Seth Weintraub

TV is roaring onto Android this week as Netflix released a client for five devices.  As per usual, XDA modders were able to extract the APK and are getting it working on just about every Android device out there. Some hacking may be involved.

In other TV on Android news, Motorola XOOMs with the Android 3.1 update are able to watch Hulu video free in their browsers (for the time being) using a special version of Adobe Flash and some hackery (below). 
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The Droid 3, likely pictured above, is getting a little more real this weekend as someone holding one of these beauts decided to run it through the NenaMark1 Benchmarking results (below).

The Results:  The Droid 3’s Texas Instrument’s dual-core 1GHz OMAP4430 CPU boasts a PowerVR SGX 540 GPU, same 960×540/4-inch screen as the Motorola Atrix and is running Android 2.3.3 Gingerbread.  Also codenamed Solana, the model is known to be a XT862.

Since these guys are being benchmarked, a release is likely coming soon – perhaps alongside the Droid X2 which is also expected to debut on May 26th with a qHD 4.3-inch screen and a Tegra 2.   Neither of these devices look to be LTE, so we’re still waiting on a rebranded Bionic?

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We’ve been messing around with the Acer Iconia Tab 10.1 for a few weeks now and can report that it is a solid bargain Android tablet with a surprisingly good screen and speakers.  It does however have its faults which include a hefty enclosure with aluminum backing, a mediocre battery life and a sometimes shaky early build of Honeycomb.

For $450 and dropping however, this is a surprisingly good first effort from Acer.  Read on for more observations.

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We’re not going to prognosticate on what a $100 price drop means for the Logitech GoogleTV. We’ve been hearing mighty nice things about the Honeycomb update that is in the works for this summer in fact. But we thought you should know that Amazon has lopped of $100 which makes this Intel-based 1080P machine a pretty good bargain.

Update: Best Buy has matched the $200 price and Sony also offers the Sony BluRay GoogleTV for $260.
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For those of you who like HTC’s Sense overlay, this is your phone.  Notable for it being the first HTC phone with a qHD display and Sense 3, this one is going to the flagship phone on T-Mobile for awhile.  In fact we’ve heard there may or may not be a launch event on June 1st to launch it.

The bad news, AndroidPolice reveal today, is that the Sense has a signed Bootloader making rooting this a more painful process.

Another Sensation video below and full specs below.
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Sorry for the quality:

[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=juujtPo7ipY&w=670&h=400]

The rest below in 10 minute chunks:
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Finally, Netflix comes to Android. The bad news, it is only 5 devices: 4 HTC devices and the Nexus S made by Samsung.

• HTC Incredible with Android 2.2
• HTC Nexus One with Android 2.2, 2.3
• HTC Evo 4G with Android 2.2
• HTC G2 with Android 2.2
• Samsung Nexus S with Android 2.3

If you are one of the 5 head over to the market, stat!

Mr. Bezos needs to work on his deniability skills.  On the subject of Android tablets, Consumer Reports got this from the Amazon CEO:

Asked today about the possibility of Amazon launching a multipurpose tablet device, the company’s president and CEO Jeff Bezos said to “stay tuned” on the company’s plans. In an interview at Consumer Reports’ offices, Bezos also signaled that any such device, should it come, is more likely to supplement than to supplant the Kindle, which he calls Amazon’s “purpose-built e-reading device.”

Bezos acknowledged the popularity of reading e-books (many of them sold by Amazon) on tablet computers such as the iPad. But he added that this popularity doesn’t spell the demise of the Kindle.

“We will always be very mindful that we will want a dedicated reading device,” he said. “In terms of any other product introductions, I shouldn’t answer.”

Amazon of course already has an ecosystem of eBooks, Music, Video and of course its own Android App Store, so the hardware really is the last piece at this point.  Both Analysts and yours truly think it really is only a matter of when.

This is My Next’s Nilay Patel goes into great detail on the suit between Skyhook wireless and Google for the rights to provide Wifi-GPS on Motorola on Samsung phones.  The whole thing is a bit tl;dr for us but there are some notables:

Andy Rubin’s emails to Motorola CEO Sanjay Jha threatening to “stop ship” over the Skyhook issue.

Also, the infamous “using compatibility as a club email below from Dan Morrill, below:
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Samsung graciously invited us to check out their new S5 Chromebook last night and we have to say it was pretty impressive.  It may not be as thin as their S9 series (or MacBook Air) but at $429-$500, this is a solid laptop.  The trackpad is much improved over the Cr-48 and the screen is much brighter as well.  The shell is both significantly thinner and rounder.  Running heavy Flash was still a slight bit laggy but again, much improved.  The Google engineers promise improvements on a weekly basis.

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It doesn’t get any better than this folks. Dan Lyons, who has a contentious relationship with Bursten’s Jim Goldman (especially from his days as a CNBC reporter, above) busted the mystery Google smear campaign wide open.  It turns out, it wasn’t Apple and it wasn’t Microsoft trying to smear Google.  It was Facebook.

I won’t spoil it but knowing how much Lyons loves Jim Goldman, he must be in hog heaven right now.
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http://www.kickstarter.com/projects/oona/the-oona-whatever-you-need-it-to-be/widget/video.html

This $25 Kickstarter project seems like a nice way to knock out a lot of the gadgets you need for your Android. Sometimes the best things are the simplest.
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Wow, developers who attended the C++ session today got themselves a Xperia Play.  Yes, it is good to be an Android developer.  So, far we’ve gotten a Samsung Galaxy 10.1, a Verizon 4G hotspot with 3 months of Free 20MB/10MB speeds, and Experia Play and a Chromebook promised next month.

Anything else?
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Engadget caught some sweet new screen grabs of the new GoogleTV Android Market interface on the new GoogleTV 2.0 device.  IT isn’t much but it is something.  GoogleTV appears to becoming more tablet like, in interface anyway.  Another below:
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Over at Fortune, I profiled the the two new guys presenting at Google I/O on Android yesterday.  It turns out that Matt Hershensen and Joe Brit aren’t actually new (though they are new at Google) in the smartphone scene.  They actually founded Danger with Andy Rubin and were working at Microsoft (which bought Danger) less than a year ago.

At Google, they’ve been charged with starting up the Android hardware division which is putting together reference designs for the new accessory interfaces that will be built with the ADK.

Here’s their 2004 talk on founding Danger:

http://ecorner.stanford.edu/swf/player-ec.swf
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Sergey Brin fielded a question today on what he’s up to.

[youtube http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Fsy6Bth6cQk&w=640&h=390]

Also Eric Schmidt’s new role and Google’s move away from “organizing the world’s information”.  Interesting.

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Google’s official launch post is here and pasted below:

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Just a quick walk thru of the Moscone West today.  This place is absolutely packed there are a lot of interesting displays including the monster sized balance ball game at the end.

[youtube http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=989PL164Uk4&w=640&h=510]

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Another update ahead of I/O tomorrow, this one looks pretty good.

What’s in this version of Google Goggles:

1. Enhanced Search History feature allows you share results with others & search for prior results
2. Improved business card scanning
3. Suggest a result when Goggles fails to recognize an object
4. Option to save query images to SD card
5. Pictures taken during slow connectivity can be saved for later.
6. ( Improved network reliability

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The 9PM Eastern Time embargo is up and everyone including the NYTimes is reporting that Google will release their new Cloud music service, called Music Beta by Google tomorrow.  Not a great name – but it implies that it is a work in progress, likely hampered by the music labels.

It will feature 10 times the storage of Amazon’s Cloud service at up 20,000 songs which will be uploaded by a service which Google bought last year called SimplifyMedia.

Since Google doesn’t have licenses from the labels, the service will be limited to playing users’ own songs.  Other features, like sharing songs with friends and buying songs from Google won’t be available until deals are signed.

By the way, is anyone else excited to see Janes Addiction live tomorrow night?

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It has taken its time coming but now if you are on Bright House Networks, Time Warner Cable & Verizon FiOS TV – ESPN, ESPN2, ESPN3 and ESPNU are available to fans who receive ESPN as part of their TV package.

A big bonus for Verizon high speed Internet users as well: If you do NOT receive TV service from an above provider, but receive high-speed internet from Verizon, you will have access to ESPN3

Sweet. Get it at the Market for Free.
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