Technology Android

[Casey]

T-Mobile officially releasing the LG Revolution as the T-Mobile G2X with stock Android!!!!!! Fuck yeah!

T-Mobile officially unveiled the T-Mobile G2X, their version of the LG Optimus 2X. The device packs a dual-core Tegra 2 at 1 GHz, a four-inch capacitive touchscreen, and HSPA+ 4G connectivity. Also on board are an 8 MP rear camera with LED flash and 1.3 MP front facing camera -- with T-Mobile's Qik powered video chat baked into the OS.
It's running on Android 2.2, and looks to be chock full of third party extras, ranging from the Tegra Zone to T-Mobile TV. No price was discussed, but we're to expect it "this Spring". Hit the break for the full presser.

 

[Casey]

Some hands on video of the G2X

http://www.engadget.com/2011/03/22/t-mobile-g2x-from-lg-hands-on-video/

 

[S O F I]

If you don't have a credit card tied to an Amazon account, I don't know what you're doing with your life. I've bought so much shit through Amazon. It's the best e-retailer.

 

[Casey]

If you don't have a credit card tied to an Amazon account, I don't know what you're doing with your life. I've bought so much shit through Amazon. It's the best e-retailer.

I do too, I've been buying music and books there for at least a decade. But if Amazon are trying to get people to use their system as opposed to Android Market, it's not a good step. It shouldn't be required purely to use the service, only if you want to actually spend money. There's gonna be people who wanna check out the service and won't even be able to download any apps that are free. So they'll obviously just use Android Market instead.

 

[Pittsey]

If you don't have a credit card tied to an Amazon account, I don't know what you're doing with your life. I've bought so much shit through Amazon. It's the best e-retailer.

I have been considering getting Amazon Prime. I checked the amount of purchases I have made in the last 6 months. It was 40 (purchases not items). So it's probably going to be worthwhile. I'll get my stuff in one working day instead of 3-5.

 

[Rukas]

According to member on XDA forums, Rio has been cracked Looking for the link right now.

Android hackers/modders win again

EDIT - got it

Hook me up.

 

[S O F I]

I do too, I've been buying music and books there for at least a decade. But if Amazon are trying to get people to use their system as opposed to Android Market, it's not a good step. It shouldn't be required purely to use the service, only if you want to actually spend money. There's gonna be people who wanna check out the service and won't even be able to download any apps that are free. So they'll obviously just use Android Market instead.

You're using their app so why not use their system. It makes sense from Amazon's perspective for a dozen of reasons, one most likely being that it's efficient for them to do it. Any free trial or service that you want requires a credit card most of the time. Look at Hulu Plus. You can get a week for free but you have to sign up with a credit card. They're not evil for that and they're not a "fail" for that. Your other reason was totally BS too. "What, they won't easily let me hack their system? FAIL. We only like services that we can hack and modify. Anarchy!!!". It's like, come on dude, I know you're used to this whole Android developers doing what they want thing, but we shouldn't expect any company to make it easy for us to do that. Android is open-source. Amazon is not. But Amazon isn't Apple either.

I have been considering getting Amazon Prime. I checked the amount of purchases I have made in the last 6 months. It was 40 (purchases not items). So it's probably going to be worthwhile. I'll get my stuff in one working day instead of 3-5.

My sister was offered Prime for free simply because she'd buy a lot of items/books. I'm surprised Amazon UK doesn't do that. I've had Prime for quite a awhile. Here in the US, if you have a student e-mail address (aka a student), you qualify for Prime. Amazon is awesome.

 

[THEV1LL4N]

what i hate is, that most of these high end stock android phones without manufacturer GUIs arent going to be available in the UK as Sense, Tounchwiz etc heavily dominate over here with Android phones.

 

[ARon]

I've been digging the Optimus2x/G2x for a while now but that was just based on specs. What the fuck is up with the size of that bottom bumper, it's huge.

I think I'll like the Pyramid more.

Really though i can't wait til we reach the 28nm die in the consumer products. I think the die the Pyramid uses is 45nm, I believe it's the msm8655, which is amazing in it's own right but 28nm will do much better on battery life. It shouldn't be too far down the line either

 

[Casey]

You're using their app so why not use their system. It makes sense from Amazon's perspective for a dozen of reasons, one most likely being that it's efficient for them to do it. Any free trial or service that you want requires a credit card most of the time. Look at Hulu Plus. You can get a week for free but you have to sign up with a credit card. They're not evil for that and they're not a "fail" for that. Your other reason was totally BS too. "What, they won't easily let me hack their system? FAIL. We only like services that we can hack and modify. Anarchy!!!". It's like, come on dude, I know you're used to this whole Android developers doing what they want thing, but we shouldn't expect any company to make it easy for us to do that. Android is open-source. Amazon is not. But Amazon isn't Apple either.

It doesn't make sense for a new venture trying to gain traction over an existing popular one. I pay for Spotify and I never had to use a credit card for the free version up until I made the decision to pay for premium....

They aren't "evil" for it but it's turning a lot of people off of their service. The other reason isn't BS either - it might not be a "fail" per se but again, you want the Android devs/modder community on your side - who do you think proselytizes Android the most? Who are the people that are making certain Android apps popular? I mean shit, there's people with bigger circles of Android users in their friends/fam/social networks than me, but if I big up something about Android there's like 40 people at this point that are gonna check it out.

And I would have been FULLY down to big up Amazon's store if I was actually able to use it, and if you didn't need a card too (because I know for a fact that a whole bunch of people aren't gonna be down with having to do that). But Amazon hasn't allowed me to do that. So it's a fail for them because people aren't gonna be supporting their Store the way they need people to if they want any significant gains over the Market.

And yeah, I think it's anti-antithetical to the vision behind Android.... as are closed-source custom UI's which is why I generally don't support them, and would root and run a AOSP ROM on any phone I might own or see that has such an interface, like Sense UI or MotoBlur phones. But that's not as big of a deal.

I just think this whole launch could have been pulled off a lot more effectively.

 

[Casey]

Anyone got any good new apps recently?

 

[S O F I]

It doesn't make sense for a new venture trying to gain traction over an existing popular one. I pay for Spotify and I never had to use a credit card for the free version up until I made the decision to pay for premium....

They aren't "evil" for it but it's turning a lot of people off of their service. The other reason isn't BS either - it might not be a "fail" per se but again, you want the Android devs/modder community on your side - who do you think proselytizes Android the most? Who are the people that are making certain Android apps popular? I mean shit, there's people with bigger circles of Android users in their friends/fam/social networks than me, but if I big up something about Android there's like 40 people at this point that are gonna check it out.

And I would have been FULLY down to big up Amazon's store if I was actually able to use it, and if you didn't need a card too (because I know for a fact that a whole bunch of people aren't gonna be down with having to do that). But Amazon hasn't allowed me to do that. So it's a fail for them because people aren't gonna be supporting their Store the way they need people to if they want any significant gains over the Market.

And yeah, I think it's anti-antithetical to the vision behind Android.... as are closed-source custom UI's which is why I generally don't support them, and would root and run a AOSP ROM on any phone I might own or see that has such an interface, like Sense UI or MotoBlur phones. But that's not as big of a deal.

I just think this whole launch could have been pulled off a lot more effectively.

I think this whole idea is a fail simply because I don't see what Amazon can bring to the table as far as apps go that Google/Android can't. Plus, aren't they getting sued for using the same name as Apple?

I can see your point but I still think it's normal business practice. But if other people feel the way you do, then it will be a problem lol.

 

[Casey]

I think this whole idea is a fail simply because I don't see what Amazon can bring to the table as far as apps go that Google/Android can't. Plus, aren't they getting sued for using the same name as Apple?

I can see your point but I still think it's normal business practice. But if other people feel the way you do, then it will be a problem lol.

Well, they have a review process. Which is a fail for me. If I wanted that I'd be using iOS. I prefer the open nature of the Market.

Also, Amazon dictates the price of the apps in their Market - not the developer. They are planning to offer one paid app for free every day. Which could be cool. But shit, it's not that a big deal really. You're right - they don't really have much to offer and I don't think this will work out as well as they seem to think it will.

 

[Flipmo]

Confirmed: RIM’s BlackBerry PlayBook to support Android apps

Waterloo-based RIM announced their Q4 and 2011 Year End Fiscal results: BlackBerry smartphone shipments increased 43% over last year to 52.3 million units, 2011 revenue increase 33% to $19.9 billion, Number 1 selling smartphone in the United States, Canada, Latin America and the UK for calendar 2010.
Jim Balsillie, Co-CEO at Research In Motion stated that “As we enter fiscal 2012, RIM is in an excellent position to benefit from the continuing convergence of the mobile communications and mobile computing markets. We are laying a strong foundation for RIM’s expanding market opportunity through focused investments and we are extremely excited about our smartphone, tablet and platform roadmaps.”
Speaking of convergence and roadmaps… RIM also confirmed a rumour that has brewing for months that they’ll support Android apps on the upcoming BlackBerry PlayBook (and future devices that run off the QNX platform).
“RIM will launch two optional “app players” that provide an application run-time environment for BlackBerry Java apps and Android v2.3 apps. These new app players will allow users to download BlackBerry Java apps and Android apps from BlackBerry App World and run them on their BlackBerry PlayBook. In addition, RIM will shortly release the native SDK for the BlackBerry PlayBook enabling C/C++ application development on the BlackBerry Tablet OS.”
Wonder what Steve Jobs is thinking now…

http://mobilesyrup.com/

Good move.

 

[Casey]

It's actually a BAD move for RIM, but the only thing they could do. The reason why, is because I hear that the deal with Google was done in exchange for RIM bringing BlackBerry Messenger to Android. Which is one of the only reasons why most people even still use Blackberrys, because they are locked into the BBM ecosystem. They've shot themselves in the foot there.

 

[Casey]

Shit.... I didn't see this one coming. Guess it'll be a while before we see any real Honeycomb ROMs.

Google keeping Honeycomb source code on ice, says it's not

ready for other devices

Itching to put some sweet, crunchy AOSP Honeycomb on your hardware of choice? You might have quite a wait, as BusinessWeek reports that Google will not release the Android 3.0 source code in the near future, and we just received confirmation of the same. Google forwarded us the following statement, which pretty much says it all:

Android 3.0, Honeycomb, was designed from the ground up for devices with larger screen sizes and improves on Android favorites such as widgets, multi-tasking, browsing, notifications and customization. While we're excited to offer these new features to Android tablets, we have more work to do before we can deliver them to other device types including phones. Until then, we've decided not to release Honeycomb to open source. We're committed to providing Android as an open platform across many device types and will publish the source as soon as it's ready.​

It's fairly clear that the company's motivation here is the same as it's been all along -- Google wants to restrict Android to the devices it was designed for. Though the company long insisted that earlier versions of Android were not for tablets, manufacturers quickly adapted the source code to slates anyhow, and we can imagine the company wasn't thrilled some of the middling results. At that time, Google's only weapon was to deny access to Gmail, Maps and Android Market, which it did liberally (with a few exceptions to the rule) but this time it sounds like it's simply withholding the "entirely for tablet" source code instead of sending cease-and-desist letters out. Another explanation, however, could just be that Honeycomb's not ready for primetime without some OEM help -- last we checked,smartphone support was a far cry from final, and even the finished Motorola Xoom still has a few software kinks to work out. Here's hoping a nice cold bowl of Ice Cream will smooth things over with the open source community before long.

 

[Rukas]

That's kind of bullshit and against what android should be about.

Time for nookie froyo casey....

 

[Casey]

It is very much against the nature of the project. I'm already seeing some serious backlash from commenters on various blogs.

Yeah, I'll probably give NookieFroyo a shot, but I'd rather rock CM7. It seems there's still a fair few bugs to iron out with that though. But I'm in no rush.

 

[Flipmo]

It's actually a BAD move for RIM, but the only thing they could do. The reason why, is because I hear that the deal with Google was done in exchange for RIM bringing BlackBerry Messenger to Android. Which is one of the only reasons why most people even still use Blackberrys, because they are locked into the BBM ecosystem. They've shot themselves in the foot there.

For RIM, yeah, it's a bad move. What other choice do they have though. If you can't beat em' - join em', right?

 

[Casey]

True.

Just realized another minus point for Amazon's App Store - no refunds.

Android Market has a 15 minute refund window.