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Love your new Android phone? You won’t for long

Flash back to 2009: You just bought a brand new Motorola Droid, the first phone to run Android 2.0 and one of the very first Android handsets to successfully compete with the iPhone. Your friend, however, decided to buy a recently released iPhone 3GS. Now jump ahead to the present: You and your friend still own those same phones, but which one out of the two feels like a worthless piece of crap? The Motorola Droid. This is the case with many Android and BlackBerry devices — they lose their Read more

Official Gameloft LIVE! app made available on Android Marketplace

I have to hand it to Gameloft for their continued support of their Gameloft LIVE! service even after Game Center’s release and domination on the iOS platform. Although, some times I find it to be somewhat annoying that all of my hard earned Gameloft LIVE! achievements scores are most likely going unnoticed since not everyone checks their Gameloft LIVE! profile as much as their Game Center profile. But when it comes to the Android OS, there’s still a gold rush of sorts of gaming social media platforms until Google decides Read more

HTC talks Ice Cream Sandwich updates – Coming in late March to select handsets

Looks like HTC isn’t wasting any time when it comes to updating its existing line of handsets to Android 4.0 Ice Cream Sandwich. Today on Facebook, HTC announced that the Android 4.0 update rollout would begin in late March, starting with the Sensation line of handsets. We do know that HTC’s new handset flow will begin to wane in 2012 in favor of better quality devices but we don’t know if that also translates to a greater focus on updating the massive amount of different handsets it released last year. Read more

Motorola: Hardware causes late Android updates, not custom UIs

When it comes to explaining the cause of Android fragmentation; we’ve heard it all … or so we thought. Recently, Motorola senior vice president Christy Wyatt voiced her thoughts on the company’s current struggles on delivering new versions of the Android OS to customers, such as Android 4.0 Ice Cream Sandwich. To no one’s surprise, Wyatt mentioned how time-consuming it is to integrate a new version of Android into Motorola’s platform. If you read deep into the words: “integrate” and “time-consuming” you instantly think about a software related issue, right? Read more

U.S. set to approve Google, Motorola deal

Google is trying to spend more than $12 billion to buy Motorola and there is some concern that the European Union may have some issues with it but a new report from the Wall Street Journal suggests that the U.S. Justice Department will let the deal go through. We’ll know by Monday if the EU has any beef with the deal and I’d imagine its concerns would revolve around patents and Google’s position in the Android chain. Additionally, the EU has been taking a close look at Google over the Read more

Video: If you root your Android device, your Google Wallet PIN code gets exposed

Google Wallet, the mobile payment service that uses near field communication (NFC) technology and hopes to one day replace the physical wallet that’s already in your pocket, apparently has a security flaw should you be one of the few people daring enough to have a rooted Android device. Now before you freak out and start questioning the security of Google Wallet, we’ll say this again in case you missed it the first time around: This security flaw only impacts owners of rooted Android phones. The guys from the research group Read more

Stefan Constantinescu

Video: New Amazon Kindle ad makes fun of the Apple iPad’s $500 price tag

Late last year Amazon launched a 7 inch tablet called the “Kindle Fire” that runs a highly customized version of Android Gingerbread. We don’t know exactly how many Amazon has sold, but some analysts speculate that around 6 million Fire tablets ended up in consumer’s hands during the fourth quarter of last year. For the sake of reference, Apple shipped 15.4 million iPads during the same quarter, though it should be noted that the Kindle Fire is only on sale in the United States, whereas the iPad is pretty much Read more

Stefan Constantinescu

Google+ for Android gets a big performance-fixing update

Google has updated mobile client of its social network Google+ for Android. The new version is said to come with massive performance improvements across the app, while also packing few new features. For instance, now you can quickly see “What’s Hot!” in your circles and view who +1′d a post or comment. Moreover, stream posts are shortened to fit more per scroll and it no longer jumps to the top for an automatic refresh. Finally, there’s the infinite photos feed in the “From your circles” section. Unfortunately, tablet users won’t Read more

Asus Transformer Prime gets a small update

Asus knows it can’t joke with Transformer Prime users as they are ready to share both the good and the bad things about the company’s flagship tablet. Hence, they keep fixing any bugs reported as fast as they can. To that end, Asus released a new update for its tablet/netbook that comes with an all new kernel inside (version 2.6.39). In addition, the new software also promises to fix WiFi and Bluetooth functionality, while also increasing the overall performance. According to user reports, the Transformer Prime is faster after the Read more

Google Voice for Android updated with ICS-style look and feel, asynchronous SMS sending

Google Voice for Android got a small update and now the application looks like it’s tailor-made for the latest version of the platform – Ice Cream Sandwich. In addition, it now comes with asynchronous SMS sending support (offline queuing), though when sending texts to multiple recipients, it will still work synchronously. Tablet users on their end will notice a few differences on the surface such as a Click-to-Call button added to the main interface and integration into the People/Contacts app… And that’s about it. Nothing major, though still worth installing… Read more

Win a free Samsung Galaxy Note from Samsung Canada

As part of the promotion for its highly sought-after phablet (phone/tablet), Samsung Canada is running a contest in which it will give away 5 Galaxy Note units to lucky bastards users. The huge device is heading to Canada’s three networks — including TELUS, Bell and Rogers — and will cost up to $729.99 sans any long-term commitments. Of course, with a three-year contract the price goes down, but you’ll still need to shell out some $200 to get this beast phone/tablet. The contest has already started and it runs through Read more