Verizon & Android news

[Bucknut24]

yea, this whole release for it has been a mess, been over at Droid Forums keeping up with everything, and its been giving me a headache, I have a feeling its been silent so they can please apple with their launch of the Iphone tomorrow


I was gonna pre order the TB at BB but the employees there were dumb as dirt, one of them didn't even know what carrier the Thunderbolt was for

 

[jwinslow]

HTC Thunderbolt exclusively hits Best Buy for $250 at launch, rooted prototype provides hope for full unlock

now, a Best Buy ad seems to clear most everything up. Like we'd originally heard, the 4.3-inch LTE smartphone will launch for $250 on a two-year contract -- or a wallet-crushing $750 without -- but the key ingredients here are three words at the very top. The Thunderbolt is apparently a "national retail exclusive" for Best Buy, which explains how the device could simultaneously face Verizon delays and yet come in for a Valentine's Day landing at the big box store.

You'll also note that the ad mentions Skype video and 4G mobile hotspot functionality

 

[Bucknut24]

I still don't believe they are releasing it on the 14th, no one has announced anything, and from reading around a lot of forums, it seems like BB has no idea, some are saying 14th (but they don't have the phones) some are saying the 17th, some are saying the 24th, and some are saying no clue

I think both BB&Vzn stores will have the TB on the 24th

 

[Bucknut24]

i really hate verizon right now, just release the damn thunderbolt

 

[CentralMOBuck]

http://www.cyanogenmod.com/devices

If you've got a rooted phone and cm7 is available for your phone I highly suggest checking it out.

 

[SloopyHangOn]

http://www.cyanogenmod.com/devices

If you've got a rooted phone and cm7 is available for your phone I highly suggest checking it out.

WOW.

I used Kangerade for a while and have most recently been using Lithium Mod, both JRummy roms, because while their features were not 100% what I wanted, they were far more aesthetically pleasing than any of the other roms, including Cyanogen.

CM7 on the other hand is outstanding. AND IT'S NOT EVEN ON A STABLE BUILD YET!

Aesthetically beautiful, with numerous visual options. Smooth as silk compared to many of the other roms I've tried. Uses the ADW launcher better than any roms I've tried. Has really nifty options for screen on/off animations that are added icing on the cake.

Wow. This is a phenomenal rom. Great call.

 

[CentralMOBuck]

WOW.

I used Kangerade for a while and have most recently been using Lithium Mod, both JRummy roms, because while their features were not 100% what I wanted, they were far more aesthetically pleasing than any of the other roms, including Cyanogen.

CM7 on the other hand is outstanding. AND IT'S NOT EVEN ON A STABLE BUILD YET!

Aesthetically beautiful, with numerous visual options. Smooth as silk compared to many of the other roms I've tried. Uses the ADW launcher better than any roms I've tried. Has really nifty options for screen on/off animations that are added icing on the cake.

Wow. This is a phenomenal rom. Great call.

Have you discovered the themes yet? If I had some time I'd try and make my own, it doesn't look that hard. Here's a badass theme. It installs just like any other apk, just download it to your sd card and install away. It's still in alpha, so it's not that polished. What phone are you using?

Honeycomb Theme

 

[SloopyHangOn]

Have you discovered the themes yet? If I had some time I'd try and make my own, it doesn't look that hard. Here's a badass theme. It installs just like any other apk, just download it to your sd card and install away. It's still in alpha, so it's not that polished. What phone are you using?

Honeycomb Theme

Moto One.

CM7 only has 3 themes stock on the M1, but I like the default one a lot.

 

[CentralMOBuck]

Moto One.

CM7 only has 3 themes stock on the M1, but I like the default one a lot.

That last link was to a theme you can install on your phone. It adds it to the list of themes that you can select from the Theme Manager. CM has been my favorite ROM ever. I've run a few different one's, but they've all been based off of CM. The only other one I've considered running was an MIUI rom which was a mixture of both android and ios. MIUI's music app is really clean. This link will download a zip file with the apk to install the app. Once you've got it unzipped on your computer just transfer it to your phone and install!

www.digitalstylewars.com/Downloads/MiuiMusic.apk.zip

 

[SloopyHangOn]

That last link was to a theme you can install on your phone. It adds it to the list of themes that you can select from the Theme Manager. CM has been my favorite ROM ever. I've run a few different one's, but they've all been based off of CM. The only other one I've considered running was an MIUI rom which was a mixture of both android and ios. MIUI's music app is really clean. This link will download a zip file with the apk to install the app. Once you've got it unzipped on your computer just transfer it to your phone and install!

www.digitalstylewars.com/Downloads/MiuiMusic.apk.zip

I did the first time.

I still like the look of the default CM7 theme, myself.

 

[Bucknut24]

went ahead and bought a X cause I got tired waiting for the Thunderbolt, and I figured for what I am going to use a smartphone for, its not worth it

lovin it so far

 

[jwinslow]

Confirmed: Verizon’s Samsung 4G LTE Android Will Be DROID-Branded [Samsung DROID Charge]

Verizon and Samsung still have yet to offiically announce this device with a name, but our earlier beliefs of it being DROID-branded seems to be true if this new promotional image is anything to go by. The name itself still hasn’t been confirmed, but Samsung DROID Charge has been thrown around for quite a while now and we won’t be surprised if and when that turns out to be it. Now we just need them to officially announce those details and a release date for the device. [via PocketNow]

PS: No, this is not the first n0n- Motorola Droid device with a Samsung Eye as others are suggesting. Verizon used an eye for the HTC Droid Incredible both in their marketing campaign and on the device itself. (The eye bootup animation was added in a later software upgrade.)

 

[jwinslow]

Rumor: HTC DROID Incredible, HTC Thunderbolt to Receive Gingerbread in Q2

The rumor mill is working hard today, it seems. The latest comes out of Droid-Life where a couple of their readers have heard that the HTC Thunderbolt and HTC Droid Incredible will both be receiving Android 2.3 sometime in Q2. (That starts in a few days.) Confirmation was given via emails sent from HTC reps to inquiring users so we can’t say this is 100% confirmed, but I see no good reason why you HTC fans on Verizon won’t be enjoying Gingerbread this Spring. [Droid-Life 1|2]

 

[jwinslow]

Live from Google IO Presser

Some details thus far:

And now on to music. "Today we're introducing music beta by Google." It's all cloud-based. "No wires, no painful syncing," direct slap at Apple and iTunes.

Create playlists online, and they instantly show up on all your devices. There are also auto-generated playlists called "instamix." It sounds basically like Pandora/Rdio/Genius. It's based on machine learning. The app connects to music in the cloud. "That means I'll never have to use a cable to add music again." (Eh. Technically you already did not. But making it easy is great, and having cloud access to your entire library is even better.) They also make songs available offline, based on recently played tracks, favorites, and selection.
The UI is really great. It has a list-driven portrait mode, or an album view mode. As soon as you sign into your Google account, all of your music just appears.

Starting today, users can rent movies from Android Market starting at $1.99 and stream them to devices. That's pretty damn big right there. 30 day rental period, with a 24 hour time frame to view the whole thing. (Same as Apple rentals, I think.)

OpenGL headtracking demo shows ability to track a Googler's head, eyes, nose and mouth. It lets you see what he's seeing, and on the flipside, manipulate facial features. A Kinnect-ish feature automatically swaps camera angles to follow voice. All of this will be available via APIs. This is kind of hard to describe, but the video is impressive.

Scrolling widgets can now be stretched horizontally or vertically. Android devices can act as a USB host. IT can support keyboards, joysticks, game controllers. There's a video of an XBOX controller hooked to a phone.

 

[jwinslow]

Google Music to stream 20,000 songs for free, official! (updated)

According to Rosenberg, "A couple of the major labels were less focused on the innovative vision that we put forward, and more interested in an unreasonable and unsustainable set of business terms." So, rather than putting the service on hold, Google will launch its music service with the ability to store up to 20,000 of your own uploaded songs for free which you can then stream over the web to your desktop or Android phone or tablet -- any device that supports Flash (don't worry iOS users, your time will come).

Amazon's service, by comparison, offers just 5GB of free storage for about 1,200 songs stored at a mediocre bitrate. Google will also best Amazon with a feature that automatically creates playlists. Google expects to roll out the service to its US users within "weeks" with Music Beta invites going out later today to Verizon Xoom owners (others will be able to sign up at music.google.com)

Note: only available in the US.