October 2011 Archives

Oct

Google+ App Updated To 2.1 With Ice Cream Sandwich Styling, Major Enhancements And Bug Fixes

Posted by David Ruddock in Android OS, Applications, Ice Cream Sandwich 4.0, News

Update: It appears the widget for Google+ has disappeared in this update, and images now appear somewhat compressed and pixelated. ~~It's unclear if this is intentional~~ (It seems one of the app's developers has said the widget will return soon, over on Google+.)

The Google+ app team just dropped a surprisingly massive update onto the Market, and it brings changes galore. In fact, there's so many changes that they've called it a "completely new app." Take a look:

The UI has taken a turn towards the styling we've seen in Ice Cream Sandwich, and menus have been ...

Oct

Samsung Galaxy Tab 8.9 Or 10.1 LTE Coming To AT&T At Some Point According To FCC Filing

Posted by David Ruddock in 4G, AT&T, Galaxy Tab 10.1, Galaxy Tab 8.9, News

We try to avoid excessive posts about FCC filings that may or may not be for Android goodies coming to the US, but this one was a dead giveaway for AT&T. Just take a look:

The guys over at WirelessGoodness dug up this picture from a recent FCC filing, and it clearly shows the device is either a Tab 10.1 or 8.9, and that it has the official AT&T 4G LTE logo. Hard to call that a "rumor." It seems likely that AT&T will announce the device before the holiday season.

WirelessGoodness

...

Oct

Time Warner Cable Remote / Guide App Coming To Android At End Of November, Live Streaming On Ice Cream Sandwich Tablets Early 2012

Posted by David Ruddock in Android OS, Applications, News

Likely not wanting to get left behind by the likes of Comcast, whose XFINITY for Android app has been quite well-received, Time Warner Cable is preparing to release a comparable remote control app for its cable subscribers at the end of November.

The app will incorporate full set-top box remote control functionality, access to the DVR interface, and an in-app 7-day programming guide.

The app is being developed for Honeycomb tablets (the test device looks to be a Galaxy Tab 8.9 or 10.1), and TWC has indicated that it's possible the release could be pushed back a little beyond November ...

Oct

Pantech To Bring Non-Touch Gestures To Android Phones

Posted by Cameron Summerson in News, Pantech

Pantech is looking to pull itself out of the low-end budget phone ditch by bringing some pretty awesome non-touch gesture recognition to Android. Imagine this: you're working on a car, cleaning the kitchen, painting... anything that where you're hands are going to dirty or wet and you don't want to touch your phone. You receive an incoming call -- what do you do? How cool would it be to simply wave your hand over the device to answer? No touching. No getting it wet or dirty.

Sure, that sounds cool, but now you want to see it in action. You're ...

Oct

Ubuntu Plans To Head Into The Mobile Space, Confront Android Head-On

Posted by Cameron Summerson in Android OS, News

Oh snap, here comes another entry into the mobile OS game. Instead of some no-name third-party, though, Canonical has plans to step up to the plate with Ubuntu and see how it fares at on-the-go computing. Once the finishing touches have been put on the the upcoming LTS (long term service) release -- version 12.04 -- Canonical plans to start porting Ubuntu to mobile handsets, tablets, and even smart TVs.

Mark Shuttleworth, Canonical founder, stated that Android will be their primary competition, going as far as to say that Google's purchase of Motorola Mobility has "[shaken] up the hardware vendors, ...

Oct

Attention Devs: Need Help Testing Your App Before Launch? Apkudo Can Run It Through Nearly 300 Devices

Posted by Cameron Summerson in Android OS, Dev, News

One of the biggest problems that developers face with Android is the wide range of devices that run the OS. Different hardware, screen resolutions, Android versions, etc. make is extremely difficult for devs to ensure that their apps will run correctly on every single device. Apkudo is a service looking to change that by helping developers test their app on nearly 300 real-world devices.

Here's how it will work: devs submit their app to the Apkudo team, who will then run the app on some 289 different devices and return the results back to the submitting developer. Pretty awesome, no? ...

Oct

Titanium Backup [Pro] Can Now Restore Apps From ClockworkMod 5 Backups

Posted by Artem Russakovskii in Applications, Mods, News

Well, this didn't take long. A little while ago, a new app called AppExtractor that can restore individual apps from ClockworkMod backups appeared in the Market seemingly out of nowhere. The app was welcomed by many of us who do custom ROM flashing here and there, sometimes wishing we could only restore a few little things from our Nandroid backups rather than having to restore whole ROMs.

As of today, Titanium Backup, sort of a de facto app in the app backup/restore business on Android, can now do the same thing. Well, kind of - it can do a little ...

Oct

Barnes & Noble Having A Breakfast NOOK Event On November 7th, But How Will All Those Journalists Fit In One Room?

Posted by David Ruddock in Android OS, Barnes & Noble, News

It seems earlier suspicions that Barnes & Noble would be unveiling a replacement for the NOOK Color on November 7th have been all but confirmed by an e-mail invitation the company has sent out to major tech outlets:

There has been no reliable information about the next NOOK Color leaked at this point, though with a week to go, we won't be surprised if the device gets an unauthorized blurrycameo before its official unveiling.

What do you think, can B&N out-Kindle Amazon with the next NOOK Color? Amazon's extremely narrow (read: negative) profit margin on each Kindle Fire will make ...

Oct

Review: Philips Fidelio AS851 Android Speaker Dock - When An Awesome Speaker Meets An Amazing Dock

Posted by David Ruddock in Other Reviews, Reviews

I wouldn't exactly say it's a secret, but I'm a bit of a closet audiophile. I've reviewed a couple of audio products for Android devices in the past (like portable speakers and headphones), and am always interested in Android-friendly sound solutions.

Today, I'm taking a look at the Philips Fidelio AS851 (yes, that is kind of a lame name), Philips' top-of-the-line Android speaker dock. How can a speaker dock be designed for Android, you ask? Well, Philips realized that their popular line of iPhone docks could pretty easily be converted to be Android friendly by changing the dock connector ...

Oct

AT&T Announces Its First LTE Smartphones, The Samsung Galaxy S II Skyrocket And HTC Vivid

Posted by Cameron Summerson in AT&T, Galaxy S II Skyrocket, News, Vivid

If you've been waiting for AT&T to start announcing some smartphones for its LTE network, that time is over. Ma Bell just took the wraps off of its first two LTE-powered smartphones, and they're nothing short of impressive.

Samsung Galaxy S II Skyrocket

The GSII Skyrocket is an incremental upgrade to AT&T's current GSII, with quite a few beefed up specs:

4.5-inch 480*800 SuperAMOLED Plus display
1.5GHz dual-core processor
8MP rear shooter, 2MP front camera
16GB built-in storage, microSD card slot
Android 2.3.5

Anyone regret buying the first GSII yet?

HTC Vivid

Previously rumored as the Holiday, the Vivid ...

Oct

CyanogenMod 7.1 Nightlies Expanded To A Slew Of Devices, Including AT&T's Samsung Galaxy SII, Motorola Atrix 4G, Optimus Black, And Tons Of Xperias

Posted by Liam Spradlin in Android OS, Atrix 4G (Olympus), Dev, Galaxy S II, Sony Ericsson, Xperia Arc (Anzu, X12), Xperia Play (Zeus, PlayStation Phone), Xperia X10 (es209ra), Xperia X10 Mini / Mini Pro (Robyn / Mimmi)

It looks like the Cyanogenmod team, in a continued effort to bring continually-updated Gingerbread goodness to as many devices as possible, have brought nightlies to a new crop of handsets, including AT&T's variant of the Samsung Galaxy SII, the Motorola Atrix, LG's Optimus Black and a handful of Sony devices including the Xperia X10, Play, Arc (X12), X10 mini, ST18i, and about five others.

Update: Here are some of the popular device/codename mappings (mapping these took a significant and unnecessary amount of time. This is exactly why Artem posted this today):

AT&T Galaxy S II - galaxys2att

...

Oct

[Download] We'll See Your Nyandroid Logcat, And Raise You A Boot Animation

Posted by Liam Spradlin in Mods, Off-Topic

You may remember last month, when some developers cheekily requested that Android's logcat icon be replaced with an image of the famed nyan cat. You may also remember that their request was granted, boosting some users' productivity by up to "200%." Thanks to an anonymous benefactor, we've got something even better:

That's right, a nyandroid boot animation. Finally, you can see Andy rocketing through the galaxy, leaving a trail of rainbows behind, each and every time you switch on your device. Not sure how to install custom boot animations? Check out our guide before grabbing the download below.

Download: ...

Oct

Timeline Graphic: US Android Phone Releases - We're Definitely Moving Faster, But How Fast Is Too Fast?

Posted by David Ruddock in Android OS, Editorials

There's been some discussion of late that, perhaps, Android phone manufacturers are iterating handsets at a pace which is detrimental to product polish and subsequent software support. In fact, a couple of days ago I took a look at the state of Android phones on US carriers with a few simple charts.

I also promised to write another post looking at how quickly, as opposed to how prolifically, Android handsets are moving in the US marketplace. I decided to look at two carriers - T-Mobile and Verizon. In the interest of cleaning up the timelines, I decided not to include ...

Oct

What I Learned About Sprint's Past And Current Data Problems As Well As Future Upgrade Plans After Reaching Out To CEO Dan Hesse

Posted by Artem Russakovskii in 4G, News, Sprint

Last Updated: January 13th, 2012

Sprint has network problems. Major problems. And they've gotten a lot worse lately. Really, really bad. Not all areas are affected - and in fact some have improved already, but more and more areas are getting so bad that Sprint's 3G data is completely unusable there, especially since the introduction of the iPhone. Troubleshooting and update my phone's "profile" and PRL didn't help, as evident from the screenshot #2 you see below.

Earlier this week I contacted Sprint's customer service, followed by an email to an executive and CEO Dan Hesse himself (or whoever fields his emails). The ...

Oct

[Weekend Poll] Is Gaming On Android Lackluster?

Posted by Aaron Gingrich in Games, Polls

This is the latest in our Weekend Poll series. For last week's, see What Ice Cream Sandwich Feature/Improvement Are You Most Excited About?

A few days ago, a post by Industry Gamers titled "GTA Developer Blasts Mobile Gaming for Being Focused on Money Over Quality" sparked quite a debate between Artem and me. We are both fairly old-school gamers, with a history of playing games via consoles and PCs since childhood. Despite both of us being long-time gamers, we had utterly different opinions on the current Android gaming situation.

See, Artem was of the opinion that gaming on ...