Technology Android

[Casey]

It was a rumor. Although they did show off the new Music app on Honeycomb, which does contain the settings that will be used for Google Music (the sync options etc).

My gut instinct is that all the software for Google Music is done. The music purchase section will be part of the web based Market, so that technology is already there. The sync software for iTunes/Windows Media Player is done. Hell even the streaming stuff is probably done.

I think that the deals with the record labels are what's holding it up, like with Spotify. It doesn't help that so many of the execs at the labels are fucking dinosaurs who don't understand the modern music industry. It'll take some time, but hopefully we'll get an update in May at Google I/O. Maybe they'll even be able to launch it by then.

 

[Casey]

Web Market is fully working now. Just installed a couple games on my G2, it was fast as hell. Installed em straight away. Has my entire purchase/download history on the site since May 2009 as well (when they introduced paid apps).

 

[dilla]

A lot of sites are abuzz about it all now and it's finally starting to sink in for me.

I am usually easily amused/amazed and the iPad had me in a stronghold for a while. Not that the Tab was the epitome of Android tablets, but it certainly didn't really impress me. After watching this, I gotta say, I'm pretty much through with wanting an iPad and I'm down for an Android tablet now. Honeycomb looks a fuck-ton better than whatever the Tab was running and I really hope they take the features from Honeycomb and put them into the next version out for phones (I say this because it's still up in the air whether HC makes its way to phones, right?). But I love the notifications and just the overall layout. As much as I like Android's current look, with the app drawer, I want something that closely resembles PC computing, in terms of layout. Something like a start button, or a tool bar on the bottom with the time and date, instead of on the top. I know screen size is an issue on phones, but I want icons I can put anywhere. I don't care if they're organized nicely in a line or what, I just want what I use all the time to fit on one screen and be easy to access.

I like the direction Google went with this. There really hasn't been much change in the UI since 2.1, and I know Google is making a bigger focus on that in the subsequent versions of Android. It needs a good bit of refining, in my opinion, and HC is one hell of a refinement.

 

[Casey]

What I've heard from a couple of inside sources is thus. Honeycomb as you know it and see it today will not be coming to Android phones. It's very much a tablet-only release.

However - Matias Duarte, the main designer behind Honeycomb's UI (incidentally the same genius who designed the T-Mobile Sidekick and Palm Pre webOS interfaces) conceptualized Honeycomb and the next major phone release (Ice Cream?) at the same time.

What that means is that there are certain things in Honeycomb that are making their way to phones, and there are other ideas in Honeycomb that have been conceptualized in two different ways that share some things in common - tablet and phone versions. They did touch on this briefly today in the presentation when they talked about "fragments". This is clever for TWO reasons. One being it's actual concept, how certain tablet app interfaces can essentially be broken into pieces and arranged differently for smaller (and bigger) screens. Phones on the smaller scale, and things like Google TV on the larger scale. The second reason this is clever is that if you pay attention to the Android haters, a word you'll see repeatedly is "fragmentation". Meaning differences between OS versions making the OS fragmented in the sense that some apps can't run on earlier versions. The haters make this out to be a bigger deal than it actually is in reality. So Google are taking back the word. Reclaiming it and changing it's meaning to a positive thing.

There's no reason to be disappointed by the fact that what you've seen today won't make it to phones in that form. Because the next major phone update has a few impressive tricks of it's own, whilst still being consistent with the "feel" of Honeycomb. This is something major that has never been done before. Apple use the same exact OS across all their devices which I don't and never felt was the right approach.

 

[dilla]

With custom ROMs and the support of the dev community, I wonder how much longer the original Droid will last in terms of updates. I know the G1 lasted a good bit, but if Android's progress is exponential, that means the amount of change (including the minimum hardware/software specs associated with them) has also grown exponentially. The changes we have seen thus far, from 1.0 to Gingerbread, it's possible those two years of progress could be shrunk down to simply a year. Possibly with even fewer updates in between. So where CM was able to provide many features of the latest phones to people with G1s, what if that changes so that by this time, next year, even a phone as modern as the Droid X wouldn't be able to handle whatever version of Android we're on.

Or I simply wonder if Ice Cream, or whatever they're going to call it, finally introduces those minimum hardware requirements we feared were going to be in GB or HC. HC clearly needs to be put on a tablet, or something similar in nature. What if the next step is a huge one, like dual-cores?

 

[dilla]

Anyone install Android on their first-gen iPod Touch? Thinking about doing it just for the shit of it.

 

[Casey]

With custom ROMs and the support of the dev community, I wonder how much longer the original Droid will last in terms of updates. I know the G1 lasted a good bit, but if Android's progress is exponential, that means the amount of change (including the minimum hardware/software specs associated with them) has also grown exponentially. The changes we have seen thus far, from 1.0 to Gingerbread, it's possible those two years of progress could be shrunk down to simply a year. Possibly with even fewer updates in between. So where CM was able to provide many features of the latest phones to people with G1s, what if that changes so that by this time, next year, even a phone as modern as the Droid X wouldn't be able to handle whatever version of Android we're on.

Or I simply wonder if Ice Cream, or whatever they're going to call it, finally introduces those minimum hardware requirements we feared were going to be in GB or HC. HC clearly needs to be put on a tablet, or something similar in nature. What if the next step is a huge one, like dual-cores?

I don't think you have anything to be concerned about. The devs will cook up the latest ROMs for years beyond the shelf life. There's already Gingerbread alpha ROMS for the G1 and by all accounts they are working pretty well. It's now been 2 years and 5 months since the G1 came out.

As far as "official" updates pushed OTA, I'd imagine the original Droid will get Gingerbread and possibly one more update after that.

As for minimum specs, I don't know what you're talking about. There never has and likely will never be minimum spec requirements for Android. I know that aside from Android you don't have any experience with open source systems so I'll let you know how it works. I could easily install the latest version of Ubuntu (10.10, released about 2 months ago) on a PC that's a decade old and it would run with no problems. Of course there would be certain options that you would not be able to use without serious slowdown, like advanced graphical effects and whatnot, but aside from that the OS and core functionality would work perfectly. Open source operating systems are designed to run on as much hardware as possible and to be as flexible as possible.

It seems like you are still thinking of Android in the same way you might think of OSX, Windows, or iOS. But it's night and day. You can't make those comparisons. And the main reason why is very simple. The people who make closed systems have a vested interest and a financial motive for requiring you to upgrade your hardware at the shortest possible intervals. That's why Apple release new iPhones every year that always have at least one new feature that they won't give to the older models. Apple want you to buy new phones every year or two, and new computers every 4-5 years or so. That's where their money comes from. The same with Windows. Microsoft want you to buy new PC's as often as possible because that's how they make their money, from licensing the OS to the OEM's.

Google don't "sell" Android and companies like Canonical who are the main developers behind Ubuntu don't sell that either. It's a completely different business model. Introducing minimum spec requirements goes against that business model. It would be the complete opposite of what they want. Android fits all shapes and sizes, like it's "parent" OS, Linux and all it's variants. Sure, there's gonna be "high-end" features that might not necessarily work, or work well, on older or lower spec'd hardware. But that's as far as it goes. An example of that would be that live wallpapers aren't built into the version of Android that's on the HTC Wildfire, even though it runs 2.1. That's simply because the screen resolution isn't high enough. And even then, with root and a custom ROM, you can actually enable it, but it's gonna look messy and reduce performance.

Honeycomb doesn't "need" to be put on a tablet. It's just been designed with tablets in mind. It doesn't require larger screens or higher spec hardware. You could download the code and build Honeycomb ROMS for phones if you wanted to, and I'm sure some people probably will.... but it's gonna look stupid because the interface was not developed to be intuitive on small screens.

You don't need to to worry about anything but the lowest of the low-end devices become noticeably outdated in a 12 month period. Development is fast, but not THAT fast. Frankly, once the N1 gets Gingerbread, I doubt very much whether the vast majority of Android users would even be able to tell the difference between 2.3 performance on a N1 and 2.3 performance on a NS. Aside from hardware differences like the FFC and NFC chip of course. And that's two phones released 12 months apart.

Every time I see these media speculations about minimum spec requirements, I just realize that the "journalists" really have no clue what they're talking about and very little experience with open source systems to understand how they work. Like I said.... you can't approach open systems from the perspective of closed ones.

Android will always have optimizations and the ability to take advantage of the latest in hardware, but it will never require it to run.

 

[Casey]

Rumor has it the HTC Pyramid 4G is dropping on T-Mobz in May. Dual core 1.2 processor, big ass high-res screen. No more info right now.

This is allegedly an internal Sony Ericsson mockup of what their retail booths are gonna look like to advertise the Xperia Arc, Xperia Play, and another device, possibly the Xperia Neo.

 

[Prize Gotti]

Motorola Android Handset Updates;

Phone Model*
Timeline
USA

BACKFLIP MB300 Upgrade to Android 2.1 now available here.

CLIQ MB200 Upgrade to Android 2.1 now available here.

CLIQ XT MB501 (T-Mobile) Upgrade to Android 2.1 - additional testing in process; more details when available

CLIQ XT MB501 (Wal-Mart)
Will remain on Android 1.5

DEVOUR A555
Will remain on Android 1.6

DROID A855 Upgrade to Android 2.2 is complete**

DROID X MB810 Upgrade to Android 2.2 available (Menu > Settings > About phone > System updates)

MILESTONE A854
Will remain on Android 2.1

MILESTONE XT720
Will remain on Android 2.1

Canada

BACKFLIP MB300 Will remain on Android 1.5

DEXT MB200 Will remain on Android 1.5

MILESTONE A853 Initial rollout of upgrade to Android 2.2 planned for Q1 2011
MILESTONE A854
Will remain on Android 2.1

MILESTONE XT720
Will remain on Android 2.1

QUENCH MB501 Will remain on Android 1.5
Europe, Middle East and Africa (EMEA)


BACKFLIP MB300 (Europe) Will remain on Android 1.5

DEFY MB525 (Europe) Upgrade to Android 2.2 planned for Q2 2011
DEXT MB200 (Europe) Will remain on Android 1.5

MILESTONE A853
Initial rollout of upgrade to Android 2.2 planned for early Q1 2011
MILESTONE XT720
Will remain on Android 2.1
India

QUENCH XT3 XT502
Will remain on Android 1.6

QUENCH XT5 XT502
Will remain on Android 2.1

Asia-Pacific

BACKFLIP MB300
Will remain on Android 1.5

DEFY MB525
Upgrade to Android 2.2 planned for Q2 2011
DEXT MB200
Will remain on Android 1.5

MILESTONE A853
Initial rollout of upgrade to Android 2.2 planned for Q1 2011
MILESTONE XT701 / XT711 (Greater China)
Will remain on Android 2.1

MILESTONE XT702 (Greater China)
Initial rollout of upgrade to Android 2.2 planned for Q1 2011
MILESTONE XT720
Will remain on Android 2.1

MOTOGLAM XT800 (Korea) Initial rollout of upgrade to Android 2.2 planned for Q1 2011
MOTOQRTY A853 (Korea) Initial rollout of upgrade to Android 2.2 planned for Q1 2011

MOTOROI XT720 (Korea) Upgrade to Android 2.2 now available here.
QUENCH MB501 Will remain on Android 1.5
Latin America and Mexico

BACKFLIP MB300
Will remain on Android 1.5

DEFY MB525 (Latin America) Upgrade to Android 2.2 planned for Q1 2011
DEXT MB200
Will remain on Android 1.5
MILESTONE A853 (Latin America)
Initial rollout of upgrade to Android 2.2 planned for Q1 2011

MOTOROI A854 (Mexico)
Will remain on Android 2.1

QUENCH MB501 (Latin America) Will remain on Android 1.5


Q4 = Fourth Quarter of 2010

Q1 = First Quarter of 2011

Q2 = Second Quarter of 2011

Q3 = Third Quarter of 2011

https://supportforums.motorola.com/community/manager/softwareupgrades

 

[Casey]

Why did you post that Gotti?

 

[Pittsey]

I want a honeycomb tablet.... NOW... I am getting fed up of waiting. Might buy an Ipad in spite...!

 

[Prize Gotti]

Why did you post that Gotti?

Incase any one with a Motorola device wanted to know when to expect an Android update.

I was kinda shocked to see how many are never gonna see past 1.5, especially this;

CLIQ XT MB501 (T-Mobile) Upgrade to Android 2.1 - additional testing in process; more details when available

CLIQ XT MB501 (Wal-Mart)
Will remain on Android 1.5

Same phone, but one gets 2.1 and the other doesn't because of the carrier? Thats kinda odd.

 

[S O F I]

I'm "over" tablets at this point.

 

[THEV1LL4N]

FAIL!
Samsung have a shortage on their Super Amoled screens and Hummingbird chips. They are downgrading the Galaxy S line:
It's official: Samsung I9003 Galaxy SL packs Super Clear LCD screen - GSMArena.com news

LCD instead of Super Amoled and 1ghz OMAP with inferior PowerVR SGX530 instead of the Hummingbird with SGX540. Imo it would've been better if they just discontinued the series. I see that they're going for sales hoping that most people will not notice and I suppose that they want to have enough S-Amoled screens for the Galaxy S2. At least they learned from their TV experience and at least introduced a new model name instead of creating a panel-lottery like they used to do.

A similar thing had happened to Wave not long before this. They discontinued the original Wave and introduced Wave 2, marketed it as superior despite it having exactly the same specs except of replacing the S-Amoled screen with a shitty LCD making the phone more bulky in result too.

i see, so thats why im seeing different versions of the wave... i just thought it was a newer but lower spec'd version.

 

[dilla]

I don't think you have anything to be concerned about. The devs will cook up the latest ROMs for years beyond the shelf life. There's already Gingerbread alpha ROMS for the G1 and by all accounts they are working pretty well. It's now been 2 years and 5 months since the G1 came out.

As far as "official" updates pushed OTA, I'd imagine the original Droid will get Gingerbread and possibly one more update after that.

As for minimum specs, I don't know what you're talking about. There never has and likely will never be minimum spec requirements for Android. I know that aside from Android you don't have any experience with open source systems so I'll let you know how it works. I could easily install the latest version of Ubuntu (10.10, released about 2 months ago) on a PC that's a decade old and it would run with no problems. Of course there would be certain options that you would not be able to use without serious slowdown, like advanced graphical effects and whatnot, but aside from that the OS and core functionality would work perfectly. Open source operating systems are designed to run on as much hardware as possible and to be as flexible as possible.

It seems like you are still thinking of Android in the same way you might think of OSX, Windows, or iOS. But it's night and day. You can't make those comparisons. And the main reason why is very simple. The people who make closed systems have a vested interest and a financial motive for requiring you to upgrade your hardware at the shortest possible intervals. That's why Apple release new iPhones every year that always have at least one new feature that they won't give to the older models. Apple want you to buy new phones every year or two, and new computers every 4-5 years or so. That's where their money comes from. The same with Windows. Microsoft want you to buy new PC's as often as possible because that's how they make their money, from licensing the OS to the OEM's.

Google don't "sell" Android and companies like Canonical who are the main developers behind Ubuntu don't sell that either. It's a completely different business model. Introducing minimum spec requirements goes against that business model. It would be the complete opposite of what they want. Android fits all shapes and sizes, like it's "parent" OS, Linux and all it's variants. Sure, there's gonna be "high-end" features that might not necessarily work, or work well, on older or lower spec'd hardware. But that's as far as it goes. An example of that would be that live wallpapers aren't built into the version of Android that's on the HTC Wildfire, even though it runs 2.1. That's simply because the screen resolution isn't high enough. And even then, with root and a custom ROM, you can actually enable it, but it's gonna look messy and reduce performance.

Honeycomb doesn't "need" to be put on a tablet. It's just been designed with tablets in mind. It doesn't require larger screens or higher spec hardware. You could download the code and build Honeycomb ROMS for phones if you wanted to, and I'm sure some people probably will.... but it's gonna look stupid because the interface was not developed to be intuitive on small screens.

You don't need to to worry about anything but the lowest of the low-end devices become noticeably outdated in a 12 month period. Development is fast, but not THAT fast. Frankly, once the N1 gets Gingerbread, I doubt very much whether the vast majority of Android users would even be able to tell the difference between 2.3 performance on a N1 and 2.3 performance on a NS. Aside from hardware differences like the FFC and NFC chip of course. And that's two phones released 12 months apart.

Every time I see these media speculations about minimum spec requirements, I just realize that the "journalists" really have no clue what they're talking about and very little experience with open source systems to understand how they work. Like I said.... you can't approach open systems from the perspective of closed ones.

Android will always have optimizations and the ability to take advantage of the latest in hardware, but it will never require it to run.

I know there haven't been minimum specs yet, but there were rumblings that GB would require 1 Ghz or faster processors, certain amount of RAM, and a minimum screen size. Was that just to enjoy all the benefits, instead of still getting GB on a device that did not meet the minimum?

And that's good to hear about the Droid lasting just as long as the G1 did and the N1 will. Google Experience phones are where it's at, I'm convinced.

 

[Casey]

I know there haven't been minimum specs yet, but there were rumblings that GB would require 1 Ghz or faster processors, certain amount of RAM, and a minimum screen size. Was that just to enjoy all the benefits, instead of still getting GB on a device that did not meet the minimum?

And that's good to hear about the Droid lasting just as long as the G1 did and the N1 will. Google Experience phones are where it's at, I'm convinced.

There were minimum spec rumors about both Honeycomb and Gingerbread. All I can say is that those rumors were complete bullshit from day one and I have no idea who started them. Perhaps a disgruntled iOS fan trying to be a killjoy.

But straight from the horse's mouth both times - the following tweets from Dan Morrill, one of the main Android developers at Google.

Dan Morril Says No Minimum Requirements for Honeycomb | Android Phone Fans

Googles Dan Morrill: Gingerbread does not require 1GHz - CyanogenMod Forum

Dan Morrill Calls Foul On Whoever Started That Gingerbread Rumor | Android Phone Fans

I'm surprised that people even thought the rumors were credible in any form. As soon as the original article came out that said Gingerbread had minumum spec requirements, Dan Morril tweeted a link to it and wrote "I love it when people just make stuff up and report it as news."

 

[THEV1LL4N]

casey, just made a bid of £320 on your G2.

 

[masta247]

I think that while Honeycomb is revolutionary I'm not really feeling the UI. I mean - the web browser, youtube app look awesome but the main UI looks kind of dull. And I don't really like these upcoming devices. Maybe because I'm not a fan of tablets at all.
I mean - they may look pretty fine technology-wise but since I used one I'm convinced that it's not a convenient form factor. Also I doubt that many people would really need it and find a real use for it that they couldn't do in an easier way with other devices.
It's more of a "wow I want it" factor that drives people to buying them.

 

[THEV1LL4N]

its the new "in" thing since technology is moving from netbooks towards tablets. The fact that it can be a phone and a computer/media device all at the same time without much change in the way it is used is what makes it so convenient - all on the same device.

however, i dont think i would need one unless i ditched my phone and went for the tablet to be my phone and computing (all-in-one) portable device.

 

[masta247]

But tables is convenient as neither of them. It's not a great idea to use it as a mobile phone and it's far from offering portable computer's functionality.
I found it entertaining while taking shit though Yes, except of actually sitting/lying on the sofa with it that's the second case scenario when using it was cool.