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Chosun: Samsung Electronics outpaced Motorola in the second quarter to become the world’s second largest mobile phone maker.

It’s the first time Samsung has been able to climb to the number two spot, and it happened thanks to Samsung’s strategy to expand sales and Motorola’s lackluster results.

Motorola said on July 19 that it shipped 35.5 million mobile phones in the second quarter, which is 1.9 million less than Samsung’s 37.4 million shipments in the same period.

Samsung’s key to overtaking Motorola was expanding sales of low-priced phones in newly-emerging markets such as India and China. In the second quarter, Sony Ericsson ranked fourth with 24.9 million worldwide shipments, followed by LG with 19.1 million. Nokia, the number one mobile phone maker, was estimated to have sold 99 million phones worldwide.

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Slashgear: Nintendo has finally decided to give us an official WiiZapper, but perhaps a small zapper such as that is not big enough for you. Thankfully you can turn to 3rd party manufacturers to provide you the bigger guns that you desire.

This Rifle Gun Prop  is pretty much just as it sounds. It’s a plastic holder for your Wiimote and Nunchuck that is shaped like a rifle.

One great thing I have to say about the Wii is that accessories are always cheap. Since most of them are simply plastic holders for the Wiimote, you only end up spending a few euro. This particular accessory will only set you back €12.

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NaviGadget: It’s a been a while since we figured out the iPhone was not going to have GPS feature. In fact you can’t even use an external bluetooth GPS receiver since the bluetooth on iPhone is restricted to headset access only. Well some location based services is better nothing at all so today we present you TrafficGauge for iPhone. We do not know how this compares to traffic info from Google but its worth a try. It doesn’t cost you a dime anyways.What you need to do is go to their website where you can enter your phone number and they send you a link to TrafficGauge for iPhone.

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Akihabaranews: Sharp looks like it will be the first to market with a THX-certified television.

Dubbed the T-series, the new lineup features a 65-inch and 52-inch LCD. Support for THX means the screen will sport the best match of brightness and contrast with home theater level quality.

The T-series LCDs feature 350cd/m2 brightness and a 2,500:1 contrast ratio. Besides that, the HDTVs will sport 1,920 x 1,080 120Hz ASV panels with 3x 1080p HDMI, 1x DVI, 2x Firewire, IrSS, and Ethernet.

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Absolute Gadget: Thrustmaster have launched a pad that will work for your PS3, PS2 and your PC. The Dual Trigger 3 in 1 controller features all the usual buttons you would expect from a Playstation pad, including mini-sticks and the home button for PS3 owners.  

Just like the official PS3 pad it also features 6 axes. A switch on the underside of the pad allows you to switch between PC and console without having to change any settings on the pad itself.There is also a mapping function allowing gamers to save their own control configurations thanks to the pad’s internal memory. This will no doubt come in useful when your annoying friend who changes the whole button layout to play Tekken visits. 

A preset button will allow said chum to switch to their preferred configuration at the touch of a button.

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Slashgear: Where you might want to stick a 2 speaker surround sound system. It seems surround sound virtualization and DVD upscaling are the two popular buzz words for the home theater industry as several products keep popping up involving one or the other or both.

This one has both. The upscaling is good for up to 720p or 1080i. The virtual surround sound is provided via Sony’s S-Force PRO Front Surround technology.

Other features include 480 watts of power and the option to upgrade with a Bluetooth adapter allowing music to be streamed between another Bluetooth device and this system.

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NaviGadget: A British designer at the Royal College of Art designed this experimental device which consists of a buzzing ring for each hand and a device controller with a GPS receiver that is worn around the neck or attached to clothing.The idea is to make people feel comfortable in unfamiliar territories by providing them with a sense of direction and helping them navigate through streets they have never been on before.

The rings buzz for left and right, and have different vibrations for forwards and backwards. Both buzz when going in the wrong direction.

The controller has an 8 digit display, through which you can enter a zip code. The electronic compass together with the GPS receiver will provide navigational info to its user for the location entered…

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Engadget: Little known fact: THX was founded by Star Wars director George Lucas in 1983 to help theater owners adjust their auditoriums for maximum impact — and in doing so became an iconic brand for AV technology, even if no one really knew what THX is or does.

Well, the company is now using that expertise to take on a new home theater challenge: automatically balancing audio and video levels. While THX-certified receivers, screens, and speakers are nothing new, what THX has under development could help ensure even the least technology-savvy users get the most from their gear. While details are slim at this point, think about how HDMI connectors can send technical details between source units and televisions to set optimal resolutions or audio formats.

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Camera Core: Realeyes3D has announced the launch of Magic Wanda, which it claims is the first camera phone messaging application to allow animated photo messages to be created and shared directly on the handset.

Animated messages can be created in Adobe Flash Lite format, without requiring a server.

Users create content such as handwritten text and drawings using pen and paper. They simply take a photo of the drawing or hand-writing with the phone’s camera.

The photograph is then overlaid with the handwritten message using Magic Wanda and Realeyes3D’s patented ink extraction technology.

There are several animation options such as scroll, stretch or rotate. There is also a bank of pre-loaded content such as frames, stamps, characters and music.

The resulting Adobe Flash Lite file can be saved on a phone or sent directly from a user’s handset to a Flash-enable device or content sharing website.

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SlashGear: Why is it that people feel the need to have everything dipped in gold or covered in diamonds? Most of the time it actually ends up looking worse than the original, yet people simply must have them. The newest gadget to get the golden touch is the iPod shuffle.A company called Xexoo is offering an iPod shuffle that has been made out of 18 carat gold. Though it will only set you back €7500.

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The Register: Hollywood Records is attempting to breathe new life into an ailing musical format, the CD. It has unveiled the CDVU+ format, which it hopes will appeal to those looking for something more than currently offered by the standard 12cm audio disc.

According to HR’s Kent Bunt, the format is designed to give consumers the content they want, but in a format they’re used to. CDVU+ will equip music CDs with DVD-style extras, such as song lyrics, feature articles and band photographs.

HR didn’t say how CDVU+ will be priced in comparison to existing chart CDs. Only time, or rather sales, will tell how popular the new format will be, especially when pitted against the might of music downloads.

And, let’s be honest, we’ve been here before. Extended CDs, CD+G and other audio CDs that incorporate data partitions have been around for years and have done little if anything to boost the demand for CDs beyond what it would ordinarily be.

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Just Another Mobile Phone Blog: Well it’s official now. Samsung officially reveals the G600. Looks like the rumors were true. Here are some specs.

- 3G
- 5 megapixel AF camera
- bluetooth 2
- FM radio with RDS
- microSD
- 2.3 inch QVGA screen
- 14.9 mm thick

Impressive stuff.

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