Hasta La Gadget!

Acer (a company that we always knew as ambitious… but not too ambitious) finally launched its Aspire One D250 dual boot Windows 7 / Android netbook today, and as you can imagine the ears of the gadget world have all perked up a little bit. According to Pocket-lint, the implementation of the open source OS on a touchscreen deficient PC is not without its issues. For instance, without any designated Android keys, one can find themselves going to the trackpad and ESC key a bit too often. Also worth noting is that this machine will only boot Android — to access Windows you’ve got to select “Switch OS” from within Android itself and then wait for Microsoft to take over. According to Register Hardware, Acer VP Jim Wong explained that the company expects people to use Android for the majority of their computing while only hitting up Windows while looking to use software and tools specific to that OS. And sure, that’s a decent rationalization — but why not give us the choice? Either way, we know you’re jonesin’ to get at all the red hot hands-on action contained within the read links below. And what are you waiting for? Go on!

Read – PHOTOS: Acer Aspire One D250 with Android
Read – Hands on with Acer’s dual-OS netbook

Filed under: Laptops

Acer Aspire One D250 Android netbook gets fondled and photographed originally appeared on Engadget on Wed, 14 Oct 2009 16:28:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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At last eluding the omnipresent Mr. Blurrycam, Motorola’s Android-powered Sholes handset has finally gotten the sort of photography it deserves, apparently with an official go-to-market name of Droid — or at least one decent photo of it. This pic, which doesn’t really confirm or deny any of our suspicions about the device (Verizon was already in the bag), made a berth on the locked Twitter profile of Boy Genius, and hopefully there’s more where this came from: we’re getting tired of the tease.

[Thanks to everyone who sent this in]

Filed under: Cellphones

Motorola Droid (alias Sholes) finally gets a decent headshot originally appeared on Engadget on Wed, 14 Oct 2009 15:04:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Looks like Acer may release a smartphone this year after all. The company has announced the Liquid A1, an Android-powered touch screen smartphone. It’s also the first Qualcomm Snapdragon-powered Android device, with a 1 GHz clock speed that should banish all talk of sluggish user interface response.

As SlashGear reports, the Snapdragon processor also means the Liquid A1 will support accelerated 3G graphics. The Liquid A1 will come preloaded with Android 1.6. So far, we know about a few other Snapdragon devices, including the Toshiba TG01 and the drool-worthy HTC HD2–but those devices run Windows Mobile instead of Android, the report pointed out.

The Liquid A1 will feature WVGA resolution; Acer’s own proprietary UI; a geotagging 5-megapixel camera; and Facebook, Twitter, YouTube, Picasa, and Flickr integration. No word yet on a price, release date, or even country–though this signals we may see 1GHz smartphones in the U.S. sooner rather than later.

The gang at Android and Me seemed to have made quite a number of acquaintances on their sojourn through CTIA and MotoDev Summit. Specifically, there were three people along the way they reportedly talked to that led to the most tantalizing of rumors. First down the rabbit hole is a Sprint developer who claimed the first 4G (i.e. WiMAX) phone will be an Android device, which honestly wouldn’t be all that shocking given the company’s love for and recent history with the OS. Next up is a Samsung exec that intimated we shouldn’t expect Android 2.0 “Eclair” until Q2 2010 — interesting in its own right, but looks like those whispers of Sholes launching with anything beyond Donut isn’t gonna come to fruition now. Our third definitive individual is an INQ head employee who let slip its handsets would be finding its way onto a US carrier’s network in 2010 and would have a “pimped out” customized Android skin chock full of social networking the likes of Spotify, Skype, Facebook, etc. The rest of its report is much ado about nothing — no LG android phone this year, no TomTom app this year, and no standalone Google Maps navigation software. Yeah, that’s quite a number of Android rumors to digest, and unfortunately nothing definitive. Looking forward to the future?

[Via i4u]

Filed under: Cellphones

Android rumor rodeo, starring Sprint’s first 4G phone, a delayed Eclair, INQ Mobile’s 2010 handset, and more originally appeared on Engadget on Tue, 13 Oct 2009 20:29:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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It’s totally not Q3 anymore, but Acer is finally fulfilling its promise to ship an Android-powered netbook, a pre-order page showing up on Amazon offering a reconfigured Aspire One D250. However, the company is apparently a little unsure of its open source OS offerings, so it’s throwing Windows on there as well. Your $349 will get you a dual-booting machine with good ‘ol XP taking up the other partition — a good thing, that, because Android in this application has been said to be half-baked at best. Meanwhile, Acer is also showing off a version of the D250 running Windows 7, which is set to hit Japan next week. Hopefully a Win7/Android super combo will soon be on offer as well, which sounds a bit more tasty than WinXP/Android.

[Via netbooked]

Read – Android Aspire One D250 Pre-Order
Read – Windows 7 Aspire One D250

Filed under: Laptops

Acer’s Android netbook now up for pre-order, Windows 7 version coming soon originally appeared on Engadget on Tue, 13 Oct 2009 08:27:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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