HTC UK creates Gramohorn II for HTC One

We’ve seen some crazy speaker ideas in our time but the Gramohorn II designed by Justin Wolter by commission of HTC UK is one of the cookiest. It’s a dock that features two horns (like on an old-timey gramophone, hence the name) that is designed specifically for the stereo BoomSound speakers on the HTC One.

HTC UK is using the Gramohorn II to kick off its “Here’s To Creativity” campaign. Strange that there’s no room for the BoomBass Speaker, but still it’s an interesting design piece, which goes well with the uniquely designed HTC One.

Anyway, there are two versions of the Gramohorn II – a plaster-based and a metal-based. The plaster one gives you a choice of 25 colors and it will set you back £999 ($1600/€1200). There will be 100 pieces made.

The metal one is more premium and comes in three finishes – Silver, Gold and Wheat Penny (all matte). Only 10 pieces will be made of each color, so they are fairly exclusive and have a price to match – £4999 ($8000/€6000).

Official Instagram beta app hits Windows Phone

A earlier promised, the popular photo sharing app Instagram is now available for Windows Phone 8 devices. The app is now ready to download from the Windows Phone Store although it’s still a beta version so you can try it at your own risk.

The application is not a completely finished product. In order to bring it to the market as quickly as possible, the developers have released it without support for video capture and uploading.

There are other missing features too. They include the inability to tag people in photos, as well as view maps from geotagged photos.

To make up for the missing features, Instagram for Windows Phone 8 has been optimized to support Live Tiles with data refresh. More importantly, the developer team will continue to fine-tune the app until it is fully on par with its Android and iOS counterparts at which point the final version should debut.

You can download the Instagram beta app for Windows Phone by hitting the Download link below. Feel free to drop us a line with your impressions in the comments section.

DOWNLOAD

FaceBook Home - Coming April 12

Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg today unveiled a new way to integrate its network on Android devices. This tool called Facebook Home, involves a rethinking of how Facebook exists on Android phones, Zuckerberg said, putting people first instead of apps.

"You're going to be able to turn your Android phone into a great social device," Mark Zuckerberg said at the unveiling. "Our phones today are designed around apps, not people. We want to flip that around."

Facebook Home will put updates from the social network right on the home screen via a feature called Cover Feed similar to HTC One's live Flipboard-like interface. Content from Facebook takes up the entire screen, with no navigation or "chrome" whatsoever. Apps are still there, accessed through a launcher that is accessible by swiping up.

Another novel feature is Chatheads, a way to

Galaxy S4 vrs HTC One

Running over the entire spec sheet of each phone will take too long - both droids are impressively armed - so instead we'll just list the differences. Here's how one is better than the other and vice versa.

Samsung Galaxy S4 over HTC One

• Bigger screen; works with gloves and air gestures
• Higher resolution camera - 13MP vs. 4MP
• Newer Android version - 4.2.2 vs. 4.1.2
• Multi-window multitasking
• Higher clock speed chipset
• Expandable storage
• User-replaceable battery of higher capacity
• Additional sensors (barometer, thermometer, hygroscope)
• Exclusive software features
• Smaller, thinner, lighter

HTC One over Samsung Galaxy S4

• Brilliant-looking aluminum unibody
• Optical Image Stabilization, image sensor with 2µm pixel size
• HTC Zoe, BlinkFeed
• Front mounted stereo speakers, Beats Audio
• FM Radio

Looking at the two lists above, you'd think the Samsung Galaxy S4 has the upper hand. It's not that simple - not all bullet points have the same weight. For example, we'll take the sleek aluminum unibody over a hygroscope any day of the week. And the megapixel debate for the two cameras will probably take a huge chunk of this article to resolve.