First HTC Rezound press shots leak ahead of NYC announcement

There’s no doubt in our minds that the New York City HTC event set for later today will see the arrival of the jumbo-sized HTC Rezound, but if you just can’t wait that long, take a gander at the photo below. It’s the rift official look we’ve had at the Verizon phone, courtesy of PocketNow. The shots line up with the numerous leaks of the Rezound (codenamed “Vigor”) in all its glory.

You can see that the Rezound takes a lot of design cues from the original DROID Incredible – that red ring on the speaker grill and camera lens probably extends inside as well, according to a leaked hands-on video. Check out those snazzy red capacitive buttons, t0o. They’re reminiscent of some of the Envy laptop models that HP released with red-on-black Beats branding, which you can see mirrored on the back of the phone. Unfortunately, we don’t know if the Rezound includes its wireless charging back plate by default or if it’ll be an add-on accessory.
Leaked specs for the Rezound point towards a 4.5-inch 720p screen, a 1.5 GHz processor and a 4G LTE connection, the latter of which these photos confirm. That makes the Rezound a match for the upcoming DROID RAZR and Galaxy Nexus on one spec or another, though unfortunately it will probably launch with Gingerbread. The phone is HTC’s first US device to take advantage of its Beats acquisition, and may or may not include a free pair of Beats earbuds. Leaked internal documents form Verizon point towards either November 10th or November 14th as a launch date,  with a retail price of $299 on-contract.
The HTC event starts at 5PM EST. Keep it here for the latest news.

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Samsung Galaxy Tab 7.0 Plus shipping early from Amazon, get one today

It looks like Amazon might have pulled the trigger a little early for this round of Samsung tablets. The brand new Samsung Galaxy Tab 7 Plus was made official by Sammy in late October but with a shipping and availability date of November 13th. Amazon has been offering pre-orders since early October and look to be shipping now, with overnight delivery available too — get yours tomorrow.

The Tab 7 Plus is the replacement for the original 7″ Galaxy Tab although this time we get Android 3.2 Honeycomb rather than Gingerbread, along with a beefed up dual-core processor and more. All the specs are listed in our device database graph below. We have a 7″ 1024 x 600 resolution display (no 1280×800 here sadly), with a 3MP camera on the rear and 2 up from for video chatting. All powered by a 1.2 GHz dual-core processor, 1GB of RAM, and like mentioned, Android 3.2 Honeycomb.

The new Tab 7 Plus comes in both 16GB and 32GB flavors and according to the picture above, and Amazon, are available right now and started shipping yesterday. Users should be receiving their orders any time now and overnight delivery is available for those interested. Pricing starts at $399 for the 16GB model, and $499 for 32GB respectively. Pricing sounds a little high if you ask me, especially with the Transformer and Kindle Fire pricing.
Either way this is one portable and powerful little tablet, and if the price is ok with you then I’d hurry and buy one because Amazon seems to be ready to roll already. Get your own ordered today by clicking here. Feel free to send us some pictures if you get one delivered today at tomorrow by hitting the TIP US link.

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Apple CEO dismisses Kindle Fire as “more Android fragmentation”

Never let ‘em see you sweat, huh Apple? In a recent interview with Apple CEO Tim Cook, a question was posed about the disruptive power of the Kindle Fire, which many see as the first tablet to pose a threat to the iPad due to its $199 price. Cook responded that the Fire simply represents more fragmentation, and that that will lead more consumers to Apple’s walled garden of hardware and software.

There’s a bit of an issue with Cook’s reasoning, however. One, Android software is thriving despite the fragmentation issue, largely because most apps released will work on Android hardware running 2.2 or later, now comprising more than 85% of the devices sold worldwide. And two, Amazon’s approach to the Kindle Fire is basically its own walled garden – a closed-off boutique of media and software that can only be purchased directly from the company. Sound familiar? Sure, it’s technically running Gingerbread, but how many of the hundreds of thousands of people who pre-ordered know that, and how many simply care that the Fire can get them movies, music, books and apps at less than half the price of the iPad?
Apple has already lost the battle in the smartphone market, and signs are appearing that their stranglehold on tablets might be slipping. Current estimates give Android 27% of worldwide tablet sales in Q3, to the iPad’s 67%. This isn’t the first time that Cook has been dismissive of Android on tablets either: back in January he called Android competitors “bizarre” and “vapor.” With Amazon expected to ship at least a quarter-million Kindle Fires on launch day, and a capability of delivering 5 million during the holidays, it’s easy to see why Cook might want to start engaging in a flame war with a soon-to-be rival.
Don’t worry, Apple – if you lose yet another mobile market to Android, you can always just sic the lawyers on Jeff Bezos.
[via SlashGear]

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Google Offers expands with new Android app

Google’s home-grown deal engine Google Offers is getting a mobile makeover. Google released its first official app for the service in the Android Market today, and you can download it now for free. The local-driven deal finder has been available for a while on the web and via an email list, but now you can get live updates sent directly to your phone. Keen-eyed readers will note that yet again the Ice Cream Sandwich interface makes an appearance, just like in recent updates to Google Reader and Google+.

Probably the most useful feature is the live update that appears in your status bar. It’s basically an alternative to Google Offers’ daily email, and should help some of us cut down on the volume in our Gmail accounts. Featured Offers and Recent offers are available, though it has to be said that the local listings aren’t nearly as comprehensive as Groupon or Living Social, which both offer their own local deal apps.
Upon installing, Google Offers immediately uses your location to recommend local deals. An integrated QR code reader will let you see if there’s a better price available online, and thankfully, you can disable the notifications if you want to browse deals passively. The app automatically keeps track of the offers you’ve redeemed in the “My Offers” section. Initial reviews are overwhelmingly positive, so why not give it a try – you’ve got nothing to lose but retail prices.

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Kobo Vox available now, beats Kindle Fire and Nook Color 2 to market

The e-reader tablet market that the original Nook Color opened up last year is about to explode, and dark horse Kobo doesn’t intend to linger around the starting gate. The company’s Kobo Vox reader, with a form factor and specs that fall roughly in line with Barnes & Noble and Amazon’s offerings, is available online at retailers across the U.S. and Canada. The Android Gingerbread based tablet is tied into the Kobo bookstore, and costs $199.99 – almost exactly the same price as the upcoming Kindle Fire.

Like its competitors, the Vox isn’t designed to light the world on fire with powerhouse specifications. A 7-inch, 1024 x 600 screen is optimized for book and periodical reading, while a modest 800Mhz processor and 512MB of RAM should cover basic web browsing and non-gaming apps well. Like its full-color competitors, the Vox has Wifi and no 3G connection. 8GB of storage will hold plenty of books, and if you fancy movies, music or extra apps a MicroSD card slot should have you covered. Kobo’s customizations to Gingerbread make it ineligible for the Android Market, but the company is claiming “Access to over 15,000 free apps” via its own custom app store.
Kobo is claiming that users will have “unencumbered access to Android 2.3,” with an emphasis on “Freedom”. Does that mean that third-party apps will be enabled via side-load? Will the Kobo’s source code become available any time soon? We’ve reached out to Kobo for clarification and are currently awaiting a response; we’ll be sure to let you know what they say. The Vox is available in black, pink, green and blue, but it looks like their online orders are backed up at the moment, and there’s currently a 5-day wait for shipment.
With Amazon’s Kindle Fire shipping out on November 15th and the Nook Color 2 announcement likely on the 7th, those looking for cheap, reader-specific Android tablets will soon be spoiled for choice.

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Microsoft provides justification for lawsuit against Android

According to statements released by a senior attorney being employed by Microsoft, the large number of patent related lawsuits between companies in the mobile industry is very understandable as it is caused by the nature of related laws in the United States. He suggested that the software giant will be expected to go on with its litigations against the Android mobile platform from Google. Microsoft’s deputy general counsel, Horacio Gutierrez, has told the media that the protection of patents is very necessary in the business. He stated that Microsoft already holds the patents for many features which add to the efficiency of smartphones, for using which Android should pay royalties to Microsoft.

The strong stance of Microsoft comes at a time when it is also signing agreements for licensing with Samsung and HTC, and in turn generating much more income from these deals than it does from its Windows Phone mobile OS. Very often, the legal battles related with patents are with the aim of striking such agreements, as most manufacturers would prefer to agree to licensing than shutting down the production of their devices altogether after injunctions and bans.

However, the instances of such legal recourses have increased many times during the last couple of years, which has prompted arguments over how the patent system affects the innovation and reforms in the market. Gutierrez categorically denied that Microsoft is waging a war against the Android platform, stating that the patent disputes take place when the involved technologies are extremely disruptive. He said that these cases are unique to the current time and situation and that the patent system in the US doesn’t need to be redone.

One of the possible solutions which have been proposed, the America Invents Act, is an attempt to cleanse the patent related regulations as it grants the rights of intellectual property on the basis of earliest filing rather than the first invention. This new Act in the federal jurisdiction might prevent some of the lawsuits from proceeding as the patent applications are speeded up by the law; however it is unlikely that it will keep the likes of Microsoft from pursuing lucrative rewards from patent litigations. Microsoft, being one of the biggest technology companies of the world, has a huge patent portfolio, thus manufacturers like HTC and Samsung agree to pay Microsoft settlements instead.

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Android’s US Market Share Nearing 50 percent in Latest Nielsen Report

Android continues to lead US smartphone market share, and the gap is growing according to the latest figures from Nielsen. For the third quarter of 2011 Android’s share reached 43 percent, up from 39 percent, compared to Apple’s 28 percent, which saw no change. Android saw its gains at the expense of RIM and Microsoft, whose dropping share combined for 25 percent of the smartphone market. Symbian and webOS featured such a small showing that Nielsen dumped them into the “other” category with 4 perent total share.
Nielsen reports 43 percent of all mobile phone users own a smartphone, with Apple ranking as the top vendor despite conflicting reports from other analytics firms.
[via Nielsen]

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XOOM 2 and XOOM 2 Media Edition tablets confirmed

Motorola’s much-rumored new tablets have been made official, in the UK at least, with the 10.1-inch Motorola XOOM 2 and 8.2-inch Motorola XOOM 2 Media Edition both being confirmed today. Each packing a 1.2GHz dual-core processor, splash-resilience and a pair of cameras – 1.3-megapixels upfront, 5-megapixels on the back – the only real disappointment is that they run Android 3.2 Honeycomb rather than 4.0 Ice Cream Sandwich.

Inside, each packs 1GB of RAM along with 16GB of storage. There are various preloaded business apps on the bigger tablet, while the Media Edition gets Motorola’s music/video streaming app preloaded. The Media Edition also boasts 178-degree viewing angles.
The XOOM 2 is 253.9 mm x 173.6 mm x 8.8 mm and 599g, 100g less than its first-gen predecessor, while the XOOM 2 Media Edition is 139 mm x 216 mm x 8.99 mm and 386g. Both have Gorilla Glass. No word on pricing, but they’ll each arrive in the UK midway through November.





[via SlashGear]

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PayPal may finally be coming to the Android Market

There are a lot of supporters, and to be fair, detractors, for PayPal. But since Android is all about choice, the lack thereof has irked the debit-card-toting masses behind the eBayer’s payment of choice for some time. But according to some of the folks at AndroidGuys, some code found in the latest Android Market indicates that the payment service will be added soon.

Rumblings of PayPal support have been running around the Android rumor mill for years, but so far, it’s been just that: rumor. Of course there’s the official PayPal app, and you can use PayPal for many in-app purchases, like ComiXology, but the addition to the Market could make paid apps a lot more accessible to international Android users, or those who just don’t want to sign up for yet another online payment system.
The code found in the Market app is certainly promising. It’s hard to imagine why Google would put it in there if they didn’t intend to use it, and soon. And it’s a bigger deal than you might realize – lots of contractors and online workers get most or all of their salary via PayPal, and official support would mean one less hoop for them to go through to get some app action. With Google expanding into book, movies and soon music, they might be eager to make paying as easy as possible.
[via Phandroid]

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