01
Sep

Back To School With Android: The Budget Phones And Awesome Apps That Will Help You Get Through The Year

Posted by in Ally (Aloha), Applications, Aria (Liberty), AT&T, Backflip, Captivate, CHARM, Devour, Droid (Sholes), Hero (Sprint, HeroC), Intercept, Moment, myTouch Slide (Espresso), Sprint, T-Mobile, Verizon Wireless, Vibrant
Last Updated: July 3rd, 2011

Phones

Not everyone needs a new phone at this time of year, especially as you probably got your last one some time around Christmas, but if you’re in the market for a decent Android phone on your college-sized budget, here’s the what you’re looking at if you’re one of the four major carriers:

Verizon

  • Motorola Droid - Affordable doesn’t necessarily have to mean cheap, and such is the case with the original Motorola Droid. While Verizon itself no longer carries the original, (it’s been dropped in favor of the Droid 2) it can be had for the price of $0.00 (or, at most, $0.01) at third-party retailers like WireFly, Amazon, and LetsTalk.com.

29
Aug
1_million_galx

Samsung Hits A Milestone: Over 1 Million Galaxy S Devices Shipped In US

Posted by in AT&T, Captivate, Epic 4G, Fascinate, News, Sprint, T-Mobile, Verizon Wireless, Vibrant

 

Samsung just sent out a press release that should help dampen the dullness today: according to Samsung, they've shipped over 1 million Galaxy S devices in the US. Not bad, especially considering they've only launched on 2 of the 6 carriers that will be getting the device. With such a hotly-anticipated and well-received line of devices, it's likely sales are really just getting started - after all, the Vibrant and Captivate only launched just over a month ago.

Samsung's Epic 4G will be launching on Sprint in just a few days (August 31), and rumor has it that Verizon's Fascinate won't be far behind.

25
Aug
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Deal Alert: Move Over, Vibrant - AT&T Samsung Captivate Now Also A Penny On Amazon.com For New Customers

Posted by in AT&T, Captivate, News, Samsung

Remember the $0.01 Samsung Vibrant deal Amazon put up last week in response to T-Mobile's $99.99 sale? After running for a few days, the promotion ran out (the Vibrant is now $69.99), only to be replaced by another one, this time for AT&T customers.

That's right, the Samsung Captivate now costs a cool 1 penny for new accounts and comes with a free activation and 2-day shipping. This is the best deal on this phone to date, and it will probably last only a few days, judging by how long it took the Vibrant deal to vaporize.

Hit up the AT&T Samsung Captivate AmazonWireless page to feed Amazon that penny and pick one of these bad boys up.

05
Aug
galaxy_s_unlocked

[Updated: Watch Out!] On-Phone One Click Root Available For Samsung Galaxy S

Posted by in Captivate, Development, Epic 4G, Fascinate, News, Vibrant

[Updated August 6 @ 10:15 AM EST]

Enterprising user rhcp0112345 over at XDA-Devs (where else?) has come up with an on-phone, one click root/unroot for the Samsung Galaxy S line of devices. It has only been tested on his Vibrant, but it should work across the line of devices.

There are no real details on the process yet - but it seems that you just install the app, hit “root” or “unroot,” and reboot your device. Sounds simple enough.

Full post:

Hey,

I just wrote this up.

Thanks to jcase for the information and his root for eris: http://forum.xda-developers.com/showthread.php?t=742228

This will root/unroot.

03
Aug
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Samsung Captivate/Vibrant Now Rootable With One Click™

Posted by in Captivate, Development, Vibrant

Android dev TGA_Gunnman has been added to Amazon’s hit list for this latest in a litany of single-click phone unlocking methods. In spite of the impending lawsuit (not really), his Samsung Galaxy S One-Click Root program does exactly what it says on the, err, titlebar.

There are separate versions for the Captivate and Vibrant, so make sure you get the right one. All users have to do is download the program - currently Windows only - run it, and click the One Click Root button with their Captivate/Vibrant connected up to USB. Now all you have left is to sit back and wait for the custom ROMs to start rolling in (since there aren’t any yet).

30
Jul
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Motorola Droid X And Samsung Captivate Open Source Code Released

Posted by in Captivate, Droid X (Shadow), Eclair 2.1, Motorola, News, Samsung
Last Updated: November 23rd, 2011

As part of the Android's open source Apache license, manufacturers are required to publicly release all of their own modifications and improvements made to the Android core. Today, both Samsung and Motorola decided it would be the perfect time to drop the Captivate and Droid X code to their respective open source sites.

This will allow ROM developers to figure out all those little quirks specific to the hardware and incorporate them into their releases.

Note, however, that the Android license doesn't cover proprietary extensions, such as custom vendor applications and widgets, and therefore does not require manufacturers to open source them:

Licensing

With the exception of brief update periods, Android has been available as open source since 21 October 2008.

30
Jul
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Samsung Shows Off All US Samsung Galaxy S Series Phones In This Promo Video - Share It With Your Non-Android Friends

Posted by in Captivate, Epic 4G, Fascinate, Galaxy S, News, Samsung, Vibrant, Videos

Samsung Galaxy S series phones - Captivate, Vibrant, Epic 4G, and Fascinate - are definitely the cool new kids on the block, and Samsung wants everyone to know that.

In this relatively lengthy promotional video, Samsung has showcased all 4 models (though, we don't get much of the Fascinate past the initial glimpse), highlighting some important aspects of these devices, such as:

  • Super AMOLED display
  • keyboard on the Epic 4G
  • 1GHz Hummingbird CPU speed
  • 3D audio
  • DLNA output
  • Android 2.1 Eclair (though, the Froyo upgrade is only 1-2 months away)
  • TouchWiz interface
  • HD video
  • Swype
  • social integration
  • apps and 3D games
  • browser with pinch-to-zoom

Of course, they forgot to mention that the phones that are already out have been successfully rooted, but we'll keep that between us.

24
Jul
CWMR

Koush Releases Final Version of ClockworkMod Recovery For Samsung Galaxy S

Posted by in Captivate, Development, Fascinate, Galaxy S, News, Vibrant

Koush has released his new version of ClockworkMod for the Galaxy S series of devices. Users who flashed older versions of CWM will have to reflash the stock kernel. However, CWM doesn’t touch the kernel – Koush says it’s “…Completely uninvasive” – rather than hard-installing, it installs to the ramdisk so that it’s gone when the phone restarts.

Installation is pretty simple – users download ROM Manager from the Market, and then flash CWM. The first time users run CWM, an additional reinstall may be needed. Koush’s instructions:

First things first, if you flashed a previous version of Clockwork Recovery using Odin, FLASH BACK TO A STOCK KERNEL using this Odin package:
http://koush.tandtgaming.com//test/k...-stock.tar.md5

This recovery is *very* safe to use.

23
Jul
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Samsung Handing Out Free Galaxy S Phones To Disgruntled iPhone 4 Users On Twittter?

Posted by in Captivate, Galaxy S, News, Samsung, Vibrant

Are you still death gripping your phone into oblivion, wishing that your signal would maintain long enough to make just one call? Don’t worry we hear you, and apparently, so do the folks over at Samsung!

There have been a few tweets flying around Samsung’s UK twitter page lately, handing out free Galaxy S phones to five lucky British individuals. Before you all rush to Twitter and start sending tweets out to Samsung though, you should probably know that all may not be how it seems.

image

Engadget has done some investigatory work on the people who have supposedly received these free devices, and found that at least four of the five people receiving the device are involved in marketing or publishing.

20
Jul
samsung_galaxy_s_1

Samsung T-Mobile Vibrant, AT&T Captivate Galaxy S Series Phones Not Without Their Own Signal Problems: Major GPS Issues Emerge For Some

Posted by in Captivate, Galaxy S, News, Samsung, Vibrant

Can You Find Me Now?

A substantial thread on the XDA forums over GPS-related woes for people using the Samsung Galaxy S i9000 has left users of the device puzzled for nearly two weeks across Europe and Asia. Now, there are similar threads for the currently available American versions, the Vibrant and Captivate, that are quickly increasing in length as well.

So, what is this problem? The Galaxy S (for some users) has difficulty locking onto enough GPS satellites to maintain an accurate fix on the user’s position. This translates to unusable GPS car navigation apps, inaccurate map readings, and generally makes using any GPS-enabled application a less-than-enjoyable (and inaccurate) experience.

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