Android Central

Android Central


Hot SGS II, Explain ICS [From the Forums]

Posted: 14 Oct 2011 03:12 PM PDT

From the Forums

The weekend is upon us and that means you'll have some to catch up on all the latest Android news you may have missed from this week -- there was plenty to go around. You can jump back a few pages or check out the Android Central forums for more Android talk.

If you're not already a member of the Android Central forums, you can register your account today.


Google Voice slowly gaining MMS support

Posted: 14 Oct 2011 01:54 PM PDT

Google Voice

Some great news for Google Voice users has arrived today. MMS support has now become a priority and is slowly rolling out to users accounts. As noted on the Google Voice Blog:

MMS has been one of the constant feature requests since we launched Google Voice and we’ve been hard at work trying to make this happen.

Today, we're happy to announce that we've made the first step in our efforts to bring this feature to our users. Google Voice users are now able to receive pictures and other multimedia messages from Sprint subscribers. The multimedia attachments will display on their mobile forwarding phone and in their email inbox when they enable text to email forwarding in their Google Voice settings. We are also planning on making them display in the Google Voice inbox.

We are working with other mobile operators to make this work across all mobile phones and will update our users as more and more operators offer support for this.

Posted by Ilya Frank, Senior Software Engineer

For now, only Sprint customers can make use of the MMS features but as noted -- Google is working with other carriers to have it implemented as soon as possible. Anyone been waiting on this?

Source: Google Voice Blog


Google lightens their load - Buzz, Code Search and Jaiku laid to rest

Posted: 14 Oct 2011 12:04 PM PDT

Google Buzz

It had to happen at some point considering it was noted during Google Q3 earnings call on Thursday. Google Buzz, the short-lived social service that was never widely used and flawed from the start has been put to rest. Along with it, Code Search and Jaiku will soon be wiped from the interwebs. As noted on the Google Blog:

  • Code Search, which was designed to help people search for open source code all over the web, will be shut down along with the Code Search API on January 15, 2012.
  • In a few weeks we’ll shut down Google Buzz and the Buzz API, and focus instead on Google+. While people obviously won't be able to create new posts after that, they will be able to view their existing content on their Google Profile, and download it using Google Takeout.
  • Jaiku, a product we acquired in 2007 that let users send updates to friends, will shut down on January 15, 2012. We’ll be working to enable users to export their data from Jaiku.
  • Several years ago, we gave people the ability to interact socially on iGoogle. With our new focus on Google+, we will remove iGoogle's social features on January 15, 2012. iGoogle itself, and non-social iGoogle applications, will stay as they are.
  • The University Research Program for Google Search, which provides API access to our search results for a small number of approved academic researchers, will close on January 15, 2012.

While we doubt anyone will miss Buzz all that much since Google+ is what they should have done from the beginning. Code Search though was something I used often so that will be missed. Also on its way out is the Google Labs website where things will be replaced by Product Search.

Source: Google Blog


Grab the Motorola Atrix 2 or Samsung Stratosphere from Costco next week

Posted: 14 Oct 2011 11:40 AM PDT

Costco

If you're eyeing the Motorola Atrix 2 (releasing on Oct. 16), or the Samsung Stratosphere (released Oct. 13), and are a member at Costco, you may want to hold off until next week, when both are available at the warehouse giant.  A lot of little perks come with buying a phone from Costco, the best of which is their generous return policy, and whatever news comes on Oct. 19 from Hong Kong from the Ice Cream Sandwich event may just make you want to take advantage of it.  Costco isn't firm on the exact dates in this memo, and we don't know exactly how much you'll save buying it from them versus the carriers storefront, but a little patience may just pay off.

Thanks, Anon!


Site that sells phones gets early SEO love by posting unannounced device at a higher price than you'll likely actually pay

Posted: 14 Oct 2011 11:14 AM PDT

Galaxy Nexus

Make sense?

This happens a lot, folks, so let's explain it again: A website that sells phones -- a third-party retailer, if you will -- knows just as well as you or I that the Galaxy Nexus (aka the Nexus Prime, aka the Samsung GT-i9250) is going to be announced next week. So it takes a leaked picture and slaps it up on its site, and gets us all to write about it. It's an SEO play. Oh, and that $749 asking price and $949 retail price? We'd be shocked if that's really what an unlocked Galaxy Nexus costs.

In fact, we're not even going to list the website that's listed the Galaxy Nexus. The Galaxy Nexus is coming. It'll be announced Wednesday in Hong Kong. (That's Tuesday evening in the States.) We'd wait until then before plopping down any money.

But in the meantime, you can visit our Galaxy Nexus forums, which we absolutlely have had live long before the phone is announced in hopes that you'll click on it and give us better SEO. But then again, we're not selling it to you for $749.

(And in other news, yes, the phone we first told you will be coming to Verizon is showing up in Verizon's inventory systems. Whodathunkit?)

Thanks to everyone who sent this in.


Samsung ChatON Mobile Messenger now available

Posted: 14 Oct 2011 10:34 AM PDT

Samsung ChatON Mobile Messenger

Back when it was announced in August, Samsung had no official launch date for their ChatON messaging service so many were left to wonder what, exactly it would arrive. As it turns out, it's available now in the Android Market. For now, it's available for Android and Bada phones but iOS and BlackBerry support is coming, making it a complete cross-platform messaging service with plenty of features:

  • Group Chat
  • Image Sharing
  • Video Sharing
  • Music Sharing
  • Location Sharing

In order to use the service you'll need a device running Android 2.2 or higher, which shouldn't be a problem for most folks. You can find the download link past the break, however -- at the moment it seems as though a lot of people are jumping on to get activated and servers are a little bogged down.

read more


Android Game Review: Destroy Gunners SP

Posted: 14 Oct 2011 09:38 AM PDT


YouTube link for mobile viewing

When I first played Destroy Gunners F, I was pretty blown away. Big robots carryings large weapons and blowing up smaller, less impressive looking robots was just too cool to me. It took me back to playing Battletech: Solaris through AOL (keyword: Battletech, I think) when I was just a wee lad and I was only allowed a few hours on the internet a day.

Where Destroy Gunners SP differentiates itself from Destroy Gunners F is the fact that it's a full-blown game, with multiple missions, mechs, and weapons to choose from. No longer are you limited to a single survival or free play mode (although free play is still here).

Controls are done the same way as in the other Destroy Gunners games, with a virtual joystick on the left and all of the weapons you have controlled by touching the screen. You can move your focus from left to right using the left and right arrows on the right side of the screen or while you're firing your weapon by dragging your finger while your gun is going off.

What helps to really make Destroy Gunners F stand out compared to its two predecessors is the fact that there's a lot more content, not only in terms of gameplay, but also customization. For example, there's three mechs to choose from, but you only start off with the normal one initially. Through completing certain missions or defeating certain enemies (I assume), you can unlock the other two models of mech.

You can also customize what weapons and powerups your mech has equipped on them. You start off with nothing but missiles and a gun, but by the end of your first mission, you should have some sort of "fast power up" item that you can also tack on. The further you go into the game, the cooler the equipment becomes, like a giant shoulder cannon (that absolutely lays out enemies) or a laser gun.

Destroy Gunners SP doesn't come cheap, running $9.99 for the whole game. I know that sounds like a lot (and it is, in the grand scheme of Android games), but if you're looking for a game that plays well and has lots of content plus replayability, then it's a worthy investment. Add in that there's OpenFeint achievements and it'll be the best 10 dollars you ever spent.

We've got download links after the break.

read more


Motorola Xoom Family Edition is official, coming Oct. 16 for $379

Posted: 14 Oct 2011 08:48 AM PDT

Motorola Xoom Family Edition

We have seen the Motorola Xoom Family Edition a time or two already, and today Motorola has made it official, and it will be an exclusive to Best Buy. The tablet is aimed at being a kids media tablet by day, but still being able to keep up once the kids go to bed with the professional stuff that needs to get done. The tablet brings quite a few features in tow with it, such as

  • Runs on Android 3.1, built specifically for tablets
  • 1GHz dual-core processor for lightning-fast responsiveness
  • 10.1” HS IPS HD screen display with capacitive multi-touch
  • 5MP back camera with flash, with 720p video webcam
  • Preloaded with almost $40 worth of applications, plus Zoodles™, the award-winning Kid Mode application
  • Preloaded with MotoPack by Motorola XOOM (App Downloader by Motorola)
  • ·Preloaded with Quickoffice™ Pro HD for seamless productivity at work
  • Preloaded with MotoPrint – the application that allows you to print straight from the Web browser
  • Preloaded with fun games like Asphalt 6 from Gameloft and SIM City Deluxe
  • 16GB built-in memory
  • Battery lasts up to 10 hours for video playback and Web browsing
  • Access to more than 250,000 apps in Android Market™

The device will be available in store as well as online starting Oct. 16 for a limited-time price of $379. So will you be picking one up for the family?


Motorola Xoom Family Edition outed once again ahead of announcement

Posted: 14 Oct 2011 07:54 AM PDT

Xoom Family Edition

A couple of days ago we got a look at was dubbed the Motorola Xoom Family Edition and now, we're starting to see some accessories for this device pop up that confirm what was sent off to bix box retailers. Still no word from Motorola confirming the device, release date or price but we're expecting to here something come Monday when Motorola shows off their goods.

Thanks, Anon!


Spec pr0n: Upcoming Droid RAZR said to be 'faster' than the iPhone 4S, but faster at what?

Posted: 14 Oct 2011 07:29 AM PDT


Youtube link for mobile viewing

You'd think by now people would have learned to stop comparing other smartphones, spec-by-spec, to the iPhone. It's apples and oranges. But that hasn't stopped the latest unsourced rumor from BGR, which claims to have the lowdown on the upcoing Motorola Droid RAZR, which we fully expect to see unveiled on Tuesday in New York.

So what are the specs? Let's break it down:

  • 4.3-inch display. OK.
  • 1.2 GHz dual-core processor. Par for the course these days, right?
  • 1GB of RAM, which BGR (as well as anyone else who can count) notes is twice as much as the iPhone. And so what? The iPhone also multitasks very differently than Android phones. The OS runs differently. It's less graphically intensive. It's not like the iPhone is slow because it only has 512MB of RAM. And, as we find ourselves repeating a lot lately, what exactly does "faster" mean? Faster at doing what?

No, the only thing rumored here we're really interested in is the claim that it's thinner than the iPhone 4/4S -- and that it's an LTE device. We've seen Samsung slim up the 4G Wimax-enabled Samsung Galaxy S II Epic 4G Touch, and we're also expecting to soon see thinner (and hopefully lighter) Xoom tablets.

Here's what we want from any manufacturer of an LTE device: Thinner and lighter, with better battery life. "Faster" is always going to come. Moore's Law and all, right?

Anyhoo, we'll be there Tuesday to find out. Stay tuned.

Source: BGR


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