Android OS - 156/165 - Android Police - Android News, Apps, Games, Phones, Tablets

Aug

Streaking Past Eclair - Dell Streak Likely To Go Straight To FroYo

Posted by Jaroslav Stekl in AT&T, Dell, Froyo 2.2, News, O2, Streak

Last Updated: December 22nd, 2010

As our very own John Thompson said in his hands-on with Dell's Streak, the phone/tablet hybrid has some really nice hardware, like a front-facing camera, a 1 GHz processor, and 512 MB of RAM, but the fact that it runs Android 1.6 is rather disappointing.

Well, the update to Android 2.1 may never see the light of day, as Lionel Menchaca, Dell's official chief blogger, has tweeted the following message, which was just spotted by one of Engadget's tippers:

So there you have it - looks like Dell is scrapping plans to roll out Android 2.1 officially, instead gunning straight for 2.2.

Aug

[Updated x2] CyanogenMod 6 Updates: RC3 For Nexus One, Droid, Droid Incredible, Dream, Magic; RC2 For EVO; RC1 For Slide, Hero CDMA

Posted by Nate Kimmey in Development, Dream, EVO 4G (Supersonic), Froyo 2.2, G1 (Dream), Incredible, Magic, myTouch 3G (Magic), myTouch Slide (Espresso), News, Nexus One (Passion), Sapphire

Get ready for another scoop of blue Froyo: CyanogenMod 6 has just been updated to RC3 for the Nexus One, Droid, Droid Incredible, Dream (G1) and Sapphire (myTouch 3G), RC2 for the EVO, and was just released as RC1 for the myTouch 3G Slide and Hero CDMA.

Update #1: added RC3 for Droid Incredible (thanks monkey droid)

Update #2: added RC3 for Droid (thanks Justin), RC1 for Hero CDMA (thanks Kenshiro2112)

Nexus One

Download Links

CyanogenMod 6 RC3 For Nexus One
Google Apps
Froyo Radio (required if coming from Éclair)

INSTRUCTIONS:
- First time flashing CM 6 to your Nexus (or coming from another ROM)?

Aug

Droid Incredible To Receive Update To Froyo August 18

Posted by Nate Kimmey in Froyo 2.2, Incredible, News, Verizon Wireless

In case you Droid Incredible owners were jealous that the much older Motorola Droid was getting Froyo, you can rest easy – your Froyo update is good and ready, and it’s set to go out Wednesday, August 18.

The update is over-the-air, so your phone should prompt you to install it. If you don’t want to wait, you can check for the update manually by going to Settings, About Phone, then System Updates. Verizon employees already have access to the update, so there shouldn’t be any problems or bugs.

If you receive the update, be sure to let us know how it works for you.

Aug

HTC Lexikon and Bee Leaked, Both Running Froyo With Sense

Posted by Nate Kimmey in Froyo 2.2, HTC, News

If you're willing to believe a Chinese website by the name of “911sniper,” then you may be excited to hear that HTC is prepping two new Froyo-running handsets with Sense on top, though neither will be “superphones” or very ground-breaking.

The first handset, called the HTC Lexikon, has a 3.8” 480x800 resolution screen with a 5MP camera and an 800 MHz processor and a full QWERTY keyboard. Nothing mind-blowing, but with this and the Samsung Intercept, it’s nice to see 800 MHz becoming the standard for mid-range Android phones. On the other hand, we have the HTC Bee, with a 3.2” 240x320 resolution screen, a 5MP camera with flash, and a 528 MHz processor.

Aug

Dell Blaze Leaked, Runs Android 1.5, Already Uninteresting

Posted by Nate Kimmey in Blaze, Cupcake 1.5, Dell, News

After today’s Dell Thunder leak, you may be excited to hear about a new Android offering from Dell: The Blaze. Unfortunately, there doesn’t seem to be any reason to be interested in the phone – the Dell Blaze is running Android 1.5 with a custom UI, and is described as an entry-level device. So, while we don’t have any actual specs yet, we can determine that the screen is fairly small, my guess would be at the very top, 3.5”, but more likely around 3.2”.

Personally, I can’t understand why Dell would choose to put Android 1.5 on this device – even Android 1.6 (which the Streak still runs) would give it much better access to the latest apps.

Aug

Second Droid OTA Coming, Brings Flash Support

Posted by Nate Kimmey in Droid (Sholes), Froyo 2.2, News, Verizon Wireless

It looks like the Droid has a second over-the-air update headed its way. The first, which started being pushed out yesterday, was FRG01B and brought Froyo to the most popular Android around. However, a Verizon email tells us that this second update will give Droid owners the ability to download Adobe Flash 10.1, leading us to believe that it is indeed the leaked FRG22 build.

If you’re already enjoying Froyo on you Droid, keep an eye out for a second update, and let us know when it comes.

Source: Verizon Email via Android Central

Aug

Google Takes Android Voice Search To The Next Level With Voice Actions

Posted by Nate Kimmey in Applications, Froyo 2.2, News

Today’s Google Mobile even certainly did not disappoint. In addition to some minor improvements in Google Search, such as the ability to call businesses and play music from the web, Google introduced Voice Actions, a huge update to Android’s Voice Search application.

The video below demonstrates all the capabilities of the new application. If you’ve used Google’s speech-to-text functions before, you’ll know how well they work, and Voice Actions simply expands on that in a very powerful way.

As a quick reference, here is the full list of voice actions:

Speak any of these commands to perform a Voice Action on your phone:

send text to [contact] [message]

listen to [artist/song/album]

call [business]

call [contact]

send email to [contact] [message]

go to [website]

note to self [ note ]

navigate to [location/business name]

directions to [location/business name]

map of [location]

Unfortunately, this is currently only available to phones running Android 2.2 – it will also come pre-loaded on the Droid 2, the first phone to launch with Android 2.2.

Aug

Vodafone Rolling Out Vanilla (!) Froyo To HTC Desire In Next 7-10 Days

Posted by Aaron Gingrich in Desire (Bravo/BravoC), Froyo 2.2, News, Vodafone

After Vodafone deployed an HTC Desire update last week that was full of crapware, customers responded with understandable anger. After initially standing firm on the crapware (“Vodafone 360”), Vodafone has now backed off and will remove it with the next update. The next update? Vanilla Froyo - and it’s coming in 7-10 days.

The surprising thing here is that the update will apparently be an unmolested version of Android 2.2 - something they elected not to do with their Nexus One update. The only customizations Vodafone will be making to the Froyo Desire update are to the network settings, in order to “optimise them for [their] network.” This is obviously good news for Desire owners, as it means they’ll receive the update sooner, and without any extra Vodafone “goodies.”

Congrats to Vodafone customers for standing together and staring down the huge teleco.

Aug

Official Motorola Droid Android 2.2 Froyo Update (Still FRG01B) Now Being Pushed Out OTA

Posted by Artem Russakovskii in Droid (Sholes), Froyo 2.2, Motorola, News, Verizon Wireless

It's been 8 days since the original Android 2.2 Froyo update for the 1st Motorola Droid leaked out online, and Verizon has been taking its sweet time to make it available to the masses, leaving us guessing whether FRG01B was indeed the final version of this Éclair->Froyo update and whether serious stop-ship bugs were discovered.

Turns out, nothing has changed - FRG01B is exactly the version that Verizon started pushing out to the Droids a few hours ago. So if you haven't flashed the update a little over a week ago, you just missed out on 8 sweet days with the frozen deliciousness.

Aug

Motorola Droid 2 Quadrant Score Leaked - It’s A Monster

Posted by Aaron Gingrich in Droid 2, Froyo 2.2, News, Verizon Wireless

A picture of a Droid 2’s Quadrant benchmark results has been released, and its score is the best stock store to date at 1,458. This is especially impressive considering the phone is apparently straight from the box.

Compared to the Droid X’s score of roughly 1,100, it’s even more impressive. Because both devices sport nearly identical hardware configurations, the difference most likely comes from Froyo - while the Droid 2 runs Android 2.2, the X only runs 2.1.

Granted, a benchmark’s real-world applicability is questionable (after all - Linpack famously runs about 400-500% faster on 2.2 compared to 2.1, but that certainly doesn’t mean the phone is 5x faster).