Within the past week, select Virgin Mobile smartphones have been receiving updates to Android Jelly Bean, with the LG Venice, Samsung Galaxy Reverb and Rush all being updated to the 4.1.2 version of the still-current platform. The LG Venice update is being pushed over-the-air and the Reverb and Rush updates are also being pushed in the same manner, marking an exception from Samsung’s typical update program, which is usually handled over the wire via Kies or other similar desktop programs.

Boost Mobile customer care also indirectly confirmed the above updates when answering a query sent by a customer inquiring about future updates:

On May 16th – May 23rd there are planned over-the-air Android Jelly Bean software release for Samsung Galaxy Rush and other phones. Customers using these phones will be receiving Software Update.

Android 4.1.2 features the following features:

Smoother user interface:

• Vsync timing across all drawing and animation done by the Android framework, including application rendering, touch events, screen composition and display refresh
  Triple buffering in the graphics pipeline
• Enhanced accessibility
  Bi-directional text and other language support
  User-installable keyboard maps

• Expandable notifications
  Ability to turn off notifications on an app specific basis

• Shortcuts and widgets can automatically be re-arranged or re-sized to allow new items to fit on home screens

• Bluetooth data transfer for Android Beam

• Offline voice dictation

• Tablets with smaller screens now use an expanded version of the interface layout and home screen used by phones.

• Improved voice search

• Improved camera app

• High-resolution Google+ contact photos

• Google Now search application

• Multichannel audio

• USB audio (for external sound DACs)

• Audio chaining (also known as gapless playback)

• Ability for other launchers to add widgets from the app drawer without requiring root access

• One-finger gestures to expand/collapse notifications

• New “Select All” button glyph on Swype keyboard

• Bug fixes and performance enhancements

Archos has announced a new low-cost Android Jelly Bean tablet in the 80 Xenon. The tablet features the following specifications:

The tablet will cost $199 when it is released within the next two months and follows other recent tablet releases from the company in recent months.

Verizon has announced that it has increased the data limits for its prepaid plan customers and will increase them for new customers starting on June 6th.

The move to increase limits is obviously inspired by the increased competition in the virtual operator space within the past 12 months and the data increase will be welcome news to current customers while making the relative expense of the plans easier to swallow compared to cheaper competitors with equivalent prepaid coverage.

Current prepaid customers will now receive unlimited talk, unlimited text and 2 GB of data for $60 a month, or for $70 a month, prepaid customers will receive 4 GB of data in addition to unlimited talk and text.

The increase in data rates will make smartphones an easier sell on the service plans, especially increasing the sales of the $60 plan and making alternatives such as Page Plus less appealing in the process as the $5 difference isn’t enough for most to forsake customer service and support, which will force Page Plus to respond to the competition in some way, whether by increasing data rates on its own plans or by emphasizing its own advantages over Verizon’s prepaid service.

HP has announced further additions to its tablet line, with the latest Android-powered tablet taking shape in the SlateBook 10 x². The SlateBook 10 x2 is equal parts Android tablet and convertible laptop by virtue of its detachable keyboard dock which also powers the tablet and features the Nvidia Tegra 4 SoC, the first commercially available implementation of the chipset when the hybrid launches later this year.

The rest of the featureset consists of a a 1,920 x 1,200, 400-nit IPS display and the latest version of Jelly Bean (4.2.2). Its keyboard has a battery built in. The keyboard also includes shortcuts for Google voice search and a laptop-style trackpad supporting multi-touch gestures. The hardware itself weighs about 2.8 pounds in total, with two USB ports, stereo speakers and SD / microSD readers. The SlateBook 10 x2will be available in August for $480.

Following the announcement of the Q5, BlackBerry CEO Thorsten Heins announced a surprise for the attendees at today’s BlackBerry Live presentation, confirming that the company’s BlackBerry Messenger messaging platform would be ported to Android and iOS after years of speculation and rumors. The availability of BlackBerry Messenger outside of the BlackBerry platform on iOS and Android reflects  the market dominance of iOS and Android, but it may also signal BlackBerry’s desire to push key platform functionality as a defacto standard.

While the availability of BBM shouldn’t be a complete surprise, the fact that it comes just as the company is mounting its comeback does come off as strange timing, as there are many group messaging alternatives available for iOS and Android that emulate and even exceed certain facets of BBM, even after factoring out the screen sharing, voice calling and new Channels functionality.

However, the expansion does mean that Android and iOS users will be able to take advantage of the aforementioned functionality in future updates, and unlike the current slate of group messaging alternatives, BBM will be free when it’s released later this year and will be compatible with iOS 6 and Android ICS at minimum. Below, more information on the new related Channels functionality also announced today:

Top BBM Channels Features:

• Create a channel – Create, edit and publish in an instant, and there are no limits to the number of followers you can have in your channel. Securely manage your channel from either a BlackBerry smartphone or the web.
• Discover channels – BBM Channels includes a carousel that lets you discover new channels. You can share channel invites within a BBM chat, and people can be added or invited using the channel’s PIN or QR code.
• View – View profiles for each BBM Channel you choose to follow.
• Subscribe – Subscribing to a channel allows the channel owner to send you timely and relevant updates, giving the subscriber instant access to your news, deals, events or whatever you want to communicate. Subscribers can choose to receive notifications when new posts are available.
• Participate – Participate and engage in conversations with your favorite people or communities by “Commenting” and “Liking” posts from channels you subscribe to. Channel owners have the option to directly chat one-on-one with a subscriber.
• Monitor engagement – Easily use built-in measuring tools to assess and monitor follower engagement and interaction

This morning, BlackBerry announced a new variant of its Q line of QWERTY-keyboard equipped smartphones in the Q5, a mid-range version of the current Q10 meant for select worldwide markets in Europe, Latin America, the Middle East, Africa and Asia, with significant cost reductions in materials and hardware from the Q10 in order to drive down handset costs further from current Q10 pricing.

The Q5 features a revised QWERTY keyboard that moves away from its recognizable design and layout and favors a more conventional design with individual keys being given more space and prominence with increased height as well as being aligned island-style. The display has been downgraded from the OLED display on the Q10, but is otherwise similar in terms of key specifications as listed below:

• Create the perfect shot with BlackBerry Time Shift mode and Story Maker
  Create the picture perfect shot with BlackBerry Time Shift mode, then create and share your story, weaving together your photos, videos and music into a movie with BlackBerry Story Maker.
• Share and be seen with BBM Video with Screen Share
  Instantly switch your BBM (BlackBerry Messenger) chat to a BBM Video conversation and catch up face-to-face. You can even share your screen, whether it’s a photo, a page in the browser, an idea, or a view from your camera.

• Stay close to what’s important to you with BlackBerry Hub
  With BlackBerry Hub, all of your messages and social conversations are only one swipe away. There’s no need to stop what you’re doing. Simply peek into the BlackBerry Hub from anywhere with a swipe to effortlessly flow in and out of your messages and conversations.
• BlackBerry World delivers a rich, thriving app and content ecosystem
  Discovering and sharing great apps and content is easier than ever with recommendations based on similar purchases, and access to more than 100,000 apps on the BlackBerry World storefront.

The phone will be available starting in July in the aforementioned markets with no word on a release for the US and Canada. In related news, Verizon, T-Mobile and Sprint have confirmed that they will release the Q10 in June with pricing and release dates to be confirmed.

Earlier this morning in a presentation held in London, Nokia took the wraps off of the latest international Lumia flagship device in the Lumia 925. The Lumia 925 marks a slight departure for Nokia in that it uses an aluminum bodyshell instead of its common polycarbonate-based body designs and will also usher in a further progression of its lower-grade PureView OIS camera technology, mostly centering on improved software and slight hardware changes.

The result of the bodyshell redesign is a phone 8.5mm thick with a weight of 4.9 ounces (the Lumia 920 is 10.7mm thick and weighs 6.53 ounces by comparison.) Nokia stated that by adding metal to the external frame, it was able to make improvements to the antenna technology inside the phone, improving the effective reception and signal stability for the device compared to previous models.

Nokia also took care to add and emphasize some of its most advanced imaging features to the 925, which features an 8.7-megapixel PureView camera with optical image stabilization, dual LED flash, and a wide-angle 1.2-megapixel user-facing camera. The camera includes improved optics for sharper pictures (such as a lens with a f/2.0 aperture) and new software that allows people to take 10 quick shots and then use Nokia’s onboard software to edit them, which Nokia calls Smart Camera and has also confirmed that the software will be included in a general firmware update for the entire Windows Phone 8 powered Lumia line as the Amber Update later this Summer.

In terms of hardware, the 925 has a 4.5-inch AMOLED display at 1280 x 768 pixels with Nokia’s ClearBlack display technology, Bluetooth 3.0, NFC, 1.5 Ghz dual-core Snapdragon processor, GPS/GLONASS, and a 2,000mAh battery. The Nokia Lumia 925 reaches European markets in June, and will follow in the U.S. later this summer. It will be sold by T-Mobile USA and feature LTE support, though pricing and availability have yet to be confirmed.

A new virtual operator powered by Sprint promises to offer fine control over the amount of voice and data service used in a given month – right down to the cent. Zact promises people total control over voice and data access costs per month and it does this through a dedicated app that requires Android devices. The provider has also released a promo video detailing the service.

Unlike other services, the crux of Zact is the capability to control service costs for mobile service in real-time, either through an online portal or through an Android app and compatible phone, both of which are surplus Sprint models from LG in the Viper 4G LTE and Optimus Elite. Due to the way the Zact real-time usage and management application is integrated into the devices, it will take longer than normal to add more devices to the sparse lineup and will mean that the iPhone will not be offered.

Two key advantages of this model that Zact is pioneering is the capability to do away with general data access and only purchase access for specific applications and services, such as purchasing data access solely for checking email, browsing Twitter, or even GPS for network-based services and only those services, potentially making data access costs much cheaper than the current average, as monthly per-application data access is a relatively new idea, at least in the US.

The other key advantage is that you can sign up for a large bucket of voice, messaging and data access at the beginning of service in order to gauge usage patterns, and you will only be charged for what has been actually been used for the month regardless of the packages that were initially purchased, making monthly costs much less expensive than expected.

In the off-chance that you do go over your preset budget for the month due to heavier than expected activity, topping up voice, data and messaging is also trivial and is broken down to the cent, making overages much cheaper than current standards. Finally, the operator will credit customers back for the unused portion of their monthly access, adding to the savings promised.

Overall, Zact sounds like the culmination of the Pay As You Go model, with the addition of real-time cost control for each service to fit nearly every kind of usage model instead of relying on either the monthly flat-rate of unlimited service, which many people don’t use to the fullest extent, or relying on the availability of increasingly more expensive Pay As You Go Options without the level of control found on Zact.

Whether it will be taken seriously remains to be seen, as the current trends point to increasing growth for flat-rate unlimited prepaid service, though this service definitely serves a niche for families and users with specific needs outside of just needing flat-rate access, such as sharing voice, messaging and data access. However, owing to the fact that the CEO insists that this is not yet another MVNO and is touting the advantages of the cloud platform that powers Zact, it may take even longer for the public to catch on.

Google has completely shut down its  SMS-powered Search functionality as of May 9th without any previous warning. Multiple attempts to access the SMS shortcode 466453 are met with the following automated message:

“SMS search has been shutdown.  You can continue to search the web at google.com on any device“.

Previous to the shutdown, Google had provided SMS-powered services such as general and business search, measurement conversion, and basic address lookup for the past 6 years and the previously dedicated page for SMS search and related services has been completely scrubbed, now returning a rare 404 error without explanation.

Google has provided the following statement on the shutdown following a constant stream of complaints being posted to its product forums:

“Closing products always involves tough choices, but we do think very hard about each decision and its implications for our users. Streamlining our services enables us to focus on creating beautiful technology that will improve people’s lives.”

Google has yet to officially release an announcement on the shutdown outside of its product forums. With the elimination of SMS search and functionality, this forces people without smartphones to rely on data access, despite the biggest users of the service being those that did not have constant or cheap data access to begin with and the service was extremely popular in South Asia, Canada Africa and in the US. With this latest move, Google is essentially forcing these customers to upgrade to a data-dependent platform such as Android, for better or worse.

Following up on a previous report earlier this week, the first Samsung Galaxy S III retail units have made their way to select Walmart locations, with the first image of the retail package surfacing  and confirming answers to two key questions in which network would be powering the year-old smartphone and whether the device would allow LTE access.

Image via HowardForums

The above image confirms that the Galaxy S III on ST will support LTE access on Sprint’s network, and subsequently will live up to the spirit and the letter of unlimited access, at the expense of coverage. The phone is expected to be launched next week across Walmart locations and online for $439,99. Like the reference models of the S III, the phone features the following key specifications:

A 4.8-inch Super AMOLED HD display at 1280×720, 8.0 megapixel camera with Zero Shutter Lag, Burst Shot and Best Photo, 2.0 megapixel front camera, and built-in NFC support. This version has been updated to run Android 4.1 Jelly Bean with the latest version of Samsung TouchWiz that reduces the customization level found in previous versions, as well as retaining the rest of the feature set from last year’s flagship. The phone is otherwise identical to all other Galaxy S III models, save for only featuring 16GB internal memory.

With StraightTalk launching the Galaxy S III, albeit powered by Sprint, it does open up possibilities for them to refresh its current Sprint powered lineup with LTE-powered devices that are more up-to-date and more attractive compared to other devices in the lineup. As the agreement with Sprint also specifies unlimited data access, those lucky enough to live in areas with LTE coverage would also be able to take advantage of such coverage for half off of Sprint’s current postpaid rates, even after taking into account Sprint’s own prepaid initiative in Sprint As You Go, which features unlimited data for $70 a month, without the opportunity to purchase a Galaxy S III.