Pre-order in China with 6.1-inch phablet, Huawei Ascend Mate

The Huawei Ascend Mate was made official last month at CES, but not without leaving a lingering question of whether bigger is really better. Regardless of how you feel about holding a huge phone in your hand(s), Huawei is looking to shake up the Galaxy Note establishment with its 6.1-inch phablet offering.

If you find yourself strangely attracted to the Ascend Mate, you’ve probably heard that it’ll be launched in China this month, while a global release can be expected in the following month. Now, we have some unofficial pricing information for the phone.

One online retailer in China has begun taking pre-order for the Ascend Mate, where it’s offered for $575. Those brazen enough to consider placing an order will be glad to know that the website ships worldwide. Before your gadget lust gets the better of you, however, we suggest you wait for more confirmation from Huawei on when the device will actually hit stores and at what price point.

Download Now, T-Mobile Galaxy S3 Jelly Bean OTA update

T-Mobile Galaxy S3 owners, we have good news for you today. After so many leaks, it looks like the official Android 4.1.1 Jelly Bean update you have been waiting for so long is finally available to download over-the-air (OTA), although you should be able to upgrade your phone’s firmware via KIES as well.

As you can see in these images, we’re looking at a 334.19MB download for the SGH-T999 Galaxy S3 version, with the update expected to take around 10 minutes to complete. As always, make sure you have a dependable Internet connection and enough battery juice to get you through the process.

In case you were wondering, we’re looking at firmware version J3O03L.T999UVDLJA for T-Mobile’s Galaxy S3 version, so go ahead, check your devices to see whether you have received the update notification.

Our tipster says that his Galaxy S3 was updated at 1:00 PST time  today (November 14) and that he updated it by checking for updates on the handset.

Thanks, Kristopher Q!

Now, Android 4.1.1 Jelly Bean is available for the Samsung Galaxy S3

We mentioned that Jelly Bean had begun rolling out for T-Mobile Galaxy S3 users earlier this morning. And well, it looks like those details have since been confirmed by T-Mobile. The carrier has posted the official support page, noting that;

“Beginning November 14, the Samsung Galaxy S III will have an optional software update to Android version 4.1.1/ Baseband version T999UVLJA via Over The Air (OTA) and Samsung Kies.”

The update is, of course, bringing Jelly Bean which means goodies such as Google Now and Project Butter. This update will bring an updated Settings menu and the new Notifications bar as well as improvements with the keyboard and camera. Additionally, T-Mobile users will also see some improvements for Wi-Fi calling.

Bottom line, this is the update that Galaxy S3 users have been waiting for. We now have seen Sprint and T-Mobile offer the update, we only hope the remaining US carriers will follow sooner rather than later. That being said, T-Mobile users now have a 344MB file download ready and waiting and it seems the only real question that remains is whether you want to grab this update over-the-air or using Kies. Of course, if we had to offer a suggestion, we would go over-the-air.

Short ways to change the Home Button Click Speed for iPhone, iPad, and iPod touch

If you have an iPhone, iPad, or iPod touch, you probably know by now that double-clicking and triple-clicking the Home button is required to perform some actions in iOS, like bringing up lock screen music controls, showing the multitasking bar, inverting the screen, enabling zoom, summoning Assistive Touch, or even turning on Guided Access to lock iOS into a single app.
The default speed required for clicking the Home button can be problematic for some individuals though, as it requires a fairly speedy double or triple tap to work. Thankfully, with iOS 6 onward we can now easily make changes to the required click speed required to activate the Home button:

• Open Settings, then go to “General” and “Accessibility”
• Tap on “Home-click Speed” and choose either “Slow” or “Slowest” as the new Home click setting

Tapping any of the Home-click speed choices will cause the iPhone or iPad to vibrate at the new speed required to activate the double-click or triple-click, providing a good indicator of the new leniency allowed.




The “Slow” setting is a fairly reasonable alternative for many people, but for young kids, those with motor impairments, or anyone with a broken hand or wrist, the “Slowest” option will prevent a lot of frustration.
 
You will need iOS 6 or later installed in order to have this feature, but it works the same on an iPad, iPod, or iPhone.

DROID RAZR M and RAZR HD official is leaked

Motorola’s big press event is about to start, and that means plenty of exciting new Android-related announcements are on their way. One of the devices expected to see the light of day today is a rumored smartphone with edge-to-edge screen.

Based on what we’ve seen so far, we have no evidence that proves that the claim of an edge-to-edge smarpthone is anything more than a rumor. The leak really gave us little to go by, just indicating that it would have no bezel and that it would likely debut under the name RAZR M.

With that in mind, we now have a press shot of two upcoming Motorola smartphones, the Droid RAZR M and the Droid RAZR HD.

As you can see, both of these devices have their bezels intact. The Razr M’s face is taken up mostly by its screen, but it’s still far from the claimed “edge-to-edge” rumor.

What do we know about the two new rumored members of the RAZR family?

The RAZR M is a mid-range device, at least based on the recently leaked hardware specs. The device is powered by a 1.5GHz Snapdragon S4 processor with 1GB of RAM. As for the display, it has a 4.3-inch qHD Super AMOLED display, Gorilla Glass 2 protection, and a 960 x 540 resolution. The phone also has 8GB of internal storage, microSD expansion, an 8MP front cam, 3MP rear cam, NFC, 4G LTE and runs on Android 4.0 ICS.

The details are a little foggier for the Droid RAZR HD, but we do know it is powered by a Qualcomm MSM8960 Snapdragon S4 dual-core processor. The device is also said to feature a 4.6-inch HD display, microSD and will run Android 4.0 ICS out of the box.

T-Mobile unlimited 4G starts today

For many cellphone users, unlimited mobile data plans have gone the way of the dinosaur. Carriers such as Verizon and AT&T have both dropped such offerings. So, where do you go if you truly want all-you-can-eat data? It seems that T-Mobile may be the savior for those that use massive amounts of bandwidth each month.

T-Mobile recently announced it would start offering a truly unlimited nationwide 4G data plan, which officially starts today. The best part is there are no data caps, no speed limits and no extra fees thrown for consuming large portions of data.

In the past, T-Mobile has used the term unlimited but dramatically dropped the speed on those who use more than 5GB of data or 10GB for their higher-end plans. This is a welcomed change.

Surely there must be a catch to all of this, right? Yes, there is. The new unlimited plan will not allow hotspot capabilities. This means no sharing your smartphone’s 4G with your laptop and other devices. If you want to share, you’ll have to stick to an option that makes use of data throttling.

While this might not be ideal, it’s hard to blame T-Mobile. Opening up the door to mass sharing with no limits could be a very costly move for T-Mobile. Either way, this is a lot better than competitor offerings.

In order to drive interest in their new unlimited plan, T-Mobile is even offering a few deals for some of their 4G smartphones. One of these deals is for the HTC One S, which you can now get for free with a two-year contract (after rebate).

at a price of £ 546, the Samsung Galaxy Note 2 SIM-free in your hands

f you’re in the UK and you’re keen to get your hands on Samsung’s latest “phablet” release then you’ll be interested to hear that online retailer Clove is taking pre-orders now. The Samsung Galaxy Note 2 will cost you £455 plus VAT which amounts to a total price of £546.


It is expected to be in stock starting from “mid-October” and so far they only have the 16GB version on offer, in Marble White or Titanium Gray color options. There’s no word on when the 32GB and 64GB versions will be available, or how much they will cost.

Clicking through the order process reveals that the device “is currently unavailable and its final price is unknown” so they won’t actually take payment until the final price is confirmed. The Clove blog reveals that they have “received indicative price and availability details” so the quoted price is liable to be accurate, but it isn’t set in stone. They are also quoting £6 or £7 for UK delivery, but they will ship elsewhere.

On the off chance that all the excitement of Samsung’s Unpacked Event at IFA 2012 in Berlin passed you by, you can follow that link and find the full video along with all our juiciest coverage of the new devices. That includes this Samsung Galaxy Note 2 review and first impressions article that has a video of the Note 2 in action which is bound to whet your appetite.

What do you think? Is the Samsung Galaxy Note 2 too expensive? Is it going on your shopping list?

Photos Leaked, T-Mobile Galaxy Note Release in July

AT&T’s Galaxy Note exclusivity may soon come to an end as T-Mobile is apparently getting ready to launch Samsung’s best-selling phablet at some point in the near future. The press photos of the T-Mobile Galaxy Note have been apparently leaked, and as you can see in the images below, the carrier’s branding is more than obvious.

This isn’t the first time we hear T-Mobile will have its own Galaxy Note flavor in stock, and CellPhone Signal today reports that T-Mo’s version will come with AWS and HSPA+ support (850MHz and 1900MHz bands), which means it will be compatible with AT&T’s network if unlocked. More importantly, the phone will have Android 4 Ice Cream Sandwich pre-installed.

The T-Mobile Galaxy Note is reportedly launching on July 11, although pricing details are not available at this time. AT&T sells the phablet for $249.99 when purchased with a new two-year contract, while Amazon has the GSM Galaxy Note version in store for $199.99 (on contract with AT&T) or $599.99 (unlocked).

We’ll be back with more T-Mobile Galaxy Note release details once the mobile operator makes them available. So far the carrier has not made any announcement related to this Galaxy device, although it is selling another hot Galaxy device that you could be interested in.

Portal 2 Wheatley Live Wallpaper App for Android Available in GooglePlay

That’s right, Portal 2 fans and Android handset owners, you heard it right, Portal 2’s Wheatley robot is now available for purchase in Google Play for just $1 as a live wallpaper app. All you have to do is head on to Google’s app store and get it.

Once you install it on your Android handset, you’ll have the robot’s omnipresent eye following your every (finger) move on the device, although that’s pretty much all that Space Robot LiveWallpaper has to offer (that’s actually the name of the app in Google Play). Fret not though, as more features are promised by the developer for future updates.

Samsung Galaxy Nexus handset owners should make sure they follow these instructions after purchasing the live wallpaper in order for it to work properly:

It’s known that most live wallpapers will be slow on stock launcher (on some version of the galaxy nexus). The quick solution now will be using other launchers and turn on the Force GPU in developer mode.

 

In case Wheatley doesn’t mean much to you then it means you haven’t really played Portal 2, one of the best first-person puzzle computer games out there, where Wheatley the funny robot likes to hang out most of the time. Nevertheless, the live wallpaper app may be an interesting choice even for those Android users that have not experienced the Portal universe yet.

Nike+Running app Now come to Android

It took them long enough, but Nike has finally made its popular running app available on the Android platform. The Nike+ Running app can now be downloaded for free on Google Play.

Using the app, runners will not only be able to track their progress, but they can also share and compare their runs with over 7 million runners on Nike+ community website. The Android version of Nike+ Running app is optimized to run on the platform and comes with an intuitive user interface. With a seamless and simple in-run navigation, runners can easily check their stats, in-progress GPS maps, change songs to fit with the mood and more – all without losing their pace. There’s also an in-run audio feedback that tells the distance as they run.

Here are other features of Nike+ Running app:

• Run Summary — makes it easy to view your route and track how you felt, the terrain you tackled, and the weather you endured.
• Rotate your phone while viewing the Run Summary to see the breakdown of your run into mile splits.
• See how your last run stacks up against your previous seven, and get fresh insights based on your latest activity every time you come back to the app.
• Swipe upwards on the Home Screen to view your next moves.
• Visualize all your runs side-by-side and see your progress in a bar graph history view.
• Syncing your run to the Nikeplus.com website allows you to view your maps on a larger screen, set a new goal, and find Nike+ Top Routes in your area.
• Shoe tagging — type in the name of your running shoes to track the distance they’re logging and see when it’s time to lace up a new pair.
• Add a widget to your phone’s home screen to show when you ran last, display your total mileage, and for even quicker access into a run.

As we are about to enter the third quarter of the year, there’s still time to meet those New Year’s resolutions. Though Google Play isn’t short on running apps, the Nike+ Running app will be a fine addition to the list that can help keep track of your progress and even provide motivation.

Galaxy Note 2 Tweeted by Samsung Mobile Arabia, cheered by big-handed folks

As tech geeks move along to the next big thing from Samsung, all bespectacled eyes are now on the upcoming Galaxy Note 2 — the eagerly anticipated sequel to the phone and tablet hybrid that hasn’t even been announced yet by the company, but has already been causing some big waves on the blogging scene.

Fortunately, Samsung Mobile Arabia let loose on its Twitter account and almost confirmed the existence of Galaxy Note 2 in less than 140 characters.

Okay, so there may not be enough information to deduct from the tweet to get really excited about – but it’s as close to an official confirmation as we can get of the Galaxy Note 2 for now from a legitimate source.

Rumors and speculations often come from dubious places on the Internet, but we don’t think Samsung Mobile Arabia is one of them. If you remember a while back, the Gulf region was one of the first to be selling Samsung Galaxy S3 way ahead from the official launch date. So we can assume that the highly-guarded information somehow already traveled west from the bunker where the Samsung Galaxy Note 2 is being secretly developed in South Korea.

In case you missed the rumored specs, the Galaxy Note 2 is expected to come with an unbreakable 5.3-inch display (possibly larger), quad-core processor, bigger battery, Android 4.1 Jellybean, and an October release date.

LG Optimus L3 E405 with Dual-SIM unveiled, Go to Europe and Asia in July

LG unveiled the Optimus L trio of smartphones back in February at the MWC, but what the Koreans forgot to mention at the time was they were planning to bring not just three handhelds to the market, but (at least) five.

The middle device of the series, the Optimus L5, has already gotten a dual-SIM version announced a few days ago and now the low-end L3 has itself been served with a “doppelganger”. The Optimus L3 E405 is the full name of this new smartphone, which looks exactly the same as the original L3 E400, comes with pretty much the same tech specs and features, but adds dual-SIM capabilities.

As you might suspect, we’re not expecting the Optimus L3 E405 Dual to come to the United States very soon (dual-SIM is not that hot in the US), but it might pop up all over Europe and Asia in a matter of weeks.

The very first market to receive it will be, a bit bizarrely, Ukraine, where it will be made available at a yet to be specified date in July for 1,500 UAH (around $186, at today’s conversion rates). Afterwards, the L3 Dual will land in Russia (LG Russia’s listing confirms it), and, while there’s no official confirmation, we’re also expecting to see it in the rest of Europe and at least parts of Asia.

Unfortunately, although dual-SIM is a feature some of you might be interested in, you should know that the LG Optimus L3 E405 doesn’t come with dual-SIM standby or active dual-SIM. Instead, you get a “convenient button to instantly change the active SIM-card to make calls”. In other words, you can fit two SIM cards under the phone’s hood, but only use one at a time.

If this inconvenience doesn’t bug you and you’re still interested in the phone, let’s quickly recap its tech specs and features. Sporting a 3.2-inch touchscreen with 320 x 240 pixels resolution, the L3 E405 is powered by an 800 MHz MSM7225A processor with Adreno 200 GPU and runs Android Gingerbread 2.3.6 out of the box.

There’s no Ice Cream Sandwich update scheduled for the 3.2-incher just yet, while the rest of the tech specs are themselves rather modest and include 384 MB of RAM, 1 GB of internal memory, a 3.15 MP rear-facing camera, a microSD card slot, WiFi, GPS and Bluetooth 3.0 connectivity.

The phone’s design is not half bad and the 110 grams (3.9 ounces) weight is actually decent, so all in all the quality-price ratio could be called fair. Do you guys agree? Will you be looking for the LG Optimus L3 E405 when it’ll start selling? Would you want to see it made available in the US as well? Let us know with a comment below.

Review Video of how ICS runs on Droid Razr and Droid Razr Maxx

Haven’t gotten Android 4.0.4 Ice Cream Sandwich update yet on your Motorola Droid Razr and Razr Maxx? The update has been  made available starting June 22 to a select number of users, with a wider roll out can be expected for the coming days – so give it a bit more time. Although by now you’ve probably learnt by heart what to expect from ICS on your Razr devices, here’s a demo video that Motorola just posted to get your heart racing once more.

Feast your eyes on all of the bells and whistles that come with the latest OS. From the new lock screen that lets you jump straight to making calls, taking pictures and more, to face unlock, data usage monitor, real-time voice typing, as well as some Motorola-specific apps like Smartactions and Webtop – they’re all shown off in the video.

  

Along with the new ICS operating system, the upgrade will also turn your Droid Razr and Razr Maxx global ready, which is a first for Verizon. This means you can take your Droid Razr and Razr Maxx out of the country and use voice and data service in over 220 countries. Naturally, you’ll have to subscribe to an international plan with the Big Red.

So, any signs of ICS yet on the horizon? For folks who have received the cold treat, how do you like the new look and feel of your Droid Razr and Droid Razr Maxx?

Firefox come to Android with something BIG next week

Mozilla Firefox was for a long while the best alternative to Microsoft’s once-ubiquitous Internet Explorer. But those times have longed passed, and now Google’s Chrome is leading the assault against the IE fortress. Nevertheless, Firefox still has a huge user base and a dedicated community behind it, that has worked hard in the recent months to make up the ground that Firefox lost to Chrome.

These days, the fiercest battles are fought on the mobile front, where Chrome has gained a solid foothold as soon as it became available on ICS devices. In addition, Firefox has found some worthy opponents in mobile- only browsers, such as Dolphin, which is apparently, the highest performing HTML5 mobile browser.

Although Firefox is late at the mobile browser game, Mozilla will not give up without a fight. And apparently, something BIG (capitalization not mine) is coming as soon as next week for Firefox on Android. Check out this tweet from Mozilla itself:

Hmm… Fast, smart, safe. Pretty much all we want from a browser. Mozilla might be preparing a major update to Firefox for Android, or they might surprise us with something completely new. We can’t help notice that Google I/O is also taking place next week. Could the two events be related in any way?

Thats great news from Frirefox, we’ll just have to wait and see.

Bell Galaxy S3 Launch in market of june 27

Just like American carriers, which have delayed their Galaxy S3 launch thanks to an overwhelming response from consumers, Canadian mobile operators have also pushed back the launch date of Samsung phone. But it looks like at least Bell has started to receive Galaxy S3 shipments, which is good news for consumers.

MobileSyrup reports that the phone started to arrive “at Bell locations across Canada – both in Pebble Blue and Marble White.” Therefore, we expect all other Canadian carriers to receive their own Galaxy S3 units, although we have no similar confirmation mentioning other mobile operators in the region.

The Galaxy S3 is supposed to start selling on June 27 in the country, with Bell employees being forbidden to make the phone available to the crowds anytime sooner.

Galaxy S3 buyers should also know that the phone is again available for pre-order from Best Buy Canada, although only in-store pre-orders that require a $50 down payment are taken at this time. The pre-order period expires on June 26, a day ahead of the local Galaxy S3 launch.

Are you buying a Bell Galaxy S3 or will you get the smartphone from a different carrier?

Presentation video of ASUS Transformer Pad Infinity TF700, launch should be around the corner

A couple weeks back, we reported exclusively on ASUS’ plans for its tablet lineup, including the long-rumored Nexus 7 tablet (to debut at Google I/O next week), the ASUS Padfone, and the ASUS Transformer Pad Infinity TF700.

Many people are excited over the Pad Infinity, which was announced at the beginning of the year, but hasn’t been yet released in the Western markets. According to the anonymous ASUS representative we talked to at Computex, the TF700 will be launched in the US at the end of June.

So far, ASUS kept mum about the Infinity and offered no official information about the upcoming launch. However, a presentation video for the TF700 just surfaced, giving us hope that the launch of the sleek transformer is indeed just around the corner.

The unlisted video was leaked by a redditor, who calls it a “launch video”. Not exactly the most reliable source, but the video does fit nicely with the other information we got so far on the TF700.

We’ll update you next week as soon as we learn anything about the launch date of the ASUS Transformer Pad Infinity. In the meantime, watch the leaked “launch video”, it’s quite enjoyable!

How to Backing Up Your iPhone Contacts Without iTunes

Anytime you use iCloud or iTunes to back up an iPhone or iOS device, the Contacts will be backed up automatically assuming the default settings are preserved. If you want to store an additional backup outside of iTunes and iCloud however, by far the easiest way to do that is with Address Book.

This will create a portable vCard file that contains all contact information, this can be stored anywhere as a manual backup and it can also be sent to other devices and imported to other phones, operating systems, email clients, and much more.

1. Launch Address Book from the Applications folder
2. Pull down the “File” menu and go to “Export” and then to “Export vCard”       
3. Set the save destination and name the .vcf file something like “Contacts-Backup”

The file you just exported is the contacts list backup. The vCard format is widely accepted and can be imported into just about anything else while preserving all names, emails, phone numbers, and whatever other data you had entered.

In fact, if you attach the resulting .vcf file to an email and send it to another iOS device, Windows phone, or Android, you can actually transfer all the contacts to a new phone without using iTunes at all too. This is handy if you want to setup a new phone with only the contacts intact, are sharing contacts with a partner, or you are temporarily using another device and don’t want to manually sync it with a bunch of other stuff.

You can also easily send single contacts directly from iOS if you wish to back up a unique contact or just share it with someone else.

MacBook Air 2012 SSD Performance Faster than MacBook Air 2011

The MacBook Air 2012 is a screamer, and though the CPU-based benchmarks show about a 15-20% improvement over the MacBook Air 2011 models, by far the biggest performance boost comes from the new flash memory (SSD) that Apple is using for storage on the 2012 models. In our tests, the disk used in the newest MacBook Air models is up to 217% faster than the previous model years drives.

MacBook Air 2012 SSD: writes at 364MB/sec, reads at 461MB/sec

MacBook Air 2011 SSD: writes at 152MB/sec, reads at 145MB/sec

MacBook Air 2010 SSD: writes at 157MB/sec, reads at 188MB/sec

t is difficult to convey just how fast the newest MacBook Air is, but it’s safe to say the performance is extremely impressive and I haven’t ever used a laptop that feels faster. You can attribute that to the ultraquick flash storage.

Interestingly, the SSD tested within the MBA 2012 is the TS128E model, a Toshiba drive. The SSD tested with the MBA 2011 and 2010 models are Samsung. You may recall that Apple also ships faster Samsung drives in some MacBook Airs, that appears to still be going on with the 2012 updates which suggests the tested Toshiba flash drive is probably slightly slower than a Samsung model, though the performance difference between the two drives is likely to be completely negligible at this point.

All read and write speeds were benchmarked with DiskSpeedTest, a free disk testing app available from the Mac App Store.

Microsoft Surface Tablet with Windows 8 Takes Aim at iPad

Microsoft released Surface today, their direct competitor to the iPad and Android tablets. As you’d expect, the device is a touchscreen tablet but differs from the iPad in that it comes in two distinct versions; a traditional tablet model based on ARM architecture and runs only Windows RT – that’s Metro for those who don’t follow MS closely – and the other is a pro model based on Intel Ivy Bridge chips that runs full-fledged Windows 8 desktop.

Other than providing a look at Apple’s competition, perhaps most interesting to iPad users is the cover that ships with the tablet. Upon first appearance it looks like a Smart Cover knock-off, but it actually one-ups Apple’s offering by including a completely functional multitouch keyboard built directly into the cover itself. It certainly looks fascinating, and assuming it works well you can bet third party cover manufactures will be cranking out similar cases for the iPad soon.

Onto the Surface specs:

Surface – Standard model

• Windows RT (Metro-only interface)
• ARM CPU
• 32GB and 64GB available
• 1.5lbs
• 9.3mm thick enclosure made out of magnesium, with built-in stand
• 10.6″ ClearType HD Display (retina-ish?), 16×9 aspect ratio
• MicroSD card slot, USB 2.0, MicroHD video, 2×2 MIMO antennae (?)
• Bundled with Office Home & Student 2013 RT
• Multitouch cover with built-in keyboard

Surface – Pro model

• Windows 8 Pro (standard Windows desktop & Metro)
• Intel Ivy Bridge CPU
• 64GB and 128GB storage
• 2lbs
• 13.5mm
• 10.6″ ClearType Full HD Display (not sure how this differs from other model)
• MicroSDXC, USB 3.0, Mini DisplayPort, 2×2 MIMO
• Bundled with Touch Cover, Type Cover, and magnet stylus pen

Noticeably missing from either spec sheet provided by Microsoft is any word on battery life, device pricing, or availability of the Surface.

Here is Microsofts …unusual… promo video for Surface, it is more similar to the Motorola DROID commercials than any Apple advertisement:

4 Steps to Run 2880×1800 Native Resolution on MacBook Pro

The Retina MacBook Pro 15″ screen resolution is 2880×1800, but because of how a retina display works the effective resolution is 1440×900 and the onscreen elements are just running in HIDPI mode. Apple provides an option to run at 1920×1200 through System Preferences, but as of now there is no built-in approach to running the retina display at the screens true 1×1 native resolution of 2880×1800. Instead, you must activate the 2880×1800 option through a variety of third party approaches, the result of which is a gigantic amount of screen real estate, albeit with tiny onscreen elements. If that sounds good to you, here are three four different ways to enable the true 1-to-1 native res:


SwitchResX
A reasonably simple solution, SwitchResX is a third-party preference panel that allows you to run custom resolutions on any display. Install the preference panel, select the Retina Display, and add a custom resolution setting for 2880×1800.

• Download SwitchResX from the developer

This shareware app is free to use for 10 days before it wants to be registered. SwitchResX has a lot of technical customizations available within it, possibly making it overkill for this task.

SetResX
Probably the easiest option of them all, SetResX is a little menu-bar app that allows you to run 2880×1800 easily.

• Get SetResX (be sure to click the lower download link, not the ads on the page)

Hopefully the developer of SetResX will find a less shady site to host their app, but nonetheless SetResX is a nice little find by CultOfMac

scrutil
Slightly more advanced due to the nature of the command line, the free utility called screenutil gets the job done immediately with a quick entry into the Terminal:

• Get ScreenUtil now (direct download link)

Launch Terminal and drag and drop scrutil into the command line to use it once, but if plan on using it often it’s a good idea to toss scrutil into /usr/local/bin for easy future access. Once installed, changing the retina display to native 2880×1800 with screenutil is achieved with the following command:
 

scrutil s 2880 1800 16




The command will report back the resolution change, the 16 at the end is color depth so you can set that to something else if you’d like. You can set it back to the default resolution either through System Preferences or with scrutil s 1440 900.




ChangeResolution
ChangeResolution is a new tiny AppleScript front end to a command line utility that changes the resolution to 2880×1800:

• ChangeResolution

Pick whichever method best suits your needs, though with the Retina MacBook Pro just now starting to ship to many customers there’s a high likelihood that better options will soon be available. We’ll keep you posted.