Microsoft and Nokia quarterly figures out; Surface 2 revenue promising

One week back, we were talking about the forthcoming arrival of Nokia’s quarterly figures, and floated a theory based on some of the disclaimers the company shared that the publication of that report might just coincide with the culmination of Microsoft’s acquisition of Nokia’s smartphone business. Well, that hasn’t actually come to pass just yet, but those numbers themselves have indeed arrive, alongside a set from Microsoft itself. Let’s take a look at how both of the companies fared in the ...

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ASUS CES news: PadFone X for AT&T, ZenFone series, dual-boot hybrid tablet

Considering all the teasers it had been dropping, we sure had some pretty high expectations for today’s ASUS CES announcement. The company had been hinting at a dual-boot Android/Windows tablet, and a later video sure seemed to imply we’d be seeing new smartphones in 4, 5, and 6-inch screen sizes. Now that’s all been confirmed, as well as some surprises. The Transformer Book Duet is ASUS’s new dual-boot, hybrid, all-sorts-of-convertible tablet. It goes from Android to Windows 8.1 at the touch of a ...

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Lenovo announces the ThinkPad 8 for business users

As smaller tablets like the Nexus 7 and the iPad mini have gained traction, we knew it was only a matter of time before these became a more popular breed among different platforms and OEMs. Microsoft’s answer to this new market is Windows 8.1, though Redmond’s strategy was to bring us more powerful tablets by allowing us to use a full desktop operating system on an 8-inch tablet. Both Dell and Toshiba have pioneered this market with their inexpensive offerings late last year, but none of these companies offered us a really powerful business tablet, as Lenovo claims to do so ...

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Top 5 Tablet Wishes for 2014

There’s no denying that the tablet industry has evolved at a tremendous pace in less than three years. For those of us non-believers of the original Microsoft Tablet PC, or even the first iPad and its potential, it was hard to even predict that the services and devices that we see ubiquitous today, would’ve been possible so quickly. That being said, there is no such thing as a perfect tablet, and not every device fits every user. Make sure you watch today’s Top 5 as we talk about the things we all wish to see happening in 2014. We discuss the things that are still not fixed, and the ...

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Surface Pro 2 receives upgraded processor

Microsoft’s Surface Pro 2 was one of the best tablets of 2013. Not only were we impressed by what we saw, but you readers voted it your third favorite tablet of the year, bested only by the Nexus 7 and iPad Air. Out of the gate, it was already a solid performer, running an Intel Core i5 Haswell at 1.6GHz. By now the tablet is less than three months old, yet Microsoft is already taking revisiting its design choices, upgrading that chip to a newer, ...

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Pocketnow Readers’ Choice 2013: Results

Six weeks ago, we came to you with a simple request: tell us what you think were the best smartphones and best tablets of 2013. In the time that’s followed we’ve seen you vote… and vote, and vote, and vote. This past Friday, we finally closed the polls and got to the business of declaring some winners. With no further ado, let’s start checking out what you chose, beginning with smartphones:

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No new Microsoft CEO decision until next year

It’s been nearly four months now since Steve Ballmer announced his intention to step down as Microsoft’s second-ever CEO, with plans to wrap things up over the following year. Even with plenty of time to make that transition, we heard claims since then that Microsoft really wanted to get on top of this, and would make its decision on new leadership before the year’s out. Well, as should be painfully obvious by now, 2013 is on its last legs, ...

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Surface Mini tablet to support in-air gesture control?

It’s been a while now since we heard anything new about Microsoft’s possible plans for a Surface 2 Mini, after a number of rumors attempted to describe such hardware a couple months back. At the time, we didn’t have a firm grasp on many specifics, with details like screen aspect ratio, size, and resolution still up in the air. While we can’t yet say if it’s any more accurate, today we get to check out some new claims about the hardware and hear ...

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Nokia changes its mind about 8.3-inch “Illusionist” tablet?

As if we didn’t have enough downright unusual Nokia rumors floating around today, with word that the Lumia 929 might forgo the number-based naming strategy we know and love and could arrive simply as the Lumia Icon, now we’re hearing that a very promising device may have hit a roadblock, upon the suggestion that Nokia’s canceled its plans for an 8.3-inch tablet. This was the model we’ve been following as codename Illusionist, which for quite a ...

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Pocketnow Weekly 074: new Google Play devices and Windows Phone rumors galore

Sometimes there’s so much news you need to call in the Reserves just to handle it all, and that’s just what we’ve done this week. Between Google’s surprise announcement of an unlikely pair of additions to the Google Play Store; Microsoft’s rumored offer to pay Samsung to keep making Windows Phones; and a boatload of reviews, we’re in over our heads this week – so we’ve brought in four team members to do the news justice. Sorry, no listener mail this week – but in its place you get a consolation prize: you get to know what curious fate ...

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Top 5 annoying things about Tablets in 2013

Let’s face it, tablets aren’t perfect. We’ve had numerous editorials talking about it, and we don’t think twice about pointing these imperfections out in our reviews. Surely in life nothing is perfect, but there are surely those companies that try harder, and those that don’t. There are companies that’ll charge you the same amount of money for lesser quality products than others, and there are those that would rather lose a premium in oder to sell you what you paid for. Now that said, tablets aren’t new. We’ve used them for over a decade, and it’s interesting to note that ...

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Could Microsoft eliminate WP8/RT licensing fees for OEMs?

Windows Phone has ended up as a bit of a Nokia-only show. Sure, we still see signs of work on an odd device from another hardware partner every now and then, but those hardly add up to a significant slice of the platform’s share. While some WP fans would like nothing more than to keep seeing Nokia dominate, Microsoft may be wishing that more OEMs were interested in releasing new hardware, and could be considering some big changes to how it licenses its platforms, including making both Windows Phone and Windows RT free for ...

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New evidence emerges for Nokia 8.3-inch Lumia tablet

We’ve sure got the Nokia Lumia 2520 (above) filling the full-sized tablet spot in the brand’s lineup, but rumors have also been pretty insistent that Nokia’s got some more tablet action in the works, and that might include a device that could provide the company’s supporters with a slightly smaller option. Recently, there’s been talk of a model codenamed Illusionist, which could be a tablet somewhere in the eight-inch range. We might finally ...

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Microsoft announces 12 Days of Deals, as list of upcoming offers leaks

Sometimes the best deals around can be among the hardest to get. That Moto X $150-off promotion just flew by fast; if you weren’t ready to jump on Motorola’s site right at noon, chances are you missed out again. That one’s gone for good, but now we’re hearing about a whole lot of new deals popping up over on the Windows side of the street, and once again we’re seeing some opportunities for big savings – if you’re fast. Microsoft’s 12 Days of Deals will have one product a day on ...

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8 things I hate about Windows 8.1 (Video)

There are a lot of people out there that absolutely hate Windows 8.1. Most of the critics out there on the internet harp on about a handful of things that are pretty easy to overcome once you put some time into learning the operating system. I’ve been using Windows 8.1 since it was in beta, and I’ve been using the final version since it was released to manufacturing, so I’ve had a good amount of time to get used to the new features and learn all about them. There are a lot of things that I absolutely love about the new operating system, but there are also a number of ...

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