The European Commission has decreed that, from 1 March, you’ll get cut off after you’ve spent 50 on roaming, while T-Mobile and Orange have busted out some new EU data-roaming rates
If you’ve got a T-Mobile Pulse, Huawei is the company that built it — and it has plenty more Android-powered phones in store for us this year
Does your heart go boom for the T-Mobile Pulse Mini? It’s a cut-down version of the Pulse, sporting Android 2.1, if that helps
T-Mobile is sweeping out the cobwebs and bringing in new tariffs for its pay-monthy contracts, starting next month, which offer much more flexibility
The Samsung Galaxy Portal is the latest Android handset, available now from T-Mobile. Want to know more? Then don’t just stand there gawping, click the link! Hurray!
Another innovation is the Backtrack trackpad placed on the back of the display and accessible when the phone is flipped open, allowing you to navigate the Backflip’s UI (and potentially play games) without getting your fingers in the way of the screen. And speaking of the UI, it utilizes the social networking-centric MotoBlur overlay to the Android 1.5 OS that’s found on the current Motorola Cliq. Check out Electronista and MobileBurn for video demos.
–Agen G.N. Schmitz
It also runs the Android 2.1 operating system, which, according to Pocket-lint, adds “a few attractive UI changes including a choice of Live Wallpapers, with which you can interact; a change to a five screen homepage with short cuts; the removal of the slideout app menu for a rolling 3D interface and a more responsive on-screen keyboard.”
Of course, being a superphone, it runs on 3G networks–but not AT&T’s. The cellular radio inside the Nexus One is geared toward T-Mobile’s AWS-specific frequencies as well as 900/2100 MHz frequencies found outside the U.S. Thusly, while the GSM Nexus One will run on AT&T, it can only connect to the dial-up-like speeds of its EDGE data network. And the current unlocked version will not work currently on either Verizon Wireless or Sprint in the U.S.
Google will be selling the phone unlocked through its own portal for $530 (where you can add some personalized engraving to the back; see image at right) and it will also be available as a subsidized phone through T-Mobile first for $180. It will be added later in the spring to Verizon Wireless in the U.S. (via a special CDMA version of the Nexus One) as well as Vodafone in Europe (specific launch dates and pricing were not announced today). Of course, for those Verizon customers who can’t wait for the latest in Android goodness, there’s always the Motorola Droid, which will be getting an update to the 2.1 operating system soon.
Walt Mossberg has had his hands on a Nexus One for a couple weeks now, and he posts his first positive impressions over at All Things Digital:
The Nexus One finally has the right combination of hardware and software to give Android a champion that might attract more people away from their iconic iPhones and BlackBerrys. It has a larger screen than Apple’s phone, and is a bit thinner, narrower and lighter—if a tad longer. And it boasts a better camera and longer talk time between battery charges.
Also, because it will be available on the large, well-regarded Verizon 3G network, the Nexus One could tempt American iPhone users, tired of problems with AT&T, to switch.
A side note: While it’s true that I’m an Apple guy to the core (to the point where I get quite chuffed hearing my toddler announce that “the iPhone wins the race” in his imagined gadget races), there’s something to be said for Apple’s secrecy-fueled flair for the dramatic and its stagecraft when presenting new releases. I followed this morning’s official rollout of the Google Nexus One smartphone via Gizmodo and others, and was rather surprised at how lo-fi their presentation looked.
–Agen G.N. Schmitz
Earlier this week, Time Magazine announced their yearly Top Ten lists, and at the head of the gadget pack was quite a surprise. The Motorola/Verizon Droid was crowned as Top Gadget of the Year—no small feat—while the iPhone languished in the 4th place position. Thankfully, the editors Lev Grossman and Peter Ha, give us a little light into their reasoning:
The Droid is a hefty beast, a metal behemoth without the gloss and finish of the iPhone, but you don’t miss it. The Droid’s touchscreen is phenomenally sharp and vivid, it has an actual physical (not great, but good enough) keyboard, and best of all, the Droid is on Verizon’s best-of-breed 3G network. It’s Android’s first credible challenge to the iPhone.


How did the Droid de-throne the iPhone? Well, while much of the whole “iPhone killer” press is just clever media chatter, there’s something exciting about seeing a real competitor to the market that’s important to recognize. Since 2007, when the iPhone was first made available to the public, cell phone and smartphone manufacturers have also been scrambling to come up with something to compete. It’s never been a matter of getting the technology, necessarily; it’s been a matter of getting the whole package right, and impressing its viability upon the public. Still, very few have risen to the challenge, and certainly none have attracted the loyalty Apple seemingly had on day one.
But for the last half of the decade, while people were tripping over themselves and pledging their first born children to get iPhones, Android has steadily gained in reputation and promise. The first release of an Android phone, the G1 by T-Mobile, was a bit lackluster. Chalk it up to T-Mobile service and, in general, the clunky design. And, as CNET observed, even the new, second-generation Android phone MyTouch still leaves much to be desired with a variety of gaps in its design including the lack of “standard 3.5 millimeter headset jack, a file manager, and camera-editing options”.


So with T-Mobile still lagging behind, the buzz about a true “iPhone killer” (sometimes I feel like they’re talking about Highlanders and not cell phones) has been feverishly pointing toward the new Motorola Droid, partnering with Verizon Wireless. And the editors at Time may be right, albeit a little premature in their ruling.


While their marketing strategy is certainly nowhere near as slick as the Apple approach, Droid has cleverly combined a powerful name in the cell phone game, Motorola, with a certain geeky trendiness that’s likely to appeal to a larger audience. Before the iPhone, nothing was more visible than the Motorola RAZR. Forget if the interface was horrible, it came in silver and pink and just looked like it might have fallen off of a spaceship. (I lusted after one until I finally caved and bought one, only to be so disappointed with the UI that I abandoned it for my old phone)
But now there’s no worry about bad interface since the sleek Droids use Android 2.0. And for the many customers frustrated with AT&T and T-Mobile, combining forces with Verizon wireless is a stroke of genius. It may just prove to be that alchemical mix needed to rattle the Apple from the tree. Or at least make the tree rock enough to get them worried.
It’s no argument that the iPhone has forever changed the way that we think about and use our cell phones. But while it’s dominated the market for the last few years, it’s also done something else rather remarkable: it upped the ante. It’s exciting to see the innovation in other companies finally taking shape and to speculate about what the next decade may bring. Seeing how far Android has come in so few years is certainly refreshing.