Android at CES 2015: the five major announcements – Android Planet

Today is the last day of CES 2015, the first electronic stock market this year, and also one of the largest. We look back at the major announcements made on Android-area.

Image: Phandroid.com

The Consumer Electronics Show – abbreviated CES – yearly State guarantees the necessary announcements in the field of mobile and technology. That was no different at CES 2015, was already on Android-field focus primarily on smart home and televisions. Interesting to see that the number of devices in your household that you can control with Android, is increasing. Of your curtains, thermostat and lighting up your kettle, fridge and washing machine. The so-called internet of things , where everyday objects (think of security cameras and locks in your home) can communicate smart with people and other objects, this year ensures that the physical and virtual world even more together . Ultimately, that make your life more enjoyable and safer.

During CES are smart plugs announced that you can use to control each regular “dumb” device with your Android or iOS device. In addition, the renewed hype surrounding virtual reality not over, witness the many VR glasses that we see are reviewed. Here we have the key announcements made during the show put on a list. What new gadget let your heart beat faster? Let us know in the comments!

1. The first TVs with Android TV

Google TV is dead, long live Android TV! In recent days we saw past the necessary TVs with Google’s optimized platform for TVs. Include Sharp, Sony and TP Vision, the company that develops, Philips TVs, this year started with Android TV. Manufacturers will almost all their new full-HD and 4K TVs equipped with the new operating system, which builds on the capabilities of Android and the excellent range of content from Google Play.

In the case of Philips, Android TV combined with the existing Smart TV platform. You’ll not only Android apps, games and functions can be used, but the apps and (on-demand) platforms that Philips offers itself. The first devices with Android TV are expected in the course of this year.

Another interesting announcement was that of the Razer Forge TV, a 100-dollar game console with the ability to stream Android games and PC games to the large screen of your television. You can operate the console with the corresponding app or a bluetooth controller is sold separately. The controller can also be used in the future for the Steam Box and your smartphone. In the US, the device appears this quarter; a European release date is unknown.

2. Google Cast for audio

New from Google’s stable at CES 2015, Google was cast for audio. The technique works in combination with different speakers, sound bars and receivers, the first models in the spring in North America come true.

You use Google Cast for audio in the same way as the Chromecast. You tap on the ‘cast’ icon within your favorite music app, select an appropriate speaker and the music starts playing. Google Cast Ready speakers where your Android device communicates with, get the music directly from the cloud. The speakers work with a number of famous music streaming services such as Deezer, Google Play Music, iHeartRadio, Pandora, Rdio and TuneIn. In the future, more audio sources are supported by the boxes.

Why Spotify missing is unfortunately unclear and is not known whether the streaming service later makes an appearance. Furthermore, it is not yet published if and when Google Cast for audio coming to the Netherlands and Belgium.

3. New curved LG smartphone

The LG G Flex 2 is LG’s first smartphone bent, but one that has the potential to do better than its predecessor. The device is namely a stroke smaller than its six-inch predecessor and has a rubber casing, which is more flexible and is provided with an improved self-healing coating. The additional flexibility would improve the durability and comfort of the unit and it seems that LG has addressed all the negatives of the first G Flex.

In terms of specs, the smartphone is equipped properly. He has a 5.5-inch poled (plastic OLED) screen with a full HD resolution, a Snapdragon 810 chip with a octacore 2,0GHz processor, 2GB DDR4 RAM and 16 or 32GB of expandable storage. Thanks to the 3000 mAh battery is the G Flex 2 probably a pretty good battery life, partly because LG for a full-HD resolution selected. Finally, there are two cameras with 13 megapixels and 2.1 on board and runs the G Flex 2 standard on Android 5.0 Lollipop. The exact price and release date are still unknown.

4. Android Car

Android Car last year already announced, but at CES we saw the first systems with the platform in the wild. Both Volkswagen and Pioneer announced infotainment systems with support for Android Car, and the systems of the latter were actually see on the show floor. They offer all the advantages of Android Car, including voice control and the ability to monitor text messages, instant messages and phone calls. In addition, Android Car standard built the Google Maps navigation and support for apps like TuneIn, Pocket Casts and Spotify.

Good to see that choose many (car) manufacturers to provide both support for Android Auto as similar CarPlay Apple to install. This ensures that the system compatibility is fine and you will soon not have to be afraid to switch from OS (or car).

5. Nvidia takes mobile chips to higher plan

Earlier this week announced chipmaker Nvidia Tegra X1, a mobile chip which will appear this year and 1 teraflop computing power of high-end PCs and approaches consoles. The X1 has a octacore Tegra processor with four Cortex A57 and Cortex A53 four chips (64-bit). Four cores of the processor clocked are lower so they are ready to perform less intensive tasks.

The GPU of the X1 is based on the Maxwell-architecture, and more than twice as potent as those of the Tegra K1, which was announced exactly one year ago. He’s good for a computing power of one teraflop, where for example the Xbox One and PlayStation 4 do respectively 1.3 and 1.84 teraflops. The clock speed of the GPU is not known, but it is clear that the X1 mobile chips to a higher plan. This will be smartphones and tablets as gaming platform more attractive.

→ read more? Check out our 5 expectations for 2015 in the field of mobile.