Hasta La Gadget!

The lines may have been subdued, but one way or another, it sounds as if Motorola managed to sell quite a few DROIDs over the weekend. According to analyst Mark McKechnie at Broadpoint AmTech, the outfit managed to move around 100,000 of ’em during the opening weekend, with most stores moving at least half of their original shipments. He also estimated that Moto would sell one million Android-based phones in Q4 2009 alone (which includes the CLIQ, obviously), and that he viewed the first few days as “encouraging.” It’s been a long, long while since we’ve been able to say this, but hey — nice job, Motorola.

Filed under: Cellphones

Analyst estimates 100,000 DROID smartphones sold in first weekend originally appeared on Engadget on Tue, 10 Nov 2009 09:12:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

Read | Permalink | Email this | Comments

“A robot is a thing that does…” Verizon / Google / Motorola are taking their ad onslaught to new heights and in a new direction, with three new ads (which will hit “soon,” according to our tipster), two of which actually show off Android functionality. It’s a bold new vision for a hyperbole-filled, guytastic campaign which shows no sign of letting up, and seems more than anything to be the complete antithesis to Palm’s coma-inducing spots instead of an antidote for Apple’s everyhipster sensibilities. Check out the three new DROID ads after the break.

[Thanks, DroidDoesItAll]

Continue reading New DROID ads show off Android, will make a man out of you

Filed under: Cellphones

New DROID ads show off Android, will make a man out of you originally appeared on Engadget on Mon, 09 Nov 2009 13:23:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

Permalink | Email this | Comments

If you walk into a Verizon store today and pick up a DROID, you’ll be out $300 (before tax) out of pocket, then you’ll twiddle your thumbs for a few weeks while you wait for some mysterious PO box in Texas to send you your $100 rebate on a debit card. Wouldn’t you rather just pay $200 upfront? Or better yet, $150? Sears — which, we have to admit, we didn’t know sold phones — is charging just $150 without a rebate for the DROID today, a full $50 less than Big Red proper with rebate. We don’t know how good these guys are with customer service (Simplexity is running the store on Sears’ behalf, it seems), but truth be told, we can deal with a little incompetency for $50.

[Via I4U]

Filed under: Cellphones

PSA: Sears charging $50 less for new DROID activations than Verizon originally appeared on Engadget on Fri, 06 Nov 2009 11:14:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

Read | Permalink | Email this | Comments

It appears that last night’s midnight opening in Manhattan went off like gangbusters, but the situation across the country is a little more subdued this morning with seemingly short lines and easy access to DROIDs at every location we’ve visited. We won’t put out a number, but we can confirm that several Engadget editors have taken the plunge today — and if riffraff like us can waltz into the store and get them, you should certainly be able to. Good luck being assimilated out there today, and be sure to post pictures of your experience in comments (up above we’ve got San Francisco’s first buyer courtesy of Ross Miller, and after the break, you can live it up with the good folks of Albany as they were paid a visit by Tim Stevens).

Continue reading DROID mania sweeps the nation, so to speak

DROID mania sweeps the nation, so to speak originally appeared on Engadget on Fri, 06 Nov 2009 09:19:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

Permalink | Email this | Comments

Along with a slew of other new devices like the Droid Eris, Verizon Wireless on Thursday debuted the Casio G’zOne Brigade–a waterproof flip phone with a full QWERTY keyboard and a 3.2-megapixel camera.

Verizon claims the phone is “water, shock, dust, vibration, humidity, salt fog, altitude, high temperature storage, low temperature storage, and solar radiation resistant.” Basically it’s the sort of phone a wilderness explorer, geologist, or Navy SEAL would love to carry around.

The phone is trying to target some of the office crowd as well by including a document viewer for Word, Excel, PowerPoint, and PDF support. It will also include standard Verizon software such as V CAST Music with Rhapsody and V CAST Video, along with support for VZ Navigator.

This new phone is the first of the G’zOne line with a QWERTY keyboard. We liked that the last unit of this family–the G’zOne Boulder–was seemingly indestructible, but it had muddy voice quality. Hopefully all the kinks have been worked out for sleek-looking Brigade.

Price and availability of the G’zOne Brigade will be announced closer to launch.