Engadget Android app updated, now with Honeycomb support!

Engadget Android app updated, now with Honeycomb support!

An Engadget app? On your Honeycomb tablet? It’s more likely than you think. We’ve heard your e-mails and your tweets and your various requests for an app that will truly make the most of your pixels, and now you’ve got it. Version 1.1.12.1 of our offering has been released to the Android Market and with that comes support for your Transformers, your Galaxy Tab 10.1‘s, and your Iconia Tab A500‘s — even your hacked Nooks. You can of course get all the latest news and updates, browse by category, watch the latest episodes of The Engadget Show, and do it all while the podcast is playing in the background. Give it a try, we think you’ll like it.

Engadget Android app updated, now with Honeycomb support! originally appeared on Engadget on Thu, 28 Jul 2011 14:00:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Mango quietly enables music streaming from SkyDrive, hides amongst your spreadsheets

SkyDrive msuic stream

Here’s a little feature that Microsoft quietly sneaked into Mango — you can stream music straight from your SkyDrive account. With the latest WP7 update comes some nice integration with Redmond’s cloud storage service, but it’s not just for pulling up spreadsheets. You can navigate to any folder and, if you tap on an compatible sound file, it’ll start playing the tune in the music app. It’s not a full fledged streaming and syncing service like Google Music or a tightly integrated ecosystem such as iTunes and iCloud, but it is a pretty neat trick. And, lets be honest, no matter how cumbersome, sometimes those unofficial solutions are much more gratifying. Check out the video of it in action after the break.

Continue reading Mango quietly enables music streaming from SkyDrive, hides amongst your spreadsheets

Mango quietly enables music streaming from SkyDrive, hides amongst your spreadsheets originally appeared on Engadget on Thu, 28 Jul 2011 13:11:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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RIM releases BBM 6, makes your mobile messaging dreams come true

It’s been quite awhile since RIM’s mobile chat service got a facelift, but back in April we got a sneak peek of the next BBM build. Since then, millions upon millions have waited with bated breath for its release, and now they must wait no more: BBM 6 has finally been unleashed upon the world. This new bit of code brings support for BBM-connected applications — so you can chat within apps and both view and download your friends’ favorite apps from lists on their BBM profiles. The new functionality means programs for real-time project collaboration are possible, as are new types of social gameplay. Nifty features, all, but are they enough to reverse RIM’s less-than-rosy recent fortunes?

RIM releases BBM 6, makes your mobile messaging dreams come true originally appeared on Engadget on Thu, 28 Jul 2011 07:57:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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ASUS confirms Eee Pad Transformer will get Android 3.2 update tomorrow

No leaks this time around, but Eee Pad Transformer users don’t have to wait much longer to get their Android 3.2 fix. ASUS has now confirmed that the update will be rolling out tomorrow, July 28th. Unlike Galaxy Tab 10.1 owners, Transformer users shouldn’t expect too many surprises in store here considering ASUS is sticking with stock Honeycomb, although there will hopefully be a few fixes included in addition to the more general Android updates.

ASUS confirms Eee Pad Transformer will get Android 3.2 update tomorrow originally appeared on Engadget on Wed, 27 Jul 2011 15:31:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Google Maps 5.8 for Android adds photo uploads, My Places, and more

Today, Google Maps 5.8 for Android improves Places and Latitude with:

  • Upload photos for a Place
  • My Places as a simple way to manage the Places you’ve starred and recently viewed
  • Descriptive terms for Places in search results
  • Add a new Place on-the-go when checking in

Photo upload for a Place

When deciding on a place to go, people often want to know what a place looks like in addition to seeing ratings and reviews. You can now contribute photos to help others get a sense of places. You can now attach your photos to Places, and yours may even become the profile picture for that page. If you want to view or delete any photos you’ve contributed to Places, you can manage uploaded photos in the “Photos for Google Maps” album on your Picasa account.

Left: Uploading pictures to a place. Right: Photos in Android Gallery

My Places and descriptive terms for mobile

In June we announced descriptive terms and ‘My Places’ for the desktop. Both these features are now in Google Maps for mobile. Descriptive terms appear in search results for Places to inform you what businesses are ‘known for,’ such as their ‘eggs benedict’ or being ‘worth the wait.’

Also, My Places for mobile provides quick access to starred and recent Place pages you’ve looked at. You can access My Places by pressing your phone’s menu button while in Google Maps.

Descriptive terms and My Places in Google Maps for mobile

Add a new Place ‘on-the-go’ for check-ins

If you’re out and about and want to check in, we want to make sure you can quickly add a new Place to check into if one isn’t available. This might happen for new businesses or those that haven’t set up a Place page yet. For example, let’s say you’re at Xoogle Xtreme Sports, a new sports shop in your neighborhood. You go to check in but don’t see Xoogle in the list of places to check into and when you do a search still nothing comes up.

Add a Place when checking in, if needed

To solve this, you’ll now see an “Add place” option at the bottom of suggested places. Select that option, and you’ll be prompted to confirm the name and location of the new place. Then a brand new place is added (and you’re checked in). This place will be available for you and others to check into from Latitude, but will not appear as a search result in Google Maps or Google Places.

We’ve also added ‘Bigger text’ to our experimental Labs features and ‘Download map area’ has been renamed ‘Pre-cache map area.’

To start using Google Maps 5.8 for Android, download the update here. This update requires an Android OS 2.1+ device and can be used anywhere Google Maps is currently available. Learn more in our help center.

Posted by Benjamin Grol, Product Manager

Netflix adds Mad Men in the US today, CBS content in Canada and Latin America later

We’re not sure how Don Draper would have sold a 60 percent price increase on your most popular service package but maybe Netflix executives can make a guess after they start watching the first four seasons of Mad Men today on Watch Instantly. Netflix’s Lionsgate deal will keep reruns flowing for years to come, while a new agreement with CBS International is bringing its programming — including Showtime shows like Dexter that were recently yanked from the US Netflix service — to viewers in Canada (who already had Mad Men) and Latin America (where it locked up a cache of telenovelas yesterday). This CBS agreement is separate from their (also non-exclusive) US deal that brought Star Trek back, but international viewers will still get to both TOS and TNG, as well as shows like Twin Peaks and 90210. Check the press release after the break for more details on the international deal, the source link for a time warp back to 1960s NYC or hit the comments below to explain how canceling your $7.99 per month service is a stand against greedy corporations.

Continue reading Netflix adds Mad Men in the US today, CBS content in Canada and Latin America later

Netflix adds Mad Men in the US today, CBS content in Canada and Latin America later originally appeared on Engadget on Wed, 27 Jul 2011 14:24:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Android Market seen running on BlackBerry PlayBook (video)

We’ve already seen the Android App Player leak out, and now the BlackBerry PlayBook has taken one more (unofficial) step towards being a full-fledged, psuedo-Android tablet. While it’s described as a “proof of concept,” the video above from CrackBerry forum member Lawguyman shows that the tablet is at least capable of running the Android Market and downloading apps, albeit with a few PlayBook-induced obstacles — check out the furious swiping around the 1:30 mark. Here’s hoping for a slightly more official solution before long.

[Thanks, Steve]

Android Market seen running on BlackBerry PlayBook (video) originally appeared on Engadget on Wed, 27 Jul 2011 12:51:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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The roads in North Dakota are giving people cancer [Medicine]

In Dunn County, North Dakota, the roads can kill you. In fact, anything you do to disturb rocks in the area, like driving or even sweeping, can kick up naturally-occurring particles that lodge in your body and give you a rare kind of lung cancer up to 30 years later. Dunn County, you see, is home to a lot of rocks containing erionite, an asbestos-like substance that’s highly toxic. Unfortunately, nobody knew that until very recently. And so at least 300 miles of roads in North Dakota are paved with the stuff. More »

How To Download/Backup Your Gmail, Google+, Calendar, and Docs Data

Google has a tremendous number of free services they offer which many of your probably take advantage of. But have you ever considered what you might lose if all of a sudden you lost access to your account? Just like all important data on your hard drive, your critical data in “the cloud” should also have backup consideration.

So if your Google account contains data you can’t afford to lose or you simply would like to have a local copy of it for yourself, you can easily download just about everything.

How to Make Free Android or iPhone Ringtones From Any Youtube Video How to Configure Your Router for Network Wide URL Logging How to Make Photos Look Like Pencil Drawings in About One Minute


Akamai sees internet speeds climb, Asia still dominates broadband arms race

Average Broadband Speeds

Akamai’s annual State of the Internet report is loaded with all sorts of interesting, if not terribly surprising, tidbits about both broad and narrowband connections around the globe. The big news? The world-wide average connection speed has jumped 23-percent from last year, to 2.1Mbps. Speeds in the good ol’ US-of-A were up 15-percent for an average of 5.3Mbps, though we still languish in 14th place on the list of fastest countries. As expected, Asia continues to dominate the speed race, with 61 cities in Japan alone making the top 100 list. If you want the fastest connections the States have to offer you’ll have to head for San Jose or Riverside in CA or the home of the Wu (that’s Staten Island for those of you not in the know), which all tied with an average 7.8Mbps connection. Check out the PR after the break and click the more coverage link to download some charts.

Continue reading Akamai sees internet speeds climb, Asia still dominates broadband arms race

Akamai sees internet speeds climb, Asia still dominates broadband arms race originally appeared on Engadget on Tue, 26 Jul 2011 21:22:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Facebook for BlackBerry v2.0 now available (Smartphones and PlayBook)


RIM has pushed out version 2.0 of the official Facebook for BlackBerry app. This is available (or will be within 24hrs) and can now be downloaded for both BlackBerry Smartphones and the PlayBook. For smartphone users this is only compatible with devices that run OS 5.0 or higher. The complete change log can be found on this post from yesterday, but for PlayBook users this update brings: Facebook Places; Facebook Event viewing; Ability to view ‘Likes’ and more privacy controls on your status updates.

A couple videos were created to showcase Facebook 2.0. Check them out after the break

Download Facebook 2.0 for BlackBerry Smartphone here
Download Facebook 2.0 for BlackBerry PlayBook here

Related posts:

  1. Facebook app comes to the BlackBerry PlayBook
  2. RIM creates a “virtual PlayBook” Facebook app
  3. Facebook 1.5 for BlackBerry officially goes live!