A German court has issued a ruling in a patent case between Motorola and Apple which could lead to a temporary ban on sales of iPhones and iPads in Germany. Motorola is charging the Apple’s mobile devices are infringing on a patent it holds related to GPRS wireless devices. But while the court ruling could lead to a preliminary injunction…

Read more »

Apple appears to be having much more success with its lawsuits outside of the US these days. This weekend we found out that the Amazon Appstore had stopped accepting software from German developers due to a trademark suit over the term “App Store.” Now Bloomberg is reporting that Apple has managed to put a temporary stop to sales of Samsung…

Read more »

The Apple iPad has a single USB connector on the bottom of the tablet which you can use to connect the device to a computer, dock, or other accessory. But the iPad is meant to be used in portrait or landscape mode and that USB port is kind of awkwardly positioned if you’re holding the iPad in landscape orientation. It…

Read more »

A few leaks and rumors about Nokia’s future plans are making the rounds this morning. First up is a Nokia Communicator device that looks a bit like a Nintendo 3DS thanks to its two screens and 3D display technology. This device looks like something Nokia is actually considering, having shown up in a patent application from the company. That doesn’t…

Read more »

Microsoft is continuing its fight against Android… not just by focusing on Windows tablets and Windows Phone 7 smartphones, but also by taking legal action against companies producing Android devices that Microsoft says are in violation of the company’s patents. Last year Microsoft sued Motorola over patent infringement in some Motorola smartphones. Now Microsoft has announced that it’s filed legal…

Read more »

Nokia may be best known for making smartphones, but according to two patent applications, it looks like the company may be getting ready to enter the tablet space. It’s not clear what operating system these devices would run, but MeeGo Linux seems like a possibility. While Nokia is shifting its smartphone focus to Windows Phone 7, the company is continuing…

Read more »

Microsoft has applied for a patent on a new type of physical keyboard that could actually display different key icons depending on how you’re using it. For instance, if you’re playing a game, the center row of buttons could show buttons for firing, moving, jumping, and so on instead of letters. When you’re composing an email, the letters would re-appear….

Read more »

HP may have purchased Palm to get its hands on the WebOS operating system rather than the company’s hardware technology. But that doesn’t mean the Palm Pre and Pixi are the only things Palm has been working on. Unwired View dug up a patent application from April which shows an intriguing device which could function as a palmtop computer with…

Read more »

The Apple iPad has already shown that people are perfectly happy to read eBooks and play video games on the same device that they use to surf the web. But that doesn’t necessarily have to be a tablet. At least that’s what Sony appears to be hoping. The Wall Street Journal reports that “people familiar with the matter” say that…

Read more »

After playing around with a dual-screen concept device from MSI earlier this year, I wasn’t 100% sold on the idea of a tablet that serves double duty as a laptop by letting you turn one display into a keyboard. On-screen keyboards just aren’t as easy to use as physical keyboards, I figured. But it turns out that the Apple iPad…

Read more »

Part of the reason smartphone have largely replaced PDAs over the last few years is that there are a growing number of activities that require an always-on internet connection. But another reason is that people don’t like carrying around two or three devices when they can stuff just one item in their pocket. Who needs a phone, PDA, and digital…

Read more »

While LG is reportedly looking to scale back its netbook ambitions, Electronic Pulp  dug up a patent filing from November that seems to indicate that just a few months ago the company was thinking big. According to the patent documents, LG was working on a “convertible computer” that would be “equipped with a notebook computer function and a tablet computer…

Read more »