Sony has announced its first-ever tablets, the Tablet S and Tablet P, at the IFA 2011 expo in Berlin. Both slates are Android-powered, with the Tablet S featuring a 9.4-inch display with the Japanese firm’s TruBlack and BRAVIA technologies, along with various entertainment options and what is expected to be a Tegra 2 dual core processor. The two devices will arrive in the UK in mid-September and November respectively.
Sony Ericsson has also taken the opportunity of an IFA 2011 press call to confirm a quicker, S version of its range-topping Android smartphone, the Xperia Arc. The new phone sports a 1.4GHz processor that makes it the London-based firm’s fastest ever smartphone, in addition to a ‘3D sweep panorama’ mode that converts 2D photos to 3D. The phone has been tipped for an October global launch.
Samsung has followed up its recent unveiling of a new range of Galaxy smartphones by announcing three more phones in its line of Bada-powered Wave devices. All three phones are expected to be available in Europe from October, and include the style-oriented Wave 3, with its four-inch Super AMOLED display and 1.4GHz processor, as well as the mid-range Wave M and the youth-marketed Wave Y.
Motorola has unveiled an updated version of its business-oriented Android smartphone, the Pro. Dubbed the Pro+, the device has been improved by virtue of a sleeker appearance in addition to a Gorilla glass protected 3.1-inch screen, a larger, 1600mAh battery and the 2.3, or Gingerbread, version of the Android platform. The Pro+ will be released in Europe and Asia next month.
Samsung has announced another two tablets, the Galaxy Note and the Galaxy Tab 7.7. The Korean manufacturer has hailed the former, as its name suggests, as a replacement for pen and paper, featuring as it does a pressure-sensitive “S Pen†with which users can write, draw or annotate. The larger Galaxy Tab 7.7, meanwhile, is a lighter, thinner and brighter revision of the original Galaxy Tab.
Microsoft has been sued for allegedly tracking the locations of users of smartphones that run its Windows Phone 7 mobile operating system, even when location tracking software has been turned off. The lawsuit has been filed in a federal court in Seattle, and claims that users’ whereabouts are being monitored whenever the camera on a Windows Phone 7 powered smartphone is switched on.