World’s Thinnest Keyboard Is a Half Millimeter Thick

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An English research firm unveiled on Monday a keyboard that is less than a half millimeter thick — making it the thinnest in the world.

CSR, the firm behind the technology in products like Beats Wireless headphones and Nike+, has now created Surface, a thin slice of flexible touchscreen with a custom-printed keyboard on top.

The device connects to your tablet or smartphone using a low-power version of Bluetooth. This specially designed chip allows the keyboard to pair with the latest devices without carrying a large battery, aiding in that ultra-thin design.

Microsoft’s lightweight Touch Cover, in comparison, is 3.25 millimeters thick –- that’s 6.5 times thicker than CSR’s Surface keyboard.

The keyboard’s touchscreen capabilities mean users can swipe, pinch, zoom and use other complex gestures unavailable with normal keyboards.

While CSR hasn’t given any details on battery life or charging, it has plenty of time to sort out the details. The device will reportedly not be available for at least another year, and the current model could change depending on how manufacturers want to use the technology. Paul Williamson, the company’s director of low-power, wireless products, told The Guardian:

“This is a working prototype and a glimpse forward rather than something people will be buying this year. We might see lots of shapes and sizes, some as small as iPad Mini or a larger, more rigid form for a desktop PC, which could be curved, in any colour way, transparent or fitted with a leather folio.”

Via Mashable

Samsung Reveals The Galaxy Note 3, The Slimmer And Lighter Evolution Of The Phablet

Samsung’s big Unpacked Episode 2 event is underway, and as expected, the company has used the venue to announce the Galaxy Note 3 smartphone. The Note is the original phablet, and the new version continues the tradition of big screen gadgets best-suited for big-handed people.

The new Galaxy Note 3 features a design with extremely slimmer bezels and sharper angles on its rounded edges, marking a slight departure from Galaxy device design language thus far. It’s thinner than its predecessor and lighter (168g), despite offering a larger screen at 5.7-inches. It also offers more battery life than the Galaxy Note 2, and there’s a new and improved S Pen, too. Plus it supports faster, and more “seamless LTE” with multi-band support.

The camera has 4K video recording capabilities with a new CRI LED flash that should improve low-light photography. Samsung claims nearly four more hours of battery life when playing back video, and performance in general during normal use should also extend battery by up to 40 percent over the previous generation.

Samsung was emphasizing craftsmanship with the Galaxy Note, which features a stitched leather rear cover (available in black, white and pink). It also has a metallic rim running around the edge, and there’s a flip wallet accessory available in 10 different colors that also features a larger S View window cover for checking messages, making calls and accessing more info at a glance without having to activate the whole display.

The new S Pen is designed to work with the larger screen. Samsung called it the “key” to unlocking Note features and power. This works via a number of new interface controls. There’s a dot on-screen that appears when you can activate “Air Command,” which is a tool wheel that provides quick access to memo, scrapbooking, screenwriting, and a finder search function. There’s also something Samsung calls “circle,” which uses a circle drawing gesture to capture content you want to save to your scrapbook, as called up via Air Command. Box is a way to multitask, that lets you do two things at once via essentially a picture-in-picture interface.

Samsung’s Knox mobile security feature, which is designed to help increase enterprise and consumer security via partitioned software for consumer and business use for BYOD device users. The Note 3 will ship September 25 in 149 countries around the world.

Samsung’s smartphone fortunes are the subject of major scrutiny at the moment, since the company is perceived as possibly having hit a ceiling in terms of growing its overall share of the market. The company is hosting a meeting with investors and analysts to discuss its long-term plans in the face of these fears, and the Note line drives quite a few sales, though not as many as the flagship Galaxy S4. Estimates for break-out sales of the Note 2 on its own are hard to place, but Samsung has in the past said it anticipated the device would pass 20 million units shipped.

Galaxy Note 3 specs:

• 151.2mmx79.2mmx8.3mm
• 5.7-inch SuperAMOLED 1080p display with 368 ppi pixel density
• 2.3GHz Snapdragon 800 processor, or 1.9GHz Samsung Exynos Octacore depending on market
• Android 4.3
• 13 megapixel rear camera, 2 megapixel front camera
• 3GB RAM
• 32 or 64GB storage
• MicroSDXC card storage expansion
• Bluetooth 4.0, WiFi 802.11ac, LTE Category 4
• 3,200 mAh battery
• LED/IR combo

No information on Galaxy Note 3 availability just yet beyond the September 25 date, and the official Samsung press materials around the launch says only that it’ll make it out to all major U.S. carriers “later this year.”

Via TechCrunch

Samsung’s Galaxy Gear is a smartwatch like no other

The Galaxy Gear, Samsung’s latest foray into the smartwatch category, is now official and it’s quite unlike anything you’ve seen before. Yes, it’s a smartphone accessory that can pick up notifications, control music playback, and keep time with a rich variety of watch faces, but Samsung takes it a few steps further by integrating a 1.9-megapixel camera, a speaker, and two microphones — allowing you to shoot short 720p movies and even conduct phone calls with the Galaxy Gear.

It’s not a standalone phone, but you can use it to make phone calls

Importantly, the Galaxy Gear is not a phone in its own right — it relies on a Bluetooth connection to your Samsung Galaxy device in order to do most of its connected work. When it goes on sale later this month, the Gear will be compatible with the freshly announced Galaxy Note 3 and Galaxy Note 10.1 2014 edition, while software updates for the Galaxy S4, Galaxy S III, and Galaxy Note II are in the works to introduce compatibility there as well. That new software should begin rolling out from October, depending on local carriers. Given that Samsung’s new Galaxy slates run Android 4.3, which supports the Bluetooth Low Energy standard, Samsung may well have just tipped its hand about when it intends to distribute the 4.3 upgrade to its older Galaxy handsets.

Watch Samsung Galaxy Gear hands-on

Returning to the star of the show, the Gear, you’ll find a 1.63-inch Super AMOLED display with a thrifty 320 x 320 resolution, a single-core 800MHz Exynos processor, a metal face and buckle, and a selection of six different shades of adjustable wrist band. Samsung is using the colors to emphasize the role of the Galaxy Gear as a lifestyle device: the Wild Orange is aimed at sporty types while the Rose Gold targets a more feminine audience. The Korean company also claims the bands are very ergonomic, but in trying them on I found them less supple and flexible than the strap on the Pebble. Additionally, with all of its extra integrated tech, the Galaxy Gear is a fair bit bulkier than the Pebble, though Samsung’s correct in saying its watch is lighter than it appears.

As usual with Samsung, the Galaxy Gear is a feature-rich device. Basic onboard apps include a pedometer and the ability to find your Galaxy (or, alternatively, an option to find your Gear via your Galaxy handset), but most impressive of all is the number of compatible apps. Samsung says there’s over 70 to choose from — which can be installed via the Galaxy Gear Manager app on your phone — and I spotted some popular names like Pocket, Path, Evernote, RunKeeper, and Runtastic Pro. Samsung’s S Voice is also accessible via the Gear, but got no direct mention in the company’s presentation. It’s either becoming a standard feature or is being deemphasized as a major selling point.

Via The Verge