HTC Desire Gingerbread update is now coming, says HTC

HTC has confirmed that Android Gingerbread will no be coming to the HTC Desire, despite claiming yesterday that the device didn’t have enough juice for it

n a bizarre turn of events, HTC has now re-confirmed that its HTC Desire handset will indeed be getting updated to Android Gingerbread, despite claiming yesterday that the handset didn’t have enough memory to run both Gingerbread and Sense.

At least, that was the case. Now, it’s no longer true – Android 2.3 is coming to the HTC Desire. But how is HTC going to achieve this? Didn’t it just say the Desire doesn’t have the internals for Android 2.3?

Simple, HTC is going to make some choice tweaks and amendments – AKA: cuts – to the update so that it’ll suit the Desire’s RAM capabilities.

Here’s the new official line, again via HTC’s Facebook page:

‘To resolve Desire’s memory issue and enable the upgrade to Gingerbread, we will cut select apps from the release. Look for status updates starting next week. We apologize for any confusion.’

But what will these cuts be? Where will they be implemented? And what kind of affect will it have on the Desire? Pocket-Lint is pretty worried about this, and rightly so too.

At present, no one knows. So what’s a Desire user to do? Well, we’d say wait and see how the update turns out (cuts-an-all) before you rush out and get the update. That way, you can see what the pros and cons are and, most importantly, what kind of cuts HTC has made.

Granted this will be quite annoying, especially if you’ve been dying to get Android 2.3 on your Desire, but it’s definitely the sensible approach. After all, you don’t want to turn your HTC Desire into a HTC Hero – Android 2.3 ain’t worth that.

by knowyourmobile.com

HTC unveils the Legend

The HTC Legend, which runs the latest Android software called Eclair, is made from a single block of aluminium and has a very bright and clear 3.2 inch AMOLED (ultra-bright LED) display. Vodafone has grabbed the handset in Europe, wary of losing out after missing the iPhone in some of the company’s key European markets.

The Legend will come to the UK in April and already analysts are predicting that it will be a design classic following its launch at Mobile World Congress in Barcelona.

“Legend’s clever use of milled aluminium casing could scoop Apple’s direction for the next iPhone design,” said CCS Insight.

Despite its body being engineered from a single piece of aluminium, the HTC Legend has a removable battery – something which the iPhone conspicuously lacks – which slides out from a compartment at the bottom of the phone. The back of the battery casing also contains the phone’s antenna so that its metal body does not hinder signal strength.

HTC has updated the user face – called HTC Sense – that sits atop Android on the device. Alongside refinements to the phone’s address book, so that contacts can be organised into groups such as business contacts and friends, it pulls information from social networking sites such as Facebook and Twitter into a single Friend Stream of updates.

The Android platform has been the making of HTC. It created the first phone, the G1, using the software, while the Legend is the new version of another successful Android phone, the Hero. The Legend, however, has a rather less intrusive “chin” at the bottom of the device than the Hero.

Alongside it, HTC also unveiled the HTC Desire, which also uses HTC Sense. It had previously been codenamed the HTC Bravo and several UK operators have been vying to get hold of it as it is essentially the same as Google’s own Nexus One device, which HTC also produced. However, it has an optical trackpad rather than a roller ball, and is understood to be cheaper than the Google device.

HTC Unleashes Desire

HTC, maker of Google ’s Nexus One , unveiled a new handset dubbed the Desire — which looks a lot like the Nexus One.

The device, shown Tuesday at Barcelona’s Mobile World Congress, is, like the Nexus One, an Android smart phone with 3G connectivity. It lacks a trackball, instead using an optical trackpad — a tweak that could make the new phone less tactile when users try to navigate through its menus.

HTC’s Desire is also different in that it will has a “sense ” display, a custom Android user interface sporting a new “leap” function that allows users to view different home screens at the same time by one pinch. The new phone has also a new “friend stream” feature which keeps social-networking updates in one list.

The Desire joins other HTC Android phones, including the myTouch 3G, sold by T-Mobile USA, and the Droid Eris, sold by Verizon Wireless.

In terms of specs, the Desire, like the Nexus One, includes a 3.7-inch multi-touch screen, a 1GHz Snapdragon processor, and the Android 2.1 operating system . It comes with 512 megabyte ROM and 576 megabyte RAM (the Nexus One has 512 megabyte RAM).

The Desire won’t be available in the U.S. anytime soon. It will, however, be launched through T-Mobile, a unit of Deutsche Telekom, in Europe and Asia in the second quarter.

Gizmodo already made a bold statement about the new phone , calling it “a real iPhone contender in 2010, no matter what Steve Jobs brings out later this year.”

Along with the Desire, HTC launched two other devices — HTC Legend and HTC HD Mini.

Next version of Nexus will be enterprise phone

Google Inc executive Andy Rubin said on Friday that the next version of the Nexus One phone, which was made by HTC Corp, will be for enterprise users and might have a physical keyboard.

Such a device could potentially pose a competitive threat to BlackBerry maker Research In Motion, which has a strong position in the enterprise cellphone market.

Rubin, the brains behind Google’s Android operating system, made the comment during an interview with Wall Street Journal’s Walt Mossberg at an event hosted by the newspaper.

The comment followed Google’s announcement earlier this week that it would sell phones direct to consumers via its website.

Google removes banking apps from Android Marketplace

A programmer who goes by the nickname “09Droid” has just illuminated security concerns sure to come into sharper focus as tech and financial services corporations move to popularize mobile device banking.

Antivirus supplier F-Secure says 09Droid offered more than 50 mobile banking applications for sale through Google’s Android Marketplace, the app store for smartphones based on the Android operating system. Google pulled the apps on Monday. Several banking firms included in 09Droid’s apps issued warnings for their patrons not to use them.

F-Secure Chief Research Officer Mikko Hypponen says no one in the security community had a chance to reverse engineer 09Droid’s first-of-its-kind banking app, so it could simply be a program that redirected users to the bank’s online website.

On the other hand, 09Droid could have rather easily programmed in stealthy code to silently steal account log-ins. The programmer did sell some number of apps prior to Google yanking them. Hypponen notes that Android apps do not go through an approval process akin to the certification process required of apps made available through the iPhone App Store or through Signed by Symbian programs.

As a rule of thumb, he recommends avoiding any third-party banking apps on any platform unless you know for certain it is expressly approved by your bank. To date, F-Secure has not seen any malicious apps sold through iPhone App Store, Palm App Catalog, BlackBerry App World or Windows Mobile Marketplace. However, the security company has seen the “Signed by Symbian” certification process subverted a couple of times.

New Google Phone?

A Google company blog post over the weekend raised questions as to whether a new phone being tested by Google employees is just a way for employees to improve upon the Android operating system or is an actual prototype that will be released in 2010.

Numerous sources online have reported the device’s existence, including photos of a handset that resembles a cross between the HTC Hero and Passion, running Android 2.1. Few specs for the Nexus One are known; however, most reports suggest that the phone is an unlocked GSM device that will sell directly to consumers. Additionally, HTC has filed a report for the Nexus One with the FCC.

Ken Hyers, senior analyst for Technology Business Research, questions the logic of a solely Google-branded device. “What I find fascinating is the idea that they are just on the cusp of some really good success and now they’re going to go and compete with their own partners. I don’t think it’s wise,” Hyers said.

Hyers said that Google may see an opportunity to develop a device that connects to all of Google’s applications and services. However, he still finds the idea full of holes. “The great thing about an unlocked GSM phone is that you can take it anywhere. However, Nokia’s tried that in the United States and failed miserably,” he said.

“Nokia has had great success with the unlocked model in Europe. So maybe we shouldn’t look at this strictly from a U.S. viewpoint,” he said, noting that if the device is being developed for an international market, it would not be in direct U.S. competition with Google partners such as Motorola and HTC.

Sprint to offer HTC Hero

Sprint will be getting the highly anticipated Android-based HTC Hero, sans the quirky form factor with which the device debuted in Europe with T-Mobile and Orange.

According to a press release, the Sprint Hero will be available at all Sprint retail locations and online beginning Oct. 11 for $179.99 after a $50 instant savings and a $100 mail-in rebate with a two-year service agreement. Pre-registration begins today online.

From pictures provided by Sprint, the U.S. version of the Hero does not appear to take the device’s European form factor, which included a unique beveled mouth piece.

European & US HTC HeroRoger Entner, senior vice president of the communications sector for Nielsen IAG, said the U.S. version is a great improvement. “I have no idea why it was left out, but they got rid of a great big wart,” Entner said. “Ideally, you want to keep it flat. That bevel on the European version was just an admission that they couldn’t get the mic and voice quality right.”

Enter said the quality of the recent wave of Android phones has produced some possible competitors to the iPhone. “We’ll see if they’re competitive with the iPhone. They should come pretty close,” Enter said, adding: “Hopefully it means less iPhone envy on Captiol Hill.”

The HTC Hero features an integrated 5 MP camera and camcorder, Bluetooth 2.0, GPS, Wi-Fi, exapandable microSD slot up to 32 GB and integrated Facebook, Twitter and Flikr.

Including the Hero, Palm Pre and BlackBerry Tour, Sprint now has three high-profile smartphone devices on its network. The carrier also offers what is considered one of the cheapest rate plans on the market. Sprint’s Simply Everything plan provides unlimited nationwide calling, texting, e-mail, data and navigation for $99.99 per month.

Chrome OS and Android may “merge” into one in the future.

+ = ?

Speaking at a press conference this week, ostensibly to discuss the new netbook platform but which covered various points of Google’s business, Schmidt and company founders Sergey Brin and Larry Page discussed the open-nature of the new platform. While in their initial blog post about Chrome OS they indicated that it and Android would remain separate, and that “choice will drive innovation for the benefit of everyone, including Google”, there now seems to be signs that the two will shift from parallel to integrated projects.

The trio also discussed the nature of open-source software and how they do not envisage Chrome OS as a direct competitor to Windows. In fact, Schmidt said, “Microsoft is welcome to put Internet Explorer on our operating system,” but that “it’s highly unlikely they would do it. They would have to port it and the port is not trivial … the ball is in their court.” Referring to Google’s well-known “do no evil” pledge, he highlighted the fact that because Chrome is open-source “even if we had an evil moment [to block out Microsoft], we would be unsuccessful.”

The first netbooks running Google Chrome OS are expected in the second half of 2010.

SonyEricsson plans and Android Phone

The rise of the Android continues, as Sony Ericsson and Nokia are both preparing Android-powered mobile phones. Pictures and details have leaked of a Sony Ericsson handset named Rachel, while The Guardian reports Nokia is planning to unveil a handset at the Nokia World conference in September.

The Sony Ericsson handset is codenamed Rachel, so expect legions of copycat haircuts on other phones. Or maybe it’s named after Rachael, the robotic love interest in Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep? and Blade Runner. Android, get it?

Rachel is built on Qualcomm Snapdragon QSD8250 platform, with a processor speed of up to 1GHz. If you want to stroke Rachel you’re in luck, as it’s reported to sport a giant 102mm (4-inch) touchscreen. It also includes an 8-megapixel camera complete with autofocus. More good news: there’s a 3.5mm headphone connector as well as the mini-USB port.

HTC is currently top droid with three phones, including the forthcoming Hero, wizardly Magic and the original G1. Other manufacturers appear to have been on a break from the Google operating system, but that’s set to change with the new phones from Son Eric, and possibly Nokia. Nokia has denied the rumour — after all the company has only recently launched its own app platform, the Ovi store. Meanwhile, Dell is rumoured to be developing an Android-based iPod touch-killer.

Also, possible SonyEricsson Android interface is spotted on unofficial SonyEricsson Blog:

Android 1.5 on the way

Well what do you know, the next release of the Android platform will not be Android 1.2, but Android 1.5.

An early-look Android 1.5 SDK (software development kit) has just been officially announced, and it’s now ready for all the developers out there who want to try it.

The Android 1.5 SDK is “based on the cupcake branch from the Android Open Source Project” and comes with Application Programming Interfaces (APIs) for several features, including soft keyboards, speech recognition, live folders and home screen widgets.

Of course, the APIs you’ll find in this particular Android 1.5 SDK are not finalized (since it’s an early-look version), so you should not release applications based on it.

It’s not clear yet when and how the 1.5 version of the OS will be available for the Android smartphones that are currently on the market.

However, if you want to download the early Android 1.5 SDK, you can get it from here.