Hasta La Gadget!

NTT DOCOMO announced today its 2012 winter lineup of 16 models for launch in or after November, including nine smartphones, one tablet, four feature phones, one photo panel and one mobile Wi-Fi router. DOCOMO’s newest collection of high-quality smartphones satisfies a wide range of user needs by offering high-end CPUs, large-capacity batteries, high-resolution displays and distinctive designs suited to specific customer segments.
Key features of the new lineup include the following:

All …

If you’re waiting for the next Nexus smartphone from Google with their own stripped-down version of Android (in whatever iteration they choose to deliver), you’ll not be waiting more than a month. A tip from French publication Le Figaro has delivered an inside source with a carrier source they’ve been speaking with anonymously that the 29th of October will be the availability date for the next-generation LG Nexus 4, with a December release date up for France specifically.

With an international release date of the 29th being tipped here, we must assume that Google will have the device for sale up on its Google Play web store rather quickly afterward with world phone capabilities. Here in the USA we’re expecting at least a device capable of working with AT&T and T-Mobile bands. If the past is any indication, this LG smartphone will also be sent to Verizon with 4G LTE in addition to AT&T’s 4G LTE network early on.

This LG device has been tipped as being based on the LG Optimus G, a quad-core processor-toting smartphone introduced rather recently internationally as well. The LG Optimus G is also coming to AT&T here in the United States as well as Sprint, the former getting an iteration with an 8 megapixel camera and the latter grabbing the 13 megapixel version of the device. Here with the LG Nexus 4 we’re expecting another 8 megapixel shooter simply based on the alleged leaked photos of the device and its thinness compared to the 13 megapixel toting Optimus G.

The All Things D conference Dive Into Mobile will be hosting Andy Rubin at the end of this month, this very possibly being the location at which the LG Nexus device will be revealed. If this is true, Google may have made an extraordinary effort with LG to not only keep this device a secret, but to release it at the same time as announcing it as well. This is relatively unprecedented in the Google/Android univer.

[via Android Community]

LG Nexus 4 smartphone launch tipped for October 29th is written by Chris Burns & originally posted on SlashGear.
© 2005 – 2012, SlashGear. All right reserved.

Yesterday, we took a gander at what could possibly be the LG Nexus device, also known as the LG E960 if you are all for model numbers. Well, here is yet another image leak of the device front a front position (albeit with a different screen compared to what we saw yesterday), and if you hit the source link, you will be able to see what the LG E960 looks like from the back as well. Today’s serving does seem to be identical to the one that was seen yesterday, although this time round it lacks the protective, design-concealing outer case complete with a pattern on its back, and there are no physical buttons to speak of. Alleged specifications do seem to jive with earlier rumors, touting a 1.5GHz quad-core processor, an Adreno 320 GPU, an 8-megapixel camera, a display at 1184 × 768 resolution, 2GB RAM, and 8GB of internal memory.

There is a possibility of a 16GB version, but that remains locked under the rumor drawer for now. So far, no mention of NFC was made by recent approval documents, so we will have to continue waiting on that one as well.

By Ubergizmo. Related articles: LG Nexus 4 spotted in Carphone Warehouse listing, LG Nexus photos leaked – could this be it?,

LG has been getting plenty of attention these days because of some recent carrier announcements (case in point: Sprint announced it would carry the LG Mach and Optimus G), but that’s not all of the LG hardware here at MobileCon 2012. T-Mobile recently outed a new LG device of its own — the decidedly mid-range Optimus L9 — and I spent a few moments getting to know it a little better.

As is usually the case with LG hardware, the L9 is light and plasticky, but it just manages to avoid crossing over into chintzy territory thanks in part to its solid construction (there were no telltale creaks to be heard when apply pressure to it) and the lightly textured finish on the device’s rear. Sure, it’s far cry from the sort of solid construction that companies like HTC are known for, but it certainly makes for a pocketable portable.

That said, there are a few curious touches here. Most notable is that when looked at dead-on, the L9 bears more than a passing resemblance to a Samsung device because of what sits below the 4.5-inch qHD display — an elongated home button and the Android soft keys that flank it.

I didn’t have a chance to load up any of my favorite benchmarking tools (the T-Mobile guy was watching us pretty intently), but there weren’t instances of visual lag or stutter as I bounded from menu to menu and app to app. That’s due in large part to the dual-core 1GHz processor and the 1GB of RAM lurking inside the L9′s slim chassis, which is probably enough horsepower to handle most daily tasks with aplomb, but I’ll have to hold off on issuing final judgment for now.

Save for the particular flavor of carrier bloatware loaded onto the L9, the software is awfully similar to the version I spotted when playing with LG’s Mach earlier today. To provide a quick recap, LG’s customer Android overlay doesn’t seem quite as offensive as it has in days past. It feels lighter and less obtrusive, an approach it seems that more and more Android-device OEMs have decided to adopt recently.

The end result is a device that in some ways thoughtfully manages to augment Android with some neat additional features without slowing it to a crawl. That said, T-Mobile seems to have sunk its claws into the device more so than Sprint did with its LG hardware. The L9 packs just a few more preloaded apps and a persistent notification indicating your account details (minutes used, texts sent, etc.).

In many ways, I feel the same way about the L9 as I do about the Mach. It’s a perfectly serviceable device with its share of nice flourishes, but it just doesn’t stand out very much. Maybe that’s just me being a jaded tech blogger, but it seems to me that T-Mobile will need to play hardball with the L9′s price tag. Naturally, that’s exactly what they plan to do. T-Mobile’s on-site staff wouldn’t budge when it came to the prospect of talking pricing, but one of them referred to the L9 as a “great entry-level smartphone.” In other words, it should be nice and cheap whenever the carrier finally decides to launch it.

Sprint finally joined the phone announcement fray earlier this morning and added a handful of new devices to its official roster. While LG’s Optimus G may garner all the love, the newly-revealed LG Mach deserves its share of attention, and I got a bit of hands-on time to do just that.

First off, let’s talk looks. The Mach’s industrial design won’t bring home many rewards, but it’s nice, well proportioned (at 12.2mm, it’s pretty slim for a slider), and largely lacking of frills. Don’t take that as a negative though — some of Sprint’s other QWERTY sliders seem clunky and overly-designed in comparison (I’m looking at you, Photon Q). That said, the Mach’s rear end is strangely nondescript silver, with a strip of lighter plastic surrounding the 5-megapixel camera, and a chrome-esque finish running around the edges.

Perhaps naturally for a mid-range device, LG opted to use a string of three capacitive navigation keys along the bottom of the 4-inch WVGA display rather than on-screen buttons, but the most annoying bit? The sleep/wake button is stuck on the top left corner of the device, a choice that flies in the face of my muscle memory.

For all that a device like this brings to the table, it’s probably going to live or die based on one thing: the keyboard. LG ran with a nicely-spaced, five row affair here, and I didn’t find much to complain about during my brief time playing with it. The keys themselves have a respectable amount of travel and yield up a satisfying click when depressed. I’ve never been sold on the need for up, down, left, and right keys on a keyboard, but hey — someone must like them.

It’s always a little tough to talk performance after such a brief spell of testing, but for what it’s worth the Mach was remained pretty darned snappy as I scrolled through app lists, settings, and menus. That’s all thanks to the dual-core Qualcomm MSM8960 (the same as the one in devices like AT&T’s HTC One X and the Droid Incredible 4G LTE) and the 1GB of RAM — nothing earthshaking, but still a clearly potent combination.

The Mach runs Android 4.0.4 Ice Cream Sandwich, but all the most hardcore users will spend most of their time interacting with LG’s custom UI. I used to be very militant about these sorts of things and railed for stock Android builds for all devices, but LG’s particular take on Ice Cream Sandwich doesn’t seem too offensive… though I still prefer the cold digitalism of untouched Ice Cream Sandwich.

There isn’t a ton of bloatware to be found either; there were only two Sprint-branded apps here and LG’s own applications (think SmartShare media streaming, a more robust video editor, etc.) are neat, if possibly unnecessary additions. The software keyboard leaves a bit to be desired, but really — chances are if you spend money on a device like this, you probably won’t be typing on-screen too much.

All things considered, there’s a lot to like about the LG’s mid-range Mach. The keyboard itself will draw its share of fans, and the rest of the spec sheet adds up to a device that’s perfectly adequate. Of course, exactly how good a buy it’ll be remains unclear — neither Sprint nor LG were willing to talk about pricing (or availability) just yet.