Nokia to release Windows 8 tablets this June, top drawer Lumia in the works?

There's some intriguing Nokia news coming out of France this morning, thanks to Paul Amsellem, head of the company's Gallic outpost. In a recent interview with Parisian daily Les Echos, Amsellem described Nokia's aspirations to regain some of the market share it's lost within France, explaining that his firm is squarely targeting the 60 percent of French users who currently don't own a smartphone. More salient, however, is what the exec had to say about Nokia's plans for future releases. According to Amsellem, Espoo will unveil a new Windows 8 equipped tablet by June 2012. Unfortunately, that's about all he had to say on the subject, but it's certainly enough of a carrot to raise our heart rates -- as are Amsellem's comments on the Lumia 800, which hit French stores yesterday. Comparing the handset to a BMW 5 series, the chief went on to say that Nokia "will soon have a full range with a 7 Series and 3 Series." He didn't elaborate much on this analogy, though its implication is rather self-evident -- new Lumia cousins may be in the works. Of course, it remains to be seen when and if the company will expand upon its Lumia line, though we'll definitely be keeping our yeux on it.
DLNA and WiFi Direct are both pretty sweet technologies on their own but, together, they offer the promise of simple, wireless media streaming without the need for that pesky router middleman. The Digital Living Network Alliance has officially incorporated WiFi Direct into its interoperability guidelines, which means you could soon be streaming movies and music between devices (like your laptop and smartphone) without connecting to a home (or public) network. And don't forget, only one part of the equation needs to be WiFi Direct certified -- so don't worry that your aging computer doesn't support it, as long as your smartphone does you're golden. Check out the PR after the break.And just like that, HP joined the Ultrabook party. After announcing the Folio in Australia yesterday, the company went and made it official here in the states too. And man, do we get the feeling the outfit's been watching the competition very closely: this guy starts at $900 and comes standard with a 128GB mSATA SSD and a backlit keyboard. Provided it comes close to matching its promise of nine hours of battery life, it could give the identically priced Toshiba Portege Z830 a run for its money. Not to mention, it undercuts the MacBook Air ($1,299 and up), along with the ASUS Zenbook UX31 and Lenovo IdeaPad U300s, both of which start at $1,100 with a 128GB SSD and no backlit keyboard. Good on ya, HP.