Hasta La Gadget!

LAS VEGAS — After HTC’s EVO Shift debuted at CES this week, I was able to spend a little time playing around with it. From what I’ve seen so far, it’s a solid contender for those who don’t want to carry around an oversized chunk of hardware.

Unlike its giant predecessor the EVO, the EVO Shift’s capacitive touch screen measures in at 3.6 inches with 480-by-800-pixel resolution. Compare that to the EVO’s 4.3 inch screen size, and the Shift might seem small. But you don’t want to carry a phone that borders on tablet-sized status around in your pants, do you?

I’m personally satisfied with a mid-range screen like that of the EVO Shift, and the image clarity on the menu screens was impressive enough to win over any size queen.

The back facing 5-megapixel camera is straightforward, lit with an LED flash. The photos I took were nothing to write home about, but then again the Shift isn’t packing the 8-megapixel cameras that a number of other recent smartphones have been. And it’s not supposed to, either. A phone like the Shift isn’t aimed at the nerds that need the latest and greatest pocket powerhouse that tops every hardware category across the board.

If you’re used to the keyboard on the Blackberry but want to move to the Android OS (Froyo in particular), the Shift has a slide-out QWERTY to accompany the touch screen. The keys are only slightly raised with flat tops, which might be annoying to those used to boards with a more nub-like keytop. But after a few minutes, texting with the buttons felt intuitive.

Browser speed seemed spotty, though the congested network inside of CES made it difficult to tell just how fast the Shift will perform when it hits Sprint’s 4G network. And that won’t be long from now: The Shift becomes widely available on the last day of CES, January 9th.

All in all, for a lightweight $150 price tag (after mail-in rebate and 2-year contract, mind you), the EVO Shift is a solid contender for its price range.

Photos: Jon Snyder/Wired.com

We happen to think the future of the car dashboard is a gradual path to obsolescence, dying and getting replaced by a mobile device. Visteon also think there’s a future for mobile devices in a dash — but not for actually replacing the car stereo. Visteon showed off its Consumer Electronics Device to Vehicle HMI (human/machine interface), which is basically a stupidly long name for a system enabling device integration of the sort we haven’t seen yet. Yes, you can stream tunes through the car’s stereo but, more impressively, actually change the channel that it is tuned to.

That’s just the beginning, with a navigation display and even simplified web browsing, but most impressive is the ability to manage the rest of the car’s interior. You can change seat positions, adjust climate controls, and probably much, much more than the semi-functional demo unit we got our hands on can do. There is a dock connector for the iPad but that’s just for providing power: the connectivity is entirely wireless, meaning people in the back seat can change the channel — or push up the seat of the person in front of them. The box that handles all this is going into production soon and so should start showing up in cars sometime over the next year. Which cars? Your guess is as good as ours, as Visteon works with more car marques than it doesn’t.

Continue reading Visteon puts an iPad in a car dashboard, we go hands-on (video)

Visteon puts an iPad in a car dashboard, we go hands-on (video) originally appeared on Engadget on Thu, 06 Jan 2011 16:56:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Pandigital isn’t beating around the bush with the two tablets it’s showing here at CES — they run Android 2.1, they’re not getting Froyo, and they’re most certainly not getting Honeycomb. These slates come in 7 and 9-inch varieties, and the 9-inch Novel comes in both AT&T 3G and WiFi-only models. To rub salt in the wound, these guys don’t have any Android Market support, and they won’t be getting it any time soon (or ever, for that matter). On the bright side though, you get B&N’s Nook app pre-installed on the Novel (get it?). Unfortunately, we’re most upset that Pandigital hasn’t seemed to change any of the things we disliked so much with the first version — the screens aren’t glamorous and the performance is still painfully sluggish. If you’re looking for a cheap Android tablet, we’d probably suggest waiting for something with a little bit lot more flare.

Pandigital 7- and 9-inch Android tablets hands-on originally appeared on Engadget on Thu, 06 Jan 2011 16:53:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Say what you want about its beta-fied OS, or the need to tether it to access its more powerful functions, the Playbook is The Hotness: beautifully built, quick, and just dead sexy. Check out our killer custom flyby video. More »

The white curtains just lifted here at the Samsung booth at CES to unveil the Samsung 4G LTE Smartphone. This Verizon LTE-ready beast touts a Super AMOLED Plus display, runs Android 2.2 with TouchWiz and features a front-facing cam. On the rear it’s got an 8 megapixel auto-focus shooter and mini HDMI on the hip. We’re busy sorting out details and grabbing pics more. Stay tuned!

Update: We’ve added the gallery with hands-on shots for your viewing pleasure!

Update 2: Samsung nor Verizon were willing to talk labels, but it’s a pretty safe bet this phone is the SCH-i520 we peeked earlier in the week.

Samsung 4G LTE smartphone for Verizon (SCH-i520) first hands-on! originally appeared on Engadget on Thu, 06 Jan 2011 16:46:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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