Hasta La Gadget!

Contrary to reports floating about the web, the Motorola Xoom isn’t getting Adobe Flash Player 10.2 today — rather, the tablet is getting updated to support Flash, which will actually arrive in one week. Adobe now says that Flash Player 10.2 will be ready to download from the Android Market on March 18th, supporting only Honeycomb tablets (in other words, just the Xoom) to start, and will eventually be available for Android 2.2 smartphones — again, contrary to what we’d been told, but we can’t really complain on that count supporting Android 2.2 (Froyo), Android 2.3 (Gingerbread) and a beta version for Android 3.0.1 (Honeycomb) at release. Froyo devices won’t get the full battery-friendly Stage Video rendering pipeline and deep browser integration like their Honeycomb tablet brethren, but dual-core phones will reportedly see a performance improvement nonetheless, and there’s a new tweak that’ll let Flash web apps pull up a virtual keyboard if needed for full functionality. PR after the break.

Update: Adobe contacted us to clarify that Flash 10.2 is, in fact, headed to all three of the most recent versions of Android on March 18th — the Honeycomb tablet version will simply sport a beta label, and the smartphone builds will lack full functionality as described above.

[Thanks to everyone who sent this in]

Continue reading Flash 10.2 beta hits Android Market on March 18th, supports Honeycomb, Gingerbread and Froyo (update)

Flash 10.2 beta hits Android Market on March 18th, supports Honeycomb, Gingerbread and Froyo (update) originally appeared on Engadget on Fri, 11 Mar 2011 11:47:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Happy news for Android tinkerers everywhere — Motorola has officially confirmed it will attempt to perform its 4G upgrade on all Verizon Wireless-riding Xoom tablets it receives from users, whether they’ve been rooted, repainted, or accessorized with fluffy dice. Naturally, the company can’t guarantee successful software updates on devices that have had their OS tweaked, so it asks users to be kind and rewind to the original firmware state. For those unwilling to stretch that far back, Moto will still give it a shot and says that it’ll install the 4G LTE modem at a minimum. What a refreshingly open-minded attitude. Now if Moto could give us an open-minded bootloader on its phones as well, we’d be all set.

Motorola will upgrade your Xoom to 4G LTE — even if you’ve rooted it originally appeared on Engadget on Sun, 06 Mar 2011 05:30:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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You might have seen Motorola’s WiFi-only Xoom popping up at European e-tailers, but it’s reportedly flying the red, white and blue today, having materialized at Sam’s Club in the good ol’ USA. Droid-Life stumbled upon several snapshots of these Xoom Wi-Fi vouchers, with a $539 price tag hanging above their heads — plenty cheaper than a cellular Xoom, and also slightly more affordable than a similarly specced iPad 2. Of course, Sam’s Club deals in wholesale merchandise, and even should this price be accurate the tablet may not be widely available at the same rate, so don’t count out $599 as the Xoom Wi-Fi’s MSRP. Meanwhile, let us know if you manage to find and ring one up at the register, eh?

[Thanks, Michael]

WiFi-only Motorola Xoom appears at Sam’s Club, bearing $539 price? originally appeared on Engadget on Thu, 03 Mar 2011 23:57:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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It’s taken almost a year to get here. The first tablet to matter since the original iPad. The Xoom is the first real Android tablet, arriving ahead of the iPad 2 by a hair. Since it’s living in the “year of iPad 2,” as Apple put it, it seemed only fitting to wait to drop judgment until we’d seen everything the iPad 2 had to offer. Frankly, there’s no way the Xoom could live up to everything it needs to be. It’s not even done yet, really. It has problems. But it’s still very good. It’s the first non-iPad tablet worth buying. And it’ll get better. More »

You might recall we ran this comparison about a month back when HP’s TouchPad was announced, but now we’re back with a full set of 2011 devices as Apple’s brand new iPad 2 has joined the fray. There’s no need for excessive introductions, really, just leap past the break to get swalloped up by an avalanche of next-generation tablet specs.

Continue reading iPad 2 vs. Motorola Xoom vs. HP TouchPad vs. BlackBerry PlayBook: the tale of the tape

iPad 2 vs. Motorola Xoom vs. HP TouchPad vs. BlackBerry PlayBook: the tale of the tape originally appeared on Engadget on Wed, 02 Mar 2011 14:58:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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