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HTC Jetstream review
When HTC entered the tablet game, it did so in reverse course. Where other manufacturers were jostling for elbow room in a 10-inch form factored world, the company opted for smaller, more familiar battleground, eschewing the rough-hewn Honeycomb OS for a Gingerbread-baked Sense overlay on the Flyer. Naturally, the time for that mini-slate to shine has come and gone. In its stead, we're treated to a flagship of sorts -- HTC's first 10-incher and AT&T's inaugural 4G LTE slate. Android 3.1 makes an appearance here, as does Sense 1.1 for tablets, but is the skinned experience really any different from the custom UX we've all come to love or hate on phones? Can the added Scribe pen functionality, repurposed here from its 7-inch brother, transform the Jetstream from third pillar offering to an always-on, on-the-go assistant? And will those newly hatched 700MHz speeds convince you to cough up for that weighty $700 price tag? Follow along past the break to see how it fared. %Gallery-137899%
Honey, at home: Philips urban beehive shrinks your ecological footprint, increases holes on belt
It's a first-world issue: running out of honey when we need just a little more to sweeten up that bowl of oatmeal or cup of coffee. What we need is a constant supply of the golden stuff, and Philips has thankfully come up with this urban beehive to provide precisely that. It's the latest addition to the company's germaphobe-unfriendly "microbial home" concept. The system is half flowerpot, half hive, with bees able to travel between flower pollination and your domestic honey factory their honeycomb house. Honey can be 'tapped' from the base, with a smoking system in place to "calm the bees" before opening the hive. Now, if Philips could fashion something to keep us in a constant supply of maple syrup, then maybe even bakery dreams have a future, after all. %Gallery-139021%
Samsung Galaxy Tab 8.9 review
What is the optimal size for a modern-day tablet? Is it 10 inches? Is it seven? Or, is it something smaller, like the economy-sized smartphone that is the Galaxy Note? We can't say for sure, but we surely can say that Samsung is as much in the dark as we are. Like a gadgety Goldilocks traipsing between an endless sea of options, that company seems completely unable to make up its mind, splitting niches into sub-niches and then cleaving those in twain again with a seemingly endless array of fractionally different tablets. Today we're looking at the Galaxy Tab 8.9. This powerful slate exists because, apparently, the Galaxy Tab 10.1 is too big and the Galaxy Tab 7.0 Plus is too small. Is the $449 8.9 just right, then? Read on to find out. %Gallery-138970%
Huawei MediaPad, Vision get priced in sterling, will arrive in UK within months
We're still awaiting further details on the MediaPad's stateside arrival, but Huawei has already spilled the beans for those on the other side of the Atlantic. At an event in London this week, the Chinese manufacturer confirmed that its seven-inch, Honeycomb-plated slate will arrive in the UK by early 2012, with prices for the WiFi only version starting at £275 (around $437). The company also took the opportunity to announce the arrival of its Vision smartphone, which will invade Britain sometime before Christmas. Huawei says it'll cost around £25 (about $40), once provider subsidies are accounted for, though specific operators won't be announced until early next year. Rest assured, we'll keep you up to date.
Acer Iconia Tab A200 leaves the FCC larger than expected
The consensus was that the Iconia Tab A200 would be the intermediate device 'twixt the 7-inch A100 and 10-inch A500 -- not so if the ruler-wavers at the FCC are doing their job properly. The schematic above shows a diagonal measurement of 29.6cm, around 11.65-inches. Given Acer's love of a thick bezel, it's safe to assume this will carry a 10-inch (or thereabouts) display. Now that it's been passed fit for human consumption (as much as you can with WiFi and Bluetooth, anyway), we should be hearing a lot more soon --including whether it'll be running Ice Cream Sandwich or disappointing us with yet more Honeycomb.
ASUS Eee Pad Transformer Prime: 10-inch Super IPS+ display, 12-hour battery and quad-core Tegra 3, ships in December for $499
For three weeks now, Android fans have been fidgeting impatiently. Specifically, ever since ASUS chairman Jonney Shih took the stage at last month's AsiaD conference and teased the next-gen Transformer tablet. Though he only gave us a quick glimpse, he recited a laundry list of specs: a 10.1-inch display, 8.3mm-thick body, mini-HDMI output, microSD slot and an update to Ice Cream Sandwich by the end of the year, if not sooner. Not to mention, it'll pack NVIDIA's hot-off-the-presses Tegra 3 SoC, making it the first-ever quad-core tablet. We knew this: we'd learn more on November 9th. Well, that day has come, and so have the juicy details. We just got word that the tablet will go on sale worldwide in December, starting at $499 with a beefy 32GB of storage, moving up to $599 for a 64GB model. (That signature keyboard dock you see up there will cost $149.) In addition to those basic specs Mr. Shih revealed last month, we now know this has a 1280 x 800, Super IPS+ Gorilla Glass display with a 178-degree viewing angle and a max brightness of 600 nits. It also packs 1GB of RAM, GPS, a gyroscope, SonicMaster audio and a 1.2 megapixel front-facing camera. Rounding out the list is an 8MP shooter with an auto-focusing f/2.4 lens and a back-illuminated CMOS sensor that captures 1080p video. Touch-to-focus is also an option here, and ASUS claims a 30 percent boost in color enhancement over competing tabs. As for battery life, we initially heard reports of 14.5-hour runtime, but ASUS is now saying the tablet alone can squeeze out 12 hours thanks to a 22Wh battery, and that the dock will add an additional six hours of juice. In addition, the slimmed-down, 1.2-pound dock brings all the other benefits the last-gen model offered, including a touchpad, USB 2.0 port and full-sized SD slot. Software-wise, it'll ship with Android 3.2 and apps such as SuperNote and Polaris Office, and we're told we'll learn more about that ICS update in "early December." In terms of design, you may have already noticed the Prime sports the same spun aluminum digs as the company's Zenbooks, though this is the first time we're seeing clear, close-up shots of it -- and in two colors, no less! At 8.3mm (0.33 inches) thick and 586 grams (1.29 pounds) without the dock, it's a smidge skinnier than the iPad 2 and Galaxy Tab 10.1, which means, unsurprisingly, that your old Transformer dock won't be compatible. Finally, ASUS coated both the display and metal cover with a hydro-oleophobic coating that makes it more fingerprint-resistant. For now, we've got photos below and if you can wait a few more weeks, we'll most definitely be putting this thing through its paces in a full review. And if you're looking for something a little less expensive, well, the original Transformer should be getting Ice Cream Sandwich soon, and we wouldn't be surprised if Santa brought a few holiday rebates. %Gallery-138833%
Four out of ten Androids prefer the taste of Gingerbread
Another month, another land-grab by Android's now-dominant Gingerbread iteration. According to the latest usage stats from its app market, the last smartphone-only version now lays claim to 44.4 percent of all Android phones. We'd put this down to continued efforts by the major phone manufacturers to deliver version 2.3 on their new phones, and not the often haphazard attempts at upgrading existing devices. Froyo, which took nine months to grab a majority share, still claws onto a 40.7 percent share, while Honeycomb on tablets (not included above) scrapes together just under two percent of the Android ecosystem. Hopefully ICS will bring harmony to all Google-powered devices, but it'll be a challenge to best version 2.x's high watermark -- it once captured 83 percent of everything Android. UPDATED: For those not in the know, these statistics come from the Android devices that accessed the app market in the latest two-week period.
T-Mobile to carry Samsung Galaxy Tab 7.0 Plus with 4G, available November 16th for $250
We were already expecting to see the WiFi-only version of the Samsung Galaxy Tab 7.0 Plus make its American debut on November 13th, but it may be worth waiting an extra three days if you'd like to have some good old-fashioned HSPA+ connectivity on T-Mobile. Indeed, the carrier announced its 4G-ified iteration of the tablet will be ready for your purchase on November 16th for a $250 down payment after a mail-in rebate and with a two-year contract. Oh, and that's not the only fine print: you'll need to shell out twenty monthly interest-free payments of $10 in addition to your normal data plan. To sum up the specs, the seven-inch tablet has Android 3.2 preinstalled, runs on a 1.2GHz Exynos CPU, has 16GB of internal storage and takes advantage of a 3MP rear-facing camera and 2MP front-facing cam for video chat. Still intrigued? Read on through the press release to learn more about your potential Tab life.
T-Mobile Springboard review
T-Mobile Springboard and Galaxy Tab 10.1 finally get official launch dates T-Mobile to carry Samsung Galaxy Tab 7.0 Plus with 4G, available November 16th for $250 Sprint files suit to stop AT&T / T-Mobile merger When the Huawei MediaPad was first announced in June, it was notable for being the first tablet we'd heard of to run Android 3.2. Since then, the Acer Iconia Tab A100 and others have beat it to market, but its arrival in the US is timely nonetheless: it joins the petite tablet party at about the same time as the Samsung Galaxy Tab 7.0 Plus and forthcoming Toshiba Thrive 7", to name a couple. We already knew that when the MediaPad landed here in the States it would be known as the T-Mobile Springboard, but the carrier just announced some key pricing and availability details: it'll go on sale November 16th for $430 off contract, or $180 with a two-year agreement and $50 mail-in rebate -- not surprising, given that we've been hearing this would cost less than $200 on contract. In addition to running on T-Mobile's 14.4Mbps HSPA+ network, it has WiFi and GPS radios, a dual-core 1.2GHz chip made by Qualcomm, 227 pixels-per-inch IPS display, 5 megapixel rear-facing camera, a 1.3 shooter up front, 8GB of internal storage, a microSD slot and support for 1080p playback. We'll return to all those specs in detail after the break, but nonetheless, it's important to get them out of the way from the get-go. After all, there's soon to be a glut of Android 3.2 tablets, and it's worth asking if this one is worth the slightly high price -- or maybe even a two-year marriage to Big Magenta. %Gallery-138087%
Panasonic Toughpad A1 and B1: the tablets you can drop and pick back up again
Panasonic's bringing its Tough ways to the tablet front, unveiling two new Honeycomb slates that could be the most durable consumer entries to that field we've yet seen. First up is the 10-inch A1, running with a 1.2GHz dual-core Marvell processor backed by 16GB of integrated storage and further expansion courtesy of microSD. That display packs 1,024 x 768 pixels in a 4:3 form-factor that is said to be anti-glare and stylus-ready, the whole package clocking in at a very healthy 2.13 pounds. Remember, this is an evolution of the Tough series: it'll have more to love -- including LTE or WiMAX connectivity and 10 hours of life from a user-replaceable battery. There's also a 7-inch B1, which we know a little less about at this point, but both are MIL-STD-810G rated to survive drops, dust and water. You know, the sorts of things that most tablet owners buy expensive cases to protect from. But, a starting MSRP of $1,299 for the A1 might make your budget keeper recoil at least a little bit, though the presumably somewhat cheaper B1 is still lacking a price. Both will quite literally drop in 2012, so watch those feet. %Gallery-138727% %Gallery-138729%
Acer's Iconia Tab A200 Honeycomb tablet emerges at Bluetooth SIG
Who's amped about another Honeycomb tablet? Go on, we'll wait for the hands to rise. All jesting aside, Acer's presumably forthcoming Iconia Tab A200 has just surfaced over at the Bluetooth SIG, where a filing has proved that a) Acer's new Honeycomb tablet will look pretty much like every other Honeycomb tablet we've seen, and b) it'll have Bluetooth and WiFi. Sadly, the rest of the details are still under wraps, but you can bet we'll be bringing 'em to you as soon as we hear more.
TWCable TV app in development for Android, should drop before the season's first 3-pointer (updated)
It was but a few months ago that we realized an updated TWCable TV iPad app was under development, and this go 'round, the cable giant has figured it best to just go ahead and confess rather than wait for any leaks to do it for 'em. In other words, a TWCable TV app for Android tablets is in production, and amazingly, it might be out before anyone realizes that there's no NBA season to speak of. According to the company, it could be released as early as November, and it'll most certainly eventually deliver "a live streaming TV experience." In the first build, it'll also include an interactive program guide, a remote control function for set-top boxes and a DVR manager for remote programming. Support for live TV streaming is on the way in 2012, at some point after Ice Cream Sandwich starts hitting tablets -- we couldn't confirm whether that's completely due to Android 4.0's enhanced DRM underpinnings but it seems likely. Really screws up your New Year's Resolution to drop cable, huh?
Motorola Xoom 2 hands-on (video)
Motorola Xoom 2 Media Edition hands-on (video) Panasonic Toughpad A1 and B1: the tablets you can drop and pick back up again Motorola Xoom a bit slow boomerangin' back with 4G LTE update Motorola has just unveiled two new tablets in Europe, and we've managed to get our grubby mitts on them. This one is the Xoom 2, the (almost) same-size successor to Moto's first Android tablet. Matching its older sister's 10.1-inch Gorilla Glass screen, there's now an all-over splash resistant coating (inside and out), with those intriguing cut-off corners we've seen already there to aid the ergonomics of handling the slab. Add to that, Motorola's new intelligent grip suppression, which means you can hold the screen and navigate with your other hand without hindrance. It runs Honeycomb 3.2, and gains an improved 1.2GHz dual-core processor inside, with a front-facing 1.3 megapixel camera, and a five megapixel shooter on the back. Comparing the tablet to its predecessor, you won't believe how much thinner it is -- this is Galaxy Tab 10.1-scale skinniness. Motorola also boast that it's now 100g lighter than the original Xoom, but we still get an HDMI port, microUSB connectivity and 16GB of storage, not to mention stylus functionality, though the capacitive pen is sold separately. The Xoom 2 itself has now been priced up at £379.99 and you can check out those cut-off corners in our hands-on video after the break.%Gallery-138342%
Motorola Xoom 2 Media Edition hands-on (video)
Motorola's second new tablet today has decided it shrink itself down to more manageable 8.2-inch capacitive screen. Like the Xoom 2, it still measures up at 0.35 inches thick -- to check we even brought our iPhone along to compare. The Media Edition weighs in at under one pound, but packs in the same 1.2GHz processor and Gorilla glass coating of its bigger sister. In the hand, this new size feels somewhere between the older Xoom and a BlackBerry PlayBook, and Moto are gearing it as an ebook-style tablet, which will just about fit inside more capacious jacket and trouser pockets. Both tablets are looking to appeal to business types, with QuickOffice, Evernote and Twonky (that means DLNA-compatible streaming) all pre-installed. The Xoom 2 Media Edition also matches its larger brother's five and 1.2 megapixel camera combo and the latest Honeycomb build available at launch. Fortunately, Motorola has already announced that yes, like the new RAZR, the two new Xooms can both expect a lick of Ice Cream Sandwich some time after launch. Check our hands-on video of the small-screened big hitter right after the break. The Media Edition is priced up at £329.99. %Gallery-138340%
Samsung Galaxy Tab 7.0 Plus now shipping from Amazon, confirmed to use Exynos SoC
We've known all along that the Galaxy Tab 7.0 Plus packs a dual-core 1.2GHz processor of some sort, but Samsung's only just now finally confirmed to AnandTech that the 7-inch tablet does indeed use an Exynos system on a chip. That's the very same SoC found in the company's Galaxy S II smartphone, so we should be looking at some similar performance from the tablet. In case you missed the news last month, it's officially set to hit the US on November 13th for $400. That memo doesn't seem to have reached Amazon, however, which is now listing the 16GB model as in stock and shipping immediately. Hit the source link below if you're ready to take the plunge.
Motorola Xoom 2 and Xoom 2 Media Edition get official (video)
Not exactly one for the shocking column here, but Motorola has officially revealed the Xoom 2 and Xoom 2 Media Edition today.The Xoom 2 rocks a 1.2GHz dual-core processor, Android 3.2, 1GB of RAM, 16GB of storage, and a 10.1-inch display.It also offers up front and rear-facing cameras at 1.3 megapixel and five megapixel, respectively, Motorola Xoom 2 hands-on (video) Motorola Xoom 2 Media Edition hands-on (video) Motorola's Xoom 2 tablets pair up for a portrait, both at around 9mm thick plus Motorola's new Splash-guard protection. The Xoom 2 Media Edition features similar specs, save for its 8.2-inch display size, which, like the standard Xoom 2, has Gorilla Glass protection. It also promises a 20-percent improvement over the original Xoom in the graphics department, which, along with a 178 degree viewing angle make the tablet optimized for media consumption, as the name implies. Thus far, availability for the similarly named tablets has only been announced in the UK and Ireland, where the WiFi versions hit around the middle of this month through retailers like Carphone Warehouse. Update: For those wondering, Motorola has now confirmed to Pocket-lint that both tablets will indeed be getting an Ice Cream Sandwich update, which should come six weeks after Motorola receives the goods from Google (although it's not clear when that will happen).%Gallery-138297%
T-Mobile unleashes HTC Radar 4G, Samsung Galaxy Tab 10.1, myTouchQ and more today
We knew it was getting cold and dreary outside, but today at T-Mobile it's shiny and warm. The carrier has released several handsets today, including the Samsung Galaxy Tab 10.1, HTC Radar 4G, myTouch and myTouchQ (online only until November 9th), LG DoublePlay, and the Samsung Exhibit II 4G. It's not too often we see six devices launch on the same day, but 'tis the season, right? If you've been eyeing any of these luscious gadgets for yourself or a loved one, it's high time to make the move.
Karuma's PlayBase tablet doesn't mind doing it for the kids
Infant-friendly devices are the "in thing" for panicking adults who don't want jammy fingers all over their Galaxy Note. Karuma is the newest to aim for the pre-Bieber crowd with the PlayBase: a cheap, durable tablet that's 9.7mm thick. The key specs include a 7-inch capacitive multitouch display, WiFi and a 1.2GHz Rockchip RK2918 Cortex A8 (the same chip in the AndyPad Pro, Archos Arnova 8 and 10). It's running a custom-skinned version of Gingerbread, but the company has included 1GB of DDR3 RAM in anticipation for a forthcoming bump to Honeycomb or Ice Cream Sandwich. As well as the rugged design, you'll also find it comes with a shock-absorbent silicon cover that protects the screen from the elements and can fold back to double as a kickstand. A front-facing camera and five hours advertised battery life round out the rugrat tablet (rugratblet?). Fans of pre-ordering things can throw down cash on November 15th and it'll be on sale proper come December 1st. Whichever way you wish to pay for it, it'll cost you £170 ($270).
GameStop's Android gaming tablets get official at 200 stores in soft launch
Android slates gussied up with pre-installed video games? We must be talking Sony here, right? Wrong. Turns out, this is what GameStop's prexy had in mind when he spilled the beans about the company's plans for a certified gaming tab. Making good on that word, but falling short of actually producing a new device, 200 of the retailer's brick-and-mortar shops are now home to an array of tablets from the likes of Acer, ASUS, Samsung and Motorola -- all members of Google's tablet OS brigade. These familiar Honeycomb faces carry their same retail prices, but come customized with seven free games and, in the case of the Galaxy Tab 10.1 and Iconia Tab A100, the company's proprietary Bluetooth controller. You can always snag that last bit separately, although if you're already committed to shelling out this much cash, what's another $39? While the verdict's still out on whether this move is a hit or miss, it sure is no wonder why PlayStation Suite's eyeing greener hardware pastures.
Google TV, take two, arrives next week with Honeycomb, Android Market
It has been a long year for Google TV. The first (and only, so far) round of hardware started shipping in October 2010 and at the time, promised the Android Marketplace with its wealth of third party apps early in the next year. That clearly didn't happen, and it quickly became most notable for what it was being blocked from doing, like streaming video from TV providers like Hulu and various network TV websites. After various false starts and delays, Sony Google TV and Logitech Revue hardware will finally receive updates to Android 3.1 Honeycomb (congratulations Google, now where's Ice Cream Sandwich?) starting this weekend with Sony up first and Logitech "shortly thereafter." The biggest additions are the aforementioned apps, a new interface, and a refocused system for content discovery that starts with the new TV & Movies app pictured above. Check out the gallery for more pictures of the new Google TV, while more details and videos follow after the break. %Gallery-137800%
