11
Dec
LG Star

LG Star Gets Hands-On Test, Dual Core Is No Disappointment

Posted by in LG, News

For those of you that can't get enough of the LG Star leaks, Engadget has managed to get their hands on the dual core phone, and, although it is a test unit, it does provide a lot of useful information on what dual core processors may be able to do for Android.

The phone's hardware is fairly non-descript despite the powerful processor held inside. It is also running a fairly unstable build of Android 2.2, which will hopefully be bumped up to Android 2.3 by the time of the phone's release, or at least shortly after. Despite the custom UI (that is oddly reminiscent of Samsung's TouchWiz) the phone doesn't appear to have any lag - thanks to the Nvidia Tegra 2 that's powering it, of course.

19
Nov
merge_back

360° View Of HTC Merge Discovered On Verizon's Site, Quickly Pulled

Posted by in Merge, News, Verizon Wireless

An Android Central forums member managed to find the 360° view Flash file for the HTC Merge, and Phil @ AC was smart enough to grab a video of it in action before it was pulled. It's nice to finally be able to see how this guy looks all the way around - a screen and keyboard shot only gets you so far, after all.

A bit gaudy for my tastes, but I'm a simple kind of man.

[Source: Android Central]

24
Aug
image

[Updated] Hands-On Review Of Sprint's Samsung Epic 4G

Posted by in Epic 4G, News, Phone Reviews, Reviews, Samsung, Sprint, Videos
Last Updated: July 24th, 2011

When offered to preview Sprint’s Samsung Galaxy S offering, the SPH-D700, also known as the Epic 4G, I immediately jumped on the opportunity. While my first personal-use Android device was the Nexus One, I’ve handled my share of Android smartphones, and my history of smartphone use has included several Samsung phones over the years. This being the first Galaxy S device I’ve personally handled, I’m glad to say that Samsung does not disappoint, and I can highly recommend the device to users who need a physical keyboard and can sign up for a contract with Sprint.

Update #1: added a 720P video sample.

05
Aug
image

Android 2.1 Update Gets Previewed On Dell Streak : 720P, Pinch-To-Zoom, New Keyboard

Posted by in Eclair 2.1, Streak

That Richard Lai fella sure gets all the luck, eh? Not only was Engadget’s London-based editor amongst the first to get to play with a Streak (aka Mini 5), Dell’s impressive 5” Android slate device, he’s now gotten an exclusive look at an early build of Eclair 2.1 running on the “tablet-phone”. While the previously unexpected 1.6 to 2.1 update is intended as a stop-gap measure to reduce the pain of waiting for Froyo, Engadget encountered several new features in their time with the new OS. While nothing has changed drastically, Eclair on the Streak has brought a few improvements and niggles of note:

The Good

  • One of the major complaints against the Streak was that its enormous screen space was wasted in landscape mode due to the inclusion of a number pad on the right side of its soft keyboard.

29
Jul
image

Video Review Of Samsung Galaxy S Running Android 2.2 Froyo

Posted by in Froyo 2.2, Galaxy S, News, Samsung, Videos

Yesterday night, a build of Froyo for Galaxy S was leaked by a previously relatively unknown Samsung firmware site Samsung-Firmware.com. Now, keep in mind, while this is an official build that came from Samsung itself, it is only a test version still using an Éclair kernel.

I wouldn't recommend you flash it just yet - instead we can enjoy this 9 minute video preview by the guys from HDBlog.it who already dared to take this ROM out for a spin. HDBlog.it is an Italian tech blog, but they were kind enough to provide an English version (though the speaker has a pretty heavy accent).

18
Jun
Droid 2 Sneak Peak: First Impressions

Droid 2 Sneak Peak: First Impressions

Posted by in Droid 2, Motorola, News, Verizon Wireless

One of Gizmodo's readers Zack unexpectedly stumbled upon an upcoming Motorola Droid 2 at a tech show and didn't hesitate to snap some pictures and play around with this Droid successor.

Here are the main points of his review, in my favorite bullet point style, to save you some time:

  • about the same size as the original Droid
  • dark chrome overall color instead of the black
  • feels really nice - more curves, fewer edges
  • different button placement as the original, both on the outside and on the keyboard
  • blue coloring around the keyboard instead of gold
  • there is now a dedicated voice search button on the keyboard and the horrible d-pad is gone, replaced by cursor keys
  • no more lip on the right side with phone open
  • the Droid 2 name might change - Motorola reps are unsure of what it will be yet
  • same 5MP camera, though noticeable faster
  • most likely will come with vanilla Froyo - not Ninjablur
  • 8GB internal memory, 8GB micro-SD card
  • 1GHz processor

Droid 2 Sneak Peak: First Impressions Droid 2 Sneak Peak: First Impressions

Droid 2 Sneak Peak: First Impressions

And here's Zack's full account if you want the original:

I am a summer intern at the Jet Propulsion Laboratory (NASA) this summer and today there was a tech show on the lab.

25
May
tweetdeck1

Tweetdeck For Android, Privately Demoed At Google I/O, Is Coming "In The Next Few Weeks" - Will It Be The Best Twitter/Social App For Android? [Post Google I/O Coverage]

Posted by in Applications, News

Across from the Plaxo booth at Google I/O, where I was spending most of my time demoing our Gmail<->Plaxo contact sync, stood the Tweetdeck booth.

I absolutely love, love, love Tweetdeck, especially after the 0.34 update (which was announced during the I/O), so I took advantage of the opportunity to chat with the CEO and one of the engineers about Tweetdeck, some bugs I've run into, and future plans.

tweetdeck2 

It turned out that the next project in the pipeline, kept under wraps for now, was Tweetdeck for Android. And the CEO was happy to demo it for me, albeit not on camera.

01
May
Dropbox beta for Android

Detailed Preview/Review Of The Official Android Dropbox Client Beta

Posted by in App Reviews, Applications, Reviews
Last Updated: July 24th, 2011

For those unaware, Dropbox.com is an online file storage service that gives users a free account to store up to 2GB of files.

As you install the client software on other systems, your files become instantly accessible, providing a very convenient way to share data between home, work, and mobile devices (an official iPhone client was released on September 29, 2009).

You can pay for additional storage if 2GB isn’t enough, or you can refer others to Dropbox which will give you an additional 250MB per user, up to an additional 8GB.

I’ve been a Dropbox user since the fall of 2009, when a coworker gave me a demo of how he used his account to synchronize files between a Linux and Windows system for doing web development.

17
Apr
Sprint HTC Hero Android 2.1

Detailed Mega Review Of Android 2.1 On Our HTC Hero - Discover All The New Features (With Lots Of Screenshots)

Posted by in Applications, Development, Hero, Hero (Sprint, HeroC), HTC, Sprint
Last Updated: April 21st, 2010

Introduction

Us, Hero owners, have been waiting for an OS upgrade for a loooooong time, since the phone got released last October with Android 1.5.

At first, we were hoping for 1.6, then 2.0, and finally 2.1 was promised ("Totally for real this time, yo" - said Sprint and HTC but we saw nothing).

Other phones kept getting 2.1 upgrades but our favorite Hero saw only promises after promises with release dates pushed further and further back.

Android 2.1 On HTC Hero

Therefore, when a Hero Android 2.1 build got [inadvertently - oh, the drama with these leaks!] leaked online, and an Android ROM hacker by the name of damageless (hi damageless!) incorporated the code from the leak into his ROM, called DamageControl, we knew the finish line was near.

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