Android OS - 145/164 - Android Police - Android News, Apps, Games, Phones, Tablets

Nov

Pro Android 3, The First Book To Cover Gingerbread APIs, Goes Up For Presale, Offers Gingerbread Hints

Posted by Artem Russakovskii in Gingerbread 2.3, News

If you want to find out all the new goodies Android's newest upcoming OS, codenamed Gingerbread, is going to bring, you may want to ask Satya Komatineni, Sayed Hashimi, and Dave MacLean. These 3 writers are the co-authors of the Pro Android book series, and, thanks to a tip from @brodduncan, we now know they've definitely been playing with Gingerbread, likely for quite a while.

The new 3rd edition of Pro Android, which recently showed up on Amazon, mentions the Gingerbread SDK in its description:

Pro Android 3 shows you how to build real-world and fun mobile applications using the new Android SDK, codename "Gingerbread."

Learn what’s new with Gingerbread: improved UI across all Android platforms, integration with WebM, the latest Flash integration techniques, and more

The above confirms our earlier suspicions of user interface improvements that Gingerbread is bound to bring as well as reaffirms the WebM integration that Google promised at Google I/O this year.

Nov

Rumored Nexus 2/S Rumored To Be Delayed By A Rumored Hardware Problem

Posted by Artem Russakovskii in Gingerbread 2.3, News, Samsung

The most widely rumored upcoming Android device without any physical evidence of its existence is, without a doubt, the Samsung Nexus 2 (which also goes by the name Nexus S) - even its picture presented above is fake.

Ever since the first time it was mentioned by Androidandme and shortly backed up by RadioAndroid, the whole Androidosphere has been abuzz with the next Google managed device for one simple reason: the Nexus One was and still remains the most open Android device on the market. Considering Google killed the crowd favorite earlier this year, any mention of a potential successor was capable of arousing geekdroids across the world even more than Gingerbread itself.

Nov

T-Mobile myTouch 4G Edges Out Win Over iPhone 4 In Wirefly's Browser Speed Test

Posted by Aaron Gingrich in Android OS, myTouch 4G (Glacier), News, T-Mobile

Our good friends at Wirefly released a video a few days ago showing a browser speed test between the new T-Mobile myTouch 4G and Apple's iPhone 4. The results added another win for the Android crowd, as the myTouch 4G bested the iPhone 4 in both tests.

The win gets even sweeter, though: the second page loads faster on the MT4G, even with the embedded YouTube video (albeit, it doesn't actually load the video). Andrew (of Wirefly) reminds us that "... there's one big difference here - this [the MT4G] has YouTube on the page, and YouTube is, of course, Flash - whereas the iPhone 4 does not have Flash, so it can't render that part of the webpage."

[Source: Wirefly]

Nov

3 Years Ago, The World Saw Android For The First Time, And This Is What It Looked Like. Happy 3rd Birthday, Andy!

Posted by Artem Russakovskii in Android OS, Editorials, News

Exactly 3 years ago, on November 5th, 2007, Google, along with its partners, publicly announced 2 very important things: the Open Handset Alliance (OHA) and Android. Up until that pivotal moment, the media speculated on the existence of a mysterious gPhone and not many were prepared for something that turned out to be much-much bigger.

Brief Android History

I know that there is some confusion around Android related dates, so let me explain, in my favorite bullet point style:

In July of 2005, Google acquired Android, which was a very small mobile oriented startup.
In the 2 year period following the acquisition, rumors regarding Google's possible entrance into the mobile phone market were aplenty, but the confirmation didn't arrive until November 5th, 2007.

Nov

Motorola Droid Pro Pre-Sale Starts November 9th, Handset to Launch November 18th

Posted by Stephen Tenerowicz in Droid (Sholes), Froyo 2.2, Motorola, News, Verizon Wireless

If you were hungering for more juicy details on the Motorola Droid Pro, today is your lucky day, as documents have just surfaced revealing the pre-sale and launch date of the device. While details are slim, the documents reveal that the pre-sale kicks off November 9th and the official launch date is November 18th. If you order between November 9th and November 17th, you’ll get your Droid Pro before the launch date - never a bad thing!

At this point we don't have a real number in regards to the price, but hopefully it will end up being near the unofficial standard of $200.

Nov

First Hints At Gingerbread UI Given By Latest Google Maps Update

Posted by Brian O'Toole in Applications, Gingerbread 2.3, News

Google Maps was updated to version 4.60 last week, and you may not have noticed it on the surface, but contained inside were some interesting resources providing an early glimpse at the style direction Gingerbread is set to take. Freenode IRC member canadiancow rather astutely spotted that there was a folder contained within the 4.60 APK that included icons and styling for API level 9, whilst we're currently on level 8 with Froyo. He changed all references to level 9 down to level 8 and recompiled the APK, and voilà, this is what Maps will look like (on left):

Obviously not a great deal has changed, but we are liking the new styling on the buttons, and the slight-transparency on the pop-up dialog.

Nov

Archos 43 16GB Tablet On Sale Now For $250 In US And Canada

Posted by David Ruddock in 43, Froyo 2.2, News

If for some reason you were lusting after the Archos 43 upon ogling the company's lineup of Froyo tablets, good news, you can buy one right now from Archos, for a tidy sum of $250 (this is for the 16GB model, the 8GB model is not currently available). What does a quarter of a grand get you? We've provided Archos' full tech specs at the end of the post, as they're quite lengthy. Currently, Archos appears to only be shipping the 43 to Canada and the US, via their online store - somewhat odd, as they are based in France (the French store shows the device is still "Coming Soon").

Nov

36% Of Android Devices Now Running Froyo - Donut And Cupcake Continue Steady Decline Into Dessert History

Posted by David Ruddock in Android OS, News

Google, as it does every month, has released updated Android platform version distribution charts today. What's changed? From last month, not a whole lot. Froyo expanded a solid 3%, from a little over 33% of the Android-verse at the beginning of October to over 36% as of yesterday, with Donut and Cupcake both losing more ground.

Pac-Man hungers for donuts and cupcakes

Éclair actually gained a few tenths of a percent, most likely due to continued sales of Samsung's Galaxy S phones, which are all shipping with Android 2.1 installed. Much of this will probably change come January, however, as Samsung has stated they hope to get all Galaxy S devices running 2.2 before the end of the year.

Nov

T-Mobile Comet Launching November 3rd - $9.99 On Contract

Posted by Stephen Tenerowicz in Comet / Ideos, Froyo 2.2, Huawei, News, T-Mobile

Last Updated: November 3rd, 2010

Well folks, we had a date for the launch of the T-Mobile Comet and now we have a price-$9.99 with a $50.00 rebate on contract. This, coupled with the carrier’s new $10.00/200MB data plan makes for a very good price point for this entry-level smartphone. The Comet will feature 7.2Mbps HSPA, FM radio, an integrated Swype keyboard, microSD expansion up to 32GB, and a 3 megapixel camera. On top of all of that, it will be powered by Froyo! All of this makes for a pretty bad ass device, with the only downside being the QVGA screen.

While this might not attract a hardcore smartphone enthusiast like myself, I can really see a lot of first time smartphone buyers being interested in this.

Oct

Android 2.1 Now Rolling Out For Sony Ericsson Xperia X10, X10 Mini, X10 Mini Pro

Posted by Jaroslav Stekl in Eclair 2.1, Sony Ericsson, Xperia X10 (es209ra), Xperia X10 Mini / Mini Pro (Robyn / Mimmi)

Right on time, Sony Ericsson's begun rolling out the update to Android 2.1 Eclair (build number 2.0.A.0.504) for the Xperia X10, X10 Mini, and X10 Mini Pro. Judging by what we're seeing on Twitter and from what our tipster told us, it's only available in Scandinavia for now, so we can only hope that other regions will get to join in on the fun soon enough.

Our tipster also mentioned that Universal Androot does not work, although a bit of digging through the forums revealed that SuperOneClick does indeed root the phones, even after the update. On that note, where's our Froyo?