Archive for January, 2011

AT&T and Google’s Android smartphones?

Ever since the launch of the iPhone, AT&T has been pushing the device almost exclusively, ignoring almost completely the Android and RIM sector of the devices. This was mainly due to the fact that they were the exclusive carrier for the device in the US. Since the news first got out about Verizon receiving the iPhone as well and preparing to launch it in February of this year, AT&T saw itself forced to look around for new devices to help keep up the subscription rates. Both AT&T and Verizon had some drops in their sales in Q4 once the announcement was made.

A pretty large part of users are holding off buying any new smartphones, while waiting for the iPhone to hit Verizon, this change obviously making an impact on both the carriers and smartphone manufacturers alike. AT&T’s CEO announced that they will start pushing Android smartphones a lot stronger now that the iPhone will be getting to Verizon, in order to compensate for the loss this is causing them. Some of the numbers they have made public regarding this are focused on the numbers of new subscribers they’ve managed to bring in during Q4 of 2010. As such they managed to sign only 400,000 new customers in the last 3 months of 2010, this being the lowest number in the past 5 years.

Considering that Verizon, who has been putting a lot of effort and money towards marketing the Android line of devices, is on a pretty close second place to AT&T, the company does see this change towards Android powered smartphones as natural. Randall Stephenson, CEO of AT&T said that “We’re going to be a heavy participant in the Android market this year, so you’re going to see a significant shift in mix”, this mix being the phones sold by the company.

The only question which still bugs me to some extent is – will the company commit so many resources to marketing the Android line as we saw Verizon do? Will they be committing enough resources to this sector or will they be balancing between the two boats never really sure in which one to get? If this will be the case and if they won’t be able to set up a stable connection between their Android lineup and the Apple lineup, Verizon might be able to take the lead this year. Yet with such names as the Motorola Atrix, Motorola Bionic and many others announced earlier this year at CES, I’m pretty sure that AT&T will have its hands filled with great new products to start market to a new segment of the population.

No matter what the future holds for both AT&T and Google’s Android OS, as long as the marketing plans will be setup with the power and customizability of Android devices in mind, I think they both will be fine. This, combined with the upgrades AT&T brought to their network, should give them a small edge in this upcoming battle of the carriers. Until next time, are you holding out for an iPhone on Verizon, and if yes, WHY? Let us know in the comments J1

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January 31st, 2011 Catalin Mengheris

Posted in Android News

Motorola announced profits of 80 million $ for Q4

I don’t know if any of you still remember the old days back in which Motorola was struggling to stay alive in the harsh world of mobile phones and devices. It’s always good to see a Phoenix rise from the ashes and achieve a comeback like the ones told in old stories. You know what I’m talking about, like the ones in the Odyssey. Well maybe not that monster slaying epic, but pretty close.

Motorola managed to achieve 80 million US dollars in profit for Q4 and even they are saying that it’s largely due to their Android smartphone lineup. Considering the trouble they were in back a few years ago, it’s fun to see them make a comeback like this one. For starters you have to take a look at what new devices they’ve launched in Q4 alone – DROID PRO, DROID 2 GLOBAL, Motorola DEFY and the Motorola BRAVO, thusly reaching an impressive number of 23 new smartphones launched only in the last year. This really shows their commitment to the Android user base and the trust they’ve put in the platform itself.

This year they saw a blazingly strong start as well with the announcement of the Motorola ATRIX 4G, marketed as the world’s most powerful smartphone, winner of CNET’s Best Smartphone at CES, and if you bother looking at some of the specs, you will understand why. The device is featuring a dual-core processor, qHD pentile display and this along with Motorola’s very own webtop application bundle, which pretty much transforms the Atrix into one of the most powerful tools available on the market. The large number of accessories added for the Atrix, amongst which the cool dock which according to some sources will put you back only 60 $. Not bad considering you can get the desktop experience in such a small package.

Considering that the Motorola XOOM tablet will be out on the market in a few months as well, being the world’s first Android 3.0 Honeycomb powered tablet, sure gives them even more credit. If some of you still are uncertain about this, just think of the Motorola Bionic which will be coming with the new 4G radio built in, which will boost its connection speed by up to 10 times. And to add insult to injury the Motorola CLIQ 2 will be coming out as well in the near future, featuring a 1 GHz processor and a slide-out full QWERTY keyboard.

When we are to combine all of these elements, I think it’s safe to assume that the future is shining bright for Motorola, as their lineup will only get stronger with these new additions. As long as they will keep the good work up, I have full confidence that they will be announcing solid profits for this year as well. This really does remind me that in general Motorola has always been bragging a lot about their products, but these past few months have proven that they are backing those marketing campaigns up with really solid products. Until next time, keep your eyes peeled for the Motorola Atrix or as they call it “The world’s most powerful smartphone”.1

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January 31st, 2011 Catalin Mengheris

Posted in Android News

LG Optimus 2X Preview

I’m pretty sure that there is quite a large number of Android fans who do stay in touch with all the latest smartphones coming out and all the coolest and latest apps or updates. So I think it’s safe  to assume that everyone by now knows the LG Optimus 2X, the World’s first dual core processor powered smartphone. So pay attention because this really is beating up the competition. What I enjoy the most was actually the way the launch occurred – no stress, no drama, it’s out folks, enjoy it. At least those in South Korea did, how lucky of them right?

On a brighter side the device will be launching pretty soon in Europe and NA as well, so make sure to give it a look. Until then, I’ve prepared a small preview of the device here so make sure to keep on reading.

In order to clarify matters right from the get go, the device has a 4 inch display which isn’t Super AMOLED or Retina or Bravia engine powered, nothing that fancy here, just a regular old WVGA screen with 16 million colors which does look great in all conditions. The overall design of the LG Optimus 2X is nice and tidy, with very few lines, something which I just love. This is mainly cause by the fact that a lot of manufacturer’s do tend to go overboard and over “design” their smartphones. What happened to clear and clean lines? Well here they are. The left side has no buttons at all, while on the right side of the phone you will find the volume buttons. On the bottom you’ll find the mic and stereo speakers which do pack quite the punch. At the top of the device you’ll find the 3.5 mm audio jack, HDMI port and the power button.

The software behind it is Android 2.2.1 Froyo with an upgrade to Android 2.3 Gingebread incoming from LG. There is a custom UI made by LG which does look quite similar to the one we get to see in the Samsung. All the apps load quickly and smoothly and it shows that the device is being powered by the Nvidia Tegra 2 dual-core processor. Starting from browsing, to viewing videos on YouTube or playing games, the LG Optimus 2X does its job marvelously, so congrats on this one LG. When talking about build quality, you’ve got yourself a winner here, the back cover does seem a touch cheap once you remove it, but as long as it sticks to the phone you’ll never say anything bad about it. In other words, you feel like you’re holding a premium device, the overall feel being better than for the Google Nexus S or the Samsung Galaxy S.

Staying a touch under the hood of this little Android smartphone, next to the dual-core processor from Nvidia, you’ll find 8 GB of storage (which can be increased via a micro SD card up to 32 GB), a 1,500 mAh battery while on the back you’ll find the beastly 8 MP camera which supports full 1080p HD recording. The device can also play 1080p videos but you’ll have to connect it to a monitor/ TV with support for 1080p videos via the HDMI port.

All in all I would say that this latest offspring LG unleashed upon the world is showing what the future of Android smartphones looks like. It’s fast, it’s well build and well design, it has tons of functions which it can easily perform at once. In case you are in the market for a new smartphone, wanting  to change up from your old device, make sure to give this one a good hard look, because it does pack a serious punch under that sleek and well built exterior. Until next time, I’ll be trying to sell my neighbor’s dog in order to get money for this little beast – anyone interested in a German Sheppard?1

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January 31st, 2011 Catalin Mengheris

Posted in Android Phone

Xperia Play – Sony Ericsson Play Station Phone preview

Thinking back a while ago when I got my first console and the tons of fun it brought with itself, I can’t help but shed a tear of joy. I also remember when I got my first time around to play with a Play Station and I still remember the game as well – Tekken. Hours over hours of fun and of course cash were poured into those activities so when it was about time, I couldn’t help but get excited as a young girl before prom night when I first heard of the Sony Ericsson Play Station phone.

It appears that the people over at Engadget got lucky when talking about the Xperia Play as it’s named, as they did receive one to get a preview done. I’ll try to keep things short and give you a basic rundown of what you can expect from this latest addition to the Sony Ericsson Xperia line.

The first thing that popped into my eyes was the Android OS version it was running, namely Gingerbread. The UI is the standard from SE, read as “it chews heavily on the resources”. The layout is being dominated by the 4 inch display, which this time around has multi-touch support. SE claims that thanks to the Bravia engine image quality is highly increased, and in the test videos this seems to have been confirmed. Keeping on the display it does have a native resolution of 854 x 480 pixels and houses 5 screens which are easily customizable.

On  the bottom you’ll get to find the standard 4 buttons, which in this preview model don’t seem to be set up quite correctly just yet. Under the hood you will find the yet unconfirmed Qualcomm MSM 8655 chipset, the Adreno 205 GPU,  802.11n WiFi, Bluetooth and 512 MB of RAM. The device has a front facing camera and a proximity sensor and on the back you’ll see the 5 MP camera along with LED flash. On the side of the device we can find the two standard buttons from the Play Station, namely “L” and “R” and between them the volume rocker. The top houses the power button and a 3.5 mm headphone jack.

In the preview we get the chance to see the device in action and despite the fact that it still isn’t really finished yet, it does move along through the menus quite nicely. The first few glimpses of the new Play Station app don’t show anything more than we knew until now. I consider that you can’t really do a proper preview of the device just yet, as there are no games out for it at the time being. Despite that, the device did manage to run a few games through an emulator, yet the experience seemed choppy at times.

Overall the device looks promising and it might come with a lot more features once it’s done. I do like the general idea when considering all the design and hardware choices and now the only thing left to do is wait for it to be launched. Sony Ericsson did any give any more details regarding this at the time, but I’m pretty sure that after MWC we will get to find out a launch date for it. Until next time, I’ll be constantly mailing Sony Ericsson to send one over to me as well.1

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January 30th, 2011 Catalin Mengheris

Posted in Android News, Android Phone

Google Android Market improvements incoming

The number of reasons for which a new user would want to buy a smartphone cannot really be specified. As most phones running around carriers and retailers have pretty similar specs, most of the time the choice comes down to seeing what operating system a device is running, what are the options of updating it and what kind of support the manufacturer offers for the product. But one of the key features is obviously related to what sort of applications you can get for your device, how will you pay for them and how could they improve your overall experience with the said smartphone.

Android market has seen its fair share of improvements over the past few months. Considering that in August of last year it crossed 100,000 applications uploaded on it by developers, it’s good to see that there is quite a lot to choose from. Still Google isn’t that pleased by the income the Android market has been generating according to Eric Chu, Google’s Android Platform Manager. In a recent Q&A which occurred at the Inside Social Apps conference in San Francisco, Eric Chu stated that a large amount of changes will be coming to the market in the following few months.

If these upcoming changes are for the better or for the worse that’s up to you to decide but overall I’ve been quite impressed by Google’s work on increasing the quality of the services the Android market provides. As such one of the new elements will be an In App Payment System which will allow developers to create add-on content for their applications. These add-ons can range from extra levels for a game or different skins or themes for an application. Although this might seem pretty good on paper, we might see a new avalanche of applications which will be half-way done and available freely on the market, but in order to unlock the full potential of the said program, we’ll have to cough up the cash. In a way it’s a good move since this will drastically reduce the amount of “applications” the market displays which largely are either themes or skins.

Carrier Billing is the other improvement which Google is planning on adding to the Android Market. In case some of you remember that a few weeks ago I did a small review for Vodafone’s Application Market, this was a feature already introduced by Vodafone. This will help a lot of users to purchase applications a lot easier but unless some sort of protection to stop your kids from going on a shopping spree with your smartphone. Improving User Discovery of applications in the Android market is another large concern which will be addressed in the upcoming updates. This will help users search through pages of applications more easily and get more relevant results on their searches. I have high hopes for this one at least because we are talking about Google – and we know where they started making money from right?

HTML 5 applications and Added Social features are two big improvements which are coming during this year as well. The first step regarding HTML 5 apps is the obvious benefits this will bring not only to developers but also to the end-user as the apps will be sharing code with both the desktop as well as the mobile browsers. As for the added social features, just think that there must be a reason for which your applications can access your Address Book. In my opinion, apps will have an easier job of connecting to your friend and/or family as well in the future.

If we are to look at all the changes this year is about to bring us, it’s safe to say that there are tons of improvements which will be hitting the Android market as well as us – the user. Until next time, I’ll keep searching for some new themes.1

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January 30th, 2011 Catalin Mengheris

Posted in Android Apps, Android News
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