Lets Find out Which is the best? There are many phones around the world which run on Android. But there are only some which are
Read more: http://www.goandroid.co.in/#ixzz1td0E6eCQ
With the launch of the much awaited Android 4.0 Ice cream sandwich operating environment for smartphones, the top mobile companies are cashing in on its hype by releasing their phones in the beaming market.
Tweet Its another wonderful morning here at Phandroid and after another 24 hours of bringing you the latest Android news and goodies, we’re left with – the other stuff. But don’t let “other stuff” fool you. We simply mean the items that for one reason or another, didn’t manage to grace our glorious front page. That doesn’t mean you wont find anything of interest, so feel free to sift through our selections and comment on the ones you found most interesting. Good night!
Tweet A few days ago, the Chinese HTC blog 911sniper that most HTC ROM leaks originate from posted images and a minimal amount of information on HTC’s 2 newest and mysterious devices: the Rider and the Kingdom. Not much was known about either, except that the Kingdom has a qHD (540x960px) resolution. Today, 911sniper gave birth to an actual ROM of the Kingdom, which cleared up quite a few things to us. Update: Porting of this ROM to the Desire HD is already in progress.
Analysis
After downloading the HTC Kingdom ROM and ripping it apart, there is no doubt in my mind that the Kingdom and the EVO 3D are one and the same, the Kingdom being EVO 3D’s codename. First of all, this is clearly a Sprint device. It is evident from the name of the ROM (Kingdom_Sprint_WWE…) and the fact that inside it contains references to WiMax all over the place. Going further, the qHD screen matches the one on the EVO 3D, and the only differences I can see are in the looks – 911′s device has "HTC" in the center with the circles around the buttons not visible, while our CTIA hands-on with the EVO 3D showed a slightly different picture. However, having differences between test and production devices is not unheard of.
Left: Kingdom; right: EVO 3D
Based on the build.prop file, we’re dealing with a Gingerbread build with a familiar build number GRI40 (Android 2.3.3) – htc_kingdom-userdebug 2.3.3 GRI40 eng.root.20110430.001439. If you remember, the EVO 3D comes with Gingerbread, so things check out here. Finally, there is an abundance of 3D apps in the leak, which may or may not point to a 3D-enabled device. It’s possible that these are just normal 3-dimensional apps visible without a 3D device, which is what we were all used to before glasses-free 3D came along. Specifically, they are:
com.htc.htcmsgwidgets3d.apk
HtcPhotoGridWidget3D.apk
htccalendarwidgets3d.apk
HtcFootprintsWidget3d.apk
HtcWeather3DWidget.apk
com.htc.FriendStream3DWidget.apk
htcbookmarkwidget3d.apk
htcmailwidgets3d.apk
htcwatchwidget3d.apk
com.htc.Sync3DWidget.apk
HtcClock3DWidget.apk
com.htc.Twitter3DWidget.apk
htccontactwidgets3D.apk
I think that the HTC Kingdom is the EVO 3D. I’d be surprised if HTC had an almost identical to the EVO 3D device, also on Sprint, in the works. Please prove me wrong if you see something I’ve missed. P.S. I’ve taken a look at the static and live wallpapers and disappointingly found pretty much nothing new. P.P.S. The HTC Rider ROM was leaked as well.
Download
Feel free to download and play with this ROM, eloquently named (with _ replaced by space for readability) Kingdom Sprint WWE 0.81.651.0 Radio 1.05.00.0429 NV SPCS 2.25 0429 PRL21078 test 188785.zip from the original link (very confusing and all in Chinese) or from the collection of faster mirrors I just uploaded. [source: Sniper]
We reported a little while ago about two things that are stirring up quite a ruckus in the digital world: The Android Market now has more free apps than its iOS counterpart, and that for the first time in a LONG time Android market share actually decreased slightly. As an Android user what does this mean for you?
More Free Apps: Anyone with half a brain knows that companies will play to their strong points. When the App Store had 10 times the amount of apps as The Market, Apple was quick to point it out (for proof, look at the press release of the iPad 2 and their comparison to Honeycomb). Now that Apple is losing ground (and quickly) in the number of apps, Apple likes to point out that people are happier with the quality of their apps (this, ironically coming before their announcement that they’re going to start “cleansing” the app store of “crappy” apps). While it’s no surprise that the App Store generally wins the award in the quality department, how much does that matter? Do you care if you get a slightly more polished game when you have to pay for it. Or does a slightly less perfect, free alternative suffice? A lot of iOS users were annoyed when they found out that Angry Birds was free on Android, but they had to pay .99 to get it for their iPhone (I can even recall a friend saying “why the heck can’t I have an app filled free version? They don’t bother me”). I think this is where the debate stems from, and where I think Android pulls away. Angry Birds looks just as good on my Evo as it does as my iTouch, and it actually plays slightly smoother on my Evo than it does on my iTouch. Some people may argue “well, not everyone can afford an Evo.” Well, people shouldn’t compare the iPhone to a cheap, $50 Android phone. That’s rather biased, don’t you think? When put up to the Android devices that compare with the iPhone, my experiences tell me that the games look just as good and play the same (and yes, games look better on a Super AMOLED screen than they do on a retina display). So if you take that out of the equation all you have let is options. You have the OPTION on Android to get an ad-free version for a price, or an ad filled version that’s free. Also, something a lot of people don’t realize, if you turn off mobile data and/or wifi you won’t get ads. So you can even get an ad free version without paying. Cool, huh? iOS developers know that a lot of buyers in that market will pay for their games so they don’t even offer an ad free version most of the time. The fundamental debate: Android has options, Apple is more polished but with a “take it as we give it” mentality. I personally prefer the Android approach, how about you? The other thing that people are having a cow about is that Android market share went down for the first time in nearly 2 years. It fell from 53% to 50%. All I have to say is, are you kidding me???? Why is this a big deal? Yeah, Apple supporters will likely rejoice at the idea that Android has plateaued, but if you think that you aren’t looking at things past the numbers. Now is the first time we’re seeing Verizon’s iPhone have an impact on Android. Did it dent the market share? Absolutely. Did people assume it would do so? Absolutely. Does this mean Apple will catch up now and Android will slip? Absolutely not. Look, Apple went up 9% and Android went down 3%. EVEN IF all of those 3% users jumped ship to the iPhone it wouldn’t account for another 6%. More than likely that 6% (and possibly more) came from the RIM users jumping ship like they’re on the Titanic and the fact that there are a lot of people who held out on smart phones waiting for the iPhone on Verizon. The Army decided that it was going to use Android for it’s units. Android is becoming more and more business friendly. And there’s that whole Honeycomb Table market that hasn’t even begun (who really thought that the XOOM was going to be super successful at that price?). Android has not stopped growing. Trust me, this war has many battles yet to be fought.
Tweet There is some rumors floating around that Verizon might be looking to block a popular wireless tethering app from the market. Apparently, Droid-life received a tip that Verizon was looking to squash the Wireless Tether app and then the publication started to look into that rumor. What the gang found was that, in fact, the Wireless Tether app wasn’t available from any of the phones it tested with.
Wireless Tether is listed on the market, but as you can see in the image above the list of devices that can’t use the app is huge. That is most of the popular Android smartphones that are unable to get the app. I think we can assume that what is going on; here is Verizon attempting to crack down on unofficial tethering in an effort to charge for official tethering and cut down on network use. AT&T has done this with the iPhone and has texted users to warn those using cracks to tether that they will be charged $25 monthly for using tethering. Once one carrier makes a move like this you can bet that others will follow. I would be surprised if all carriers aren’t moving to block unofficial tethering in short order. The Wireless Tether app is reportedly unavailable form devices on both AT&T and Verizon. Any T-Mobile or Sprint users who can find and use the app let us know.
The Eee Pad Transformer officially hit the market around the world late last month. We mentioned then that there were not many of the tablets in stock, especially in the US, with the launch mainly focusing on Europe. The available units were sold quickly at most of the retailers in the US, and many people were probably wondering exactly why the supply of the tablet was so low. Some may have figured that Asus was just taking it slow with their tablet to see what the demand was and perhaps to keep the demand for the tablet up.
Apparently, that isn’t the case. Netbooknews cites sources that claim that Asus is facing massive shortages of required hardware to build the Transformer and that shortage is only allowing the tablet to be built in very small quantities. Exactly what component is so limited is unknown at this point. However, it appears that it’s not a matter of the parts simply going to other companies, but rather the parts simply aren’t available at any price.
The limitations placed on Asus by parts shortages are reportedly limiting Asus to making a mere 10,000 Transformer tablets each month. Asus would like to be making 300,000 tablets per month. The sources claim that the bottlenecks are expected to last until mid-June. I don’t think it would surprise anyone to find out that ht shortages are due to the disaster in Japan. If you want a Transformer, buy it while you can, when you can. I expect prices of the available units might push up if demand remains high.
Nexus One owners, tonight you’re getting a nice treat in the form of the incremental Gingerbread update 2.3.4, previously available only to Nexus S owners. To recap, the main feature in this release is the video and audio enabled Google Talk, although since the N1 lacks a front-facing camera, it’s not going to be as useful as it was for the Nexus S. Update: Err, looks like there is no video or audio support in this release at all, according to those of you with Nexus Ones. Why Google didn’t just disable the phone’s camera and left it a one-way video and two-way audio is beyond me, but at this point you may as well try the Gtalk version that was extracted from the Nexus S for everyone with Gingerbread to play with. Additionally, the following issues should now be fixed:
Installation instructions Note: If you don’t have GRI40 (2.3.3) and instead somehow still have FRG83G (2.2.2), then head over here and install GRI40 first, then proceed below. To download and apply the update to your Nexus One manually, follow the following steps:
Download the update file GRJ22-from-GRI40 and rename it to update.zip (make sure it’s named update.zip and not update.zip.zip if you’re using Windows and have it set to hide file extensions).
Move the file to your SD card’s root using your favorite method – the easiest way is probably mounting the phone as disk using a USB cable.
Reboot your phone and when it starts booting back up, hold down the Power button and the Trackball.
Select Bootloader and then Recovery.
The phone will reboot into recovery but first it’ll show an exclamation point and a triangle. At this point, mash the Power and Volume Up buttons a few times until the recovery screen shows up.
Select Apply sdcard update.zip, which should start the update process.
You know how all the bigtime Android iterations are named after desserts? Do you also see how the titles of these deserts have been released in alphabetical order? These Android titles go like so: Cupcake, Donut, Eclair, Froyo, Gingerbread, and Honeycomb. This last version is the first tablet-specific version of Android and should, based on what we know at the moment, be considered as being developed aside from the main Android bloodline. That said, the next version’s name has been “leaked” by a Google developer by the name of Romain Guy: Ice Cream Sandwich.
See, I TOLD YOU man, I TOLD YOU. Actually Andy Rubin told you (sort of) back in January of this year in a conversation with Jason Kincaid. Have a look at that old post and continue on to the following: a code issue inside the subject of Gradients in Honeycomb. In this short and sweet conversation, official Android worker Romain Guy notes the following: “A bug fix will be provided in Ice Cream Sandwich.”
This changes everything! Actually it doesn’t really change anything, but it’s fun to know that the version of Android that will make some big strides to combine both versions of Android now has a sandwichy name. As Eric Schmidt said back at Mobile World Congress 2011: “We have OS called gingerbread for phones, we have an OS being previewed now for tablets called Honeycomb. The two of them… you can imagine the follow up will start with an I, be named after dessert, and will combine these two.”
Tasty enough? Totally tasty. Then of course there’s the most empirical evidence of all: if there were to be a giant Froyo sculpture out in front of the Googleplex and there were to be a giant dish of Ice Cream, there would be some confusion. If the Ice Cream is a big sandwich instead, all of that confusion just melts away like the tasty, tasty treat it is. ALSO, the hero image in this post comes from Google circa 2006. Still yummy.
Tweet With this step-by-step guide you can now convert your iPhone into a functional Android device and upload your favourite apps and widgets that you wanted to try out for a long time. However, few bugs and performance issues remain, making your phone work a little slow, but if that’s okay with you, then read on. Requirements:
First-generation iPhone/ iPhone 3G with firmware versions between 2.0 and 3.1.2, jailbroken with Redsn0w, Blacksn0w, or PwnageTool. If the software is already updated to 3.1.3/ 4.0 beta, use PwnageTool to create a jailbroken 3.1.2 .ipsw file to restore.
A 32-bit Linux system (Unbuntu) or virtual machine depending on the type of handset you own.
The iPhone OS 3.1.2 .ipsw file for your device, namely either iPhone1,1_3.1.2_7D11_Restore.ipsw or iPhone1,2_3.1.2_7D11_Restore.ipsw.
The firmware for the Marvell WLAN chip inside the iPhone- Visit URL > Choose your platform > Select Linux 2.6 – Fedora>Click the Search button underneath> Download file SD-8686-LINUX26-SYSKT-9.70.3.p24-26409.P45-GPL. You’ll obtain a file called SD-8686-LINUX26-SYSKT-9.70.3.p24-26409.P45-GPL.zip.
Instructions: Before starting the process, extract .ipsw file from the Marvell’s Website for multitouch and WLAN firmware for the iPhone. Step 1: On the Linux machine, create a folder “Firmware” in home directory. Step 2: Extract SD-8686-FEDORA26FC6-SYSKT-GPL-9.70.3.p24-26409.P45.tar from SD-8686-LINUX26-SYSKT-9.70.3.p24-26409.P45-GPL.zip to a temporary folder. Step 3: Extract FwImage/helper_sd.bin and FwImage/sd8686.bin from SD-8686-FEDORA26FC6-SYSKT-GPL-9.70.3.p24-26409.P45.tar and move them to ‘firmware’ folder. Step 4: Rename helper_sd.bin to sd8686_helper.bin. Now, you obtain WLAN firmware. Next we work over the multitouch firmware. Step 5: On the Linux machine, create a folder “idroid” in home directory. Extract utils/dripwn from the prebuilt tarball (downloaded .tar archive). Step 6: Copy 3.1.2 .ipsw file obtained from Apple’s Website into the ‘idroid’ folder as dripwn. Step 7: Begin a command-line shell (Terminal under Ubuntu) and navigate to the ‘idroid’ folder. Type cd ~/idroid. Step 8: Visit the page and copy the VFDecrypt key. Step 9: For 1st generation iPhone, type the following in the shell ./dripwn iPhone1,1_3.1.2_7D11_Restore.ipsw [the VFDecrypt key you copied] For iPhone 3G: ./dripwn iPhone1,2_3.1.2_7D11_Restore.ipsw [the VFDecrypt key you copied] Step 10: Upon execution of the command, zephyr_main.bin, zephyr_aspeed.bin, and zephyr2.bin is obtained in ‘idroid’ folder. Move these files into the ‘firmware’ folder. You now have all the files needed for Android, and you can begin installing it. Step 11: If you haven’t already, install the OpenSSH tool on iPhone via Cydia. Step 12: If you just installed OpenSSH, connect to your iPhone via SSH, log in as root with the password alpine, and change the password for root by typing passwd root. Then, enter passwd mobile to change the password for the mobile user. Step 13: Extract prebuilt/android.img.gz, prebuilt/cache.img, prebuilt/ramdisk.img, prebuilt/system.img, prebuilt/userdata.img, and zImage from the prebuilt tarball. Step 14: Use the ‘scp’ command or an SFTP client to upload all of these files into the /private/var folder on the iPhone. You can use these commands on Linux, if you wish to use scp. Assuming you’re in the same folder as the files, enter: scp android.img.gz root@[ip address of iPhone]:/private/var/ scp cache.img root@[ip address of iPhone]:/private/var/ scp ramdisk.img root@[ip address of iPhone]:/private/var/ scp system.img root@[ip address of iPhone]:/private/var/ scp userdata.img root@[ip address of iPhone]:/private/var/ scp zImage root@[ip address of iPhone]:/private/var/ Step 15: Using the SFTP client or scp, create a folder called firmware in the /private/var folder on the iPhone. Now, upload all the files from the ‘firmware’ folder. If the ‘firmware’ folder is inside the home directory, use the following command: scp -r ~/firmware/ root@[ip address of iPhone]:/private/var/firmware Step 16: Reboot iPhone. Check to ensure the files are still present after the reboot and that they all have the right sizes. An incorrect file size will not exactly match the source file size. Step 17: Extract utils/oibc, utils/loadibec, and prebuilt/openiboot.img3 from the prebuilt tarball into ‘idroid’ folder. Step 18: Shut down the iPhone and place it into Recovery Mode: With the iPhone powered off and plugged into the computer via USB, push Hold and Home simultaneously, and then let go of Hold after the backlight turns on. Continue holding Home until the ‘Connect to iTunes’ image appears on the screen. Step 19: Run the following commands in Terminal cd ~/idroid sudo ./loadibec openiboot.img3 The ‘openiboot’ boot menu should now appear! Step 20: Use either the volume-control buttons or the Hold button to select the second menu option, Console. Tap the Home button to launch it. A text-mode console should start running on the screen, ending with a ‘Welcome to openiboot’ message. Step 21: Type sudo ./oibc in Terminal. The same messages that appeared on the iPhone screen should now appear in Terminal. Create a backup of the NOR, if something goes wrong, your iPhone is safe. Step 22: Type nor_read 0×09000000 0×0 1048576 in Terminal/oibc. This will read the entire NOR into main memory. Step 23: Type ~norbackup.bin@0×09000000:1048576 in Terminal/oibc. A file will appear in the ‘idroid’ folder> norbackup.bin. Save it. The command uploads the NOR to the computer. After you make this backup, you are now free to modify the NOR. The next step installs OpeniBoot onto the NOR, supplanting the existing Apple iBoot bootloader. Step 24: Type install in Terminal/oibc. This process may take a few minutes. Wait until the installation-complete message appears. Step 25: Type reboot in Terminal/oibc and then exit by pressing Ctrl-C. The OpeniBoot menu should now pop whenever you boot your iPhone. You can uninstall OpeniBoot from oibc with the ‘uninstall’ command. Type help for a list of all OpeniBoot commands. You can still get into the iPhone OS’s recovery mode by holding down Home on the iPhone OS option in the menu until the ‘Connect to iTunes’ image appears. Use the OpeniBoot menu to boot Android by selecting that OS from the menu whenever you wish.
Most of us remember the hype surrounding RIM’s BlackBerry Playbook and how it’s QNX OS would allow users to load Android apps for use on the tablet. I know how excited some of my developer friends were about this possible new prospect. Given the similarities between Android’s Dalvik VM and RIM’s Java based system it seemed like an easy transition. However, the Playbook was eventually released without the touted Android capabilities to many people’s dismay. Fast forward to today where RIM announced the details of their new BlackBerry 7 OS and although many hoped it would offer some core features from the QNX operating system (Android app compatibility?) – it fell short. RIM officially confirmed today that there will be no Android apps (or even Flash for that matter) on the new soon to be released BlackBerry 7 OS update. However, Android apps aren’t entirely off the table just yet. According to RIM’s vice president of handheld software product management, Andrew Bocking, the new QNX OS may soon come to handhelds, the only problem is they will need to feature a dual-core processor which RIM doesn’t offer at the moment. He did mention they are hard at work on a more portable cellphone version of the OS and although nowhere near ready you can expect to hear more about it later this year. What do you guys think at the possibility of a BlackBerry phone running Android apps? Is this something you would be interested in? Or will it be shunned like an Android red-headed step child?
6:56 PM
Simranpal SIngh
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