For those bargain hunters out there, iPhone in Canada just spotted a sale on iTunes gift cards. Starting tomorrow, Friday October 5, a $50 gift card will only cost $40 at The Future Shop. Once added to your iTunes account you can use it for Apps, Music, TV Shows and Movies.
Source: iPhone in Canada
Blackberry rolled out version 2.1 of its PlayBook OS today. Some of the new features available are:
The new version is only compatible with the original WiFi PlayBook, the 4G LTE version should get its update within a month.
Source: Engadget
It has been reported by several sources that Google’s Street View will be coming to the web app tomorrow. Now that your iOS 6 no longer uses the Google Map App, iPhone and iPad users have no longer had access to the popular feature. You can access the app through your mobile Safari browser at maps.google.com.
Sources: Mobile Syrup and All Things D
LTE service on Rogers seems to be back up again at least in some areas.
I just noticed that Rogers LTE service is down as my iPhone 5 is defaulting to 3G. A quick call to Rogers Technical Support confirmed there is a problem with LTE and Rogers One Number. I guess we will have to survive with good old 3G for a while. No word yet on whether this is related to the data overcharges that some Rogers customers have been reporting.
Even though Ice Cream Sandwich (Android 4.0.3-4.0.4) was released nearly a year ago and Jelly Bean (Android 4.1) about three months ago, Gingerbread (Android 2.3-2.3.7) is still the top OS among Android users. Version 2.3 of Gingerbread still accounts for almost 56% of users, while Ice Cream Sandwich is now up to 23.7%. The latest offering from Google, Jelly Bean, is only at 1.8%. The low rate for Jelly Bean is not surprising since there are only a handful of devices that have been released that are capable of being upgraded to it (e.g. Galaxy Nexus, Nexus S and Nexus 7). The adoption rate is expected to jump significantly once popular devices such as the Galaxy S III and the HTC One X get upgraded. It was recently reported that Samsung has started to roll out Jelly Bean to its devices in Europe while HTC smartphones will receive the update later this month.
In the Apple world updates to the OS are supported by most of its devices, only the older iPhones were not capable of upgrading to iOS 6. As a result, the adoption rate of the new mobile OS by iPhone users was already 17% after only 24 hours and now today that rate is at 60% in Canada and the US.
Source: Mobile Syrup
Mobile Syrup is reporting today that Bell will soon start selling the Red version of the Samsung Galaxy S III. An internal Bell document that they received indicates that the new flavour will be available on October 9 only in the 16 GB version.
Source: Mobile Syrup
If you are planning to sign up for a new voice and data plan with Rogers, you may want to do it before October 14 to take advantage of their “Additional GIG of data” promotion. According to Mobile Syrup, if you sign up for a $63 or $73/month voice and data plan between now and October 14 you will receive an additional 1 GB of data absolutely free. In addition to the 2 and 4 GB of LTE and sharable data included in the $63 and $73 plan, you will also get:
Source: Mobile Syrup
Customers who recently upgraded to the new iPhone 5 on an eligible 3 year voice and data plan qualify for a $50 mail in rebate. You can get the rebate form at the Rogers website or from the retailer where you purchased your new phone. Even though the form says that the iPhone is not eligible, it is. You can mail this form in with the original receipt but an easier option would be to get the rebate processed on-line. To complete the rebate process on-line, follow these steps:
1) Login to your MyRogers account
2) Click on “Account Info”
3) Click on the “Products and Services” tab, you should by default be in the “Wireless” section, if not choose “Wireless”
4) If you have multiple Rogers devices, select the phone number of the eligible device
5) Under the “My Phone” section, you should have a “Get Rebate” button, click on this
6) The next screen is the rebate form which should already be completed with your information
7) Verify that the information is correct and then click the submit button at the bottom of the screen and you’re done
You should get a email from “sales.receipt@shoprogers.com” confirming that your account will be credited for the $50.
Thanks Greg
The “Just for Kids” section which has been a popular section on the web version of Netflix, was just added to the iPad version of the app. This Kids friendly section provides movies and television shows that are appropriate for children aged 12 and under. At this point it is only available for the iPad 2 and the new iPad but it should be rolled out on the original iPad and Android tablets soon.
Source: The Verge
With the coming of October comes an announcement of expanded coverage of Rogers and Fido’s Long Term Evolution (LTE) network. New cities just added (according to the Rogers site) are:
British Columbia: Victoria, Abbotsford, Kelowna
Alberta: Edmonton
Saskatchewan: Saskatoon, Regina
Ontario: St. Catherines/Niagara, Oshawa/Pickering/Ajax, Windsor, Sudbury, Kingston, Oakville, Burlington, Hamilton, London, Kitchener, Waterloo, Cambridge, Barrie
Quebec: Quebec, Sherbrooke, Trois-Rivières
Customers with LTE enabled devices (e.g. Samsung Galaxy S III, iPhone 5) can expect to get speeds from 12 to 40 Mbps. Rogers’ goal is to reach 60% of Canadian by the end of this year. Depending on the coverage in your area and the number of LTE devices using it you can get pretty good speeds, I know that in my area the LTE speeds are faster than my WiFi network.
Source: iPhone in Canada and Mobile Syrup
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