Google has been sued successfully and lost for use of Linux on it’s server platform.  Although this may not be a huge loss to Google financially, this issue could extend to the Android platform. Bedrock Computer Technology has also sued AOL, Yahoo and Amazon to name a few.

Will companies like Bedrock Computer Technologies impede the growth of Linux?

What do you Geek-A-Holics think?
Get your Geek Freak on and let us know.

Source: Intomobile & BBC

Hello Folks!

This week, Verizon Wireless kindly sent us a Moto Droid X to get our hands on and open up to see what it was made of!

Read on to find out what we think of it, and for our Youtube Video Links!

The DROID X is the ‘sister’  product to the original Motorola DROID which we reviewed a few months back, we have to say there are A LOT of improvements.
First off, the processor grew from a 524 MHZ TI OMAP to the big 1GHZ. According to What we’ve heard, it’s also one of the highest performing ARM processors on the market, a strong competitor to the Snapdragon!

Second, it got a boost straight to Android 2.1 and sports it all on a MASSIVE 4.3″ WVGA Screeen. We really love the screen’s quality!

The battery cover was a gripe on the old Moto DROID, and this one has been beefed up and won’t fall off in the pocket!

Now, onto specifics. The device is lighter, thinner, but longer (height-wise) than the EVO, which contends it as to being really equal, as some prefer the extra width on the EVO and its more curved simple design. The X sports a curved, thicker edge where the camera is giving it a ramp on the back. This may bother some when held in the hand a specific way, but it also ensure you always pick the phone up from the right side!

Other stats include standard micro-USB, HDMI-Out (Identical to the EVO,) 8MP Camera with Dual-flash and four buttons on the bottom edge. They are ordered – Menu, Home, Back, and Search. This switch in menu and home seems strange, and if you are a previous Android User, it will take some getting used to in order to adjust to the difference!

The software runs a standard Android 2.1 compliment with an upgraded Motorola software enhancer for the homepage. It’s much lighter and more customizable in comparison to HTC Sense, but both serve the same purpose of weather, calendar, contacts and more. the DRIOD X however uses a much more blocky design so they can be interchangeable used in various orders to keep the style. The Sense style is more curved and stylish, unlike the simple coloring of the X, but at the same time is less compatible with “mixing and matching.” Social networking and aggregation is also combined using various internal sofware. It also sports a Need For Speed Demo and various Verizon features (Visual Voicemail, My Verizon, City ID and more) but we still prefer the standard software as always. Did we mention everything has a wicket red style to it for Big Red? Everything moves through just as fast as the EVO’s snapdragon, but the text and content resolution is much smaller, meaning you get more per page, but you will need to strain your eyes a bit at times! The EVO likes it wide and easy to read, but you have to scroll more often.

Lastly, i want to note speeds. The X is of course CDMA just like Sprint, but i’ve always seemed outperforming Download Speeds (for the most part) through various times of the day. Upload speeds however have been slow, perhaps akin to Sprint’s more open bandwidth and allowing the higher speeds. Still, at times Verizon can be inconsistant with speeds as Sprint remains the opposite, which brings questions to mind on how it gets its bandwidth maintained (at least in the New York Metro area where the review was performed)

The 1570 mAH battery performs well through a day of heavy usage. I will admit the EVO slacks on Battery life big time and it can suck you down to 40 in a matter of hours of moderate usage without clockspeed control (through root.) I will admit though both are strong contenders and fabulous devices for the avid Android user.

The EVO and X Both sell at $199.99 through a two year contract on Verizon and the X requires a 30$ smartphone data plan, while the EVO requires a 10 dollar premium data fee not including a data – talk plan. The X is a welcomed addition to Verizon’s “Rule the Air” campaign and surely will prevent Verizon users from feeling left out when interested in a powerful device like the DROID X. Based on current specifications, it’s very likely to hit 2.2 by the end of the year as well.

Reviewer: Mr. Joshua Sherman

Editorial Assistant: Mr. Wayne Sherman

Today, Sprint announces its newest Android handset, the Samsung Intercept. It comes with a 3.2″ screen, slide-out keyboard, and a 3.2MP camera. There’s not much special about this little device, but its probably the replacement for the popular Samsung Moment. It will retail for $99.99 after a $100 mail-in rebate and a two-year contract (with an Everything Plan w/ Data). It will be available through all Sprint retail channels starting July 11th, and it also comes in two stylish colors, Gray Steel and Satin Pink!

Samsung Intercept makes menu and display navigation easy with a highly responsive optical joystick that virtually zips from item to item. It operates on the Sprint 3G network (EVDO-Rev. 0) and features Wi-Fi capability, integrated GPS navigation and accelerometer. Additional features include:

• Home screen that scrolls right to left for more space to organize widgets and apps
• 3.2 Megapixel camera and video camcorder
• MP3 Player with MicroSD card slot (supports up to 32 GB)
• Stereo Bluetooth(R) wireless technology
• Visual voicemail
• Sprint TV(R), Sprint Football Live and NASCAR Sprint Cup MobileSM
• Access to social networking sites Facebook(R), Flickr(R) and TwitterTM
• Access to personal and corporate e-mail
• Easily view Word, Excel, PowerPoint on-the-go to maximize productivity

Time for another high-end Android phone to join the market, this time its by Samsung and reportedly coming to At&t. Back in January, we reported on the Samsung Galaxy 2, with recent reports showing the Galaxy S is coming to T-Mobile this year. Now there’s another Samsung device, which is very similar to the Galaxy S, dubbed the i897.

Back in March, Bluetooth.org posted some information on this device, showing that it includes Bluetooth 3.0, a 4″ AMOLED screen, and the TouchWiz 3.0 interface. AndroidGuys got an anonymous tip that the phone will also be running Android 2.1 at launch, that it will be coming to At&t with a 5MP camera and 2GB of internal storage. It will also have the 800×480 resolution.

And now, XDA user Drayvin has pulled some APK files from the i897, including “MSpot radio”, which, when installed, goes into the menu as a 10 minute trial of At&t Radio. According to him, the phone is coming out in July, but he didn’t provide any information on how he got his hands on one.

HTC has announced its newest Android handset, the Wildfire. Its an entry-level Android 2.1 device with a smaller screen and a slower processor than the Desire and Legend. It features a 3.2″ QVGA capacitive touchscreen, 5MP camera with LED flash and auto-focus, and the usual Bluetooth, GPS, and WiFi. It has the MSM7225 chipset clocked in at 528MHz with 384MB of RAM and 512MB of ROM. Its almost like a miniature HTC Desire with the optical trackpad.

KEEP YOUR FRIENDS CLOSE WITH HTC WILDFIRETM

Availability
The new HTC Wildfire will be broadly available to customers across major European and Asian markets from Q3 2010.

Source: MobileTechWorld

While there’s been no official announcement from Sprint, people are reporting that if you download the update executable from Sprint’s website that you’ll end up with Android 2.1. The download page still shows the update is dated 2/19/2010. There’s some discussions going on in our forums about it too. Have you tried it? What was your result and how did the update go?

Thanks to everyone who sent this in.

The folks over at AndroidPolice are lucky enough to have a Nexus One running Froyo, Android 2.2. You’ve probably seen the slight changes to the homescreen, heard about Flash 10.1 finally coming to Android, make more RAM available for the Nexus One, possibly activate the FM Receiver/Transmitter in the Nexus One, and that it will offer a JIT (Just-In-Time) Compiler for the kernel. Based on a LINPACK benchmark, it shows the Nexus One with Froyo getting 37.5 MFLOPS compared to around 6.5 on a stock N1.

You do have to take these results with a grain of salt though. Not every app will benefit from these changes. Most will probably see a 2-3% increase since JIT only helps programs that are not compiled to native code.

Source: AndroidPolice

Looking at the screenshot to the right, it appears that those who are rocking the Hero or Moment on Sprint will be receiving an official update to Android 2.1 sometime in early May. Features that Android 2.1 includes are Live Wallpapers, interactive backgrounds that change based on user input (a video of which can be found here), 5 home screens instead of the 3 found in Android 2.0, an updated App Launcher, a 3D photo gallery, and voice recognition for all textual input fields. An exciting May it will be then!

Source- Phandroid via Engadget

Have a Motorola Backflip? Want an official Android 2.1 upgrade? You will have to wait until the third quarter of 2010 to officially receive the Android 2.1 OS update, as Motorola has refreshed its release schedule for Android software updates. Other notable upgrades for Motorola products to Android 2.1 is the Droid, which is, as Motorola puts it, “currently rolling out in stages”, the Cliq/Cliq XT for sometime in Q2 of this year, and the Devour, which is under consideration for the OS update

AT&T will be the carrier of choice for Dell when it releases it’s first Android-powered smartphone for the US market later this year. Given the name Aero, it’s skinned home screen is distinct from any other Android device currently on the market. There is no word on specifications or features, or even a release date for that matter, but Dell is releasing their first smartphone to the US market since the Windows Mobile-powered Dell Axim series a few years back.

Source- AT&T via Engadget

New handsets will include the updated operating system while existing owners can upgrade through Samsung’s proprietary PC Studio 7 software (available at http://www.samsungmobile.com).  The upgrade is available in Germany and Samsung has detailed that it will be gradually rolled out to other European markets, Southeast Asia, the Middle East and Asia, Africa and rest of the world (Antarctica and Americas.)

Motorola Droid owners are shaking their heads in disapproval and perhaps a little misplaced jealousy as the Samsung incantation of Android Eclair will sport no less than nine screens (Droid has three).  The Galaxy Spica will also experience some additional multimedia improvements over and above it’s current ability to play divx files (which Droid doesn’t).  The new media browser permits user to easily browse through Media files stored on the memory card and updates to the camera software promise ‘enhanced picture options and viewing functionality.’

Source: Samsung Press Release

Update: The other big news here is that the ROM for the Droid Eris also includes HTC’s SenseUI, which is the first time we’ve seen SenseUI on an Andriod 2.0+ ROM. This paves the way for the other HTC Android devices and confirms that SenseUI will run on 2.1.