Hasta La Gadget!

Nokia’s prepping for a fourth quarter launch of its MeeGo smartphone. The N8 will hit before the end of Q3. The company’s absolutely not planning to use Android and a tablet isn’t happening anytime soon. And that’s just the tip of the iceberg when it comes to the stuff we learned this morning during our captivating chat with Niklas Savander, Espoo’s executive vice president and general manager of the Markets unit. With its quarterly profits dropping and losing daily (in mindshare, at least) to the Apples, HTCs and Motorolas of the world, we were certainly not lacking questions when we headed into the meeting, and Savander took on our questions about Nokia’s short and long term plans with stride. We’ve got the key points of the interview bulleted out after the break — and the full transcript after that.

Continue reading Nokia’s VP talks N8, MeeGo ‘milestone product,’ tablets, Android and more!

Nokia’s VP talks N8, MeeGo ‘milestone product,’ tablets, Android and more! originally appeared on Engadget on Fri, 06 Aug 2010 18:27:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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This amazing robotic ball is called the Smart Ball. Built into a small plastic sphere, the robot inside is controlled via your Bluetooth cellphone (Android only right now, but any phone could do it) and rolls in the direction you tell it. The control interface is the phone itself: You tilt it and the accelerometers pass on the info to the ball, controlling speed and directions. Imaging playing Super Monkey Ball in real life and you pretty much have it.

The balls are actually prototypes for a real commercial product, and were made by hacker group Gearbox. The Gearbox folks have already opened up the APIs (the parts that let programmers create apps to control the balls) and have been running hack weekends where people can come along and try them out.

Controlling a ball’s roll is pretty cool, but other uses are even cooler. For instance, one commenter suggests having a GPS app control the Smart Ball: input your destination and the ball would roll away, guiding you to your goal like a benign willow-the-wisp.

The Gearbox people are aiming for a price of around $25, and already have games planned or written. Sumo, for instance pits one ball against the other, with two people trying to knock each others’ ball off a table. The phone would keep track of things and offer stats and league tables. Neat.

We’ll be keeping an eye on the Gearbox blog to see when these are available to buy.

Smart Ball [Gearbox via Make]

See Also:

• Video: Pool-Playing Robot Is Unbeatable
• Human Beats 340-Pound Robot in Football Kick-off
• Robot

We suppose the good news is that Cablevision COO Tom Rutledge mentioned the intent is to bring all of its services — broadcast TV, video on-demand — to networked devices capable of displaying video, specifically mentioning the iPad, and that it is also working on program guide software for Android and PCs. Unfortunately, unlike the TV Everywhere websites from others like Comcast, or Dish’s Sling-powered placeshifting Cablevision only plans to allow access within the residence. According to Light Reading, the comments came during the company’s second quarter earnings call, when he also noted that the PC to TV Media Relay for bringing web video to the cable box was still undergoing testing ahead of a fourth quarter launch, while the long awaited network DVR is in its second phase of testing will also begin rolling out later this year. We’re not sure if Cablevision’s reluctance to extend video beyond our four walls is a technical issue, greed, or if it’s simply tired of fighting Hollywood over content rights after the network DVR legal battle, but we’re still hoping for a change of plans down the line.

Cablevision promises TV, VOD streaming to iPads, other networked devices — but only at home originally appeared on Engadget on Fri, 06 Aug 2010 08:31:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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In another case of Canadians getting things ahead of their southerly neighbors, the Motorola Flipout has made its journey across the Atlantic and settled on Rogers as its first North American carrier. 3-year contractual commitments will be greeted with a lowly C$30 charge for the phone, or if you can’t bear the thought of being locked in for so long, you can buy the flipping thing outright for C$375. As a quick reminder, the Flipout runs on Google’s Android 2.1 OS, but embellishes things a little with a freshened up variety of the Motoblur UI. If that, together with the “hip to be square” form factor, sounds like your slice of pie, we suggest you head on over to the source link and put those Canadian Dollars to good use.

[Thanks, CoconutCheez]

Motorola Flipout makes North American debut with a Rogers exclusive originally appeared on Engadget on Thu, 05 Aug 2010 19:47:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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We’ve been flooded with a deluge of tips about the HP Zeen ever since we posted those first FCC images of the tablet device this morning, and it’s actually a little surprising at how perfectly everything aligns. We’ve now had multiple tipsters confirm that the Zeen is an e-reading-focused Android tablet with the unique ability to connect directly to an HP printer and function as its interface without the need for a computer. But that’s not all — here’s everything else we know:

• The Zeen is a capacitive tablet running a HP skin on top of Android 2.1 — it won’t get shifted to webOS, and it’s not clear if it’ll get upped to Froyo before launch given the development time required. It has capacitive touch buttons, a SD card slot, video support, and at least some prototypes have cameras with a special webcam app installed.
• The goal is for the HP home screen and skin to be the only home screen available, but that hasn’t been fully implemented yet.
• E-reading is a major focus, and the Zeen has “significant” integration with the Barnes & Noble Nook bookstore and ecosystem. Makes sense, as the Nook itself is based on Android, and being able to print e-books from the Zeen would be a huge differentiator — and a great way for HP to sell more ink.
• The Zeen will come in two configurations: a $399 bundle with a new printer called Zeus and as a standalone unit for an unknown price. The Zeus has its own “basic” control setup, but when the Zeen is docked it provides a rich interface to the printing functions — presumably a web-connected interface like the one HP’s been moving towards with other printers.
• Despite the CQ model number, the Zeen is a straight HP product, with a laser-etched logo on the back.

So that’s what we know about this enigmatic product. It certainly adds up — HP has long said one of the reasons it bought Palm was to use webOS as a consistent interface to other connected devices like printers, and it only makes sense that the company was working on executing that strategy with an OS like Android long before Jon Rubinstein and company joined the team. Besides, how better to sell more ink than by making it easy for consumers to hit Facebook and print pictures without having to use a computer at all? It’s certainly interesting — we’re waiting patiently to see when and where the Zeen next appears.

The HP eStation Zeen, the Zeus printer, and everything we know about them originally appeared on Engadget on Thu, 05 Aug 2010 17:41:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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