Its powerful components should hopefully make it a very swift device. We’ve not had enough time with the new phone to make any firm conclusions about its camera and software tweaks, but we’ve got high hopes for good performances all round.

Emphasis mine. Yes, It’s easy to see why this one is the “winner”.

Samsung Galaxy S3 Vs Apple iPhone 4S Vs HTC One X | CNET UK.

the AT&T version of the Samsung Galaxy S II has 42% more screen area and Sprint / T-Mobile versions of Galaxy S II have 58% more screen area than the iPhone 4S.

Ignore that screen sizes are all over the place, and rest assured the Galaxy is huge. Hope you have big pockets. And hands.

The Galaxy S II HSPA+ network speeds are at least 50% faster with AT&T 21 MBPS and three times faster with T-Mobile’s 42 MBPS than the iPhone 4S’s 14 MBPS HSPA network.

Our theoretical you-will-never-see-them speeds are faster than their theoretical you-will-never-see-them speeds. 

Galaxy S II continues to have the thinnest smartphone design 

We’re huge, but a millimeter thinner. 

Open Ecosystem – Consumers can use the Galaxy S II to buy music from Amazon, Rhapsody, or a variety of other music services, as well as multiple cloud music services supported such as Amazon, Google Music and multiple video chat clients available for use including Google Chat and Skype. The Samsung Galaxy S II is not limited to a single manufacturer’s storefront or app store.

The iPhone uses the #1 music store in the world, Galaxy doesn’t. 

In short, until we add a cheap Siri knockoff and a few other features for which we’ll kipe Apple’s icon designs, just ignore the iPhone 4S.

How many years can an OS exist
Before its best days have gone by?
How many new paradigms can be shown
That much better methods apply?
And how many times to the well will they go
Before seeing it’s finally run dry?
The answer my friend is blowin’ in the fan
The answer is blowin’ in the fan.

How many vendors were pulled on a chain
Building tablets unfriendly to hands?
How many failures and misguided tries
Were continued according to plans?
And when will they get the futility of
Shoehorning PCs into cans?
The answer my friend is blowin’ in the fan
The answer is blowin’ in the fan.

(Inspired by this tidbit about a prototype Windows 8 tablet.)

“The court is of the opinion that Apple’s minimalistic design isn’t the only technical solution to make a tablet computer, other designs are possible… For the informed customer there remains the predominant overall impression that the device looks [like the iPad].”

The above is from presiding Judge Johanna Brueckner-Hofman in her verdict.

Forget whether you think the tech world is lawsuit-happy. Forget whether you think this is a bad decision. Forget whether you think this is just Germany, and no other country will rule this way. Forget your Apple hate or Samsung/Android love. Forget all that.

Instead, remember the above quote.

It gets old seeing companies copy Apple so fully, and then claim they had no choice because there’s no other way to make whatever it is they’re making. Of course there is. We’re not talking a single function like a volume switch or camera button, but rather an entire product. If Apple used that lazy cop-out, the iPad would have been built like previous Windows tablet designs and failed miserably.

What Apple did was rethink what a tablet could be, and so could anyone else if they choose. It may then be a success or failure, but it wouldn’t be a copy. 

While the competition peaks at “about average”, Apple passes “better than most” to be “among the best”.

Not sure the word “among” is even necessary.

Here’s the text of the highlighted passage:

• Do not develop in the open. Instead, make source code available after innovation is complete

• Lead device concept: Give early access to the software to partners who build and distribute devices to our specification (ie, Motorola and Verizon). They get a non-contractual time to market advantage and in return they align to our standard.

Court papers confirm what most people already knew, but what some OEMs (HTC, LG, etc.) were hoping wasn’t true. Google intends to give lead time advantage to some hardware makers over others. Yes, the Motorola purchase wasn’t just about patents. 

An executive at Android tablet maker Lenovo claims that Samsung sold only 20,000 of the 1m tablets that it shipped last year

Well, there you go.

Next up, Chevy issues Ford vehicle recalls.

Samsung copies Apple’s iOS devices quite well, but their PC designers are not as deft.

The accompanying review says the Samsung Series 7′s will “rival the Apple Macbook Pros in terms of beauty”. Are they blind? This thing looks like the keyboard and palm rest were taken from two different prototypes and then forced to “fit” together.

By contrast, Samsung and Motorola try to shut Apple’s products down on the basis of allegedly standards-essential patents, seeking injunctions and (in MMI’s case) an ITC import ban regardless of whether Apple might be willing to pay FRAND royalties. Contrary to making a clear distinction as Nokia did, Samsung and Motorola simply lump standards-related and unencumbered patents together as if all patents were the same.

Interesting read about Apple’s claims that Samsung and Motorola are abusing their FRAND (fair, reasonable and non-discriminatory) patents.

Especially interesting when you consider that Nokia rightly drew a distinction between the two kinds of patents, and Apple settled with them.

The chart totals over 100% because respondents were allowed multiple choices. That’s too bad because it skews things a bit. Yes, the iPad is stomping everyone, but 94.5% has less meaning when the total comes to nearly 150%.

It’s better to look at this one column at a time, where we can determine a device’s absolute rejection (not acceptance). For example, we don’t know that 3.8% of respondents would buy a RIM PlayBook, because it may have been their second choice, but we do know 96.2% of respondents rejected it outright, since it’s not on their list at all.

I think of the beatdown like this: for each iPad competitor (column), 90% or more of respondents rejected it. In other words, nine out of 10 people wouldn’t even put it on their list as a second choice. Meanwhile, the iPad is rejected only 5.5% of the time. Put it all together and we know not only that the vast majority of respondents are interested in the iPad, but that for most of them there is no Plan B.

Samsung Galaxy Tab:

Sales not as fast as expected… a Samsung executive revealed those figures don’t represent actual sales to consumers. Instead, they are the number of Galaxy Tab devices that Samsung has shipped to wireless companies and retailers

HP Touchpad: 

According to one source who’s seen internal HP reports, Best Buy has taken delivery of 270,000 TouchPads and has so far managed to sell only 25,000, or less than 10 percent of the units in its inventory.

RIM PlayBook: 

RIM has quietly cut its sales expectations for the BlackBerry PlayBook after its disappointing sales from the spring

Motorola Xoom: 

New estimates for sales of Motorola’s Xoom tablet–available since late February–are in, but even the most optimistic predictions are scarily small and pale next to the iPad 2′s first-weekend sales numbers.

Surveys of consumers’ future buying habits mean very little. If consumers did what they said in surveys, products made via those surveys would be raging successes, but they’re not. Apple, perhaps famously, eschews such surveys, contending a customer doesn’t know what they want until they see it. So even though the future looks great for Apple in the article’s surveys, it means little to me.

There is, however, one type of survey that’s very important. Customer Satisfaction is not about the future, it’s about real people who own the device now, and how happy they are with it. I would argue it’s the only survey that really matters. Look at that chart. Apple crushes everyone by such a wide margin the other guys should be revamping their support policies, procedures and staff, not their product lines.

“…but there is an even broader market for consumers who want an iPad format but also want more functionality, more grunt, more IO… While the ARM-based processor in the iPad is a great chip it’s not designed for crunching spreadsheets and all those other things that the traditional notebook does.”

So says Emmanuele Silanesu, Samsung’s Australian IT marketing manager.

The ARM processor was designed to get maximum “grunt” with minimum power draw and heat dissipation. It was designed to do what Intel’s trying like crazy to do with the Atom processor now. With only partial success, if the performance of devices with Atom chips is any indication.

Apple has a great recent relationship with Intel, so why did they pass on the Atom for their mobile devices? You think Intel wasn’t ready to give Apple a killer price? Of course they were. Apple passed because the chip’s not there yet, and they knew it.

But you go right on “crunching spreadsheets” on your Q1, Mr. Silanesu. I just hope it’s not the same spreadsheet used to determine if that Q1 would be a success.