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Dec

[Weekend Poll] What Type Of Browser Are You Using On Your Android Phone?

Posted by Aaron Gingrich in Applications, Polls

This is the latest in our Weekend Poll series. For last week's, see What Type Of Keyboard Are You Using On Your Android Phone?

Much like keyboards (which we covered last week), browsers are a dime a dozen. Google ships one browser with Android (in more recent versions, that's been Chrome), which most manufacturers then replace with their own proprietary version. And then there are the dozens (if not hundreds) of third-party browsers available on the Play Store.

What browser do you use on your phone? Stock Android (from before the days of Chrome as default), stock manufacturer, Chrome, or third-party?

Nov

[Weekend Poll] What Type Of Keyboard Are You Using On Your Android Phone?

Posted by Aaron Gingrich in Applications, Polls

This is the latest in our Weekend Poll series. For last week's, see Will/Do You Use The Multi-User Support In Android 4.2?

There's an absolute plethora of keyboard options available for Android devices - in today's poll, phones in particular. You can use the Android (AOSP) keyboard, the stock manufacturer keyboard that ships on your phone, or one of the hundreds of third-party options available in the Play Store. And if you go third-party, there are all different styles, from quirky options like 8Pen, to trace-based keyboards like Swype, and traditional predictive tap-based choices such as SwiftKey.

Nov

[Weekend Poll] Will/Do You Use The Multi-User Support In Android 4.2?

Posted by Aaron Gingrich in Jelly Bean 4.2, Polls

This is the latest in our Weekend Poll series. For last week's, see HTC And Apple Have Called A Truce - Are The Patent Wars Winding Down?

Android 4.2 is here, and with it comes proper support for multiple users on tablets. According to Cam, it's easy to setup and intuitive to use, too. Unfortunately, it doesn't work on phones at this point (presumably because of a Nokia patent).

At this point, we do have to address the pink elephant in the room here: it's likely you don't have 4.2 yet. And if the Android Platform Distribution numbers are any indication, most devices probably won't get 4.2 until mid-2014.

Nov

[Weekend Poll] Will You Use The Google Wallet Physical Card?

Posted by Aaron Gingrich in Android OS, Polls

This is the latest in our Weekend Poll series. For last week's, see Do You Prefer The Classic 10" Tablet Layout, Or The New Hybrid UI?

As we know by now, Google Wallet has been facing a lot of resistance. Major US carriers are blocking it while competition is getting intense. Google's fighting back, though, and word has it that new partnerships may be in the works. More importantly, Google is primed to introduce a physical Google Wallet card.

You read that right: the service that was introduced as a way to ditch your cards and cash in favor of just your phone is now resorting to using a card.

Oct

[Weekend Poll] Do You Prefer The Classic 10" Tablet Layout, Or The New Hybrid UI?

Posted by Aaron Gingrich in Polls

This is the latest in our Weekend Poll series. For last week's, see Pick A Phablet Edition: HTC DLX, Samsung Galaxy Note II, Or LG Optimus Vu II?

The release of the Nexus 7 brought a new phone/tablet hybrid UI to Android tablets. And today, most people agree that it works well - on the 7-inch form factor, anyway. The latest leaks from the upcoming Nexus 10 suggest that Google will keep using that same hybrid UI, despite having a display that's a few inches bigger in each direction.

As David correctly pointed out, the result is that the phone and tablet UIs are now virtually identical.

Oct

[Weekend Poll] Pick A Phablet Edition: HTC DLX, Samsung Galaxy Note II, Or LG Optimus Vu II?

Posted by Aaron Gingrich in DLX, Galaxy Note II, Optimus Vu II, Polls

This is the latest in our Weekend Poll series. For last week's, see Are You Content With Your Phone's Stock Battery Life?

Complain as some people might, smartphones are getting bigger and bigger. Nothing exemplifies that fact more than phablets like the HTC DLX (or other variants, such as the J Butterfly), Samsung Galaxy Note II, and LG Optimus Vu II. Packing 5"+ displays, powerful CPUs, and 2GB of RAM, these phones aren't for your grandmother.

^{Left to right: HTC J Butterfly (Japanese variant of the purported DLX), Samsung Galaxy Note II, and LG Optimus Vu II.}

Oct

[Weekend Poll] Are You Content With Your Phone's Stock Battery Life?

Posted by Aaron Gingrich in Polls

This is the latest in our Weekend Poll series. For last week's, see If The Major Manufacturers All Made Similar Nexus Phones, Whose Would You Buy?

LG was hard at work this week pimping the new Lithium Polymer battery technology used in the Optimus G. Promising higher battery density in a smaller, lighter package, word's still out on how much of an improvement it is in the real world. Obviously, though, any advances in battery tech are welcome - more battery life is never a bad thing.

It got me thinking: are people happy with their phone's stock battery life? Sure, your phone probably can't go 3 days between charges like the dumbphones of yore could, but these days, most do make it through a full day of use.

Oct

[Weekend Poll] If The Major Manufacturers All Made Similar Nexus Phones, Whose Would You Buy?

Posted by Aaron Gingrich in HTC, LG, Motorola, Polls, Samsung

This is the latest in our Weekend Poll series. For last week's, see How Much Total Storage Do You Need In A Phone?

Let's say that the rumors (and evidence?)of a Nexus program are true, and Motorola, Samsung, LG, and HTC are all making Nexus phones for release before the end of the year. For the sake of our poll, let's just pretend that they are all powered by the same CPU, GPU, and RAM, and had roughly the same screen size and resolution. Let's also say that there are no custom UIs used. As a result, updates are handled by Google directly, meaning they can be rolled out across all of the devices at roughly the same time.

Sep

[Weekend Poll] How Much Total Storage Do You Need In A Phone?

Posted by Aaron Gingrich in Polls

This is the latest in our Weekend Poll series. For last week's, see What Was Your First Version Of Android?

These days, it seems like the push is towards storing most content on the cloud, rather than on-device. We can stream all of our music and movies from the web and our photos are seamlessly backed up as well. In fact, it seems like aside from games, only a small portion of our content needs to be stored locally. Then again, some people insist on storing everything they have on their phone at all times. It's not uncommon to hear complaints that a device has just 32GB of storage dozens of times.

Sep

[Weekend Poll] What Was Your First Version Of Android?

Posted by Aaron Gingrich in Android OS, Polls

This is the latest in our Weekend Poll series. For last week's, see Will You Be Buying A New Kindle?

Earlier this week, Ron gave us an interesting look at what codenames came before Android 1.5, Cupcake (spoiler: 1.1 was "petit four," and 1.0 didn't have any codename at all). It's hard not to read the post without taking a nostalgic walk down memory lane, isn't it? I still remember heading into my local T-Mobile store to play with the G1 when it launched.

My life with Android officially started on June 4, 2010, with the launch of the HTC EVO 4G - and with Android 2.1, Éclair.