Hasta La Gadget!

It’s summer. It’s hot. Naturally, everyone wants to lick some frozen dessert in one form or another. Shortly after the Nexus One got its absolutely official Android 2.2 update, HTC has once again leaped out to tell us of its own Froyo offering. The Taiwanese mobile giant has informed Recombu that it’s expecting “several of our 2010 models including Desire, Legend and Wildfire” to join Google’s latest green bot party “beginning in Q3.” We went to the trouble of confirming this with HTC ourselves, and while this isn’t really much of an update from the company’s previous statement in terms of time frame, here’s hoping that at least some of its customers will get the delivery before the summer fiesta ends.

HTC: expect Desire, Legend and Wildfire to get Froyo ‘beginning in Q3’ originally appeared on Engadget on Tue, 29 Jun 2010 09:32:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Good news, Android fans! HTC’s Aria — arguably the first Google-fied phone on AT&T worth caring about — is seemingly slipping onto carrier floors a few days early. As the story goes, the Sense-equipped, Android 2.1-powered handset was supposed to go on sale this Sunday, but based on these unboxing shots from a giddy tipster, it’s clearly ready to be procured early in some locations. Still unsure if it’s worth your $129.99 on contract? Have a peek at our review right here.

Update: We’re also hearing through the grapevine that these are in stock in certain Best Buy Mobile locations.

[Thanks, Travis]

HTC Aria slipping out early into AT&T stores originally appeared on Engadget on Fri, 18 Jun 2010 13:04:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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It’s sort of hard to believe, but AT&T finally has an Android phone worth paying attention to. Mind you, the AT&T compatible Nexus One is easily the best Googlephone on America’s largest GSM operator, but this is the first one that the company has bothered to brand and sell on a subsidized plan within its own stores. Pundits could argue the reasons why forever, but considering that the carrier’s doing all it can just to keep up with the demand for iPhones, it’s hard to imagine that AT&T has been longing to pursue Android with reckless abandon. Believe it or not, it’s been over 1.5 years since T-Mobile gave the world the first taste of a mobile OS that would soon rival (and surpass) the other options already on the table, but outside of the forgettable Backflip (and the nowhere-to-be-found Aero), there’s been no Android to speak of on AT&T. HTC has somehow managed to break down the blue and orange walls, piercing the heart of a hardened operator and squeezing a delightful mid-range Android smartphone into a lineup that’s about to be monumentally overshadowed by the iPhone 4. So, is the HTC Aria worth the $129.99 that you’ll be forced to pay on a 2-year agreement when it ships on June 20th? Read on to find out.

Continue reading HTC Aria review

HTC Aria review originally appeared on Engadget Mobile on Thu, 17 Jun 2010 11:04:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Um… okay? In what’s easily one of the most curious product introductions of the year (in terms of method, not design), AT&T has seemingly just made official the first not-awful Android device to be sold in subsidized fashion for its network. ‘Course, those who don’t mind ponying up for an out-of-contract phone have been able to to pick up an AT&T-compatible Nexus One for a few months now, but contract lovers have been stuck with the Motorola Backflip and the promise of Dell’s admittedly underwhelming Aero. Dante Martin, a product manager at the carrier, has followed up on a prior video with a confirmation that the HTC Aria is indeed “launching on AT&T,” though he gives precisely no specifications in his address posted after the break. All we know is that the phone will most certainly ship with Sense and an optical trackball, but mum’s the word on a price or release. For now, anyway. Here’s hoping this is just the beginning — AT&T needs a decent dose of Android in the worst possible way.

[Thanks, Travis]

Update: Ah, and here’s the official presser. It’s a mid-range phone with Android 2.1, a five megapixel camera, 3.2-inch HVGA capacitive touchpanel, inbuilt WiFi and support for 7.2Mbps HSPA. There’s also a soft-touch back and a total weight of around four ounces, and AT&T says this one will be available on June 20th nationwide for $129.99 on a two-year contract (after $100 mail-in rebate, of course). As for specs? There’s a 600MHz Qualcomm MSM 7227 processor, proximity sensor, integrated GPS, a digital compass, light sensor, 512MB ROM / 384MB RAM, a microSD card slot (2GB included) and a 1,200mAh battery good for up to six hours of yapping.

Continue reading HTC Aria goes official for AT&T, gets toyed with on video (update: $130, coming June 20)

HTC Aria goes official for AT&T, gets toyed with on video (update: $130, coming June 20) originally appeared on Engadget on Mon, 14 Jun 2010 09:21:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Last time we heard about ExB’s PTPT (pronounced “petite petite”), the software startup was just beginning to show off the basics of its touchscreen interface; since then, the small German company has been polishing up the UI and prepping it for Android phones and tablets. According to the CEO Ramin Assadollah, the company is in talks with a “major hardware manufacturer” that’s planning on skinning its Android products with the incredibly unique software. We got to see PTPT running on an Android 1.6-powered Acer Liquid while at the Netbook Summit, and though it took us a few minutes to understand how the interface worked, it’s definitely interesting and responsive. The input starts with three circular icons representing people, places, and things and then a bar that represents time.

You can simply select an individual person — you can import contacts from a variety of sources, including, Twitter, Facebook, and so on — from the halo that appears, and then drag them up to a specific time to get various updates or e-mails from that person. The custom predictive text keyboard in the e-mail interface was very snappy — it’s also just nice to see a change from the stock Android input. Then, you can drag that person to things to see pictures of them. And just like in the original demo, you can then move the pictures icon to a point on the timeline to see pictures from that time. Though the phone and tablet demos we saw didn’t have widgets on the homescreen, we were assured that they can be added. We promise this is all better explained in the demo video below, so mosey on down after the jump. We’ll be here, wondering what Android devices this software may pop-up on.

Continue reading PTPT shows off wild Android UI skin, we go hands-on

PTPT shows off wild Android UI skin, we go hands-on originally appeared on Engadget on Wed, 26 May 2010 18:11:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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