Nokia 808 PureView

Nokia 808 PureView packs a 41-megapixel camera

The Nokia 808 PureView is a new smartphone with an astounding 41-megapixel image sensor

At this week's Mobile World Congress in Barcelona, Nokia announced the 808 PureView, a smartphone with an astounding 41-megapixel image sensor. The Nokia 808 will be the first smartphone by Nokia to include its new PureView imaging technology, which combines a high-resolution sensor with Carl Zeiss optics and Nokia-developed algorithms.

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Typically you might want a high megapixel camera in order to take photos that can be printed larger - what makes the Nokia 808 PureView special, however, it what it does with those pixels. The 808 uses a new pixel oversampling technology, that captures seven pixels of information and then condenses those into one single pixel. This reportedly results in an exceptionally sharp photo, and the ability to zoom in on any portion of a 5-megapixel picture without losing clarity in the image.

The technology also works on video, so you can shoot a full HD video at 30fps and 4x zoom. Nokia has made some untouched images taken with the camera available online (as a sizable download) so you can get a feel for the quality.

In addition to offering a decent lens and large image sensor, the camera also has a few other notable features. It can capture photos quickly (in less than a second), has a Xenon flash as well as an LED video light for shooting in dark places, and offers integration with services such as GetMe Rated (for having other people rate your photos) and Vimeo, for sharing your videos with the world. Nokia claims the phone can capture audio at CD-like quality, and the handset is also the first smartphone with built-in Dolby Headphone technology, so you can listen to tunes (or your videos) in Dolby Surround sound using any set of stereo headphones.

Besides the camera and sound, the rest of the specs for the handset are actually on the low end of things. The Nokia Belle phone has a 4-inch screen with a 640 x 360 resolution, a 1.3Ghz single-core processor, and 512Mb of RAM. The handset comes with 16GB of storage space, but supports microSD expansion up to 32GB.

The Nokia 808 PureView is expected to roll out in May for around US$605.

Quad-core iPad 3

Quad-core iPad 3

If the rumors prove true, an LTE, quad-core, Retina display iPad 3 will be announced on March 7 - but it's a big if

It's been a busy week on the iPad 3 rumor mill, and things have progressed considerably since our last iPad 3 update with the iMore blog citing "reliable sources" who suggest an official iPad 3 announcement is likely on March 7. Further, the same sources indicate that the next iteration of Apple's tablet could be powered by a quad-core processor and include - as we already suspected - a Retina display. There's some suggestion that the device could feature LTE connectivity - though this latter point seems shrouded in uncertainty. Time to take the cautious stick to the iPad 3 rumor cauldron ...

The LTE speculation seems to originate from the same iMore article on Monday that broke the March 7 announcement - but seems to be a point of speculation based on the iPhone 5 likely being an LTE handset. "We're still not certain if the iPad 3 will get it earlier," wrote iMore's Rene Ritchie. The same story is firmer upon the points of a 2048 x 1536 Retina display, a quad-core Apple A6 system-on-a-chip and a March 7 announcement - all of which I interpret iMore to have derived directly from its source. The announcement date agrees with a prior prediction from All Things D that an announcement would come the first week in March.

The Wall Street Journal followed this with a story that seemed to peg an LTE iPad 3 as a near-certainty, but cited vague-sounding sources such as "people familiar with the matter" and "one of those people." Of course iMore went on to use the Wall Street Journal story as the basis of a firmer story on an LTE iPad. One has to wonder if a comical game of Chinese whispers is being played out here, with flimsy LTE rumors getting firmer by the minute through the safety blanket of repetition and diminished responsibility. Apple may not comment on speculation, but it has fun watching, no doubt.

Following a separate thread, the Wall Street Journal also revealed that, according to anonymous sources inside Apple's supply chain, Apple is working on a smaller, approximately 8-inch iPad with a similar resolution to the current 9.7-inch iPad 2. Assuming all the rumors proved true, this would lead to a three-tier iPad market consisting of iPad 3, a discount iPad 2, and a new smaller iPad with similar-sounding specs - a rather muddy, confusing and unAppley-sounding state of affairs.

Back in January, iLounge's Jeremy Horowitz's source (simply referred to as "source") suggested iPad 3 would be a little thicker, with beefed up camera specs in line with the iPhone 4 or 4S. The article seems to be the origin of subsequent iPad 3 Retina display rumors, though Horowitz says "high-def screen." In the same piece, Horowitz suggests that Apple will continue to ship the iPad 2 at the reduced price of US$399.

We'll know nothing for certain until March 7 (if the date proves correct), and in the mean time, your guess is as good as anyone's. If I were a gambling man I'd say improved cameras are a near-certainty, an HD Retina-like display very likely, a quad-core processor highly possible, and a cut-price iPad 2 eminently sensible. An LTE iPad 3 and a smaller 8-inch iPad sound rather less likely, though they're by no means impossible. Time will tell.

Facebook's New Headquarters

Facebook's New Headquarters




You may wonder if Facebook’s new headquarters is a college campus or a multibillion-dollar company. Their new 57-acre headquarters is in Menlo Park, California, on the same land that Sun Microsystems had its headquarters. See how Facebook employees get to spend their time at work.



The 57-acre campus, which formerly housed Sun Microsystems, features open work spaces for nearly 2,000 employees.