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Posts tagged software front
July NPD: Sales down 26%, NCAA Football leads software
Aug 11th
Ouch! Overall video game industry sales are down 26% in North America for July, year over year, with a 29% dip in console hardware sales mostly to blame. New retail software sales saw a less severe 17% drop, while accessories saw only an 8% drop. Unsurprisingly, on the hardware front, “the platforms that contributed a greater portion of new physical retail dollar sales as compared to last year were the Xbox 360 and the PS3,” says NPD’s Anita Frazier. She also adds that July 2011 is the industry’s “lowest month since October 2006.” We’ll say it again: Ouch!
As has become the norm, Microsoft trumpeted its performance in an email claiming a “45% share of the overall current-generation console market.” Six years into the Xbox 360′s lifecycle, the console managed to move 277,000 units “maintaining the number-one console spot in the U.S. for 2011.” Frazier notes that, while the Xbox 360 may have had the strongest numbers of the three consoles, July “was the first month that the Xbox 360 saw a year-over-year decline since December 2009.” Of course, last July saw a strong sales spike “driven by the introduction of the Kinect-ready slim form factor SKU,” Frazier reminds us.
On the software front, July 2011 only saw “17 new releases [...] compared to 29 last July.” With NCAA Football 12 taking the top sales spot, reflecting a “15% increase in unit sales versus NCAA 11 in July 2010,” Frazier postulates that this year’s Madden delay might have prompted football fans to pick up EA’s earlier offering. Find the full top ten list after the break.
Continue reading July NPD: Sales down 26%, NCAA Football leads software
July NPD: Sales down 26%, NCAA Football leads software originally appeared on Joystiq on Thu, 11 Aug 2011 18:30:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.
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Tags: football fans, top ten list, software salesSamsung Galaxy S WiFi 5.0 preview (video)
Feb 14th
Well, would you look at what we found chilling at Samsung’s booth here at MWC? Yep, it’s that Galaxy S WiFi 5.0 we heard about just the other day, and it’s one interesting tablet / media player hybrid. We’d be inclined to call this thing a Streak 5 or Acer 4.8 Iconia competitor, but it doesn’t have a trace of cellular or 3G connectivity. We were, however, able to confirm what it does have — it packs a 1GHz Hummingbird processor, a 800 x 480-resolution display, a 5 megapixel camera with a flash, and a 2500mAH battery. On the software front, it runs Android 2.2 (although it will be upgradable to Gingerbread) and TouchWiz. Oh, and it has the full suite of Google applications (YouTube, Gmail, Google Chat, etc.) and access to the Market.
So, what’s it like? Well, it looks like an enlarged Galaxy Player (or what is now known as the Galaxy S WiFi 4.0), which really means it looks like Galaxy S smartphone and the Galaxy Tab mashup. The white slippery back clearly looks like our Sprint Galaxy Tab, but the thinner design and rounded edges remind us of a Vibrant or Fascinate. It’s really a very “Samsung” device, and we don’t mean that in a bad way — the plastic build feels pretty solid and the screen seemed very high quality. As for performance, it seemed fairly quick and a preloaded video played rather smoothly. We wish we had more information on when this one was going to land stateside, but a rep on hand would only tell us that it will be hitting Korea this month and other countries soon. Check the break for a short hands-on look at this guy and the galleries below for some close up shots.
Gallery: Samsung Galaxy S WiFi 5.0 hands-on
Gallery: Samsung Galaxy S WiFi 4.0 hands-on
Continue reading Samsung Galaxy S WiFi 5.0 preview (video)
Samsung Galaxy S WiFi 5.0 preview (video) originally appeared on Engadget on Mon, 14 Feb 2011 11:08:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.
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Tags: google chat, megapixel camera, software frontLG Optimus Pad first hands-on! (video)
Feb 14th
We’ve just gotten back from playing around with LG’s 8.9-inch, 3D-friendly Optimus Pad (known as the G-Slate in the US). This Android Honeycomb tablets sports a dual-core CPU inside and a dual-camera array outside, giving you both the optical and processing capabilities to produce 3D video. Its screen cannot actually play back glasses-free 3D, but if you really have to have that third dimension on the move, you’ll be able to buy a set of glasses to recreate the effect. The Optimus Pad is slim, though we couldn’t get a great feel for its ergonomics with all the wiring attached to it, has nicely curved corners, a matte black back cover that’s pleasant to the touch and seemingly durable, and an extremely glossy screen up front.
We likened the Pad to the Optimus 2X in an earlier post and it carries over a lot of industrial design elements from its smartphone sibling, including the metallic strip down the middle of its rear branded with a “with Google” logo. That’s actually meaningful this time — the Optimus 2X wasn’t a stock Android installation, it was subjected to LG’s (not entirely successful tweaks), however the Pad looks to be a straight Google Experience Device, in much the same vein as the Motorola Xoom and Samsung Galaxy Tab 10.1, its nearest and most direct competitors. That being said, the code on the device we handled still wasn’t up to scratch on the software front, as evidenced by us managing to crash both the browser and Google Maps within a few minutes of putting down our first fingerprints on the tablet. The 3D camcorder also seems like a memory hog, we weren’t able to get it started up initially because of the number of apps that were already open (which at the time was no more than four). Let’s remain optimistic, though, this wasn’t exactly a slate we snatched off a retail shelf and LG has time to optimize and spruce things up before shipping this thing out. We’ve got pictures for you below and a press release after the break. Video is incoming at the very fastest speed our wireless connection can carry it.
Update: Video is now in, get to the ogling!
Gallery: LG Optimus Pad first hands-on!
Continue reading LG Optimus Pad first hands-on! (video)
LG Optimus Pad first hands-on! (video) originally appeared on Engadget on Mon, 14 Feb 2011 05:24:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.
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Tags: dual core cpu, curved corners, google maps, retail shelfLG Optimus Pad first hands-on!
Feb 14th
We’ve just gotten back from playing around with LG’s 8.9-inch, 3D-friendly Optimus Pad (known as the G-Slate in the US). This Android Honeycomb tablets sports a dual-core CPU inside and a dual-camera array outside, giving you both the optical and processing capabilities to produce 3D video. Its screen cannot actually play back glasses-free 3D, but if you really have to have that third dimension on the move, you’ll be able to buy a set of glasses to recreate the effect. The Optimus Pad is slim, though we couldn’t get a great feel for its ergonomics with all the wiring attached to it, has nicely curved corners, a matte black back cover that’s pleasant to the touch and seemingly durable, and an admittedly extremely glossy screen up front.
We likened the Pad to the Optimus 2X in an earlier post and it carries over a lot of industrial design elements from its smartphone sibling, including the metallic strip down the middle of its rear branded with a “with Google” logo. That’s actually meaningful this time — the Optimus 2X wasn’t a stock Android installation, it was subjected to LG’s (not entirely successful tweaks), however the Pad looks to be a straight Google Experience Device, in much the same vein as the Motorola Xoom and Samsung Galaxy Tab 10.1, its nearest and most direct competitors. That being said, the code on the device we handled still wasn’t up to scratch on the software front, as evidenced by us managing to crash both the browser and Google Maps within a few minutes of putting down our first fingerprints on the tablet. The 3D camcorder also seems like a memory hog, we weren’t able to get it started up initially because of the number of apps that were already open (which at the time was no more than four). Let’s remain optimistic, though, this wasn’t exactly a slate we snatched off a retail shelf and LG has time to optimize and spruce things up before shipping this thing out. We’ve got pictures for you below and a press release after the break. Video is incoming at the very fastest speed our wireless connection can carry it.
Gallery: LG Optimus Pad first hands-on!
Continue reading LG Optimus Pad first hands-on!
LG Optimus Pad first hands-on! originally appeared on Engadget on Mon, 14 Feb 2011 05:24:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.
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Tags: camera array, memory hog, inch 3d, dual core cpu, third dimension, curved corners, free 3d





