Android Ice Cream Sandwich on the HTC G1!

David C    Android, News, Open Source    

This is a working AOSP port of Ice Cream Sandwich to the HTC G1, the first android phone! Brought to you by our own jcarrz1, XDA Recognized Developer.

See the full thread on XDA-Developers for more details.

Alpha 2 download: http://www.scienceprousa.com/jcarrz1/jcarrz1-g1-ics-alpha2.zip

340,000 views and counting!

As seen on: Engadget, The Verge, Tech Crunch, XDA Portal, and many other tech news sites!

Infographic: Humans vs. Computers

David C    Technology    

While this infographic fails to take into account some of the vast differences between humans and machines, you’ll certainly learn a few neat things anyway!

Google Plus vs. Facebook

David C    Technology     Facebook, Google, Google Plus, Infographic

Here is a great infographic from technoboms.com that highlights some of the key differences between Google Plus and Facebook.

Archos enters the Honeycomb arena with the 8 and 10 inch G9 Series Tablets

bs2    Android, News, Tablet PCs     Archos, G9, Honeycomb, Tablets

Archos has been in the tablet business for quite some time; it offered the first Android 10″ tablet with the Archos 101, a Froyo equipped device launched early last year.  Unlike past Archos Android devices, which lacked the Android Market and the official “Google blessing,” this new set of tablets brings for a full, genuine Honeycomb experience with some impressive additions to boot.

The 8 inch 80 G9 and 10 inch 101 G9 will launch this September with Android 3.1, although this could easily become Android 3.2 depending on the availability of that release.  Archos has not merely produced another run of the mill set of tablets, however; the G9′s feature unique features including the availability of a 7mm thin Seagate Momentus 250GB hard drive, which easily trumps the storage available on any other tablet.

Up to this time, Honeycomb tablets have had hit and miss video playback support; while the Tegra 2 chip is able to power through full 1080p video, codec support was somewhat limited.  Archos has solved this problem by pairing the brand new Texas Instruments OMAP 4 1.5Ghz Dual Core processor with a full set of proprietary codecs which will fulfill the company’s reputation for broad media playback support.  Formats that can be played on the G9 tablets include AVI, MP4, MOV, 3GP, MPG, PS, TS, VOB, MKV, FLV, RM, RMVB, ASF, and WMV at resolutions up to full 1080p.

Rounding out the package, Archos equips the 8″ tablet with a 1024×768 resolution screen at 160ppi, and the the 10″ model with a 1280×800 resolution screen at 151ppi.  The tablets include HDMI out, an SD card slot, 1GB of RAM, and as previously stated, the option of a 250GB hard drive or a more economical 16GB of flash storage.

While other manufacturers like Apple,  Motorola, Samsung have produced two separate SKUs of their tablets to allow for a 3G option, Archos takes a different approach.  The tablets include a slot and full sized USB port on the rear that allow a special USB 3G modem to be installed flush with the tablet’s surface.  his same modem can also be used with a regular PC, allowing for more flexibility on the 3G plan.

HTC launches the socially-infused Status, a rebranded ChaCha for the US and Canada

bs2    Android, News     Android, Facebook, HTC ChaCha, HTC Status, sense

The HTC ChaCha first debuted at MWC 2011 in February, and was met with some ridicule due to its awkward name (which was made even more awkward when it became ChaChaCha in Spain). HTC seems to have learned from this gaffe, however, and is launching this solid device in the US and Canada under the new name the Status.

At first glance, the Status looks like an average portrait QWERTY Android device, but unlike competitors like the Galaxy Pro and Droid Pro, the Status takes a social spin on the concept, rather than a business-centric approach.  The Status features a 2.6 inch, 480×320 LCD with a very accpetable DPI of 221.  The specs mirror many of HTC’s recent midrange devices such as the Desire Z, with an 800Mhz Qualcomm Snapdragon processor, 512MB of RAM and onboard storage, and a 1250mah battery, which, while smaller than the huge cells in the Evo 3D and Sensation, should provide more than acceptable life on a smaller device like the Status.

A 5MB camera is present on the back of the phone, while a VGA front camera facilitates video chat.  But the most important and unique feature of the Status is the clearly labeled Facebook button on the front below the well-spaced QWERTY keyboard.  Thus button is context-aware, and allows the user to easily post a new status update based on what they are doing, whether it be listening to a song, watching a YouTube video, or browsing the web.  The button also allows quick access for posts and checkins throughout the phone’s UI.  This button while surely take the Facebook experience on Android to a new level, bringing a new level of ubiquity that even Google + might not be able to challenge.

Like virtually all recent HTC phones, Status runs Android 2.3 Gingerbread with Sense UI, although it is not clear what version will come pre-installed (probably not the 3D-heavy Sense 3.0, as that has been reserved for higher resolution devices thus far).  The Status will be available in black, silver, and purple.

Nokia follows up the N9 with the Sea Ray, its first Windows Phone 7 device

bs2    News, Nokia, Windows Phone 7     n9, nokia, Sea Ray, Windows Phone 7, WP7

Following the public debut of Nokia’s widely praised N9, Nokia CEO and former Microsoft executive Stephen Elop unveiled the “highly confidential” Nokia Sea Ray Windows Phone 7 proptotype.

The hardware looks very similar to the Nokia N9, with an 8 megapixel Carl Zeiss camera on the rear and slick black minimalistic styling. As with all other Windows Phone 7 devices, the Sea Ray sports a hardware shutter button for photo capture.

The device was shown off running Windows Phone 7 Mango, the new version of Windows Phone that Microsoft plans to launch late in the year. Nokia has announced that it will launch a few Windows Phone 7 devices this year, with more to come next year; based on this prototpye device, it’s safe to say that those will be running Mango.

Every 60 Seconds

David C    Technology     Blogs, Craigslist, Every 60 Seconds, Facebook, Firefox, Flickr, Google, iphone, LinkedIn, Pandora, Scribd, Skype, Tumblr, Twitter, WordPress, YouTube

Google restores Movies access to the Motorola Xoom WiFi

bs2    Android, News     Android, Google Movies, Honeycomb, motorola, Xoom

When Google announced its brand new Movie rental service at Google I/O in May, it seemed likely that Google would extend the service to as many users and devices as possible.  However, despite receiving an update to Android 3.1 like its 3G counterpart, the Motorola Xoom WiFi mysteriously lacked access to Google’s Movie marketplace.

It appears that this restriction has now been lifted, as Xoom WiFi users can now browse and rent films from the Android Market.  Google offers a number of new releases that can be streamed in HD quality, ranging in price from $1.99 to $4.99.  The option to downoad, or “pin,” movies locally for offline viewing is also available (and for WiFi owners that may lack a constant Internet connection, this is quite useful).

No word on whether or not Google plans to lift its restriction that prevents rooted users from accessing the Movie rental service.

Google enhances mobile search with new updates

bs2    Android, Apple, Mobile Apps, News     Android, Google, Google Maps, Google Search, ios, Local

In addition to the stunningly useful image search and instant page pre-loading that Google announced at its Inside Search event today, new enhancements to the mobile search experience were also rolled out.

Google has added new buttons to the Google homepage on mobile devices to make it quick and easy to find local stores, gas stations, ATMs, restaurants, coffee shops, bars, and more based on the device’s current location.

Tapping on one of these icons brings the user to a new list view that highlights the location of each result on a map.  As you scroll through the list, the “pin” for each result is highlighted on the map.  A quick tap on the location or business name brings up a page with reviews, contact information, and further details.  We’re pleased to see that Google has improved its local search even further!

In addition to faster local searches, Google has also introduced the “plus” button to build searches based on multiple blocks of text.  This functionality has been present in the native Google search apps for iOS and Android, but the functionality now carries over to the browser-based engine as well.  As text is entered into the search box suggestions can be added individually using the “+” button.

Samsung picks up steam, updates Galaxy S to Android 2.3.4

bs2    Android     Android 2.3.4, Galaxy S, gingerbread, samsung

In addition to being one of the first manufacturers to release Gingerbread (in the form of Android 2.3.3 for the Galaxy S and a handful of other devices), Samsung has now bumped the Galaxy S line to Android 2.3.4 which brings a variety of fixes and support for the new Google Talk Video Chat that debuted on the Nexus S a few weeks ago.

Interested users can wait for the update to become available in their region through Samsung’s Kies software, or download the full ROM package, build I9000XXJVP, from SamFirmware.

It’s good to see manufacturers stay on top of Android updates, and we hope this trend follows accross the rest of Samsung’s Android lineup.