Samsung's had another stab at owning the wrist – but what's the difference between the two?

We all expected Samsung to launch a new Galaxy Gear at MWC 2014, but to have two come along at the same time is a little odd.

If there was a vast difference between the spec sheets, we'd understand the logic, but there are many similarities between the two watches, which will make it hard for the prospective buyer.

There are key upgrades on offer though from the original, which will make it hugely more popular if the price is right.

So check out our gallery of the new watches, and let us run you through some of the key specs so you can tell which is right for you.

Design

This is the main area where the two differ, and we can see this will be partly where the two are sold against one another.

The Samsung Galaxy Gear 2 doesn't deviate a huge amount from the first iteration, coming in with 36.9 x 58.4x 10.0 mm, and weighting 68g. That's not a lot different from the Galaxy Gear 2 Neo, which clocks in at 37.9 x 58.8 x 10.0mm, but is 20% lighter at 55g, which will make a fairly big difference.

However, both are thinner than the original, which came in at 37.9 x 58.8 x 10.0mm and weighed a whopping 74g in comparison.

The main upgrade between the new two and the original is the band – Samsung is going to allow users to change the strap on their Gear 2.

This is partly allowed by the moving of all the new sensors into the head of the watch, which means you can customise it without having to be stuck with one colour, which users had to do with the original Gear to allow for the camera.

Sadly the charging block still exists for the Galaxy Gear 2 and Gear 2 Neo – any hopes of being able to connect the watch straight into a standard phone charger are scuppered here.

Camera and infra red

The camera has been kept for the Galaxy Gear 2, but it's another missing feature for the Galaxy Gear 2 Neo.

It's barely been changed from the whopping sensor on the original Gear (a 1.9MP offering), but has been moved into the main head of the watch to allow for the aforementioned straps.

The camera still isn't facing forward, so any hopes of a Dick Tracy-style video call have been scuppered.

A new addition for both the Gear 2 and Gear 2 Neo is the infra red blaster, which Samsung already has on its flagship phones and most tablets.

This is pretty cool, as it will allow you to control the TV or DVD player with a touch of your finger right from your wrist – although it's likely this will appear cool simply because most of us hankered for that digital watch that could act as a remote from childhood.

OS

Now this is a surprise: the new Galaxy Gear range will run on Tizen rather than Android. This is a bold move from Samsung, as while it has put a lot of effort into the new OS it's co-creating with others (with Intel a big partner) it's yet to make it to the big time.

Given that in the press release Samsung was crowing about the fact the Gear 2 will be able to connect with a range of devices, it looks likely we'll be seeing TVs and other gadgets running the OS too so Samsung can offer real interoperability.

Those worried about the apps already made for the original Gear shouldn't – and not just because there are far more pressing things to get upset about. The Tizen OS is set up to port over Android apps pretty easily, and given there weren't a huge amount made in the first place chances are the Gear 2 will offer a decent suite and backwards compatibility.

There are also quite a lot of launch partners as well, with the likes of Banjo, BMW, CNN , Conde Nast, Expedia, eBay, Evernote, Feedly, Garmin and Glympse all playing the game.

Source : techradar[dot]com

The likelihood that Samsung will launch Gear smartwatches in multiple varieties at MWC 2014, next week, has increased following a series of Twitter leaks on Saturday.

Prolific leakster @evleaks posted press renders of a pair of watches, initially dubbing them the Galaxy Gear 2 and the Galaxy Gear 2 Neo.

However he soon backtracked, claiming the devices would not be 'Galaxy branded.' That suggests, as speculated previously, at least part of Samsung's offering will not be arriving on Android.

Instead, it's likely that any non-Galaxy branded watches will be the first devices to run on Samsung's own Tizen operating system.

Confusing? Yep.

A few hours later @evleaks posted another image, claiming it to be the Samsung Galaxy Gear 2.

So, while Samsung appears to be testing the appetite for its own in-house operating system, there's still going to be an Android version for Google loyalists to get their teeth into.

If all this sounds confusing, don't worry, it is. We're sure all will become clear during Samsung's Unpacked event on February 24, which is now around 48 hours away.

• Review: Samsung Galaxy Gear... don't expect to be impressed

Source : techradar[dot]com

We've seen various rumours claiming the Samsung Galaxy Gear 2 smartwatch may launch at MWC 2014, but a new leak suggests it might come as part of a double act.

The information comes via @evleaks - a prominent Twitter leaker - who posted a blurry image of two watches along with the message "Samsung Galaxy Gear 2 and Galaxy Gear 2 Neo."

This was then followed by another, clearer image of the watches, which appear to sport a more slender design over the original Galaxy Gear - and no camera bulge, although it appears a lens is still present on top of both devices.

No specs were offered with the photos, but going by the icons on the screens the watches will sport notifications, cameras and possibly fitness features (if that is a running shoe we see).

No more Galaxy?

A later tweet from the same source then suggested that Samsung will actually drop the Galaxy brand for the devices, making them the Samsung Gear 2 and Samsung Gear 2 Neo.

Of course there's no way to verify the images, and they could well be renders chucked together in PhotoShop, but hopefully we'll find out what Samsung is hiding on February 24.

Source : techradar[dot]com

Apple has dropped iOS 7.0.6 to fix a previously unheard of security issue, which left iPhones and iPads vulnerable to hackers operating on the same unsecured wireless network.

The flaw in the way iOS devices handles secure sockets layer (SSL) and transport socket layer (TSL) authentication could allow for data to be intercepted by third parties the company said.

In its release notes, Apple claimed to have had restored "missing validation steps" in order to nix the bug, but said it did not divulge the full nature of security issues until an investigation had taken place.

It wrote: "Impact: An attacker with a privileged network position may capture or modify data in sessions protected by SSL/TLS

"Description: Secure Transport failed to validate the authenticity of the connection. This issue was addressed by restoring missing validation steps."

OS X affected too?

It is not known whether the flaw had been exploited, but one expert, Johns Hopkins University cryptography professor Matthew Green, called the oversight "as bad as you could imagine."

Security firm CrowdStrike took a look around the iOS 7.0.6 and concluded that Mac OS X devices are at risk from the flaw too, and said it expects Apple to launch an update for its desktop software too.

Explaining the nature of the flaw in layman's terms, Crowdstrike wrote: "To pull off the attack an adversary has to be able to Man-in-The-Middle (MitM) network connections, which can be done if they are present on the same wired or wireless network as the victim. Due to a flaw in authentication logic on iOS and OS X platforms, an attacker can bypass SSL/TLS verification routines upon the initial connection handshake.

"This enables an adversary to masquerade as coming from a trusted remote endpoint, such as your favourite webmail provider and perform full interception of encrypted traffic between you and the destination server, as well as give them a capability to modify the data in flight (such as deliver exploits to take control of your system)."

So there you have it. We have no idea how long these "missing steps" were missing, or whether they've always been absent. Needless to say, it's advisable to get on that iOS 7.0.6 update with a quickness.

Source : techradar[dot]com

If you thought the high-spec Google Nexus 5 was a decent deal at £300, then the deepest price cut yet will knock your socks off.

Independent retailer Carphone Warehouse is now selling the 16GB handset for just £240 in black, red and white.

Red and black are available now, but the white model is listed as pre-order and will be ready to ship on February 27.

The 4G LTE handset will arrive with a 5-inch full HD 1080p display, with 445ppi, as well as the very latest the Android 4.4 KitKat operating system.

Cutting edge specs

Meanwhile, the presence of a 2.3GHz quad-core Snapdragon 800 processor, with 2GB RAM in the engine room, makes it a match for most high-end handsets on the market.

The camera comes in at 8-megapixels, while the manufacturer LG also packed in a 2300mAh battery promising 17 hours of talk time.

Our review late last year commented: "There's a minimalist charm to the Nexus 5 that's hard to resist. It's comfortable to hold, the display looks great, it's extremely fast, and it never slips up or stutters. This is Google's invitingly priced vision of a premium Android smartphone."

For £240? That's smartphone finesse money (usually) can't buy.

Source : techradar[dot]com

A leaked memo suggests that Google may be about to make a very smart move that could bring some order to the chaos of the Android operating system.

The memo was reportedly sent out to several of the Android world's leading 'original equipment manufacturers' (OEMs) - in other words the people who actually make the smartphones and tablets that run versions of Google's mobile OS.

In it, according to Mobile Bloom, Google gently suggested that unless new Android devices were released with the most current version of the OS then it might withhold access to certain key Google services like Maps or the Play store, collectively known as Google Mobile Services or GMS.

Approval window

Under Google's new regime, each major Android OS release would have a GMS 'approval window' that closes roughly nine months after the next OS release. If a vendor tries to launch a new device with an older version of Android after its approval window has closed then Google will simply bar that device from using Play, Maps, Gmail and all the other GMS goodies.

The reason for this rule change is fragmentation.

Google's most recent figures show that around 60% of Android devices are running some flavour of Jelly Bean while the latest release, KitKat, is on under 2% of systems. Perhaps more worryingly, Honeycomb (Android 2.3.x) is still on 20% of devices and there are untold numbers running versions older than 2.2 as that's the point where Google's census cuts off.

By way of contrast, Apple recently crowed that in the magical land of iOS more than 80% of devices are now running the latest version of the OS, iOS 7.

One of Android's strengths is that it is easily modifiable to run on different hardware and that OEMs can build cheap, low-end phones and tablets as well as premium devices. The downside to this freedom is that there has been nothing to stop vendors cooking up their own custom builds of Android and then dragging their feet over updates. Until now.

Crackdowntime

There are arguments against this kind of crackdown, however. A deep re-skinning of the Android OS is one of the few tools at the OEM's disposal that can help carve out a real brand identity for a new device.

The basic template for the generic smartphone is well established and without the ability to 'add value' in software, the argument goes, then the new phone will be a generic slab with only the number and placement of hardware buttons and quality of its camera to tell it apart from all the other glass oblongs.

The reason that existing smartphones can take a long time to receive OS updates - often many months after the official release from Google hits the current flagship Nexus handset - is that OEMs feel the need to make their mark on the new code, adding interface tweaks and changes to core OS functions to make their devices more distinct and support their value-added services.

The counter-argument is that I can count on one hand the number of OEM 'enhancements' to the basic Android OS that have actually made it better for the people who use the phones day-in, day-out and still have enough fingers left to do a decent multi-touch gesture.

The recent Android releases have solved most of the interface niggles that resulted in heavy-handed skin jobs like HTC Sense and while a complete look 'n' feel change may help boost the brand it does little to make the phone or tablet any simpler or more pleasant to use.

The F word

OS fragmentation might seem like the kind of problem that is only obsessed over by phone nerds and people already in the industry - after all, many consumers don't see their phone as an 'Android' device at all but rather a Samsung or a Sony or whatever.

It does give the Android OS a disadvantage however and a good case could be made that it is the stability and uniformity of iOS that attracts developers. More developers means better apps, means happier users.

Android has done remarkably well considering it has to support a huge range of hardware and the wide spread of OS versions has still, somehow, given rise to a healthy app ecosystem that is finally starting to reach parity with iOS.

Imagine how much more could be done if OEMs could be persuaded to add their personal touch in other ways - through better hardware, bundled services, better launchers, bespoke apps - if all this exists outside the main OS it can be kept up to date and bug-free without having to match pace with the rest of the OS.

If Google can use its muscle to get all new Android devices on the same page it must be good for developers and, ultimately, better for you.

• More Fighting Talk: Let's get lairy about tech

Source : techradar[dot]com