Sony MT27i Pepper shows up in a press shot

We’ve seen this one in blurry shots back in January, sporting a Sony Ericsson logo. Today, the Sony MT27i Pepper emerged in a press shot, proudly wearing a Sony logo, with Xperia Smart Tags by its side

As you have probably guessed already, the Smart Tags clearly suggest that the device will sport NFC connectivity when launched. The rest of the rumored specs include a 1GHz dual-core CPU and NovaThor U8500 chipset, 3.7″ screen with resolution of 480×854 pixels, and 5MP snapper.

Given the nature of the leaked image, we can reasonably expect that the Sony MT27i Pepper will get officially unveiled sooner, rather than later. Naturally, we will keep you posted on any new findings, related to the device.

Thanks to everyone who sent this in!

Source (in Japanese)

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Intel Atom-packing Orange Santa Clara benchmarked

Intel are serious about getting into the mobile phone business with phones like the Orange Santa Clara. The Intel Atom Z2460 chipset however drew some ridicule for its single CPU core.

Early benchmarks show, however, that the single (but HyperThreading-capable) core packs a lot of punch. A lucky CeBIT visitor had a chance to run a couple of browser-based benchmarks, which are easier to access than dedicated apps.

The Santa Clara scored nearly 90K on BrowserMark, beating an iPhone 4S by a slight margin. The Samsung Galaxy Nexus, which uses the highly-optimized Android 4.0 ICS browser, scores over 100K on this benchmark, but the Santa Clara is still on Gingerbread and should see its scores jump after the planned ICS update.

Orange Santa Clara vs. iPhone 4S in BrowserMark

The Intel-based droid also posted some impressive scores on Vellamo. It managed to outpace the Galaxy Nexus and placed behind the quad-core Asus Transformer Prime and the dual-core Xiaomi Mi-One Plus.

Santa Clara’s Vellamo benchmark

The Orange Santa Clara used for these tests ran Android 2.3.7 Gingerbread and its Atom CPU was reportedly clocked at 1.4GHz. Browser-based benchmarks are not the best at pushing several CPUs to their limit (and much less when it comes to the GPU), but these are pretty encouraging results, especially with a dual-core Atom chipset on the way.

Source (in German)

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Tegra 3-powered LG X3 impressive benchmark scores leak

After the Optimus 3D 2 the other day we now got some extra info on the other hot droid, which LG will unveil at the MWC. We stumbled upon the benchmark results of the LG X3 – the quad-core beast with an impressive 4.7″ HD screen we first saw in January.

According to the author of the leak, the specs we heard last time around were spot on. This means the LG X3 will be built around the Tegra 3 chipset, featuring four Cortex-A9 CPU cores, running at 1.4GHz. A 2000 mAh battery will make sure that there’s always enough power to keep the X3 going, while the impressive AH-IPS screen will fill in at the front.

The LG X3 is said to have 16GB of expandable thought the microSD card slot internal memory, an 8 MP main camera and a 1.3 MP front-facing snapper. As it to be expected, the LG X3 will run the latest version of Android, 4.0.3 Ice Cream Sandwich, out of the box.

With specs like that it’s no wonder the LG X3 puts the Samsung Galaxy Nexus to shame in the performance department. The quad-core LG monster achieves more than twice the score of the Android ICS flagship at Quadrant with the results distribution staying consistent over the different categories.

The LG X3 will certainly be a handset worth keeping an eye on and it might be a huge step towards improving the LG position in the smartphone game.

Source

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Gigabyte GSmart G1355 is a dual-SIM droid with a 4.3 screen

Gigabyte has a new affordable droid on the way – the Gigabyte GSmart G1355 – and it has two tricks up its sleeve. The G1355 is a dual-SIM droid with a 4.3″ WVGA screen making it a rare beast – most dual-SIM droids have small screens.

Now, the GSmart G1355 isn’t a high-end device by any means, despite what the large screen might lead you to believe. It runs Android 2.3 Gingerbread on an outdated Qualcomm MSM7227T chipset (800MHz CPU, 512MB RAM, Adreno 200 GPU).

The rest of the specs include a 5MP auto-focus camera with LED flash, microSD card slot and Wi-Fi b/g/n. The Gigabyte GSmart G1355 measures 11.5mm thick, which is quite decent, but it weighs nearly 170g, which is chunky even for a phone with a 4.3″ screen.

Specs are pretty close to the ZTE Skate (also known as Orange Monte Carlo) with the advantage of the second SIM card slot, of course.

Anyway, the GSmart G1355 will launch at the end of this month, which means it will most likely be present at the MWC. There’s no pricing info yet.

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