SlashGear Week In Review- Week 26 2010
Happy Fourth of July to readers in the US and welcome to another Week in Review! Apple announced on Monday that it had sold a whopping 1.7 million iPhone 4 smartphones in three days. I knew they would sell a lot of the things, but didn't think it would be that many. Monday we posted up our review of the Samsung Galaxy S smartphone. We liked the device, but it had some occasional issues with CPU lag to sour the overall enjoyment somewhat.
Some users of the iPhone 4 started to report that their handsets were getting very hot. Some even reported that their device was locking itself due to overheating. Sony issued the new PS3 3.40 firmware Tuesday. The firmware added PlayStation Plus, Facebook, and more to the console.
iSuppli tore down the new iPhone 4 early in the week to see what was inside. The teardown artists figure the iPhone 4 costs about $187.51 to build for the 16GB version. With all the complaints and issues for users of the iPhone 4 it was little surprise to hear talk of class action suits spring up. The issues with poor reception are the reason for the class action talk.
Corsair announced early in the week that a security glitch with its Padlock 2 flash drive had been discovered. The glitch allowed the password to be removed without affecting the data leaving it vulnerable. Another new potential issue with the iPhone 4 surfaced this week with proximity sensor issues being reported. The sensors are said to randomly activate the screen during a call making it easy to hang up or mute the call you are on accidentally.
Hulu Plus was officially announced this week with more shows and in HD quality. The shows will stream to the iPhone, iPad, and various TVs. Tuesday we posted up our official iPhone 4 review. In the end, we say the new device is a worthwhile upgrade for any user of an older iPhone.
Wednesday brought a rumor that Verizon was set to launch LTE in several test markets in November and then offer LTE handsets in those markets on Black Friday. This would be an earlier launch for its LTE networks than previously expected. Street legal Tron lightcycles hit eBay for auction in the middle of the week. Every geek that likes Tron was drooling for one of the $35K beasts.
Dell was accused of trying to cover up sales of defective computers in 2003-2005. The machines allegedly had mainboards that would fail at a significant rate. Sony announced that some of its Vaio notebooks were overheating to the point of warping the plastic cases this week. The machines were under a recall issued and a new firmware was offered to fix the overheat problem.
Details of Android 3.0 codenamed Gingerbread surfaced midweek. Notable improvements included 720p displays and fragmentation. Amazon unveiled a new Kindle DX this week with a graphite color and a new screen. The screen offers 50% better contrast than the original for $379.
Microsoft officially killed off the Kin feature phones after sales were abysmal for the devices. Hopefully carriers and hardware makers get the point that questionable hardware with a high-priced data plan will not fly with consumers. Lucasfilm told Wicked Lasers to stop selling that sweet Pro Arctic Laser that we saw a week or so ago. The laser looks too much like a lightsaber for Lucasfilm's comfort.
Apple PR announced that the emails allegedly from Steve Jobs telling a user that the iPhone 4 was "just a phone" were fake. Someone sent the emails as a hoax. That talk of a class action suit over the issues with the iPhone 4 came true. The first class action suit was filed in a Maryland court Wednesday.
Dell officially announced that it did not knowingly sell defective computers on Friday. This was in response to the allegations that Dell tried to cover up defective computers made earlier in the week. Friday we learned that the issues with signal strength on the iPhone 4 when held just right came down to an incorrect formula for calculating signal strength. A new firmware update is coming to fix the issue. Thanks for reading and have a safe holiday weekend!