Based on breathless reports we’re seeing on Twitter and in the XDA-Developers’ forums, it would appear that Samsung has just pushed out the official Android 2.2 Froyo update for its Galaxy S as promised. Our Nordic friends are the first to report seeing the build I9000 JPM update in the latest version of Samsung’s Kies PC software. It’s early days though, so do let your fellow i9000 owners know how it goes in the comments below. List of changes (including GPS fix) listed after the break.
Update: We’ve just been handed the official press release for the Andoid 2.2 Galaxy S update. Indeed, Nordic countries get it first (starting mid-October, aka, “now”) before it’s “gradually rolled out to other European markets, Southeast Asia, the Middle East Asia, North America, Africa and rest of the world.” Hey, it takes time to update 5 million handsets.
We’d been wondering if the Droid 2 Global was just a beautiful figment of our imagination after the Droid Pro came out of left field, but it looks like the world-phone edition of Verizon’s slider Droid is still coming — it just appeared in the VZLearn employee training system. No idea when it’ll actually hit, but we’re guessing it’ll be sometime soon — and then the decision between global Droids with QWERTY keyboards will be as agonizing as possible.
We’ve got a little more detail on those four new pre-orderable phones up in Best Buy Mobile’s business this week now that the news has gone from leak status to official, and needless to say, the truth is even stranger than fiction. The Dell Streak will be available for the first time in retail stores for $299.99 on contract come October 24, joined by a white version of Verizon’s Samsung Fascinate for $149.99 on contract; those two will be followed on November 8 by the HTC Surround for $199. Here’s where it gets interesting, though: the white Sony Ericsson X10 for AT&T — also rumored in our original leak — will come pre-loaded with “The Essential Taylor Swift Experience,” which frankly doesn’t paint a picture of the target demographic we’d really expected. But hey, we like surprises! What does her essential experience entail, exactly? Two albums, a new single, ringtone and video content, and access to her new album when it launches on October 25. This bad boy also comes in on October 24 for $99 on contract. Best Buy claims that all four of these are in-store exclusives… which, particularly with the Surround, is pretty insane. Follow the break for the press release.
Forget all that Mini stuff, Opera is bringing its full-flavored mobile browser to Android some time very soon indeed. To tempt people on board, the new software will support hardware acceleration for buttering up frame rates while you zoom around at potato-scalding speeds, while pinch-to-zoom will also be implemented in a big O Android browser for the first time. Opera Mini will be partaking in the latter upgrade as well, while Opera Mobile proper is expected to make its debut on the Android Market at some point over the next month. All versions of the “well diversified” OS are supported too!
[Thanks to everyone who sent this in]
Update: Opera has clarified that the first Android beta of Opera Mobile will have pinch-to-zoom and will arrive some time over the next month, but won’t be bringing hardware acceleration with it. That’ll be a feature for a later date.
Let’s be real: almost every phone looks better in white. Okay, so that’s strictly a matter of personal opinion — but if you’re a white phone kind of person, turn your attention away from the forever-delayed iPhone 4 and toward a couple that are launching shortly thanks to some new details from Best Buy. Turns out Verizon’s white Fascinate and AT&T’s white X10 are both scheduled to hit on October 24, alongside the Dell Streak — not in white, by the bye — followed by the HTC Surround on November 8 (which we already knew). Any of ’em can be yours for a $50 deposit.
Update: We’ve been told that the white Fascinate and X10 will be exclusives for Best Buy, at least at first.
We’re still not sure what’s up with the few reports of G2s receiving OTA updates that add WiFi calling and native hotspot support, but T-Mobile isn’t fessing up to them just yet. In a statement issued to Phone Scoop, T-Mobile said that these features “are not currently supported” on the handset, although T-Mobile thankfully added that it “knows these features are important to consumers and we’re working to deliver them to G2 users in the future.” It’s hard to tell if that means an update is just minutes away from widespread distribution, or if we’ve still got weeks or months to wait for these features. Familiar story?
The Vega, a Tegra 2-powered Android tablet, has had a long and painful birth, but it looks as if it is just about to see the light of day. First shown off in November 2009, back when we were still calling the iPad the “Apple Tablet”, the Vega should soon be on sale in the UK, for a bargain-priced £250 ($395).
To be sold in the UK by the Dixons Group (in PC World and Currys stores), the Vega is incredibly well appointed for the price. At it’s heart is a 1GHz Nvidia T20 Tegra 2 processor and a 10.1-inch capacitive 1024 x 600 touch-screen. Then things get ridiculous: A micro SD-card slot (with 4GB card supplied), 802.11b/g Wi-Fi, 3G-ready SIM-slot, a microphone, Bluetooth, 1.3-megapixel webcam and a battery which will play n1080p video for up to six and a half hours.
There is also a 1.5-Watt speaker, a USB-port and even and HDMI-port. The OS is Android 2.2 Froyo, and the RAM is 512MB, with 1GB option. Whew.
But it’s bound to be junk, right? How could they make it so cheap, with so many things packed inside? Well, take a look at this video and you’ll see that it actually runs pretty well:
Pretty amazing, huh? Apart from that awful keyboard, I mean. Without any official announcement of pricing and availability, we’ll have to wait and see if that figure is really correct. The Vega will sell under the Advent brand, which is just a rebadging for Dixon’s stores (the original MSI Wind netbook was also sold under the Advent brand, for instance). This appears to be the same Vega that was announced by Converged Devices all those months ago.
It’s been a while but, with this and Samsung’s Galaxy Tab due very soon, the competition for the iPad is starting to arrive. That’s good for everyone: iPad haters get alternatives, and iPad lovers benefit from Apple’s response to competition.
It’s been a long, long time since the Tegra-powered Vega tablet came to be officially, and things have changed considerably since then. The biggest modification is the size, down to 10-inches from 15, though the 1GHz NVIDIA Tegra chipset is still in there with its 1080p abilities in tow. Alas, a 1024 x 600 resolution on the capacitive touchscreen puts something of a damper on that, but HDMI output means it’ll tickle the pixels nicely on your HDTV. There’s a 1.3 megapixel webcam, 802.11bg WiFi, a 3G SIM slot, 512MB each of ROM and RAM, and naturally microSD expandability, with a 4GB card included. The OS is Android 2.2 (Market support unknown) and battery life is rated at a quite impressive 6.5 hours of 1080p video, enough to watch both the animated and JCV-featuring Street Fighter movies in one sitting. The best part? The thing is supposed to hit giant UK retailer Dixons next week, on October 18, for £249 — just under $400 American. That’s an unsubsidized price, and a rather attractive one at that.
Update: Video after the break, and Android Communitymanaged a hands-on. Thanks, Kevin.
Samsung’s Galaxy S Android phone is officially a runaway success. It has sold five million units since its launch at the end of June, just over three months ago, proving that a single Android phone is capable of iPhone-like sales figures. The Galaxy S joins Motorola’s Droid as one of the fastest-selling Android handsets.
The Galaxy S, soon to be joined by the Galaxy Tab tablet, has a huge four-inch AMOLED screen, a 5MP camera and the ability to quickly drain the battery and bring the browser to its knees by running Adobe’s Flash plugin.
The numbers break down like this: Of five million units, two million were sold in the US, one million in Samsung’s home country Korea and the rest in other world markets, including China, where the handset went on sale in September. The announcement was made by Samsung at another launch event in Tokyo, Japan, where the Galaxy S will go on sale in late November, running Android 2.2 Froyo.
Sony on Tuesday launched internet-connected HDTVs and Blu-ray players powered by the new Google TV software interface.
With Google TV, Sony says users can “watch television while tweeting about what they’re watching, checking their fantasy football scores, or finding related content on the web.”
As the video above shows, Sony’s emphasis with Internet TV is less about delivering stand-alone content over the web than recasting the television set as a multitasking device. Prices range from $400 to $1,400, and all models will be available for purchase Oct. 16.
Image by Sony
Sony’s Internet TV HDTVs will come in four sizes: 46-inch ($1,400), 40-inch ($1,000), 32-inch ($800), and 24-inch ($600). All four will have Intel processors, 1080p resolution and LED backlighting (except the 24-inch HDTV, which has a CCFL backlight). They will all have four HDMI and four USB inputs. (The press release has no information about component or composite inputs.)
They all have Wi-Fi, will come with the now-famous QWERTY RF remote with integrated mouse, and of course will have Google TV built-in. (Each Internet TV model has the NSX prefix and a GT1 suffix; for example, the 46-inch Internet TV is the NSX-46GT1.)
Sony will also be selling an Internet TV Blu-ray player, called the NSZ-GT1, for $400. It will have the same remote, a similar Intel processor, and will be able to play back Blu-ray discs. The Blu-ray player will have one HDMI input, one HDMI output and four USB inputs.
Sony’s contribution to Google TV, however, has probably attracted the most speculation. An ABC News story on Sony’s Internet TVs showed an oversized remote control that disappointed many (including a few of us here at Wired). Last week Sony Insider received leak about the product line (which we wrote about here at Gadget Lab) that nailed the screen size of all of the HDTVs but happily overshot the prices by as much as $500. I had an inkling, though, that those prices might be high when Sony held a contest to give away a new 40-inch Internet TV and pegged the approximate retail value of the prize at just $1,000.
Sony is certainly pricing Internet TV much more aggressively than most observers expected. In fact, the new Internet TVs will actually be selling for about $100 less than already-discounted current Bravia models with similar specifications. For example, the 46-inch Bravia NX-800, which also has an LED backlight and built-in Wi-Fi, currently retails for $1,500 at SonyStyle.com (marked down from $2000); the comparable NSX-46GT1 with Google TV will start at $1,400. The Blu-ray player does cost more than comparable non-Google TV Sony Blu-ray players with Wi-Fi, which run between $200 and $300. But for only $100 more than the $300 Logitech Revue, the additional Blu-ray playing capability may make $400 seem like a very fair price too.
A handful of Google TV apps will come pre-installed on Sony devices, including Pandora, YouTube, Napster, Twitter, television content from CNBC and the NBA, and Sony’s own Qriocity on-demand video service.
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