Brian O'Toole - 4/18 - Android Police - Android News, Apps, Games, Phones, Tablets

Brian O'Toole

Having learnt his writing techniques reading e-Books of Sherlock Holmes, Brian now spends his time /kicking, lurking, SSHing and encoding.

Jan

CES 2011: Video Walkthrough Of Toshiba's Anonymous Tegra II Tablet

Posted by Brian O'Toole in Honeycomb 3.0/3.1/3.2, News, Thrive / Regza / Antares / AT100, Toshiba

Last Updated: April 16th, 2011

While Toshiba's original attempts at an Android tablet running on the Tegra chip didn't exactly go down a storm, they seem keen to continue with Android devices, and brought a new tablet with them to CES. Artem got a video demo from one of their reps, and as you can see there are some attractive features to note.

Like the Motorola XOOM, the nameless Toshiba tablet (henceforth "Anon") has a 10.1" WXGA (1280x800) screen, which was unsurprisingly nice and crisp. It also sports the convenience of full-size USB and HDMI ports, along with a full SD card slot allowing for storage expansion up to 64 GB.

Jan

CES 2011: Opera For Tablets Demo [Video]

Posted by Brian O'Toole in Applications, News, Videos

Opera Software's Jeremy Forrester spent some time showing off Opera's latest browser, which was designed specifically for tablets. The browser was shown running on Samsung's Galaxy Tab.

The browser is not completely finished, but you can get a good idea of how it performs in the video above. It works nicely with Adobe Flash and should provide a familiar experience to those who are have used Opera's previous mobile browsers. More info will be made available by Opera come MWC in February.

Jan

CES 2011: ASUS's Eee Pad MeMO - Dual-Core Snapdragon Sketchpad

Posted by Brian O'Toole in ASUS, Honeycomb 3.0/3.1/3.2, News

Last Updated: January 11th, 2011

ASUS turned a few heads with their recent device unveilings, with one of the more intriguing ones being their Eee Pad MeMO. Unlike almost every other tablet device here at CES, the MeMO is not using a Tegra II processor but will instead be powered by the latest Snapdragon. The MSM8260 is the first dual core processor we've seen from Qualcomm, and we were eager to put the 1.2 GHz chip through its paces. Unfortunately, the MeMO crashed during the 3D rendering section of the Quadrant benchmark. Prior to this, the Neocore benchmark had gone into some kind of endless loop, so our attempts at empirical measurement of the device's capabilities were frustrated.

Jan

CES 2011: A Look At RCA's Android TV Prototype

Posted by Brian O'Toole in Google TV, News

At the RCA booth today we got a quick glimpseat something they're working on. It's a 42" full HD TV, that runs Android 2.2 at the same time. The OS can be controlled from the TV's remote or with what looked strikingly similar to the Brando Rii Bluetooth keyboard. The UI is a custom media-centric launcher which allows you to view images and videos on the large screen. Around the back we found a USB port which indicates that you should be able to play external media from your own storage devices.

As you can see in the notecard, the Android TV supposedly has access to the Android Market.

Jan

CES 2011: Deep Dive Preview Of The Sony Ericsson Xperia arc - Video Walkthrough And Details Galore

Posted by Brian O'Toole in Gingerbread 2.3, News, Sony Ericsson, Videos, Xperia Arc (Anzu, X12)

Last Updated: January 11th, 2011

Following on from their press release on Wednesday, Sony Ericsson invited the media this morning to a designated conference room at the Hard Rock Hotel for some play time with their newest Android device. We spent over an hour with the handset to get an idea of what to expect when it hits the market.

The reps there acknowledged the difficulties they had experienced with their previous Android handsets, and showed what appeared to be decisive commitment to putting those hold-ups behind them. With the Xperia arc (sic), Sony Ericsson has trumped its competition at CES with the first Gingerbread device to be announced since the Nexus S.

Jan

CES 2011: Hands-On With Motorola's Dual-Core Atrix 4G For AT&T: There's A Dock For That

Posted by Brian O'Toole in AT&T, Atrix 4G (Olympus), Motorola, News, Videos

At Motorola's booth today, we got a chance to play with the Atrix 4G - a dual-core HSPA+ equipped slate handset, sporting a whopping 1GB of RAM and packing a couple of notable features. Along with the laptop dock demoed in the video below, the Atrix 4G also has a media dock (called "HD dock") which allows you to connect it to a larger screen (and use the same WebTop desktop-like interface) as well as plug in a keyboard and a mouse. The Motorola rep also informed us of plans for regular charging and car docks, so it looks like wherever you may be, the Atrix will have a bespoke resting place.

Jan

CES 2011: Hands-On With T-Mobile's Dual-Core HSPA+ Dell Streak 7 Android Tablet

Posted by Brian O'Toole in Dell, Devices By Manufacturer, News, Streak 7, Videos

At T-Mobile's press schmoozing session this evening, a few HSPA+ devices were available for the blogging masses to clench in their clammy hands. One in particular that we were keen to try was the Dell Streak 7, the new big brother of the original Dell Streak (Mini 5), announced earlier today. With the 7" tablet boasting a Tegra II dual-core processing unit, our interest was piqued, so we took a look in the video below:

As you can see, the performance fell short of the hype and anticipation that many of us felt with this CES's dual-core bonanza. It might be slightly hard to detect with the frame rate of the video recording, but scrolling still felt choppy despite the power contained within.

Jan

CES 2011: Quick Hands-On With Verizon's LG Revolution: 4G LTE In A Semi-Stock 4.3" Package

Posted by Brian O'Toole in LG, News, Revolution, Verizon Wireless, Videos

At Verizon's 4G event today, we got some quick demo time with LG's initial LTE offering, the Revolution. Sporting a trendy 4.3" display, the device is obviously geared towards content creation and consumption. Not only does it include a 720P-capable 5 MP camera on the back, it also makes a mark with it a 1.3 MP front facing camera for video calls.

Unfortunately, it only has a single-core processor, clocking in at 1 GHz with 512 MB RAM alongside, but that shouldn't stop it from being a fairly decent performer all around. Best of all, the version of Froyo that LG has chosen to ship the Revolution with looks relatively uncontaminated, and with merely a tinted status bar here and altered icon there, the changes seem fairly forgivable in the near-mandatory custom UI sphere of Android lately.

Dec

ADW Launcher Ex Finally Released, Transitions To A Whole New Dimension

Posted by Brian O'Toole in Applications, Apps/Games, Development, News

Those of you acquainted with the inimitable Ander Webbs have been waiting for this one for a while. Once dubbed ADW Freak, the souped-up version of everyone's favourite open-source launcher has arrived, and it's now named ADW Ex.

On the surface, Ex brings ... well, it brings crazy transitions and UI effects, mainly. But underneath all that is some pretty impressive performance improvements. In a launcher, the real place where performance counts is in the drawer scrolling, and if you've been feeling that ADW is a bit laggy lately, Ex will quell your frustration with its silky smoothness. Combine that with some cheekily named "4D" effects, a handful of desktop scrolling transitions, and the ability to tinker with your desktop icons and you have a pretty compelling revamp of this third-party desktop stalwart.

Dec

HTC Hints At Its Next 4G Phone, Unveil Coming January 6th - A Verizon Phone At Last?

Posted by Brian O'Toole in HTC, News, Thunderbolt (Mecha)

HTC's released plenty of phones lately, but Verizon - arguably the biggest Android carrier - hasn't been getting any love since way back with the release of the Droid Incredible. What better way to bring it all back than with an LTE launch phone? Judging from HTC's rather smug (who can blame them?) teaser page, they're set to hit the ground running with a launch of the "Incredible HD" on January 6th. That coincides happily with the start of the Consumer Electronics Show, where Verizon are already expected to be pushing their LTE agenda.

It may not be the only LTE device readying itself for action with Big Red, but staunch HTC fans have been somewhat starved of choice on the famously reliable CDMA network of late.