Dec 12

Galaxy Player 4.0 review

Posted in: Android, GalaxyS, gingerbread, Google, media player, MediaPlayer, PMP, review, samsung, Today's Chili, video
Galaxy Player 4.0

Apple users have the iPod touch, but what about Android fans? Where do they turn when looking for an app-running, connected media player — basically a smartphone without the phone? Well, believe it or not, there are a few options out there (like the Philips GoGear and Cowon’s D3) And one of the premier lines is certainly Samsung’s Galaxy Player offerings which, as the name implies, borrow a few things from their beloved cellphone siblings. There’s both a 4.0 ($230) and a 5.0 ($270) model which have four- and five-inch screens, respectively, but, besides the size, the two are practically identical in the specs department. We toyed with the smaller Galaxy Player 4.0 for a couple of weeks and our thoughts on Sammy’s (somewhat pricier) answer to the iPod touch are right after the break.

Gallery: Samsung Galaxy Player 4.0 review

Continue reading Galaxy Player 4.0 review

Galaxy Player 4.0 review originally appeared on Engadget on Mon, 12 Dec 2011 10:00:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Dec 12

Sony Ericsson Xperia Nozomi spotted out again, can’t help but get its photo taken

Posted in: Android, gingerbread, Google, leak, leaked, mobilepostcross, mobilepostmini, sony, Sony Ericsson, SonyEricsson, Today's Chili, xperia

Sony Ericsson’s forthcoming flagship was already looking like a very handsome slice of smartphone, but it’s even more dashing in these thankfully crystal-clear shots. This latest leak give us a nice close-up of the matte-finished monolith, showing off a dedicated camera button, HDMI port, built-in battery and the conspicuous absence of microSD storage. The LT26i is rumored to possess a 720 x 1280 resolution spread across a 4.3-inch touchscreen, with a dual-core processor behind it. Sony Ericsson also looks to have finally taken the plunge with front-facing shooters, with an as-yet unspecified camera embedded above the screen, while a stylish glassy button bar below seems to run right through the device. Take a peak at the still-codenamed Nozomi — uncovered — after the break, or check out a full 360-degree runaround at the source below.

[Thanks everyone]

Continue reading Sony Ericsson Xperia Nozomi spotted out again, can’t help but get its photo taken

Sony Ericsson Xperia Nozomi spotted out again, can’t help but get its photo taken originally appeared on Engadget on Mon, 12 Dec 2011 09:29:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Nov 01

Samsung Illusion, Casio G’zOne Ravine 2 and BlackBerry Curve 9370 to hit Verizon this month?

Posted in: Android, BlackBerry, gingerbread, leak, mobilepostmini, samsung, Today's Chili, verizon, Verizon Wireless, VerizonWireless, vzw

Don’t rub your eyes. That above pic is no mirage. It’s a leaked rebate form heralding the Big Red arrival of an actual Illusion — a 3G Samsung-made one, that is. The form, sent to us by an eagle-eyed tipster, confirms that mysterious Gingerbread phone’s imminent November launch, while also outing two other equally un-hyped devices: the BlackBerry Curve 9370 and Casio G’zOne Ravine 2. No official release date could be gleaned from the info at hand, but with a redemption period ranging from the 1st of this month to the 28th, we’re fairly certain this triumvirate of mid-range phones will be making a retail debut soon. So, if you need to replace your last battle-weary, ruggedized smartphone or have a hankering for portrait QWERTYs, this fair fall month’s mobile refreshes could be just the ticket.

Samsung Illusion, Casio G’zOne Ravine 2 and BlackBerry Curve 9370 to hit Verizon this month? originally appeared on Engadget on Tue, 01 Nov 2011 15:36:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Oct 30

Refresh Roundup: week of October 24, 2011

Posted in: 4G, Android, BlackBerry, firmware, firmware update, FirmwareUpdate, gingerbread, HTC, LG, lte, mango, Microsoft, mobilepostcross, motorola, refresh, RIM, roundup, samsung, sdk, software update, SoftwareUpdate, Sony Ericsson, SonyEricsson, thunderbolt, Today's Chili, update, wifi, Wp7, xperia

Your smartphone and / or tablet is just begging to get updated. From time to time, these mobile devices are blessed with maintenance refreshes, bug fixes, custom ROMs and anything in between, and so many of them are floating around that it’s easy for a sizable chunk to get lost in the mix. To make sure they don’t escape without notice, we’ve gathered every possible update, hack, and other miscellaneous tomfoolery from the last week and crammed them into one convenient roundup. If you find something available for your device, please give us a shout attips at engadget dawt com and let us know. Enjoy!

Official Android updates

  • Guess which phone’s finally getting Gingerbread: the HTC Thunderbolt. Yes, we’re being serious. [Thanks to everyone who sent this in, and thanks Eddie for the image!]
  • Gingerbread is now rolling out to the Motorola Droid Pro and Droid 2 Global. [PhoneScoop]
  • The HTC EVO Design 4G wasn’t out for very long before it was ready for a maintenance release. It’s called version 1.19.651.0, and no change log was found right away.
  • More HTC stuff: the EVO 3D also offers a small bug fix in the form of a security update under the name of version 2.08.651.3. [AndroidCentral]
  • The LG Revolution on Verizon’s also officially gaining Android 2.3. [Pocketnow]
  • In the UK, HTC Desire S owners are now finding themselves beneficiaries of the Android 2.3.5 firmware update as well as Sense 3.0. [AndroidCentral]
  • How about a couple for the little guys? CSpire, formerly known as Cellular South, is pushing Gingerbread to its Samsung Galaxy S and Motorola Milestone X. [AndroidCentral(1) and (2)]
  • Sony Ericsson announced this week that Android 2.3.4 is rolling out to the 2011 Xperia lineup around the world. Additional enhancements include 16x video zoom, WiFi DLNA, screen capture capability, ability to attach USB peripherals to Sony Ericsson LiveDock and more.

Unofficial Android updates, custom ROMs and misc. hackery

  • The Samsung Stratosphere on Verizon has been successfully rooted. [AndroidCommunity]
  • HTC devices receiving the official Gingerbread kernel source from HTCDev this week: The Evo Shift 4G, the Thunderbolt and Droid Incredible. [AndroidCentral]
  • When it rains, it pours — the Thunderbolt, on top of receiving Gingerbread and its accompanying kernel source, has also found itself on the receiving end of an Ice Cream Sandwich SDK port. As can be expected, it’s still in prealpha stages and has a few bugs to work out. [AndroidCommunity]
  • If you’re a CM7 user, there’s now a file available that will turn your lock screen into one that resembles Ice Cream Sandwich’s style. [Droid-Life]

Other platforms

  • Microsoft’s pushing a firmware upgrade to the LG Optimus 7 Windows Phone which seems to grace the device with WiFi tethering and the ability to locate hidden WiFi networks. [WMPowerUser]
  • It’s not a BlackBerry firmware update, but many people still have a soft spot for BBM and will be interested to know that RIM is putting out version 6.0.1 with a few enhancements. Head to the source to check it out. [MobileTechReview]

Refreshes we covered this week

Refresh Roundup: week of October 24, 2011 originally appeared on Engadget on Sun, 30 Oct 2011 11:41:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Oct 28

White Galaxy Note appears, developers wanted to pen third-party apps for its stylus

Posted in: Android, gingerbread, Google, mobilepostcross, samsung, sdk, smartphone, Smartphones, Today's Chili

We’ve already inspected every inch of Samsung’s big bad phone-tablet hybrid, but a soupçon of extra news has trickled out from the Galaxy Note’s bombastic launch event in London yesterday. Those looking for brighter color scheme to match the striking glow of its HD Super AMOLED display are in luck, as the Galaxy Note looks set to arrive in white; the ethereal ying to its companion’s midnight blue yang. Sammy added that the Galaxy Note’s S-Pen SDK will be available to third-party developers starting December, hopefully bringing more uses for that slide-out stick. And that’s despite the latest Android OS offering native stylus support — the Galaxy Note remains a Gingerbread affair. The current smartphone king was unable to confirm if the UK would be getting the white model on the November 3rd launch day, or ever. Similarly, we’re still waiting on Samsung to put S-Pen to paper on pricing and any possible US launch details.

White Galaxy Note appears, developers wanted to pen third-party apps for its stylus originally appeared on Engadget on Fri, 28 Oct 2011 13:21:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Oct 28

Samsung claims top spot in global smartphone shipments for Q3 2011, Apple slips to number two

Posted in: Android, Apple, business, gingerbread, Google, GoogleAndroid, industry, ios, ios 5, Ios5, iPhone, mango, market share, marketshare, mobilepostcross, nokia, samsung, smartphone, Today's Chili, windows phone, windows phone 7, WindowsPhone, WindowsPhone7

On this edition of As The Smartphone World Turns…, we’ve got Samsung violently snatching victory from the jaws of Apple, claiming its spot at the top of global smartphone vendors once more. Dramatics aside, the latest shipment figures tallied up by Strategy Analytics are showing that worldwide smartphone shipments are up 44 percent year-over-year, reaching a staggering 117 million units in Q3 2011. Digging into that a bit, we’re told that Samsung has overtaken Apple from a units-shipped standpoint, with Sammy moving 28 million smartphones and claiming 24 percent of the market share. If you’ll recall, Apple briefly grabbed hold of numero uno last quarter, but has now fallen a rung with 15 percent of the global pie. Of course, things could be dramatically different when we see Q4 2011 figures roll out — remember, Q3 2011 was the last quarter in a long string with the aging iPhone 4 as Apple’s “newest” device. Stranger still, Nokia is slotted third with just 14 percent of the global share, representing a precipitous drop from 33 percent a year ago. Similarly, Nokia’s fortunes are apt to change with both the N9 finally out and its spate of Windows Phone devices heading out in short order. Hop on past the break for the full breakdown.

Continue reading Samsung claims top spot in global smartphone shipments for Q3 2011, Apple slips to number two

Samsung claims top spot in global smartphone shipments for Q3 2011, Apple slips to number two originally appeared on Engadget on Fri, 28 Oct 2011 09:37:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Oct 28

Samsung Galaxy Note review

Posted in: Android, breaking news, BreakingNews, galaxy, gingerbread, Google, Ifa2011, mobilepostcross, review, samsung, sdk, smartphone, Smartphones, Today's Chili, video

Remember the display on your first mobile phone? If you’ve been chatting on the go for as long as we have, it was probably barely big enough to fit a complete telephone number — let alone a contact name or text message. And your first smartphone? Even displaying scaled-down, WAP versions of web pages was asking a lot. Now, those mobile devices we couldn’t live without have screens that are much, much larger. Sometimes, though, we secretly wish they were even bigger still.

Samsung’s new GT-N7000 Galaxy Note is the handset those dreams are made of — if you happen to share that dream about obnoxiously large smartphones, that is. It’s as thin as a Galaxy S II, lightning fast and its 5.3-inch HD Super AMOLED display is as gorgeous as it is enormous; the 1280 x 800 pixels you once could only get with a full-size laptop (or in the Galaxy Tab 10.1) can now slide comfortably into your front pocket. Its jumbo display makes it the perfect candidate for a notepad replacement and, with the included S Pen stylus, you’ll have no problem jotting notes on the fly, marking up screenshots or signing documents electronically. But, is that massive display too much of a good thing? You’ll need to jump past the break to find out.

Gallery: Samsung Galaxy Note review

Gallery: Samsung Galaxy Note vs. Galaxy S II

Continue reading Samsung Galaxy Note review

Samsung Galaxy Note review originally appeared on Engadget on Fri, 28 Oct 2011 07:15:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Oct 27

Motorola Atrix 2 review

Posted in: Android, gingerbread, mobilepostcross, motoblur, motorola, review, texas instruments, ti, Today's Chili, video

We’ve seen a lot of game-changing devices this year, haven’t we? 2011 has already witnessed the first Honeycomb tablets, the influx of LTE and the introduction of a boatload of smartphones with dual-core processors. One of those groundbreaking devices was the Motorola Atrix 4G, which we called the best smartphone at CES 2011 because of its powerful Tegra 2 SoC and simply innovative Webtop operating system with an accompanying Lapdock. It was new, and it was powerful.

Not even ten months after the Atrix’s February 22nd launch, we’re already seeing its successor, aptly named the Atrix 2. At the risk of sounding blunt, it’s not a groundbreaking device — aside from a few bumps in specs, larger display and a fresh redesign, it doesn’t offer the same level of showmanship or innovation so eagerly demonstrated in the first iteration. But does the sequel compensate for the lack of sizzle? How much does this improve over the original? Does the newest version of the Lapdock satisfy? We’ll answer these questions and so much more after the break.

Gallery: Motorola Atrix 2 gallery

Continue reading Motorola Atrix 2 review

Motorola Atrix 2 review originally appeared on Engadget on Thu, 27 Oct 2011 14:00:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Oct 27

Motorola Droid 4 exposed to our wandering eyes, comes with LTE in tow?

Posted in: 4G, Android, gingerbread, Google, lte, mobilepostcross, motorola, Today's Chili, verizon, Verizon Wireless, VerizonWireless, vzw
We were just a tad disappointed when the Motorola Droid 3 came out without Verizon’s signature LTE logo on the back, but a mere three months later the QWERTY slider is back with a new model that should be packing 4G. The images above and below, procured by Droid-Life, show what looks to be a super-slim device with the same slight curves on the corner as the RAZR, and tapered back akin to the Droid Bionic. And, interestingly enough, it appears to be nearly complete, judging by the non-Mr. Blurrycam quality of the images and the tutorial stickers on the screen. Not only does the device appear to offer LTE, it also adds Webtop and should be compatible with the LapDock 100 and 500. Rounding out the tentative specs are a 4-inch display, spacious five-row keyboard (with number row included), 1080p HD video capture, front-facing camera and a non-removable battery. It also comes with Android 2.3.5 installed instead of Ice Cream Sandwich, something which we hope to see remedied soon after launch. Looks like we’re finally close to having a high-end QWERTY option on Verizon’s 4G lineup.

Motorola Droid 4 exposed to our wandering eyes, comes with LTE in tow? originally appeared on Engadget on Thu, 27 Oct 2011 12:23:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Oct 27

HTC Raider 4G LTE available on Rogers today, Bell’s version coming soon

Posted in: 4G, Android, canada, gingerbread, HTC, lte, mobilepostmini, Today's Chili
Now that both Rogers and Bell have alive and kickin’ LTE networks, it’s high time we see a full lineup on them, right? HTC’s doing its part, at least, by offering the Raider 4G LTE (aka Holiday), a device we’ve seen announced in Korea and Australia so far. Curiously, Rogers lists the device as having a 1.2GHz dual-core CPU, a downtick from its Asian counterpart, though everything else appears to be the same: it offers a 4.5-inch qHD (960 x 540) display, a full gigabyte of RAM, an 8MP rear camera with LED flash and 1080p video capture, a 1.3MP front-facing cam for video chat and runs with Android 2.3.4 and HTC Sense 3.0 installed. Rogers will be the first in Canada to get the phone out the door, since it’s available in stores and online today for $150 with a three-year commitment, whereas Bell has it listed as “coming soon” on its official site with no actual pricing indicated (MobileSyrup says it will likely be sold for $170). If your heart goes pitter-patter for this Raider, go ahead and pick one up — just keep in mind that the lost ark is not included.

HTC Raider 4G LTE available on Rogers today, Bell’s version coming soon originally appeared on Engadget on Thu, 27 Oct 2011 11:27:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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