Tech Roundup: Apr 28, 2012

[Being an avid technology tracker, I have decided to pen a weekly roundup on what's buzzing around in the world of technology, especially centred around smartphones. So, here's the definitive list on the happenings last week.]

Samsung usurps the 'World's Biggest Phone Maker' title from the Finnish giant Nokia, thus ending its 14-year long run, according to Strategy Analytics. Bolstered by the hugely successful Galaxy series smartphones, Samsung has shipped 93.5 million handsets this quarter while Nokia trails behind with 82.7 million phones.

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Cloud wars reach the next level with Google finally unveiling its much rumoured Google Drive cloud service to store documents, videos, photos and other files. Launching with 5 GB free space and integrated Google Docs support, users can opt for a paid upgrade - 25GB of space for $2.49 a month, 100GB for $4.99 a month, or 1TB for $49.99 a month. The happy news along with this announcement is that the Gmail free storage limit has been upped to 10 GB (from the previous 7.5 GB cap) completely free of cost.

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Not to be left behind, Microsoft has launched the SkyDrive app for Windows (8, 7 and Vista) and Apple OS X Lion. The apps will allow seamless syncing of data with the cloud service across various devices, including iPhone and Windows Phone 7.5 smartphones (via SkyDrive apps for the respective platforms).

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Facebook has revealed, in a quarterly filing ahead of its IPO, that its monthly users have touched a humongous 901 million, out of which 526 million users are active on a daily basis. Meanwhile its purchase of the photo-sharing service Instagram for a whopping 1 billion USD has had its share of brickbats, with some users even going to the extent of deleting their Instagram accounts citing privacy concerns, now that it's part of Facebook. This article from Forbes Tech definitely makes for an interesting read: 10 Reasons Why Facebook Bought Instagram.

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According to IT security company Sophos, India has emerged as the leading source of junk email (9.3 percent of the world's spam in the first 3 months of 2012, up from around 8 percent in 2011) and has overtaken the United States, which previously held the top spot.

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Much to the chagrin of Google, Amazon's Kindle Fire has emerged as the most successful Android tablet so far, accounting for 54.4 percent of all the Android tablets sold in February 2012 while Samsung emerged as a distant second with 15.4 percent.

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Fragmentation has always been a contentious issue with Android smartphones (having experienced personally) and now it seems to have struck Windows Phone as well. As per the latest news (courtesy The Verge), none of the current Windows phone 7.5 aka Mango devices will be upgradable to Apollo, the next major iteration of Windows Phone soon to be out later this fall. If this is true, the move would be disastrous for the fledgling ecosystem and especially for Nokia, which just launched its flagship Windows Phone device Lumia 900.

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Ever since the original Galaxy S (launched in 2010) from Samsung became a runaway hit with smartphone lovers, the Korean electronics giant has capitulated on its success rather smartly by incorporating significant hardware and software improvements. It released the Galaxy SII last year to critical acclaim and this year is no different. With the announcement imminent on May 3rd, rumours of the third generation Galaxy smartphone have been swirling thick and fast over the last couple of days. Samsung too has added fuel to the rumormongers by unveiling the teaser at the cryptically titled tgeltaayehxnx website. Now that the quad-core processor (1.4 GHz Exynos 4 Quad) - of course, it runs on Android Ice Cream Sandwich - is confirmed, there is little doubt that HTC's latest beast One X has a stiff competition ahead.