Found 41 articles
18
Nov
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Ready For Black Friday? Verizon Discounting Plans, US Cellular Offering Cheap Phones Galore

Posted by in News, US Cellular, Verizon Wireless

Now that everyone and their cousin's friend are preparing for Thanksgiving and the national shopping day that follows (Black Friday), we're starting to see some great deals popping up, especially from carriers looking to sway over new customers.

One such carrier, US Cellular, announced today that it will be offering "door-busting" bargains on all four of its Android phones in celebration of Black Friday, beginning November 22 and ending on the 29th. Their deals aren't really mind-blowing in comparison with some of Wirefly's recent deals, but they're quite a bit cheaper than US Cellular's regular prices:

  • Samsung Mesmerize - $99.99 after an $80 mail-in-rebate
  • HTC Desire (see our review here) - $49.99 after an $80 mail-in-rebate
  • LG Apex - $0.00 after an $80 mail-in-rebate
  • Samsung Acclaim - $0.00 after an $80 mail-in-rebate

In related news, Verizon Wireless will be rewarding customers who add a new 3G smartphone to their existing plans by subtracting $9.99 from their monthly bill, the same cost as adding a line.

17
Nov
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Motorola Droid Pro Unboxing And Hands-On

Posted by in Droid Pro, Motorola, Phone Reviews, Reviews, Verizon Wireless
Last Updated: July 24th, 2011

So... what can I say? It's the Droid Pro, Android's answer to the Blackberry, the Blackberry running Android - in short, the phone that's supposed to kill off RIM once and for all. But is it? Our review unit just arrived in the mail today, and while I'm not ready to do a full review just yet, I am ready to give you my initial impressions as well as an overview of what's in the box. Ready? Read on!

The Unboxing

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The box is standard fare for a Droid device - black, gray, and red, except for the Droid Pro name, which is inscribed in white.

13
Nov
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Android 2.2 Froyo Coming To European Dell Streak Before The End Of The Month

Posted by in Dell, Froyo 2.2, News, Streak

Android 2.2 isn't new by any means, but if you're using Dell's five-inch Streak, it looks like you're only now going to receive the update:

dell-streat-froyo-e1289615346709

Worse still, this only applies to Streaks in the UK - the rest of us will just have to keep holding out. Before you go off to silently pout in a corner, though, there is one more twist to this story - what's actually contained in the update:

11-13-10-streakfroyo000 11-13-10-streakfroyo2001 

11-13-10-streakfroyo2003 11-13-10-streakfroyo2004 

To recap, it looks like Dell will soon be allowing customers to download the update  directly from its website (much like Motorola has done with the Backflip and the Cliq for the update to Éclair), although actually installing the update will wipe all data from the device.

12
Nov
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Amazon Wireless Temporarily Drops All Of Its 6 AT&T Android Phones Down To $0.01: Backflip, Bravo, Xperia X10, Flipout, Flipside, Captivate

Posted by in AT&T, Backflip, Bravo, Captivate, Flipout / Twist, Flipside, News, Xperia X10 (es209ra)

Amazon Wireless, Amazon's mobile arm, launched a big sale on all AT&T Android phones today in a weekend promotion that could easily rival even the upcoming Black Friday deals (BF is happening on Nov 25th). All of the AT&T Android phones Amazon Wireless carries are temporarily exactly 1 penny:

  • Motorola Backflip
  • Motorola Bravo
  • Motorola Flipout
  • Motorola Flipside
  • Sony Xperia X10
  • Samsung Captivate

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In addition to the above, a few other Android and some Win Phone 7 (if you're into that sort of thing) phones are also bearing the sweet sticker price of a mere cent:

  • HTC Droid Incredible
  • Motorola Droid 2
  • Motorola Citrus
  • HTC Surround (Win Phone 7)
  • LG Quantum (Win Phone 7)

Get them while they're hot out of the oven - the promotion ends November 15th.

10
Nov
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Motorola Backflip Finally Officially Hits Android 2.1

Posted by in AT&T, Backflip, Eclair 2.1, Motorola, News

It's hardly the latest and greatest, but it's a hell of a lot better than what users of the AT&T Backflip were stuck on previously - that's right, a manual update to Android 2.1 Éclair for the much ballyhooed device is now up on both AT&T's and Motorola's servers.

It's not an OTA (over the air), and it comes with an installation guide worthy of a novel, just like the Cliq yesterday. Unlike the Cliq upgrade, however, Backflip owners have a choice of an automated online upgrade tool in addition to the manual approach. Hey - we'll take our dessert regardless of the delivery method.

09
Nov
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Motorola CLIQ 2.1 Éclair Update Now Officially Available, Complete With The Longest Installation Instructions EVER

Posted by in CLIQ / DEXT (Morrison), Eclair 2.1, Motorola, News

Motorola CLIQ owners have been waiting for this day for a very-very-very long time, but, believe it or not, it's finally here. Following the leaked version from 3 weeks ago, the official Éclair for you phones (but not CLIQ XT just yet) is now available from Motorola - not as an OTA, but as a downloadable .zip.

Why Motorola put together the longest update instructions I've ever seen, with more warnings than a prescription drug, is beyond me - it seems to me like the same effect could have been achieved via the existing OTA (over-the-air) update mechanism Android already supports.

07
Nov
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AT&T Motorola Bravo And Flipside Now Available For $130/$100 From AT&T, $0 From Amazon And Wirefly

Posted by in AT&T, Bravo, Flipside, Motorola, News

No matter what you say about AT&T (i.e. how long can they keep locking down sideloading no their Android phones?), at least their commitment to Android has definitely picked up compared to only a few months ago.

Today, as expected, 2 more new Android phones are available on AT&T, namely Motorola Backflip and Motorola Flipout.

Motorola Bravo

The Bravo is a slightly more upscale of the two, but still fails to impress me in any way other than being DLNA-enabled. To refresh your memory, here are the Bravo specs:

  • TI OMAP 3610 800 MHz processor
  • No physical keyboard
  • 512 MB RAM, 2 GB ROM, 2GB microSD preinstalled
  • 3.7", 854 x 480 FWVGA screen
  • 802.11 b/g/n WiFi
  • MOTOBLUR
  • 3MP camera with auto-focus (ugh)
  • DLNA-enabled
  • 1540 mAh battery
  • Android 2.1

The Bravo is available from AT&T for $129.99, but also showed up on Amazon for $0.01 and Wirefly for free.

30
Oct
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The Revenge Of El Jobso - Apple Countersues Motorola

Posted by in Motorola, News

 

At the beginning of the month (October 6 to be exact), Motorola sued Apple for infringing 18 of its patents, including ones as diverse as antenna design and multi-design synchronization. Of course, being a company run by El Jobso himself, Apple just couldn't help it - they just had to strike back.

10-30-10applemotopt

And strike back the fruit-themed company has, claiming Motorola's Android phones infringe on six Apple patents, including (but not limited to) the:

  • Droid
  • Droid 2
  • Droid X
  • Cliq
  • Cliq XT
  • Backflip
  • Devour A555
  • Devour i1
  • Charm

The patents?

  • 7,812,828, Ellipse Fitting for Multi-Touch Surfaces
  • 7,663,607, Multipoint Touchscreen
  • 5,379,430, Object-Oriented System Locator System
  • 7,497,949, Touch Screen Device, Method, and Graphical User Interface for Determining Commands by Applying Heuristics
  • 6,493,002, Method and Apparatus for Displaying and Accessing Control and Status Information in a Computer System
  • 5,838,315, Support for Custom User-Interaction Elements in a Graphical, Event-Driven Computer System

It's not surprising to see Apple re-enforcing its scrolling patent (that would be patent #7,497,949) yet again, and since the company filed the cases in the Western District of Wisconsin (a court with a reputation for being nice to the plaintiffs), Motorola might be in deep with the sharks here.

22
Oct
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[Updated With Mirror] Motorola Cliq Gets Manual Update To Android 2.1 Éclair

Posted by in CLIQ / DEXT (Morrison), Eclair 2.1, Motorola, News
Last Updated: October 24th, 2010

It's been a long and difficult journey for Cliq owners, but it looks like the finish line may just be around the corner – Motorola is now allowing a limited number of users to test out the update to Android 2.1 Eclair.

Jealous? Don't be - thanks to the folks over at Android Central, the rest of us get to join in on the fun too. Unfortunately, the process isn't exactly as simple as an OTA, so here's how to do it:

  1. Download the update file (it should be called "Blur_Version.2.1.5.MB200.T-Mobile.en.US.zip") from here.

    Update: It was bound to happen sooner or later - the file at the link above has been pulled.

18
Oct
ATT-Uverse-logo-2009

AT&T U-verse Mobile TV App Now Available For (Select) AT&T Android Phones

Posted by in Applications, AT&T, News

 

I'm usually not too fond of carrier's bloatware, manufacturer's skins, and other causes of lag and potential frustration for end users (not to mention that I'm especially skeptical when it's coming from AT&T), but AT&T's new U-verse Mobile app for Android isn't looking too bad. To be clear, this isn't anything new; the app's already been available for the iPhone, the Blackberry, and the Xbox 360 in addition to being available on Windows Phone 7 devices at launch, but now it's made its way to our operating system of choice!

The app is only relevant to U-verse subscribers, and rather than allowing users to actually watch TV over a 3G connection, AT&T merely allows its minions to:

  • manage DVR recordings
  • browse the U-verse TV program guide

Literally, that's it - unless you're on WiFi, in which case you can download (not stream) the content to your device.

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