6 things I want to do with NFC (Smartphones Unlocked)

S Beam on the Samsung Galaxy S3 makes terrific use of NFC.(Credit:Josh Miller/CNET)Tapping your phone on a console to pay for fries and a Coke is cool. Yet until the stars align, it's not how you'll be using NFC, the near field communications standard that gets devices talking to one another quickly and in a very short range.Instead of using NFC to replace your credit card, it will increasingly become...

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Crave giveaway: Two leather iPad cases from Kavaj

Congrats to Gene W. of Highlands, Texas, for winning a Kanex Sydnee four-port recharging station in last week's giveaway. Is your iPad in need of a new outfit? This week's prize is for you. We're giving away two sleek iPad cases from Kavaj, a purveyor of leather gadget jackets started by two former employees of Amazon in Germany. The winner gets one Berlin case in black that fits the iPad 2, iPad...

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Ubuntu Touch beats Firefox OS to win best of MWC from CNET

Ubuntu Touch has won the best of Mobile World Congress award from CNET(Credit:Sarah Tew/ CNET)We've seen lots of interesting hardware at Mobile World Congress, and yesterday when the team met to talk about what product should get our best of show award, there were plenty of gadgets in the mix. Asus' Padfone Infinity was in the running, along with its FonePad, the Nokia Lumia 720 and Sony's Xperia...

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Huawei Ascend p2 camera test

BARCELONA, Spain--Huawei took the wraps off its latest high-end, super-skinny Android phone, the Ascend P2 on Sunday. It has a 720p 4.7-inch display, a 1.7GHz quad core processor and a 13-megapixel camera, all stuffed into an 8.6mm body. I was given an early hands on with the P2's camera to see how it stacks up against the Nexus 4.Huawei Ascend P2 (Click image to enlarge)(Credit:Andrew Hoyle/ CNET)Nexus...

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Why you shouldn't expect an all-metal Nokia Lumia anytime soon

Nokia's Lumia 520 is the cheapest Lumia yet in videoBARCELONA, Spain--Part of what makes Nokia phones like the Lumia 920 and new Lumia 720, and Lumia 520 so distinctive are its bright color options, and part of what makes those shades pop is the use of polycarbonate, a type of plastic, as the body material.Although Nokia hasn't ruled out an all-metal body, speaking with Hans Henrik Lund, Nokia's vice...

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Wireless carriers seek cross-border spectrum cooperation

Telecom Italia Franco Bernabe called on governments to harmonize wireless spectrum availability to make it easier for carriers to operate globally.(Credit:Stephen Shankland/CNET)BARCELONA, Spain--Mobile network operators traditionally use Mobile World Congress to call for lower taxes and more wireless spectrum. This year, a new word has entered the wish list: harmonization.The mobile industry today...

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Samsung HomeSync is a Jelly Bean-powered Apple TV rival

Samsung's not content with just making smart TVs, taking another lunge into your living room with HomeSync, an Android-powered media hub.The glossy black box, announced today at Mobile World Congress in Barcelona, has an HDMI connection, but also hooks up to other gadgets over Wi-Fi or Bluetooth. The HomeSync streams Android movies, TV shows and games, but Samsung promises the system will also work...

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Nokia Lumia 720, 520 photos leak ahead of MWC

This could be the Nokia Lumia 720 you're gazing at.(Credit:EVLeaks)BARCELONA, Spain--Days before Nokia has a chance to unveil its Mobile World Congress lineup, apparent leaks of its two upcoming smartphones, the Lumia 720 and Lumia 520, have already surfaced to go along with some bubbled-up specs.If the images, provided by EvLeaks, prove accurate, the mid-tier Lumia 720 and more entry level 520 will...

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Crave giveaway: Kanex Sydnee four-port recharging station

Congrats to Johnal L. of Costa Mesa, Calif., for winning a pair of Aperio Audio Verus Forte speakers in last week's giveaway. This week's prize is sure to get the winner all charged up. We're giving away a Kanex Sydnee recharging station, which charges up to four iOS devices at once through its four 2.1-amp USB ports. It works with all iPhones and iPads, and would be quite happy in any iFriendly...

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Social pollution masks? Winning wearable tech ideas

The Tree Voice concept lets anyone walk up and interact with a tree and get updates on the local environment.(Credit:Frog Design)While anyone could dream up a spinning virtual GPS globe constantly updated with a slideshow of global Flickr photos emanating from a hat, competitors in Frog Design's contest for new wearable technology concepts had to keep their designs within the realm of feasibility....

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Google debuts event page for Academy Awards ceremony

Google's Academy Awards destination page.(Credit:Screenshot by Steven Musil/CNET)Google is rolling out the red carpet for the Academy Awards with a destination site that promises to help users "get more from the Oscars."In a partnership with Oscars organizers, the Web giant has created a resource page to keep movie fans engaged and informed in the days leading up to the awards ceremony on Sunday....

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Microsoft moves Outlook.com out of preview

Microsoft announced Tuesday that its Outlook.com browser-based e-mail service has moved out of its preview stage and is now available globally.First introduced last July, Outlook.com is Microsoft's boldest e-mail move since Google launched Gmail in 2004 and a clear answer to it. As I said in my First Take, the simple interface, Skydrive integration, and promise of mega storage will remind you of Google's...

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LG's 5.5-inch Optimus G Pro to reach U.S. in Q2

LG Optimus G Pro(Credit:LG Electronics)After some earlier teasing, LG Electronics fully detailed its Optimus G Pro Android phone today, a high-end model with 5.5-inch screen, LTE networking, and a quad-core 1.7GHz processor.LG often sells its phones first in its home market of South Korea, and it looks like that's the plan for the Optimus G Pro, too. But it'll arrive in other areas, too, including...

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Russian meteorite: The conspiracy theories

A strange time for a military attack?(Credit:CNN; screenshot by Chris Matyszczyk/CNET)A good hearty conspiracy theory can shine a sharp light on two of humanity's most enduring traits.One, of course, is humanity's boundless imagination. The other is humanity's essential suspicion of humanity.So while you might be deeply immersed in Bill Nye's explanation of the Russian meteorite, those with darker...

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Q&A: MacFixIt Answers

MacFixIt Answers is a feature in which I answer Mac-related questions e-mailed in by our readers.This week, readers wrote in with questions on how to read older AppleWorks documents in newer versions of OS X, how to get files to all open in a specific application, recovering a Mac Mini's files from a system that will not boot, and whether or not cleaning utilities are useful. I welcome views from...

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Crave giveaway: Aperion Audio Verus Forte speakers

Congrats to Michal H. of West Lafayette, Ind., for winning a copy of Nuance Dragon Dictate for Mac 3 in last week's giveaway. Now, get ready to pump up the volume. This week we're giving away a pair of satellite speakers from Aperion Audio. Aperion -- whose home theater speakers have been called "spectacular" by CNET contributor and Audiophiliac Steve Guttenberg -- went petite with its Verus Forte...

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Researchers develop a more accurate car navigation system

Researchers say new navigation system can be installed on any vehicle, including a Volkswagen Touareg.(Credit:Josh Miller/CNET)Driverless cars could get a big boost from a new system that researchers say will increase the accuracy of in-car satellite navigation systems by 90 percent.Researchers say the system combines conventional GPS signals with data from sensors such as accelerometers and gyroscopes...

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Opera embraces WebKit in browser brain transplant

Opera CTO Håkon Wium Lie(Credit:Stephen Shankland/CNET)Opera Software, an independent voice in the browser market since the 1990s, will dramatically change its strategy by instead adopting the WebKit browser engine used by Safari and Chrome.The Norwegian company announced the move today and said it will show off the first fruits of the work with a WebKit-based version of its Android browser at the...

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Most-viewed tech on CNET right now

Click through to find out where the Asus Transformer Pad Infinity TF700 falls on the list. We spend a lot of time evaluating tech around here, looking at both the hardware and the software sides, and telling you which products we think are worth your hard-earned dough and which are best avoided. Behind the scenes, we're always keeping an eye on what you're looking at as well. Some gadgets are...

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LA Microsoft Store not mobbed, but Surface has a following

The Surface Pro(Credit:Brooke Crothers)LOS ANGELES -- The launch of the Surface Pro at the Microsoft Store in LA's Century City was a relatively low-key affair compared with the debut of the Surface RT. When I arrived just after 10 a.m. there was a small line (see photo). That said, both versions -- 64GB and 128GB -- of the Surface Pro had sold out immediately. Of course, no one would say how many...

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