The latest app to announce support for Android Wear, Google’s smartwatch platform, is none other than BBM. BlackBerry’s messaging service will soon be available for Android Wear devices (in “early 2015″), though an exact release time frame hasn’t been given.

BBM for Android Wear will let you access your messages straight on your watch, without the need to reach for your smartphone all the time. Read more »

While LG was busy announcing the curved LG G Flex2 at CES 2015, subsidiary LG Display held a more obscure event for select few in what they called a “private showroom”. What came out of that showroom was a photo of a 6-inch phablet with “Dual Edge” display, an even curvier version of the one we’ve seen on the Samsung Galaxy Note Edge.

It is a competitive world out there, and with a version of Galaxy S6 with dual edge display pretty much confirmed, it was only natural for LG to cave in and offer a device with a display on each side. Read more »

Kingston introduced today microSD and SD cards under the UHS-I Speed Class 3 boasting some 90MB/s read and 80MB/s write speeds. This is great news for those who want to play and record 4K video without stuttering.

In fact, as per the SD Association’s latest specifications, the UHS-I U3 standard guarantees performance of at least 30MB/s read and write, and Kingston’s latest offering exceeds the standard Class 10 SD cards 9 and 8 times for read and write speeds, respectively. Read more »

Intel is staying close to emerging new technologies – the Internet of Things, smartwatches and now HDMI sticks. With the rising popularity of Google’s Chromecast and Amazon’s Fire TV Stick, Intel’s Compute Stick stands out with a complete Windows 8.1 with Bing copy for just $150.

The stick is powered by a quad-core Atom processor, not unlike the ones found in phones and tablets. Read more »

Microsoft is listening to suggestions over at the User Voice forums on how to improve its products and one commenter mentioned how offline access to files in OneDrive will be great to have. In comes Casey Penk (a program manager at Microsoft) who reveals that the team is already on it.

Keeping offline copies from OneDrive is possible on a desktop Windows 8.1, but not on the phone. Competing services like Dropbox and Google Drive have file pinning as well (on Android and iOS at least). Read more »

Back in September last year, when Panasonic announced its smartphone/high-end camera hybrid Lumix CM1, the company said that the device would launch only in select European markets. But that’s all changing as it has now been announced that the smartphone is headed to the US, where it will go on sale later this year. The announcement was made during a press event at the ongoing Consumer Electronics Show (CES) in Las Vegas.

The smartphone will be available as an unlocked GSM version for $1000, which means that it will be compatible with either AT&T or T-Mobile’s network, although Panasonic is in talks with other carriers for future versions of the device. Read more »

To celebrate the 2015 Consumer Electronics Show (CES) happening this week in Las Vegas, Qualcomm has started a sweepstakes that allows US residents (age 18 older) a chance to win some really cool prizes. Dubbed Qualcomm #InventForBetter, the sweepstakes runs through Friday (4:00:00 pm PT) this week.

To enter, all you have to do is to sign into your Twitter account, follow Qualcomm, and then send a tweet expressing what you would do with a mobile device powered by Qualcomm’s Snapdragon processor, using the hashtag #InventForBetter. Read more »

Sennheiser has updated its premium Momentum series of headphones. The current Momentum and Momentum On-Ear now feature improved design for better comfort as well as the ability to fold them for easier transportation.

Along with that, the company also announced two new wireless versions of the Momentum headphones. They feature the design improvements of the second generation models, but cut the cord and go for Bluetooth (aptX) to transfer the data. The headphones feature built-in controls to control your audio playback and calls, as well as NFC for pairing easily with your smartphone or tablet. On top of that, they also feature active noise-cancelation, which is not present in the wired models. Read more »

Mobile messaging service WhatsApp now has over 700 million monthly active users, up from the 600 million the company reported around four months ago. The announcement was made by co-founder and CEO Jan Koum in a Facebook post, where he also revealed that WhatsApp users are now sending more than 30 billion messages per day.

“Most of all, we’re grateful that so many of you are using WhatsApp to stay in touch with your friends and family, business colleagues and classmates,” Koum said. Read more »

Last November, Microsoft launched a preview of Office for Android tablets. However, this was only available to you after you completed a survey, and if you then got invited. Starting today, though, the preview has thankfully arrived on the Google Play Store, which is where you can go to download the Word, Excel, and PowerPoint apps for Android tablets.

What’s more, there’s now support for Android 5.0 Lollipop, so those of you who have Android’s latest on your tablet can finally try out the Office apps too. Read more »

The most popular custom ROM for Android has entered the age of Lollipop, with the release of the first nightly builds based on the latest OS version from Google. CyanogenMod 12 builds come with Android 5.0.1 Lollipop, and they’re already available for 31 devices.

Obviously, more handsets and tablets should get CM12 support in the future. And like with all CM nightlies, keep in mind that these too can have (many) bugs. If you aren’t comfortable with that, you should wait for an “M” release based on Lollipop. Read more »

At the end of last year, we heard an intriguing report which said that Microsoft would ship Windows 10 with two Web browsers on board – IE11 for backwards compatibility, and a new one codenamed Spartan, which was allegedly being built from scratch. Today the existence of project Spartan has pretty much been confirmed by the leaked screenshot you can see below.

This apparently shows us the second version of Spartan, dating back to November. It’s an older iteration than the one currently in the works, but it does help us get a general idea about it. And immediately that codename starts making sense, for this is shaping up to be a very bare bones experience, with a very minimalistic design. Read more »

Mophie’s line of Juice Pack-branded battery cases are quite popular, and today the company has unveiled a trio of new such offerings, tailor made for the iPhone 6 and iPhone 6 Plus. What’s more, all three are already up for pre-order at the Mophie website (although when they’ll start shipping is still a mystery).

The iPhone 6 gets two options, the Mophie Juice Pack Air and the Juice Pack Plus, while there’s only one Juice Pack available for the iPhone 6 Plus. Read more »

Razer is getting out of its comfort zone for CES 2015. The gaming peripheral company announced an Android-based gaming console dubbed Forge TV. For good measure, Razer also revealed the Nabu X, a simple and affordable smartband with just three LED lights.

The Razer Forge TV is quite compact at just 4 x 4 inches and houses a Snapdragon 805 chipset with a quad-core 2.5GHz Krait 450 CPU, 2GB of RAM and an Adreno 420 GPU. Read more »

Last year Toshiba released a pair of tablets under the Encore 2 name. Both devices featured a slick body with rounded edges for better handling and a nice Satin Gold finish. Both tablets feature 1280 x 800 pixel screens in 10 and 8-inch form factors, respectively. They are powered by quad-core Atom processors and come with an array of connectivity options: 802.11n Wi-Fi, Micro HDMI and wireless display support.

In a recent announcement Toshiba revealed that it will now offer an improved version of the devices that include support for Pen input and are bundled with one, produced by Wacom. The extra input method is said to be very precise, with 2048 levels of pressure intensity and should offer an array of new possible features and uses for the next generation Encore 2 tablets, dubbed Encore 2 Write. Read more »