While today’s smartphones may boast just as many pixels as your television and a faster processor than your PC, they’re not great at going outdoors. Drop any of them onto hard concrete without a case and you can almost guarantee you’re in for a pricey repair bill. That’s not the case with the new Samsung Xcover 2, however.

Announcing just this morning, the Xcover 2 is “the ideal smartphone for active explorers who are enjoying outdoor lifestyles and seeking a durable mobile device with essential smartphone capabilities.”

Samsung vice president JK Shin has confirmed that the company will be announcing the Galaxy Note 8.0 at Mobile World Congress next month, but you don’t need to wait until then to see what it’ll look like. Thanks to these pictures of the device out in the wild, we can see that the iPad mini competitor looks a lot like a giant Galaxy S III, with a traditional button setup that’s unlike other Galaxy tablets.

We like STM. They generally make stuff that’s inexpensive,and a little unusual — and also with lots of useful pockets, which probably has something to do with kangaroos.

STM’s latest offerings are the Skinny series cases for the Samsung Galaxy Note 10.1 and the Tab 2 10.1, both of which ditch pockets in favor of svelteness.

If you believe recent reports and predictions from analysts, Apple must make its iPhone cheaper or introduce a low-cost model if it wants to compete with Samsung going forward. The Korean company currently boasts the largest smartphone market share in the United States, and its lead is expected to increase throughout 2013. But did you know that Apple has actually sold more devices? 88 million more, in fact.

Raymond James analyst Tavis McCourt has been comparing Apple’s cumulative smartphone sales with Samsung’s, and it appears the Cupertino company’s iPhone outsold the Galaxy S and Galaxy Note lines 219 million to 131 million.

LAS VEGAS, CES 2013 – We’re always a bit stumped at how PhoneSuit is able to stuff so much battery in to their batteries. Their new Flex line is another great example; those little battery logs above each contain 2600 mAh of juice, which is more than any iPhone battery case I can think of. And that’s not even the coolest thing about them.