Cherry Mobile just unveiled a new Intel-based Android tablet under its MAIA line. The MAIA Pad Plus is priced at P2,999 and is now available in stores.
Cherry Mobile unveils new MAIA series with Intel chips in tow
Confirming earlier reports, Cherry Mobile today took the wraps off its MAIA line of devices (two tablets and one handset). MAIA, which is short for Making Amazing Innovation Accessible, is Cherry Mobile’s new branding for Intel-based gadgets, the company revealed. These devices are affordable, as expected, and they run Android KitKat on Intel’s latest 64-bit chipsets. The hero product of the MAIA family is called the MAIA Smart Tab, an 8-inch tablet that can boot into Android or Windows 8.1 in seconds. It also comes with 2GB of RAM and 32GB of expandable storage (16GB is allocated to Android; another …
ASUS PH unveils iPad mini rival with 4GB of RAM
Earlier today, ASUS Philippines showed off two new tablets under the ZenPad line, with the company continuing its push into the crowded budget segment. New entrants to the market, the ASUS ZenPad C 7.0 and ZenPad 7.0, which I discussed briefly several days ago, carry the promise of an upscale design with interchangeable backs and category-leading performance in a surprisingly compact, 7-inch form factor for under P8,000. Of the two, the ZenPad 7.0 is especially interesting because it’s essentially a mid-range tablet, except it’s not priced like one. I have a unit that I’ll be testing over the next few days …
ASUS ZenPad 7.0 tablet to launch on July 30
After garnering a lot of attention in the smartphone space, courtesy of the high-specced but reasonably priced Zenfone 2, ASUS Philippines will be looking to impress would-be tablet owners next week with the launch of two new additions to its tablet line. I’ve just received word that both the ASUS ZenPad C 7.0 and ZenPad 7.0 are going to be unveiled on July 30. Naturally, pricing remains a mystery at this point, though a 3G version of the ZenPad C 7.0 has been spotted on Villman going for P5,995, which makes it all the more likely that a local release …
10 things you should know about DOST’s free WiFi project
There’s hope for a connected Philippines yet. The Department of Science and Technology (DOST) held a press conference today to discuss the upcoming rollout of its P1.4-billion public WiFi project and to clarify certain aspects of the landmark service that will connect millions of Filipinos to the Internet at no cost. The internet is now a vital component of every day, be it in public or at home. This has spawned a competitive industry of internet companies trying to provide the best deals for customers. Although there are those who prefer using an office cell signal booster to get the …
What does DOST’s 50MB of free Internet get you?
Image via The Verge Earlier this week, reports surfaced that the Department of Science and Technology (DOST) has already begun installing Internet access points in the Quezon City Circle. This is in anticipation of a P1.4-billion project that plans to deploy 7,000 public WiFi hotspots across the Philippines before the end of 2015. Its initial rollout is slated on July 24, and according to DOST, it will offer free Internet access to anyone with a WiFi-capable device, albeit with certain restrictions — chief of which is a 50MB daily data cap. You can’t use it to download stuff from torrent sites, …
Mid-range Samsung Galaxy Tab A comes w/LTE, S Pen
Samsung’s been in the tablet business for quite some time, and over the years, it has played around with different designs to keep things interesting. Right now, it seems the Korean giant has taken a different approach to making mid-range slates, as evidenced by the outward appearance and 4:3 screen ratio of its new Galaxy Tab A tablet. It is, in many ways, the unofficial successor to the Galaxy Note 8.0. The 4:3 ratio, as Samsung puts it, “is ideal for reading books, magazines and newspapers, as well as surfing the net,” though I’d argue that packing more pixels into the 8-inch …
Lenovo unveils 4 new laptops, price starts at P14,495
Hoping to maintain its competitive advantage in the PC and tablet industries, Lenovo today unveiled 4 new consumer laptops for the local market. The company’s latest offering includes the Lenovo Yoga 300 and 500, Ideapad 100, and Z51 laptop, which is by design a multimedia workstation aimed at music and movie lovers. The Lenovo Z51 is a 15-inch laptop equipped with a full-HD display and AMD Radeon graphics. Other internals include up to an Intel Core i7 processor and up to 1TB of built-in storage. Its base price starts at P42,995. The entry-level Ideapad 100, on the other hand, is powered …
CloudFone unveils dual-OS, Android Lollipop tablets
Are two operating systems better than one? Local tech company CloudFone seems to think so, as it has just unveiled a pair of dual-OS tablets, alongside two other slates leveraging the Intel platform. The CloudPad Epic 7.1 and 8.9 can switch between Android KitKat 4.4 or Windows 8.1 pending a hardware reboot, while the CloudPad Epic 8.0 is a pure Windows tablet that comes with a Bluetooth keyboard. The CloudPad One 7.0, on the other hand, gets Android Lollipop 5.1 out of the box and timely over-the-air updates for the next two years, similar to devices under Google’s Android One initiative. …
16,000mAh Xiaomi Power Bank goes on sale April 24
Via AskMeBazaar Xiaomi has been busy lately. Fresh off announcing two new devices for the Philippine market, the Chinese manufacturer is bringing its 16,000mAh Mi Power Bank to Lazada Philippines to be sold on the online retailer’s website at noon on April 24. And the price? Just P1,299, which is double the cost of the 10,400mAh Mi Power Bank, though it makes sense, as the convenience of carrying one battery pack instead of two is obviously going to come at a price. It will be available in one color only: silver with a brushed look. Neither Xiaomi nor Lazada Philippines …
Xiaomi’s iPad mini challenger priced in PH
Via MyDrivers (UPDATE, April 28: Mi fans, mark your calendars. Xiaomi Philippines just confirmed the first sale date of the Mi Pad on the company’s Facebook page. The tablet will be available starting May 4, 2015.) It turns out the Redmi 2 isn’t the only Android KitKat device Xiaomi is planning to release in the Philippines soon. Last year’s Mi Pad, the company’s iPad mini challenger — which, coincidentally, also looks like a candy-coated Apple tablet — is on the cards for the local market, as hinted at by its official Philippine website. The Mi Pad features a slab of Corning …
We’re breaking the rules of online publishing…
Who are crazy enough to soft-launch a site that’s so bare? My writing partner since my Mega Publishing days, Ramon Lopez, and I are. We have disregarded the first, second, and third rules of online publishing: You do not launch a website unless it’s packed with articles, or as my former boss, Summit Media president Lisa Gokongwei-Cheng, would call it, puno. Surprisingly, we’re okay with breaking “those rules.” First, we already bought two phones so we could write about and take videos of them. Second, we couldn’t bear to watch our clips just sitting on our computer for weeks. Sayang. Third, it’s …