QWERTY - 2/3 - Android Police - Android News, Apps, Games, Phones, Tablets

Jul

Motorola DROID 3 Now Available At Verizon For $199

Posted by David Ruddock in Droid 3, Motorola, News, Verizon Wireless

Yep, you read that right - you can pick up a DROID 3 right now from Verizon's online store, complete with free overnight shipping for $199 on a new 2-year agreement or eligible upgrade. If you're a new customer planning to switch to Verizon (or planning to add a line), it's worth noting that you'll be subject to Verizon's new tiered data plans as of today. You can also buy it off contract, and it's not too expensive, either - it'll cost you $460 commitment-free.

If you're getting the D3 on an eligible upgrade, there's no need to worry - you can keep your all-you-can-eat unlimited data, unless you're coming from a featurephone data plan, in which case you'll be forced into tiered data as well.

Jun

[Deal Alert 2] EVO Shift 4G Now Free At Wirefly On New 2-Year Agreement

Posted by David Ruddock in Deals, EVO Shift 4G (Speedy), News, Sprint, Tips & Tutorials

Last week, I listed the EVO Shift 4G in my roundup of the best Android phones under $50, but that was when it was priced at $40 on AmazonWireless. Wirefly has now gone and beaten that price silly, offering the QWERTY-keyboard slider phone for the low, low price of "free" if you open a new Sprint account, or add a new line to your existing plan.

The EVO Shift 4G does have a tiny 3.6" display, but it's also packing a next-gen single core Snapdragon processor and a big 1530mAh battery - along with a fresh update to Android 2.3.3 Gingerbread.

Jun

Sprint's Q3 Roadmap Leaked - Samsung Epic 2 And "Full Touch 4G" Device In The Pipeline

Posted by Jaroslav Stekl in Epic 4G Touch, Samsung, Sprint

The EVO 3D just came out today, but it looks like HTC's new flagship won't be the last high-end Android phone to grace Sprint store shelves this year. Quite the contrary - according to This is my next, whose editors have a nearly spotless track record where leaks are concerned, "Big Yellow" is gearing up to launch two new Android handsets, this time from Samsung: the Epic 2 and an as-of-yet nameless "full touch 4G" device.

The Epic 2, as its name implies, will be the successor to last year's Epic 4G. Sadly, This is my next reports that the phone will be a marginal improvement at best - its processor is still a single-core Hummingbird chip (though the clock speed is now 1.2GHz, as opposed to the original's 1GHz), and its screen is still 4 inches.

Jun

DROID 3 Gets In-Depth Hands-On: Pentile Display And Puny Amounts Of RAM Included

Posted by David Ruddock in Droid 3, Motorola, News

The DROID 3, like the DROID 2, has been pretty lax about showing itself off prior to any sort of official announcement from Motorola. Today, the DROID 3 has been all but fully revealed by a member over at XDA China. Two things from that post immediately caught our attention: a qHD Pentile display, and 512MB of RAM. Both of them should make you queasy.

We aren't big fans of Moto's Pentile qHD displays, particularly as it appeared on the DROID X2. If your vision is good, and you hold your phone at a normal distance from your face (read: about one foot - not three), Pentile looks like crap - there's little argument.

Jun

Motorola XOOM Folio Case With Built-In Keyboard Now Available, Will Set You Back $85

Posted by David Ruddock in Motorola, News, Tips & Tutorials, XOOM

Do you wish your XOOM was an ASUS Transformer - but leather? Motorola's got a new keyboard / leather folio case out for the XOOM, and it's on sale for a pretty reasonable $85. Spiffy. It's unknown if the keyboard is connecting via Bluetooth, but that seems like the most obvious way to go about doing this, as there's no mention of any sort of charging functionality, so we assume it's all done sans wires. You can get it from Verizon here. Oh, and the $85 price tag includes free 2 day shipping. Sounds like a deal to us.

via AndroidMixer

Feb

HTC Officially Announces The Merge, Coming This Spring To North America

Posted by David Ruddock in HTC, Merge, News

Well, after some rumors that the HTC Merge might never arrive, it seems the mysterious but often-seen slider device will be coming stateside sooner rather than later. An official HTC press release for the company's first Android CDMA world-phone popped up only minutes ago:

The HTC Merge™ Smartphone Brings Android™ and HTC Sense™ to HTC's First CDMA Android World Phone

BELLEVUE, Wash., Feb. 25, 2011 /PRNewswire/ -- HTC Corp., a global designer of smartphones, today announced that the new HTC Merge smartphone will be made available through multiple North American carriers beginning in spring 2011. The HTC Merge smartphone combines a full QWERTY slide-out keyboard with the power of Android 2.2, the HTC Sense experience, a large 3.8-inch touch-screen display and a 5 megapixel camera to create a complete mobile experience for those looking for a truly complete smartphone.

Feb

HTC Desire Z: Long-Term Ownership Hardware Review

Posted by Brian O'Toole in Desire Z (Vision), Devices By Manufacturer, G2 (Vision), HTC, Phone Reviews, Reviews

Last Updated: July 24th, 2011

Take a look at the top tier of Android phones right now and you might notice something. They all kind of look the same. Black front fascia, large touchscreen, minimal waistline. Boring, right? Well that's just the way things are going. Alternatives to the slate way of living are becoming increasingly rare, which puts the HTC Desire Z with its hardware keyboard in an intriguing light. With its metallic accents and suave grey pallet, the Desire Z cuts a different path. So how do I mean rare? If you want a top-level QWERTY Android phone in the USA you have a fairly limited selection to choose from: Sprint has the Samsung Epic 4G, Verizon the Motorola Droid 2 and T-Mobile the HTC G2.

Jan

Asus's Android Tablets May Ship With Honeycomb After All, Says Asus

Posted by David Ruddock in ASUS, Honeycomb 3.0/3.1/3.2, News

Last Updated: January 14th, 2011

In what is the most carefully-worded way of saying "we don't know" I've seen in a while, Asus's UK marketing manager John Swatton has told Pocket-lint that the company's new Android tablets will be shipping with Honeycomb "if Honeycomb is available." The reason for the uncertainty? Swanson seems to be suggesting that Motorola's XOOM has been given special treatment by Google, while Honeycomb remains unavailable to most, if not all, other tablet manufacturers. Swatton says, "When our tablets launch, they will launch with the latest version of Android whatever that is."

Asus's Android tablets, the Eee Pad Transformer and the Eee Pad Slider, will be launching in April and May, respectively.

Jan

Sony Ericsson's X10 Mini Pro Follow-Up Leaked

Posted by Jose R. Ortiz in News, Sony Ericsson, Xperia X10 Mini / Mini Pro (Robyn / Mimmi)

Sure, Sony Ericsson's XPERIA arc is getting all of the attention right now, but the folks at the IT168 forums have posted specs and a pair of images of a supposed XPERIA X10 Mini Pro follow-up.

The poster lists this unnamed device as having an Adreno 205 GPU, 384MB RAM, and a "7230 CPU". No clock speed is listed, but it's safe to assume that "7230" refers to the Qualcomm MSM7230 processor which recently made an appearance in HTC's Desire Z/G2 running at 800MHz, though it is also capable of running at up to 1GHz.

These specs fall in line with the leak we saw just a couple of weeks ago from the same forum.

Jan

Acer Unveils QWERTY-Packing beTouch E210

Posted by Jose R. Ortiz in Acer, beTouch E210, News

Looks like we might finally start seeing the candybar form factor a little more often [or maybe not, given the specs --Aaron], as Acer has unveiled the BlackBerry-esque beTouch E210. The E210 packs a four row QWERTY keyboard and 2.6" touchscreen into a 115 x 62.5 x 11.5mm chassis. It also includes an optical trackpad for more precise navigation needs.

The newest beTouch will be running Android 2.2 on a ST Ericsson 416MHz chip, and packs 256MB RAM and a 512MB ROM. Although it doesn't have significant onboard storage, it does have a MicroSD slot, which you'll need if you plan on snapping pictures with the 3.2MP camera.