droid

TechCrunch are reporting that a new HTC phone running Android is just around the corner. Described as the next “super” Android Device, it is expected that HTC are to be the ones who will build the phone. Also TC mention that senior Android guys over at Google have now started carrying one of the HTC phones around for testing.

It is expected that the Dragon/Passion will be a super slim phone running Android… but TC also mention something else interesting in that there will actually be a real Google phone, branded by Google. Although not much is known about this Google branded phone, TC managed to find out that they are definitely working on a phone under their own brand. [click to continue…]

Magellan have launched their iPhone satnav application along with a car kit accessory for using in your car.

The Magellan RoadMate comes at an awkward time just after Google [GOOG] have announced Google Maps Navigation which brings a fancy GPS guidance to Android based phones and with rumours of an iPhone version coming soon (again for free). However, I still think that Magellan have a chance at shifting some units if priced right. A number of people have commented on how high priced the TomTom iPhone dock is. If Magellan can sell that at a decent price then they could take a good share of the market. As of yet, there is no official price for the car kit. [click to continue…]

The iPhone app, Google Earth, has received an update that sees a bunch of new features being added to the software. The new software is named Google Earth 2.0 and now provides more integration with your computer that allows you to view maps you create on your computer.

The new integration allows you to use the My Maps website on your computer to look at various trips. When saved, the information is automatically synced to your iPhone allowing you to access needed information while on the move. [click to continue…]

A few weeks ago the XPERIA X10 was announced and at that time it was reported as being a bit sluggish in menu transitions and responsiveness in general. It seems like the new phone has had a firmware update though that has fixed all the problems.

With the phone coming in Feb 2010, there is still a bit more time for more tweaks although it seems the Android based phone is actually running ok now. [click to continue…]

Samsung announced a new smartphone today called the Samsung Galaxy Spica i5700. The phone is Google [GOOG] android based and runs with an 800MHz processor. Although not quite the speed of the Snapdragon processors running at 1GHz it’s still a bump up from other android based phones that tend to run a little slower.

The Samsung Galaxy comes with a 3.5mm headphone jack so that standard head/ear phones can be attached for listening to music. Power is provided by a 1500mAh battery and the phone measures 13.2mm in thickness making it fairly slim. [click to continue…]

Back on November 4th, iFixit posted a bounty asking for someone to provide the innards of the Motorola DROID. The person who could get some decent pictures to them first would receive $300… that person has now provided the photos. The reason they didn’t do their own teardown was due to being busy on other projects.

phoneWreck were the ones who got the pictures sorted first and describe the DROID as being difficult to take apart thanks to hidden screws and a bunch of other preventative ways of letting you in to the phone. Anyway, they got past the problems and managed to take the phone right apart. [click to continue…]

Yesterday a challenge was set on the XDA Forums to see if any users could manage to get Google Maps Navigation to work on the T-Mobile G1. The thread was opened at 8:32pm last night with an answer to the problem being provided at 3:36am this morning with full instructions how to complete the hack.

Alright… i’ve yet to be able to identify the specific lines yet… but here you go.

I was able to get navigation using the 2 build props attached.

I used SU File Browser and adb to do this. You can do it all with adb but between the 2 i was able to do things faster.

Mount system as rw
delete build.prop and build.trout.prop
(or you may modify yours to match, and skip the next step)
push the new build.prop and build.trout.prop to /system/
delete /system/app/Maps.apk
delete /system/sd/app/com.google.android.maps.apk if present
delete /system/sd/dalvik-cache/data@app@com.google.android.apps.maps.apk@classes. dex
REBOOT you have to reboot for the phone to re-read the build props
install the new maps.apk — i did adb install if you do not get Success then you missed something.

update: after all is working.. you may put your old build props back

[click to continue…]

Last Friday saw the release of the Motorola DROID which is the first smartphone to run the Android 2.0 OS. Reports are showing that perhaps 100,000 phones were sold in the first weekend of it’s launch. Verizon at the weekend had 200,000 DROID handsets made available and most of the stores sold at least half the stock indicating that perhaps 100,000 were sold in total.

The information came from Mark McKechnie of Broadpoint AmTech Inc who has also indicated that Motorola expect to sell 1 million phones based on Android software this year and 10 million in 2010. [click to continue…]

Just a few weeks ago we mentioned that Adobe had launched Photoshop for iPhone that allowed easy editing of photos on the iPhone. Adobe have now announced that Photoshop for Android is now available that allows you to also edit photos on your Android phone.

Adobe describe the Android version of photoshop as allowing you to drag your finger to crop, adjust colour, apply effects and perform a number of adjustments of your photo. [click to continue…]

When the DROID was launched just a few days ago, we already knew it lacked pinch and zoom functionality while the equivalent version for Europe supposedly will have that feature as standard.

As of now it seems that pinch and zoom for native applications will not be made available. What this means is that you wont be able to use pinch on zoom on Google Maps Navigation, the web browser and any other apps built in to the phone. However, this doesn’t prevent third party apps from using these features thanks to pinch and zoom being included in the standard API of Android 2.0. [click to continue…]

LG have announced that they are creating a new Android based phone that will run a SnapDragon processor. The phone is set to launch in about 5 – 6 months time in Q2 of 2010. Other than known what OS it will run and that it will be powered by a SnapDragon processor, there isn’t really anything known just yet.

LG have commented that the phone will be a more mature device than the LG GW620 that was recently launched. [click to continue…]

Both the HTC DROID Eris and Motorola DROID are now available over on the Verizon store as of today. The Motorola DROID has been the phone to get the majority of the spotlight over the last few weeks and rightly so as it runs the Google Android 2.0 operating system that is a big upgrade from 1.5/1.6 that other phones have. One of the big features of Android 2.0 is Google Maps Navigation that provides a free turn by turn sat nav system for Android 2.0 based phones.

The Motorola DROID currently has an online price of $199.99 (that includes a $100 discount) based on a 2 year service plan. If you opt for a 12 month contract then the price is $269.99. Contract prices start around $39.99 although that is for a voice plan with an extra $29.99 being mandatory for a data plan. If you opt for a month to month plan the phone sets you back $559.99. Full prices can be found here. [click to continue…]

Verizon have officially announced that they will be offering the HTC DROID Eris and that it will be launched tomorrow on their network. The DROID Eris is another version of the HTC Hero and has a 3.2 inch capacitive touchscreen along with a 5 megapixel camera, EVDO Rev.A and it uses the HTC Sense user interface.

For storage the HTC Eris has a microSD card slot with an 8GB microSD card being provided in the box. The phone unfortunately does not run the Android 2.0 operating system which of course means it will lack the fancy new Google Maps Navigation that the Motorola DROID will be getting. [click to continue…]