Android L is here err Android Lollipop is here

hahaha...
watch this funny video from today's silent Android L release.
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Anroid 5.0 aka Lollipop brings: 

new UI called Material Design
finally smarter WiFi connection logic! (most annoying because of free WiFi everywhere!)
5k new APIs for developers
more syncing of app status and history over devices
more filter options for lock screen notifications
multi user support now also available on smartphones
device encryption automatically turned on
USB audio support (USB microphones, speakers and and and)
Support for HVEC > UHD 4k playback out of the box
Tap & go > setup new devices easily by initiating the process via NFC
support for 64-bit HW
battery saving techniques inbuilt (known to Xperia Users as Stamina mode)
Camera raw support
>> check out the full list here

Wow Sony will update their entire Xperia Z line...  >>  blogs.sonymobile.com

Xperia Z2 impressions

If I'd need to buy a new cell phone today, I would not hesitate a sec and get the Sony Xperia Z2. [uhm update 25.06.14: got the Z2 today ;-)

Why?

The good:
+ great Camera
+ great build quality, waterproof
+ great overall product design
+ "It's a Sony" > everything just works, I was very happy with all my previous Xperia phones.
+ great screen > 5.2" 1920x1080, beware it's not the brightest one
+ stereo speakers
+ excellent battery stamina reported by many users
+ has FM radio, which I use everyday
+ good language support, comes with ISO 8859-11 thai font (see white paper p.13) to many this is way more important than the cpu, Samsung removes some languages and fonts in distant markets, rendering the phone annoyingly unusable for Thais)
+ built in hardware is top notch (same as the other flagship phones)
+ Noise canceling feature indeed works, but makes headphones a tad bit heavier
+ good value for money, CHF 699 (599 in Aug.14)  or €582 launch price

+ good the Android UI hasn't been revamped to the max
+ fancy notification light
+ you can set the display's white balance!
+ the smart band receives good critics and might be interesting to you

the bad:
- Speakers are very very clear when listening to audio, but during calls, the speaker u hold to your ear will "chatter" a bit, so phone conversations won't be very clear! confirmed with a 2nd device. This is the phones biggest minus! Forget about this, speaker sound during calls turned perfectly cristal clear after two weeks! No idea, what happened.

- the noise cancelling head phones do not have a remote button to pick and end phone calls! Very annoying on the bike. Noise canceling does work, but not on the bike, doubles the wind sound :-(  doh
- no IR to directly control your home media
- some folks don't like the touch feeling, when fingers meet the loading dock contacts
- touch feeling at device edges not super smooth due to overlapping frame, to protect the glass. Can't be further described, go and touch the thing in the shop.

 

Xperia Z2 sample picture. Reduced to 1600px from original 5248x3936 (7.51MB size)

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Here's the Xperia Z1

finally officially announced ... the premium Xperia Z1. Everything sounds perferct - and judging by our Xperia Z experience, everything IS perfect.

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More Xperia Z1 pictures

from the site 365dian

Honami Xperia Z1 pictures c6903

 from sony tweet on 23/08/13

Wife's Xperia Z is a charm - while the missing sharpness in the taken pictures and missing camera button are downers, everything else, including the display, is close to perfect.
My excellent Xperia S slowly comes to an end because I let it drop just a few to many times.

I'm most likely to get the Xperia Z1, aka Honami, once it's out later this year. Today gadgethelpline released pictures of what seems to be the phone's final look.
Very pleasing, just like the Xperia Z Ultra but including a flash.

 
Specs are all fine. Up to date hardware, nothing to worry about.
I just hate the fact, that they didn't include a xenon flash. The reason seems to be, that Sony might be developing a camera module (which won't be bought by anyone).


5" 1080p (full HD) display with Triluminos. Reading good things about it only.
very good: uncommonly huge camera sensor 1/1.6 inch (or 1/2.3 inch) for less graininess

20MP cam, LED flash, (5248 x 3936)
2MP front facing cam (who cares)
Snapdragon 800, MSM8974 chipset (2.2 GHz, quad core, Adreno 330 GPU)
16GB internal memory
microSD card slot
3000mAH battery
144 x 73.9 x 8.3 mm
LTE (FDD 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 7, 8, 20 - underlinded are the ones active in the USA)
NFC, MHL, fm-radio
no IR!
shipping with Android 4.2.2

(source ePrice.com.tw)

again, image source is gadgethelpline.com - thanks a lot!
More and older pictures can be found here at justamp

for pictures of the Honami user interface please check out this thread at xdadev - page1 and page6
thanks eXistenZ

supported frequencies (not all of them active for US market) - source: FCC

Android Launcher Pro on Xperia S

Android Launcher Pro Plus receives many bad reviews these days, because it isn't further developed. For the very few bucks I once spent for the product? No anger at all over here - the contrary is the case: Launcher Pro works like a charm on my new Xperia S (Android 2.6.7). How about some screenshots to illustrate my minimal design setup?

The only big drawback worth mentioning: the extremely nice Xperia Weather Widget can only be used with Sony's own Xperia launcher. But hey, my message is: personalizing your phone is fun and very satisfying! There's an adequate launcher out there for all of you.
How can still be people out there defending the "fruity" icon imposition from cupertino? it's crap ...


I'm completely aware that Launcher Pro might not work anymore with Android 4.0 ICS, but that's another story. Most likely I'll be switching to Nova Launcher by the end of june.LauncherPro works absolutely fine on top of Android 4.0.4 - currently testing Nova Launcher - it's features are very similar to LP.

homescreen  5 rows / 4 columns

all labels hidden

dark icons in the dock are self made - not downloadable yet

glass icons from MySiteMyWay

desktop Visualizer 

SiMi Folder Widget

Silent Mode Toggle New

Poweramp Full

Simple Calendar Widget 

Circle Battery Widget 

WiFi Widget

Timesheet Time Tracker

LauncherPro 

Wallpaper: drop and green by Zim2687

variations - many excellent wallpapers out there

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Sony Xperia GX announced

There are so many likers of the Xperia Arc design out there... I believe the Xperia GX will be better accepted as a 'true' successor than the cool Xperia S. Specs and Design come in a pleasant package, it's not surprising that the phone announcement was received well so far.

Please bear in mind, that most Sony Japan releases don't make it over to europe, but I have the feeling that this will not hold true for the Xperia GX, because there are so few negative critics in the forums at this point - it would be dumb to not wide-release the phone. Might be the model LT29i, codenamed ‘Hayabusa’ - scheduled for July/August.

But then again the specs are so close to the Xperia S' ones, we just have to wait and see.



notable Specs
(taken from sonymobile japan)

• Japan June release with Android 4.0 
• screen: 4.55"  /  1280*720  /  LCD  / 319ppi
• camera: 13MP back illuminated sensor, LED flash, coming with the very very handy fast startup functionality. Good: the flash was moved away from the lense (reducing a bit the chance for red-eye effect). sample pictures here
• front facing camera has 1.3MP
• video full HD video recording of course (let me tell you that it works surprisingly well on Xperia S)
• 1 GB RAM, 16 GB inbuilt (?) Storage plus microSD slot... see picture below
• lack of native hdmi port  >  coming with microUSB MHL instead
• supporting Bluetooth 3.1 / not 4.0 as required by upcoming gadgets
• supporting nttDocomo's 75Mbps high speed connectivity  Xi（クロッシィ）  LTE down 75Mbps, LTE up 25Mbps max. (theoretical stuff)
•  with 127g a bit lighter than the Xperia S (144g)
• dual core cpu @1.5GHz (S4 Qualcomm MSM8960), fed by a removable 1700mAh battery
• btw: Felica is their wireless wallet, doesn't matter to us folks in europe

Sony Xperia GX in white and black

Sony Xperia GX parts, translated by google chrome

Xperia GX removable memory. posted without asking first - please visit the source

more pictures over at sonymobile.co.jp

 and more pictures from the launch event at ascii.jp
more pictures @ xperia freaks 

.sold out a day after the release in japan on 09 aug 12

Sony Xperia S quick review

While I was happy with my HTC Desire and the Android experience in general,  I was looking forward to a new cell phone for quite a while now.

The HTC Desire didn't have enough memory for all the new big apps and the camera quality didn't satisfy my needs.

When my wife bought a Sony Ericsson Arc I was very surprised by the device's overall performance and appearance - putting the brand into pole position for my next phone.

Went on to preorder the Xperia S at Digitec - for a low CHF 500.-

Box content (Switzerland): USB cable, loader, 2 NFC tags (check the video below), earphones, no hdmi cable.



PROS, now that I've used it for two weeks:
+ very good looking Android customization

+  very good FM Radio (screenshots below)
+  good camera (a bit grainy in low light situations)
+  decent panorama functionality 
+  ultra short start up time for camera, very useful
+  pleasing design
+  good build quality
+  screen quality
+  surprisingly good earphone sound quality!
+  very good hdmi out support, great usability, videos in 720p
+  front facing cam for Skype video calls just works
+  finally a good Sony full keyboard offered with the Update to 4.0.4

Medicore
0  4.3" screen size a bit to small for my liking
0  default keyboard is bad, I'm using "perfect keyboard" instead. Why they don't offer an international version of their POBox eludes me. see above

CONS
-  annoying! no support for USB mass storage mode (MTP only)
-  sometimes you hear fizzling sound during calls (bad shielding against own antenna)
-  battery performance medicore (14hours standby with all my syncing)
-  camera without HDR function
-  mail client doesn't offer a peak time off/on configuration

launcher and widgets look good (music app is Power Amp)

Conclusion:
Two things bother me: battery performance isn't good enough yet and the absence of USB mass storage mode > using the USB media transfer mode isn't as intuitive since it doesn't allow Windows to display thumbnails for the pictures stored on the phone.
Hey! Overall I'm very very happy with the Xperia S. I totally don't care about the nonsense quad-core and duo-core discussion. The phone never ever lacked performance. My fav game Robotek isn't a resource hog either.
Also that everybody is complaining about the absence of Ice Cream Sandwich means nothing to me. It's coming a bit later, so wut. Current Android 2.3.7 is a charm - all the apps are very nicely customized by Sony!

using FM radio everyday - pleased with functionality

[update to ICS made the FM radio unworkable. It has been fixed with the release release of firmware 6.1.A.2.45 on 27.08.2012]

default keyboard is waisting to much space
>> Keyboard has been updated with ICS 4.0.4 release!

finally - full keyboard with dark skin

BTW: Techies should head over to duosecurity.com for a very good read about Ice Cream Sandwich's poor ASLR implementation up to release 4.0.2. Quite a letdown.
Also make sure that you read Nick Kralevich's (Android Security Team) comments in the Wrap-Up Section. Good to know Sony will use at least ICS 4.0.4 from the start.

Xperia S panorama shot (original resolution 4912x1080
)

Logitech Ulitmate Ears 200vi and Android

After about a year of daily use on my bicycle ride to work the loose connection close to the jack began to really bother me. The jittering sound drove me nuts.
Eventually I decided to get a new pair of Ultimate Ears ... and they had to be cheap too [digitec.ch]



Ulitmate Ears 200vi - quick summary:
+  good overall build quality
+  soft and comfortable ear plugs
+  good price while providing mic
+  rigid cables,  means no cable tangle
+  button to pick and end calls (htc desire)
0  Sound quality is not splendid but acceptable, I miss some clearness.
0  Bass is unspectacular also.
-  cheap looking too (nooo really)
-  yup, I said so already: I'd love more bass

full specifications see Logitech site

>> I wanted cheap and got cheap, with acceptable sound quality. Solid, not more, not less
On 2nd thought I might opt for the 350vi instead.

The compatibility list on the ultimate ears website is completely useless. I'll test them for you on some Android devices and report here over time. (These headphones are wired in the CTIA standard.)

HTC Desire
sound works, mic works, only the remote's middle button is usable > one click for play/pause and to pick and end a call, long press the middle button to fast forward to the next song.

Google Nexus S
sound works, mic works, only the remote's middle button is usable

Google Nexus Galaxy
sound works, mic works, only the remote's middle button is usable

Google Nexus 4 lg
sound works, mic works, only the remote's middle button is usable


Sony Ericsson Arc 
completely not compatible with this phone, but that's bearable since Sony Ericsson offers a very good earphone collection themselves. Sony Ericsson Arc headphone jack is using the OMTP standard that isn't compatible to the CTIA wiring standard.

Sony Xperia S
hmmm - I first thought they are most likely to work since Sony promotes in their spec sheets that the new Sony phones will support CTIA wiring standard. Bought the phone, turns out that my ultimate ears totally don't work on Xperia S. No sound, no mic, no nothing.
Doesn't matter much because the earphones that came in the box have better sound quality.


HTC Wildfire S
(follows)

Samsung I9100 Galaxy S II
sound works, mic works, only the remote's middle button is usable

check out CompHelperKid's review vid for some more details

rotten Amazon App Store

I often state that I don't like to read books, they are generally out dated and so forth. But I do read a lot - just everything that doesn't come in the form of books. Bro reads around 8 hours a day and makes a fortune from the gathered knowledge.

For real: this was today's best read, comes in two URLs - a company mainly developing for iOS, later also for Android and then checking on Amazon App Store. Well written and amazing: Amazon App Store Rotten To The Core. Then we have to read through this comment to get a more complete view.

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Android 4 - Nexus Rumors

[Update 19.10.11 Been really busy from 0600 through 2300 and ... missed all the great news of course. But then again, Android 4 seems to be even better than expected, so I'm happily looking forward to the upcoming hardware greatness, which will be announced in the coming weeks. What really bothers me, is that wife and kids are angry because of the long away time /]

(btw: i made above's pic - how about backlinking?)

Coming to you October 11th October 19th
livestream on youtube.com/android @ 10:00 HTK

Since the announcement we often get to read that the next Android release will be merging together the Android 2.x and tablet Android 3 branches to one release, handling all display resolutions with a Honeycomb style user interface (Update 19.09.11: YES it will - read through this dev post.)  . There's no official word on the naming of that next release - call it Android 4 - Android 2.4 with 2.6.35.7 Kernel - Ice Cream Sandwich - Android 3.4 - whatever. The next release is being told to bring new

• face recognition features
• better multitasking
• better video conferencing
• USB hosting
• new launcher / new UI
• a lot of goodies for developers!

Reading about all the next Nexus phone rumors? Man they are insane to say the least. I don't even want to name the sources, other than "the net"  ... it just doesn't make all to much sense at the moment. Altogether I belief that we're dealing with Android 2.4 rather than Android 4, we'll just have to wait and see.
Read for your amusement only and drool on. Android 4 stuff will be added here once the news condense in a more rational context.

Nexus 3 aka Nexus Prime promoting Android 4 - rumor summary as of june 2011

• display 720p - 4 inch  (1280*720)
• cpu Snapdragon 'krait' dual core, 1.2 to 1.5 GHz (or TI OMAP 4460)
• gpu? (integrated into OMAP is the PowerVR SGX540)
• 1 GB memory
• of course with NFC and the whole rest
• Hardware might come from LG > nexus 3 teasers like this one are wide spread
• if the hardware comes from Samsung then we might face a 4.65 inch Amoled display in a device called GT-i9250. 1280x720 | 5MP cam 

What does that mean to me?

• Wife's Arc is close to perfect. Great camera, perfect hdmi out, good design
• Samsung? I don't like how they clone the iphone over and over, hardware is superb though
• HTC Sensation reviews don't make me fully happy - camera and product design not adequate
• LG firmware still featuring some weird bugs, bad launcher
• Sony Ericsson and HTC released commitments to unlocked bootloaders
• ...still being very happy with my HTC Desire?
• hardly ever missing any Android functionality other than a really good camera?
• not being an OS Upgrade Junkie?

I would like to see a Sony Ericsson Arc successor, with dual core to support vast media options, front facing camera, edge to edge display and the next Android release in Q1 2012. (Nope I'm not talking about the ST18i). So I guess that I won't buy the next Nexus.
[Update 13.07.] I just checked for news about the Sony Ericsson Duo. Head over to IBT Tech section for a good roundup. In Japan it might be released as the Nozomi ...
[Update 31.08.] today Sony Ericsson announced the "Arc S" single core CPU with 1.4 GHz. I guess that's not the successor I'm wating for but certainly a great device.

announced 09. January 2012: the Xperia S. Quite neat. Probably my next phone. click here for an overview of the phone's specs. (yup, fm radio with rds is included)

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Sony Ericsson Arc

Wife wants to replace her Sony Ericsson Satio because sometimes it just behaves really weird - every week it happens once that you can't pick calls or one can hardly hear her talking (crash related!), the symbian user interface also turned out to be very unintuitive etc.
From all devices her friends are using she likes Xperia X10 the most > for the simple reason, that its design is appealing! Via my HTC desire it's also clear, that Android  usability is fantastic. Requesting: good product design, multitouch and Android? We're currently looking forward to the recently announced Sony Ericsson Arc!

It also features:

• large screen | 4.2"
• respectable cam | 8MP backround illuminated sensor
• decent battery pack | 1500mAh
• hdmi out | all videos easily presentable on tv
• robust Gingerbread
• fm radio

 

the rest is nonsense geek stuff that doesn't bother her the least (for example two microphones which will provide noise canceling during phone calls). All together it seems to be a cool gadget, fusing tons of technical stuff with an appealing jacket...   let's see where it goes from here
Price @digitec is extreme! >> chf 799.- reasonable chf 569.-

more information can be found here:

more pictures: google image search
launch article at sony ericsson blog with commercial videos

technical specifications at sony ericsson / at GSM arena

hey this video seems cool to me - also spotted our bedroom tv in it LOL:

Android browser allows data theft

Extreme news arrived yesterday... to my surprise all big international Android sites haven't reported it yet.

A simple link allows an attacker to steal user data from your Android phone!
Thomas Cannon discovered this and explains here

I got the news here:
Android vulnerability permits data theft on heise.de

und die deutsche Version dazu:
Android-Lücke ermöglicht Datenklau

Brief comment:
Compared to the whole rest of bugs and problems I consider this a severe flaw since most of us use the good and slim default browser. No rooting no dialog box, nothing but an URL is needed to make this work. This will not become widespread but provides an excellent example how all devices can be tricked by consequently accessing it's "features"
We'll all track, how Android providers handle this problem. No paranoia please, my next few phones will feature Android for sure, seeing how thin the membrane protecting personal data can become (for a limited time) is impressive though.

Android HTC Desire better user interface

*** this article is outdated - new version May 2012 here ***

 ***
 

BTW: you can make your phone look better and add functionality to the homescreen without even rooting the device. Below you see how I set up my phone these days.
The lower dock is scrollable with a swipe, so you can add a total of 15 fully customizable actions (actually even more if you use the "swipe gesture action")

apps and widgets used: LauncherPro, MusicMod, weather widgets (yr.no),
WiFi widget, smooth calendar, battstatt, tajm, diviclock, apps organizer

wallpaper credits: tamilia orb vector
more wallpapers here and more inspiration at XDA dev

 

 

Exchange ActiveSync on Android phones - Desire Froyo

Loads of Android users around the globe have been waiting for a matured support of Microsoft Exchange ActiveSync security policies.

The good news: since Android 2.2 aka Froyo MS Exchange syncing works exactly as desired! I just created some screenshots to give you an idea how Exchange support was implemented into Android. Let's hope your HTC Android, Samsung Magic, Xperia X10 etc. will get a Froyo update soon.

First the exchange setup. Honestly... it can't get any easier than that, the setup process works the same way as on every other phone supporting MS Exchange: your administrator has to provide nothing more than the name of the server you need to connect to and add your user-id to the designated active directory group.

Go into settings > "accounts & sync" - add Exchange ActiveSync
You will be prompted for the server name, your user-id,
domain name, email address and password. Done.

before syncing for the first time you'll have to accept
the security policies activated by the Exchange Administrators

the screenshot gives you an idea

you can setup the update schedule quite precisely
(peak time start and end, sync frequency)

our administrator set the password retry limit to 10 see top of screenshot
the 11th wrong try will trigger the process "erase all data"

most important: the integration into the android calendar
and email is absolutely seemless! This is also true for the reminders.

...you get the idea!

HTC Desire Froyo Update Android 2.2

On July 21 HTC released the official Android 2.2 aka Froyo update for the HTC Desire. The Update is delivered to you over the air (FOTA). Go to settings / system software updates / and hit "check now" if you want to get it right away.

In no particular order, here's a quick overview of some of the new functions that have been added:

Adobe flash 10.1 showcase now downloadable in the android store
...works fabulously! Even a flashheavy site like okaydave.com works

 

HTC: new FM Radio widget, new color
Now with real RDS support - wow didn't expect that

voice recognition searches now actually work
with the same tool? hey even voice dialing works fine

HTC: new flashlight using the photo LED - but I think flashlight apps to make the main display shine in bright white are more useful

HTC: added 720p video recording mode
HTC: camera options now also displayed portrait style
(click here for Desire 720p test video)

"recent apps" now showing 8 apps, new design

Wifi Hotspot functionality

Thai and other Asian fonts added, Chinese Input added
they all render in the browser as well as in all apps

• HTC: easier keyboard language switch through added key
• new texting dialog makes it much easier to attach files (mms)
• HTC: new "App share" application
• HTC: is the calculator widget also new?
• browser can now display animated GIF
• browser now supports file upload
• HTC: powering off phone now delivers better feedback (vibrating)
• much better MS Exchange ActiveSync security policies support (auto-discovery, GAL look-up, calendar synchronization, remote wipe)
  
• better browser performance
• some apps can now be installed/moved to SD-Card
• new Android Market widget
• screen can now also be rotated to the right
• Android Market now offers the option "update all"
• THE BAD: all of a sudden google search history was activated automatically
  
  >> full list of new features at android developers

New Version Details:
Android version 2.2
Baseband version 32.43.00.32U_5.09.00.20
Kernel version 2.6.32.15-gf9c0527 / htc-kernel@and18-2 #1
Build number 2.09.405.8 CL218634 release-keys
Software number 2.09.405.8
Browser version WebKit 3.1