Apple officially confirms an iPad event for October 16

The Apple event on October 16 is now official after the company sent out invites to the press. The event going to be held in Apple's Town Hall auditorium on the Infinite Loop Campus in Cupertino, California at 10AM PT / 1PM ET.

The invite containing the words "It's been way too long" leads to the event that will see the debut of Apple's refreshed iPad Air and iPad mini. Thanks to the plethora of leaks surrounding the two we know they're both packing the Apple A8 chipset with an M8 co-processor, Touch ID, Apple Pay. Both slates will be thinner than their predecessors with the iPad Air 2 measuring just 7mm (and sacrificing the vibrate/mute button because of it).

Additionally, the company is preparing to announce a new iMac line-up. It's going to tout new, higher resolution screens - 6400 x 3600, 5760 x 3240, and 4096 x 2304 pixels. It's also possible that Apple is ready to also reveal a 12-inch MacBook with Retina display, but we haven't heard much about it.

Mac OS X Yosemite Beta 5 and Golden Master Candidate for developers have started seeding today and we suspect Apple is going to be ready for the OS final release to coincide with the October 16 event. Expect updated iWork and iLife apps as well as redesigned iTunes 12.

The event is a little more than a week away, so stay tuned as we'll cover every bit of it.

HTC Desire Eye has 13MP selfie camera, S801 chipset

There was a lot of speculation what the Eye will be, well it turns out it's the new Desire flagship. The HTC Desire Eye can be seen as an upgrade over the HTC One (E8) as it takes the 13MP camera with dual-LED flash from the back and brings it around the front too.

That give the Desire Eye a unique face – a much larger than usual front-facing camera is positioned above the screen and it gets a dedicated dual-LED flash and a microphone. It's getting the same treatment as the back camera, which has a dual-LED flash and a microphone too. There's another microphone on the bottom of the device for a total of three mics used for better audio through noise cancellation.

   

HTC Desire Eye in Blue

Both cameras can record 1080p@30fps video. The one on the back has an f/2.0 aperture and a 28mm lens, while the one on the front has a wider 20mm lens but a smaller f/2.2 aperture.

HTC's trademark BoomSound speakers are harder to see but still on board. They flank the larger 5.2" screen of the HTC Desire Eye, an LCD with 1080p resolution. Besides selfie camera and screen size, the Eye also trumps the One (E8) with an IPX7 rating – water resistance up to 1m of water for half an hour.

The Desire Eye carries much better specs than most of the Desire family. It's powered by a Snapdragon 801 chipset with 2GB RAM and runs Android 4.4 with the latest Sense software and two camera-centric apps – Eye Experience and the new Zoe.

   

HTC Desire Eye in Red

Anyway, the phone also boasts LTE connectivity, dual-band Wi-Fi a/b/g/n/ac, Bluetooth 4.0 with aptX, NFC and a microUSB port. The port is left uncovered while maintaining the IPX7 rating, just like the HTC Butterfly 2.

The Desire Eye has 16GB of built-in storage, expandable by microSD cards (up to 128GB) and a 2,400mAh Li-Po battery. With front-facing stereo speakers, a large front-facing camera and a larger screen, the Eye is not the most compact device around, measuring 151.7 x 73.8 x 8.5 mm.

The HTC Desire EYE will be offered by AT&T exclusively at launch. Further availability and pricing details will be available later on.

The HTC Eye Experience app will help you use the two 13MP cameras to the fullest. Split Capture divides the photo 50/50 between front and back cameras, while Crop-Me-In creates a single photo with you photoshopped into the back camera image.

The impressive front-facing camera on the Desire Eye also targets high-quality video calls. To make things easier it can track up to four faces and keep them in place so people can relax and not worry about positioning while they chat. This even works with third-party video call apps like Skype.

HTC EYE Experience will roll out to the following models (full feature list to be confirmed at roll-out): HTC One (M7), HTC One (M8), HTC One (E8), HTC One mini, HTC One mini 2, HTC One Remix, HTC One Max, HTC Desire 612, and HTC Desire 816 in the coming months.

Then there's the new Zoe. Recent HTC phones came with just a promise for a new app for months on end but the wait is over. The new version offers collaborative video editing and it integrates with RE – HTC's new action camera. Zoe is not completely done even after all this wait, the new content engine will launch later this year.

    

HTC Zoe app will be available for all Android devices

Zoe is not just for HTC phones – not even just for Android. HTC will release Zoe apps to the general Android population and even iOS later this year.

    

iOS too

Motorola DROID Turbo manual is out early, confirms specs

The Motorola DROID Turbo manual has hit the web before the official announcement of the monster handset. The manual details a 21MP camera with dual-LED flash and 2160p video capture.

The screen will be 5.2" big with QHD resolution (2,560 x 1,440 pixels) and will support Moto Display – notifications of messages, calls and more show up on a sleeping display without wasting much power. While Moto Display is on you can use Moto Actions to wave over the phone to check the new message. Moto Voice is also on board with for always-on voice commands.

The Motorola DROID Turbo passed through benchmarks where it left traces of a Snapdragon 805 chipset - 4x Krait 450 CPU @ 2.65GHz, Adreno 420 GPU and 3GB of RAM. The phone also had 32GB of built-in storage, but unfortunately the manual says nothing about a microSD card slot.

We've seen the back of the device, which had a new take on Motorola's carbon fiber backs.

Motorola Nexus 6 goes through CPU-Z, confirms chipset

More details regarding the Motorola-made Nexus 6 (codenamed Shamu) have appeared through the Geekbench benchmark database as well as thanks to a couple of CPU-Z screenshot posted on Twitter.

The 5.9" Nexus 6 managed a multi-core Geekbench score of 3199, which is more than the score of both the iPhone 6 and iPhone 6 Plus. The high result is thanks to the Qualcomm Snapdragon 805 chipset with a 2.65GHz quad-core Krait 450 CPU inside and 3GB of RAM.

Furthermore, the Nexus 6 comes with QHD resolution resulting in a pixel density of 496ppi. The high-end specs sheet also features a 13MP camera with OIS and a dual-flash ring configuration akin to theMotorola Moto X (2014). The battery is rumored to have a capacity of about 3,200mAh, but won't be removable.

This isn't the first time we see the Nexus 6 go through a benchmark. The phone also went through the GFXBench, which tested its Adreno 420 GPU. Needless to say, the phone did quite well. Android L is going to debut on the phone, as goes the tradition with new Android releases.

A couple of weeks ago, a photo of the Nexus 6 leaked. In the photo, the phone relaxes next to the LG G3, which gives us a good idea of how big it's going to be.

Samsung Galaxy Note 4 UK launch delayed to October 17

The Samsung Galaxy Note 4 was supposed to hit the shelves in the UK tomorrow but there is going to be a small delay. An eager Twitter users asked Samsung Mobile about the launch who confirmed that the flagship phablet will be available a week later than originally planned.

The timeline map released by Samsung a week ago put the UK among the countries where the Galaxy Note 4 will be available on October 10.

That was for Samsung's own stores though, pre-orders for on-contract devices listed October 17 as the shipping date. A good part of Europe will also get the phablet at that date and now it seems so will the UK. Samsung is citing "amazing interest and demand" as the reason for the delay.

The Samsung Galaxy Note 4 costs around £575 off contract but can be head for free with a contract worth at least £38 a month.

Samsung Galaxy Ace 4 LTE lands in the UK on October 17

Samsung has partially revealed its launch plans for the Galaxy Ace 4 LTE in the UK. The phone will be available both online and in Samsung Experience Stores stores starting October 17. Sadly, pricing information is yet to be revealed.

The company also said that O2 and EE are going to be one of the first carriers to offer it, but we presume Vodafone and T-Mobile UK are also going to join in.

The entry-level specs sheet of the Galaxy Ace 4 LTE includes a 1.2GHz quad-core CPU, 1GB of RAM and a 4.3" LCD display with 800 x 480 resolution. The phone runs Android 4.4 KitKat out of the box and features Samsung Knox 2.0. At the back of the Galaxy Ace 4 LTE resides a 5MP camera with LED flash. Under the back cover operates a 1,800 mAh Li-Ion battery and the weight of the phone is a hair above 130 grams.

The phone is not to be confused with the Samsung Galaxy Ace Style LTE, which packs an AMOLED display and has a different back cove featuring a cool stripe in the middle. That phone is alreadyavailable for purchase in Germany with a €199 price tag.

Samsung Galaxy Note Edge hits the FCC, bound for AT&T

Samsung has stated numerous times that the Galaxy Note Edge is going to have a limited release worldwide. Still, the phone is preparing to launch in the US as it has been spotted passing by the FCC with a model number SM-N915A.

The Galaxy Note Edge, which packs a 5.6" curved Super AMOLED display, is listed to have LTE support AT&T (bands 2 and 4) and US Cellular (bands 5 and 12). While a time frame for the phone's launch on these carriers isn't specified, we suspect it will be before the end of November.

Currently, the Samsung Galaxy Note Edge is available for pre-order in the UK, Germany and Japan, but also China.

AT&T and US Cellular are yet to reveal their pricing conditions for the Galaxy Note Edge. We do expect it to start at $399 on contract in the best case scenario.