New products are traditionally developed in darkness – but rarely launched in darkness too. Samsung yesterday turned the auditorium lights way down before "revealing" its first Foldable Thing. This Foldable Thing was brandished in a Samsung executive's hand – some distance from spectators. And you couldn't get any nearer. That …

The handful of fans anticipating a Microsoft "Surface Phone" should brace themselves for disappointment. Just-published patents filed by Microsoft look back rather than forward: back to Courier, the code name for a booklet-style, hinged dual-display tablet product that Microsoft canned in 2010. The "new" claims, filed in …

I have a confession: I've fallen out of love with Bring Your Own Device. Over the years, I've worked with, and administered, a number of BYOD schemes. I've even written positive things about BYOD. After all, what was not to love? Users providing the mobile equipment and the company not needing to worry about maintaining the …

Microsoft has revamped its Surface tablet, which at last includes a SIM card slot. The 2017 iteration of the boutique but highly profitable fondleslab loses the numbering – it's now just a "Surface Pro". Cosmetically there's little difference: the tablet retains the 2736 x 1824 (267 PPI) display and 786g weight (for the i5 and …

Tablet sales have once again fallen, as the market logged its tenth consecutive quarter of decline. Research firm IDC said on Thursday that the 8.5 per cent drop in shipments year-over-year means that it has now been two and a half years since the tablet market saw any sort of positive growth. In the past three months, all but …

Comment"The iPad is done," writes Europe's shrewdest hardware scribe Volker Weber in the aftermath of Apple's annual revamp of its tablet line. The revamped iPads contain no new features, just price cuts, making it a "clearance sale". "Apple is just refining the components, but there isn't much they can do these days to make yet …

The tablet computer market has slumped into “spiraling decline”, according to box-counter IDC. The firm defines tablets as either a “slate”, like the iPad, or a “detachable” that offers a first-party keyboard like a Microsoft Surface device. The firm's totted up all the sums from a year's worth of its Worldwide Quarterly …

Frustrated Surface Pro 3 customers unable to properly charge their batteries have been offered a fix by Microsoft. Last month Microsoft 'fessed up to its battery woes, saying they were down to software problems rather than a hardware fault. Some Surface Pro 3 devices have been working as long as the power is plugged in, but …

After 12 months of “free” upgrades, it's now business for usual for Microsoft and the hard work begins on trying to shift paid-for Window 10. Microsoft closed the door on free upgrades from Windows 7 and Windows 8.1 to Windows 10 on July 29. The Anniversary Update of Windows 10 arrived on August 2. From now on, if you want to …

Brit-tech success poster child ARM holdings is to be acquired by Japanese telecom multinational Softbank. ARM, whose chip designs drive the majority of the world’s smartphones, is under offer for a remarkable £24.3bn - a premium of 43 per cent over current stock price. Softbank, whose last yearly revenue totalled 19.5 …

Canonical is hoping to put Ubuntu into the hands of slab-fondlers who want something that can double as a near-desktop. It's doing so via a partnership with Spanish smartphone-maker BQ, whose 10.1-inch Aquaris M10 will run the Linux distro. While the M10 is already available with a more conventional Android config at €229.90 …

We are all perfectly happy with our existing high-end technologies and aren't planning to upgrade any time soon. That's according to Accenture, which carried out a survey of 28,000 people across 28 countries, and found "sluggish demand" for the most popular consumer electronics. Not that we've stopped buying them: "just" 48 …

Toymaker VTech – already under heavy fire for a massive security breach and insecure apps – faces fresh security criticism: researchers have discovered it was possible to easily lift data from its Innotab tablet. Tests by UK security consultancy Pen Test Partners revealed that it was easy to harvest data left on any lost, …

Enterprise adoption of Windows-powered computing slabs will make Microsoft the fastest growing tablet computer maker by 2019. That’s according to Strategy Analytics, which reckons Microsoft will hold 18 per cent of the global tablet operating system market in four years – up from 10 per cent now. Android will remain top dog, …

Hewlett Packard Inc is turning to partners to help drive business among the enterprise and small and mid-markets in the UK and Ireland. HP Inc Wednesday announced it would convert 300 of the region's largest, direct business accounts into indirect relationships to woo partners. The newly independent computer and printer-maker …

Microsoft will stop all sales of Windows 7 Pro to PC makers on Halloween 2016. Satya Nadella’s firm has quietly let slip that October 31, 2016, will be the final day for PC makers to buy copies of the operating system for pre-install. Microsoft updated its product support lifecycle page, here, in October with the change …

Global shipments of tablets have fallen for the fourth successive quarter, according to data from analyst house IDC. In the third quarter of 2015, manufacturers shipped 48.7 million fondleslabs worldwide, down 12.6 per cent year on year. IDC estimates that there are 581.9 million tablets in the world, but that sales growth is …

As expected, Microsoft has updated its Surface Pro fondleslab with a new model powered by Intel's latest silicon. But unexpectedly, it has also produced a laptop version of the platform that is going to make Apple sick. The Surface family had a rocky start, some might even say unsuccessful, with small marketshare gains – but …