Google – TechVirtuoso

Nexus One users get some Android 2.3 love, both OTA and manually stimulated

February 25th, 2011 at 12:31 PM 1 Comment Michael Stanclift

Nexus One owners rejoice. Google has finally released Android Gingerbread (2.3.3) for your mass consumption. Officially, you can get the update over the air here in the next week or so, but if you’re impatient (as most of you are) you can download the update directly from Google’s server and manually update. While the manual update process uses the same signed code as the over the air, it requires a little more work and Google hasn’t stuck their head out to tell you to do it this way, officially.

While Nexus One owners will be the most excited, there is also an update for Nexus S owners, which fixes some bugs and adds some new features to the NFC chipset. With this release, both Nexus phones from Google are now the two most up to date devices running officially released and supported versions of Google Android.

Download from Google for Nexus One
Download from Google for Nexus S

Excellent step by step instructions on how to update the device manually can be found over at Android Central for the Nexus S, and the Nexus One.

via xda-developers

My five predictions for the iPhone 5

February 17th, 2011 at 8:14 PM 2 Comments Michael Stanclift

Late winter, early spring… it’s that time of year where the entire technology world begins to wonder about what Apple has planned for the next version of the iPhone, which, come late June will be the device that sets the trend for mobile technology into the next year. Like it or hate it, the iPhone is the standard that all Android, WebOS, BlackBerry and Windows Phones must either match or surpass to be taken seriously.

So what will this phone feature? It’s impossible to tell until Steve Jobs takes the stage to tell us, and even then there will still be many unanswered questions until it gets into the hands of the consumer. Even though the release of the next generation iPhone happens like clock work, I’m still constantly asked questions like “when will the next iPhone be out” or “should I wait to buy it?” — This article serves to help anwser those questions right now.

By the way, if you thought I mistaken when I said Steve Jobs will take the stage, let me clarify: (more…)

How much are iOS users worth compared to Android?

February 17th, 2011 at 12:17 PM 3 Comments Michael Stanclift

I’ll let the chart speak for itself.

via Mobclix

Mobile World Congress award winners

February 17th, 2011 at 11:56 AM No Comments Michael Stanclift

Mobile World Congress announced the winners of the various yearly awards. Everything from phones, to apps, to networks, and a bunch of other things no one except the real mobile geeks cares about.

Among the most interesting awards:

Best Mobile App – Angry Birds
Best Mobile Device – Apple iPhone 4
Device Manufacture of the Year – HTC

What is a little bit telling about the ecosystems of each of the major smartphone platforms, is that Apple was the only platform where a third party developer won “App of the Year” in that category:

iOS – Angry Birds (Rovio)
Android – Google Maps
Blackberry – BlackBerry Messenger (RIM)

While Google Maps on Android is quite possibly the best mapping program on any mobile platform, it’s sad that that was the best Android could come up. with As far as BlackBerry goes, if the built in messenger is the most interesting thing about it… it’s not even worth insulting.

A complete list of awards is available at the GSMA website.

Google One Pass to offer unified payment system for online publishers

February 16th, 2011 at 3:05 PM No Comments Michael Stanclift

httpv://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qiz_2c_QpOQ

Yesterday Apple dropped a bombshell on the tech world when it announced it was going to be strong arming publishers and subscription based content providers by demanding 30% off the top of any transaction done in iOS.

Google must have been listening to the backlash, and today announced their own payment platform for publishers called Google One Pass. However, until Apple, it will only take 10% off by handling the transaction and promises that the platform will be “open and flexible” … something Apple isn’t exactly known for.

Also, unlike Apple, this payment system will not only work in regular apps, but on mobile or web based transactions. However if Apple’s recent developer terms are not changed, don’t expect to see this platform on anything except Android.

The platform is based on the already mature Google Checkout system.

Microsoft just bought Nokia for the cost of one employee

February 11th, 2011 at 8:58 AM No Comments Michael Stanclift

httpv://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xe3ksR8zgXg

Symbian is dead, long live Windows Phone. Nokia is now an major player in the Windows Phone ecosystem, and all Microsoft had to do was let of one their people become the CEO. Not a bad deal.

(more…)

Two factor authentication now available for your Google accounts

February 10th, 2011 at 1:35 PM 5 Comments Michael Stanclift

Google has now set the bar a little higher for Internet account security. Now the super-paranoid (like yours truly) can further secure their Gmail through the use of Google’s new two factor authentication system.

While not as cool as as using YubiKey for LastPass you can now use your phone to generate a one time password to gain access to your Google account. As I’ve covered before, you shouldn’t be using the same password for multiple online accounts, but you really shouldn’t be using your main email password for anything else, as it is the go-to place for account recovery. But even if you are, this additional layer of security will make compromising your account nearly impossible. (more…)

One of these tablets is not like the other, one you can buy right now

February 9th, 2011 at 8:06 PM 4 Comments Michael Stanclift

Today was an interesting day in the tablet world. We learned that what was left of Palm has now officially been smashed into HP, and that HP is serious about really building on the momentum that Palm had started to build with webOS. HP announced a plethora of new things today (which you can read more about over at Engadget, who I stole/borrowed the wonderful chart above from) but the most interesting today was their new tablet, the HP TouchPad.

I have been getting a lot of crap from people for talking a lot about Apple on this site recently. If you’re bothered by this, feel free to stop reading now, or write your own articles. Fact of the matter is, they’re key to a lot of the technology I’m interested in right now and they execute it better than anyone else.

(more…)

Google announces Nexus S, intros with motion sickness inducing video

December 6th, 2010 at 11:46 AM 1 Comment Michael Stanclift

Google has announced their new platform phone, the Nexus S. Based on the Samsung Galaxy S series of phones, it’s the successor to the HTC built Nexus One.

Beyond the typical stuff, the phone specs/features:

1GHz Cortex A8 (Hummingbird) processor
16GB of internal storage
512MB of RAM
4″ WVGA (800 x 480) screen with Contour Display (curved glass screen) on Super AMOLED
Dual cameras (Back-facing: 5 megapixels 2560×1920 with auto focus and flash, front-facing: VGA 640×480
Near Field Communication (NFC) hardware
Android 2.3 (Gingerbread)

According to Google, starting December 16, Nexus S will be sold unlocked and carrier-independent initially through Best Buy stores in the U.S. and after December 20 at Carphone Warehouse stores in the UK.

Its quad-band GSM (850, 900, 1800, 1900) and tri-band HSPA (900, 2100, 1700) which means it will only have 3G service on T-Mobile in the U.S., and EDGE on AT&T.

(BTW, seriously, don’t watch the video above if you get motion sickness. It made me a little sick to my stomach to try and make it all the way though.)

Google releases Chrome 8

December 3rd, 2010 at 2:01 PM 4 Comments Michael Stanclift

Google has released the latest major (stable) version of their Chrome browser to the public, version 8.0.552.215. Along with 800+ bug fixes, Chrome now also includes a PDF viewer built into the browser inside a sandbox. One less reason to install Adobe Reader!

The version 9 (dev) branch of Chrome now also includes Adobe Flash running inside a browser sandbox. It was released on Wednesday and also includes improvements to the GPU acceleration features, and fixes some problems with Google Instant search.

You can download Google Chrome from their servers, or if you want to live on the edge adjust your update settings to get access to the beta or dev channels here.

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