WOW - Fully Charge your phone in 20 seconds

I'm sure you would agree that the biggest pain point with our fancy large screen smartphones is the battery life. Whenever you are out and about - either you carry a power bank or keep looking for socket to plug it in. And then it takes good amount of time to charge the phone. 

Imagine a power bank - small in size - and which charges your phone in 20 seconds.

A 18 year old high school student Eesha Khare from Saratoga, California has developed a storage device (super capacitor) which can be used to charge a phone in 20 - 30 seconds- this storage device can hold the charge for a long time. Eesha just received $ 50,000 young scientist award from Intel foundation.

Looks like next breakthrough in battery life is not far away.This device can potentially be embeded in smartphone making battery life issue go away. Will wait and see which company adopts this invention to make it a commercial product.

Well done girl - you make us proud!!

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iPhone 4 buy back - sell your old smartphone and get huge discount on iPhone 4

There is a very exciting offer being run by Apple in India - its the iPhone 4 buy back program. In this program you can sell ANY of your old smartphone and get Rs 7000 discount on iPhone 4- maximum retail price of iPhone 4 is Rs 26,500 so if you have any old smartphone you want to get rid off then you can get iPhone 4 at Rs 19, 500 effective price - you can even avail EMI option on this price.

This offer was launched on 5th April 2013 and from today i.e. 11th May this offer has been spiced up even further - but only for students - if you are a student then you can get Rs 7777 for your old smartphone (Rs 7000 for non students) - you of course will need to give a student id card.

Just walk into any good mobile selling store in your neighbourhood and chances are this offer will be available there.

Simple and Power offer which is easy to avail for a dream SmartPhone.

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iPhone 5 India launch photos

Here are joyous moments of iPhone 5 India launch captured in priceless photos

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iPhone 5 India launch video

iPhone 5 was launched in India on 2nd November 2012 with much fan and fare

5 launch events were done in Gurgaon, Delhi, Mumbai and Bangalore - these events were with a twist - breaking the tradition of launching in front of the "channel", iPhone 5 was launched in front of the "customer"  - for the first time, Indians stood in long queues to buy their iPhone 5:-

Here is a video that captures the thrill and joy:
(or watch it on Youtube http://youtu.be/7UdkcuU2WlY)

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iPhone 5 India launch and Prices

iPhone 5 is due to be launched in India on 2nd November. If you are interested in grabbing this excellent product on first day then Redington India (authorised distributors of iPhones in India) is hosting launch events in four cities on 2nd November 7 pm onwards

Gurgaon - Galleria, DLF phase 4
Delhi -DLF Place Saket
Mumbai - Inorbit mall
Bangalore - UB city

Redington's website (http://appleiphone5.redingtononline.com/) gives MRPs of iPhone 5 : 16 GB for Rs 45,500; 32 GB for 52,500 and 64 GB for 59,500

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iOS6 - the final frontier?

Below is the dump of key iOS 6 features as per Apple's official list. 

For me there are two key disappointments as yet - first one: turn by turn navigation that i used to use in Google Maps is not there anymore (for India) in iOS maps and secondly the ever present YouTube app has disappeared. At the time of writing this #iOS6 tag is trending in Google+ - people talking about horrors of iOS6 maps - i'm sure maps issues will take time to settle down.

Good ones are Multiple photo streams, VIP mail box, Facebook integration (though if you have SmartSyc app then this Facebook integration is more or less redundant), Do not disturb - Option of reply with message and remind me later while receiving a call is also cool

Here is the list:

• Maps
• Apple designed vector based maps
• Turn-by-turn navigation with spoken directions on iPhone 5, iPhone 4S, iPad Wi-Fi + Cellular (2nd and 3rd generation)
• Real-time traffic information
• Flyover for photo-realistic, interactive 3D views of major metro areas on iPhone 5, iPhone 4S, iPad (3rd generation), and iPod touch (5th generation)
• Local search results with Yelp photos, ratings, reviews, and available deals
• Siri integration for requesting directions and finding places along a route
• Siri improvements
• Sports: scores, player stats, game schedules, team rosters, and league standings for baseball, basketball, football, soccer and hockey
• Movies: trailers, showtimes, reviews and facts
• Restaurants: reservations, reviews, photos and information
• Send a Tweet
• Post on Facebook
• App launch
• Eyes Free in supported automobiles
• Local search available in Siri supported countries (availability may be limited during initial rollout)
• Additional country and language support for Canada (English and Canadian French), China (Mandarin), Hong Kong (Cantonese), Italy (Italian), Korea (Korean), Mexico (Spanish), Spain (Spanish), Switzerland (Italian, French, German), Taiwan (Mandarin), US (Spanish)
• Supported on iPhone 5, iPhone 4S, iPad (3rd generation) and iPod touch (5th generation)
• Facebook integration
• Single sign-on from Settings
• Post from Photos, Safari, Maps, App Store, iTunes, Game Center, Notification Center and Siri
• Add location and choose audience for any post
• View up-to-date Facebook profile photos and contact information in Contacts
• View Facebook events and birthdays in Calendar
• Like content and see your friends' Likes in App Store and iTunes Store
• Shared Photo Streams
• Share selected photos with the people you choose
• Friends can view shared photos in Photos app, iPhoto and Apple TV
• Friends can like and make comments on individual photos 
• Passbook
• One place for boarding passes, store cards, movie tickets and other passes
• Barcode display for boarding flights, buying coffee, getting into movies and other actions
• Passes displayed on Lock Screen based on time or location
• Passes can be automatically updated
• Supported on iPhone and iPod touch
• FaceTime improvements
• FaceTime over cellular support for iPhone 5, iPhone 4S and iPad Wi-Fi + Cellular (3rd generation)
• Receive FaceTime calls, sent to your iPhone number, on your iPad and iPod touch
• Phone improvements
• Do Not Disturb to suppress incoming calls and notifications
• 'Reply with message' option when declining a call
• 'Remind me later' option based on time or location when declining a call
• Mail improvements
• VIP mailbox to quickly access mail from important people
• Flagged email mailbox
• Insert photos and videos when composing email
• Open password protected Office docs
• Pull down to refresh mailboxes
• Per account signatures
• Safari improvements
• iCloud tabs to see open pages on all your devices
• Offline Reading List
• Photo upload support
• Full screen landscape view on iPhone and iPod touch
• Smart app banners
• JavaScript performance improvements
• App Store and iTunes Store improvements
• Updated store design
• iTunes Preview history
• Complete my season
• Complete my album
• Game Center improvements
• Challenge friends to beat high scores and achievements
• Post high-scores and achievements to Facebook and Twitter
• Friend recommendations based on your Facebook friends
• Accessibility improvements
• Guided Access to limit device to one app or restrict touch input on certain areas of the screen
• VoiceOver integration with Maps, AssistiveTouch and Zoom
• Support for Made for iPhone Hearing Aids for iPhone 5 and iPhone 4S
• Improved privacy controls for Contacts, Calendars, Reminders, Photos and data shared over Bluetooth
• Reminders can be reordered in the Reminders app
• Custom vibrations for alerts on iPhone
• Clock app for iPad
• Clock alarm with song
• Search all fields in Contacts
• Automatic movie mode for improved video sound quality
• Definitions of a selected word for Chinese, French, German and Spanish
• New keyboard layouts for French, German, Turkish, Catalan, Arabic and Icelandic
• Keyboard shortcuts shared across devices via iCloud
• Bluetooth MAP support
• Global network proxy for HTTP
• Features for China
• Baidu web search
• Sina Weibo integration
• Share videos to Tudou
• Share videos to Youku
• Improved text input for handwriting and Pinyin
• Bug fixes

Some features may not be available for all countries or all areas. Please visit this website for more details:

http://www.apple.com/ios/feature-availability

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iPhone 5 launched... here are the details

Post updated with iPhone 5 photos - feature details below

-- iPhone 5 will come in two colors -  Black or white front. The white one will be with raw aluminum back and the black one will have black anodized backing.

-- Display size is larger - 4 inch screen - though width is same as iPhone 4/4S - height is increased - logic is it should fit comfortably in your hand - so width has been kept same.

-- It is made entirely of glass and aluminum.

-- It's the thinnest and lightest iPhone yet; 7.6 mm thick, 18% thinner than 4/4S

-- It weighs 112 grams - 20% lighter than the 4S.

-- It has 326 ppi (Samsung S3 has 306) Retina display of 4-inches. Resolution is 1136 x 640 resolution. (S3 has 720 x 1280)

-- It has five rows of icons -iPhone 4/4S has four;  plus the four shortcuts on the bottom.

-- 44% better color saturation with sRGB rendering.

-- Supports GPRS, EDGE, EV-DO, HSPA, HSPA+, DC-HSDPA and LTE!

-- It has really unique innovative dynamic antenna... it can automatically switch antenna connections.

-- There's also 802.11a/b/g/n with dual-channel - up to 150Mbps.

-- Processor -A6. 2X faster CPU and 2x graphics and 22% smaller in size compared to the A5 in 4/4S. It will load pages 2.1X faster than before. 

-- Battery Life: 8 hours of 3G or LTE talk time or browsing - 10 hours on WiFi browsing.

-- Camera: 8-megapixel sensor, a 5-element lens and f/2.4 aperture. Same as the iPhone 4S but thinner. It comes with dynamic low light mode. It evaluates nearby pixels to give up to 2 f-stops greater low-light performance.And, there's a new image processor in the A6 to reduce noise and includes a so-called "smart filter" to do better at color-matching.
It's really powerful to deliver amazing low-light photo capture." And it's 40% faster image capture. Panoramic image capture is provided.You sweep the scene vertically to get the most resolution, then just swing your phone to get panoramic picture. It will take care of the noise if you shake it a bit. The front-facing camera is now 720p- backside illuminated.

-- Shared Photo Stream : There's a new feature Shared Photo Streams. You can share a series of photos with friends and family for them to view and comment.

-- Videos : It is 1080p with face recognition and better video stabilization. You can click photos while making a video.

-- FaceTime over cellular networks - 4/4S FaceTime only worked on WiFi.

-- The audio system - there are three microphones-Front, bottom, and back.The speaker has a 5-magnet transducer. That's three more magnets in your transducer. Each one a mystery.

-- Connector: It is all changed - and is called Lightning.You can plug it in either way, it's all digital and 80% smaller. Apple will ship an adaptor to convert lightning to work on your old docs etc.

-- No NFC

-- No Bluetooth 4.0

-- No wireless charging

-- No micro-USB compatibility.

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