HTC One KitKat update hits Canada, as US owners left waiting

No, we’re not having Canada Fridays here at Pocketnow (is that a thing? That should be a thing), but we’ve got a little follow-up to a story from earlier this week that hails to us from the Great White North, as we check out HTC’s ongoing progress to make Android 4.4 KitKat updates available for its 2013 flagship, the HTC One. As we told you on Wednesday, HTC announced that it wouldn’t be able to quite hit its goal of having HTC One ...

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Canadian staple Tim Hortons cooks up a special BlackBerry treat

It’s been just over one year now since BlackBerry launched BlackBerry 10, introducing the Z10 and Q10 in the process. BlackBerry really needed a new hit to keep its head above water in a rapidly shifting smartphone climate, and BlackBerry 10 was supposed to be that revitalizing force. Unfortunately for the company, the months that followed were anything but kind, and in spite of a few notable accomplishments (

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Red Nexus 5 render leaks, showing its stuff

The relentless momentum behind these red Nexus 5 rumors thunders ahead this week, already bringing us a whole bunch of pics – both of the phone’s packaging and the handset itself – as well as an idea of when sales of the smartphone could eventually begin. As we wait for next week to see if those rumors of a February 4 launch are correct, this afternoon brings us one more sign of the phone’s existence, with the first press render of the red Nexus ...

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Next Android release may forsake Dalvik for ART

With the release of Android 4.4 KitKat, we saw Google introduce a new virtual machine, giving users the opportunity to switch from the just-in-time compilation of the familiar Dalvik VM to one using ahead-of-time compilation, the Android Runtime ART. With KitKat, ART was added as a bit of a preview – it wasn’t the default VM, and while our experiments with it revealed a lot of promise, initial load time and the threat of compatibility issues were still factors that gave us ...

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Smartwatches will not be a fad, if done right

Love or hate them, smartwatches are a growing thing. Many of us here at Pocketnow have or will soon own a Pebble, and Michael Fisher also has a soft spot for the Galaxy Gear. And Joe and I share similar theories on the future of smartwatches, wearables, and the personal area network. But it’s not just us those of us who are obsessed with technology either. As new generations of devices have come out and they ...

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A post-Motorola Google may step-up its interest in wearables

Google’s brief experiment with being involved in smartphone hardware manufacturing (or at least, doing so at arm’s length) is about to wrap up, but as we know, the company’s still got plenty of hardware interests elsewhere. Those take the form of things like Chromecast or Google Glass, with the latter generating a whole lot of buzz as we near a presumed commercial launch. Alongside Glass, we’ve been hearing rumors now and then of Google’s interest in smartwatches, and according to a new report, these wearable ...

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Apple’s App Store bombarded with “Candy” games in protest of trademark

If you’ve been lucky enough to not have received a Candy Crush Saga invite on Facebook, you’re one of the lucky few. This game has become an instant hit on both Facebook, and mobile devices like the iPhone, up to the point where King, the company behind the game, has now effectively won a trademark application for the world “Candy” in the UK. This trademark gives King exclusive rights to own the name “Candy” in anything that has to do with games, and as a result, a lot of competitors are unhappy. In signs of protest, Apple’s App Store is currently ...

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The Pocketnow Weekly is Stitcher’s Best Technology Podcast of 2013!

“‘New beginnings in print beget new beginnings in podcasts.’ We’re not sure who said that. In fact, we might’ve just made that up right here, on the spot. And that’s the kind of seat-of-the-pants action you’re going to get every week on our new podcast, the Pocketnow Weekly.” That’s the opening graph of the post that kicked off our audio-only podcast back in July of 2012. Today, 81 episodes of “seat-of-the-pants action” later, we’ve been ...

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Apple patents pressure-sensitive iPad bezel and touch screen experience

There’s no denying that Apple has revolutionized the touch screen experience ever since the first-generation iPhone, and we’ve even seen more of that come to the way you can navigate around the iPad. At the moment, though sometimes cumbersome, you can navigate around apps and services with four-finger swipes on the iPad, though it does seem that Apple is just getting started. The company’s new patent application shows a new iPad with pressure sensors in both the display and the bezel, in a way that would allow both pressure sensors to work together in order to provide ...

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How Best Buy’s unusual new offer could save you $50 on a phone this year

We’re well used to seeing smartphone retailers offer discounts on their wares, but all too often those savings come with significant restraints: maybe only certain models are covered, or only those form specific manufacturers, and we’re often talking about some narrow time window during which you can take advantage of the deal. Yesterday Best Buy revealed a new promotion that isn’t without its own limitations, but the generally wide-open structure of it, with comparatively few ...

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iPhone surpassed the Samsung Galaxy line-up in sales last quarter

Apple’s results last quarter have proven to shock more than few of us. Just recently we learned that the iPad actually gained global marketshare for the first time in a while last quarter, which is extremely difficult in a world full of $200 tablets. Now it seems that even the iPhone broke some records in sales last quarter when compared to its direct competition. Two quarters ago, Samsung’s 38% of US smartphone market share had surpassed Apple’s 34%, something which proved to be ...

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Satya Nadella to be Microsoft’s CEO, Gates steps down as Chairman says Bloomberg

All this CEO hunt for Microsoft has turned into quite the soap opera, but recent claims from Bloomberg follow on the recent news that we heard yesterday. It seems that Microsoft’s board has reached a decision, or should we say a couple of decisions, and these are quite dramatic. First of all, Bloomberb points to Satya Nadella as the Microsoft’s next CEO. Nadella has been in Microsoft for 20 years, has been heavily involved in products like Office and Bing, and is currently focused more on Microsoft’s consumer products and also its cloud computing business. Now one of the ...

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Don’t expect the 12.9-inch iPad Pro any time soon

Apple’s recent name change for its larger iPad to iPad Air has left a lot of speculation in the tech world. Given the fact that Apple’s MacBook line-up is made of the MacBook Air and MacBook Pro, and also due to some rumors of Apple building a 12.9-inch iPad, many of us assumed that this larger iPad would make Apple’s iPad Pro line-up in the future. Sadly new rumors don’t paint a pretty picture for this possible iPad Pro as analysts at IHS have just told CNET that: “Some manufacturers over the last six months have received sample quantities of a larger panel. ...

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Lenovo CEO aims to “surpass” Apple and Samsung, shares new Motorola purchase details

Lenovo’s purchase of Motorola has been dominating smartphone news for the past couple days, and while we fully expect to see things start calming down in the near future, for the moment there are still new aspects of the deal worth discussing. We checked out an interview Lenovo CEO Yuanqing Yang gave to The Wall Street Journal yesterday, where he talked about the lack of any significant business plan just yet for how to revitalize Motorola. Today, ...

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