Akamai reports Philippine internet speed at 1.4Mbps

Latest quarterly report from Akamai, an Internet content delivery network, shows that average internet speed in the Philippines has climbed up to 1,428Kbps or 1.4Mbps with an average peak of 13,880Kbps (13.8Mbps).

The results are actually pretty close when compared to other neighboring South Asia countries.

Here are the other internet speed results in the same quarter (Q1 2013):

(Average Connection Speed / Average Peak Connection Speed)
Hong Kong: 10.9Mbps / 44.8Mbps
Singapore: 6.9Mbps / 41.1Mbps
Thailand: 4.8Mbps / 30.1Mbps
Malaysia: 2.7Mbps / 23.6Mbps
China: 1.8Mbps / 8.3Mbps
Indonesia: 1.5Mbps / 12.7Mbps
Philippines: 1.4Mbps / 13.8Mbps
Vietnam: 1.4Mbps / 11.4Mbps
India: 1.2Mbps / 9.3Mbps

The numbers for the Philippines are very close to Indonesia and China. The Philippines even ranked higher when it comes to Average Peak Connection Speed.

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Omron HEM-7112 Automatic Blood Pressure Monitor

During the recent summit hosted by HTC in Bangkok, one of the more frequently discussed topics on what’s the next big innovation for smartphones was “health monitors” or life sensors integrated into the device.

Also, from last year’s event at the Qualcomm Annual Editor’s Week in San Diego, CA, we saw the chipmaker producing a lot of health sensors and hi-tech medical devices for life monitoring.

But, before those devices become really widely available, dedicated monitoring devices like this Omron HEM-7112 which is an automatic blood pressure monitor.

The device has one very basic yet specific function — take your blood pressure on-the-go. The unit is powered by two (2) triple-A batteries (there’s an option to plug directly to a wall socket).

It was pretty easy to use but we had a nurse at the office that help us interpret the results — just strap on the cuff around your upper arm (near the biceps region) and just press start. You get the results in a matter of seconds.

I actually bought a similar Omron monitor about 2 years ago when I had some unexplained health problems although the one I got was more portable and looked like an over-sized velcro wrist watch.

Disclosure: Omron sent us this unit to use and keep.

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Lenovo K900 unboxed, first impression review

We’ve had several encounters with the Lenovo K900 before and now that it has been officially released in the Philippines, we immediately purchased a unit so we can do a review here on YugaTech.


The combination of polished aluminum and solid glass is what got us attracted with the Lenovo K900. It has almost the same materials used as the equally gorgeous HTC One.

At 5.5 inches, we thought the K900 would be unwieldy for single-handed operation but that really depends on the size of your hands. In our case, we found that making calls is still doable with one hand while composing text messages will require both hands.

Although the K900 sports a seemingly unibody design, the back plate is actually removable once you unscrew the four (4) hexalobular socket screw drive (we think you’d void the warranty if you try to open it though).

While the entire front panel is mostly covered with glass and protected around the edges by a metal shell, the back side is covered by two distinct aluminum alloy — the base chassis is slightly darker, more polished and has a soft matte finish while the battery plate has a brushed metal look and lighter hue.

The large Lenovo logo is carved into the backplate, the speaker grills are at the bottom end while the camera and dual-LED flash is found at the top end.

The handset is very thin, among the thinnest we’ve ever seen in any handset we’ve reviewed and it’s short of sexy.

The power button is situated on the right side of the handset along with the micro-SIM card slot (comes with a pin to po-up the slot) while the volume controls are on the left side.

At the bottom end, the micro-USB port and 3.5mm headphone jack are both found along with the microphone. A secondary noise-canceling mic is found on the back side, near the LED flash.

Since there’s no microSD card slot for storage expansion, the K900 supports USB On-the-go. If there’s one thing that most people would look at as a deal-breaker for the K900, it would be the lack of expandable microSD card slot.

Having used a number of Lenovo smartphones before, we’ve notice how their custom UI has improved over time.

The native icons are circular and even the app drawer will scroll thru the app list even if you swipe vertically or horizontally (a simple UX tweak that makes a lot of sense).

There are also a number of usability and power management features added into the system by Lenovo.

Although there are only two (2) physical CPU cores on the K900, each core can simultaneously run 2 threads which helps make the device perform like it has 4 virtual cores.

Lenovo K900 specs:
5.5-inch IPS LCD display @ 1080 x 1920 pixels, 401 ppi
Corning Gorilla Glass 2
Intel Atom Z2580 2.0GHz dual-core CPU
PowerVR SGX544
2GB RAM
16GB internal storage
WiFi 802.11 b/g/n, dual-band
Bluetooth 3.0
13 MP camera w/ dual LED flash
1080p video capture
2MP front-facing camera
GPS w/ aGPS support
Android 4.2 Jellybean
Li-Po 2500mAh battery
157 x 78 x 6.9 mm (dimensions)
162 grams (weight)

As such we’re seeing really good benchmarks scores for the K900 — 6,051 for Quadrant, 21,205 for Antutu Benchmark and 59.9fps on NenaMark 2 — results are pretty much similar or close to the Xperia Tablet Z. These are really good scores considering the K900 is only running on 2 cores.

The Lenovo K900 is now available in local stores for a suggested retail price of Php22,990 although they were having a promo earlier where you cna have it for Php21,990 on cash or straight charge. Watch out for our full review soon.

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Ford launches Ford Fiesta 2013 in the Philippines

Ford Philippines also launched their new line-up of Ford Fiesta cars last week with promise to also bring the Fiesta Sport+ with the 1.0L EcoBoost engine later in the year.

There were a total of four (4) variants of the Ford Fiesta made available to Philippine customers.

Ford Fiesta 1.5L Ti-VCT Sport 5-door, Titanium 4-door: Php868,000
Ford Fiesta 1.5L Ti-VCT Trend 5-door and 4-door AT: Php798,000
Ford Fiesta 1.5L Ti-VCT Trend 5-door and 4-door MT: Php768,000
Ford Fiesta 1.5L Ti-VCT Ambiente 5-door and 4-door MT: Php698,000

The 2013 Ford Fiesta will be available in ten (10) colors — Arctic White, Black Mica, Highlight Silver, Metropolitan Grey, Ice Blue, True Red, Aurora Blue, Chili Orange, Phantom Purple and Celestial Blue.

They have a wall display art over at High Street in The Fort if you want to check out the new Ford Fiesta.

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New Toyota Vios 2013 launched, priced

Toyota Philippines recently launched the 2013 Toyota Vios, with six (6) different variants of manual and automatic transmissions.

The re-designed Vios looked more masculine with the wide front grills. It has some semblance with the Honda City and the Mitsubishi Lancer EX.

Here’s the complete list of variants and suggested retail prices:

Toyota Vios 2013 1.3 Base Php 592,000
Toyota Vios 2013 1.3J M/T Php 630,000
Toyota Vios 2013 1.3E M/T Php 727,000
Toyota Vios 2013 1.3E A/T Php 762,000
Toyota Vios 2013 1.5G M/T Php 812,000
Toyota Vios 2013 1.5G A/T Php 847,000

These models are all assembled in their Toyota Plant in Sta. Rosa, Laguna. Available colors come in White Pearl, Freedom White, Silver Metallic, Gray Metallic, Black, Red Mica Metallic, Dark Brown Metallic, and Orange Metallic.

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