Sunday, October 7, 2012

Android Community

Android Community


Samsung Galaxy Note II review via SlashGear

Posted: 06 Oct 2012 02:39 PM PDT

The Samsung Galaxy Note II has officially arrived ladies and gentlemen, and after the surprise success of the first Galaxy Note, we’re expecting Samsung to knock it out of the park with this latest iteration. Chris Davies has written up his full review of the device over at SlashGear, leaving no stone unturned in the process. You’ll have to head over there to check out the entire rundown of pros and cons, but we’ll also be covering some of the biggest talking points here. Let’s jump into it, shall we?


First up is the look and size of the device. The Galaxy Note II looks more like its Galaxy S III cousin this time around, so much so that you’d be forgiven if you thought the Note II was just a jumbo-sized version of the S III at first glance. The HD Super AMOLED screen is even bigger with this new version (5.5-inches compared to the original Note’s 5.3-inches), and though it is a bit heavier than the original Note, it’s also a little thinner. Interestingly, Samsung has brought the resolution down from 1280×800 to 1280×720, despite the fact that the Note II features a larger screen. That isn’t a bad thing, however, as it means the Note II will play nice with 720p apps, and we’re pleased to report that the screen itself is rich and vibrant.

Also worth noting is the Exynos quad-core processor clocked at 1.6GHz, which is working in tandem with 2GB of RAM. As you might have already guessed, those mean that the Galaxy Note II is capable of running smooth and lag-free, and sure enough, the benchmark tests give some really great results. For instance, the Note II was given a score of 5908 in Quadrant, which isn’t a score to stick your nose up at. In short, you’ve got some power under the hood with the Galaxy Note II.

With all that being said, you’re probably thinking that battery life is pretty miserable with the Note II. You’d be wrong, though, because even after a full day of heavy use, the Note II’s beefy 3,100mAh battery was still chugging along with power to spare. Even better is the fact that the battery is easily removable, so you can swap it out for a different one if you’d like. On the back, we’ve got a 8MP camera, the same as the Galaxy S III, and even though we would have preferred seeing the Galaxy Note II touting a few more megapixels, the camera is still capable of taking some great looking pictures.

The S Pen has also been given an upgrade, getting a little bit bigger in size with this latest release. The tip is better suited for delicate screens, and naturally, it works well with the Note II’s vast array of software. The Note II comes packing features like handwriting recognition, S Voice, and – perhaps most importantly – Android 4.1 Jelly Bean, so you’re getting an up-to-date version of the Android OS with this device. Have a look at SlashGear’s Galaxy Note II software overview below to get a better idea of the features that come included with the handset.

As if you couldn’t already figure it out, the Galaxy Note II is a great device, provided you can get over the larger-than-normal display. If you can, then you’ll have one of the best Android devices currently available on your hands. Samsung has managed to pack a ton of useful functionality into one really beautiful (if not intimidatingly large) device, so you really can’t go wrong with the Galaxy Note II. Once again, be sure to read through SlashGear’s full review of the Galaxy Note II to hear much more about how great the device is!

samsung_galaxy_note_ii_review_sg_71 samsung_galaxy_note_ii_review_sg_38 samsung_galaxy_note_ii_review_sg_33 samsung_galaxy_note_ii_review_sg_26 samsung_galaxy_note_ii_review_sg_21 samsung_galaxy_note_ii_review_sg_13 samsung_galaxy_note_ii_review_sg_7 samsung_galaxy_note_ii_review_sg_1
Device Specifications and Information
Device Info
    Device Name : Galaxy Note II
    Manufactuer : Samsung
    Carrier : NA
    Announced Date : August 29, 2012
    Release Date : TBA
    Also Known As : GT-N7100
Display
  • Screen Size : 5.5 Inch
  • Resolution : 1280x720
  • Screen Type : HD Super AMOLED
Dimension & Weight
  • Height : 5.95 Inch
  • Width : 3.17 Inch
  • Depth : 0.37 Inch
  • Weight : 180 Grams
Battery & Power
    Battery Type:
  • Lithium Ion
  • Battery Capacity : 3100 mAh
  • Talk Time : NA
  • Stand By Time : NA
Software
    Android OS:
  • 4.1.x
    Audio Playback:
  • AAC
  • AAC+
  • AMR
  • MID
  • MP3
  • WAV
  • WMA
    Video Playback:
  • h.263
  • h.264 / AVC
  • 3GP
  • MPEG-4 (MP4)
  • WMV
    Messaging:
  • SMS
  • MMS
  • IM
Hardware
    CPU : Exynos 4412
    CPU Clock Speed : 1600 Mhz
    Core : 4
    Ram : 2000 MB
    Internal Storage : 16 GB
    Front Facing Camera :
    Camera Resolution : 8 MP
    External Storage:
  • MicroSD
  • MicroSDHC
    Camera Features:
  • Auto focus
  • Flash
  • 1080p Video Recording
    Sensors:
  • Accelerometer
  • Ambient light
  • Proximity
    QWERTY :
Cellular Network
    Network Technology:
  • GSM
    GSM Band:
  • 850
  • 900
  • 1800
  • 1900
Device Connectivity
    Wi-Fi:
  • 802.11a
  • 802.11b
  • 802.11g
  • 802.11n
    Bluetooth:
  • A2DP
  • Bluetooth 4.0
    Location Features:
  • Compass
  • GPS
  • Cellular location
  • Wi-Fi location
    FM Radio :
    NFC :


Android Authority

Android Authority


MegaDroid project is a virtual town with 300,000 Android smartphones

Posted: 06 Oct 2012 06:19 PM PDT

 

Sandia’s David Fritz holds two Android smartphones, representing the virtual network of 300,000 such devices that he and other researchers are using to advance understanding of malicious computer networks on.

What do you do with a town full of 300,000 Android smartphones? You run all sorts of tests, of course. But since not everyone would be willing to become a guinea-pig for a scientific experiment, researchers at the U.S. government’s Sandia National Laboratories in Livermore, California, are using an array of virtual smartphones through a datacenter with 500 cheap desktop computers.

This setup emulates a network of 300,000 Android smartphones, which includes exchange of SMS messages, wireless data, and an array of phone sensor and radio activity.

The main aim here is to study the interactions across different devices, which will eventually have a handful of practical applications. For instance, the team intends to use their findings to help developers that build social and location-based apps (such as Foursquare), those that build disaster-mitigation apps, and even developers planning to build mesh-type networks for emergency use.

Researcher are also looking into the possibility of Android smartphones running distributed applications over such a mesh network. This way, the phones need not rely on a central network, or even a WiFi network, in order to communicate with each other.

Apart from innovative ways for smartphones to communicate with each other, the research will also look into possible “attack vectors,” through which malicious hackers or malware can break into networks and Android smartphones. This is an important consideration today, given smartphone malware is on the rise today, especially within the Android ecosystem.

The researchers are planning to extend the experiment to other platforms such as Apple’s iOS, although Android is the ideal one at this point, given its more open nature.

Show full PR text

Sandia builds Android-based network to study cyber disruptions

LIVERMORE, Calif. — As part of ongoing research to help prevent and mitigate disruptions to computer networks on the Internet, researchers at Sandia National Laboratories in California have turned their attention to smartphones and other hand-held computing devices.

Sandia cyber researchers linked together 300,000 virtual hand-held computing devices running the Android operating system so they can study large networks of smartphones and find ways to make them more reliable and secure. Android dominates the smartphone industry and runs on a range of computing gadgets.

The work is expected to result in a software tool that will allow others in the cyber research community to model similar environments and study the behaviors of smartphone networks. Ultimately, the tool will enable the computing industry to better protect hand-held devices from malicious intent.

The project builds on the success of earlier work in which Sandia focused on virtual Linux and Windows desktop systems.

“Smartphones are now ubiquitous and used as general-purpose computing devices as much as desktop or laptop computers,” said Sandia’s David Fritz. “But even though they are easy targets, no one appears to be studying them at the scale we’re attempting.”

The Android project, dubbed MegaDroid, is expected to help researchers at Sandia and elsewhere who struggle to understand large scale networks. Soon, Sandia expects to complete a sophisticated demonstration of the MegaDroid project that could be presented to potential industry or government collaborators.

The virtual Android network at Sandia, said computer scientist John Floren, is carefully insulated from other networks at the Labs and the outside world, but can be built up into a realistic computing environment. That environment might include a full domain name service (DNS), an Internet relay chat (IRC) server, a web server and multiple subnets.

A key element of the Android project, Floren said, is a “spoof” Global Positioning System (GPS). He and his colleagues created simulated GPS data of a smartphone user in an urban environment, an important experiment since smartphones and such key features as Bluetooth and Wi-Fi capabilities are highly location-dependent and thus could easily be controlled and manipulated by rogue actors.

The researchers then fed that data into the GPS input of an Android virtual machine. Software on the virtual machine treats the location data as indistinguishable from real GPS data, which offers researchers a much richer and more accurate emulation environment from which to analyze and study what hackers can do to smartphone networks, Floren said.

This latest development by Sandia cyber researchers represents a significant steppingstone for those hoping to understand and limit the damage from network disruptions due to glitches in software or protocols, natural disasters, acts of terrorism, or other causes. These disruptions can cause significant economic and other losses for individual consumers, companies and governments.

“You can’t defend against something you don’t understand,” Floren said. The larger the scale the better, he said, since more computer nodes offer more data for researchers to observe and study.

The research builds upon the Megatux project that started in 2009, in which Sandia scientists ran a million virtual Linux machines, and on a later project that focused on the Windows operating system, called MegaWin. Sandia researchers created those virtual networks at large scale using real Linux and Windows instances in virtual machines.

The main challenge in studying Android-based machines, the researchers say, is the sheer complexity of the software. Google, which developed the Android operating system, wrote some 14 million lines of code into the software, and the system runs on top of a Linux kernel, which more than doubles the amount of code.

“It’s possible for something to go wrong on the scale of a big wireless network because of a coding mistake in an operating system or an application, and it’s very hard to diagnose and fix,” said Fritz. “You can’t possibly read through 15 million lines of code and understand every possible interaction between all these devices and the network.”

Much of Sandia’s work on virtual computing environments will soon be available for other cyber researchers via open source. Floren and Fritz believe Sandia should continue to work on tools that industry leaders and developers can use to better diagnose and fix problems in computer networks.

“Tools are only useful if they’re used,” said Fritz.

MegaDroid primarily will be useful as a tool to ferret out problems that would manifest themselves when large numbers of smartphones interact, said Keith Vanderveen, manager of Sandia’s Scalable and Secure Systems Research department.

“You could also extend the technology to other platforms besides Android,” said Vanderveen. “Apple’s iOS, for instance, could take advantage of our body of knowledge and the toolkit we’re developing.” He said Sandia also plans to use MegaDroid to explore issues of data protection and data leakage, which he said concern government agencies such as the departments of Defense and Homeland Security.

###

Sandia National Laboratories is a multiprogram laboratory operated by Sandia Corporation, a wholly owned subsidiary of Lockheed Martin Corporation, for the U.S. Department of Energy’s National Nuclear Security Administration. With main facilities in Albuquerque, N.M., and Livermore, Calif., Sandia has major R&D responsibilities in national security, energy and environmental technologies, and economic competitiveness.

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This article, MegaDroid project is a virtual town with 300,000 Android smartphones , was originally published at AndroidAuthority.com - Your Android News Source.


Digital music sales up 15% over last year, 1 billion songs already sold

Posted: 06 Oct 2012 03:28 PM PDT

ALMAGAMI / Shutterstock

There is no denying that services like Spotify and Rdio are great for listening to music, but they may not be the future of all music like some people may think. A recent Nielsen report shows that digital music sales aren’t slowing, and actually will likely break last year’s sales record.

Digital music sales are up 15 percent over 2011 so far this year. With 1 billion songs already sold, Nielsen is fairly certain that last year’s record of 1.3 billion songs sold will be broken in 2012. With Google, Amazon and Apple all banking heavily on selling digital music downloads, each of these companies is certainly made happy by this news.

While the days of downloading music for free from file sharing sites are hardly behind us, people seem more likely than ever to pay for downloaded music. This could be for a number of reasons, but convenience is certainly chief among them. When the choice is between either going to a record store and buying an album, ordering an album online and waiting for it to ship, or pay a few dollars and listen to it immediately, the instant gratification of the latter is very appealing.

While streaming services offer the same instant gratification that buying music digitally does, they’re not without their caveats. First, while they do offer a lot of music, there is plenty of music available for downloading that isn’t available for streaming. Second, while streaming apps are available on a lot of devices, you can’t yet stream your music everywhere. With a downloaded song or album, users don’t need to worry as much about compatibility.

In a way, it’s likely that streaming services are actually helping digital music sales. With customers able to listen to full albums before purchasing them, they can make more informed purchases and are therefore less wary of purchasing songs or full albums.

It doesn’t seem to stop at music either. It seems that people in general are more likely to buy things digitally lately. Google’s recent announcement of 25 billion total downloads in the Google Play Store is a great example of that. The rise of ebooks is another sign that people are growing more comfortable with paying for digital content.

Senior Vice President of Client Development for Nielsen David Bakula says "As we look ahead, it's clear that digital music purchases—and consumption through streaming sources—will continue to grow, and that consumers' appetites for digital music will change at the speed of technology.” Whether digital downloads, streaming or a combination of the two will lead in the future remains to be seen, but it’s clear that consumers are increasingly looking towards digital means to get their music fix.

How do you prefer to listen to music?  Streaming services, digital downloads or both? Have you found yourself spending more on digital music purchases lately?

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This article, Digital music sales up 15% over last year, 1 billion songs already sold , was originally published at AndroidAuthority.com - Your Android News Source.


NTT DoCoMo’s new Grip UI can detect how you hold your phone and acts accordingly

Posted: 06 Oct 2012 01:30 PM PDT

Grip UI
Mobile devices are always getting new features. Over the last year we have seen countless features evolve from NFC, for instance. Pretty much every new phone coming out has a really nice voice search system in place. We recently said goodbye to Motorola’s Webtop application. NTT DoCoMo is looking to bring a little uniqueness to their offering with Grip UI.

You can do a lot of cool things with Grip UI. Just moving around the OS, you can use special grips on the side of your phone to do things like open applications. For instance, you can grip the top of your phone and it could open the web browser for you. Or you can grip the bottom, wait for the screen to dim and then swipe right and it’ll open calender. It’s really very unique and you can customize these for your favorite applications.

This is done with a network of pressure sensors that occupy the sides and back of the device. Based on where you grip and how hard you grip, the sensors will send input to the device. Then, depending on your settings, the device will act in a specified manner. In the video below, you can see that you can unlock the device simply by squeezing it.

Could Grip UI be the next big thing for mobile phones?

It definitely should be. Most smart phones and other devices use the popular grid system for icons and widgets. Grip UI could help pull away from that. With literally dozens of ways to grip the phone and issue commands, the need for a home screen isn’t as prevalent as it is now.

As an exmaple, you don’t need a dock at the bottom of every home screen if you can just grip a certain way, swipe up and open your notifications drawer. Program in four other grips and there are your four quick apps that most docks allow for. Now you can go with no dock.

There really is a wealth of possibilities with something like Grip UI. It can detect whether you’re holding it right handed or left handed and portrait or landscape. It can help with small hands or even large hands. Grip UI adapts to the grips of the user, rather than making the user adjust their grip to work with the UI. This could be especially helpful in gigantic phones, like the Samsung Galaxy Note 2.

Check out the video below for a full demonstration or NTT DoCoMo’s official website if you want more info. Is this something that you could see being successful? Tell us what you think.

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This article, NTT DoCoMo’s new Grip UI can detect how you hold your phone and acts accordingly , was originally published at AndroidAuthority.com - Your Android News Source.


Papaya’s cross promotional tool AppFlood expanding, getting iOS version

Posted: 06 Oct 2012 12:43 PM PDT

PapayaMobile launched AppFlood, a cross promotional tool for developers, back in July. The service seems to be a hit, and according to Papaya, AppFlood is only getting started.

How It Works

Despite its recent launch, chances are good that if you try out a lot of apps, you’ve probably already seen AppFlood in action. How it works is fairly simple: developers get to advertise their apps within any of the other apps using the service, and in return, they advertise those other apps themselves. With more than 350 developers using the service, that’s a lot of exposure, especially if you’ve just launched your app.

In addition to exchanging traffic, developers can also buy and sell traffic. While this would seem like a good spot for Papaya to step in and take a cut of the proceeds, they don’t. All buying, selling and exchanging of traffic via AppFlood is completely commission-free.

This seems to be working, because Papaya is saying that AppFlood is already generating up to 200 million impressions a month.  Papaya says that AppFlood is also seeing click-through rates of up to 45 percent, and install rates of up to 37 percent. Given the short period of time the service has been around, this is impressive. For developers using the app, this is a lot of exposure that they wouldn’t get otherwise.

Looking Forward

PapayaMobile isn’t taking this success as a sign that it’s time to take a break, either. The company is working on adding support for the Unity game development tool and developing an iOS port of AppFlood. PapayaMobile CEO Si Shen says that “"We are expanding and iterating at break-neck speed in order to become the market leader for cross-promotion by the end of this year.” Seeing how far the company has come in just a few months, this wouldn’t be entirely surprising to see happen.

Do you think that services like AppFlood will be the future for developers who want to advertise their apps? Or do you think that traditional advertising methods will stay dominant?

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This article, Papaya’s cross promotional tool AppFlood expanding, getting iOS version , was originally published at AndroidAuthority.com - Your Android News Source.


Introducing the 7-inch Alcatel One Touch T10 budget tablet

Posted: 06 Oct 2012 10:56 AM PDT

The market for lower priced tablets like Google’s Nexus 7 and the Kindle Fire series continues to grow, and more and more companies are announcing their own entries into the market. The latest company to throw their hat into the ring is Alcatel, with its recently announced One Touch T10.

While other companies are trying to top the Nexus 7 and Kindle Fire by offering better specs or a dramatically lower price, it isn’t clear what Alcatel is trying to do here. While we don’t know pricing specifics yet, the specs alone are certainly not enough to help the Alcatel One Touch T10 compete in the increasingly crowded market for budget tablets.

The One Touch T10 is powered by a 1 GHz single-core processor and includes 1 GB of RAM, 4 GB of internal storage expandable by 32 GB via a microSD slot, a 0.3-megapixel front-facing camera, and a 7-inch screen with a resolution of 800 x 480. The tablet runs Android 4.0 Ice Cream Sandwich and icons for the Google Play Store are seen in promotional photos, but no other details on included software are known at this time.

With tablets with similar specs found online for around $80 USD, Alcatel is going to have to be very aggressive with pricing to make the One Touch T10 stand out at all. If it is priced low enough, the tablet could surely find a niche, but with prices dropping all the time, this seems to be a curious move on Alcatel’s part. One advantage the tablet may have is that, unlike many lower-priced tablets, the Google Play Store icons shown in marketing materials seem to indicate that this is a fully Google-certified device.

Would you consider buying the Alcatel One Touch T10 at the right price? Or do you already have your eye on another tablet?

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This article, Introducing the 7-inch Alcatel One Touch T10 budget tablet , was originally published at AndroidAuthority.com - Your Android News Source.


It is official, Motorola has finally announced that they’ve killed off Webtop

Posted: 06 Oct 2012 09:30 AM PDT

Webtop
We all knew this was eventually coming. Amid many reports over the last few months that Motorola could be killing off Webtop, Motorola recently reported to CNet that it would be discontinuing Webtop support. There are plenty of other things to be excited about for the new Motorola line up. However, those who were looking forward to Webtop are going to be disappointed.

For those who don’t follow Motorola products, Webtop was an open-source interface that customers could use to connect their Moto phones to their computers. Once you dock the phone, Webtop opens up and people can use various applications from their phones on their computer. It was based on Ubuntu and the desktop interface was very Ubuntu-like.

When Webtop was released, it was critically acclaimed. Many believed that it could be a go-to feature in the ever waging battle of Android vs iOS vs Windows. It very well may have been if Motorola had done a little more to make the feature accessible. According to CNet, interest in Webtop died when getting the full accessory package for the Motorola Atrix 4G cost a whopping $500.

What is Motorola doing now that there is no Webtop?

Now that Webtop is out of the way, Motorola is getting back to the basics. Better internal specs, better external specs, and better battery life is the credo going into the next release of Motorola phones. They’ve even gone so far as to nip a few problems in the bud before people got a chance to complain about them. This has also been HTC and Samsung’s credo over the last year or so. While it is nice seeing smart phone makers focus on specs and quality assurance, we are seeing less and less odd and unique features because of it.

Webtop may be officially dead, but it is not officially gone. You can still download the source code from Sourceforge as of the time of this writing. Additionally, phones that had Webtop will still have it. So there is still a chance for third party development if Webtop fans want more.

Although Webtop wasn’t a particularly popular feature, it was definitely a pretty cool one. It helped Motorola stand out from the pack and really, it was just implemented wrong. There was nothing wrong with the actual software. Is there anyone who’s going to miss Webtop? Let us know your thoughts.

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This article, It is official, Motorola has finally announced that they’ve killed off Webtop , was originally published at AndroidAuthority.com - Your Android News Source.


iPad mini, Razer’s Project Fiona confirmed for production

Posted: 06 Oct 2012 09:02 AM PDT

Android tablets are about to get new competitors in the near and distant future, some of them running iOS 6 while others will have Windows 8 under the hood. Today I'm specifically talking about Apple's iPad mini and Razer's Project Fiona, as both have been confirmed for production.

iPad mini

Of the two, the most important rival for Android tablets, especially budget-friendly ones, is the upcoming 7.85-inch iPad mini that will directly challenge the Google Nexus 7 and the Kindle Fire family of handsets.

The Wall Street Journal reports that Apple suppliers have already begun producing the smaller iPad, and we're probably going to see it hit stores in the coming months. The publication says that LG Display and AU Optronics started mass-producing LCD displays for the upcoming iPad model last month, although nobody will comment on the record on the matter.

The 7.85-inch display is said to feature a resolution lower than the third-generation iPad, although we don't have any official specs and features for the device.

Project Fiona

Unlike the iPad mini, and other budget Android tablets that can be used to play a variety of games these days, Razer has a tablet that's specifically designed for gaming on the go. Called Project Fiona and spotted initially at CES in early 2012, the 10.1-inch Windows tablet features a couple of joystick handles meant to give players better control on the action happening on the screen.

AnandTech reports that Project Fiona has also been confirmed for production, although that doesn't mean the device will be available to order this year, as initially expected.In fact, it looks like there's no final design for Project Fiona and hardware details "have not yet been set in stone."

What tablet are you planning to buy this holiday season and for what purpose? Will you choose iOS, Android or Windows?

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This article, iPad mini, Razer's Project Fiona confirmed for production , was originally published at AndroidAuthority.com - Your Android News Source.


Chameleon 1.1: more widgets, better widgets, and stock widgets

Posted: 06 Oct 2012 08:09 AM PDT

chameleon tablet

The Chameleon smart launcher for Android is one of our favorite projects currently in development. We like how it tries to redefine the home screen, and turn it into a smart, interactive dashboard that displays all the information you need at a glance.

When Chameleon version 1 hit Google Play a couple of weeks ago, some users complained about the limited selection of widgets. That is set to change though. Teknision, the developer of the project, has been working hard to create more widgets, but also to make available widgets created by the community and even stock Android widgets.

That is right, Chameleon 1.1 will support regular Android app widgets, in spite of their drawbacks, which, according to Teknision, are "extremely limited interactivity and poor adaptive layout". We think this move will open up Chameleon and make it more flexible, and perhaps convince more people to try it out.

Teknision has also been working to create additional widgets; two new ones, Google+ and Calendar, are now available, and if you have the launcher installed you should see a notification that they have been added. In case you don't see the notification, you might want to force close the app and restart it.

The Google+ widget works within the constraints of Google's API, which is quite limited, but besides that, it has all the features you might want. For now, the Calendar widget only works with Google Calendar, but the team promises that compatibility with local calendars is coming soon.

An upcoming Widget Catalog will contain community creations, developed using the Chameleon SDK. It's good to hear that people are interested in developing for Chameleon, and hopefully this trend will only grow. Teknision has promised to support third-party developers, by updating the SDK and providing documentation.

Did you give Chameleon a try? What do you think of it?

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This article, Chameleon 1.1: more widgets, better widgets, and stock widgets , was originally published at AndroidAuthority.com - Your Android News Source.


LG Optimus G Nexus announcement coming at end of month, new report says

Posted: 06 Oct 2012 08:03 AM PDT

The LG Nexus rumors keep coming up these days, and we're almost certain that we're going to see the first LG Nexus handset ever reach stores this winter. We now have a new report talking about the device, this time from CNET, which is apparently able to confirm that "the phone will be a modified version of the Optimus G.

The handset will be announced by Google and LG at the end of the month, but press invites for said event are not out yet. Yesterday we learned that LG’s Nexus will be release in mid-November, which makes an October announcement very likely.

The phone will be announced at the end of the month, according to a person briefed on the matter. While it will run some of the same specifications as the Optimus G, it will be modified to fit into the Nexus program. Google and LG haven’t yet come up with a name for the product.

Meanwhile, we're going to keep calling it the LG Optimus G Nexus, although LG Optimus Nexus is also a product name we've heard before for the product.

CNET also reminds us that LG "may not be the only company to unveil a Nexus phone," which is pretty much in line with what we've heard so far from various sources. In addition to the LG Nexus, the web is currently filled with various Samsung Galaxy Nexus 2 leaks and sightings, not to mention that Sony and HTC are also rumored to work on their own Nexus-branded handsets.

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This article, LG Optimus G Nexus announcement coming at end of month, new report says , was originally published at AndroidAuthority.com - Your Android News Source.


Motorola Razr I and global Razr HD join the unlocked bootloader club

Posted: 06 Oct 2012 07:27 AM PDT

US-based readers with an interest in Android modding, please don't read this post. It will only make you sour, because the two phones in question are not selling in the United States. And even if the Razr HD would get an unlocked "developer edition" at some point, you would have to pay full retail price for it.

Now that we got that out of our way, what's the news? The Intel-powered Razr i and the international version of the Razr HD will have their bootloaders unlocked, according to Motorola's website. This includes the Canadian version of the device, carried by Rogers.

The Motorola Razr i will be available in select countries in Europe, Latin America and Australia. It has already launched in the UK, and it's launching as we speak in Brazil. The Razr HD, the Kevlar-backed successor to last year's Razr, will be available this month in Germany and other European markets.

So, why is it important that these two phones will get their bootloaders unlocked? Well, it's mostly important if you are an Android modder or if you like to run custom versions of Android, like CyanogenMod or AOKP. Developers have a much easier time working with a device that has an unlocked bootloader, which means these devices get ports and updates faster than locked ones. Even if some skilled dev manages to bypass the bootloader somehow, the custom software on it is usually less stable and polished.

It’s good to see Motorola actually doing something to appease the modder community (unlike it's been doing in this case). We just wish the program would be extended to more devices and to more carriers. But to be honest, it's not always Moto's fault. Hear that Verizon?

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This article, Motorola Razr I and global Razr HD join the unlocked bootloader club , was originally published at AndroidAuthority.com - Your Android News Source.