Hasta La Gadget!

The Motorola Xoom’s release is close, very close. How do we know that? Well, Moto has just handed one to Chad Ochocinco — one of the NFL’s most recklessly loquacious players — and you don’t do that with an unfinished product. For his part, Chad’s finding the Honeycomb tablet to be “pretty awesome” and regretfully informs Motorola that it “won’t be getting this back.” Tracking Chad’s tweets reveals that he’s just landed in Dallas, site of this year’s Super Bowl, where he’s received the Android-driven hardware. Something tells us neither he nor Motorola’s tablet will spend the next week hiding in the shadows — look for a lot more screen time for both in the buildup to the big game (and Moto’s big halftime ad). One last note? Chad’s image above was taken using an iPhone 4. Guess he’s holding out for the Atrix 4G.

[Thanks, Zizo]

Motorola Xoom lands in Chad Ochocinco’s safe hands, is ‘pretty awesome’ originally appeared on Engadget on Tue, 01 Feb 2011 03:51:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Wow, insider tipsters are getting efficient! Verizon appears to have only just added Minimum Advertised Pricing for the Motorola Xoom to its internal systems, but already it’s been leaked out by more than one source. Android Central has the damning evidence, which lists an $800 levy for any prospective owners of the flagship Android Honeycomb device. It’s accompanied by a listing of the HTC Thunderbolt at $250, with the logical conclusion being that the Moto tablet will come unsullied by subsidies while the HTC LTE handset will probably cost that much on a two-year deal. That makes plenty of sense to us — the typical smartphone price is $200 and Verizon can point to the 4G goodness the Thunderbolt brings as justifying its $50 premium, whereas the Xoom’s cost seems to be in line with the Galaxy Tab’s pricing. Now, how about some launch dates, leaksters?

Motorola Xoom priced at $800 at a minimum, according to Verizon leak originally appeared on Engadget on Fri, 21 Jan 2011 18:41:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Traditionally, CES isn’t a huge mobile event — the biggest phone news has historically been saved for MWC in February and CTIA in March — but that changed in a huge way this week. Looks like 2011 is shaping up to be the year of 4G, and both carriers and manufacturers alike wasted no time jumping on the hype bandwagon with a variety of announcements that promise to make the next few months exciting… and really, really fast. AT&T kicked things off early in the show, but it was just the beginning of a relentless torrent of mobile news that lasted for days and ultimately left us with a pile of devices and network upgrades that should take us at least through the middle of the year. Read on for the recap!

Continue reading 4G at CES 2011: AT&T, Verizon, and T-Mobile make big moves

4G at CES 2011: AT&T, Verizon, and T-Mobile make big moves originally appeared on Engadget on Mon, 10 Jan 2011 15:51:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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The Motorola Xoom is a huge product this year for two reasons: it’s a major first tablet from a major Android manufacturer, and it’s the flagship device for Honeycomb, an OS that’s been announced for dozens of other tablets here at the show, but not actually shown running on any of them. The only problem is that Motorola isn’t really showing Honeycomb on the Xoom, either. Instead they’re showing a demo video of the UI, which is actually running on top of real Honeycomb. For a glimpse under the covers, Jacob snagged a quick illicit peek at a totally unpopulated home screen, the gallery app, and even the task switcher the other day. We’ll just keep that between us, however, and until we get a full-on official look at the UI, we thought we’d walk you through that demo UI video Moto is running on the actual tablet and pretend like we’re actually using the thing, which should clear up some of the confusion on this brand new tablet OS while simultaneously stoking our egos. Check it out after the break.

Update: Here’s the gallery of the non-pretend and very real UI shots we peeked in the first hands-on post (including a shot of the task switcher in its current form).

Continue reading Motorola Xoom: pretend UI hands-on walkthrough (video)

Motorola Xoom: pretend UI hands-on walkthrough (video) originally appeared on Engadget on Sun, 09 Jan 2011 22:14:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Tablets! Tablets tablets tablets. They’re the hot ticket at this year’s CES. Just about everyone’s got one (not that everyone should). We’ve parsed, prodded, and played with the main contenders. And this one’s best. Well, these ones. More »