Android and Me |
- Three of our readers will try to set the Guinness World Record of longest games marathon on a tablet next week at E3
- MadFinger Game’s new zombie shooter Dead Trigger coming to Android in June
- US versions of Galaxy S III could look exactly like global version
- Google will reveal “the next dimension” for Maps June 6th
- T-Mobile schedules Samsung Galaxy S II Android 4.0 update for June 11th
- Verizon’s viewdini is a curator for your mobile streaming video
- HTC Desire C now available in the UK
| Posted: 01 Jun 2012 04:12 PM PDT  Last month we shared that Qualcomm was hosting the Snapdragon Gaming challenge in hopes of breaking the Guinness World Record of Longest Video Games Marathon on a Tablet. Several of our readers attended the qualification event and three were lucky enough to make it through to the finals. Jason Arias, Kevin Marquez, Thomas Biard and 47 others will now attempt to game for 26 hours in a row to put their name in the record books and compete for $50k in prizes. The challenge begins next week at E3 in Los Angeles from 12:30 p.m. Tuesday, June 5 through to 7 p.m. Wednesday, June 6. Challengers will get to game on an AT&T Samsung Galaxy Tab 8.9 and they will be randomly assigned 1 of 5 games to play. Title’s include Let’s Golf 3 by Gameloft, Virtua Tennis by Sega, Galaga: Special Edition by Namco Bandai, Blood & Glory by Glu, and Fruit Ninja by Halfbrick. Gaming for 26 hours is a tough challenge (especially if you get stuck with Fruit Ninja!), so we mailed the guys a case of Bawls You can also win a Samsung Galaxy Tab 8.9!
If you want to cheer for our guys and follow the event from home, you could also win a free Galaxy Tab 8.9 from Qualcomm. All you need to do is follow @Snapdragon and tweet #SanpdragonWRC for a chance to win. Basic contest details are listed below, but head over to the official sweepstakes page for the full rules. You could win:
How to join the conversation:
Example tweet and retweet:
Good luck!
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| MadFinger Game’s new zombie shooter Dead Trigger coming to Android in June Posted: 01 Jun 2012 03:51 PM PDT  Today MadFinger Games, creators of the hit shooter Shadowgun, revealed their next title for Android. Dead Trigger is an action-packed first person zombie shooter set in the present where the world has collapsed and modern civilization is coming to its end. Millions of people have turned into zombies and it’s your job to figure out how to stop the beasts. Players will smash hordes of bloodthirsty zombies, search for supplies, save other survivors, and explore the city to uncover the truth. Expect tons of gore as players will be able to shoot away zombie’s heads, chop off their limbs, and kill them with creativity using a number of gadgets including a laser amputator, blade chopper, baits, mines, grenades, radar, and more. MadFinger Games says Dead Trigger will be out by the end of June on iOS, Android, and a special version for TegraZone. The Tegra 3 version will feature exclusive effects like ragdoll physics, volumetric fog, specular lighting, and enhanced fluid and water. After the game is released, MadFinger will continue to support it with free updates that include new missions, weapons, gadgets, characters, and more. Shadowgun was one of my all-time favorite shooters on Android, so I’m excited to see what MadFinger delivers this time around. It appears they will offer the same stunning graphics, but this time around they really beefed up the characters, environments, animations, and story lines. Check out the teaser videos below to see actual game footage and hit up the source link for additional information. Gallery
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| US versions of Galaxy S III could look exactly like global version Posted: 01 Jun 2012 03:05 PM PDT  Rumors suggest the Samsung Galaxy S III could arrive in North America around June 20th, but we are still waiting on the specific details for design, specs, and pricing. According to a new leaked image posted by Chris Ziegler of The Verge, it appears the T-Mobile version of Samsung’s flagship device will look exactly like the global version. Previous versions of the Galaxy series had been tweaked by the US carriers with different designs and names, but this could be a signal that the Galaxy S III will arrive unmodified as Samsung intended it. About the only differences we are expecting will be with the internals. All the US versions of the device are expected to get Qualcomm’s Snapdragon S4 processor instead of Samsung’s new quad-core Exynos, and they could also see 2 GB RAM instead of 1 GB. Previous T-Mobile rumored release dates include:
If the device is really coming this month, then we should expect a formal announcement from Samsung any day now. Are you excited to get a pure Samsung design, or were you hoping for something slightly altered?
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| Google will reveal “the next dimension” for Maps June 6th Posted: 01 Jun 2012 02:46 PM PDT  Google has sent out press invites today featuring the image above for an event to be held at 9:30 a.m. Pacific time on June 6th. As you can see the subject for the event is Google maps and the invite not so subtly hints at new 3D functionality in maps. The invite also came with the text below which doesn’t really provide any additional guidance (pun not intended). This clearly isn’t only focused on mobile, but considering that Google Maps and Navigation are one of the real aces up Android’s sleeve it’s hard to imagine it won’t be featured fairly prominently. At this invitation-only press gathering, Brian McClendon, VP of Google Maps and Google Earth, will give you a behind-the-scenes look at Google Maps and share our vision. We'll also demo some of the newest technology and provide a sneak peek at upcoming features that will help people get where they want to go – both physically and virtually. We hope to see you there.Google PR With the threat of Apple perhaps taking the wraps off their own mapping apps during WWDC, which begins on June 11th, this might be a case of Google looking to overshadow whatever Cupertino has managed to piece together. Other than slicker 3D graphics or faster performance is there anything in particular you would like to see come to Google Maps?
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| T-Mobile schedules Samsung Galaxy S II Android 4.0 update for June 11th Posted: 01 Jun 2012 02:42 PM PDT  The wait is over! The long-overdue Android 4.0 update for the T-Mobile Samsung Galaxy S II will be available on June 11th. While HTC, Motorola and most other Android OEMs typically push out OTA (over the air) updates, Samsung’s Android 4.0 update for the Galaxy S II will be available for manual downloads through Samsung’s Kies. Over the past few months, there have been multiple Android 4.0 leaks and previews for various Samsung phones, giving us a pretty good idea of what to expect. The Android 4.0 update should incorporate the majority of the new features Google introduced with Ice Cream Sandwich, but users will have to dig to find them since TouchWiz on it will not look much different than previous versions. Now that we have a release date for T-Mobile’s Galaxy S II’s update, it’s only a matter of time before Sprint and AT&T announce their plans for rolling out Android 4.0 for their version of the handset. How long do you think it’ll be before Samsung is able to update all U.S. versions of the SGSII?
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| Verizon’s viewdini is a curator for your mobile streaming video Posted: 01 Jun 2012 11:52 AM PDT  So it took just a bit longer than I thought, but Android is an absolute powerhouse of mobile streaming video now and rather than having difficulty finding anything to watch the difficulty is in sifting through everything that is available to stream across all the various sources. Enter Verizon with their viewdini app to try to help find the show or movie that you are interested in without having to jump in and out of half a dozen apps. The app just became available yesterday and while it is available in the Play Store it is locked to Verizon customers with 4G phones or tablets. (Quick note to fellow rooted users: I had to go to the web Play Store and install from there as it wouldn’t show up on device.) I haven’t spent a tremendous amount of time with the app yet, but I’ll give you a few of my first impressions and since it’s free you can check it out yourself using the market link at the bottom of the post if it is sounds like it might work for you. Let’s start with the services it is tying into as that will give you a hint of what is going to be available. At launch they are linking to CBS, Comcast Xfinity, Hulu Plus, mSpot, Netflix and Verizon Video. Verizon FiOS is going to be coming soon and they are looking to add more to the roster, but nothing concrete at the moment. I’ll start with the positive. The app has a strong ICS look and feel to it and ran smoothly on my Nexus. There are a number of ways to browse with a featured section, breakdown by genre and movies versus TV. One of the most critical features to me is the “sort and filter” option which lets you select the providers you want to see content from, among other things. My one complaint with the filter is that you can’t select multiple providers simultaneously as the point of the app is to be able to browse across providers. One bug I ran into is that I noticed some shows aren’t showing all available sources. Browsing TV shows I selected “How I Met Your Mother” and it displayed CBS as the source which only offered the most recent episode rather than all of the seasons that are available through Netflix. Hopefully this will be sorted out and doesn’t reflect some sort of agreement with CBS to display their content through their portal. The last thing I’ll touch on is the CBS content itself as it is actually just taking you to the browser to view their video. It works alright, but at least on the Nexus (and I’d imagine on any 720p phone) it is not very touch friendly and I had a bit of difficulty selecting the “full screen” option. It also of course requires Flash, which meant that I needed to kick back to the stock browser rather than use Chrome as I prefer. The concept itself is a winner for me and I’ll definitely be keeping an eye on it as it’s just a couple tweaks away from being a really useful app for streaming video enthusiasts. Show Press ReleaseWATCH THE SHOW: VIEWDINI FROM VERIZON WIRELESS NOW AVAILABLEInnovative Mobile Video Portal Provides Quick and Easy Access to Leading Content Providers, Including Verizon Video, Comcast, Netflix and Others BASKING RIDGE, N.J. – Verizon Wireless today announced viewdini, an innovative portal that brings movies, television shows and other video content to the forefront of consumers 4G LTE tablets and smartphones, is now available. Viewdini brings the power of Verizon Wireless' 4G LTE network to the screen by streamlining access to videos from a wide range of content providers, including cable operators, websites and other popular video sources. Powered by CBS Interactive's TV.com, viewdini is an innovative video portal that creates a new entertainment choice for consumers by making it simple to search and view movies, television shows and other videos on mobile devices. Comcast Xfinity®, Hulu Plus, mSpot, Netflix and Verizon Video are among the participants today, with more expected to be added soon, including Verizon FiOS. "This is another example of how the power of Verizon Wireless' 4G LTE network and wide variety of 4G LTE devices is driving innovation," said Kristi Crum, executive director of Marketing at Verizon Wireless. "We continue to expand and enhance our content with our audience in mind, working with reputable content providers in order to bring a rich mobile entertainment experience to our customers." Verizon Wireless' viewdini makes it easy for users to search thousands of titles from some of the Web's leading content providers, TV sites, movie studios and cable operators. By simply searching for a title, topic or an actor's name, viewdini lets customers know which services have mobile video for streaming, and whether it is available at no additional charge, by subscription, to rent or for purchase. A simple click will also provide related content and information like cast and crew information and links to similar titles. Viewdini is available to Verizon Wireless customers with 4G LTE-enabled Android™ devices, with support for other operating systems coming soon. The app can be downloaded from Verizon Apps and Google Play, and is free to customers. A Verizon Wireless data plan is required and usage may count towards a customer's data allowance. Video subscription, rental or purchase fees may also apply.
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| HTC Desire C now available in the UK Posted: 01 Jun 2012 07:39 AM PDT  As expected, the HTC Desire C is now available in the UK and will soon make its way to other countries across Europe. The HTC Desire C is the latest budget-friendly Android 4.0 handset from HTC. When you say budget-friendly, we’re talking about a free phone paired with a £13 (roughly $20) monthly contract which gives you 100 minutes, 5,000 texts and 250MB of monthly data. Anyone looking to buy the HTC Desire C off-contract can find it at T-Mobile and Orange for £169 while Three is looking to beat its competition by offing the handset for £149. The HTC Desire C runs on Android 4.0 with HTC Sense 4.0 and features a 3.5-inch HVGA (320 x 480) display, 600 MHz Qualcomm processor, 512 MB of RAM, 4 GB of internal storage, microSD card slot, 5 megapixel camera, Beats Audio, and a 1,230 mAh battery. From what we can tell, the handset available from Orange, T-Mobile and Three is the standard model, but you will soon be able to purchase an NFC-enabled version of the Desire C for a slight premium. Besides its looks, the HTC Desire C does not have anything in common with HTC’s flagship devices, but that’s not necessarily a bad thing. The HTC Wildfire and Wildfire S were very popular phones in Europe because of the value they offered and we’d expect the Desire C to at least live up to its predecessors’ successes. Would you ever consider buying a device like the HTC Desire C as a starter phone for a family member or would you rather get them a used flagship phone from a year ago for around the same price?
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. If anyone is going to break the Guinness word record, hopefully it is one of our own.
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