It was only a matter of time before someone jumped on eBay to buy a phone only to find that it came pre-loaded with the latest and for-the-most part unseen version of Android aka Ice Cream Sandwich.  The Nexus S pictured above and on video below was just released over at Engadget, giving us a fabulous look at Android 4.0 and all of its cyan-greenish tints, Honeycomb lock screen, recently used app scroller, and more.  

When the Samsung Stratosphere first popped up on DL, most of us had fingers an toes crossed that it would be Verizon’s Galaxy SII variant.  We now know that not to be the case and will instead see a device more on-par with the Epic 4G on Sprint than anything.  That doesn’t mean it is a total flop though – remember that there is a pretty good sized group of people that cannot live without a physical keyboard and also want 4G LTE.  This will be their option, for now.

We just received the comparison specs sheets for the device from our friends at Verizon, so that those interested can get an idea as to what they might expect when the device launches on October 6.  What we have is a single-core 1GHz processor, Android 2.3, 1.3MP front camera, 5MP rear camera, 512MB of RAM, 4″ Super AMOLED display, and 4G LTE capabilities.

Verizon is calling it a “mid-tier” option, so we can hope that means it will come in around a $149.99 price point.  

Verizon XOOM owners, the time has come.  If you still care about upgrading your device so that it has 4G LTE capabilities, then tomorrow you will want to visit this site.

As far as the rest of this press release goes, I’m assuming that those of you that bought this back in February are not going to be all that thrilled.  You get upgraded for “free” yet you paid $100 more on-contract ($230 more at full retail) than those that will wait to pick one up on October 13 – the day the pre-installed LTE version launches.

Couldn’t toss in 3 months of free service or something Big Red?  Maybe $100 credit to XOOM owners’ accounts for putting up with 2 delays and months of waiting?  Remember, this upgrade was supposed to happen back in May…we are almost into October.  Just sayin’.

Download the “Getting Ready” guide here.  More details after the break.   

If there weren’t already enough ways for people to share and browse photos on the web, then Yahoo! just filled the gap with the release (finally) of their very popular Flickr service in form of an Android application. Users can upload or snap new photos directly into the app, comment on others, view friends’ activity, and then share it all with the world.  We are still trying to figure out why this took so long to create, but we are happy to see it arrive.   

When Samsung swapped out the “Plus” for “HD” in its new screen on the Galaxy Note and Galaxy SII HD LTE, we initially thought that was a good thing.  Turns out that the “Plus” may have played a bigger roll than most people noticed.  According to a new report and the pictures you are seeing above, the Super AMOLED HD that was recently introduced may in fact be a PenTile (RG-BG) display as we once saw on the original Galaxy S line and not the RGB Stripe that we love in the Super AMOLED Plus.

Before we all start freaking out at the thought of this screen landing on the Galaxy Nexus - OK, feel free to freak a little – you have to remember that with 316 PPI, you shouldn’t notice the hatching for the most part. Just look at this image we took of the DROIDX2′s PenTile and tell me if you will hate this HD version from Samsung.  I sure won’t.   And if you look at the image above, this RG-BG PenTile can at least make mostly straight lines as compared to the RGBW PenTile that Motorola has made famous this year.  While I have not held the Note, I have not heard or read a single complaint about the screen.

The problem (at least to my knowledge), is that you won’t get the same battery benefits as with RGBW, but that was sort of expected at an HD level.  The phone has a lot more work to do – expect to see some massive batteries included.

Everyone relax, it should still be a beautiful Galaxy Nexus HD display.

*Note – Many in the comments are pointing out that this was sort of expected in the first wave of “HD” screens.  Super AMOLED Plus HD will probably cure some incurable disease then.

Via:  thegadgetlife, Phandroid

When we hear there is another OS device coming out and that said device will run Android apps we all have reason for excitement. That was the case for the BlackBerry PlayBook – when word first came out that the PlayBook would be able to run some Android features, people were definitely curious about it.

But sometimes there isn’t a happy ending and RIM engineers have come out and stated which Android features you won’t be seeing on the PlayBook.

Android’s famed battery-sucking Live Wallpaper, SIP and SIP VoIP, anything built using the Native Development Kit, apps containing only App Widgets, and apps containing more than one activity tied to the Launcher.

In addition, any packages which rely on Google Maps, in-app billing services, Android’s text-to-speech engine, or the cloud-to-device messaging system will all be rendered unusable under the company’s runtime system.

Well that hurts. So basically the main features that make Android, “Android” won’t be making its way to the PlayBook. Existing owners for the PlayBook can’t be happy about this, but then again, I don’t think anyone necessarily bought the PlayBook with the intent of using a bunch of Android features on it. I could be wrong though.

New word of lacking Android integration enough to make you forget completely about the PlayBook?

Via: The Next Web

Patience is finally paying off for HTC Thunderbolt owners as Gingerbread is now officially rolling out and CyanogenMod 7 has been updated for rooted users too.  There are good fixes in this new build, but we always recommend knowing your device inside and out before attempting these types of things.  Plus a backup or two wouldn’t hurt either.

Added to the list of working features are Bluetooth calling, camcorder will now have better audio, and you’ll be introduced to some different lockscreen options.  Full support and instructions can be found at the original RootzWiki thread.  Feeling frisky?

Via: RootzWiki

Cheers Phil!