Over the holiday weekend, I had a small budget to buy a new TV for my bedroom and maybe a cool something else to go with it. (Was thinking PS3?) I was budgeted to spend under $500 and I wasn’t really sure what I wanted but I know I definitely wanted a TV with WIFI and it had to be able to stream Netflix as well as some media off my network. To get the biggest bang for my buck, I was looking at a no frills 37” HDTV with a higher end BluRay player with wifi. As luck would have it, right when I thought I figured it all out, I saw a pile of Sony BluRay Players with Google TV built-in, for $199 each. I dropped the ‘SMART’ player player I had and headed to cash out. All in all, I spent right around $475 for the TV and the unit. Not bad for what has now basically become a smart TV with a WiFi  BluRay player.

When I got home, I unpacked and hooked up my new toys and it took me about ten minutes to set everything up and get it running. The longest part of the setup was the software update to Honeycomb for the player. It came with a qwerty remote, which I love, and the remote also doubles as a true universal remote. Aside from the full keyboard, the remote also has a touch sensitive cursor to fully navigate the screen like a mouse on a desktop. My only complaint with the remote is a lack of backlight. As far as the BluRay player goes, it runs great and I will leave it at that. It is a Sony, it is BluRay (their invention), it plays great. End of review for the BluRay portion. 

The Google TV portion of the player literally brings the term “smart-tv” to life. Now we all know that Samsung has a line of “SMART” TVs, and every other company out there has some “wifi enabled” options built in them, but those features are not even in the same realm as Google TV. Comparing those to Google TV is like comparing a Palm Treo to a Galaxy Nexus. (Nice name drop huh?) That may sound extreme, but it doesn’t take long to realize this is the truth. In my configuration, adding Google TV to a standard HDTV was literally like implanting a brain into the TV. In some aspects, it reminds me of the old PC days whereas the TV has become just a monitor again. Following a spent with this device hooked up in my bedroom, it only seemed fitting that I purchase another unit for our main entertainment center before the sale ended, which I did. My plasma in the living room was quite the opposite of the TV in my bedroom and I purchased it only 6 months ago. Unfortunately I paid extra to have a “wifi enabled” tv with apps on board and I only say unfortunate, because those apps and features will never be used again now that Android has taken a firm position in my living room. Unlike video game systems, you don’t just go back to older versions of windows on you PC to re-live the nostalgia. For me, I won’t be going back to the pre-installed junk on my plasma just for fun. It is with a sad bit irony that I can state, my 6 month old smart tv has become obsolete due to a product produced well over a year old. Figure that one out.

So what is it that is so great about Google TV? Where is all the magic in this little box? How did I fall in love with it? Google TV is so much more than just adding a browser to a TV with some hokey apps, much more. I am reminded of back in the day when they first added the interactive guide to cable? For you Gen Y and whatever, younger people since then, we used to have to purchase a TV guide or go to a special channel to see what was upcoming on cable back in the day, there was no interactive guide. Before you ask why we didn’t just use the web, it was because we couldn’t constantly tie up the phone line just to check AOL and Netscape, but let’s keep this story on track. The guide used to just scroll endlessly with an infomercial in the upper corner selling a 50 pack of hunting knives, or whatever, while you waited for your favorite channels to scroll by. If you missed your channel, you had to sit through all 700 channels again or you could just start surfing. Well, at some point, in the late 90s I think, our cable boxes got smarter and they added an interactive guide to them. (This time also marked the death of the little black boxes when everything went digital.) The guide was a huge step forward and while may not seem like a revolutionary thing now, take yours away and you will see how handicapped our cable boxes used to be. It is in this same fashion that Google is going to make its way into our living rooms. Google TV adds a diverse amount of function to everything I have in my entertainment center and it seems very natural in its place with my other components. When using the device, it is almost like adding a perfect functioning skin onto your basic TV. I have come to realize that this is what Blur, Whiz, and Sense are all trying to do. I said trying. keep up with me.) Google TV changes things from just letting me watch my TV, to actually using my TV. From the customizable wallpaper and app drawer, all the way down to the way it communicates with my cable box, receiver, TV, and home server, the integration is seamless.

It also happens to be user friendly for all levels. Using a media player connected to my TV that has every codec known to man, all the way to a search engine that finds what I want to watch by searching live TV, future TV, Netflix, Amazon Video, YouTube, the Web, and even Google Rentals, there is never an excuse for not being able to find my favorite shows. For something that just was opened to the market a few months ago, there is enough to keep you entertained and informed for now and I find myself not spending as much time with the browser as I initially thought I would. I have a tablet and laptop better suited for surfing the net and when it comes time to share on the big-screen, the Chrome to TV plug-in will really shine. In addition to the Chrome to TV plug-in, all android devices have various remote apps and several other items that make their use even more fun in the experience of it all.

In the short weeks I have owned my Google TV, I have not only grown to use it constantly, I truly have come to love it. It reminds me of the Christmas season just two years ago when my Verizon upgrade date was up on my Palm Treo and I had been following a small movement for a new line of smart-phones running off a new operating system made by Google. The search engine guys?!? I took the plunge and bought myself a Motorola Droid because the commercials and the web compelled me so much. (I even ponied up and got my wife an Eris. ha! Old joke if you are an OG D1 guy.) I really didn’t know what to expect from my Droid but I wanted to be “wowwed.” It was less than 24 hours later that I was officially at that state. I then began an endless pursuit to find out what I could do with this device and many nights were spent poking into forums and through youtube videos rooting, romming, and bricking my phone over and over again. (God I loved SBF.) Those old phone days are long gone but my new Google TV is giving me this same type of experience all over again. Just like in the beginning, I am still spending countless hours tinkering, reading and tweaking to get that
perfect experience. With a broader adoption of Google TV on the horizon, I can’t wait to see what unfolds.

Almost forgot to mention, I still haven’t bought a BluRay disk yet, not that anyone in my house has noticed.

This was a guest post written by DL reader Pakman2k.

Click here to view the embedded video.

Though the iPhone has been the Apple of countless eyes and ears for quite some time, T-Mobile’s 4G Android-Powered Smartphones are quickly streaming into view.

And these smartphones aren’t satisfied with just keeping up. Sure, the iPhone 4S is fast, sleek, competent and stylish, and many swooned at its release as they will at the next Apple product introduction. However, T-Mobile’s newest 4G smartphones are loaded with features sure to leave iPhone users feeling like they’ve got nothing more than a core.

T-Mobile’s max theoretical data download speed clocks in at a lightning quick 42 Mbps, compared to the iPhone’s max theoretical speed of 14.4 Mbps. (This is possible because of currently being America’s largest 4G network.)

Equipped with a Qualcomm® Snapdragon™ S3 Processor that’s got a 1.5 GHz dual-core CPU, T-Mobile’s Samsung Galaxy S II boasts a 4.52” Super AMOLED Plus screen, blazing fast Internet downloading that puts your home PC to shame, Google Voice Search capabilities for a truly hands-free experience, and access to T-Mobile’s best plan ever: subscribers get two lines – just $49.99 each – with unlimited data, talk and text and up to 2GB of high-speed data.

Smitten by the Samsung Galaxy S II? Encourage others to take a bite: share the latest video touting its dynamic qualities.

This is a sponsored post written by T-Mobile.

After yesterday’s piece by Ron on the idea that Android manufacturers need to slow down, we had another reader step up and put together a well-thought-out rebuttal. As a site that prides itself on having the greatest group of Android enthusiasts in the world, this is the type of stuff that solidifies that claim. Who else sees discussions turn into featured posts by readers? Let’s take a look at what Skipper K. has to say.

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Is Android coming at us too fast and too hard? Are we really better off with fewer handsets?

It’s been argued that Android manufacturers need to slow it way down. We’re inundated with new devices; it seems like every week there’s a shiny, brand-spankin-new model with iterative, minuscule feature updates. Even within the same make and model lineup one can get lost or left behind seemingly in an instant. Just look at your and my favourite device of all time: the OG Droid (don’t argue; it’s your favourite).

Ah, the OG. It’s been called the Droid, Droid 1, OG Droid, Sean Connery Droid, and Battlestar Galactica (OK, maybe I’m the only one who’s called it that). A ground breaking device in it’s day, it began to feel a little dated when the Droid X was released a scant 9 months later. And then the Droid 2 a month after that…and the Droid Pro the same month. Then the Droid 3, X2, Bionic, and now the RAZR. What’s next, the Droid X3.5 Halloween followed by the Droid X3.6 Thanksgiving Slide?  

We hear the same story from HTC, Samsung, LG; heck, even Sony Ericsson! Take them all together, and it feels like there’s a new device hitting daily. The phone you pre-ordered today is obsolete the day before it ships!

Slow down and take a breath there, turbo. What we need is a big heaping dose of perspective. Whereas this situation is fairly annoying to gadget bloggers who have to write about every device release imaginable and gadget enthusiasts who can’t seem to keep a single device for even half of their contract period (guilty), these two demographics are far from the targeted consumer. With the heroic rise in Android adoption over the past few years, I’m going to go out on a limb and say that Google, Moto, HTC, Sammy, and the rest of the gang have to be doing something right.

We, and the public at large, love Android for two major reasons: choice and openness. Openness doesn’t really play into the hardware refresh rate, so we’ll focus on choice. Want a 4G device? Long battery life? Killer screen? Slider QWERTY? Pico projector? 3D (all five of you)? Large screen? Small screen? Gaming? Rugged design? Business? Droid Does. Rather, Android does. All of it.

Not only will the dizzying pace of hardware development accommodate any taste or style, but it accommodates one other personalised factor: contract expiration. Unlike some companies with fruit logos and an outdated, child-like user interface (which shall remain nameless, like Voldemort), Android isn’t tied to a single hardware refresh per year. Combining this with the breakneck release fury of the manufacturers, this means that you can always be assured of having the option to purchase the latest and greatest handset within weeks of your renewal date. No paying for last year’s hardware with this year’s prices. If you want the best, you got it. Want to save some cash and still whip out a slate that makes applesauce out of the competition? There are plenty of slightly dusty but more than capable devices for that, too.

I can’t really see the downside. If it were a case of quality being sacrificed for quantity, there might be a point; but it’s not. Take, for instance, the Motorola Atrix. A knock-down, drag-out device of awesome when it was released (I won’t mention Blur), but a mere 8 months later and there’s already an upgrade: the Atrix 2 (I won’t mention the SGSII). It’s easy to look at this and cry foul at Moto; quantity over quality! But this begs the question: where’s the quality gap? The Atrix was a phenomenal device, and the Atrix 2 is even moreso. The Atrix 2 is hardly more than an iterative upgrade, to be sure, but it’s still an upgrade.

My point is this: releasing multiple hardware devices year round is nothing but good for the market. Smartphone growth is still soaring, and the market has yet to be saturated. If that’s the case, why wouldn’t we want to see an army of our favourite little green bots assaulting Verizon, AT&T, Sprint, T-Mobile, and Cricket stores every single month? More handsets means more developers and better apps, and the average consumer won’t care that the Droid Bionic they purchased isn’t as snazzy as the Droid RAZR, or that their Droid X might not get a timely update to IceCreamSandwich. We, the Geek Elite, are the only ones who bother about such things; and we should be happy to have so many devices over which to drool and lust!

I don’t know about the rest of you, but I have a Droid Life problem. I’m mashing refresh on Droid Life and Android Life all day waiting for some sort of news. Why should I complain when my proverbial cup runneth over?

Android isn’t like those other guys. They have their success plans, and we have ours. The last thing any of us want is for our beloved Android to morph into some hideous iVoldemort, and trying to artificially direct the organic flow of handset development will do just that. Choice is the beauty of Android, and manufacturers choose to develop a slue of handsets year round because, well, that’s what the market wants. Haven’t we had enough of companies dictating to the market what it should do? I, for one, am refreshed to see an ecosystem where it works the other way round.

I can almost see the comments now: But, but, locked bootloaders! Low end devices! Blur! No updates! Spare me. You and I both know that the general market doesn’t care about such things. To them, Ecalir, Gingerbread, and IceCreamSandwich are things that add fat to your
thighs and smiles to your faces. And for those of us who do care about Vanilla Android, OS updates, and the latest features?

‘Nuff said.

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As always, care to comment?

After seeing an opinion piece on smartphone pricing by Dan yesterday, followed by our report that the DROID RAZR may be $649 off contract, one of our readers wanted to express his thoughts on the matter. Are we more fortunate than most countries? Has the smartphone become so integrated into our lives that the higher prices are justified? Rob K weighs in.

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Smart phones are EXPENSIVE! And guess what, they always have been. The Palm Treo 700w (which I owned) was upwards of $620 off contract and a whopping $500 with 2-year agreement. That was in 2006, with a 2-year agreement!

What has changed since then? Well for starters we have Android and iOS, and phones have actually come down in price while improving dramatically. We have diverse hardware and software (for better or for worse). The cameras! The screens! The apps! I think we have it pretty good.  

Full retail aside (as I assume most people do wait until they have an upgrade), $200-$300 for a piece of hardware and software that will literally be used every single day for a considerable amount of time isn’t too bad. I would argue that we use our mobile phones comparatively more than both TVs and home computers. The phone goes in our pockets when we wake up in morning and is not departed from us until we go to sleep for the night (where it will then serve as our alarm clock and weather report as soon as we wake up). For some people I know, the mobile phone has replaced the need for a home computer. To drop more dough on that device seems fair.

Motorola Mobility (the smart phone arm) lost money last quarter on $2.1 billion in mobile device revenue. Although their financials don’t break out segment level gross margins, as a total company they were only making 25% on their devices, a far cry from the 100% touted in previous articles. That doesn’t include the fact that they have to advertise and research and develop new phones! At the end of the day they didn’t make a single cent. Now sure Motorola might just be a poorly run company, but the fact is that even Apple is only making 40% (total company, including Mac sales) before advertising and R&D and they are considered the king of mark-up.

We have to be thankful for subsidies. Some countries don’t get them. At the end of the day, people don’t switch carriers all that much. It’s a hassle. We have family plans. There’s mobile-to-mobile. The service of X carrier is better here. We rarely pay full retail. Only hardcore enthusiasts and those who have disposable income are doing that.

$300 for a brand new phone with top of the line hardware is $13/month over a 2 year agreement. You don’t get $13 worth of enjoyment out of that phone you have every month? Get a RAZR (circa 2004)…oh wait that cost $500 on 2-year contract with Cingular when it debuted.

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Thoughts?

This is a guest post written by @ronoffringa, a long time Droid Life reader and launcher aficionado.

There are a lot of third-party application launchers available for Android from GO Launcher EX to ADW to LauncherPro. Most Android users choose to go to a third party launcher to either get a stock look on their phone or just to customize it more. While my personal favorite launcher has always been LauncherPro (please no hate mail from ADW fans), the delays in an update to the rewrite of LauncherPro made me begin to look elsewhere for a new feel for my phone.

Launcher 7 is an attempt to replicate the simplicity of Windows Phone 7’s launcher on an Android device, and it does a great job. There are others out there (like Windows Phone Android), but Timo Kujala’s Launcher 7 easily takes the cake. From live tiles to widgets to transition animations, Launcher 7 is the way to go for someone who wants a simple launcher or who loves the look and feel of Windows Phone 7, but doesn’t want to leave the Android fold.  

The Set Up
When you first open Launcher 7 it gives you a default set of icons like Phone and Browser and then lists the rest of your applications to the next screen on the right, which can be accessed by swiping over or pressing the arrow. If there is an application that you want to add as a tile to the main screen, all you have to do is long press the application and a new screen will appear allowing you to customize the tile with whatever icon you want and how large you want the tile to be (1×1, 2×1). Launcher 7 comes with a set of white icons to use if you want to try and make each tile look as close as possible to WP7, or you can just use the application’s default icon.

Live Tiles
This is where Launcher 7 really shines over and against other WP7 launcher imitations. There are options for live tiles, like the calendar tile you see above. The calendar tile will cycle through your 24 hour events or display an event that is coming up that day. Another option for live tiles is a People tile, which displays pictures of your various contacts. For those familiar with WP7, you’ll recognize that these live tiles are straight from the WP7 launcher. While the options for these lives tiles are limited right now, there is a lot of potential to make the app even more like WP7 and then to expand beyond with custom live tiles.

Widgets
Recently, support for widgets has been added. As you can see from the images above, my battery percentage and weather forecast widgets fit right in with the rest of the tiles. Any widget can be added by pressing menu and then Add Widget. While there will be some limitations for which widgets can be added (mostly size), you shouldn’t have much trouble finding a way to get the information you need onto your main screen. The widgets update automatically and respond exactly how they would if they were on a normal Android launcher.

Wrap Up
Launcher 7 isn’t for everyone, but for people who love a simple experience and want access to their information and their applications quickly, Launcher 7 is worth a try. The dev doesn’t guarantee that the launcher will work on all phones, but a quick perusal of the comments will show that most phones handle the launcher just fine. It has easily replaced LauncherPro for me because of its simplicity. I’m by no means a lover of minimalism (I would pick Fancy or Beautiful Widgets clocks over any other clock), but with a busy schedule and a need to access things quickly and easily, Launcher 7 helps me get things done. Besides all of that functionality mumbo-jumbo, it’s fun to use. I find myself choosing to use Launcher 7 more and more because I enjoy the simple beauty that it offers.

You can find both a free version (with ads on your applications list page) and an ad-free paid version in the market. Even die hard fans of Launcher Pro and ADW should give this a shot – you may be pleasantly surprised.

Guest post written by Michael T, a self proclaimed “geek” with a passion for scanner radios and getting amazing nights of sleep using soothing jungle beats.  Oh, you can add guest posting to that list too.

I’m a bit of an insomniac, and always listen to something to put me to sleep. Typically it’s a podcast. My Droid would be a great sleep assistant if it would stop after a podcast ends. How cool would it be to set my Droid in its ezeStand, start a playlist, podcast or audio stream and set a sleep timer? Well, it’s very cool! MusicSleep is the solution. For $1.49, you’ll a get a sleep timer for almost any media player available. If you’ve got a player that’s not compatible, contact the developer and he’ll add it. I did this with Scanner Radio, and it took less than 24 hours for an update to be pushed to the market.

It’s very simple to use, simply start your preferred media player, and then open MusicSleep and set the timer. When the time is up, MusicSleep fades the media volume and closes the selected player.

Sweet dreams!

Price: $1.49

Download…

Guest post written by Michael T, a self proclaimed “geek” with a passion for amateur radio and scanner listening.  Oh, you can add guest posting to that list now.

I have always been a scanner radio listener, but I never thought my phone would satisfy this part of my inner-geek. I was wrong.

If you want to hear police radio chatter, there are few apps for that. However, Scanner Radio stands out because of its simplicity and speed. I can listen to the police in my hometown of 35,000 people in the middle of desert. If you’d like to hear something besides police, you can browse by genre, area or source. You can also search by location (menu or GPS).

It’s important to note that the developer doesn’t control what frequencies you can hear, this is a function of the sources. Currently Scanner Radio features feeds from LiveFireFeeds.com, RadioReference.com, RailroadRadio.net and Wunderground.com. So, asking for the developer to add the “Mayberry Sherriff” won’t help. Sorry, no Andy Griffith.

Still, the list of available frequencies (over 2,100) is quite impressive. You can listen to the Fire Department in Roswell, NM, the LAPD and many places in between.

This is a young app, and updates arrive every couple of days or so. Unlike many app updates though, there seems to be something new with each update. I am told by the developer that there will be an option to remove ads and the capability to add custom audio streams in the future.

If you like some of the other scanner apps, I highly recommend giving this one a try. If you’ve never listened in on America’s Finest, give it a try.

Best part, it’s free!

Download…

Download Link

Guest post written by Danny Darko, the craziest Droid maniac on the planet.  Danny is a technology freak who could bring to life a new piece of technology almost daily.  He may just be one of the most entertaining internet personalities I’ve ever met.  Enjoy his offerings!

Hello , my fellow Droiddicts!  First and foremost “thank you” to Kellex for hosting such an awesome blog where Droiders of all levels can enjoy all the fruits of the Android.  (Gotta love open source software.)  As a fellow Droider I am always looking for new and useful apps and the app that I am writing about today is called “Executive Assistant” by Appventive.

Executive Assistant is an all around app meaning it is a multi-purpose app.  There are up to 7 different widget variations with a very user friendly integration.  It has 5 functions by default, with 2 more as add-ons for social networking bringing the total to 7.  (Count kids, 7 functions, sweet? Right?)  And those 7 functions can be displayed 3 different ways:

1) Lock Screen (My personal choice.)
2) A Widget
3) Welcome Screen

Through those different displays, the functions are in order:  Phone, Gmail, Messaging, Feeds (Google Reader by default) and Calendar. You can even set each icon to have a preferred app for that specific function and also launch apps, return missed calls, check your voicemail, or even dial Google Voice.

You can leave a number in the app in case the phone is lost.  Whatever number you leave is displayed at the top of the lock screen stating, “If found Please Call 123-456-7890″ which I feel is a great plus. We all know how easy it is to lose your phone so, every little bit helps.

You can add Twitter and Facebook to the app, so that you can stay in touch with what’s happening in your world; never missing a beat. Just like the other functions you can set Twitter and Facebook to your preferred apps of choice. (Hootsuite baby!)

You can use this as a lock screen which does not wear on the battery as much as other lock screen applications do.  I have found no problems with battery life using the app in that capacity.

There is also a payed version of the app which is called Executive Assistant + which comes with some hidden features meaning they took the ads out of it.  So to sum it up this app treats you like an A-lister.  You will never have to use 7 different apps to keep your life up to date, again.  Go to the market and grab yourself a personal assistant “Executive style” and rock out with your assistant out.   Droooooiiiiiid#1

Download…

Download Link