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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HTC's Sense-skinned phones will blab to just about anyone who asks. Photo: Jon Snyder/Wired.com

HTC’s skinned version of Android contains a serious security flaw which allows any application access to a huge trove of your personal information, according to mobile blog Android Police.

HTC’s proprietary Sense software — which runs on the company’s EVO 4G and Thunderbolt smartphones, amongst others — contains almost everything that happens on your phone in a data file, including GPS location information, phone numbers, SMS data (plain numbers and encoded text), and more. Any app can get access to this data simply through a permissions request.

The problem is due to logging tools that HTC recently added, which gather a huge amount of personal info and usage data. HTC hasn’t provided a reason for adding the tools.

Here’s the process, as described by Android Police:

any app on affected devices that requests a single android.permission.INTERNET (which is normal for any app that connects to the web or shows ads) can get its hands on [the data.]

Worryingly, there is an off-by-default VNC server included in the OS. This could possibly allow remote access, according to Artem Russakovski at Android Police.

Out of all the currently available mobile operating systems, security issues and exploits plague Android the most by far. Because applications submitted to the Android Market are not vetted by Google in advance, malware and insecure applications have a far greater chance of slipping in undetected. In August, McAfee released a report citing Android as the “most attacked operating system,” with Android mobile malware attacks jumping 76 percent in a three month period. In May, the popular Skype app for Android was also discovered to contain a security vulnerability, which could allow malicious apps access to personal data.

But as Android Police says, the Skype loophole pales in comparison to HTC’s security issues. Whereas Apple could deploy a quick fix just a week after its GPS-gate affair (which was little more than location data being cached in the iPhone and not being encrypted during backups), Android OS updates are notoriously slow to roll out. Because the carrier takes care of the updates, it can be months before they are pushed to customers, if at all.

Tech savvy users can root their phones and remove the HTCloggers apk file. The majority of Android users will have to wait for this update.

Massive Security Vulnerability In HTC Android Devices Exposes Phone Numbers, GPS, SMS, Email Addresses [Android Police]

See Also:

• Skype's Android App Could Expose Your Personal Details
• Amazon App Store Requires Security Compromise
• Android App's Data Collection Raises Mobile-Security Questions …
• Google Flips Remote Kill-Switch on Android Apps
• Android Malware Found in Angry Birds Add-On Apps
• Android Malware Explodes, iOS Remains Safe

No costly proprietary tools needed to accomplish iFixit's Thunderbolt Display teardown. Image: iFixit

Apple sure does know how to pack in a lot of gear into a seemingly simple LCD monitor. How do we know? iFixit’s latest teardown, of course!

iFixit took apart Apple’s 27-inch Thunderbolt Display for our viewing pleasure, revealing an iMac-like glass panel that can be removed with heavy-duty suction cups and a host of parts not normally found in an LCD monitor.

In fact, the display itself shares an uncanny resemblance to an iMac display because it’s actually the same model: an LG LM270WQ1, which was used in the iMac Intel 27″ from October 2009. This is also the same display that’s in Dell’s competing 27″ monitor, albeit with LED backlighting instead of CCFL. The display is 2560 x 1440 pixels and supports 16.7 million colors. Interestingly, that’s 1.07 billion fewer colors than on Dell’s display.

But anyways, the Thunderbolt Display houses a large brushless fan for noiseless cooling. And housed on either side edge of the display in “massive enclosures” are 49-Watt speakers, complete with a miniature subwoofer.

Rather than being soldered directly to the board, the Thunderbolt cable that routes to the display plugs into a standard Thunderbolt socket situated on the logic board. And both sides of the logic board are “packed with enough chips that it’s hard to believe there’s no computer inside this display,” according to iFixit.

The whole shebang can be taken apart using non-proprietary parts like suction cups, screwdrivers and a spudger. Repairability rating? iFixit gave it an 8 out of 10.

via [iFixit]

We came, we saw, we conquered — and just like that, Intel’s Developer Forum was over. Much like years past, Chipzilla was proudly beating its own drum: we saw demos of Ivy Bridge and Haswell, a healthy helping of Ultrabooks and of course its high speed interconnect du jour, Thunderbolt. But that doesn’t mean we didn’t see a lot of other random, mind-stimulating otherness. Did you catch all the treasures we found lurking deep within the halls of this year’s show? Unfortunately, we can’t tell from here, so you better hop past the break for the full listing and find out.

Continue reading Intel Developer Forum (IDF) 2011 wrap-up

Intel Developer Forum (IDF) 2011 wrap-up originally appeared on Engadget on Tue, 20 Sep 2011 15:00:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Taco Belkin: Why buy a whole new monitor when you can just grab this little dock instead? Photo Daily Tech

If you own a new Thunderbolt-equipped MacBook Air, you probably have an eye on Apple’s new 27-inch Thunderbolt monitor, with its mess of expansion ports out back which will let you turn laptop into desktop by plugging in just one cable.

But before you ditch your perfectly good monitor and drop a grand on a new one, consider Belkin’s Thunderbolt Express Dock, a standalone dock which has the exact same ports as the Cinema Display.

The dock, an aluminum taco shell, has three USB ports, a FireWire 800 port and a hole for Gigabit Ethernet. It also has a Thunderbolt passthrough to send video and anything else onto monitors or further docks, and has a DC-in socket to power all the junk you have attached.

It’s a great idea, and although Belkin hasn’t yet put the thing up on its site, the dock is sure to cost a lot less than a new monitor. And if you’re using one of Apple’s aluminum Cinema Displays already, this dock will sit on its foot and blend right in.

IDF 2011: Belkin Shows Off Thunderbolt Express Dock [Daily Tech]

See Also:

• Thunderbolt Display Almost Turns MacBook Air into iMac
• How Thunderbolt Could Hook Up Notebooks With Powerful …
• Apple Releases Thunderbolt Cable. Now All We Need Are …