Ever since Apple announced the iPhone 4S having “A5″ processor, everyone has been pointing to the below image from a test run by Anandtech and saying that the iPhone 4S will be twice as strong as the Samsung Galaxy S2. I beg to differ.

AnandTech's GPU Comparison Featuring SGX543 MP2 and Mali 400

While the above test doesn’t have any discrepancy, one major thing is that the SGX 543MP2 results are from an iPad 2 (a tablet) while the Mali 400 results are from a smartphone. Thus, we can’t readily take this to directly and accurately predict the comparison results for iPhone 4S because there are other things to consider:

1. Mali-400 lags behing SGX543MP2 in “offscreen” tests which are done for resolutions greater than native SGS2 resolution (SGS 2 resolution is 800×480 while test is done at 720p) and brute triangle pushing. Samsung didn’t have to optimize their GPU implementation for this because SGS2 was never going to run a game at 720p resolution and would also need to push lesser triangles for similar detail. Hence they could easily make this trade-off to get lesser power consumption and heat generation

2. Mali-400 goes hand in hand with SGX543MP2 in all other tests as seen on glbenchmark.com

3. It is naive to think that the same SGX543MP2 implementation as iPad 2 will be present in iPhone 4S. Even if iPhone 4S is slated to have “A5″, a lot depends on the actual clock speeds (CPU and GPU), graphics memory, etc. Apple will do similar trade offs like Samsung (and Apple has already done this with A4 in iPad 1 vs iPhone 4) and the real results would be available only then.

So,  the end result is that we will have the real comparison only when iPhone 4S is out.

PS: Not that the results matter anyways since firstly, the comparisons should now be moving to upcoming Nexus Prime and not SGS2 and secondly, the raw power of these GPUs won’t determine much since they cater to two completely different OSs and would have a lot of software and ecosystem dependencies on the user-perceived outcome.

© Shantanu Goel | This article, titled SGX 543MP2 vs Mali-400: Is iPhone 4S GPU Really Twice As Strong As SGS 2?, was originally published on Shantanu's Technophilic Musings

Samsung just uploaded a teaser video to Youtube which hints at the upcoming Android phone Nexus Prime with IceCream Sandwich. It has a sideways glance at what people believe is the Nexus Prime. I’ll deconstruct the image a bit.

Nexus Prime Image in Samsung's Video

Nexus Prime Image enhanced by an engadget user

The things to take away from here:

1. The phone will have a curved display like Nexus S

2. It has a power button on the side (right side, since it’s marked with the power icon)

3. The interesting thing however is the 3 dots on the left side. People claim that it could be related to camera or volume controls or even speaker grills. But I think that they are for dock connection. Anyone who has owned a Nexus One has seen the same 3 gold dots on the bottom used for dock connection. I believe that on Nexus Prime they have been moved to the side mainly because Prime has (or is supposed to have) a 16:9 screen and hence the optimal placement in a dock would be horizontal and hence the sideways placement.

Let me know what you think

© Shantanu Goel | This article, titled Deconstructing The Samsung Nexus Prime Video, was originally published on Shantanu's Technophilic Musings

Swype just released their latest beta version 3.25 for Android phones but most of the folks are facing a “parse error” while trying to update to the latest version. If you are one of such folks, there is a simple solution that I just tried and got working. Instead of updating from the swype installer, you need to update manually. Uninstall your existing swype, then uninstall the existing swype installer on your phone. Then head over to http://beta.swype.com/android/get (from your android phone) and download and install the new swype installer again. Then open the new swype installer and use it to update to the latest version. Done . And I must say the new version is pretty spiffy

© Shantanu Goel | This article, titled Swype 3.25 Beta Pre-release Parse Error Solution, was originally published on Shantanu's Technophilic Musings

Recently I received Huawei Ideos U8150 phone for review. This is an Android smartphone meant for the entry level market. I had the phone for a few weeks to put it through its paces and here are some of my thoughts about it. I am not going to expand a lot on the general Android points as we all know about it but will concentrate succinctly and to-the-point on the aspects which can make it or break it for this phone against its competition in the similar price ranges.

Huawei Ideos

Display: The display is average and pretty much on par with the other handsets in this range. It’s a low resolution QVGA (320×240) screen. While it’s usable but not a brilliant one and would give a sublime web browsing experience. The brightness of the display was average as well, nothing to write home about but not below the competition either.

Touchscreen: A good thing about this handset is that it has a capacitive touchscreen. A few entry level phones skimp out on this and put a resistive touchscreen but not so with Ideos. The screen response is pretty good.

Android Version: Ideos sports Android 2.2 Froyo which is again a good thing since this is the latest I have seen in any entry/mid-level and most high end phones as well. Gingerbread is still too new and I’m happy enough with Froyo. A lot of other phones are still stuck on Eclair 2.1.

Camera: The camera is ok’ish with its 3.2 MP sensor and no LED flash. It works well for well lit subjects but is useless in dark. The quality of photos taken is average as well. Nothing extremely bad but nothing very good as well, just good enough for capturing spontaneous moments when you are not carrying your proper standalone camera with you.

Connectivity: Ideos has 802.11n wi-fi and 7.2mbps HSDPA 3G for connectivity. wi-fi connected to my router in a snap and it also has hotspot (or wireless tethering) capability for upto 8 devices. 3G connectivity was ok. Speedtest results came out to be similar to my Nexus one over both wi-fi as well as 3G.

Built: Ideos is built sturdily but looks a bit tacky with its shiny back. But then again, it’s hard to find a good looking phone in entry level smartphones which performs according to it’s looks as well. I didn’t try any drop tests on it but I’d fathom it’d easily survive any short falls. The phone is also pretty light and small, easy to pocket.

Performance: Ideos has a Qualcomm MSM7227 processor, rated at a clock speed of 528 MHz. This processor is fairly standard in almost all the entry level devices and is good enough for daily usage and most of the apps. But most games would struggle on it. If you are buying this (or any other entry level smartphone) with the correct expectations of it performing according to it’s price range, you shouldn’t be disappointed.

Web Browsing: Web browsing is mediocre on Ideos because of it’s low resolution screen, low specc’ed processor (which also results in lack of Adobe Flash). If you plan on using the browser for your web needs, don’t bet on opening any javascript heavy pages quickly and should look mostly to fill the void by using specific apps for the services you are trying to access.

Battery: The phone is good on the battery and it was able to last around 1.5-2 days on a single charge for medium usage even though it houses just a 1200 mAh. This is on-par, if not better, than most other phones in this range.

GPS: The GPS was quick to get a fix and retained it to a good accuracy almost same as my Nexus one. Using Google maps on this phone was a breeze.

Other Notes: The phone bundles a free 2GB microSD card and also stereo headphones. The headphones are average at best like most other phones and you should really pair it with a cheap set of Creative IEMs that will give you a much better output while staying on a budget.

Conclusion: While the phone is not a powerhouse in itself, I’d rate it pretty good in it’s price segment. If I had to buy an Android smartphone on a budget around 8000 INR, it’d be a toss up between this and the Samsung Galaxy Pop S5570. So, this is a +1 recommendation from me for this phone.

© Shantanu Goel | This article, titled Huawei Ideos U8150 Review, was originally published on Shantanu's Technophilic Musings

Google just released the latest version of its Music app  that ties into its cloud player service Music Beta. This brings the version upto 3.0.1 and adds a lot of fixes, crashes a lot less and now even works on Samsung Galaxy S with Gingerbread which was broken earlier. If you are outside the US and not able to download the app from the market, then download it from here: http://www.multiupload.com/KIM5LQDL0K

I just tried it on my Nexus One with Stock Gingerbread (2.3.4) and it works awesome. Picked up my music from the Google account immediately and even recognizes the third party equalizers like MusicFx…

Don’t forget to say Thanks

© Shantanu Goel | This article, titled Google Music Beta Latest APK version 3.0.1 for Android, was originally published on Shantanu's Technophilic Musings

It was just about an year ago that we heard about the $35 Android Tablet from India which would revolutionize the education in developing countries. Mr. Kapil Sibal promoted it with utmost fervor until it was found that the BoM itself of the tablet was more than $50 and none of the guys claimed to have “invented” it even knew about its existence until a few days before the announcement. Ultimately, it was discovered that the tablet was just a rebranded chinese import which the government wanted to bring down to $35 price point by subsidizing the cost and not by somehow inventing cheaper parts. What more proof can we get about it’s non existence that it hasn’t materialized after so much of time and even the company that was supposed to be making it according to the government (HCL) has said that it has nothing to do with it.

That was that but it seems like the episode has given a brilliant idea to a few others as well. Import cheap/sub-standard products from China, rebrand them, ask government for subsidy and claim to have “invented” a revolutionary low cost computing device. iWebLeaf is a case in point. I came across them through a couple of articles where this little company formed by a couple of engineering students has invented two ultra low cost products: A 3G data card for 1300 INR (~ $30) and a Laptop for 5000 INR (~ $110). I was pleasantly surprised and my initial reaction was to applaud the effort. Then I noticed that these products, although announced for quite some time and having gotten a LOT of mainstream media coverage on almost every news channel, have not come to the market yet. The reasons for the 3G card are unknown but the laptop was said to have been dropped because of lack of Government support (read “subsidy”).

Disclaimer: Before you read any further, please note that I’m an Indian myself and stay in India only (i.e., not a condescending NRI). I am a developer myself and love innovating and innovators and have the greatest respect for all that our country has given to the world. This piece is a rant against only those few individuals who make the rest of the India look bad by claiming authority over fake innovations.

Being a part of the semiconductor industry for quite some time, I was curious to find out how they achieved this feat which no one else including big name companies have been able to do even after years of research (XO-PC). I looked at the purported specs of the laptop and it struck me that yet again, the BoM itself was much more than 5000 INR. When I raised some questions about this, the “innovators” replied that they are saving all this money because they “developed their own processor DXA16″ which is equivalent to a 1.6GHz Intel Atom. What again raised even more doubts in mind was that they said their processor didn’t have anything to do with Intel and they didn’t even have to take an X86 license even though they claim windows support for the laptop, which means that their processor MUST be x86 compatible. Secondly, they mentioned that they have got jobs in TCS and CTS and won’t continue further. I’m completely flummoxed why an under-graduate student who has designed his own commercially viable micro processor in a college lab during a period when other students struggle to just write 10 line assembly programs, would go and join a mass-recruiting services company. If I was him, any company from Intel to TI to Qualcomm to ARM would be ready to hire me for any salary that I demanded. On top of this, they gave weird reasons to drop it that they want to do it only for Orissa and no other state, etc.

It was also mind-blowing that they made such great inventions but their own website doesn’t have even a single word about these. All they have there is the run of the mill Web-Hosting, SEO, site design, blah blah.

Anyways, another person on the same forum where I raised the doubts uncovered an ugly truth. Their data card is nothing but a rebranded chinese card. See this link: Cheap 3G Data Card.

Points to note:

1. This card has the exact same specs including speeds, features (e.g. same RAM, ROM amounts, sd card etc)

2. It costs around $35 for a single piece including shipping. So, for bulk purchase, you can easily get it much cheaper and sell it around the $30 price.

3. It looks exactly the same  with just an iWebLeaf logo slapped over the version sold by these innovators.

Pics:

iWebLeaf Data Card:

Chinese Data Card:

Note: You can also see this video of iWebLeaf Data Card and compare it against the rest of the pics on Deal Extreme site for the chinese card.

Laptop: I was even more skeptical about their laptop now. And I was flabbergasted with surprise when I found out that all it took me was around 2 minutes of search for “cheap chinese laptop” on china trader sites like alibaba/traderkey etc and I stumbled onto a company called Enzo-Tech. If I could do this in 2 minutes, couldn’t the rest of the mainstream media folks do a little bit of fact check with their vast resources? They produce a 10″ Mini Laptop which, just like the data card:

1. Has the exact same specs as the iWebLeaf laptop (except that they list Atom as the processor instead of DXA16, which is a farce anyways)

2. Looks exactly the same with just iWebLeaf stickers pasted all over. (Pics below)

The only concern here is that even this laptop is not available for the low price that iWebLeaf mentioned. This laptop sells for around $200 in small quantities. If bought for very large quantities (e.g. in thousands or 10s of thousands by a government), the price would come down radically and with a little bit more of subsidy, it can achieve the price that iWebLeaf mentioned. But it would still be “cost price”. Sale price to end users will have to be much higher due to customs, logistics, handling, shipping, etc even if they were to sell it on a no-profit basis.

iWebLeaf Laptop:

Enzo-Tech Laptop:

Note: You can also see this video of iWebLeaf Laptop and compare it against the pics/specs on Enzo-Tech’s website and see that it is the same.

What to make of it? I don’t have anything against these guys as entrepreneurs. They have every right to import, rebrand and resell products. A huge number of people and companies do this. What I take offense to, however, is to claim that they invented these things which isn’t true and then blame the Government for not allowing them to prosper by not spending the tax money I pay for their benefits. Moreover, this not only shames other “True” Indian innovators when these fakes are discovered but also sets wrong examples for our budding engineers to choose the shortest path possible to get 15 minutes of fame and then a job instead of really doing something to make the nation proud. I’m also yet again dis-illusioned by our mainstream media who will report anything and everything under the sun just to get more eyeballs and TRP without doing any sort of fact-checks. Yes, YOU SO CALLED TECH JOURNALISTS, I am calling you out.

In the end, I will make my offer to iWebLeaf guys again as I made to them elsewhere. Prove me wrong and I’ll myself heap praises upon you and your products through my blog and all other publications that I influence. Also, I will make sure to hire you in my company with at least 5 times the salary that you are getting in TCS/CTS.

© Shantanu Goel | This article, titled iWebLeaf – India’s $35 Android Tablet Spawning Fake Innovators?, was originally published on Shantanu's Technophilic Musings

Now, this is mind blowing. I’ve just talked to a pretty reliable source within the Android ranks of Google that Google is going to distance itself legally from Android and spin it off in a separate company. The source said that the move can happen very soon and may be announced at Google I/O conference in May. Although details are sketchy and only very few high profile folks know about it within Google, my source says that the probable reason is increasing worries about legal aspects of Android with respect to Patents and IP law suits. Google also doesn’t want to be held responsible by any of the OEMs using Android when they are targeted by these law suits. So, they arrived at this decision to create a win-win situation where the new company will still be handed over instructions from MountainView through back channels but liabilities of the company are going to be very limited because they will show zero or no earnings at all.

I can see everyone from Cupertino to Redmond running helter skelter by this move from Google as they will lose one major weapon in their armory in their “Take no prisoners” war against Android’s rapid growth.

I’ll keep you guys updated as I get more details on this.

Update: Yes, it is true………………..that all of you saw straight through my pathetic attempt at an april fools joke

© Shantanu Goel | This article, titled Google to abandon Android. Spin off separate company, was originally published on Shantanu's Technophilic Musings

According to TechCrunch, that is. TC has a post on its blog right now (from none other than Michael Arrington) that says Toddlers Pick iPhone Over Windows 7 Phones 10-1. The article says that this is because a toddlers’ app maker’s notes that their app sold 71.5 apps per day on average on the iOS app store, while the number was 7.5 on the WP7 marketplace. Go read the article (it’s pretty short) and come back to read the below.

As I posted in the comments there, the “article” has fail written all over it. Points to note:
1. Moms make the choice, not toddlers
2. The sample set is too small
3. iPhone has been selling for 3 years and WP7 for like 1 month..so D.U.H
4. The iPhone apps also sell on iPod/iPad.
5. It’s not “Windows 7 phones”, its “Windows Phone 7″ lol. One of the most prominent tech blogs can’t even get the name right.
6. Acc to TechCrunch, “Data like this hints at the total run rate for Win7 phones“, so basically WP7 has already sold around 12 million already (Total iOS devices sold till now is around 120mn acc to Jobs). That’s mighty impressive for a one month run..

On a serious note, I didn’t expect this post to be coming from Mike. Or maybe this is like that recent editorial plagiarism scandal where the newspaper editor said that he was tired so he got it written by his juniors..

© Shantanu Goel | This article, titled Android/iPhone Beware: WP7 Phones have already sold 12 million devices, was originally published on Shantanu's Technophilic Musings

Rovio Mobile has been pretty considerate for the Android lovers and has released their Angry Birds game for free on the Android market. Many people love it but quite a few are annoyed by it because Rovio chose to monetize it by in-game advertisements, and that too placed at awkward places which can hinder the gameplay. Many users have also reported that they are being forced to view video ads as well these days. Another drawback is that if there is no network connection (e.g. if you are in a no-signal area, roamin, in-flight, or just don’t have a data plan), then the game won’t run at all. So far all the queries about this or pleas to have a paid app have been skirted around by Rovio. But this will soon be history.

One of my friends at work received an email recently from Rovio announcing the new “Seasons” edition for Christmas and Halloween levels. But that is not the important thing, something else is. Read this:

Angry Birds Seasons Available For Android

Today, we bring you Angry Birds Seasons, a special edition spin-off of Angry Birds!

Season?s Greedings consists of 25 daily surprises for fans of Angry Birds to enjoy while counting down the days until Christmas.

Included in the game is also the 45-level Halloween special edition, now packaged as a separate episode called Trick Or Treat.

Angry Birds Seasons is available for Android devices through GetJar and Android Market.

Payment option and performance  upgrades to follow

We are still working on two things for the Angry Birds games on Android:

First, we are bringing a graphically lighter option in the game, to enable better performance on older phones.

Second, we will introduce a payment system to opt-out of advertising.

Both of these upgrades will be included in later updates.

So as you can see, Rovio is about to bring out a paid option for Android folks as well so that we can kill those pigs in peace

© Shantanu Goel | This article, titled Ad-Free (Paid) Angry Birds For Android, was originally published on Shantanu's Technophilic Musings

Just read this article over at zdnet. What it basically says is condensed in these two points:

1. Android is a failure for Google because it is open and carriers/OEMs are stripping off google search from it and putting replacements like baidu/Bing. (BTW, half the people say Android is fail because it is not open and the other half say it is fail because it is open. Which one is it, please decide )

2. The solution is a Google Phone with google branding, sold unlocked at full price.

Let me answer 2nd point first. Dana Blankenhorn, thanks for that nice blast from the past advice. Google already did it with Nexus One, like, one year ago duh..

Now, on to the first point. Even if lot of people are stripping off Google search, they still have a big share of the mobile search market. They didn’t create Android solely to earn from it directly. It was more of a way to ensure that they still have an avenue for mobile revenue which would have otherwise been completely lost (iPhone). Another thing here is that if they didn’t keep it open enough for other players, it might have not got such widespread adoption or they might have been killed in US/EU under antitrust laws.

So, all I can say to Dana and ZDNet is ———————-> kthxbi

© Shantanu Goel | This article, titled ZDNet Fail. Answer is Stop Tech Blogging, was originally published on Shantanu's Technophilic Musings