Android Community

We’re Here: Amazon Kindle Fire Event
Amazon smartphone reportedly confirmed for debut tomorrow
Mysterious 5-inch HTC phablet leaks again
Eric Schmidt outs 1.3 Million Android activations daily, 500 million devices worldwide
Motorola DROID RAZR HD and MAXX HD Hands-on
Motorola DROID RAZR M Hands-on
Motorola announces DROID RAZR HD, RAZR MAXX HD, and RAZR M

Posted: 06 Sep 2012 10:37 AM PDT

We’re here live at the Amazon press event in Santa Monica, California, where the online giant plans to unveil their newest lineup of Android tablets. We’ve been speculating about what will be shown for weeks but in a matter of minutes they’ll be up on stage revealing it to everyone. There’s even talk of an Amazon Kindle smartphone.

If you haven’t been following the news lately, we’ve heard countless reports that Amazon will be sticking to their popular and successful 7-inch form factor and will be showing off at least two 7-inch Kindle Fire tablets. Previous reports suggested an improved model all around with a front facing camera, and Android 4.0 Ice Cream Sandwich covered in their own Kindle Fire skin.

Then talk of the original getting a slight software upgrade and possibly a price drop has been on the horizon for some time now. The most exciting possible news however, is that they’ll be showing off their new Kindle Fire Smartphone — although we have no clue what that will actually be named.

Sources yesterday suggested it isn’t quite finished so we’ll only be getting a sneak peak today of their new phone so we’ll just have to wait and see. Stay tuned for anything and everything Android related from Amazon later this afternoon.

Amazon smartphone reportedly confirmed for debut tomorrow

Posted: 05 Sep 2012 05:21 PM PDT

Amazon is getting ready to unleash a few new Android devices soon and will be unveiling them tomorrow in their press event. We’ve already seen countless reports of two Kindle Fire tablets but now the rumors are stirring up yet again regarding an Amazon Kindle Fire powered Android smartphone. Lets take a peek at the rumors below.

The folks from The Verge have been all over Kindle Fire leaks as of late, and apparently have someone close to the source feeding them some reliable information. We received our first look at the upcoming Kindle Fire 2 from these sources early last week. Now these same tipsters have apparently “confirmed” an Amazon Kindle Phone is currently in the works and will get announced tomorrow.

We are hearing this will run the Amazon Kindle Fire UI version of Android 4.0 Ice Cream Sandwich, and be split off from any real Google ties aside from running a heavily skinned version of Android. With Motorola announcing three new smartphones today, Nokia doing the same with the Lumia Windows Phone 8 series, and HTC having an announcement later this month it all makes sense for Amazon to reveal some details — even if the phone isn’t complete.

That’s right. Sources have confirmed the Kindle Phone is indeed real and currently under construction and not in the final stages. We’re hearing multiple reports that Amazon will be showing off this new device to the press tomorrow along with at least two new Kindle Fire Tablets and a few Kindle E-readers. Sources from The Verge reported that the phone is unfinished and will only get a very brief unveil to peak our interest.

With Nokia Maps replacing Google Maps, Amazon App Store replacing the Play Store and Amazon Cloud Player replacing Google Music can this compete in this tight market? We’d love to hear your thoughts. We’ll be live from the Amazon event to get all the details so stick around folks!

Mysterious 5-inch HTC phablet leaks again

Posted: 05 Sep 2012 03:16 PM PDT

Earlier this week we got our first glance at the upcoming and still very mysterious rumored 5-inch Galaxy Note rival from the folks at HTC. Fast forward a few days and now we are getting our third picture of the unknown handset only this time we can see that 5-inch screen in all it’s blurry glory. The photo surely isn’t clear — but we’ll take what we can get.

Over the past few months we’ve been hearing subtle rumors that HTC is planning an impressive 5-inch 1080p smartphone phablet to take on the competition from Samsung with their Galaxy Note II, as well as LG’s Optimus Vu. After a few leaks suggested the phone could head to Verizon we got a little excited.

Monday’s leak showed a rather large device that is most likely the rumored 5-inch smartphone with plenty of red accents like we’ve seen with recent HTC devices on Verizon like the Incredible. While that was the initial thought multiple other sites are stating this could be the tight lipped HTC One X+ we’ve heard a few rumors about in the recent past.

Whether this is a quad-core Tegra 3 packing One X+ boosted to 1.7 GHz like rumors have suggested, or the 5-inch HTC phablet we’ve been waiting for either way we want to know all the details — and soon. The folks from TechOrz managed to snag this front facing photo and are calling this the Endeavor C2, which would make it be a successor to the HTC One X, and not a 5-inch device. Either way we’ll be finding out more details soon, possibly at HTC’s event slated for later this month.

What do you guys think? Or is it too blurry to tell?

Eric Schmidt outs 1.3 Million Android activations daily, 500 million devices worldwide

Posted: 05 Sep 2012 02:44 PM PDT

Today during Motorola‘s announcement of a few new DROID RAZR HD smartphones for Verizon Wireless we received a few heartfelt words from Google’s own Eric Schmidt. Since Google’s now the proud owner of Motorola Mobility he took the stage to talk about the future, then talked Android numbers.

The staggering and simply amazing numbers you see above is what the number one mobile OS in the world if capable of. Put Android out for the masses and this is what you get it return. 1.3 million Android devices being activated each and every single day. That’s seriously quite impressive.

We’ve slowly seen this number climb from 500,000 to 800k and then a few months back it had passed the 1 million a day mark. Now just a few short months after Google IO and the activations daily are approaching 1.5 million a day. Schmidt then went on to blow our minds even more by stating that there is currently almost 500 million Android smartphones, tablets, and devices worldwide to this day. If that isn’t a serious rate of adoption I don’t know what is.

Eric Schmidt quickly took the time to talk Motorola, numbers, the future, and then finished by saying do the math! With Dennis Woodside here to take Motorola to the next step, and Google to continue to push the cutting edge with Android things should be exciting. The added bonus of Google and Motorola being one should only help these numbers continue to climb.

Motorola DROID RAZR HD and MAXX HD Hands-on

Posted: 05 Sep 2012 02:28 PM PDT

Motorola surprised everyone this morning when they announced not one DROID RAZR HD, but two. Just like the previous generation you’ll also get the RAZR MAXX HD option for those needing truly all day battery life and more. These impressive new 4.7-inch ICS smartphones were announced this morning and we’re taking a quick look on video below.

Yup, today Verizon kicked off the end of summer with three brand new Motorola DROID RAZR smartphones to grace their network. What we’re looking at below is their flagship model in the DROID RAZR HD and RAZR MAXX HD. Both of these smartphones are nearly identical like last years, only one offers a massive 3,300 mAh battery. Before we start with the videos lets take a look at the specs.

This truly shouldn’t be anything new as these phones have been leaked near a half a dozen times the past few months. Motorola didn’t really surprise us with anything and you have a 4.7-inch Super AMOLED HD display (1280 x 720p) with on-screen navigation keys, Android 4.0 Ice Cream Sandwich is on board for the official release although the models we are looking at have Jelly Bean. Motorola promises the update to Android 4.1 is coming soon.

Other specs to round out these phones is the popular 1.5 GHz dual-core Snapdragon S4 processor under the hood, 1GB of RAM, 32GB of internal storage, micro-SD and HDMI support, and of course Verizon 4G LTE. You have 8 megapixel rear shooters for the camera, VGA front for self portraits, and a few large batteries. Motorola chose a happy-medium 2,530 mAh for the regular RAZR HD — which should last you all day with ease. Then 3,300 mAh on the MAXX that gives you over 21 hours of talk time. Enough about specs though lets see these phones in the flesh.

Overall as you can tell the new RAZR lineup is extremely similar in all areas to the original. the Kevlar coating on the back has been slightly redesigned and now covers the entire device. The rounded off edges feel nice but the phone is still rather wide. Personally we like the more industrial design choice Motorola took with the new RAZR HD and find it quite pleasing to use and hold. Android 4.1 Jelly Bean while not final seems to be running quite amazing here so far.

With the RAZR HD being extremely thin still at 8.3mm and the RAZR MAXX only adding a millimeter or so to that these devices are super thin and lightweight while still remaining strong and durable thanks to the Kevlar. So far we like what Googlrola has done and hope for more good stuff to follow. These devices will ship later this year although no exact details were given, and they should be running Android 4.0 Ice Cream Sandwich out of the box.

Thoughts on the all new Motorola DROID RAZR line?

Motorola DROID RAZR M Hands-on

Posted: 05 Sep 2012 01:54 PM PDT

The newly announced Motorola DROID RAZR M might not be their new flagship smartphone, but we could certainly see it steal some of the sales. The RAZR M is an impressive budget smartphone from the folks at Motorola and Verizon — only it isn’t a budget device. It offers near top of the line specs for a great price. Lets take a look.

Announced earlier today alongside the new RAZR HD the RAZR M is a unique smartphone. It isn’t quite as nice as the new devices while slightly outpacing the older original RAZR in most categories. The specs were all leaked weeks ago and confirmed today but one more time before our quick video here’s the rundown, plus what makes the M special.

The RAZR M you’ll get the same 4.3-inch AMOLED qHD (960 x 540) resolution display as the original RAZR only in a smaller package. Motorola managed to make this nearly an edge-to-edge display device as we speculated on earlier this week. Running with Android 4.0 Ice Cream Sandwich (Jelly Bean coming soon) you have the popular Qualcomm 1.5 GHz dual-core Snapdragon S4 processor, 1GB of RAM, and 8GB of internal storage. The screen and built-in storage are its only downfalls though.

Other specs include a 2,000 mAh battery which is quite impressive for such a small device, and will offer awesome battery life better than the leading budget phones available. We also have an 8 megapixel camera and VGA front for video chat. All this is quite nice considering the RAZR M will only be $99 dollars. As far as hands-on and our first impressions — this device is rather nice. The design is a bit industrial with marks on the sides, but the display is awesome. Sadly it’s only qHD but having nearly no bezel around the device really makes it stand out during usage.

The device is one of the first to come with Google Chrome browser pre-installed out of the box and offers an exceptional browsing experience with the speed of Chrome and Verizon 4G LTE. The hardware has always been great from Motorola and this was no exception. The DROID RAZR M feels durable, well built, but has a slight industrial look to it. It should make tons of people proud especially for only $99 and a new 2-year contract. It’s available for pre-order starting today and will hit Verizon stores early next week. Who’s excited?

Motorola announces DROID RAZR HD, RAZR MAXX HD, and RAZR M

Posted: 05 Sep 2012 01:08 PM PDT

Today Motorola announced three new Android 4.0 Ice Cream Sandwich powered smartphones for Verizon Wireless at their press event in NYC this afternoon. Two were expected and one was somewhat a surprise. That being the RAZR MAXX HD. The DROID RAZR HD and RAZR M have leaked multiple time the last month, but rumors of a MAXX version were squashed long ago. Head down below for full details.

The Motorola DROID RAZR HD and DROID RAZR MAXX HD are a subtle yet much improved smartphone over their older counterparts. The original RAZR had a wide 4.3-inch screen of low resolution, and an aging processor powering Android. Today they’ve matched the top-tier crowd once again by announcing the all new RAZR HD complete with a 4.7-inch Super AMOLED HD display (1280 x 720p) and Android 4.0 Ice Cream Sandwich.

Just like previous models they are super RAZR-like thin, wrapped in Kevlar coating for superior protection while remaining lightweight, and are powered by Verizon 4G LTE. The regular RAZR HD comes in at just 8.3mm thin while the bigger brother in the MAXX is a respectable 9.4mm instead for the added battery under the hood. Full specs you ask? These devices are powered by the popular 1.5 GHz dual-core Qualcomm Snapdraon S4 processor, 1GB of RAM, 32GB of internal storage (with micro-SD support) 8 megapixel rear camera with LED flash, 1.3 VGA front for video chat, and run on Android 4.0 ICS. Motorola showed them off running Jelly Bean here today — so we can expect that update to arrive very soon. The devices however will launch with Ice Cream Sandwich. The RAZR HD gets a large happy-medium 2,530 mAh battery while again the RAZR MAXX is 3,300 mAh promising 21 hours of talk time, 13 hours of video playback or eight hours of continuous web browsing.

Then Motorola also announced the DROID RAZR M which has been receiving tons of play in the news as of late. This edge-to-edge display packing smartphone is smaller than the original RAZR while having the same size 4.3-inch qHD (960 x 540) AMOLED display. It is also powered by Android 4.0 Ice Cream Sandwich and the 1.5 GHz dual-core S4 processor as the others. We still have 1GB of RAM and an 8 megapixel camera but instead comes with 8GB of internal storage. This is Motorola’s new budget smartphone. It is available for pre-order starting today for only $99 with a new 2-year contract, and will hit the streets starting next week.

We have hands-on pictures and videos coming up in a matter of minutes thanks to our sister site SlashGear, so stay tuned for a quick peek at the all new DROID RAZR line for Verizon Wireless.