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DNP IFA 2013 preview what to expect

CES 2013 was a decidedly sleepy show by most accounts, but this year's IFA is shaping up to be anything but. Devices set for a reveal are still under proverbial lock and key, but chatter, teases and leaks have painted a fairly full picture of what we can expect to see in Germany: smartwatches and wearables, Haswell hardware and phones with 4K shooters. Join us past the break to get up to speed on what Berlin might dish out this week.

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Welcome to Engadget's back to school guide! Today, we've got a killer selection of bag and case recommendations. Head to the back to school hub to see the rest of the product guides as we add them throughout the month. Be sure to keep checking back; in early September, we'll be giving away a ton of gear, including one of the picks in this very guide.

Engadget's back to school guide 2013 bags and cases

What's a stellar arsenal of tech if you've got nary a thing to store it in? Lucky for you, we're serving up a collection of bags and cases to protect and sort your gadget stash -- and to keep that stylish look on the up and up as well. From a case that adds some extra juice to your iPhone 5's battery to a solid rucksack that adapts to a trip as easily as you must, this collection has something for everyone -- head below to dive in.

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DNP Lenovo IdeaTab A1000 review how important is audio quality in a budget tablet

It's not easy being a 7-inch tablet these days. With relatively inexpensive devices like the ASUS MeMo Pad HD 7 and the refreshed Nexus 7 offering a whole lot of bang for your buck, budget tablet makers are facing stiffer competition than ever before. Lenovo hasn't had much luck thus far delivering mobile devices that impress and, indeed, the company's latest offering -- the 7-inch IdeaTab A1000 -- has its work cut out for it. With the 16GB model priced at $160 (currently on sale for $130), the petite IdeaTab prioritizes sound quality over its other functions, perhaps in the hopes that its above-average performance in that area will woo picky buyers. But does the A1000 have what it takes to compete in a crowded market? Read on to find out.

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Meizu MX3 handson a significant improvement from the MX2

Having sat through Meizu's entire launch event in Beijing, we have to admit: the new MX3 took us by surprise. We weren't expecting much after knowing some of the key specs from the leaks, and to be frank, the Chinese company lost its way with the MX2; but Jack Wong's team seems to have put its focus back in place with its latest flagship. First off, while the MX3 has preserved the predecessor's metallic-rim design, Meizu has now managed to refine the manufacturing process to remove all the sharp edges, and boy does that new body feel good. The TOL (touch-on-lens) display may look odd with its 1,800 x 1,080 resolution, but it looked good on the demo units, and that 15:9 aspect ratio has some advantage for web browsing in portrait mode.

There were many other features that we couldn't comment on based on our hands-on, such as the audio quality from the Wolfson chip and the image quality from the third-gen Sony 8-megapixel sensor, but the presence of these components suggests that Meizu may be headed back in the right direction. The number of improvements on the slick, Android 4.2-based Flyme 3.0 is also impressive, making it slightly more user-friendly (especially for first-timers) as well as more pleasing to the eye. It'll just take some getting used to with Meizu's own soft key approach (virtual buttons on a "Smart Bar" plus a capacitive home button). Much like the battery life and radio performance, we'll only be able to properly comment on the software part over an extended period of usage, so do keep an eye out for our MX3 review in the near future. Oh, and we have a hands-on video after the break.

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Sky becomes first UK TV network to broadcast live 4K

Remember how we'd heard that a British broadcaster is trialing 4K TV? We have a hunch as to which company that is: Sky now claims that it's the first UK TV network to have conducted a live 4K broadcast. The firm captured a weekend Premier League match in ultra high resolution using the same infrastructure it normally requires for a live show, with satellites delivering a feed to the company's Isleworth broadcast center. Commercial service remains distant, mind you -- Sky requires both more research and wider adoption of 4K TVs to justify an upgrade. If everything falls into place, though, Sky could have an advantage over rival providers that have yet to venture beyond HD.

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HTC's Butterfly s officially gets a Hello Kitty makeover

Last week, an HTC Butterfly s leaked out sporting Hello Kitty colors, and our Chinese sister site has now had a chance to play with one, in the fur. The celebrated feline's bow is now butterfly-shaped, of course, and it comes with kitty flight attendant and pilot figures wearing EVA Air uniforms, in honor of its Hello Kitty jets -- yes, that's a thing. Fortunately, the 5-inch device has plenty of room for all the stickers on the outside, and there are nine different wallpaper themes for the 1080p screen. HTC is marketing the device in the ubiquitous ladyphone category for China, but c'mon -- the Kitty's appeal transcends such pigeon-holing. It's now available for around $770 in Taiwan only, but you can catch more images at the gallery below.

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iPhone 5C glimpsed in blue and pink, actually looks quite premium

Our previous look at a tangled pile of iPhone 5C's wasn't especially flattering, and it only showed the plain white version of the rumored handset. The newer image above is impossible to authenticate, but it's a tad more sympathetic and it comes from a batch of photos of yellow, pink and blue plastic iPhones (or perhaps knock-offs) that briefly appeared on Chinese site iapps.im before being deleted at the request of a "relevant party." Although there are definitely some echoes of Nokia's Lumia 620 here, the close-up shot of the blue model suggests we may be looking at something a bit thinner, with slightly less rounded edges, and with a non-removable unibody that may also have a more serious matte finish -- although the translucent packaging makes it hard to be sure. Go ahead and squint at the other photos after the break.

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Meizu MX3 unveiled with Exynos 5 Octa, 51inch screen, Wolfson audio and 128GB option

Ahead of main rival Xiaomi's big event later this week, Meizu has today unveiled its latest Android device, the MX3, at the Beijing National Aquatics Center. Like many recent flagship phones, this one finally breaks the previous 4.4-inch barrier to make way for a 5.1-inch display, though with an odd 1,800 x 1,080, 15:9 panel from Sharp and JDI to follow Meizu's string of odd aspect ratios. At the same time, the manufacturer has managed to keep the screen bezel at 2.9mm thick, making the carefully curved body 72mm wide (as well as 9.1mm thick and 143g heavy). This is apparently the result of Jack Wong's 30-plus handcrafted wooden prototypes, followed by some 3D scanning. Read on for more.

Update: Our hands-on post is up as well!

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Dice+

After a year's wait, DICE+ is finally shipping its Bluetooth game die. The chance cube is available for $40 in the US, and €40 ($53) in many other parts of the world. While the selection of compatible Android and iPad games is limited to a handful of party and strategy titles, the developer kit should lead to more releases in the future. If you're eager to modernize your board game experience, you can buy the digital dice from DICE+ itself through the source link.

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Oppo N1 flashes its Snapdragon 800 as exec leaks logic board pic

Oppo's N1 smartphone has been sitting on our watch list ever since we first got wind of its strange N-Lens camera add-ons, which will apparently offer a choice of zooms up to 15x. Now we can flesh out another key spec: the Chinese handset will run on Qualcomm's Snapdragon 800 processor, which should more than cope with its equally unusual dual touch inputs and possibly help it to rival other imaging-centric Androids like the Galaxy S4 Zoom and Sony's upcoming Honami. The HSPA+ Snapdragon processor (MSM8274) was shown on a photo of the N1's internals that was "leaked" by an Oppo marketing exec on Sina Weibo -- and unless we're horribly, horribly mistaken, the photo also seems to show a microSD slot to store all those optically stabilized, 16-megapixel images. Barring other significant pseudo-leaks, you can expect the next big N1 update on September 23rd.

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