Archive for the ‘qualcomm’ Category

FLO TV Personal Television hands-on (video)

After a few years of marketing FLO TV through Verizon and AT&T, Qualcomm has struck out on its own to sell a standalone FLO TV, this here FLO TV Personal Television. It seems like a bit of an odd choice in the current media consumption climate, and the price is certainly steep at $250, along with the $9+ monthly subscription fee, but Qualcomm naturally has its reasons. Basically, if people want a second screen to watch FLO TV on, or already have a non-FLO phone that they’re happy with, this gives them the option, and then there’s the all-important family car ride where you might hand this device to your kid, but wouldn’t be so likely to toss them your own phone. Unfortunately, the lack of a hefty carrier subsidy means the $250 pricetag doesn’t seem too in line with the quality of this device — particularly the screen, which pales in comparison to those found on the similarly priced Zune and iPod touch (at least on the prototype device we played with). The touchscreen interface is pretty simple and reasonably quick, though touch detection isn’t exactly first-tier, but basically this whole device is as straightforward and no-frills as it looks. Check out a quick hands-on video after the break.

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FLO TV Personal Television hands-on (video) originally appeared on Engadget on Wed, 07 Oct 2009 10:12:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Flo TV gets official announcement and pricing

We’ve been watching the evolution of the Flo TV story with some interest; it may prove to be an interesting little gadget for compulsive TV-watchers. We heard the rumor, we broke the interface, we saw the box, and now we have it straight from the horse’s mouth: Flo TV is, as expected, a mobile TV device with a 3.5″ 4:3 capacitive touchscreen and built-in stereo speakers, and it accesses “live and time-shifted” programming via a “dedicated multicast network.” Sounds pretty sweet to me.

I used the LG Vu for a bit, and I have to say that instant-on portable TV was kind of fun to have, even though I’m not much of a TV watcher. Its selection was much more limited than the Flo TV’s, though. Qualcomm lists CNBC, Comedy Central, MSNBC, MTV, NBC, NBC 2Go, NBC News, NBC Sports and Nickelodeon as channels. You can check out the lineup here, and the program guide here.

Battery is rated at 5 hours of TV and 300 hours of standby. It remains to be seen how the picture is, of course, and how well the signal holds, but you leave that to us.

The device itself costs $250, and the minimum subscription is $9. That’s not bad (less than a Peek), but of course, like regular TV you’ll have to pay for the good stuff. More info, as always, at their website.

Flash 10.1 announced for just about anything with a screen, webOS and WinMo betas this year (update: Pre video!)

Flash 10 already supports HD video on the desktop, but 10.1 — announced this week at Adobe’s MAX conference in Los Angeles — is being billed the first to really reap the full benefits of the Open Screen Project by unifying feature sets across a wide variety of platforms on the desktop, the laptop, and the pocket. As usual, Windows, Mac, and Linux will all get hooked up with the latest release, but public betas of 10.1 for Windows Mobile and webOS will be hitting before the end of the year as well followed by Android and Symbian in “early” 2010. RIM’s also gotten official with its rumored membership in the Open Screen Project, though the lack of a timeline for 10.1 support in BlackBerry OS is a stark reminder of the long technical road that lies ahead for Waterloo as it tries to match the smartphone competition tit-for-tat in the multimedia space. At the end of the day, mobile Flash means nothing without the horsepower to properly drive it, so let’s hope that Tegra, Snapdragon, and next-generation architectures like OMAP4 start to come on board en masse just as these builds come out of beta.

Speaking of fast chipsets, the other big news out of the show is that Flash 10.1 will take advantage of GPU acceleration on a number of key mobile platforms, including both nVidia’s Tegra and Qualcomm’s Snapdragon alongside ION for smooth (well, theoretically smooth) 720p and 1080p video on the latest generation of netbooks and smartbooks.

Update: Added video of the Palm Pre running three instances of Flash in parallel after the break.

Read – Flash 10.1 announcement
Read – RIM joins the OSP

Continue reading Flash 10.1 announced for just about anything with a screen, webOS and WinMo betas this year (update: Pre video!)

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Flash 10.1 announced for just about anything with a screen, webOS and WinMo betas this year (update: Pre video!) originally appeared on Engadget on Mon, 05 Oct 2009 01:31:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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