SlashGear Week In Review - Week 14 2011
Welcome to another edition of the SlashGear Week in Review! Let's get right into it. Early in the week Amazon rolled out its Appstore test drive feature. The feature allows you to test out some of the apps available on the store on a virtual Android device for 30 minutes. A Montana Radio Shack store is offering a wild deal for people that sign up to have new service installed. The store will give a gift certificate for a 380 handgun or a shotgun to those that purchase service.
Sony Ericsson announced that it was going to offer up a new Android bootloader unlock tool. The catch is that the tool will only be offered for certain handsets in its 2011 lineup. We went hands on with the Nokia C7 Astound for the T-Mobile network early in the week. The phone is small and for now all you get is some light impressions with a full review coming soon.
We put up a review of the HTC Desire S, which is the follow up to one of the most popular Android phones of 2010. The phone is reliable and with well-made software that will be another HTC bestseller for sure. The Samsung WiFi only Galaxy tab got an official price and date. The tablet will landed on March 31 for the equivalent of $477 on Amazon UK. European regulations announced early in the week that some episodes of the cartoon The Simpsons would be editied for content. The shows with references to nuclear accidents and radiation are being cut.
An awesome underwater dome that reminds me a lot of Bioshock that is 100-years old turned up in images. The dome is under a lake in Witley Park in the UK and is part of an old mansion that was built by J. Whitaker Wright. Windows Phone has been tipped to get an update that will bring NFC payments to the device. This is no surprise given all the focus some big companies are putting on NFC payments over the last few months.
We spent some time putting together an first impressions video of the Asus Eee Pad Transformer for you to check out mid-week. We found a lot to like and will be offering up the full verdict on the device in a few weeks. The Eee Pad Transformer and the Eee Slate EP121 also both had their official price and launch date announced. The Transformer will sell for the equivalent of $688 on April 6 with the slate landing on April 10 for the equivalent of $1602. Tesla announced that it was suing BBC and Top Gear over a test the Top Gear crew did on the Tesla Roadster. The Top Gear crew claims the Roadster ran out of power after 55 miles and had to be pushed while Tesla claims the batteries were still charged and working.
A guy made a DIY slingshot later in the week that doesn't shoot rocks or BB's. This slingshot shoots machetes and is sure to cause the loss of a finger or two at some point. An awesome item perfect for coffee drinkers turned up on Thursday called Coffee Joulies. They are silver coffee beans with some polymer inside that melts to absorb heat from coffee that is too hot and then puts that heat back into the drink to keep it warm.
Chris put up his skeptics review of the iPad 2. Chris figures he can respect the iPad 2, but finds it hard to love. We reviewd the Sony Xperia Play smartphone late in the week. The phone doesn't deliver the knockout punch that would have made Sony's day and the device lacks the polished experience we wanted to see.
A doctor took his robotic surgical tool and used it to make tiny paper airplanes. The doc did this to show how much dexterity and control the tools have and they are impressive. A dude took a phone book and crammed it into the port of his massive car stereo where the air is displaced. The air was powerful enough to blow pages out of the phone book.
We rounded up all the wacky April Fools products that surfaced on Friday. We always see some crazy gear this time of year and on occasion, some of the crazy gear actually turns into products. Sony CEO Howard Stinger let slip that Apple is buying "it's best sensors" from Sony. Presumably that means that the iPhone 5 will be using the 8MP sensor that Sony makes.
The stock of the iPad 2 in stores may improve with Apple adding a new display panel provider. Apple has AU Optronics making the IPS screens of the tablet now too. That's all for this week's edition, see you next time!