Motorola ATRIX Comes To Canada !

At CES Las Vegas , Motorola announced their latest flagship model which is arguably the most powerful smartphone in the word at the moment. The Motorola ATRIX is powered by the latest Nvidia Tegra 2 chipset which is a dual core chipset clocked at 1Ghz. The ATRIX comes with 1GB of onboard RAM and the dual core processor gives performance equivalent of 1Ghz from each core and this allows the phone to playback 1080p content. The phone comes with a biometric scanner inbuilt to provide for enhanced security.

The ATREX comes with a unique dock which allows users to connect a keyboard , mouse , monitor and use the phone as a portable computer. The ATRIX runs a special version of Firefox 3.6 when connected to the dock. The phone is also compatible with a netbook style dock which converts the ATRIX into a portable computer with a 12" screen. The dock also gives the phone an additional 8 hours of battery life.

The smartphone runs on the Android 2.3 platform and has a qHD , 24bit screen which makes it gives it great visibility both indoors and outdoors. The Motorola ATRIX will be available on Bell Canada within the 1st Quarter.

Droid Bionic Comes To Verizon

Motorola has been on a roll lately showing off several new devices at the Consumer Electronics Show at Las Vegas. One of the more interesting devices to be unveiled was the Motorola Droid Bionic. It is powered by the new Tegra 2 processor delivering a dual core 1Ghz processor which is capable of performance figures of upto 1Ghz on each of the cores.

The Droid Bionic brings support for the latest 4G network technology by Verizon. The internal RAM on the phone is 512 MB which is enough for the Android 2.3 powered smartphone to operate smoothly. The Droid Bionic can easily play back Flash 10.1 content and even HTML 5 video in the browser. The Droid Bionic comes with a front facing VGA camera which lets users video chat with their friends over 4G and WIFI. There is a rear facing 8MP camera which can capture HD 720p video. The Droid Bionic also comes with a 4.3" qHD screen which lets you watch HD content right there on your screen. Not only that , you can also playback 1080p video content via HDMI on your LCD screen. The Droid Bionic will soon be available on the Verizon network.

[Via our post on PhoneReport]

LG Optimus 2X Launched !

Amidst several leaks and previews, not much was left unknown of the LG Optimus 2X. The phone was officially shown off yesterday at CES during the Nvidia keynote. The phone was referred to as a 'superphone' due to the presence of the Tegra 2 chipset. The chipset enables the Optimus 2X to encode and decode 1080p video. Being a dual core chipset , it essentially gives smartphone users almost 2Ghz worth of performance ie 1Ghz on each core.



The Optimus 2X comes with a WVGA 4" display which is said to be exceptionally bright. The 8MP camera is capable of capturing 1080p video which can then be played back on your HDTV via the included HDMI port. Internal memory is 8GB and is further expandable by another 32GB via the memory card slot. The operating on the system is Android 2.2 ie Froyo with an LG designed UI layer in top. The LG Optimus 2X will be available in Korea within a few weeks with a global launch planned soon after.

[Via]

Opera Launches WAC Widget Runtime For Android

Opera Softwares , the company behind the wildly popular Opera Mini browser has released a new web runtime called WAC which will allow developers to create widgets for Android compatible with the Wireless Applications Community 1.0 specifications.

Developers can start developing widgets and begin implementing the WAC APIs by downloading the runtime from http://www.opera.com/download/get.pl?sub=++++&id=33389&location=270&nothanks=yes

Instructions can be found at: http://labs.opera.com/docs/wac/installation_instructions/ This runtime is provided for evaluation and demo purposes and is free of charge for all developers.

[Via- CellPassion]

Want Swype For Android ? Here's Your Chance !

Heard of Swype ? The award winning and arguably the best method of entering text on Android is presently only available pre-installed on a select few devices. Not on your phone ? Fret not ! The limited beta is set for expansion and now you too can get in on the action.

If you want to sign up for the Swype beta program and try the slide-to-type keyboard method for yourself, just head over to Swype's beta site and click on the link to register. The app is free, but there's no telling how long registration will remain open -- so if you're interested, you might want to sign up soon.

Being the awesome application it is , we highly recommend that you go and grab it NOW !

[Via- PC World]

Android Tips and Tricks !

Here at Infectech we all like to use shortcuts and handy tips which improve our mobile experience and generally improve usability. With the new Android 2.3 Gingerbread OS out, there were bound to be certain improvements in the usability along with new tricks to use. The official Google blog has simplified the process of finding those by quoting some of the better ones !

Tips

• Visual cue for scrolling: When you are in a scrollable list (like your Gmail inbox) and you reach the end of the list it shows an orange hue—a visual cue that you can’t scroll anymore.

• Notification bar icons (Wi-Fi, network coverage bars, etc.): Turn green when you have an uninhibited connection to Google, white when you don't. Hint: if you're in a hotel or airport using Wi-Fi, the bars won't turn green until you launch the browser and get past the captive portal.

• Voice actions: Tell your phone what to do by pressing the microphone icon next to the search box on the home screen, or long press the magnifying glass. You can tell it to send an email or text message (“send text to mom, see you for pizza at 7”), call someone ("call mom"), navigate somewhere (“navigate to pizza”), or listen to music ("listen to Mamma Mia").

• Find things you’ve downloaded from your browser: Your downloads are now neatly collected in a Downloads manager, which you can find in the apps drawer.

• Turn a Gallery stack into a slideshow: In Gallery, when you are looking at a stack of photos, put two fingers on the stack and spread them. The stack spreads out and the pictures flow from one finger to the other, a moving slideshow that lets you see all of the photos.

• Walk, don’t drive: Once you’ve gotten directions within Google Maps, click on the walking person icon to get walking directions.

• Easy text copy/paste from a webpage: To copy/paste from a webpage, long press some text, drag the handles around to select the text you want to copy, and press somewhere in the highlighted region. To paste, simply long press a text entry box and select paste. Gmail is a bit different: you need to go to Menu > More > Select Text.

• Turn your phone into a Wi-Fi hotspot: Go to Settings > Wireless & Networks > Tethering & Portable Hotspot. (You may have to pay extra for this feature.)

• Look at Maps in 3D: With the latest release of Google Maps, you can now look at 3D maps. Tilt the map by sliding two fingers vertically up/down the screen, and rotate it by placing two fingers on the map and sliding in a circular motion, e.g., from 12 and 6 o’clock to 3 and 9.

• Cool shutdown effect: When you put the phone to sleep, you’ll see an animation that resembles an old cathode tube TV turning off.

Keyboard tricks

• Shift+Key to capitalize a word: In Gingerbread (and supported hardware), you can Shift+Key to capitalize a letter instead of going to a separate all caps keyboard.

• Auto-complete: The space bar lights up when auto-complete can finish a word.

• Quick replace: Tap on any previously typed word, then tap on a suggestion to automatically replace it with the suggested word.

• Easy access to special characters (like numbers, punctuation): Press and hold any key to go to the special character keyboard. You can also press and hold the "," key for an extensive punctuation keyboard.

Applications

• Angry Birds: Popular game that lets you knock down blocks by slingshotting birds.

• Astro: Awesome file explorer app. Browse and access the directories on your phone, and take full advantage of its capabilities. Great if you’re a power user.

• Chrome to Phone: This one is really useful for Chrome users. You can send anything you browse on your computer to your phone. So if you are heading out to a restaurant or party and look up directions on your computer, just click the “send to phone” button (requires Chrome to Phone extension) and that exact page will open on your phone. Same with virtually any webpage.

• Flash: Install from Android Market to watch Flash videos embedded throughout the web. Runs even better on Gingerbread.

• Fruit Ninja: A juicy action game that tests your ability to smash flying fruit. A fun time-killer on the bus or train.

• FXCamera: Popular photo sharing app with slick effects and filters.

• Google Maps: Use your device as a GPS navigation system with free turn-by-turn voice guidance, and take advantage of other Google Maps features like Street View, Latitude and Places.

• Instant Heart Rate: Measure your heart rate using your camera.

• Phoneanlyzr: Track your phone usage: who you text most, call most, average call length distribution, etc.

• RemoteDroid: Control your computer from your phone. Gives you a mobile wireless mouse and keyboard. Great if you’re using your computer for music or movies.

• Shazam: Identifies virtually any song you are listening to.

• SoundHound: Record a snippet of a song and get it identified instantly. You can even hum (if you can carry a tune!).

• Tango: A free, high-quality video call app that works on both 3G and Wi-Fi. If your device has a front facing camera (e.g., Nexus S), you will love this app.

• YouTube: New UI. Plus, portrait-mode player, and view comments and drop-down box video information 

[Via - Google]

Motorola Tablet Teaser Trailer !

You might've seen teaser trailers for movies. Maybe even music albums but for a gadget ? Motorola seems to be going out of its way to create pre-release hype for its impending Honeycomb base Android tablet ! Check it out below.

HTC Knight Leaked

New images of the HTC Knight have now leaked on the internet. Showing off the front of the device , it is clear that it comes with a side sliding QWERTY keyboard. There is a possibility hence that it will be called the HTC Shift 4G. The device highly resembles the Evo 4G. The screen is 3.7" wide and comes with the standard 800 x 480 WVGA resolution. The latest version of the HTC Sense UI will work on top of Android. The smartphone which is making its way to Sprint also has a camera with an LED flash.

The HTC Knight will be the ninth Android device to hit Sprint. Official announcement dates have been pegged at 6th January 2011. The phone is rumored to come with Android Gingerbread ie Android 2.3 which has very similar hardware requirements to Froyo. An interesting thing is that all the leaked photos have shown the phone encased in a form of protective housing.

First Images Of Android 3.0 and Motorola Tablet !

Andy Rubin from Google today showed off a prototype tablet from Motorola called the Motorola Stingray. The device was shown off momentarily on the screen and as such not much is known about it. It seems to have a 10" screen. Rubin pointed out a video chat camera , NVIDIA processor and dual core 3D graphics processors.

The tablet was running Android 3.0 ie Honeycomb and we can see the first glimpses of the UI below. There seems to be a new UX here as it combines onscreen buttons in the corners with floating widgets. Honeycomb is scheduled to reach the market around Q2 , 2011.

What are your expectations from Honeycomb (Android 3.0) ? We'd love to hear it in the comments below !

[Via- Engadget]

Flash Update 10.1.105.7 Coming To Android

Flash for Android just received a minor update. The bug-fix update brings it to version 10.1.105.7 and can be grabbed from the Android Market for free.

[Via- Android Central]

Samsung Sells 1Million Galaxy Tabs

The Samsung Galaxy Tab just crossed the one million units shipped mark. Only recently they had announced the sale of 600,000 units. It seems that the tablet is doing pretty well while facing competition from others like the iPad.

The plan seems to be to move about 1.5 million units before the end of the year. Any Samsung Galaxy Tab users here ? We'd love to hear about your impressions !

[Via Samsung Hub]

Angry Bird Seasons Out For Android !

The next update for the popular game has hit the Android phones. Angry Birds Seasons marks the beginning of the countdown to Christmas. Rovio will be unlocking one new Christmas themed level everyday till Christmas ! The new update will also be bringing the Halloween themed levels to Android devices. The previous update was an iOS exclusive till now.

Google Releases Dedicated Google Reader App For Android

Google Reader is a staple diet for every RSS Junkie. To take it to the mobile sphere , Google has just released a homegrown Android application for Google Reader. The application syncs well with both the server and the desktop side. The feeds are sorted alphabetically and can be matched to the same order as that on the desktop.

It is possible to like and share stories and to also email them to someone.

Sony Ericsson has finally begun rolling out an update to Android 2.1 for its 1.6 powered SE X8. The device which runs the Sony specific Timescape UI will be getting the update in order of the Si Number on the device. As global rollouts have already begun , you should have your update pretty soon if you haven't received it already !

[Via - Sony Ericsson]

Nexus S Images Leaked Via XDA Developers

The first close up images of the Google Nexus One successor have finally been leaked by the members of the XDA Developer Forums. The Nexus S as it is known is the next generation super smartphone by Google. Internal specifications are still sketchy but rumors peg it at a 1.2 Ghz Dual Core processor which would make this the fastest Android phone to date. The camera is said to be capable of capturing 720p video. It will be the first phone to be powered by the upcoming Android 2.3 Gingerbread operating system. The smartphone is being manufactured by Samsung and is said to include the next version of its Super AMOLED display technology. The design highly resembles Samsung's own flagship Galaxy S smartphone. We have also heard rumors of the Nexus S packing in a curved glass display which is evidently designed to ease one handed usage.

From our post on PhoneReport.info

Acer Reveals Phone With 1024x480 Resolution Screen

Acer has just unveiled its Android phone with an XGA resolution screen at a Global Press Event in
New York City.The as of now unnamed comes with a 8MP camera capable of 720p video capture. It also comes with a front 1.3 MP Camera. Some unique features include six-axis gyroscope and LED edge lighting. Acer plans to ship the phone out somewhere in April 2011. More information as it appears

[Via-Engadget]

TweetDeck For Android Gets Beta Update

Android user ? Love Twitter ? Then you must be using TweetDeck for Android , one of the best mobile Twitter application. Well it just got a beta update which brings in several nice improvements.                    

Here is the changelog

1. Landscape mode for all update detail views
2. Twitpic support
3. Manual bit.ly shortening
4. Allo for dismissing Places notifications
5. Fix faving tweets on 3G in France
6. Allow old style RTs for protected users
7. Support FB Single Sign On
8. Allow users to delete DMs that are sent to them
9. Likes and comments on FB photos should stay in app
10. Bug fixes

Click here to get the application.  

[Via - TweetDeck Blog]

LG Apex QWERTY Android Phone Heading To US Cellular

The LG Apex is a mid range Android device heading towards US Cellular this week. Armed with a 3.2 MP Camera unit , 3.2" display , Android 2.1 , the QWERTY enabled device is aimed squarely at the low-mid range market. It has been priced competitively at $80.

SE Xperia X10 Finally Getting Multi Touch

The Sony Ericsson is the flagship Android device from the manufacturer. Unfortunately it lacks basic features like multi touch and runs on an obsolete version of Android ie Android 1.6. It seems that the manufacturer aims to fix at least one of the flaws.

The Sony Ericsson X10 will soon receive an update to support multi-touch gestures. There will be some limitations in the implementation. Pinch-to-zoom will be enabled for browser and maps, but not in situations such as SE puts it, "situations like when the movement of the two fingers cross each other on the X- or Y-axis that could cause strange behavior." Basically if it requires to buttons to be pressed at once on the screen , it will not work.

LG Optimus Released In India

One of the most popular LG models in recent times , the Optimus One has finally seen release in India. Selling over 1 million units across the world so far, the Optimus One is based on Android 2.2 (Froyo). The Optimus One runs the operating system on a 600 Mhz processor. The screen is small at 3.2" with HVGA resolution while the camera is 3MP with no flash. The Android on the LG smartphone has been skinned with a custom UI. The phone has been priced at about Rs 13,500.