Verizon Wireless today announced that DROID™ 2 by Motorola will be available for pre-sale on August 11.  Hitting all the right keys, DROID 2 is a feature-packed device that helps manage work and social life with an enhanced QWERTY keyboard, ultra high-speed Web browsing, 3G Mobile HotSpot capabilities, full push corporate e-mail, intuitive social messaging and Adobe® Flash® Player 10.1 for access to the full web – all built on Android 2.2.

“When we announced DROID X last month, we reaffirmed our commitment to continue to bring unique Android experiences to the Verizon Wireless network,” said Jeffrey Dietel, vice president – wireless device, marketing and development for Verizon Wireless.  ”The DROID by Motorola was our first Android device, so it is important for us to include the successor to that phone in our portfolio.  DROID 2 is not only a continuation of our commitment to Android but offers customers the features and form-factor they crave on the Verizon Wireless network.”

“With the new DROID 2, we’ve taken a big leap forward from the original DROID,” said Bill Ogle, chief marketing officer of Motorola Mobile Devices and Home Business.  ”We listened to consumers and are providing an even more robust experience built on Android 2.2 that includes a new keyboard, increased processing power, Adobe Flash Player 10.1 and 3G Mobile HotSpot capabilities to send, access and share information even quicker than before.”

DROID 2′s super-slim design helps customers e-mail, text and tweet with ease.  DROID 2 offers a redesigned symmetrical keyboard with raised keys for more responsive typing to push out notes and status updates.  Speech-to-text input and the virtual multi-touch keyboard allow for quick messaging; or customers can also use Swype for even easier text input.  In addition, full push corporate e-mail delivers enhanced features such as remote wipe and password enforcement so that information remains secure.

DROID 2 packs power and speed.  Customers can enjoy the freedom of wireless with the 3G Mobile HotSpot and the ability to connect up to five compatible Wi-Fi® devices, and watch content on the full multi-touch 3.7-inch brilliant display, or share content captured on the 5-megapixel camera with enhanced functionality and DVD-quality video capture with DLNA connectivity to share on compatible devices.

Customers can also download favorite apps from Android Market™, which has more than 70,000 applications, and store them on 8 GB of preloaded on-board memory and the 8 GB microSD™ card, which can be upgraded to a 32 GB SD card for a total cargo capacity of 40 GB.  Popular apps available on DROID 2 include NFL Mobile (downloadable), Skype mobile™ and BLOCKBUSTER On Demand® presented by V CAST Video.  Customers can even manage their wireless accounts or their contacts from their phones with My Verizon and with Backup Assistant(SM).

“It’s great to see amazing new smartphones like the DROID 2 come pre-installed with Flash Player 10.1,” said David Wadhwani, senior vice president and general manager, Creative and Interactive Solution Business Unit at Adobe.  ”With the completely redesigned and hardware accelerated Flash Player 10.1, DROID 2 users will be able to experience the full Web on the go.”

Adobe Flash Player 10.1 lets mobile users experience millions of websites the way they were meant to be seen – with rich Internet applications (RIAs), content inside the browser, including games, animations, data presentations and visualizations, e-commerce, music, video, audio and more.

R2-D2 DROID 2

In honor of the iconic Astromech Droid from the Star Wars™ Saga, Verizon Wireless will offer a limited-edition R2-D2 version of the DROID 2, available only online in September.  The special version of the phone will feature exclusive Star Wars content and external hardware designed to look like the trusty Droid from the film saga.  Visitors to the upcoming Star Wars Celebration V in Orlando, Fla., can see a preview of the limited edition phone and sign up to receive alerts when the phone is ready for sale.

Pricing and Availability

DROID 2 by Motorola will be available at www.verizonwireless.com on August 11, and it will be in Verizon Wireless Communications Stores beginning August 12 for $199.99 after a $100 mail-in rebate with a new two-year customer agreement.  Customers will receive the rebate in the form of a debit card; upon receipt, customers may use the card as cash anywhere debit cards are accepted.  In addition to subscribing to a Nationwide Talk plan or a Nationwide Talk & Text plan, customers will also need to subscribe to an Email and Web for Smartphone plan.  Nationwide Talk plans begin at $39.99 monthly access.  Email and Web for Smartphone plans start at $29.99 for unlimited monthly access.

Customers can add the optional 3G Mobile HotSpot service to their DROID 2 smartphones for $20 per month.  The 3G Mobile HotSpot allows customers to turn their phones into a wireless modem for up to five compatible Wi-Fi® devices.  In addition, current Verizon Wireless customers who have contracts ending by December 31, 2010, can upgrade to any smartphone, including DROID 2, without penalty.

For more information on DROID 2 by Motorola, go to www.droiddoes.com.  For information about Verizon Wireless products and services, visit a Verizon Wireless Communications Store, call 1-800-2 JOIN IN or go to www.verizonwireless.com.

Popularity: 8% [?]

Motorola today announced DROID X, a powerful device built as a pocket-sized home theater with a massive hi-resolution display and lightning-fast speed. Users can do more to capture, share and enjoy their content.

Capture, share and enjoy your world with DROID X, a pocket-sized home theater with a massive 4.3 inch high-resolution display that lets you capture HD movies for playback on your HDTV. It also features a powerful processor and scary fast speeds, all on Verizon Wireless’ 3G network, the nation’s largest and most reliable wireless voice and data network. DROID X utilizes high-performance diversity antennas along with innovative software to improve signal strength and reduce dropped calls. DROID X users will receive Android™ 2.2 and Adobe^® Flash^® Player 10.1 via an over-the-air update in late summer.

Capture Sights and Sounds
Capture your memories in high definition with 720p HD video capture.  Customize your videos with a slow-motion effect and make them flawless with an advanced three microphone solution for directional audio capture and noise cancelation.  In between takes, make sure no still shot is missed with a fully loaded 8 megapixel camera capable of 1/1000 second shutter speed and features such as auto-focus, touch to focus, panoramic capture and a powerful dual LED flash to produce high-quality photos.

Share with Ease
Share personal videos with friends using either an optional HDMI cable or Digital Living Network Alliance (DLNA) certified technology, enabling you to stream, store and share content with multiple DLNA compatible devices such as a HDTVs, game consoles or PCs. Share the wealth of your own 3G Mobile HotSpot with up to five Wi-Fi enabled devices, all while accessing your content at superfast speed, powered by a 1 GHz processor.

Enjoy Life’s Brilliant Moments
DROID X brings your content to life with a vibrant 4.3-inch display with a crisp WVGA 854 x 480 resolution. Download full-length movies and enjoy them in cinematic widescreen format¹.  DROID X will feature Adobe Flash Player following a software update late summer, which will deliver streaming video from tens of millions of websites or game play with a full PC Web experience.  Whether texting, checking push corporate e-mails or updating your status, the large display reveals a spacious virtual keyboard to do it all.  Type and text with ease at more than 50 words per minute with Swype^® using one continuous finger motion across the screen keyboard.  Get up close and personal with your favorite sites using pinch-to-zoom.

Enjoy additional preloaded apps and games such as EA Need for Speed Shift™, NFL Mobile, Skype mobile™ and a full suite of Google™ Mobile Services, including Android Market™, Google Maps™ with Street View, Google Latitude, a YouTube™ widget, Calendar, Google Search™ by Voice, and, of course, Gmail™ and Google Search™. You can also easily download BLOCKBUSTER On Demand^® presented by V CAST Video via a link icon on your home screen or use V CAST to watch your favorite shows.

More Social, More Connected, More Memory
Preloaded social networking widgets allow you to sync and stream your feeds and updates from Facebook^®, Twitter and MySpace all to one screen in real time.  With 8 GB of onboard memory and a pre-installed 16 GB memory card, DROID X can be expanded to up to 40 GB with the addition of a 32 GB memory card to house favorite videos, images, games and apps.

DROID X will be available July 15 exclusively from Verizon Wireless for $199.99 after $100 mail-in rebate with new two-year contract. DROID X users will receive Android 2.2 and Adobe Flash Player via an over-the-air upgrade late summer.

Popularity: 10% [?]

The new decade is already poised to start off in a huge way in the tech world. Google has a press conference scheduled for Monday in which they will be releasing the Nexus One, their first foray into the world of hardware. Some say this is going to be to the first “true” Google phone. Engadget already got their hands on one. Check out their first impressions.

Also, rumors have been at all time high for Apple’s “universe-changing” tablet/ebook/large-iPhone/iSlate(?). Rumors about this device have been around for at least five years, and kind of died down with the release of the iPhone and the iPod Touch. Now some serious sources like the New York Times, Wall Street Journal, Business Week, and many others seem to be pretty confident that this “God gadget” will be coming in 2010. Some have even concluded that an Apple event will be held at the end of the month and will focus on the “mobile computing space” (aka a tablet). After waiting years for a touch-screen iPod because of rumors of its release every other week, I now only believe it when I see it. Though this time, with the fever pitch of rumors, I may just believe it before I see it. Just like the iPod changed the music industry this past decade, the Apple tablet may change the print industry over the next decade. The end of the month couldn’t come soon enough. If this “iSlate” actually does come out then, you bet you’ll be hearing from me about it!

So, which of these tech news items gets you excited/hopeful for the coming year/decade? Sound off in the poll after the break!

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Big thanks to Verizon for this one!.  Launched November 6th is Andriods first device running OS 2.0. Combined with some google apps makes this phone one you must pick up! Check out the video above and Go Comment!.

Popularity: 15% [?]

Announced today is the T-Mobile Pulse, a prepaid-capable Android smartphone that utilizes a UI overlay known as Canvas. In terms of specs, the Pulse is quite capable with a 3.5-inch HVGA display, 3.2 megapixel camera, 2GB internal memory, 528MHz along with HSDPA, Wi-Fi and GPS radios. There are two features notably absent however; a flash for the camera and a 3.5mm headphone jack. Both T-Mobile and Huawei insist that their exclusion was necessary to keep the Pulse’s dimensions slim and trim at 160mm x 62.5mm x 13.5mm. Like it or not, the 3.5mm-less and flash-less Pulse will be as cheap as chips when it goes on sale this October: £179.99 ($293 USD) — or as low as 4.95€ in Germany with a 2-year agreement.

Via [ BGR]

Popularity: 8% [?]

We told you so. For a long time we’ve been talking about Android’s eventual implementation in devices well beyond phones and computers. We’ve joked about an Android Car but agree with the main concept and in actuality, its already in the works. We’ve talked about household information centers running Android and those are in the works too, with what we called Android Hub. But its all much closer than you think… as in 2009 close.

An article published on Forbes.com by Elizabeth Woyke discusses how Android is set to invade homes and it outlines the exact concepts we’ve been discussing and dreaming about since Phandroid’s inception. Only now it isn’t just a concept or idea… its products in motion that will launch later this year.

On “Remote Controls” for home devices/appliances:

The home control devices are designed to talk to major household systems, such as lights, locks, security and heating/ventilation/air conditioning (HVAC).

On home entertainment centers:

The media devices play a similar unifying role in the entertainment realm, allowing users to program their digital video recorders (DVRs), remotely control their stereo systems, and view TV listings directly on the gadget’s screen.

On Android Hub:

Touch Revolution is calling the third category of products, “smart phones for the home.” These cordless phones, meant for indoors use only, will communicate via radio waves like typical home phones or through voice-over-Internet-protocol (VoIP) on wi-fi.

Notice the company name “Touch Revolution”? These folks were talking about their NIMble Android Desk Phone way back in January and THIS is the company who is behind the latest wave of news as well. A quote from Touch Revolution founder Mark Hamblin way back from that January 2009 article foreshadows it all:

“The types of touch interfaces that started with mobile phones will become the standard for electronics devices of all sorts – in the home, at the office, in the car – virtually anywhere people directly interact with technology.  These devices will have a variety of capabilities, features, and form factors – WiFi, GPS, Bluetooth, accelerometers, haptic feedback, small screens, large screens, integrated, stand-alone, portable, … the list goes on.”

We went on to make our own list of possible household, automotive and other appliances/gadgets/tech where Android could be used and it looks like it will actually get done! The Forbes article claims all devices have touch-screens ranging in size from 4.3 to 10 inches and come with charging cradles.

 

So when and where can we expect these products?

Expect to see most of the products before the end of the year, in the U.S. and elsewhere. Brown says Touch Revolution is working with “companies with major brands” on upcoming launches. Touch Revolution provides the touch screens and Android features, encapsulated in a module. Its partners then customize the hardware and software, if they choose, and bring the product to market.

Major manufacturers… if you are listening… please jump on board with this because you’ll make me happy and yourself rich in the process. I kid you not. TouchRevolution haven’t updated their blog since that originally inspiring post but with this latest spike of interest I’m hoping they’ll be convinced to follow up with some updates.

I’m amazingly glad to see that this is still in the works and am incredibly excited to see the results of all Touch Revolution’s hard work! I hope at least one of the main mobile carriers in the US pick up the Android Hub desk phone… that would be SICK

Source: Android Phone FAN

Popularity: 20% [?]

Get ready for more Google in your life. A slew of household gadgets based on the company’s Android operating system will debut within the next five months, a new report says, including several high-tech remote controls for your home.

The news comes by way of touchscreen-driven device-maker Touch Revolution — the same folks who introduced the Android-based NIMble Concept Desk Phone at the Consumer Electronics Show in January. The NIMble phone, featuring a 7-inch touch-sensitive screen, attempts to put the power of a smartphone into tabletop form, allowing you to access contacts, calendars, and e-mail through a user-friendly interface.

The new devices, as described to Forbes , will follow the same basic model: bringing the functionality of your mobile phone into your (presumably non-mobile) home. A Touch Revolution marketing exec tells Forbes several “well-known companies” will be using its touch technology to create the gadgets, and they’ll all be hitting store shelves before the end of the year.

Here’s what’s said to be on tap:

• Home Control Gadgets

The home control gadgets — or super-sweet remotes, in non-geek speak — will serve as powerful command centers for your entire house. According to Forbes, the devices will be able to handle everything from switching on lights to locking doors and adjusting the A/C. They’ll have screens anywhere from 4.3 to 10 inches and will be Web-connected through your home wireless network.

• Media Control Devices

The old remote will feel as outdated as a 5.25-inch floppy compared with the media control devices on the way. The gadgets will enable you to control all your media devices from one tablet, letting you adjust the sound, program the DVR, or even browse through TV listings right from the built-in screen. And, no surprise, you’ll be able to surf the Web from these clickers, too. Unfortunately, all the impressive additions won’t make the remotes any less likely to disappear between the couch cushions.

• Home Smartphones

Like the aforementioned NIMble phone — which, by the way, is rumored to become available for about $300 in September — the upcoming Android home smartphones will do far more than just help you communicate. The cordless devices will give you phone access, of course, but they’ll also connect to wireless networks to allow for VoIP connections and online data retrieval. Plus, they’ll be able to run Android applications, so you could use them as photo frames or possibly even game consoles.

(T-Mobile is said to be working on a similar line of Android-based home phones, although details on those devices have thus far remained fairly scarce.)

Android Home Device Details

Touch Revolution tells Forbes the new Android devices will come in a variety of shapes — some with bases for tabletop use, others with flat shapes built more for holding or wall-embedding. Touch Revolution is handling the touchscreen and Android side of the deal, while the other companies are creating the hardware and managing the branding. The gadgets, according to the Forbes interview, will be available in the United States, as well as in other unspecified countries.

On the whole, Android is expected to see enormous growth over the coming months. One research firm goes so far as to predict a 900-percent increase in Android adoption this year — and that’s accounting only for smartphone sales. Add in these new home gizmos and the host of other Android devices currently under development, and the platform certainly appears to be one worth watching.

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The name of the phone, myTouch, goes with the big ethos of this phone: Customizability. Users will be able to customize the menus, wallpapers, icon and a range of other things on the device with the use of themes and skins. The handset will come in 3 colors, black, white, and merlot, and there will also be options to customize the shell of the unit also.

The phone will also get to know you and your search habits over time, how very Google of them:

“The other key point T-Mobile is touting for the myTouch is something called Sherpa, which T-Mobile worked with startup Geodelic to create. Basically, Sherpa is an application that claims to learn from a user’s actions. So, for example, if you’re searching a lot of Thai food, Sherpa should recognize that as something that you like in the future. And it uses your location information to give you tailored results for what it believes you will want based on what you’re around.”

The Hardware

While the myTouch keeps it’s 528 MHz processor, it has doubled it’s internal memory to 512 MB which bumps up the loading of apps and also makes the apps run more smoothly than on the G1. The screen size and resolution is the same as the G1, and unfortunately, is still not multi-touch. The camera is 3.2 megapixel with autofocus, comes with a 4-GB microSD card.

The big difference is that they did away with the physical keyboard. It’s running the Cupcake OS build, and the myTouch will now have a virtual keyboard. This makes for a slimmer, sleeker, and lighter handset.

While these some of these specs are admittedly, slightly meh, there is one big improvement. They did improve the battery life, which was the biggest complaint that users had with the G1. According to TechCrunch, “Well just in everyday use with a couple applications running in the background, my G1 battery would be gone in a few hours. The myTouch battery easily lasts all day in the same environment.”

Existing T-Mobile customers can pre-order the myTouch starting July 8. The device will be $199 with a 2-year agreement, and availability is set for early August.

via TechCrunch

Popularity: 9% [?]

zOMG, who’s excited? Android’s little cheerleader is! Check this out: According to the leaked slide on Engadget, the HTC Lancaster feature quadband EDGE and 850 / 1900MHz HSPA, AGPS, a 3 megapixel fixed-focus camera, Bluetooth 2.0, microSD expansion, and a “unique HTC social messaging user interface”. The display is oddly only 2.8” and not 3.2” with QVGA 240 x 320 pixels. Targeted date is early August, no word on price yet, but I am totes excited to see this development for Google Android!

Popularity: 9% [?]