January, 2012 - Android Community

Monthly Archive: May 2013

Galaxy Nexus Franco kernel shows us the need for speed, and great battery life

By Cory Gunther
on 30 Jan, 2012

Recently here at Android Community we've been enjoying many different kernels for the Galaxy Nexus and have even featured a few here in the recent past. While many are great and work well today we have what appears to be one of the absolute best at the moment. That is the Franco kernel. More details and impressions after the break.

Motorola DEFY MINI takes a stroll through the FCC with AT&T bands

By Michael Crider
on 30 Jan, 2012

Here's a surprising turn of events: Wireless Goodness spotted the cute 'lil DEFY MINI going through the FCC at the behest of Motorola. The budget phone was revealed early this year for various international markets, but we didn't think it would be headed to the US any time soon (at least not with the same branding). The wireless bands that the test phone was sporting point to an AT&T release - or not, since those are the same HSPA+bands that are used in many countries around the world. Manufacturers often send phones and tablets through the FCC as a formality to show off to prospective carriers, or on their way north to Canada.

Verizon Spectrum by LG Review

By Michael Crider
on 30 Jan, 2012

LG's Optimus LTE - which for the purposes of our American readers is known variously as the LG Nitro HD on AT&T and the Spectrum by LG on Verizon - is the company's current flagship. That puts carriers in an awkward position, since LG is definitely a second fiddle to the likes of Samsung, HTC and Motorola, at least here in the US. This being the case, Verizon prices the Spectrum at $199.99 on a two year contract, a full $100 less than HTC's Rezound, Samsung's Galaxy Nexus and Motorola's DROID RAZR/DROID RAZR MAXX. So, can you get a top-of-the-line smartphone for a mid-market price, or at least what's become mid-market on Big Red? Let's find out.

Samsung now offering unique personal engraving for Galaxy Note buyers

By Cory Gunther
on 30 Jan, 2012

Samsung is looking to take things up another notch and have introduced personal engraving options for their new and popular new Galaxy Note smartphone. According to Samsung's official Flickr page, buyers in South Korea can now get personalized custom engraving with their purchased from now until March 31st at select Samsung locations. Nice touch Samsung!

New Galaxy Nexus spotted in Benchmark tests

By Cory Gunther
on 30 Jan, 2012

For now we are going to chalk this up as just a rumor or most likely some spoofed information. What we are seeing is apparently some benchmarks ran of the popular NenaMark2 suite. What makes this unique is the device is being listed as the Samsung Galaxy Nexus -- only with a new TI OMAP 4470 processor with much, much better graphics and a possible speed of around 1.8 GHz. Interesting indeed. Is Samsung about to pull a Motorola and drop another device so soon?

Official Android Developers now on Google+

By Cory Gunther
on 30 Jan, 2012

Android and Google just keep getting more and more social. After making an official Twitter and Google+ page late last year they are back and now have an official social page for all things Android Development. The Android dev team now has a dedicated social space for developers to meet, share, learn, and connect with one another.

Qualcomm AllJoyn peer-to-peer gaming and sharing hands-on

By Cory Gunther
on 30 Jan, 2012

Earlier this month we were able to get a first hand look at an impressive technology from Qualcomm called AllJoyn. What is AllJoyn you ask? A peer-to-peer proximity based gaming, streaming, and sharing technology between devices such as Android phones and tablets. This makes device-to-device communication easy and simple for games, music, and anything else you can think of. Check out all our hands-on videos from CES 2012 below.

Samsung Galaxy Note LTE heading to Rogers in February too

By Cory Gunther
on 30 Jan, 2012

The Samsung Galaxy Note has been in the news plenty as of late, and we'll be seeing more soon with AT&T and now Rogers both getting a 4G LTE version coming next month. While we got our first look at the LTE model back at CES, Rogers official blog RedBoard has just outed they'll be getting the 5.3" phone/tablet hybrid too.

Lenovo promises Ice Cream Sandwich update for ThinkPad Tablet in Q2

By Michael Crider
on 30 Jan, 2012

Lenovo's got some pretty exciting things lined up for 2012 as far as Android hardware goes, but apparently they haven't forgot about users of their buttoned-down ThinkPad tablet. ITWorld reports that the company has committed to upgrading the Honeycomb tablet to Ice Cream Sandwich some time in the second quarter of this year. Specific dates weren't given, but the should put the release at somewhere between 2 and 5 months from now, barring and delays.

Astdroid project helps your phone navigate in low Earth orbit [UPDATE]

By Michael Crider
on 30 Jan, 2012

We've seen Android slip the surly bonds of Earth to touch the face of God (or at least slip past the upper sections of the atmosphere) before, but at least one developer wants to make it an everyday occurrence. Various weather balloon and rocket delivery systems from students and hobbyists have given us dirst-cheap photos and videos of the Earth in the last few years (including this nifty Lego-themed project from Canada) and Denver-based developer Danny Pier thinks the whole process can be streamlined with an Android phone. To that end, he's developing an app that will record pictures and video as well as GPS information in an all-in-one package.