When DStv launched their DStv Mobile service in November 2010 it was only compatible with your PC and iOS devices. A few months after the announcement however DStv promised to have Android and Blackberry apps that will be compatible with the service.

April came and gone without any apps released for the Android and Blackberry platforms as promised and now a few months later DStv has finally launched their much anticipated Android app for viewing DStv Mobile content through the Drifta decoder.

But don’t get too happy yet, there are some fallbacks to the new DStv Mobile Android app, like it is only compatible with certain device, yep not a certain version of Android but more specific only certain devices. The DStv Mobile Android app will only run on the Samsung Galaxy S (GT-I9000), Samsung Galaxy Tab (GT-P1000) and Samsung Galaxy S II (GT-I9100), and don’t even think that you’ll be able to run this on a rooted phone.

DStv is preventing people with rooted phones to make use of the app due to content right restrictions, which in my opinion is a bit of a fail specially since major Android handset manufacturers are now adopting a open bootloader policy which enables you to run just about any version of Android on your phone.

Personally for me the launch of the DStv Mobile Android app is a bit of a fail seeing as it has so much restrictions, and why it is only compatible with a hand full of Samsung device is beyond me. What do you think, should DStv rather have waited a little bit longer before releasing to offer more device compatibility? It’s clear that DStv pushed this app for the Rugby World Cup.

Samsung today launched their very first Windows Phone 7 device in South Africa called the Samsung Omnia 7.

“The Samsung Omnia 7 is our first Windows Phone 7 device and we anticipate that consumers will be drawn to its fantastic entertainment experience. Most importantly however, the device demonstrates our commitment to offering consumers a choice of platforms that fit their lifestyles,” says Paulo Ferreira, Head of Mobile Product and Business Solutions at Samsung.

The Samsung Omnia 7 features a 4″ Super AMOLED touch screen, a 1GHz processor and 5-megapixels camera capable of taking HD video.

Samsung Omnia 7 Phone Specs:

The Samsung Omnia 7 Windows Phone is exclusively available from today 6 June 2011 from Vodacom and has a recommended retail price of R5 299.00.

Samsung has spotted a gap in the market most other manufactures have missed and it is one the iPod Touch has been dominating, but for how long the question remains.

Most smartphone manufacturers have been rushing to bring out their own tablets, but one manufacturer has gone the extra mile and added a smaller touch screen device to their line up of products for this year.

In addition to the new Samsung GALAXY Tab 10.1, successor to the popular Samsung GALAXY Tab, Samsung has also announced the Samsung GALAXY S WiFi 4.0, a iPod Touch like device running Android.

“The Samsung GALAXY S WiFi 4.0 is the perfect product for multimedia enthusiasts who pursue the new trend of smart experience.” said JK Shin, President and Head of Samsung’s Mobile Communications Business. “There is a huge demand for access to applications and rich multimedia on the go. With the Samsung GALAXY S WiFi 4.0 we have created a device that delivers a Samsung GALAXY S Smartphone-like app experience and stunning entertainment features at a reasonable price.”

The Samsung GALAXY S WiFi 4.0 is essentially a GALAXY S smartphone with the telephony guts ripped out, delivering users with a full multimedia experience and access to Android Apps without the need of being tied into a cellphone contract.

The GALAXY S WiFi 4.0 comes with Android 2.2 Froyo, a large 4″ touch WVGA Super Clear LCD, a 3.2 Mega Pixel rear-facing, a front facing VGA camera, 802.11 b/g/n WiFi, and a GPS receiver, all powered by a 1GHz processor.

Users of the GALAXY S WiFi 4.0 will have access to more than 230 000 applications through the Android Market, and have full turn-by-turn navigation through Google’s Navigation App and the onboard GPS receiver.

This has to be the first true iPod Touch competitor that I know of that runs Android, and must say I can’t understand why we have never seen Android devices like these before. I for one would sure not mind owing a Samsung GALAXY S WiFi 4.0.

The Samsung GALAXY S WiFi 4.0 is expected to be available in South Africa from April this year.

Barcelona, Spain is currently hosting the Mobile World Congress, a huge conference dedicated to mobile devices where large electronic companies showcase their latest and greatest mobile device, one such company is Samsung.

For a while now rumors has been flying around about the release of the Samsung Galaxy Tab II and the Samsung Galaxy S II, but up until now these was just rumors, Samsung has now officially announced the release of both the Samsung Galaxy Tab II (10.1) and the Samsung Galaxy S II.

Samsung Galaxy S II

The Galaxy S II is an Android 2.3 Gingerbread phone with a 4.3″, 800 x 480 Super AMOLED Plus display, a 1GHz dual-core Orion / Exynos processor, NFC, Bluetooth 3.0, and 24Mbps HSPA+ connectivity. The Galaxy S II is very thin at 8.49mm, which makes it the worlds thinnest smartphone on the market, but for how long I don’t know. The Galaxy S II also features a 8 Mega Pixel Camera AF with LED Flash and 2 Mega Pixel Front-facing Camera.

Samsung Galaxy Tab II (10.1)

The Galaxy Tab II (10.1) is a 10.1″ Android 3.0 Honeycomb Tablet, and has a 1280 x 800 resolution. It features an NVIDIA Tegra 2 dual-core processor clocked at 1GHz, and storage of either 16GB, 32GB or 64GB. It looks allot similar to the Motorola XOOM tablet. The Galaxy Tab II (10.1) also features a 8 Mega Pixel Camera capable of 1080p video recording at 24fps and a 2 Mega Pixel Front-facing Camera.

Both devices are set to launch in Europe in early March, and with Samsung’s strong presence in South Africa we are likely to see them here not too long after that.

In December 2010, Google announced their latest Smartphone to the market called the Nexus S, since then the Nexus S has only been available in a few select stores in Europe and South America, but that is set to change.

Vodafone has announced yesterday that the Nexus S will be available in all Vodafone store around the world soon and that includes South Africa.

Vodacom has confirmed that they will offer the Google Nexus S with its 4″ curved super AMOLED screen, 1GHz Hummingbird processor, and 16GB storage in South Africa but can not yet comment on the exact date the device will be available.

Why would you want the Google Nexus S as appose to other already locally available Android handsets? To put it simple, the answer is updates. The Nexus S is a Google phone meaning it runs no custom software, just plain Android. Because it runs vanilla Android, users of the Nexus S will get updates as soon as they are available ensuring that they always run the latest Android operating system where as if you have an HTC phone you would probably only get updates a year later because the manufacturer runs custom written software on top of Android.

Would you consider getting yourself the Google Nexus S?

Samsung South Africa has announced that their popular Android tablet, the Samsung Galaxy Tab, will soon see a price cut. This news comes only days after Core Croup, official Apple distributor in South Africa, launched the Apple iPad in South Africa at ridiculously low prices.

Samsung jumped Apple one when they launched the Galaxy Tab in South Africa in late 2010, making it the first officially available tablet in South Africa, but it came at a hefty price of R 7,999.00 just a bit cheaper than what it would cost to import an Apple iPad at the time.

The tables have however now turned with the iPad officially available in South Africa starting at R 4,399.00 for the 16GB WiFi version, almost halve the price of the Samsung Galaxy Tab.

When Samsung was asked by MyBroadband whether they will be responding to the launch of the iPad, Samsung responded that they have lowered the pricing and will review other channels and price drops as required.

Samsung was however unwilling to reveal with how much they have lowered the price of the Galaxy Tab and also stated that the Galaxy Tab is also a video and voice device that have other competitive differentiators.

Should the Galaxy Tab’s pricing come in line with that of the Apple iPad what tablet would be your first choice?

Yesterday was not only a big day for Google when they announced their latest version of Android, Android 2.3 Gingerbread, but the company also unveiled their latest smartphone to the market.

Google announced the successor to their Nexus One phone yesterday called the Nexus S. This time around Google is taking no chances with the not so great success of their Nexus One, by teaming up with Samsung to bring us the Nexus S.

The Nexus S is manufactured by Samsung and is build based on the very popular Samsung Galaxy S. The Nexus S will be the first phone to run Android 2.3 Gingerbread right from the start and as with the previous Nexus this one will also get updates to the Android platform as they are released.

Now for some specs. The Nexus S features a 4” super AMOLED curved display to easily fit the palm of your hand, front and rear facing cameras, a 1Ghz Hummingbird processor, 16GB of internal memory, and NFC (near field communication) hardware that lets you read information from NFC tags.

Visit the Google Nexus S site for more information.

The Nexus S be available in the US on the 16th of December, and the UK on the 20th but there are still no word whether we will see it in South Africa, but with Samsung having a strong presence in South Africa who know maybe we will see the Nexus S here sooner than we think.

The battle of the tablets are heavily underway with the Apple iPad leading the race being first to the market selling more than 3 million units in the first 80 days of being available, however Samsung and RIM are not just going to let Apple rule the tablet market, both these manufacturer introduced tablets of their own, the Samsung Galaxy Tab and the BlackBerry Playbook.

Here are some comparisons between the BlackBerry Playbook, Apple iPad and Samsung Galaxy Tab:

The tablet market suddenly just got a whole lot interesting with the introduction of the BlackBerry Playbook. Although there are still some features that RIM failed to announce, it is pretty clear that with all that power under the hood the Playbook may just be as good as the Apple iPad and Samsung Galaxy Tab, if not better.

Which one of the above tablets would you prefer?

Up until now the only real tablet set to take on the Apple iPad was the Samsung Galaxy Tab, but now RIM is set to change that with the introduction of their very own tablet called the BlackBerry Playbook.

The BlackBerry Playbook is an ultra portable tablet with a 7″ LCD display capable of 1024 x 600 screen resolution. The Playbook offers games, media, apps and everything the real Internet offers including support for Flash 10.1 and HTML 5.

The Playbook runs the new BlackBerry Tablet OS with on-screen keyboard and true multitasking capabillities powered by a dual-core processor. Apart from all the power under the hood the BlackBerry Playbook also has 2 HD cameras, a 5MP back-facing and 3MP front-facing camera, enabling you to make video conference calls with rich stereo sound.

The BlackBerry Playbook looks as if it is more aimed at the business market than the comercial market which its integration with other BlackBerry devices. All in all the BlackBerry Playbook does look like a good contender for the Apple iPhone and Samsung Galaxy Tab.

What do you think about the BlackBerry Playbook?

Soon after Samsung broke news that they will be introducing a tablet to the market called the Samsung Galaxy Tab, they aired their first commercial showing off what the Galaxy Tab is capable of doing.

Watch out Apple, Samsung means business with the Galaxy Tab. I wouldn’t mind owning one of these.