Buzzkill: Galaxy S And Galaxy Tab Won’t Get Official ICS Builds.

Time to weep and cry inconsolably, Galaxy S/Tab owners. Samsung has officially announced their Android 4.0 Ice Cream Sandwich upgrade cycle for a slew of devices, with the aforementioned staples of Android being absent from the list. According to Samsung, the Galaxy S and original Galaxy Tab lack the needed RAM to run TouchWiz alongside ICS.

We know what you’re thinking — Simple solution, don’t install TouchWiz. While it is the best choice, Samsung is running with it whether you like it or not.

The price you pay for buying crappy skinned Android devices. Of course, if you’re reading this article there’s a good chance you know your way around the whole Android rooting scene, so there’s some saving grace. When carriers/manufacturers take away your lemons, make a rocket. (No sense whatsoever…)

AMD Radeon 7970 Gets Official. Gamers, This Is Your Card.

The Nvidia vs. AMD fight just got kicked up several notches with the official announcement by AMD of their upcoming 7970 flagship GPU. The card is the first to make use of the new 28-nm manufacturing process and AMD’s new “Graphics Core Next” architecture. In short: 3GB of memory, 2048 stream processors, 32 raster units, 128 texture units 4.31 billion transistors. This card is a beast.

Sheer specs aside, the 7970 will support up to five simultaneous audio streams via HDMI and DisplayPort as well as enhanced Eyefinity features and support for stereoscopic 3D.

Finally, in addition to a more efficient slab of silicon thanks to the 28-nm die, AMD has designed the 7970 with a new fan design that promises more CFM than previous generations coupled with a redesigned vapor cooling chamber.

Takeaway: This card is going to rock. Get it for $549 starting in January.

Facebook For PlayBook Updated To Version 2.1.

The black sheep of the tablet world, RIM’s BlackBerry Playbook, has something to boast about this week — a new Facebook update. Despite being an overall non-starter in the tablet world (until RIM’s recent fire sales), the PlayBook was the first tablet to get a legitimate “official” Facebook app — long before Apple’s much more popular iPad. With that said, the PlayBook’s Facebook app has officially hit v2.1.

The list of improvements include Facebook Groups support as well as improved media handling and tweaked photo/video uploads. Not anything earth shattering by any means, but enough to keep the 3 PlayBook owners of the world happy a little while longer.

Get it in App World starting…now.

Leaked VZW System Screenshot Shows Delayed Droid 4 Release: February 2nd.

Delays are never a fun thing to talk about in the consumer electronics world, especially so when the product in question is a rather highly regarded one. Unfortunately for Android lovers, the bad news concerns the upcoming Droid 4. Originally rumored to hit shelves today, December 22nd, now looks to be a multi-week delay. The latest information made available by the leaked internal VZW screenshot above shows the wait time to be as long as ~6 weeks, pushing the Droid 4′s release into early February.

Our only hope is that VZW’s recent LTE outage isn’t a sign of some ominous underlying problem, and in turn the reason for the recent rash of phone delays. Let’s hope VZW at least takes the Droid 4 for a walk around CES’ crowded halls. Should they do just that, rest assured we’ll get some more screenshots for everyone to enjoy.

Check Out This Sexy LG Display With 1mm Bezels.

We’re positive that consumer electronics hardware manufacturers are going to try and blow our retinas away with a smorgasbord of displays at CES in a few short weeks. But as far as we’re concerned, it is LG’s new DM92 display and it’s 1mm bezels that have captured our attention the greatest. Additional features such as the sleek chrome base and 3D don’t hurt either.

Release is said to be February for an as of now undisclosed price. Look for more info once we get a little bit of hands-on time at CES next month.

So This Is What Sense UI On Ice Cream Sandwich Looks Like.

Android 4.0 Ice Cream Sandwich packs a pretty stellar, all-new user interface. The only bummer buzzkill is that many carriers and/or manufactures are going to destroy ICS with their own custom skins. And when it comes to custom skins, nothing is more prevalent than HTC’s Sense UI. Love it or hate it, Sense UI will continue on in Android 4.0, though it’s not going to be as big of a visual upgrade as the “4.0″ numbering would suggest as is made evident by the image above — a screenshot from a leaked HTC Sensation XE ROM with official numbers of 4.0.1.

Yeah, that’s supposedly what Sense UI looks like on ICS — more or less same thing as it does on 2.x. Pretty disappointing if you ask us. The bottom bar is a little different and adopts some ICS functionality, the that status bar…oh that status bar. We’d say it’s just as long in the tooth (if not more) than iOS’ simple icon style layout.

Of course, this is obviously an early build that’s leaked out. HTC could really be saving the big UI tweaks for more official events — at least we hope so.

Microsoft: 2012 CES Is Our Last Major Year.

Want to catch a glimpse of Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer or their gigantic booth at CES? Then you best pull a few strings and plan on attending the upcoming 2012 CES as it will be Microsoft’s last CES in which they’ll feature a large presence.

Microsoft spokesperson, Frank Shaw, stated that while Microsoft will still remain present for future CES events, 2012 is the last year in which they’ll hold a keynote and occupy a space on the show floor — behind closed doors meetings and such will also still take place. According to Shaw, Microsoft’s own product cycles are simply moving too fast to hold tight to CES’ yearly schedule. Fair enough we s’pose.

Shocked, unfazed, indifferent?