.::REALITYRECALL::.

Boy oh boy, HTC is entering the tablet arena with quite a bang. The company has just taken the wraps off its brand new 7-inch Flyer Android tablet, which touts a 1.5GHz single-core CPU, 1GB of RAM plus 32GB of flash storage, an aluminum unibody construction, 1024 x 600 resolution, a tablet-optimized version of Sense, and… what’s this, a pressure-sensitive stylus! The HTC Scribe trademark we saw floating around in legal waters turned out not to be the branding for a tablet, it’s actually the name HTC gives to the technology enabling what it calls a “groundbreaking pen experience.” Other details include a 5 megapixel camera on the back paired with a 1.3 megapixel imager up front, a 4000mAh battery rated to last for four hours of continuous video playback, and memory expandability via a microSD card.

The Flyer will ship in Q2 2011 with Android Gingerbread 2.4 on board. HTC says it’ll be indistinguishable from 2.3 as far the end user is concerned, though we all know it won’t be quite as good as the 3.0 stuff. We’re told not to worry, however, since the new version of Sense being introduced with the Flyer will be the focal point of the company’s software offering. As far as HTC is concerned, Sense matters more than the underlying platform, and the reason Honeycomb isn’t the shipping OS here was explicitly stated as HTC not having enough time with the latest Google code to customize it to the full requirements of Sense. Guess that settles that.

There are a couple more software enhancements, both marking the introduction of the fruits of HTC’s recent deals: OnLive cloud gaming will be coming with the Flyer in the form of an app you open up to access the web-connected bored-relieving service, while that Saffron Digital acquisition has turned into an HTC Watch app for movie streaming and downloading.

We spent a bit of quality time with a Flyer unit recently, although we weren’t allowed to turn it on, and our early impressions are rather mixed. On the one hand, we do appreciate the ruggedness and durability that’s afforded by the one-piece aluminum shell, but on the other, the Flyer is quite the chunky beast in your hands. We’d imagine strapping in such an extra-speedy processor is the main culprit for its extra girth, though the Flyer is, ironically enough, not terribly light either. We found it heavier and generally a lot less polished from a design perspective than Samsung’s Galaxy Tab. Anyhow, HTC should have functional units for us immediately following its MWC presser this morning, and we’ll be delving in deeper with this super-specced device. Hang tight!

Update: Pictures of the Flyer can now be explored below and we have video awaiting your audience just past the break.

Update 2: Even more video!

Continue reading HTC launches 1.5GHz, 7-inch Android 2.4 Flyer into the tablet wars (update: hands-on video!)

HTC launches 1.5GHz, 7-inch Android 2.4 Flyer into the tablet wars (update: hands-on video!) originally appeared on Engadget on Tue, 15 Feb 2011 05:31:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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You may remember back at Computex we caught a very quick look at Intel’s MeeGo for tablets. Well, Intel’s landed at MWC with that very same tablet user interface, except it has done a bit of work to the underlying software and it’s finally ready to start letting the press play around with it. If you were to closely compare the design of the UI or what Intel is calling its “tablet user experience” to the one we saw back in June, you probably wouldn’t notice much of a difference in terms of aesthetics, and that’s because most of the work Intel’s been doing has been to the code and framework — it shifted it away from C++ and moved it over to QML, which is part of the Qt language. The brunt of the experience and the individual apps (we’ll get to those, or the lack there of soon) are all built on QML, which Intel’s Mike Richmond promises will enable lots of neat UI elements. So yes, Intel’s done some important retooling on the technical and software end of things, but unfortunately, that doesn’t mean the interface is anywhere close to done yet. We got a look at the software running on an Atom-powered ExoPC, so hit the break to find out just what we are talking about.

Continue reading Intel shows off more of its MeeGo Tablet UI, still needs lots of work

Intel shows off more of its MeeGo Tablet UI, still needs lots of work originally appeared on Engadget on Mon, 14 Feb 2011 06:30:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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We’ve just gotten back from playing around with LG’s 8.9-inch, 3D-friendly Optimus Pad (known as the G-Slate in the US). This Android Honeycomb tablets sports a dual-core CPU inside and a dual-camera array outside, giving you both the optical and processing capabilities to produce 3D video. Its screen cannot actually play back glasses-free 3D, but if you really have to have that third dimension on the move, you’ll be able to buy a set of glasses to recreate the effect. The Optimus Pad is slim, though we couldn’t get a great feel for its ergonomics with all the wiring attached to it, has nicely curved corners, a matte black back cover that’s pleasant to the touch and seemingly durable, and an extremely glossy screen up front.

We likened the Pad to the Optimus 2X in an earlier post and it carries over a lot of industrial design elements from its smartphone sibling, including the metallic strip down the middle of its rear branded with a “with Google” logo. That’s actually meaningful this time — the Optimus 2X wasn’t a stock Android installation, it was subjected to LG’s (not entirely successful tweaks), however the Pad looks to be a straight Google Experience Device, in much the same vein as the Motorola Xoom and Samsung Galaxy Tab 10.1, its nearest and most direct competitors. That being said, the code on the device we handled still wasn’t up to scratch on the software front, as evidenced by us managing to crash both the browser and Google Maps within a few minutes of putting down our first fingerprints on the tablet. The 3D camcorder also seems like a memory hog, we weren’t able to get it started up initially because of the number of apps that were already open (which at the time was no more than four). Let’s remain optimistic, though, this wasn’t exactly a slate we snatched off a retail shelf and LG has time to optimize and spruce things up before shipping this thing out. We’ve got pictures for you below and a press release after the break. Video is incoming at the very fastest speed our wireless connection can carry it.

Update: Video is now in, get to the ogling!

Continue reading LG Optimus Pad first hands-on! (video)

LG Optimus Pad first hands-on! (video) originally appeared on Engadget on Mon, 14 Feb 2011 05:24:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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While we’re probably still years or decades away from getting our very own animatronic clones, Google’s released the next best thing for the time being. Available on the Android Market is this Androidify app, which, as the name says for itself, lets us mere mortals craft our Android mascot lookalikes. Hell, you can even slap on some facial hair or a baby droid while you’re at it. We’ll say no more — see the app in action after the break, if you’re not already busy dishing out your new avatar across the web.

Continue reading Google’s Androidify app lets you create your very own bot avatar (video)

Google’s Androidify app lets you create your very own bot avatar (video) originally appeared on Engadget on Mon, 14 Feb 2011 02:18:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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