Mobile Phone Blog:

Well folks, it’s due to be landing on actual, proper retail phones before the end of the year (although possibly not in the UK), but up till now, us peeps in the real world haven’t been able to get our hands on Ubuntu for mobile, to have a fiddle about with it. I know that a lot of people are wanting to get their hands on it, but as yet, they simply haven’t been able to.

Up till now, that is, ‘cos according to Engadget, the Ubuntu Touch Developer Preview is due to go public on February 21st (side note: I guess they’re calling Ubuntu Touch now, eh?).

So, what do you need, to be able to have a fiddle about with it? (more…)

Right then, one of the coolest bits about Android is that the OS is moddable; talented software type people, who are far cleverer than me, can fiddle about with the OS, and make it do things Google never thought of when they were making it. Well, one of the coolest things I’ve seen modders do is this, in the Paranoid Android custom ROM…

Dear god, that’s brilliant! It just looks like pure win, it really does, but the thing is that it’s not just cool looking. There’s actually a very good reason why the mod exists, I’d wager, and it’s not just because it looks funky as hell… (more…)

Right then, there’s already been rumours that LG would be making the next Nexus phone (well, okay, there was a rumour that LG are making one of multiple Nexus phones that’ll be appearing this year, as I blogged about at the time), but that rumour may have got a little bit more concrete today.

Y’see, there’s a story on Engadget, where they’re reporting on a guy who’s got hold of a new phone called the LG E960 Mako, and the simple fact is that most people seem to be theorising that this, right here, is the next Nexus phone.

So, are they right? Is this unassuming phone from LG the next Nexus device? And if it is, what can we expect from it?  (more…)

It’s become a tradition, now; every year, Google announces a new version of Android, and then a couple of months later, they unveil a “pure Google experience phone” upon which to show it off, and the most of these devices was last year’s Samsung Galaxy Nexus. The same thing’s expected to happen this year, except that this year, there might be something a little different about to go down.

‘Cos there might not be just one new Nexus phone, this year…

No sirree, there might be three new Nexus phones, this year, according to a rumour reported on by Android And Me, and only one of them is made by Samsung… (more…)

Well, folks, we’re getting closer and closer to the day the world ends (in December, naturally, when the Mayans all come back to eat us, or something), but before then, we’ve got a few more superstar smartphones to get our hands on. Y’know, before Mayan ghosts, riding a gigantic solar flare, come to wipe us out. But which phones are the most anticipated? Which phones are people most on tenterhooks for?

Well, let’s start with the one I’m most excited about, ‘cos it’s the sequel to a phone that seriously impressed me, both with its sheer size, and the fact that it was a mass market smash hit, despite everyone saying it would never be anything other than a niche phone… (more…)

Well, like his says in the video, it always happens; someone announces a new version of their phone operating system, and almost immediately, it gets leaked, before its public release. So, check it out: Android Jelly Bean in action, on a Samsung Galaxy Nexus…

Ye gods, that looks fast. Looks like that Project Butter stuff that Google’s been working on has really paid off, ‘cos that, right there, is a bleedin’ responsive OS. So, which bits do I really like? (more…)

Right then, ever since Ice Cream Sandwich started appearing on phones, people began speculating about what the next version, codenamed Jelly Bean (Google and their sugary codenames, eh?), would be like. Well, there’s no more need for speculation, because Jelly Bean, also known as Android 4.1, has been officially announced.

So, what can we expect from Google’s new baby? Well, the first thing to note is that Jelly Bean is an incremental update to Ice Cream Sandwich, so there’s not going to be any huge, sweeping changes, like there were when they made the jump to ICS. However, what there is, right, is a load of new stuff that, while not a huge paradigm shift, is still rather cool… (more…)

Right then, this is an interesting little case, and it’s one I figured I’d best blog about, ‘cos if you’ve got a Samsung Galaxy S II, this could well affect you. Y’see, me and my good mate/personal IT guru, the erstwhile Bulldog, spent a solid hour trying to fix a problem with his Galaxy S II, and the thing is… well, both me and him reached the conclusion that it’s a systematic problem with Samsung’s implementation of Ice Cream Sandwich on the Galaxy S II.

Maybe I should back up and explain what’s been occurring. He has a Samsung Galaxy S II, and a few days ago, he got the notification saying that it was all set to update to Ice Cream Sandwich. So he did. And that’s when the problem started, but it didn’t end there. So, what’s the crack? (more…)

Ever since Motorola released the Milestone, a phone that seriously impressed me, I’ve had a bit of a soft spot for them. There was a time, so many years ago, when I viewed them as being rubbish, but then the Milestone came out, and it was a brilliant phone (hell, it was my phone of the year, that year). So, what I’m saying is that I like Motorola (even if I’ll never love them as much as HTC, but that’s a given, ‘cos I’m an HTC fanboy).

So, when I see a story about them bringing out new phones, I get interested. That’s exactly what’s happened today, ‘cos according to Mobile.163 (Google-translated link, enjoy the grammatical lulz), they’ve shown of three new Android phones in China, and they’re all button-less… (more…)

Now then, here’s an interesting thing. It’s well known that the Nexus range is made entirely of Google’s own, untarnished view of what Android phones should be like, without any additional interface on top. The last phone to be released in the range was the Samsung Galaxy Nexus, and everyone seemed to love it, which is fair enough, really, ‘cos it was brilliant.

According to CNet, though, Google might be planning on expanding the Nexus range, ‘cos they apparently filed a patent back in January for a new sliding phone. And the thing is… it turns out that there’s a couple of rather compelling reasons to suspect this will indeed lead to a Nexus slidephone going on sale… (more…)