Hasta La Gadget!

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

• Windows Phone Mango now being delivered to 100 percent of compatible devices
• Windows Phone Apollo coming ‘middle of next year,’ says Nokia VP
• Nokia N8 gets Symbian Anna service pack update
• Symbian Anna update rolls out to compatible Nokia smartphones in the US
• Motorola Xoom will get updated with Ice Cream Sandwich
• Ice Cream Sandwich supports USB game controllers and HDMI
• RIM confirms PlayBook OS 2.0 delayed until February, still no BBM in sight
• Sprint issues OTA fix for HTC Android handset vulnerability

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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We just heard last week that the Windows Phone Mango update was available on nearly every compatible device, and Microsoft has now made things completely official. In a post on the Windows Phone blog today, Microsoft confirmed that it’s “now delivering Mango to 100 percent of eligible phones around the world, regardless of carrier.” That feat was reached less than a month after Microsoft announced that Mango was available on half of Windows Phones, which certainly an improvement on the pace of the earlier NoDo update. Included in this last batch is the LG Optimus 7 on Telefonica is Spain and the Samsung Omnia 7 on Deutsche Telekom. Now, about that Apollo update…

Microsoft: Windows Phone Mango now being delivered to ‘100 percent’ of compatible devices originally appeared on Engadget on Fri, 28 Oct 2011 02:11:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Now that Ice Cream Sandwich is real, the inevitable next step is a parade of announcement that certain devices will / won’t experience the latest and greatest flavor of Android. Xoom owners can breathe easy however, as a support forum mod (totally reliable source) confirms Moto will issue an update for its family-friendly tablet, but can’t say when we’ll see it. Feel free to check out our emulator-powered Android 4.0 tablet demo until then, but considering how long it took to slide LTE into those slabs, you should probably grab a Snickers.

Motorola Xoom will get updated with Ice Cream Sandwich, but when? originally appeared on Engadget on Sat, 22 Oct 2011 20:15:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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We know that Samsung has the first crack at Android 4.0 with the Galaxy Nexus, but it’ll only be a matter of time before we begin seeing it show up on rival devices. HTC has already made an official statement on its plans (or lack thereof), and now it’s Motorola’s turn. Alain Mutricy, SVP Portfolio and Product Management, was in Germany talking up the European announcement of the RAZR, and slipped in a few details about Ice Cream Sandwich. Mutricy mentioned that while the company’s new flagship device was designed for Gingerbread, plans have been set to introduce the latest version of Android in the start of 2012, with a more precise date naturally on its way. Given past experience, however, it’s probable that the unbranded version of the device will get the refresh ahead of the Droid RAZR on Verizon, so US users may need to exercise a wee bit of patience here. Regardless, it’s time for the competition to step up — if the RAZR is next in line to get the OTA update, the Galaxy Nexus will have the spotlight all to itself for a fair amount of time.

Motorola RAZR to get updated to Ice Cream Sandwich in early 2012 originally appeared on Engadget on Wed, 19 Oct 2011 09:55:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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It may not have resulted in much of a numerical bump, but the just-released webOS 3.0.4 software update for the HP TouchPad is a fairly significant one. The big new addition is the ability to pair non-webOS phones, which will let you answer calls on your TouchPad (pairing with third-party Bluetooth keyboards is also said to be “streamlined”). It also adds a new Camera app for photos and videos, plus support for Ogg Vorbis music files, and online / offline messaging status support. Perhaps just as notably, HP is also promising “better performance” and “user interface improvements,” as well as a number of other enhancements and “more robust Skype video calling.” We’ll be giving it a go ourselves, but feel free to share your own impressions in the comments below.

[Thanks to everyone who sent this in]

Update: We’ve since spent a bit of time with a TouchPad running webOS 3.0.4, and it is indeed noticeably snappier and more responsive. Receiving phone calls via a non-webOS phone also works as promised (although you can’t make phone calls from the TouchPad), and the new Camera app is simple and gets the job done — though the TouchPad’s camera itself is still decidedly lackluster. Another somewhat minor but important change is the scrolling behavior in the web browser — it now requires a far more deliberate swipe left or right to move the page horizontally, which results in far less accidental jumping around than before.

HP TouchPad gets webOS 3.0.4 update, now able to answer calls from non-webOS phones originally appeared on Engadget on Tue, 18 Oct 2011 11:14:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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