More Lumia smartphones from Microsoft

Microsoft earlier announced that they will introduce new Lumia smartphones at IFA Berlin on September 4. So September 4 is here, Microsoft went on stage and what did we get. Three new smartphones that's what, each with different special features.

First the Lumia 735. With the front facing camera of full HD 5-megapixel wide-angle, so you can guess this is the selfie phone that was rumored for a while now. The other features are 4.7-inch 1280 x 720-pixel display with "curved glass", 8GB of storage, 15GB of free OneDrive cloud storage, micro SD on which you can add 128 GB of storage, 1GB of RAM, a 1.2GHz Qualcomm Snapdragon 400 processor and a back camera of 6.7-megapixel. Expected a better back camera for a Lumia device, but this is a selfie smartphone so will see how this new trend picks up. The cost will be somewhere around €219.

Another smartphone is Lumia 730. It is very similar to the 735 model but it doesn't have 4G LTE connectivity. What it does have is a 2 SIM slots. So you can have two SIM cards at the same time. This is a feature that is lacking on almost all of the smartphones. Why? It's a pretty neat feature, lot's of people have to carry two smartphones, this kind of devices could prevent that. The price will be somewhere around €199.

And the main smartphone we been expecting and been hearing the most rumors is the Lumia 830. It is packing 5-inch 1280 x 720-pixel display with Corning Gorilla Glass 3, 1GB of RAM, 15GB of free OneDrive storage, up to 128 GB of expendable storage, 3 high-performance microphones, Qi wireless charging and a back camera of 10 MP. Really disappointed in the back camera, by the leaked photos we were expecting at least 20 MP. However wireless charging is a nice feature, nice to see that in the mid range smartphones. Price for this smartphone will be €330.

Of course all three Lumia phones are running Windows Phone with the latest 8.1 version. Microsoft didn't talk that much about their operating system, this event was mostly about introducing new smartphones and some new camera features.

Source technobuffalo.

Satya Nadella to China

Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella is headed to China, the worlds most populated country and one of the markets that is on the rise. Absolutely logical decision to visit this certain economy. Let's just say that isn't the case this time. It's not about expansion, more about preventing disaster.

In July this year Chinese officials raided offices of Microsoft, the accusations were antitrust concerns. Company from Redmond is not known for great relations with the government in China. This country was the last to approve their purchase of Nokia devices department and lately Windows 8 is baned on all official computers in China. Sure China is a very closed country for western companies, but it looks like they really have it out for Microsoft.

From Microsoft no official announcement on this trip that's suppose to happen sometimes in September. China is known for it's share of paranoia so Satya Nadella has to be great at negotiating if he wants to cool things of over there.

It's not like other people are not paranoid about their technology gadgets. I mean just ask the celebrities in Holywood, with this recent scandal about leaked photos, nobody is feeling safe. Anybody can be a target of the hackers or even the government, they like looking in to your personal files just as well.

Another Microsoft mishap happened in China these days. Their division leaked a preview of Windows 9 with some new features, like the return of the start button in your down left corner. The post was quickly removed but with all things Internet related it was spotted and it spread everywhere. Poor Microsoft just can't get it going in China these days.

Source cnbeta.

Surface Pro 3 world wide

Surface Pro 3 is an amazing device, in almost every review by any tech website it was praised. So let's get that out of the way. But Microsoft should be aware that in today's market that is not enough.

So far Surface Pro 3 was available in only three countries, United States, Japan and Canada. Now it is available in 25 more markets Australia, Austria, Belgium, China, Denmark, Finland, France, Germany, Hong Kong, Ireland, Italy, Korea, Luxembourg, Malaysia, the Netherlands, New Zealand, Norway, Portugal, Singapore, Spain, Sweden, Switzerland, Taiwan, Thailand and the United Kingdom. That's a total of 28 markets, it's not bad but it's not good enough either.

First of all 28 countries is not the whole world. There are other huge markets that are not included, nor is Microsoft saying when or even if ever the Surface Pro 3 is going to be launched in those countries. If we were talking about some other company they would get a pass for not including all the markets, but Microsoft doesn't. They are an IT giant, one of the largest companies in the world, if they can't hit all the markets then who can. And besides don't they already include practically the entire world in their software business, why not also do that with hardware.

Secondly devices are shipping to slow. OK, they are new to shipping out devices, it takes practice and time to do it right. That's all good, but when you have a great device like Surface Pro 3 you need to get it available for people right away. Otherwise you are giving the competition time to breathe and that is never a good thing.

With this launch Microsoft has reduced the price for the Surface Pro 2 and the device is now somewhere between $100 and $200 cheaper. Surface Pro 2 is still a good device, so this could be a viable option for some costumers. Also an opportunity for Microsoft to get rith of the stocked devices that are not selling the way they expected.

Source Microsoft.

No more MSN Messenger

Truly an end of an era, MSN Messenger is shutting down completely. Looks like the logo on the picture is no longer in function.

Microsoft announced last year that they are going to shut down MSN Messenger and now we know the official date. It's going to happen on October 31. The service that was launched in 1999 has been with us for more then a decade now. For a time it was the most popular IM messenger there was, a few years back if you were using the Internet and you wanted to send messages, MSN was the way to go.

These days this IM service has been overruned by other popular services. Skype, Whatsapp, Facebook and many others are the ones costumers mostly use. Not that Microsoft has a reason to be concerned regarding this matter, after all they are the owners of Skype, currently the most popular IM service there is. They paid a big price in the acquisition of Skype, but now it looks like it was worth it.

There are still people that use MSN MEssenger and Microsoft has them covered. Company will give them $2 that they can use in Skype for calls. Not a bad way to get people on your service and stop them from using the competition.

Anyway the date October 31. is the final day for MSN messenger. Everyone that used the service probably has many memories attached to it. It was after all a revolutionary application for the time, for most of the people it was the first IM service witched they used to communicate with friends and family over the Internet. And you always remember the first.

Source forbes.

Mobile operating systems World wide

Smartphones are everywhere, probably everyone has one. There are a lot of different manufacturers, whole bunch of different hardware specifications. But only three operating systems that really matter. So how do they stand on the global market.

First one is Android, the absolute king. Leader in all the countries the research was done in and not only that, there market share is increasing. This operating system is getting a lot of criticism lately but according to the statistics it's on almost every phone.

Second on the list is iOS from Apple. There market share is on the opposite trajectory then Android from Google. Platform is loosing ground almost in every country. Some say this is expected, they only have one smartphone per year, they can't hold that much of the market with only that.

And of course third on the list is Windows Phone from Microsoft. This has been a hit and miss quarter for them. In some countries they are improving in some they are falling, globally there just about the same as they where.

Three IT giants battling over the smartphone market, probably the most importante one there is at the moment. Lot of innovations and new devices are coming for all platforms, so it's needless to say that things will remain very interesting in the years to come.

Source kantarworldpanel.

More about Lumia 830

Nokia, the part of Nokia that was bought by Microsoft, the part that is developing smartphones. They are getting ready to release a new device, Lumia 830, and more leaks are on tech websites every day.

Lumia 830 will be the mid-range Windows Phone device, so far low-end and mid-range devices are top sellers from Nokia, high-end devices like Lumia Icon, or 930 for other markets don't get great sale results, no matter that the reviews and the hardware is great.

Whats the most important aspect of almost all Lumia devices, well the camera of course. Lumia 830 is no different, Nokia is often bragging about their camera quality, and honestly they have every right to be proud of them, right now there are at least one step in front of the competition. Camera looks similar to the one on the Lumia 1020, but it's not likely to be 41MP, according to rumors it might be something like 20MP. Still great for a mid-range phone.

Other specifications are not known, display will probably be 4.5 or 4.7 inches in size, with the resolution of 720p or maybe even 1080p. Of course you can expect Windows Phone 8.1 version on this smartphone and running all that will be Snapdragon 800 or 801.

Now that all of these things are put into one device and if Microsoft can make the price be affordable, people could get exited about Lumia 830. Still no official news about when this smartphone will be announced, probably at IFA but will just wait and see about that.

Source wpcentral.

Steve Ballmer leaves Microsoft completely

Steve Ballmer is no longer CEO of Microsoft, Satya Nadella is, OK we already know that for some time now. But Steve Ballmer was still a member of the companies board and now he is leaving that position as well.

Recently Steve Ballmer was all over the news, but not on the technology websites, it wasn't anything like that, it was related to basketball. Former CEO of Microsoft become a new owner of the Los Angeles Clippers, after the previous owner had to step back do to racism charges. So it looks like NBA is the new frontier for Steve Ballmer, 34 years in the technology business was enough.

Satya Nadella was quick to respond, this is what he said: “I am sure that you will bring the same boldness, passion and impact to your new endeavors that you brought to Microsoft”.

According to the latest news it looks like Ballmer want be satisfied just with running one NBA team he is also set to become a teacher. Yes that is true, he is about to tech business courses at Stanford. Everybody that watched any of his interviews or live performances so to speak, knows that the guy is full of energy and passion. So don't be surprised if you hear that Ballmer is planing anything else, you never know what to expect from him:

Source businessinsider.

Another smartphone chart

People at statista made a new smartphone chart that contains three IT giants, Apple, Microsoft and Google. This is a chart about smartphones and their prices across different platforms. According to this chart Apple and Google are happy with their results, while Microsoft has something to look forward to in the future.

This chart represents second quarter of 2014, where Android manufacturers have shipped 249.6 million smartphones, majority of those phones are still low-end 58.66%. Apple and their iOS platform have a reason to be happy, considering they don't make low-end iOS devices and have only made one mid-range device so far. Their market share is 84.6% of high-end smartphones, keep in mind that these type of devices bring in the biggest profit.

Microsoft is still struggling, but they could have a bright future for their Windows Phone platform. So far most of their smartphones are low-end devices, Android wasn't any different when it got started. Also Windows Phone is faster and better at using limited hardware then Android is, it still doesn't have as many apps but that could change very soon. Also there are many new manufacturers that are planing or already developing smartphones with this operating system, so thing could get interesting really soon.

Of course these chart looks simple, but it isn't, it only tries to simplify things. Smartphone market is huge, spread all across the globe and has to much variables that it could fit in to one small chart. Almost everyone that takes a look will interpret this data differently and that's OK, because there really isn't any clear winner here. As far as the consumers are concern the more competition the better the products, the more innovation there will be and that is all that matters.

Source statista.

Windows "Treshold" preview next month

Windows 8.1 was released just some time ago and it looks like Microsoft is already talking about Windows 9. Of course not the full version but rather the preview version of the brand new operating system.

The current working title is "Treshold", or at least the preview edition will be called by that name and it will be arriving next month or early October. It will be available for anyone to download so it's not just developers this time. Something similar like Apple has been doing with OS X Yosemite. Of course this want be the full version but hopefully we will see some innovations.

Full version of Windows 9 isn't expected until the second quarter of 2015. We will probably see some updates for Windows 8.1 in the meantime and possibly an 8.2 version or higher.

Some of the new innovations that are expected or have been leaked in the meantime are the new Start Menu, people like their Start Menu, this was one of the reasons Windows 8 got a lot of hate at the early stages. Others are Metro-Style applications you can run on your desktop, elimination of Charms bar and virtual desktop. Of course one of the most expected innovations is Cortana integration with Windows 9. Cortana is one of Microsoft's projects that is definite win, almost everyone is loving this application right now and much more is expected int the future.

Another thing that has been rumored in the past is too much Windows from Microsoft. Of course this is about operating systems. There are already three major Windows OS on the market. Windows Phone for smartphones, Windows RT for tablets and the full version of Windows that is also running on some tablets like the Surface Pro lineup. During this year or in the next year we will see some new smart devices like smartwach and VR devices like Oculus Rift. So that means some more operating systems and that is definitely too much. The rumor was that Windows RT and Windows Phone will merge into one OS and that at the moment seems like a good idea, especially considering tablets with RT version haven't really taken off.

Interesting time for Microsoft, the market is changing, new devices are coming out, so they will have to change as well. Windows "Treshold" will be the first step in that direction.

Source zdnet.

Microsoft vs Samsung Court Battle

If this title said something like Apple vs Samsung there wouldn't be much surprise there, those two companies have been going at it in court and outside of court for years. But this time is not Apple that is having problems with Samsung, another IT giant has decided to sue them, this time it's Microsoft.

In case you didn't know Android is not free, well it is for the user but not for the company that wants to build smartphones with that operating system. Android is using a number of Microsoft patents, so if you want Android on your smartphones you have to pay royalties per-device to Microsoft. Redmond based company has been making a lot of money in the past years from these royalties.

Sumsung however stopped paying royalties ever since Microsoft bought Nokia's hardware department, according to them this was a break of their IP agreement. Of course Microsoft doesn't share this opinion so it looks like another patent war in court is about to happen.

David Howard from Microsoft had this to say : “After spending months trying to resolve our disagreement, Samsung has made clear in a series of letters and discussions that we have a fundamental disagreement as to the meaning of our contract.” and he added “We are simply asking the Court to settle our disagreement, and we are confident the contract will be enforced,”

Considering Samsung is the world biggest manufacturer of Android based smartphones, this would mean a big loss for Microsoft if they just stop paying royalties. Who knows maybe this is just Microsoft's way of saying, hey if you are going to build Android smartphones it's going to cost you. But if you want to build Windows Phone smartphones you can do that for free. Guess if you are a huge company and you want to build millions of smartphones, this kinda makes sense.

According to various analysts and the speed of the courts, this is one lawsuit that could take years to end. Guess by now Samsung is use to being sued.

Source Microsoft.

White Xbox One on the way

Microsoft is feeling pretty good about their console sales, New generation console Xbox One has been selling like crazy ever since the release date. Sony has sold more PlayStation's 4 but that's not a reason to complain when your own results are great.

French game retail website put out on sale a new white Xbox One that is coming in package with the game Sunset Overdrive. Both console and the game were available for 399€. Only a few hours after the offer went online it was taken down, apparently Microsoft is still not ready to begin selling their white Xbox One. But hey, this was only a rumor so far, now it has practically been confirmed.

So far the white version of Xbox One was only offered to employs that contributed to the production of the gaming console. Now it looks like it may soon be available for anyone that is willing to buy it. That is if you are in the countries that Xbox One is launched in, there are still may countries that are not on this list.

Nothing has been officially confirmed by Microsoft. This year's Gamescon is being held on 14-17. August maybe we can expect to see the console there.

Source polygon.

Surface Pro 3 in 25 more countries

Latest tablet or hybrid or water you want to call it, Microsoft calls it Surface Pro3, is going to be on sale in 25 more countries by August 28. Device has been in pre-order for same time in these countries that include China, UK and most of Europe. Still to slow for the company that wants to sell hardware world wide, devices should be on the market sooner, and in a lot more countries.

Surface Pro 3 has been for sale in just a few countries, but it did receive all around god reviews. And what's more important people that bought the device are happy and usually have only positive things to say about the experience of using Surface Pro 3.  OK, they been some keyboard issues but nothing major that would ruin the experience. Even the sales are better then with the previous models but that hasn't been officially confirmed.

However there is also a lot of bad news for the Surface department. Poor Microsoft just can't get it going as far as making profit goes. So far since Surface launched in 2012, the companies losses mount up to 1.7 billion dollars. Sure Microsoft had to invest a lot of money in production cost, they just started making hardware so you cant expect immediate results.

People at Microsoft understend that the market is very competitive and you have to sacrifice if you want to make it. Microsoft is no stranger to initial loss of money on their new project, Bing has been losing money for years and even Xbox was in losses all until Xbox 360 started to make actual profit in the gaming department.

How Steve Nadella will react to these numbers is still unknown, as he said the company will focus on services not so much on hardware. We hope that the Surface line doesn't get canceled or soled, because it is really a great product.

Source computerworld.

Xbox One to be Available in 26 more Markets

Xbox One was released in late 2013, but it's still not available for all the markets world wide. Microsoft is planing to expand the sales to another 26 countries in September this year.

Xbox One sales results have been great so far and Microsoft was generally just bragging over Twitter and other social media about the sale reults of their new console. But this doesn't mean the Xbox One sales can't get even better with time. Last console was on the market for ten years and this one is also planed for many years to come. New updates and new games that will definitely keep the Xbox One relevant in the future.

The new market list:

Argentina Belgium Chile Colombia Czech Republic Denmark Finland Greece Hungary

India Israel Japan Korea Netherlands Norway Poland Portugal Russia

Saudi Arabia Singapore Slovakia South Africa Sweden Switzerland Turkey UAE

On other Xbox One related news, Marc Whitten left Microsoft after 14 years. This is just one of the changes from the new leadership of the company. Satya Nadella is taking Microsoft in a new direction and so far the fans are exited about this, but it's still way to early to see any results.

Source Xbox Wire.

Windows Phone from Lenovo

Long has been rumored that Lenovo is making a smartphone based on Windows Phone operating system, and now this spring, possibly April those rumors will come true.

Microsoft has recently released a list of partners regarding their Winwows Phone smartphones, this is an area in which they plan to make an impact in this year and years to come. So far the IT giant from Redmond didn't have much success, as WP is only 4% of the smartphone market world wide.

Lenovo is also trying to make an impact in smartphone sales, with very little success so far. The company has recently bought Motorola Mobility from Google for $2.91 billion, which will definitely get them name recognition, but they didn't announce any new smartphones just yet. Considering how Android market is crowded and dominated by Samsung, Lenovo's move to make a smartphone with Windows Phone shouldn't come as much of a surprise.

New Windows Smartphone from Lenovo will be running the new Windows 8.1 OS, 4.5 or 5 inch screen and Snapdragon 400 or 600, with the price tag somewhere around $400. According to the rumors it will be announced in April.

Acer has also been rumored to make a smartphone with Windows Phone, but  they have delayed these plans until Microsoft operating system increases their market share. Who knows Acer, maybe until then it will be too late.

Source technobuffalo.

Satya Nadella is the new CEO of Microsoft

After months of rumors and just about every important name in the IT industries mentioned for the role of the new CEO of Microsoft we finally have the official news that Satya Nadella is the new CEO for the Redmond based company.

Who is Satya Nadella? Well he is 46 years old, been working at Microsoft for 22 years. Before that he worked for Sun Microsystems and until this morning he was executive vice president of cloud and enterprise in Microsoft. Satya Nadella wasted no time and has already issued a letter to the employees.


“While we have seen great success, we are hungry to do more,” Nadella said. “Our industry does not respect tradition – it only respects innovation. This is a critical time for the industry and for Microsoft. Make no mistake, we are headed for greater places – as technology evolves and we evolve with and ahead of it. Our job is to ensure that Microsoft thrives in a mobile and cloud-first role.”

Strong words, lets hope he lives up to the challenge. Many fans of the Redmond IT giant are happy that the new CEO is an engineer, not an economist like the previous CEO Steve Ballmer. Satya Nadella is only the third CEO in the company history and honestly we wish him all the best at his new job.

Source technobuffalo.

Microsoft with a Record Quarter Earnings

Microsoft had great financial results in Q2 of their fiscal year. Total revenue from the Redmond giant was $24.52 billion with the net profit of $6.56 billion. Results were even above what was predicted by Wall Street so the stock of Microsoft when up by 3 percent.

Basically they had increased sales in just about everything. Office packages for business users sales was up, which is not something strictly connected to the holiday season like for example the Xbox sales. In the last quarter the company has sold 7.4 million Xbox units, from that number 3.5 million is Xbox 360 and 3.9 million goes to the new console Xbox One. Even the revenue from the Surface tables has doubled to 893 million.

Microsoft is currently in transition period. Nokia devices department will soon be a part of Microsoft, and the company is looking to produce more of it's own hardware. Also their CEO Steve Ballmer is leaving and the new CEO will be announce in the next couple of days. This year should be interesting for the Redmond company.

Source Microsoft.

Surface 3 and Surface Mini

Surface 2 and Surface Pro were released a few months ago and so far we have no official sale numbers. But no matter because there are already leaks about Surface 3 and Surface Mini that Microsoft is planing to launch during this year.

First to launch will be Surface Mini, it is expected sometimes in the first half of this year. Microsoft is looking to compete with the iPad Mini and a lot of 7 or 8 inch Android tablets that are already on the market. It's still unknown will the Surface Mini come with the Pro version and full Windows 8 or will they just release the Windows RT version.

Al tho we don't know the number of Surface 2 units sold, no one can deny that this is a powerful and well build tablet. Only major criticism was the lack of apps compared to the competition. So much is expected from Surface 3 which we expect later this year. No details were officially released but there is a number of tweets hinting what the Surface 3 tabled could look like.

These are some of the features that are expected:

-Nvidia's Tegra K1 chipset to power Microsoft's Surface 3 tablet.

-The firm might be working on Surface Mini and LTE versions of Surface 2.

-InstantGo support to arrive with Windows 8.1 OS' first update for Intel's BayTrail+ chips.

-AMD's Mullins CPU to be used in Xbox TV instead of Microsoft's own designed chip.

-Company's plans for Microsoft Notebook is currently on hold.

Source gadgets.ndtv.

Nokia SmartWatch Concept Looks Great

Everybody in the IT knows 2014 is going to be in the sign of the smartwatch. Maybe it want be the device that changes the way we view technology and the way technology effects our everyday lives but it's definitly going to be the device everybody is talking about. Wearable technology is the future and smartwatch should be the first step.

Nokia is one of the companies that is developing a smartwatch of their own. So far very little is known about this device. You can check some of the images on the Facebook link. There are already many big companies that are developing smartwatches. Sony, Samsung, Pebble and others have their own devices but only Pebble is getting good sales results and none of smartwatches has brought anything revolutionary. The real revolution is expected from Apple's iWatch coming later this year, but will have to wait and see about that.

Microsoft is one of the big companies that has recently started to develop it's own hardware and according to rumors they are interested in producing wearable technology. Nokia's device department has been recently bought by Microsoft so the future of their smartwatch is unknown.

Sony and Windows Phone

Sony has been rumored to bring a Windows Phone device from the very start of the WP release. So far we have seen some prototypes but never a smartphone with the WP operating system was released from Sony. Well it looks like the year 2014 just might be the year when Sony will deliver a Windows Phone smartphone.

In the last few years Sony has been making great smartphones for Android, but they still don't have great sales results compared to Samsung, the company that's dominating the Android market. So the Windows Phone option just might be the new thing that Sony is looking for. Even Sony Mobile Europe chief Pierre Perron said that they don't want to be a company with just one OS.

“We don’t want to be a single OS manufacturer, I don’t think it’s a viable position in the long term,” Perron said.

Microsoft wants more of the big companies to get involved in the Windws Phone ecosystem, and even they bought Nokia and are planing to develop there own hardware they still want other companies to use their operating system. In recent talks with Samsung and HTC, Microsoft has offered them a free Windows Phone on all smartphones that they produce. This is an attempt to compete with Android, will just have to wait and see if this strategy will bring better results.

Source techradar.

Microsoft Treshold Update in 2015

Microsoft is expected to bring Windows Phone Blue update early this year. This update should be the beginning of cross-platform unification that is coming in 2015. According to the recent rumors Microsoft is working on Treshold update that will unify Windows, Windows Phone, Windows RT and Xbox UI.

This will not be a single operating system that is going to be running on all the devices, this will be a number of shared UI elements across the different platforms. Treshold update could bring us a unified app store which is for now just wishful thinking, considering how many different app stores Microsoft has over different operating systems. IT giant from Redmond is hopping that Treshold update will make it easier for you to work and have fun using Windows.

One of the first unification process should be the merge of WindowsPhone and Windows RT. Microsoft isn' happy hawing so many different operating systems for so many devices so this could be the first big unification.

The year 2014 is very important for Microsoft, because the company is currently in transformation. They also want to build hardware not just software like it's been the case for all these years. Recent purchase of Nokia is a step in that direction. So this should be a very important year for Microsoft.

Source ZDNET.