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Verizon is just not letting up on the updates. Which is kind of a crazy thing to say about the carrier. Today's is an oddity, though, as the Droid Charge will be getting a mild upgrade. Yes, really. It's not a huge change, though. Unfortunately, it's not Jelly Bean (or even Ice Cream Sandwich), but it does bring a couple of the features from those platforms, including face unlock and a photo editor.
It's always nice to see a device update roll out. This time around, we're seeing the details of a new software update for the Droid Charge spring up on Verizon's support page. The update brings things to version FP1, and mainly consists of some bug fixes and minor improvements:
Ah, the Droid Charge -- the Droid that never should have been. It was the first LTE Droid to hit Verzon and... well, its accomplishments stopped there. In fact, this once-flagship device is still running Froyo, rendering some of its hardware basically useless (like the front facing camera). Fortunately, Gingerbread may be just around the corner for those who bought into the Charge hype, as a new leaked build just landed on MyDroidWorld, courtesy of P3Droid.
When I switched from AT&T from Verizon and swapped my aging, battered, and bruised Nexus One for a DROID BIONIC, the possibility of buyer’s remorse was not on my mind. I was coming from AT&T - America’s single least reliable network in terms of dropped calls. So, I thought the last thing I’d end up doing was wishing I was back there. And now, at least part of me does.
Yesterday we highlighted a deal with VZW's first LTE phone, the HTC ThunderBolt. If the TBolt isn't your cup of tea, then Amazon Wireless has come through with yet another amazing deal on an LTE phone: the Samsung Droid Charge.
The Droid Charge was the first 4G phone with Droid branding to hit VZW, and as such, has been the flagship phone of the Droid lineup since its release back in May. If you were to walk into a Big Red retail store and buy the Charge right now, you would leaving with $300 less than you went in with, and, lets face it, who wants to drop that much coin on a new phone?
Skysoft... errr, I mean Skype updated its previously measly Android device support from 5 devices to more than 20 today with the introduction of version 2.1 of its Android app. There are no new features outside of expanded device support, which was badly needed in order for the app to climb out of the sea of 1-star reviews (although stability and quality improvements would have made today's release even sweeter).
Netflix this evening appears to have quietly unleashed the Android app on 16 more previously unsupported devices, all without updating the application at all.
Yesterday, Skype with video was officially released to the Android Market. There was one problem, though: it was only supported on a small number of seemingly random handsets, like the Nexus S (but not the Nexus S 4G), Desire S, Xperia neo, and Xperia pro. Thanks to the ingenuity of skilled Android modder 0mie, that's no longer the case.
Update 2: SMS send and receive and mobile hotspot are non-working. Do not download this file (the link has been removed) - wait until a more stable release is available. If you need to flash back to Froyo, please check out this thread on MyDroidWorld.
If you're a Droid Charge owner, there's a good chance you're wondering when Gingerbread will be coming your way. After all, we've heard many Gingerbread rumors lately - but not a mention of the Charge. Until now, that is.
I'm not a big fan of the DROID Charge, but hey, to each his own. And apparently consumers haven't been such huge fans of the phone's notoriously high original MSRP ($300 on upgrade or new agreement), making it the most expensive subsidized Android phone to date.
It looks like VZW has an update ready for the Droid Charge that should be hitting handsets pretty soon - but it's not Gingerbread. It's mostly a bug fixer, so don't expect anything too astounding to come from it, although the info on Big Red's site does make mention of improved switching between 3G and 4G LTE, which was one of the biggest gripes we had with our review unit.
So, you bought that fancy new Nexus S/DROID Charge/Galaxy S II/G2X/Flyer with a front-facing camera, and you were excited to make video calls. Then you noticed there isn't any native video chat client for Android (yet - Talk will have this integrated soon). Then you heard about fring, which is pretty cool. Then you tried to install it, only to discover it didn't work. Then you probably had a sad.
So, I'm probably not the best person to write about anything that might encourage someone to buy a DROID Charge (I sure as hell wouldn't, and our friends at Droid-life agree), but here we are. Amazon's offering the Charge for a slightly-more-reasonable price of $200 on a new 2-year agreement or eligible upgrade, down from the absolutely absurd price of $300 you'll get it for everywhere else.
If you have been patiently waiting for the first 4G LTE DROID to hit Verizon's network after last month's 4G outage that delayed the original release, you'll be pleased to know that your wait ends tomorrow, as the Samsung DROID Charge is finally set to hit the shelves of Big Red.
Make no mistake, the DROID Charge is a cool phone. It looks cool. Its boot screen looks cool. Hell, even the camera has been carefully crafted to look like some sort of crazy piece of future-tech.
Neither z4root nor SuperOneClick is currently working on the Charge (though I'm sure someone will come up with a one-click method soon enough), but guess what - Gingerbreak sure does. Follow these instructions, and you should have root and full /system unlock on your Droid Charge in a few minutes. Credit goes to the Exploid Crew and unnamed testers.