Straight Talk, Unified eMail, Signal drops [From the Forums]
Straight Talk, Unified eMail, Signal drops [From the Forums], ,
Chris Parsons
We've blown through a bunch of content for you all this week so be sure to get yourself caught up if, for whatever reason you missed out on anything. In addition to the news and editorials, we also managed to do up a Android Central podcast for you all and if that isn't enough — be sure to check out the Android Central Forums:
- HTC One X Forums - Anyone having signal drop issues?
- HTC EVO 4G LTE - Should HTC/Sprint give good will gesture?
- Samsung Galaxy S III Forums - No Android Experience, Tempted by the S3
- Samsung Galaxy Nexus Forums - Straight Talk MMS problems
- Droid RAZR Maxx Forums - Non-Unified eMail inbox possible?
If you're not already a member of the Android Central forums, you can register your account today.
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HTC One XL now available in Australia from Mobicity
HTC One XL now available in Australia from Mobicity, ,
Richard Devine
Aussie carrier Telstra, may have delayed its own launch of the HTC One XL, but that doesn't mean our Australian friends are completely out of luck. Enter third-party retailer Mobicity, which is now stocking the One XL regardless.
The One XL of course is the non AT&T, Snapdragon S4 powered variant of HTC's flagship device. Available in black only, the One XL will work on all Australian 3G/HSPA networks, as well as the 1800MHz LTE network offered by Telstra. (And if anyone's thinking of importing, the One XL also supports European LTE networks on 2600MHz bands.)
Pricing is set at AUS$ 850, and the phone is available right now.
via Ausdroid
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From the Editor’s Desk: A slow CTIA, whose app is it anyway, the EVO 4G LTE isn’t as bad as you thought, eh?
From the Editor’s Desk: A slow CTIA, whose app is it anyway, the EVO 4G LTE isn’t as bad as you thought, eh?, ,
Phil Nickinson
Two thirds of these guys busted their butts at CTIA in New Orleans. One of them was not me.
Another CTIA has come and gone. I'm not usually one to gripe about the pace of a show, given that at these things we're essentially on a working vacation in cool city. But this spring's CTIA was pretty meh. The biggest announcement was, what, Verizon's Droid Incredible 4G LTE? Not an unimportant phone, I suppose, and it should sell just fine. But while Sprint and AT&T and T-Mobile are rocking phones from the new-and-improved HTC One line, with much-improved cameras, Verizon's missing out.
Samsung missed a pretty big opportunity in New Orleans, too. Not even a week after it unveiled the Galaxy S III to a worldwide (or at least European) audience in London, Sammy squandered a great chance to get the U.S. even more excited about it, and to get CTIA attendees (mostly of the American variety, we wager) proper looks at the new flagship phone. Strike while the iron is hot, they say.
Of course, the U.S. carriers will put their own spin on the Galaxy S III. And it's pretty likely that we'll see some sort of event to show them off, just like what we had with the Galaxy S and Galaxy S II. But it was pretty surprising to see a minimal showing from Samsung here in New Orleans. No both. Just a brief appearance at the Mobile Focus event, where journos and companies cram into a ballroom for food, drink and a slightly more intimate look at products than on the show proper. The Galaxy S III is an important phone that was mostly kept off the floor, and that's a shame. Good thing we went to London to get a proper introduction. (By the way, if you haven't read Alex Dobie's piece — "Hype, expectation an the Galaxy S III" — you've missed out.)
The roundtable keynote featuring the CEOs of Sprint, Verizon, AT&T and T-Mobile, moderated by CNBC's Jim Cramer, was entertaining if not overly substantive. (It also went a bit long, with each of the four's intro remarks taking more time than many of us would have preferred.) But Sprint CEO Dan Hesse hit home a little bit with a renewed push for mobile privacy, security and safety. Those are three things that will only become more important in the coming years. The Sprint Guardian program, which covers all applicable lines on an account for a relatively small fee, should be an interesting way of going about it.
Otherwise, no real showstopping announcements. No real major releases. Will CTIA in the fall (back in San Diego) make up for it? Or is the usefulness of trade shows starting to run its course for manufacturers?
Oh, by the way. Those two guys in the picture above — Jared "The Body" DiPane and Anndrew "Yes that's how it's spelled" Vacca kicked some serious ass last week. Cheers, boys.
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From the forums: Galaxy Nexus OEM Desktop Dock
From the forums: Galaxy Nexus OEM Desktop Dock, ,
Richard Devine
Patient British Galaxy Nexus owners have finally reached a once far away moment. OEM accessories for the device are starting to appear at retailers such as Clove Technology. One such patient Nexus owner is nhuth from the Android Central forums. The precious Desktop Dock has just shown up in the mail, and nhuth was good enough to share with us a couple of photos of the item along with a quick first impression.
I preordered the Galaxy Nexus desktop dock and vehicle dock from Clove.co.uk back in February and just received my desktop dock today. All that was in the box was the dock itself and quick-start guide. There are no cables included. The Galaxy Nexus fits in smoothly with a nice, quality feel. The pins work just as I would have hoped. Out back is a micro USB port and 3.5mm audio jack. Unlike the Nexus One dock, no bluetooth is included. So, there is no way to control your music with the phone out of the dock. The connection is solely through the three-pin connection.
Sounds like a bit of a mixed bag. A quality item, but functionality limited a little to what it might have been. Either way, we're glad to see these items are starting to appear in peoples hands. If anyone else has recently taken delivery of the same dock, let us know your own thoughts in the comments below.
Thanks nhuth!
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Prototype wind turbine condenses 1,000 liters of water a day from desert air
If you live in or travel through a desert region, having access to clean water is always going to be an issue. If you can’t carry enough for your journey, you have to ensure your route allows for a few water bottle refills. But the lack of water in deserts and other arid locations may soon be a thing of the past if a new wind turbine system is implemented on a large scale.
Marc Parent, founder of Eole Water, realized that he could extract water from the air after noticing how much water an air conditioner unit collected. He decided to combine a green energy source with the necessary components for condensing water directly from the air. The end result after 10 years of R&D is the WMS1000 wind turbine, capable of condensing and storing up to 1,000 liters of water every day.
The 34 meter tall turbine requires 15mph winds for its 13 meter diameter rotor to turn and generate sufficient energy. It then produces 30kW of power for the system to function. Air is drawn in through vents in the nose of the turbine and a generator heats it producing steam. That steam is then fed through a cooling compressor to form moisture that gets condensed into water. The resulting liquid is piped into a storage tank at the base of the turbine after being purified.
As long as an area meets the wind speed requirements this is a completely self contained system. It effectively allows mass water storage in some of the most arid places on earth.
The Eole Water wind turbine isn’t just an idea. A prototype unit was constructed and erected in Abu Dhabi 6 months ago and has consistently produced up to 800 liters of water a day. With that test proving the system works, Eole is now working with a number of manufacturers to produce the turbines
Although the desert example shows off the potential of the system, the turbines can be deployed anywhere. Eole believes they can be erected anywhere that is isolated, does not have a reliable water source, in disaster areas, and as a source of wtare for organic farming where a low impact on the environment is highly desirable.
Read more at Treehugger and Eole Water
Geek.com
Grab an unlocked Tegra 3 model HTC One X from Daily Steals
We usually don't worry too awful much about the various people importing and hawking unlocked phones on the Internet, but sometimes things just need passed along. The deals site Daily Steals has the unlocked, Tegra 3 version of the HTC One X up for sale, and if you want to part with $ 630, you can get your hands on the world version. We're not going to get in the middle of the debate over which version is best, and chances are the average user would see zero difference between the two, just know that it's very possible the only way to get the quad-core version is to import one.
Note that this won't have 3G/4G (or 11G) of any sort on T-Mobile (it lacks the 1700MHz band) unless you live in one of those freakish areas where T-Mo also transmits on AT&T's frequencies. And it also lacks network optimizations for AT&T, but for the most part it will work just fine. If seeing how smitten Phil and Alex are with theirs makes you want one of your own, here's your chance.
Thanks everyone who sent this in!
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Android Central – Android Forums, News, Reviews, Help and Android Wallpapers
Killer non-Google Android smartphone to be released this year, could it come from Amazon?
Despite the fact that most technology experts were skeptical of the Kindle Fire’s success in a tablet market so heavily dominated by Apple’s iPads, the guys at Amazon seem to have hit the jackpot with the 7-incher released last fall.
While it is yet to truly challenge the iPads, the Kindle Fire, with its killer price and great app support, has managed to be second-best in a very crowded and extremely competitive market. The Fire will most likely get a rehashed version during 2012 and, according to recent reports, Amazon might also be prepping the release of a couple other tablets.
However, it appears that Amazon is not yet satisfied. If we are to believe some speculations that have recently surfaced a couple of days ago, they might launch an Android-based smartphone of their own as well.
To make this rumor all-the-more juicy is the fact that speculation has been initiated by Ted Morgan, CEO at Skyhook Wireless. Skyhook is a technology company involved in a couple of legal battles with Google for the past few years. According to Morgan, the Kindle Fire’s success has emboldened several Android device makers to seriously consider the possibility of manufacturing their own devices, running “forked” versions of Android.
As you may or may not know, Amazon’s Kindle Fire runs a modified and heavily skinned version of Android 2.3 Gingerbread. The Fire’s software doesn’t give users direct access to Google Play, but instead reroutes user’s app desire to Amazon’s own Appstore.
Getting back to Ted Morgan’s recent statements, we have to stress the fact that he doesn’t clearly say at any time that Amazon is working towards the manufacturing of an Android-based super-phone (or “major” phone, as he calls it), but he is obviously implying it.
“Everyone’s emboldened by the success of Amazon. Everyone’s saying ‘we need to go our own way’”, said Morgan, who also “confessed” that he’s been spending a lot of time recently with companies that are forking and tweaking Android. “[Google] really [does] restrict anything a device maker can do to stand out, for their own purposes… Nobody wants to just be a manufacturer for Google. You see that with what Amazon has done, where they made it their own, and you also see a whole host of manufacturers taking Android down their own path,” added Skyhook’s CEO, painting a pretty dark picture for Larry Page’s and Sergey Brin’s search giant.
An Amazon super-phone? That sounds awesome!
Even though we are basing pretty much this entire article on rumors and speculations that might seem far-fetched for most of you, it is still worth mentioning. If what Mr. Morgan says is true, then the Android we know now could be a radically different (and substantially more fragmented) beast in the near future.
Right after the Fire’s release in November last year we were almost sure that Amazon would be bringing to market the “Kindle Phone”. The gadget was supposed to be priced around 200 dollars or less and be powered by a TI OMAP4 processor.
Of course, the rumors proved to be (partially) bogus, as there’s still no sign of such a device on the market, but that doesn’t mean Amazon didn’t consider releasing such a device. Due to time passing and technology evolving, if today’s speculations prove to be accurate, we could be seeing an even more exciting gadget from Amazon soon.
Still, while I hate to be a buzz kill, it’s important we stay grounded. We’ve all gone down rumor creek before. We know where it can go. Keeping in mind Ted Morgan’s bias against Google with their ongoing legal feuds, we should probably take these rumors with a pound of salt or so. Also, he doesn’t clearly say that Amazon is the company behind the “major” forked Android smartphone that is to be released by the end of the year, so we might be seeing someone else trying to strike out on there own.
That would be fine by me though, as I personally think that competition never hurts, and will never hurt the technology market and its enthusiasts.
Amazon Phone? Kindle Phone? Fire Phone? Fire sale? Good for Android?
Amazon’s Kindle Fire May Just Kill Google’s Android Market 
Amazon’s Kindle Tablet – iPad Killer or Android Tablet Killer? Or Both?
This article, Killer non-Google Android smartphone to be released this year, could it come from Amazon? , was originally published at androidtime.com – Your Android News Source.
From the Editor’s Desk: HTC all up in here; all your SGSIII’s are fake; apologies to Dropbox
Exciting times, folks. I'm writing this from somewhere over New York and Pennsylvania and Maryland and Virginia, on the way home from the Sprint HTC EVO 4G LTE event, and recuperated from the 3 a.m. release of our HTC One X/One S/Sense 4 content earlier in the week. And I'm excited. I'm excited for us to have no devices to play with and explore and write about. And I'm excited for you folks to get your hands on them, too. (And if you haven't waded into our EVO 4G LTE forums, you're missing out on some great stuff.)
It's easy to get caught up in it all, even for us. It's easy to see what we want to see. The One X isn't perfect. The One S isn't perfect. The EVO 4G LTE has a ridiculous name (though at least it doesn't have any commas in it), and folks are freaking out too much over its design (which hardly is the worst thing in the world) without having actually held the damn thing.
A deep breath might be needed. And judging by our completely unscientific poll, 70 percent of you are plenty happy with what you've seen so far.
But you know what the really fun part is? This is still pretty early. HTC's just the first of the major manufacturers to unveil its new generation of Android smartphones. Samsung and Motorola are still to come. We've gotten an early look at LG, but still need to spend some quality time with them. So, yeah. Right now we're all focused on HTC, and that's fine. But there's still more to come.
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Asus Padfone on sale in Taiwan from $600-$1000
There’s no denying that the Asus Padfone is a clever design. Not only does the system allow you to insert the smartphone base unit into a tablet dock with an extended battery, but roll in the trademark Asus Transformer keyboard accessory and you’ve also got yourself an Android netbook. Top it all off with the wild Bluetooth headset/stylus combination, and you’ve got a veritable Swiss Army Knife of mobile computing utility.
Now, at long last, Asus has finally started taking pre-orders for the Padfone — at least in Taiwan. Converted to U.S. currency, the smartphone itself is retailing for about $ 610. That’s roughly $ 130 less than the iPhone 4S sells for.
Tack on the accessories that actually make the Padfone interesting, and the price predictably climbs a bit. The tablet and stylus pack adds another $ 240, while the full kit — phone, stylus, tablet dock, and keyboard — will cost you just shy of $ 1,000. Whether that amount of money is enough to get folks to buy the Padfone combo instead of, say, another high-end Android phone and a Transformer Prime, remains to be seen. While that would mean managing data on two different devices, you’d be getting two additional processor cores (or is it three?) to play around with.
The Padfone certainly isn’t a bad deal if you consider what you’d be spending on three separate devices, but it’s not the kind of bargain the Asus MeMo is rumored to be. Then again, Asus hasn’t started taking pre-orders for the MeMo yet, so there’s no telling whether or not they’ll actually bring it to market at the $ 250 price tag they said they would.
More at Engadget
Geek.com
Intel’s budget 330 SSD expected April 13 from $89
Intel is set to introduce a new 300 series budget range ofl SSDs carrying the model number 330. Until now Intel has remained quiet on price point and specs, but online retailers have beaten it to the punch and jumped the gun a little early.
A number of stores decided to list the new drives along with their price, release date, and spec. For a budget offering you can’t expect too much, but Intel may be about to surprise everyone.
The 330 series used a 6Gbps SATA-III connection, 25nm flash memory, and read/write speeds of 500MBps/450MBps respectively. The storage levels include a 60GB, 120GB, and 180GB options.
So how much can you expect to pay for what looks to be a relatively fast SSD? The 60GB unit is listed at just $ 89, the 120GB is $ 149, and the 180GB is $ 234. If they turn out to be correct prices then Intel is about to undercut the competition and make an SSD upgrade a more tempting proposition for many. 60GB SSDs are already on sale for just below that price point, but they typically have write speeds around 90-100MBps, not 450MBps.
As for release date, according to Amazon’s UK site all three drives should be available from April 13, which happens to be a Friday. You may remember the previous Intel drives these will be replacing, the 320, had a serious issue that could render them useless. Lets hope Friday the 13th isn’t unlucky for the 330s.
If you have a laptop, netbook, or desktop that could benefit from some extra speed, then the 330s may be worth considering. In a laptop it will likely save you some battery too due to how low the power draw is of these drives compared to a typical hard drive. And with more services moving to the cloud, it’s probably not that hard to live within 60GB. Even if you can’t, you can always use your existing drive alongside the 330.
Read more at Engadget and SabrePC
Geek.com
