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Jan

RIM's New CEO Says Android Devices Are "All The Same," We Beg To Differ - With Giant Comparison Pictures

Posted by David Ruddock in Android OS, Editorials

Let's be frank: RIM's BlackBerry products are unilaterally, shall we say, unexciting. And RIM's new theme song should probably be this. And by "unexciting," I mean ugly, hopelessly dated, and so boring that a story about them spontaneously bursting into flames might actually give the company some much-needed edginess in their marketing campaigns. Maybe that's a bridge too far.

Anyway, when I read this morning that RIM's new CEO Thorsten Heins, speaking to CrackBerry, said Android devices are "all the same," I couldn't help but go slack-jawed in a combination of muted laughter and near disbelief at the irony.

Jan

[CES 2012] Hands-On With The Huawei Ascend P1 S - The World's New Thinnest Smartphone (With Comparison Shots)

Posted by David Ruddock in Ascend P1/P1 S, Huawei, News, Videos

We're onto the second day of official pre-CES activities here in Las Vegas, and this morning we got to spend some time with Huawei's newest smartphone - the Ascend P1 S. While the vast majority of information about the device was leaked sometime last night, we had a chance to take some video of the Ice Cream Sandwich device and share a few insights about it, as well as obtain some relevant info on pricing and availability.

The P1 S (as well as the thicker and larger-batteried P1) will be headed to most markets around the globe in the early part of Q2 - possibly as early as March for European and Asian markets.

Dec

[Head To Head] Asus Transformer (TF101) Versus Asus Transformer Prime (TF201): No Surprises Here - Prime By A Landslide

Posted by Aaron Gingrich in ASUS, Eee Pad Transformer, Eee Pad Transformer Prime, Tablet Reviews

Although we heard rumblings that the Prime would be delayed, some lucky customers have already received their Asus Transformer Primes, and it was briefly available (again) on Amazon before quickly selling out (again). Based on the universally glowing reviews (including my own), you're probably well aware by now that the Prime is a truly excellent piece of tech. But how does it compare to its older brother, the Transformer (TF101)? Is it worthwhile for TF owners to upgrade to the TP?

The Specs

Before diving in, let's run over the Prime's specs:

10.1-inch 1280x800 Super IPS + display with Gorilla Glass
1.3GHz quad-core NVIDIA Tegra 3 Processor with 12-core GPU (up to 1.4GHz in single-core mode)
1GB RAM
microSD slot and microHDMI port (with support for 1080p video output) on tablet
SD card slot and USB port on dock
8MP F2.4 rear shooter with 1080p video recording and continuous flash, 1.2MP front camera
Tablet: 8.3mm thin, 263mm wide, 180.8mm tall, 586g (1.29 lbs)
Dock: 8 - 10.4mm thin, 263mm wide, 180.8mm tall, 537g (1.18 lbs)
12 hour battery life playing 720p video, 18 hours with keyboard dock
Metallic spun finish
Two available colors: Amethyst Gray and Champagne Gold
Android 3.2.1 - will be updated to Android 4.0 (Ice Cream Sandwich) as soon as possible after release

Size and Build

Dimensions and build quality are probably the two most significant factors in tablet purchases for casual consumers, so it should be no surprise that Asus placed an emphasis on how thin and light the Prime is.

Dec

Size Really Does Matter: Common Tablet Resolutions Compared

Posted by Cameron Summerson in Android OS, Tablets

In one of the the more recent weekend polls, we asked what is your ideal tablet screen size? - most users went for 9.51" - 10.5", which ended up taking about 50% of the overall votes. This is not much of a surprise since 10.1-inch is the most common size of Android tablet.

For those who don't already own a tablet, though, trying to decide what size to get can be somewhat of a task. Today we're going to take a closer look at a couple of different tablet resolutions to give you a better idea of how they compare to one another.

Nov

Verizon Specifically Marks The Galaxy Nexus As Having "No OEM Customization," 32GB Internal Storage

Posted by Liam Spradlin in Galaxy Nexus, Ice Cream Sandwich 4.0, News, Verizon Wireless

In a recent "Competitive Comparison" graphic, Verizon has labeled Samsung's Galaxy Nexus as having "No OEM Customization," ostensibly as a selling point against the competition.

It's interesting that Verizon would go so far in labeling the Nexus' UI as such, but it may hint that VZW is at least vaguely aware that some consumers prefer a stock experience, and consider it a strong enough selling point that it should be included in a comparison chart. It's also likely that Verizon simply wanted to accurately describe each device's UI, but I find it odd that they included "Android 4.0 Ice Cream Sandwich" twice in the same column, just to make clear that there are no custom overlays to be found on the Nexus.

Nov

Barnes & Noble NOOK Tablet Vs. Amazon Kindle Fire: FIGHT!

Posted by Cameron Summerson in Kindle Fire, News, Nook Tablet

When the Amazon Kindle Fire was announced, we were all pretty excited about its tablet-meets-e-reader form factor, low price, and powerful hardware. Barnes & Noble has fired back this morning with an equally impressive device (and in some aspects even more so), albeit with a slightly higher price tag. As always, both devices offer features that make them unique from each other -- but, at the end of the day, which one is the better choice?

Let's throw both devices in the ring and see how they fare with one another, shall we? First up, specs:

NOOK Tablet

7-inch IPS lamination display
1GHz dual-core processor
1GB RAM
16GB storage with SD card slot
400 grams
9 Hours of video playback, 11.5 hours of read-time
$249

Amazon Kindle Fire

7-inch IPS display
1GHz dual-core TI OMAP4 processor
512MB RAM
8GB internal storage, no SD card slot
413 grams
7.5 hours locally-stored video playback, 8 hours read-time
$199

With specs out of the way, let's take a closer look at each one to get a better idea of which device is the better buy this holiday season.

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 budget handsets or QWERTY phones, because we all know the subtext of this whole conversation: the iPhone.

Oct

Chart: Are There Really Too Many Android Phones? That Depends On How You Look At It

Posted by David Ruddock in Android OS, Editorials

After reading a couple of great pieces on Droid-life about how Android manufacturers seem to be moving at breakneck pace to advance hardware and iterate handsets like crazy, I had an idea - let's visualize it in different ways. First, we'll start with a pretty basic comparison, showing the US's four major carriers and the number of Android devices they currently offer.

*includes upcoming DROID RAZR and Galaxy Nexus on Verizon. Based on respective carrier websites as of 10/28/11.

Next, we'll see how much each of the major handset manufacturers contributes to these numbers at the present moment.

*includes upcoming DROID RAZR and Galaxy Nexus.

Oct

iPhone 4S VS. Android Benchmarks Posted: Even The Galaxy S II Is Getting Smoked (For Now, At Least)

Posted by David Ruddock in Android OS, Galaxy S II, News

Last Updated: August 20th, 2012

The folks over at the always impartial, numerically obsessed hardware review and benchmarking site Anandtech have gotten their hands on some results comparing the iPhone 4S to a slew of Android devices in browser and GPU performance. The results are, well, interesting. Take a look at these graphics comparing browser JavaScript performance:

The closest competitor to Apple's iPhone 4S? The testers decided to make the Galaxy Tab 8.9 the Android Honeycomb representative, and even with its aging Tegra 2 chipset the Tab pretty much matched Apple's iPhone 4S inch for inch. But we think we have an explanation for the Tab 8.9's extreme browser performance figures: Honeycomb.

Sep

Android Boot Times Compared: Epic 4G Touch Vs EVO 3D Vs EVO 4G Vs Thunderbolt. Psst, HTC, This Is Just Embarrassing

Posted by Artem Russakovskii in Epic 4G Touch, EVO 3D (Shooter), EVO 4G (Supersonic), HTC, News, Samsung, Sprint, Thunderbolt (Mecha), Verizon Wireless, Videos

Last Updated: September 24th, 2011

Last night, I sent out a message from our social accounts praising the Epic 4G Touch's boot times. They amazed me as soon as I turned this Galaxy S II Sprint variant for the first time last Friday and haven't ceased to amaze me ever since. I have loaded up all the same apps and then some compared to any of my other phones, and still - the Epic 4G Touch blazes by the competition like no other device I've seen.

I promised you guys a video comparing the boot times of E4GT with the EVO 4G. Sure, that didn't sound like a fair fight, but that wasn't my point - I wanted to show the current EVO 4G owners (and other year+ old devices) how far technology has advanced in that year+.