Packed inside the Gingerbread (Android 2.3.4) update for the HTC Thunderbolt, you will find a new dock app that pops up automatically when dropped into a cradle.  As you can see in the photo above, it’s simple, but still gives you enough information to make it worthwhile.

It’s not customizable other than the wallpaper stream in the background or the music you decide to play, however, it’s a welcomed addition.  It pulls in your calendar feed, weather, can turn into a hotspot automatically, and even pull in your Friend Stream.  If only we could toss in a Gmail icon it might be perfect.  

The tech world has been buzzing about Amazon’s new Kindle Fire tablet this morning, which just so happens to be running a custom version of Android.  At just $199 and with access to all of Amazon’s services including Prime, music, cloud storage, books and magazines, this may be one of the most influential tablets to see the light of day.

With that said, we are seeing a pretty mixed reaction from readers in the comments this morning and want to get a better feel for this device.  It’s running Android (possibly 2.3 or 2.1 depending on who you ask), but you almost can’t tell since Amazon has customized every last ounce of it.  Some of you are into it as a nice media device, yet others are a little turned off by the fact that it’s not really an Android tablet and lacks a camera.  Oh, we are also pretty sure that it won’t have the official Android Market and will instead utilize Amazon’s Appstore (not surprising by the way).

So tell us, are you planning to buy one?

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Back when Cut the Rope first hit Android, there was some serious hype around it and for good reason. One of the most popular iOS games had finally made its way to Android and it worked like a charm. Well today, users can pick up this classic game for free from Amazon and enjoy all the cute cutting ‘om nom’ goodness. You can’t go wrong with Cut the Rope.

Amazon Link

Cheers Chris and everyone else!

The new Amazon Kindle Fire was just announced at $199 as one of, if not the most affordable and deeply integrated Android tablets ever built.  It will ship on November 15, but future Fire owners can pre-order the device right now.  Amazon’s product page for their shiny new tablet includes every last detail you could have ever dreamed of including full specs, the multiple Amazon services it will use, and a quick video overview.  

A couple of readers turned on their Asus Transformers this morning and found a little surprise that needed their approval.  An update to Android 3.2.1 was/is available, bringing the most popular Honeycomb tablet on the planet up to the most current version.  Since we had yet to see a changelog after the XOOM WiFi received a similar update, we cruised over to Asus’ Facebook page and sure enough, they had posted the details:

Google Update: Android 3.2.1

• Security enhancement

New Feature:

• Supernote

IME/Translation:

• Added Farsi IME support
• Czech IME improvement : support Qwerty & Qwertz
• JP SKU fixed translation bug and Polaris office font
• Added more language translation into ASUS App

APP Updates:

• CN SKU 3rd party app bug fix
• Polaris office & ASUS WebStorage update

Improvements:

• Browser with Adobe Flash improvement; ex: YouTube
• Browser force-close improvement
• Improve Wi-Fi stability
• Improve Chinese handwriting prediction : recognize character from each stroke

Go grab it now!

Cheers David!

Most of the mystery was out of the bag on Monday when a report surfaced, but everything is now official.  Amazon has introduced the Kindle Fire as their next tablet.  It has a 7″ IPS display, dual-core processor, Gorilla Glass, access to all of Amazon’s media services (books, magazines, cloud storage, music, etc.), Amazon Prime for movies/tv/shopping/etc., and does not require a cable for syncing.  It’s Android, but from what we can tell, is so customized that you won’t actually know that unless you are an uber-nerd like us.  This is looking like quite the player and actually has us a little excited about a tablet for the first time in a while.  Price hasn’t been announced at the Kindle event just yet, but Bloomberg is reporting that it will be just $199.  Update:  Price is now official at $199.

You can pre-order it today – it ships on November 15.  

The HTC Rhyme will land on Verizon store shelves this Thursday as one of the more female-friendly phones we have ever seen.  It’s a mid-range phone for the most part, but HTC assured all of us that the goal here was to focus on style and functionality rather than next-gen specs.  After you take a look at the wallpapers included, you’ll quickly realize that they weren’t messing around.  These might be some of the best we have seen from a phone in a long time.