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December, 2011 Articles

Sony Ericsson LT28at Hits Bluetooth SIG With 720p HD Screen, 13MP Camera and AT&T’s 4G LTE

by Chris Chavez on December 22nd, 2011

Oh, sweet Mother Theresa, what is this? It appears that Sony Erics– Er, Sony is finally stepping up to the plate and preparing a superphone of their own, the LT28at for AT&T (I know, it stings). I originally mistook this leak for an American version of Nozomi (LT26i) — which could still very well be [...]

Official ASUS Transformer Prime “Origami” Cover Now Available From Amazon – Can Be Yours For $40

by Chris Chavez on December 22nd, 2011

The ASUS Transformer Prime is no doubt on many a Phandroid’s wishlist this holiday season and some of you are already receiving your supertabs as we speak. If you decided to forgo the optional keyboard dock, you may find that your Prime is left rather… exposed. It wasn’t too long ago we showed you ASUS’s [...]

Leaked Verizon Doc Says Motorola DROID 4 Postponed Until Early February

by Chris Chavez on December 21st, 2011

You had to see this coming. A new leaked Verizon doc is showing the Droid 4 — rumored to be launching tomorrow — has been postponed all the way back to February 2nd of next year. This no doubt comes as bad news to those of you looking to get your hands on a 4G [...]

Overkill From Craneball Studios Now Available For Android – Nitty-Gritty, First Person Shootin’

by Chris Chavez on December 21st, 2011

Craneball Studios is at it again, this time with their newest Android offering, a nitty-gritty first person shooter called Overkill (gotta say it from the depths of your throat). Deviating from their more “cutesy” styled title like Super Rope, Overkill pushes you headfirst into a post apocalyptic future where you must kill to survive. Okay, [...]

Official: HTC EVO View 4G Honeycomb Update Rolling Out Tomorrow – Available Now For Download

by Chris Chavez on December 21st, 2011

Just as promised, the HTC Evo View 4G — Sprint’s version of the HTC Flyer — is receiving it’s Honeycomb OTA update (software version 2.23.651.1), finally pushing the tablet up to the more “evolved” version of the Android OS optimized just for tablets. Even little tablets. The 217MB update brings about a number of fixes [...]

Amazon No Longer Blocking Kindle Fires From Accessing Web Version Of Android Market

by Chris Chavez on December 21st, 2011

A lesser known fact about the Kindle Fire — when entering “market.android.com” in the device’s web browser, the device would actually forward you Amazon’s own Appstore instead of Google’s world famous web version of the Android Market. Pretty frustrating and somewhat alarming to some users as they were essentially being blocked from accessing a website [...]

Hasbro Sues ASUS For “Transformer Prime” Name – Says Consumers Will Associate The Tablet With Autobot Leader

by Chris Chavez on December 21st, 2011

What do we have here. Oh yes, it’s yet another lawsuit from a company attacking an Android manufacturer. Nothing new there. Or is it? In a surprising twist, this time, the lawsuit has nothing to do with an Android competitor. Seems Hasbro isn’t too keen on ASUS allegedly “stealing” one of their trademarks when they [...]

Sony Ericsson Xperia Active Takes a Pummeling, Keeps on Ticking

by Kevin Krause on December 21st, 2011

The Sony Ericsson Xperia Active can take a beating, but it isn’t invincible, is it? This collection of videos suggests otherwise, as the handset designed to survive the stresses put on it by an active user is tortured in a way that makes Hostel look like a Disney flick. Nearly every implement imaginable is take to [...]

Verizon States No LTE Performance Issue with the Galaxy Nexus, Will Adjust Status Bar to Better Match Other Devices

by Kevin Krause on December 21st, 2011

Verizon has made a statement regarding a planned update to handle Galaxy Nexus 4G issues, and it doesn’t involve tweaking the phone’s radio firmware. As was reported yesterday after independent testing, the Galaxy Nexus is privy to the same signal strength as other 4G devices on Verizon’s network, the difference is the way it reports [...]

Happy Holidroid Contest: Photo Challenge

by Quentyn Kennemer on December 21st, 2011

If you’re unsure what this whole “Holidroid Contest” thing is all about, be prepared to get excited. From November 24th through December 25th, Phandroid is giving away a Kindle Fire every single day along with other great prizes like the Galaxy Nexus Galaxy Tabs, JAMBOX, SmarTouch Gloves, Android Phones, Android T-Shirts, Seidio Vouchers and more. Read our announcement post for details. [...]

MOTOACTV Receiving Update, Enhances Battery Life and More

by Kevin Krause on December 21st, 2011

Motorola’s workout companion device is receiving a software update that brings along improvements in power consumption and other optimizations. The update is currently headed out to all 8GB MOTOACTV devices, raising their software version to 4.55.76. An update for the 16GB model is slated to begin rolling out over the next week or so and [...]

Leaked HTC Sensation ROM Gives First Look at Sense UI on Android 4.0

by Kevin Krause on December 21st, 2011

Though the official update to Ice Cream Sandwich is likely a good way off, a newly leaked ROM for the HTC Sensation is giving us our first glimpse at how the Sense UI will appear when coupled with Android 4.0. At first glance, not a whole lot looks to change. Notification bar icons remain rather [...]

Intel Demos Their Medfield-based Android Smartphone and Tablet

by Kevin Krause on December 21st, 2011

Intel appears one step closer to finally breaking into the mobile arena after making their reference tablet and smartphone designs accessible to MITs Technology Review. Both devices are based around Intel’s Medfield iteration of their Atom processor, a chip based on the 32nm manufacturing process and promising better battery life than previous mobile CPUs from [...]

Android Team Wishes All a Happy Holiday

by Kevin Krause on December 21st, 2011

The Googlers of Building 44 took some time away from churning out Android improvements to spread some holiday cheer. As can be expected from Google, no expense was spared. They even trucked in some snow to make Santa Claus feel a bit more at home. We’re sending our warmest of holiday wishes right back at [...]

Swype Beta Update Brings Dragon Dictation and 50 Languages

by Quentyn Kennemer on December 21st, 2011

The folks at Swype have released a new beta for users to try out. The latest update brings Dragon Dictation support giving them a nice TTS input option over the default Android TTS option (which isn’t bad, but we like options). It currently supports English, French, Italian, German and Spanish and more will be added [...]

Santa Booth Transforms You Into Santa Claus [Holiday App]

by Quentyn Kennemer on December 21st, 2011

It’s that time of year again, folks – the big, jolly guy known as Santa  is about to drop into everyone’s chimneys (or climb into everyone’s windows? That’d be creepy) and chow down on milk and cookies. If you want to see what you’d look like as Santa you can download Santa Booth. It’s simple [...]

Canadians Beginning to Receive Transformer Prime Units

by Quentyn Kennemer on December 21st, 2011

It looks like the first group of North American citizens are beginning to receive their ASUS Transformer Prime units in the mail. Canadian reader Mark has reported receiving his through UPS. Check your tracking number from your respective retailer to see if yours is inbound. United States customers have also reported that device shipments have [...]

Verizon’s 4G Outage Issues Resolved

by Quentyn Kennemer on December 21st, 2011

And the short saga comes to a close. Verizon’s just informed everyone that the 4G network outage that occurred earlier this morning has been resolved. They did not give a detailed explanation as to what caused the outage, as usual, but they did acknowledge which consumer may have been affected. I and many others have [...]

Cricket Launches 4G LTE Network in One Market Today, No Phones to Take Advantage of it Yet

by Quentyn Kennemer on December 21st, 2011

Those of you on Cricket will be happy to know that the budget carrier has launched their 4G LTE network today. Most of you probably won’t be drenched in 4G goodness as they’ve only launched in one market starting out – Tucson, AZ. And they don’t even have phones to take advantage of the network [...]

This is Just… Wrong

by Quentyn Kennemer on December 21st, 2011

I know, I know, but still. Can’t help but laugh. [Thanks Josh!]