Android!

[Draegan]

Droid X should be out in 2 weeks I think?

[Ozzu]

My dilemma is that I'll need a new phone very soon (once my ex-employer cuts off this awful AT&T service that I don't plan to stay with) and the Droid X isn't out yet and the Incredible is back-ordered until well after the Droid X launches. I'm tempted by the keyboard of the original Moto Droid and the fact that they're actually in stock at VZW, but will I regret getting one?

I just recently traded my Palm Pre Plus for one. It's an awesome phone still. It's also easily rooted and overclocked if one were so inclined to do so.  However, I'm probably going to be left out in the cold on Gingerbread until late next year when I'll be eligible for an upgrade. The processor speed is fine, as I have it overclocked, but the 256 MB RAM will end up screwing me in that department.

Unless someone throws together a ROM for it. I can only hope.

[Draegan]

Rumors: http://techie-buzz.com/mobile-news/rumor-samsung-already-working-on-a-galaxy-s-successor.html

A leaked picture of the successor of the Galaxy S a.k.a Galaxy S I9200 has been found on the internet. The phone is rumored to feature a 4.3-inch Super-AMOLED display with a resolution of 1280×720. The phone will be powered by a 2 GHz processor (!), and will have 1GB of RAM, and 4GB of ROM. The camera at the back of the device will be an 8MP one, with 1080p video recording capability.

[Quinton]

I wonder where they're finding 2GHz ARM cores -- the highest end I've seen at present are 1.5GHz scorpion from Qualcomm, and unless you're really cranking the memory bus (hard on battery) running at or above 1GHz doesn't buy you much (tests we did on N1 showed little or no user perceptible difference between 768MHz max clock and 1GHz).

[TripleDES]

It's a Samsung phone, don't expect any aftersales service. There's also no dev community worth mentioning. For that matter, Moto and HTC are promising similar jesusphones.

[Salamok]

I wonder where they're finding 2GHz ARM cores -- the highest end I've seen at present are 1.5GHz scorpion from Qualcomm, and unless you're really cranking the memory bus (hard on battery) running at or above 1GHz doesn't buy you much (tests we did on N1 showed little or no user perceptible difference between 768MHz max clock and 1GHz).

pretty sure it is marketing speak, the phone uses the hummingbird cpu which is 1ghz, the phone spiel does mention multicore so maybe it is really 2x1ghz hummingbird cpus.

[Quinton]

Aha.  They had been making noise about an SMP follow-on to their PC110 SoC.  Maybe it's finally shipping then.

[Yegolev]

I suddenly find that I want a simple tethering solution before Friday of this week.  Also seems like PDANet is what the Google searches turn up, but I figure there has to be something else by now.  Short story is that my Blackberry has died and my plans to work from a lakeside retreat in the mountains this weekend is in danger.  I seem to get a good 3G on my Moto Droid, though, so I am looking for a quick fix.

[NiX]

I've only seen mention of it, but apparently you can tether using a USB cable in debug mode, but not sure for which devices it works and can't find any links.

[Salamok]

pdaNet requires USB in debug mode, easy to set up and other than the need for a cable I'm pretty happy with it. 

[Righ]

I just recently traded my Palm Pre Plus for one. It's an awesome phone still. It's also easily rooted and overclocked if one were so inclined to do so.  However, I'm probably going to be left out in the cold on Gingerbread until late next year when I'll be eligible for an upgrade. The processor speed is fine, as I have it overclocked, but the 256 MB RAM will end up screwing me in that department.

Unless someone throws together a ROM for it. I can only hope.

I went for it. I didn't need the latest & greatest and the keyboard is handy. There will lots of new phones by the time Gingerbread is generally available and this will do until then. :)

[Ozzu]

Wordwise is such an addicting game. I guess I understand why 'Words With Friends' became a popular iPhone app now. This is similar to that.

[Ghambit]

I plan on getting the new Sammy 'droid phone on the 18th from ATT.  Anyone got the skinny on this thing?  Supposedly, it's a "gaming" phone... comes with "sixaxis" control.
I know it's still entry-level Droid tech' by comparison, but it's the best droid ATT has to offer right now.   I like the display specs; 4" amoled that doesnt burn through batteries (16 hr. talk time supposedly); typical Sammy display dominance  (cant wait to push ther graphics drivers to the limit).

[Engels]

Do you mean the Samsung Captivate?

[Ghambit]

Do you mean the Samsung Captivate?

yes

[Abagadro]

It's ATT"s version of the Galaxy S.

[caladein]

Considering it's their first high-end Android phone, I really hope they don't gimp it like they have their last two.  (Yes, I know, Nexus One, but that's over $500.)  There's no indications that they won't though so... yeah.

Fucking AT&T.

[Ghambit]

Whatever, I'm gonna hack the shit outta mine regardless, along with dabblilng in some sixaxis 'droid game development.

[Lantien]

Just got back from a one week visit to Asia.  Froyo 2.2 on the Nexus one held up well for the very little I was doing.  Once I got to a fairly well connected city (Taipei), was able to take advantage of the Wifi they have blanketing most of the city.  Didn't have a chance to play with the tethering though.  Battery life held up pretty well, as my phone as an mp3 player made it across both sides of the trip. Definitely very cool to have the internet in your pocket, as opposed to lugging a laptop.

As for the Samsung Galaxy S, got to fiddle with it a bit when I was at a store in Taipei.  Pretty phone, responsive with Samsung's version of 2.1 on the phone.

Just to keep it straight, the Samsung Galaxy S will be released for all 4 major US carriers, with minor tweaks/renames to each ones.  The general things they seem to have in common are 4 inch screens, a 5 MP camera, a GHz processor, and a half gig of RAM.  I think most of them (all of them?) will come loaded with Swype too.

T-mobile: The Samsung Vibrant will be out July 15th.  No front facing camera.
AT&T: AT&T's version will be called the Samsung Captivate. 
Sprint: will be called the Samsung Epic 4G.  It plans on having a hardware keyboard, and a front facing camera.
Verizon: will be called the Samsung Fascinate. 

I would imagine as this phone has quite shiny specs, this phone will have a much better following/community than what was able with prior Samsung phones (especially the behold II).

[Abagadro]

Thanks for the rundown.

Captivate has been announced as available July 18th. 

[KallDrexx]

Considering it's their first high-end Android phone, I really hope they don't gimp it like they have their last two.  (Yes, I know, Nexus One, but that's over $500.)  There's no indications that they won't though so... yeah.

Fucking AT&T.

My IT admin coworker got the Aria and he loves it (his first android phone too).  He did root it but I don't think it's that bad of a phone.  It's not like the backflip.

[Abagadro]

Can someone explain "rooting" in old-guy moron-speak for me?

[Segoris]

I think the simple terms of putting it would be it gives access to everything in the phone. If it was a computer, using a rooted phone is like using a computer as the admin while a non-rooted phone is like being a basic user with limitations set for you and leaves some files as read only.

[Abagadro]

I get that part of it, but what does it allow you to do in practical terms, i.e. what benefit is there to doing it?

[fuser]

I get that part of it, but what does it allow you to do in practical terms, i.e. what benefit is there to doing it?

A prime practical example (non android) on the iPhone it allows you to install apps outside of the apple controlled store. Or setup the ui how you want it.

On the android where the OS is not nearly the walled garden apple has. The only reason I see to root an android phone would be the ability to load custom firmware if your phone is an older release.

[Segoris]

For android, rooting allows for custom UIs, system back ups to an SD card, tethering, removing bloatware (such as that from Sprint), organizing cache data to an SD card (such as the market, google maps, etc), and overclocking.

[Ghambit]

How powerful is the SD card cache??  Noticeable differences?
Also, is there no app that will "auto-organize" the SD to proper virtual memory?

[Draegan]

zomg... getting a DroidX today (assuming the stores don't sell out?)!!

[naum]

DroidX locked…
http://www.mobilecrunch.com/2010/07/14/droid-x-actually-self-destructs-if-you-try-to-mod-it/

Well, I might have recommended a Droid X for big-phone-lovin’ fandroids out there… but now that I’ve read about Motorola’s insane eFuse security system, I’m going to have to give this one a big fat DON’T BUY on principle. I won’t restate all my reasons for supporting the modding, hacking, jailbreaking, and so on of your legally-owned products here — if you’re interested in a user’s manifesto, read this — but suffice it to say that deliberately bricking a phone if the user fiddles with it does not fall under the “reasonable” category of precautions taken by manufacturers.

Really. If you want to make it difficult to hack, that’s fine. You think your software should be enough, that’s fine. But once I pay money for the item, it’s mine, and disabling my device because you don’t like what I’m doing with it falls under the category of sabotage.

Here’s what eFuse does. This information is a couple days old but it’s worth reading if you’re interested in Android, development, or open standards in general. Besides, I just found out about it, so you have to read my words whether you like it or not. or you could just stop reading. Either way. Anyway:

If the eFuse failes to verify this information then the eFuse receives a command to “blow the fuse” or “trip the fuse”. This results in the booting process becoming corrupted and resulting in a permanent bricking of the Phone. This FailSafe is activated anytime the bootloader is tampered with or any of the above three parts of the phone has been tampered with.

[Segoris]

DroidX locked…
http://www.mobilecrunch.com/2010/07/14/droid-x-actually-self-destructs-if-you-try-to-mod-it/

It's been present in Motorola Android phones already, just not used.
http://stevenbird.info/2010/07/15/droidx-today-is-the-day-more-security-info/


Also:
http://www.boygeniusreport.com/2010/07/15/reality-check-modding-the-droid-x-may-not-lead-to-a-bricked-phone/
http://www.droid-life.com/2010/07/15/enough-with-the-efuse-talk-already/

How powerful is the SD card cache??  Noticeable differences?
Also, is there no app that will "auto-organize" the SD to proper virtual memory?

I haven't moved my cache so I don't know how big of an effect it has.

[naum]

App Inventor
http://appinventor.googlelabs.com/about/

[Segoris]

That looks awesome, thanks for that post Naum.

[Draegan]

Just got my droidX. OMG so awesome.  Now I need to find all the apps that I couldn't get on my G1.

Suggestions please.

How about a cool looking RSS Reader first.  


Edit:
So far: NewsBob, Kindle, Pandora, Solitare, NESoid (will download roms when I get home), task manager, siriusxm radio.

Anyone have any decent live wallpapers?

[Segoris]

Grats on the phone!

Just out of curiosity, can you see if you can find Mario Live or Digital Rain wallpapers on your DroidX in the market? I couldn't on my Droid with Android 2.1 and am wondering if it is a Motorola issue or something else. They work now but getting them on my phone and working was a pain compared to how easy it normally is.

For apps, I know within the last few pages there were suggestions on apps, so just dig through the last few pages. Though, here are some I remember off the top of my head:

TasKiller
Dolphin HD
MountUSB
Barcode Scanner
Adobe Reader
AndroZip
DroidLight (uses flash from camera as a flashlight)
Ringdroid
Stopwatch


For Live Wallpapers, I keep Galaxy, Digital Rain, Fireworks, Mario Live, and Water

[Quinton]

Yeah these guys are a bit hysterical about the efuse business.  Moto has always used OMAP secure boot.  That doesn't actually prevent most of the exploits people want to gain control of the system.