Category: phonebloks

Toshiba will manufacture Project Ara’s processors

Kevin Bruce Francisco Leave a comment

On an unexpected note, it looks like we’ll be seeing Toshiba-made CPUs once Google’s Project Ara becomes available on January. There are also three types of processors that the Japanese company will supply Google.

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You’d think the upcoming Project Ara will be backed up by a Qualcomm CPU since they’re the front-runner and leading provider of wireless technology today, but Toshiba closed the deal and made it official last October. According to the report, Toshiba is the only Japanese company that is a “preferred supplier” of Google to handle this new technology of handsets with removable and replaceable modules.

The three types of processors to be supplied by Toshiba most likely will be for the three different sizes of Project Ara – small, medium, and phablet. The report also points out that Toshiba will be the sole supplier of processors until about a year after the release.

We’ve seen the working prototype of Project Ara and that owning a working device would cost about Php4,400. So far, do you like how this device is shaping up?

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Motorola announces Project Ara modular smartphone

Louie Diangson Leave a comment

Motorola has just announced Project Ara, a free, open hardware platform for creating highly modular smartphones.

Project Ara aims to do for hardware what the Android platform has done for software which is to “create a vibrant third-party developer ecosystem, lower the barriers to entry, increase the pace of innovation, and substantially compress development timelines.”

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In essence, Project Ara wants to give users the power to decide what your phone does, how it looks, where and what it’s made of, how much it costs, and how long you’ll keep it by allowing you to replace or customize almost every hardware aspect of your phone.

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Ara consists of an endoskeleton and modules, with the endoskeleton being the structural frame that holds all the modules in place. These modules can be the CPU, the RAM, keyboard, battery, internal storage, etc. And all of them can be replaced or upgraded.

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In case you’re wondering why the concept is very similar to Phonebloks which we wrote about last month, that is because Motorola’s Advanced Technology and Projects group is closely working with Phonebloks creator, Dave Hakkens, on the said project.

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As of the moment, Project Ara is in its early stages of development and is gathering feedback from the Phonebloks community and Ara Scouts. In the coming months, Motorola will start sending invitations to developers to start creating modules.

As for the launch, Project Ara is expected to arrive sometime next year.

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Phonebloks, a Lego-esque modular smartphone

Louie Diangson Leave a comment

A Dutch designer has come up with an interesting concept for a smartphone called Phonebloks that lets users replace and upgrade parts similar to what you do with a Lego block.

phonebloks

Dave Hakken, the person behind this concept builds on the idea of a phone “worth keeping.” Instead of disposing the whole phone when it gets broken or gets old, you can just easily swap the broken or outdated “block” with a new one. Preserving the parts that are still usable.

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Phoneblok also allows users to customize their smartphone according to their needs. You can remove blocks that are not essential and allocate that space for more important features like battery, for example. Watch the video below for a better understanding.

However, as mentioned earlier, Phonebloks is currently a concept and needs the attention of big brands and investors to make Phonebloks a reality. For that, the Phonebloks team has turned to Thunderclap to gain as much social reach as possible to create demand.

If you want to support their campaign you can head out to the source link below.

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