Sony confirms Ice Cream Sandwich update for Tablet S, P

Sony has announced on its official support forum that it will indeed release the official Android 4.0 update for both the tablets. Company however did not give a specific time-frame, but considering company’s timeliness with the updates till now, we would them to release ICS around Feb/March.
Company had recently rolled out the second release of Android 3.2.1 on Tablet S. To remind you, Sony’s Honeycomb tablets come with dual core NVIDIA Tegra 2 processor, dual cameras and 1GB RAM on-board along with 9.4 inch (S) and dual 5.5 inch displays (P).
Here is company’s full statement:

Today we’re happy to confirm that an update to Android 4.0 will be available for Sony Tablet. Details including timing will be announced in due course, so please stay tuned.

via

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Xiaomi M2 specs rumored

Remember the Xiaomi phone that was recently spotted running Android Ice Cream Sandwich? Well it looks like the phone has got successor on its way. Rumored to be called the Xiaomi M2, the Android smartphone will have a 4.6″ display, a 2.5GHz CPU, 2.5GB of RAM, 32GB of storage, 5-megapixel front facing camera, 12-megapixel rear camera, and Ice Cream Sandwich. The phone is also estimated to have a very low price tag of $394 (2,499 Yuan). Now there’s no way to verify if these are the actual specs of the device, but if they are, we’re looking at a powerful smartphone. Quite hard to believe especially because of its low price tag. However if it turns out to be true, it’s going to be one device that we’re keen on getting our hands on. Stay tuned for more details.

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Dell partners with Chinese search engine Baidu for Streak Pro

Dell’s American Android ambitions may have soured after lackluster sales of the Streak 5 and Streak 7 tablets, but it’s more than willing to take advantage of the rapidly expanding Chinese market. Since Google’s ubiquitous presence isn’t nearly as ubiquitous across the Pacific, it’s partnering with search engine Baidu to deliver services to their latest creation, the Streak Pro. The phone will use the Baidu Yi platform, a fork of Gingerbread’s open-source code that remains compatible with Android apps. Dell has effectively ended its Android products in America after it stopped selling the Streak 7 tablet through T-Mobile earlier this month.

Dell is the first company to produce a Yi phone, though they’ve released more subtly modified Android phones in the territory in the past. And just because it’s releasing to a traditionally low-income market doesn’t mean it won’t be impressive: the Streak Pro is aiming for the growing high end with a 1.5Ghz dual-core processor, 4.3-inch Super AMOLED screen and qHD resolution. That’s enough to match most of the flagship phones in the US and Europe, and considerably more powerful than any ARM-based Dell products produced before.
Baidu apps are already commonplace on many Chinese Android smartphones, and the Yi platform will be an even greater integration with the company’s far-reaching services. It’s unclear how closely Yi will follow Android’s development path – they could simply update the modified Android code incrementally, as Barnes & Noble has done with its Nook tablets, or continue with independence development on their own. The latter seems unlikely, as apps published for Android would become increasingly nonfunctional the further that Yi’s code strays away from Android’s source. [via Engadget]

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Samsung Galaxy S II Duos Headed to China with Dual GSM/CDMA Support

After revealing a duo of dual-SIM handsets yesterday in the form of the Galaxy Y Duos and Galaxy Y Pro Duos, Samsung will add to their lineup of handsets with expanded radio capabilities. A new variation on the Samsung Galaxy S II is headed to China and will support both GSM and CDMA2000. The phone is known as — you guessed it — the Samsung Galaxy S II Duos. The specs largely mirror previous GS2 iterations and include a 1.2GHz dual-core CPU, 4.52-inch Super AMOLED Plus display, and 8MP camera with 1080p video recording. The phone ships with Android 2.3 but should be in line for an Ice Cream Sandwich update along with other members of the Galaxy S II roster. The world phone will be available from China Telecom.
[Samsung via GSMArena]

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Huawei Ascend 2 announced for US Cellular

If you’re in the market for a new low-end Android device because you’re new to the platform or you just need a temporary device until your next phone or you’re just broke, Huawei’s latest offering on US Cellular might fit the bill. Called the Huawei Ascend 2, this phone features a 3.5″ 320 x 480 display, a 5-megapixel camera, a 600MHz processor, Android 2.3, a preloaded 2GB microSD card and a 1,400mAh battery.
The phone will cost you nothing (after a $100 rebate) with a 2-year contract so it should be perfect for the reasons mentioned above. It’s no Android superphone, but the Ascend 2 isn’t too shabby-looking and if you’re not doing anything but basic smartphone tasks, it should be more than capable. Head over to US Cellular’s website for more details.

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Samsung Galaxy S III: Concept rendering or leak?

It seems that the folks down at Concept Phones received an email with images attached (as pictured above) of a device that the person claims to be the Samsung Galaxy S III. That person went on to list down the specs of the device which to be honest seemed a little too good (and slightly outrageous) to be true, but we’ll let you decide.
According to Ivan Ilchenko, the person who leaked/created the rendering, the photo appeared on Samsung’s official page in Russia as well as on Russia’s social network Vkontakte. The device apparently features a 5” HD Super AMOLED display and is “Universal” phone that runs on both Android 4.0 and Bada OS, while powered by a 1.5GHz quad-core Samsung Exynos 4412 processor with TouchWiz 5 as its UI of choice.
Other specs include a 12MP camera, a 2MP front-facing camera, 32GB/64GB internal storage and support for a microSDXC card slot, a stylus, 4G LTE support, NFC and even USB 3.0. Is such a device even possible? Personally I drew the line at dual booting Android and Bada, but either way we suggest taking this with a grain of salt for now. At the very least we’re left with a pretty decent rendering of what the Samsung Galaxy S III could look like.

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Sharp Launches Android 2.3 AQUOS Phone IS14H in Japan

Japan is getting another unique Android from Sharp, the AQUOS Phone IS14H .he phone feature a form factor one might more immediately associate with a feature phone, but aside from its slide-out numerical keypad little else is shared. The IS14H features android 2.3, a 3.7-inch qHD display, and 8MP camera capable of 720p HD recording. Other standard goodies such as WiFi, Bluetooth, and GPS are topped off with a few cherries, which include a 1seg TV tuner, NFC, and infrared blaster. In Japan the phone will be sold by KDDI au, and as with most Sharp devices we expect it to remain a regional release.
[via TechCrunch]

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Galaxy Tab and Galaxy S won’t get ICS updates, sky continues to be blue

Considering how hard it is to get Android manufacturers to update nearly new phones to the latest official software version, it should be no surprise that Samsung has declined to upgrade the Galaxy S line of smartphones and the original Galaxy Tab to Ice Cream Sandwich. The company confirmed the news on its Samsung Tomorrow (translated) blog, disappointing many and surprising few. If you can read Korean or make sense of the Google translation, it looks like TouchWiz is a primary culprit.

Samsung notes that unlike Nexus phones, the Galaxy S and Galaxy Tab require extra space for TouchWiz, video applications and carrier additions. There’s an obvious answer to that conundrum, Samsung, and it’s spelled A-O-S-P – just leave out the extra stuff that few are particularly fond of anyway, and you’ll be golden. But TouchWiz has become Samsung’s hallmark on the Android platform. It would be easy enough to send out a Galaxy S Ice Cream Sandwich ROM based on the software update now available for the near-identical Nexus S, but it appears that differentiation via TouchWiz is more conducive to “the best user experience”. It’s not especially good news, but at this point in Android’s evolution it’s unfortunately par for the course.
Of course, we would be lax in our editorial duties if we didn’t remind you that the carrier and manufacturer isn’t the only place to find software updates. Both the international version of the Galaxy S and the WiFi Galaxy Tab already have home-cooked Ice Cream Sandwich ROMs in the making, and they will probably only get better now that the Nexus S update is widely available. Official updates for the Galaxy S II and all the second generation versions of the Galaxy Tab should be ready by early next year. [via The Verge]

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HTC and their retailers win relief from IPCom

It looks like HTC’s streak of bad luck might only be a short term thing. Just yesterday we reported that patent firm IPCom sued about 100 retailers for continuing to sell HTC’s products even after the deadline, and in an effort to protect their products and their retailers went back to the courts to seek some form of relief.

According to the TaiwanEconomicNews, it seems that HTC was successful in seeking relief and the German courts have since issued an injunction against IPCom, basically telling them to stop harassing HTC’s retailers with lawsuits. We guess with the courts favoring HTC in this particular case, it seems that their workaround of IPCom’s patents must have been satisfactory enough for the court, even if IPCom doesn’t seem to think so.
Of course this could have gone the opposite direction. As we mentioned yesterday, HTC was liable for penalty if they were found guilty of contravening the court’s orders. The fine would have cost HTC €250,000 each time they were found guilty.

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