Aaron Gingrich - 3/72 - Android Police - Android News, Apps, Games, Phones, Tablets

Aaron Gingrich

Aaron is a geek who has always had a passion for technology. When not working or writing, he can be found spending time with his family, playing a game, or watching a movie.

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Oct

Lenovo IdeaTab S2110 Review: Good Display, Bad Everything Else

Posted by Aaron Gingrich in Ideatab S2110, News, Tablet Reviews

This post is part two of a two-part review of the IdeaTab A2109 and S2110. Accordingly, the intro and software sections apply here as well. For your convenience, I've copied them here.

For part one (the review of the A2109), please click here.

There's no doubt the Android tablet market is heating up much like the phone market was a few years ago. Where before there were relatively few choices, manufacturers are now rolling out new models left and right - sometimes, it seems, with reckless abandon. It's almost like Newton's third law in action: for every great tablet released, an equal but opposite tablet is released.

Oct

Lenovo IdeaTab A2109 Review: The Name Is About As Good As The Tablet

Posted by Aaron Gingrich in Ideatab A2109, News, Tablet Reviews

This is part one of a two-part review of the IdeaTab A2109 and S2110. Part two (the S2110 review) will be published tomorrow.

Oct

[Weekend Poll] If The Major Manufacturers All Made Similar Nexus Phones, Whose Would You Buy?

Posted by Aaron Gingrich in HTC, LG, Motorola, Polls, Samsung

This is the latest in our Weekend Poll series. For last week's, see How Much Total Storage Do You Need In A Phone?

Let's say that the rumors (and evidence?)of a Nexus program are true, and Motorola, Samsung, LG, and HTC are all making Nexus phones for release before the end of the year. For the sake of our poll, let's just pretend that they are all powered by the same CPU, GPU, and RAM, and had roughly the same screen size and resolution. Let's also say that there are no custom UIs used. As a result, updates are handled by Google directly, meaning they can be rolled out across all of the devices at roughly the same time.

Oct

HTC Promises Jelly Bean For One X And One S To Begin Rolling Out In October

Posted by Aaron Gingrich in Jelly Bean 4.1, News, One S (Ville), One X (Endeavor)

Tucked away in HTC's press release about the HTC One X+ and Sense 4+ was one tidbit that should make quite a few people happy:

The Android Jelly Bean with HTC™ Sense 4+ update is scheduled to begin rolling out for the HTC One™ S and HTC One™ X from October.

As most of you probably already know, Jelly Bean (Android 4.1) is the most polished version of Android yet. Coupled with some of the "enhancements" in Sense 4+ - namely, the improved camera software and the Get Started functionality - it should be quite a nice update. With the rollout scheduled to begin "from October," it seems safe to assume it should be out en masse by the end of the year.

Oct

HTC Announces Sense 4+ With Camera Enhancements, Easy Device Setup

Posted by Aaron Gingrich in HTC, News, One X+

Last Updated: October 26th, 2012

In its One X+ announcement, HTC also announced some changes to Sense. While none were groundbreaking (so don't expect a visual overhaul) and not a lot of details were revealed, the company did mention a few things were being upgraded.

^{Protip: the image on the left is gigantic when full-sized. Apparently HTC's target date was September 24.}

The camera software seems to have received the bulk of the changes, starting with the front-facer, which now includes Self Portrait mode (previewed below, left). As you'd expect, it makes taking self-shots easier by "detecting the human face at various angles and applying subtle enhancements to skin and eyes" - in other words, it auto-'Shops you.

Sep

[Weekend Poll] How Much Total Storage Do You Need In A Phone?

Posted by Aaron Gingrich in Polls

This is the latest in our Weekend Poll series. For last week's, see What Was Your First Version Of Android?

These days, it seems like the push is towards storing most content on the cloud, rather than on-device. We can stream all of our music and movies from the web and our photos are seamlessly backed up as well. In fact, it seems like aside from games, only a small portion of our content needs to be stored locally. Then again, some people insist on storing everything they have on their phone at all times. It's not uncommon to hear complaints that a device has just 32GB of storage dozens of times.

Sep

Amazon Kindle Fire (2012) Review: For The Budget Minded, A Great Entertainment Device - But Not Much Else

Posted by Aaron Gingrich in Amazon, Kindle Fire, News, Tablet Reviews

According to Amazon, the original (2011) model of the Kindle Fire (KF) captured 22% of the tablet market. Whether or not you believe that figure, it was almost certainly the most popular Android tablet of the year. When compared to the often-times much more expensive tablets on the market, it was easy to see why: the Kindle fire offered 90% of the experience for 50% (or less) of the price.

But that was before the competition hit back. Samsung released the comparable (but more capable) Galaxy Tab 2 7.0 in April, and even with a keyboard and USB adapter, it cost just $250.

Sep

Sony Tablet S Software Update Rolling Out In The US With Goodies From Xperia Tablet S

Posted by Aaron Gingrich in News, Tablet S

Sony's Tablet S (or "S1") was released over a year ago to little hubbub. Still, that's not keeping the increasingly-awesome Sony from shooting a new update out for it with many of the software features of its successor, the Xperia Tablet S. None of them are especially mind-blowing, but they certainly add functionality:

Guest Mode
Redesigned media players
More "Small" (floating) apps
Expanded functionality for the remote control app
New widgets
Social Feed Reader Cloud has been updated to Socialife
Oddly, they suggest people also download Watch Now from the Play store

Otherwise, things stay basically the same. There are no Android updates included (still 4.0.3), nor other changes, from what we can see.

Sep

Google Play Store Surpasses 25 Billion App Downloads, Has A $0.25 Sale To Celebrate

Posted by Aaron Gingrich in Android OS, Apps/Games, News

You may remember that in December of last year, Google announced they had surpassed 10 billion app downloads in the Play Store, and had a $0.10 sale to celebrate. Today, the company is announcing that the Play Store has hit a whopping 25 billion app downloads. It took over 3 years to hit 10 billion; it took just 9 months more to hit 25 billion.

Accordingly, the Play Store is again having a sale for the next five days, with many products discounted to just $0.25:

Every day you’ll be able to choose from a collection of apps from some of the world’s top developers including Gameloft, Electronic Arts, Rovio, runtastic, Full Fat and more.

Sep

[Weekend Poll] What Was Your First Version Of Android?

Posted by Aaron Gingrich in Android OS, Polls

This is the latest in our Weekend Poll series. For last week's, see Will You Be Buying A New Kindle?

Earlier this week, Ron gave us an interesting look at what codenames came before Android 1.5, Cupcake (spoiler: 1.1 was "petit four," and 1.0 didn't have any codename at all). It's hard not to read the post without taking a nostalgic walk down memory lane, isn't it? I still remember heading into my local T-Mobile store to play with the G1 when it launched.

My life with Android officially started on June 4, 2010, with the launch of the HTC EVO 4G - and with Android 2.1, Éclair.