Once having the tablet arena almost entirely to itself, Apple is now in the middle of a full-scale battle: everyone who could have a tablet does, and even Amazon's Kindle Fire is in the fray at a very low price. The new iPad, then, faces the challenge of not just being the best but of giving buyers a reason to spend more than $199. A record-setting display, new graphics and 4G go a long way, but we'll learn in our review of the new 2012 iPad to see if it's enough to keep the crown... Read more...
$29 Android Phone Isn’t Alone in Bare-Bones Options
The price of the low-end ZTE Score on Cricket's (now Leap's) network keeps dropping lower and lower, in one sale after another. Last November it cost $49 from Amazon Wireless, $80 less than its original $129 price tag. Now it's down to $69 -- without a two-year contract -- and it's on sale now at Best Buy for $29, for an unspecified length of time. Read more...
IDC: Android tablets reduced iPad dominance in fourth quarter
New figures from market analysis firm IDC suggest Apple’s seeming stranglehold on the tablet market may already have been broken by Android: the firm’s sales figures for the fourth quarter of 2011 find iOS devices — e.g., the Apple iPad — accounted for a mere 54.7 percent of the global tablet market, down from 61.6 percent in the third quarter of the year. IDC attributes this decline in Apple’s dominance of the tablet market to the success of Android devices, in particular Amazon’s Kindle Fire. IDC says Android’s share of the media tablet market rose from 32. Read more...
IDC: Android tablets reduced iPad dominance in fourth quarter
New figures from market analysis firm IDC suggest Apple’s seeming stranglehold on the tablet market may already have been broken by Android: the firm’s sales figures for the fourth quarter of 2011 find iOS devices — e.g., the Apple iPad — accounted for a mere 54.7 percent of the global tablet market, down from 61.6 percent in the third quarter of the year. Read more...
IDC: Android tablets reduced iPad dominance in fourth quarter
New figures from market analysis firm IDC suggest Apple’s seeming stranglehold on the tablet market may already have been broken by Android: the firm’s sales figures for the fourth quarter of 2011 find iOS devices — e.g., the Apple iPad — accounted for a mere 54.7 percent of the global tablet market, down from 61.6 percent in the third quarter of the year. IDC attributes this decline in Apple’s dominance of the tablet market to the success of Android devices, in particular Amazon’s Kindle Fire. IDC says Android’s share of the media tablet market rose from 32 Read more...
IDC: Android tablets reduced iPad dominance in fourth quarter
New figures from market analysis firm IDC suggest Apple’s seeming stranglehold on the tablet market may already have been broken by Android: the firm’s sales figures for the fourth quarter of 2011 find iOS devices — e.g., the Apple iPad — accounted for a mere 54.7 percent of the global tablet market, down from 61.6 percent in the third quarter of the year. IDC attributes this decline in Apple’s dominance of the tablet market to the success of Android devices, in particular Amazon’s Kindle Fire. IDC says Android’s share of the media tablet market rose from 32. Read more...
IDC: Kindle Fire cut iPad to 55% share, 2012 ahead of goals
IDC on Tuesday gave its own breakdown of world tablet share from this fall and painted an optimistic look at Android's position in the market. Going higher than others' estimates, the research team believed that Amazon shipped 4.7 million Kindle Fires, or enough to stake out 16.8 percent of tablets worldwide. Along with a slight gain from Samsung to 5.8 percent, the prediction would have knocked Apple down from 61.5 percent last summer to 54.7 percent in the last few months of 2011.... Read more...
Apple claims reports misread Jobs’ e-book remarks
Apple on Thursday hoped to rebut claims that its late CEO Steve Jobs had admitted to collusion with publishers as part of a class action lawsuit filed against it. It believed that the lawsuit's view that comments Jobs made on publishers being "unhappy" with Amazon and iBookstore pricing leveling costs weren't the surefire evidence the plaintiffs thought it was. Read more...
Amazon seen on track for new 7in Kindle Fire, 10in model too
Amazon may have reshuffled its Kindle Fire sequel plans again to drop an 8.9-inch model. A rumor Wednesday night spread to Digitimes had Amazon instead planning a straightforward seven-inch sequel to the current model as well as the alluded-to 10-inch version. Success with the tablet was leading Amazon to drift from e-readers to tablets, prompting the larger model, the sources claimed.... Read more...
Samsung cherry-picks in Galaxy Note 10.1 vs. new iPad
Samsung had an immediate reaction to the new iPad where it crafted a skewed comparison between Apple's new hardware and the Galaxy Note 10.1. The argument contends that Samsung's tablet is better primarily because it has native pen input, which would let it draw, edit photos, and write with a pressure-sensitive pen. "Popular" demand for aftermarket iPad pens at Amazon was portrayed as a sign users wanted the feature, Samsung said.... Read more...