Cell Bytes

Earlier this week the T-Mobile G2 was rooted, but much to the surprise of many any modifications would only take hold until the handset was restarted. This created quite the stir in the root community, especially after recent releases from Motorola contained security features such as locked bootloaders to make the devices especially hard to crack. It left many wondering if perhaps it was simply an issue with the method of rooting, but many feared the reason was a bit more sinister. Turns out they were right. The T-Mobile G2 was designed to only allow temporary rooting. Read T-Mobile’s take:

“As pioneers in Android-powered mobile devices, T-Mobile and HTC strive to support innovation. The T-Mobile G2 is a powerful and highly customizable Android-powered smartphone, which customers can personalize and make their own, from the look of their home screen to adding their favorite applications and more.

The HTC software implementation on the G2 stores some components in read-only memory as a security measure to prevent key operating system software from becoming corrupted and rendering the device inoperable. There is a small subset of highly technical users who may want to modify and re-engineer their devices at the code level, known as “rooting,” but a side effect of HTC’s security measure is that these modifications are temporary and cannot be saved to permanent memory. As a result the original code is restored.”

Now I’m no expert on Android hacking, so I can’t say for sure whether or not a workaround will be found to deal with the security measure put in place by HTC. If previous work by members of the Android hacking community are any indication, I’m hopeful one will be found. If not, it looks like the days of truly open Android phones are numbered. Quite the shame.

[via DroidLife]

We just got back from demoing an onslaught of Android-based handsets from Motorola and there was one in particular I really wanted to get my hands on. The Motorola FlipOut might not be the most exciting device for people like you and myself who appreciate a good combination of braun and beauty, but Motorola’s not here to please just one crowd.

The FlipOut isn’t the performance beast you’d want to handle all of the heavy lifting of intense mobile computing, but the device also isn’t for the person that needs to do a lot of heavy lifting to begin with. And there are a lot of people that fit right into that category. For the sake of comparison, the Symbian operating system powers many low-powered, cost-efficient handsets around the world. Their platform isn’t number one because of how many smartphones Symbian is on, it’s because of how many feature phones it’s on. Most people who own a phone with Symbian aren’t even aware that it’s Symbian. This is the type of market penetration Motorola’s getting at with the FlipOut.

Affordability attracts a ludicrously large amount of people, and when Motorola shows those people what they can do with a phone that won’t break their bank, they’re hoping people are going to want to flock to that product. This is what the FlipOut is all about, and this is what Motorola’s overall strategy with Android is all about.

I digress, though, because these are supposed to be my impressions of the device. I sat down with the FlipOut for a decent amount of time today and while I wasn’t completely blown away, I was able to play out the age-old scenario of a teen or a light smartphone user who would pick this up to do their cliche bidding of texting, emailing, and web browsing.

The first thing I’m drawn to is the keyboard, of course. The phone flips out to reveal a full 5-row QWERTY keyboard for those who aren’t really keen on typing on a screen that small. (And the screen is small, indeed, clocking in at 2.8-inches with a QVGA resolution.) The keys had great track and feel, but were just a little too scrunched together for my taste (though this could be because I have hands the size of coconuts.) I had no problems with “clickability,” if you will, but it still wasn’t as fast as when I took it to the virtual keyboard (which I didn’t have many problems with considering how little room I had to work with.)

Backing Android 2.1 with MOTOBLUR (yes, Motorola’s still using MOTOBLUR despite their plans to eventually move away from it) is a very respectable TI OMAP processor (still not sure which one) clocked at 720 MHz and working in conjunction with a PowerVR SGX 530 GPU. This won’t “cut through the web like a circular saw through a banana,” but it’ll make for some pretty speedy activity when switching between apps, browsing the web, and typing to your heart’s content.

One thing I was pretty disappointed with was the phone’s camera. I didn’t expect it to keep up with the likes of the Motorola Droid 2 or the Droid Pro, but I didn’t think the muddy quality it eventually ended up producing would bother me as much as it did. (Mind you, it’s only a 3-megapixel sensor but I’ve gotten better quality out of other devices with similar specs.) I wish I could say for sure what the problem is, though, because I couldn’t tell whether or not this was because of the low-resolution screen or the quality of the camera’s sensor. The only way for me to be sure would’ve been to export the images and take a look on my computer, but I didn’t have much time to do that. Even with giving the FlipOut the benefit of the doubt in this area, I didn’t walk away too satisfied.

Other than that, though, everything was business as usual. When you take away Android, MOTOBLUR, and all of the features you expect to make up any minimal Android handset these days, the FlipOut is a unique and fun communication tool that’ll catch on by virtue of its form-factor and “flipout” mechanism alone. And if that means getting more Android devices into more hands, then I’m all for the large pool of different and unique devices we’ve been so fortunate to enjoy these days.

Verizon’s COO Lowell McAdam took the stage during this week’s CTIA 2010 in San Francisco, speaking about the carrier’s upcoming rollout of the 4G LTE network. Apparently, it’ll debut before the year end and provide LTE coverage for 1/3 of the US population before the year is out.

The freshly appointed COO (a week on the job) claimed that Verizon will offer 4G connectivity in 38 markets this year and they’ll bundle half a dozen smartphones and tablets with this service. They’re made by “top OEMs” and they’ll reach speeds of 8 to 12 megabits per second. We suppose that there’s also a Motorola Stingray tablet among them and at least a HTC smartphone.

Here’s a map of the initial rollout, if you’re curious.

When is the last time you purposefully dumped water on your phone? Probably never. You’re more likely protecting it from the lightest of rain drizzles and babying it every time you place it in your pocket. But we’re not you, so we’re going to pour water on a phone:

Of the 7 phones Motorola announced on Tuesday, the Motorola DEFY for T-Mobile is one of my three favorites (along with Droid Pro for its BlackBerryishness and Flipout for it’s awkward teen attraction). These might not be high end Android’s but they are a vital part of not only Motorola’s strategy, but also the Android ecosystem, and it represents what Android is and can be.

More and more users are flocking to Android, and Motorola is thinking about those that haven’t yet switched to Android, asking themselves why not, and then catering to these users with unique offerings that fit their needs. The Motorola DEFY is clearly geared to the youthful, everyday phone user who wants the benefits of a smartphone but not all the baggage of caring for a tender piece of love and technology.

The DEFY claims to be Life Proof, which when it comes down to non-marketing speak, means you can get it a little wet, drop it and rough it up a little bit on accident and you won’t break the darn thing. It’s durable, and it comes with one of my favorite pieces of smartphone technology that I hope to see in all phones at some point – Gorilla glass.

The Motorola Droid, a phone I picked up the day it came out, was the first phone to popularize Gorilla Glass. Put it in your pocket along with keys, coins, and other goodies that would normally scratch your screen and the Gorilla Glass (for the most part) keeps your screen looking brand new. Now the body of your phone might get a little banged up, but it’s the precious screen that we care most about since it’s the keeper (and relayer) of the content that makes a phone what it is.

Talking specs, the Motorola DEFY rocks a capable but not overwhelming list:

• 3.7-inch screen
• 5MP camera
• 3.5mm headset jack
• FM Radio
• Android 2.1
• MOTOBLUR
• 800MHz processor

That’s MORE than enough multimedia power to make moving from a feature phone to a smartphone well worth the money, even if you happen to splash some water on it or drop it down a flight of stairs or five. Because let’s face it, after watching the video above, at some point or another we all wish we had a phone that could defy the elements. Or our own clumsiness.

You might be familiar with Universal Androot; it used to be the biggest one-click rooting solution out there and could get the job done on just about any device. Now it has popped up in the Android Market, with one big stipulation: it won’t work on phone’s carrying the FRG22D version of Froyo and a handful of other handsets. Still, the list of devices it won’t work for is only a fraction of those it will. Check out the following list:

• Google Nexus One (2.2)
• Google G1 (1.6)
• HTC Hero (2.1)
• HTC Magic (1.5) (Select Do not install Superuser)
• HTC Tattoo (1.6)
• Dell Streak (2.1)
• Motorola Milestone (2.1)
• Motorola XT701
• Motorola XT800 (2.1)
• Motorola ME511
• Motorola Droid (2.01/2.1/2.2 with FRG01B)
• Sony Ericsson X10 (1.6)
• Sony Ericsson X10 Mini (1.6)
• Sony Ericsson X10 Mini Pro (1.6)
• Acer Liquid (2.1)
• Acer beTouch E400 (2.1)
• Samsung Galaxy Beam
• Vibo A688 (1.6)
• Lenovo Lephone (1.6)
• LG GT540 (1.6)
• Gigabyte GSmart G1305

And here is the list phones you won’t want to bother downloading this for:

• Samsung i9000 / i6500U / i7500 / i5700
• Motorola ME600 / ME501 / MB300 / CLIQ XT
• Motorola 2.2 FRG22D
• Archos 5
• HuaWei U8220
• HTC Desire / Legend / Wildfire (/system 無法寫入, 不過可以靠 Soft Root)
• HTC EVO 4G / Aria
• SonyEricsson X10i R2BA020
• myTouch Slide

So this should remain a viable option for those who want to take in easy path to the often treacherous world of root. Grab it in the Market now.

[via DroidLife]