Big Day for ZiiLABS, including Trinity phone

It’s a massive day for ZiiLABS, with their Shenzen conference beginning today. So far, we’ve seen several new interesting devices, including the Trinity smartphone, and a pretty nifty set of apps called ZiiLife. Check the latest news over at ZiiEGG.com. Due to the Thanksgiving holiday here in the States, I was unable to update this blog with info about the new Vado HD 3rd Generation or the X-Fi2 Firmware update (big one), but I will have an in-depth article for each up shortly.

Creative, ZiiLABS to Host First Zii Summit In First Week of December

When I read the Singapore Business-Times article over on epiZENter yesterday, there was a curious mention of demonstrations at a ‘Shenzen conference’. Not being particularly great with China’s second busiest port city, I thought it was just an industry conference. However, that has changed with the press release from ZiiLABS today, which announced a ‘Zii Summit’ for December 1-2 in Shenzen. According to the press release, Creative CEO Sim Wong Hoo, in addition to the head of ZiiLABS, Hock Leow, will be giving keynote addresses on the first day in addition to a press conference. More importantly, however, is the seminar that will be held over the two days to showcase the ‘technology, platforms, products, services, and content’ of the Zii ecosystem. Simultaneously, however, is the real point of the summit- to showcase the full range of Zii-powered devices. The wording in the press release, which is copied below, is overwhelmingly positive as all press releases are, mentions multiple Zii-powered products. The door has been locked shut on any leaks thus far to upcoming devices, but it seems that this will open the floodgates. I’m certainly excited.

ZiiLABS Press Release ZiiLABS Announces Graphics and HD Video Acceleration for Adobe Flash Player, AIR Support

More good news on the Zii front. HD Video acceleration and full Flash support have officially been announced by ZiiLABS. On a more surprising front, AIR support will be coming to the Zii EGG platform. Read more for the entire lowdown.

This Week in EGG

The internet has gotten hold of the EGG, and as such have revealed their first impressions. Browse through some of these and let us know what you think below in the comment section!

Our sister site: ZiiEGG.com

DAPreview (DaHarder)

Anything But iPod

Also, Engadget unveiled a roadmap for development on the platform, which you can see in this article.

Additionally, ZiiLABS has announced that they will be using the Wolfson WM8350 audio chip in the device for audio processing. This will work in union with the ZMS-05 processor, which will do almost all of the work except audio processing. It’s an interesting step, but the chip claims to be a very power-efficient one, and could increase battery life for the audio side. Read more about the WM8350 here, and read the ZiiLABS press release below.

A Bit More on the Zii EGG

After the release of the EGG, there was much excitement about the “next big thing” from the little company that could. However, there were also a few issues that sprung up regarding the shipment unit- and I got some answers.

• Despite the various differences around the web with regards to capitalization and spelling, the official product name is the Zii EGG – with the entire EGG part capitalized.
• The HD cable is not included with the SDK package- and the box contents over at ZiiLABS is much clearer. The device box will include the following: the Zii EGG, earphones, a USB cable, the wall charger, and a warranty card.
• The 32GB included in the SDK promotion is embedded in the device. This is not the 0GB device that ZiiLABS offers to OEMs so they can add 32GB of storage via SDHC.
• The device is of matte plastic material. A comparison shot can be seen here on a fake iPhone.
• Currently the only shipping countries are those listed. No mention of you poor Australian people who want the device.
• No new information on the battery life. The focus at this point is on developers and thus there is no stable benchmark for battery life.
• The SDK contains all the tools, libraries and example applications to get developers started. It will be officially supported under Ubuntu 8.04 using the Eclipse program. This is great because people who are on any system now can (for free) install Ubuntu as a secondary OS to program in without messing up the Windows/Mac system. And if you’re already in Ubuntu, then you know how to manage your OS properly and probably already know a decent amount of programming.

On another note, I’ll be launching an app store over at ZiiEGG.com soon- please post in the forums links to free Android programs so that I can begin building the collection!

Creative Patents Found For “Drag and Drop” on Touchscreen Devices, Revealing Tabbed Web Browsing

Remember when Creative took Apple’s lunch when they stole the ZEN UI? It seems like another Creative patent may come into play down the line to buffer the bottom line. This time, it’s for a drag and drop user interface for touchscreen devices. It was filed back in January 2008 under the 3DLabs brand, but it nontheless shows that the company has been working on the touchscreen for almost eighteen months. This is a patent application, and thus is not an official patent until the USPTO approves the application.

It seems that the way that the device will work is having an “action” area of the screen where the object (music title, album, video) is dragged onto the action tab with the finger. The copy/paste method also seems to be implemented this way- and the ability to copy/paste media files is a first for a Creative device.