Hallelujah! I just watched this video showing that the recent Nexus One OTA update brings multi-touch to the device! Hooray! Below is a video from AndroidCentral.com that shows the three apps that make the most use of this feature;
The bowser
Google Maps
and Gallery
The update also includes Google Goggles, a ’3G switching to EDGE’ fix and more!
If you haven’t gotten the OTA yet, Android Central has a great walk through on manually updating your Nexus One.
In the meantime, here’s an excerpt from their thoughts as well as the video:
Enjoy.
‘Multitouch on the Nexus One, for all intents and purposes, is the same as multitouch anywhere else (any by that we mean the iPhone, natch). Pinch to zoom, spread your fingers to zoom out. There’s a slightly weird elasticity to it — the motion continues slightly after your fingers have stopped. We wouldn’t call it a bug; it’s just a noticeable difference.’
I know, I’m a geek. I love technology and I especially love action figures. Heck, I even love in-action figures that don’t do anything. So I’m excited to see that DeadZebra.com will be offering miniture Android vinyl figures as of February 10th!
Below are some pics of the little guys as well as some info from the Dead Zebra’s mouth, so-to-speak. Anyone going to get these? Anyone as excited as I am?
I personally get sick of the ‘There’s an app for that’ hype sometimes as well as Apple bragging about how their market is sooo much bigger than Android’s. I understand it’s competition and usually competition is healthy, but, I don’t have to like it when I’m a total fanboy when it comes to Android.
That said, I’m actually excited when I see more mainstream media outlets reporting on Android, celebreties endorsing Android devices and major networks creating Android apps and bragging about it. Just like the Discovery Channel app I wrote about recently and now we can add The Weather Channel them.
But The Weather Channel has done even more by advertising their app on the air and displaying a QR code that allows Android users to scan the screens of their televisions and download the Weather Channel app to their phones. Check out the video below to see the ad.
Some may say their channel is boring but I think this is pretty cool!
Do you think QR Codes are the way to go when it comes to advertising on mainstream media? Let us know in the comments!
I came across this video recently and I found it creative as well as informative;
YouTube user AndroidHD has taken six Android Handsets, ran the same video on them in unison, filmed them and posted the results. So if having great video resolution is an important factor when purchasing an Android device, this video is worth four minutes out of your day. The phones compared are:
Nexus One vs Moto Droid vs Acer Liquid vs Samsung Galaxy vs HTC Hero vs HTC myTouch 3G.
After watching this video, it seems to me that the Nexus One not only has an amazing screen, but it has the amazing screen. But, I may be a little biased as I love that device.
So what’s the verdict? Leave a comment and let us know which one you feel has the best video processing power!
The guys at PhoneScoop.com have got a hold of the new HTC myTouch Fender Edition and have created a cool video review of the device. Here is the video of Eric Clapton’s baby followed by the full technical specs. So what do you guys think? Is this device worth getting over the regular myTouch? Will you be purchasing it? Leave a comment and let us know!
We have known for awhile that Mozilla was working on Firefox for Android and now we have visual progress. Vladimir Vukićević (a Mozilla developer) just posted a screen shot of the first page load from the Firefox browser running in the Android emulator. He notes that we are still a ways to go from a usable alpha release, but we are one step closer.
Note that the screen shows the full Firefox browser and not the mobile UI. Vladimir explains the situation on his blog:
“You’ll note that this is the full Firefox interface, and not the Fennec/Firefox Mobile UI; we’re testing with the full interface because it’s significantly more complex than the mobile UI and stresses Gecko much more. So, if the full UI works, then Fennec should work fine as well. Given the interest in Android on netbook and tablet devices, an updated version of the full Firefox UI might find a home on some of these. Android has been pretty great to work with so far; it’s a bit unusual platform for us due to its Java core, but with the NDK we’re able to bridge things together without many problems.” -Vladimir VukićevićMozilla
In a related note, Mozilla has updated their mobile platforms page with their plans for other operating systems. They chose Maemo as their first mobile platform then started on Windows Mobile. Android is Mozilla’s next biggest challenge and they have no plans to support other platforms at this time.
Mozilla does not have plans to build an iPhone browser due to constraints with the OS environment and distribution.
Bonus: Check out the more than 40 add-ons that are currently available for Firefox Mobile
T-Mobile will announce a partnership with media syncing app developer doubleTwist, according to TechCrunch. The app will be pre-installed on some of its Android phones, including the new myTouch 3G Fender Limited Edition handset. This is big news for the Android community since no Android phones come with syncing software akin to iTunes. As of now, users mount SDs card to their computers and drag and drop the files onto phones. (more…)
Just saw this tidbit over at TmoNews.com regarding the Nexus One 3G issue. You remember that one? Apparently the Nexus One has a hard time deciding whether it wants to be on T-Mobile’s 3G network or on EDGE and constantly swaps back and forth between the two. It is reported that devices display this behavior in areas where there should be full 3G coverage.
Well, a Google employee posted on Google Support Forums that the issue was due to ‘being on the edge or outside of 3G coverage, which a product fix cannot address.’
Now the employee did say this ‘may be due to’ so I’m not necessarily agreeing with TmoNews that this employee is blaming T-mobile’s coverage, (Article here) but it does seem weird that they mention how ’other T-Mobile handsets (such as the G1) work perfectly fine in the same locations.’
I don’t find this entirely true in my experience. Where I reside, we’re well within T-Mobile’s 3G coverage and while my G1 was functioning, I experienced this issue in numerous areas but especially inside my home. On my front porch, I would have solid 3G. Once inside, I could literally watch it go from 3G to EDGE every few seconds.
I just chalked it up as the network not liking my walls but didn’t blame it on T-Mobile’s 3G service as I have nothing but good things to say about it.
The Google Employee did say there will be an update via OTA soon that will help the issue but until then, what has been your experience? Anyone with a G1 or a Nexus One have the same issue within Magenta’s 3G borders?
Discovery Channel has launched a free app that’s available in the Android Market created by Rhythm NewMedia.
I found this out over at IntoMobile.com and I’m excited about it. I love the Discovery Channel and according to the article,
‘Pop open the new Discovery Channel app and you’ll get video clips from such shows asMythbusters and Deadliest Catch (I love those shows), plus you’ll also get access to photo galleries, quizzes, programming schedules, and a whole lot more. You can even use the app to browse and purchase DVD’s from DiscoveryStore.com.’
Sounds pretty cool for Discovery Channel fans such as myself. Has anyone down loaded this app yet? Like it? Hate it? Let us know in the comments as well as why!
It has been interesting to watch Google as they promote the Nexus One across their network of online services. We spotted Nexus One Adsense banners the day the phone was announced which were followed by ad spots on Google.com, Gmail.com, YouTube.com, and a host of other Google domains.
Google has another trick to keep the Nexus One hype growing on YouTube, the 4th largest site on the Internet. Several of the top YouTube users began receiving Nexus One phones last week in order to create sponsored videos that would promote the device. No word has been given on how many phones were sent out, but at least 10 videos have appeared on the Google Nexus One YouTube page.
Below is a small sample of videos that have received several million views. We can see a lot of people are watching these videos, but will that translate into more Nexus One sales?
