Oy. This is how not to launch new tech - they're announcing hardware without any use cases to explain to consumers why it's valuable. This is a symptom of the lack of coordination between electronics manufacturers and the Android team, which unfortunately doesn't seem to be righting itself after all this time.<p>I love 3d mapping tech, and am eagerly awaiting it in devices. This tech could have been integrated into Google Maps, one of the most popular apps on mobile devices, but instead is launched with this weird message of hope that maybe one day it could be used for useful things potentially, you know, if developers come up with some ideas for that or something. This is Microsoft all over again.<p>Techies of course can speculate and hope and fill in some possible use cases, and it'll maybe move a few units for a short while as a lot of gimmick tech does, but to the general market this is one big 'huh?'<p>Use cases, folks. Use cases.
Honest question: given the nature of this device (communication), is anyone else nervous about Lenovo, given their recent shenanigans? (One only needs to google "lenovo privacy concerns" to see what I mean.)
Non-engadget link for those who have given up on them (I can't possibly be the only one):<p><a href="http://bgr.com/2016/06/09/lenovo-phab2-pro-release-date-price/" rel="nofollow">http://bgr.com/2016/06/09/lenovo-phab2-pro-release-date-pric...</a>
This article demonstrates better what this could be used for:<p><a href="http://techcrunch.com/2014/02/21/heres-an-actual-3d-indoor-map-of-a-room-captured-with-googles-project-tango-phone/" rel="nofollow">http://techcrunch.com/2014/02/21/heres-an-actual-3d-indoor-m...</a>
What I found more interesting is that 652 looks a very nice chip and its priced at $500, 1440p, 64G with all the tagno stuff for a specialized product.<p>Why can't we have a $300-$350 phone with snapdragon 652, 1080p from most manufacturer even Lenovo? I guess they have this ZUK 2 now in the similar price/performance but a sub brand.
This will be interesting when paired with a 3D printer. The tango technology does a really good job of scanning objects and if you export them to a slicer it should be possible to print them. That said, it could also make for a really interesting data "theft" system, being able to derive detailed models from something in a display case for example. <a href="http://boingboing.net/2016/02/23/scanning-artists-de-loot-stole.html" rel="nofollow">http://boingboing.net/2016/02/23/scanning-artists-de-loot-st...</a>