Motorola Droid Bionic Gets a Much Needed Update

Remember the Motorola Droid Bionic? We do and apparently Verizon does as well as the carrier is now rolling out an update for the first dual-core 4G LTE smartphone that brings along some enhancements and bug fixes that will surely put a smile on the faces of owners. Of course, it’s not the Android 4.0 Ice Cream Sandwich update that all of you with a Bionic are waiting for, but hey, it’ll have to do.

The update, according to Phandroid, is rolling out at this moment to Droid Bionic users so those of you with the device handy will want to take it out, head into your Settings and take a peek to see whether or not the software is waiting for you.

Chances are, it probably is.

So what’s included in the update?

Well, the key things include stability enhancements that should make the overall experience with the Droid Bionic a whole lot better, what Verizon is calling improved battery life and improvements to the mobile hotspot.

Here is the full rundown:

Device Features

+ Added support for National Plus Code Dialing.
+ Added support for Bluetooth® Personal Area Networks (PAN).
+ Receive text message alerts while on voice calls without voice call interruption.
+ Improved audio while streaming video to a TV using the HDMI connection.
+ Improved Bluetooth audio when paired and connected to the device.
+ Improvements in device stability prevent the following:

• Black screen lockups
• Camera multi-shot lockups
• Idle resets
• Multimedia dock lockups

+ Device is now capable of providing Verizon Emergency Alerts.
+ Improvements in battery life.

Data Connectivity

+ Data connectivity and stability improvements.
+ Improvements in Wi-Fi Mobile Hotspot download performance.

Application Improvements

+ YouTube videos will resume play from their previous location after
pausing to access the Notification Panel.
+ Composing a Visual Voice Mail message no longer mutes the voice call.
+ Messages saved with Visual Voice Mail will store to the SD card target shown
on the user interface.
+ Visual Voice Mail improvements for message storage and deletion.
+ Play WAV audio files.
+ The following apps are now preloaded:

• Amazon MP3
• VCAST Apps Store

Overall, this is a fantastic update besides the bloatware that Verizon decided to throw in there at the end. We think you’ll manage though.

The Motorola Droid Bionic came out in September of 2011 after a lengthy delay which saw the device undergo a design change. It was then overshadowed by the launch of the Motorola Droid RAZR a month later. However, we still thought highly of Verizon’s first dual-core 4G LTE device.

You can get a good feel for the device by watching the video below:

http://blip.tv/play/_U%2BC0bx5Ag.html?p=1

keep up with the newest technologies and contemplate about how these will be used in the future. On this blog I’ll share my thoughts about the future of technology, based on the high Tech Road Show Blog inventions of today.

Posted By Haytham Ahmed to Blogger to HI-TECH-MOBILE-PHONE fox-hi-tec.blogspot.com | Hi-Tech-Mobile-Phone

Motorola DROID4 Spotted on DroidDoes Site

It seems that Verizon is preparing its DroidDoes minisite for the arrival of the RAZR-esque Motorola DROID4, although as far as we can tell, the content is not actually live yet (the screenshot is purportedly from the mobile site). While not much about the 4 remains unknown save for a price and release date, the near-final looking appearance of the alleged promo page would seem to at least indicate that a launch is close at hand.
Coming just about six months after the DROID3′s debut, the Gingerbread 2.3.5-powered 4 offers a sleeker form factor along with LTE connectivity, and steps up the rest of the internals somewhat as well: the dual-core processor has been bumped a few hundred megahertz to 1.2GHz, while the DDR2 RAM clocks in at 1GB.
We’ll almost certainly see the DROID4 hit stores before the end of the month, but as with the Galaxy Nexus, rumored ship dates keep coming and going. The latest leak from Droid-Life points to a release on the 22nd, so we can’t really be sure if there are delays at play here or not.

Related articles

• Motorola DROID4 Spotted on DroidDoes Site [PICS] (mashable.com)
• Motorola DROID4 Spotted on DroidDoes Site (Images) (pocketnow.com)
• Official Photos Surface – Moto’s Droid 4 Looks Like The RAZR’s Smaller Cousin (With A Keyboard) (androidpolice.com)

Posted By Haytham Ahmed to Blogger to HI-TECH-MOBILE-PHONE fox-hi-tec.blogspot.com | Hi-Tech-Mobile-Phone

Motorola Droid 4 Specifications Leak Out

 

The official specifications and pictures of the upcoming Motorola Droid 4 have been unearthed by Droid Life, revealing a device very similar to the Droid Razr, with the addition of a physical QWERTY keyboard.
The device sports a 4-inch qHD screen – slightly smaller than RAZR’s 4.3-inch screen – and is powered by a 1.2GHz dual-core processor with 1GB of RAM.
It has an 8-megapixel camera on the back as well as a HD-capable one on the front for video chats, and it supports fast data transfer via LTE. As for the keyboard, it’s a 5-row, edge-lit, PC-like variety.
The Droid 4 is slated to hit Verizon’s stores on December 8.
Head on over to Droid Life for a neat comparison of the evolution from the original Droid to the Droid 4.

Posted By Haytham Ahmed to Blogger to HI-TECH-MOBILE-PHONE fox-hi-tec.blogspot.com | Hi-Tech-Mobile-Phone

Hands On: Motorola Droid Razr Is Super-Thin, But Not Quite Super

The Motorola Droid Razr rolls out to the United States on Friday, bringing an unusually thin smartphone into the hands of Android aficionados. Let’s put it to the test.

Its claim to fame is its industrial design — the ultra-thin Motorola Droid Razr (Verizon, $299.99 with 2-year contract, $111.11 if you order it from Amazon on 11/11/11) is a mere quarter-inch thick. That’s the big story here. For those of the metric persuasion, that means it’s sporting a thickness of 7.1mm, quite an achievement considering the amount of tech goodness crammed into such a tiny package. Everyone who saw it was impressed by its slim form factor and smart good looks. If you’re sold on Verizon and Google‘s Android smartphone operating system, that might be enough to get you to plunk down your three bills.

Upon closer examination, it feels unusually light. It has a Gorilla Glass screen, but its plastic sides feel cheap. I like its handsome woven Kevlar back, the same material of which football helmets are made. To the untrained eye, it might be mistaken for more-expensive carbon fiber. But I like Kevlar as a material used on the back of a phone. It’s tough. It’s not the pleasantly grippy material I liked so much on the Motorola Atrix 2, but it’s still excellent.

While many users will complain about the lack of a removable battery, as far as the Razr’s design goes, that’s a plus. The back is uninterrupted by doors and latches, giving it a much cleaner look. However, I’ve never been fond of the big “chin” at the top of the back of many Android smartphones (see our gallery below for pics of this compared with an iPhone 4S), and this super-thin model’s design is marred by that raised ledge that contains the 8-megapixel camera/lens, its LED flash and a speaker. That “chin” is at least double the width of the rest of this otherwise-thin phone.

On the side is a plastic door for the SIM and microSD cards, and it feels so flimsy that I wouldn’t be surprised if it broke off after a few months of hard use. That, along with the plastic volume controls on the other side, imparts that overall feeling of lightweight cheapness to this otherwise beautifully designed handset.

Here’s a complaint I haven’t often seen: Why does no smartphone maker (except Apple) object to cellular providers placing a company logo front and center — and on the back, too? This might be seem like nitpicking, but I really don’t want to be reminded of Verizon every time I look at the screen of my smartphone, and that’s what I’ll have to do with the Droid Razr with its Verizon logo glaring at me from the bottom of the screen.

Speaking of the screen, I’ve seen better. Completely spoiled by Apple’s “retina” display, for close-up viewing angles, no matter how many superlative-sounding names you attached to this (albeit generously sized) 4.3-inch “Super AMOLED Advanced qHD” screen, I could still see distracting and visible pixels. Not good. I’d give it a C+.

A plus for spec hounds (see detailed specifications here) is its dual-core 1.2GHz processor, making everything happen in a snap. It’s satisfyingly fast. Along with its 4G LTE connectivity, this phone is a speed merchant.

However, even with all this processor power and graphics goodness, for some reason the Droid Razr can’t scroll smoothly enough for my taste. No matter what app I’m using or what I’m doing with the phone, if I’m scrolling from one screen to the next or from top to bottom of a long Twitter list, it’s just not the kind of buttery-smooth movement I’d like to see on a phone with this kind of power and technology. This is an example of a product with superior specs but inferior usability.

The 8-megapixel camera does an admirable job of shooting both stills and 1080p video, with vibrant color and sharpness in both. Its focus and exposure snaps into place a little slower than I’d like, and its motion stabilization when shooting video doesn’t help much, but its level of quality is still slightly higher than most Android smartphone cameras I’ve used. See the gallery for a couple of unretouched examples of its photos, demonstrating the picture quality that’s possible in good lighting conditions.

Android users can find better screens on which to view their beloved operating system, but they won’t find a thinner 4G LTE smartphone than the Motorola Droid Razr. There’s improvement on the horizon as well — Motorola promises the new Android 4.0 Ice Cream Sandwich operating system will be available for this Droid Razr in early 2012. That’ll be a plus, adding better usability and an enhanced feature set to Android, which still feels to me like a work in progress.

Overall, even though it has more shortcomings than I’d like, I think the Motorola Droid Razr is a notable technological achievement. It offers a large screen that looks acceptable until you get too close, along with the satisfying speed of its dual-core processors, graphics and connectivity. Although it doesn’t have the smooth usability of other smartphones, its pleasant good looks and ultimate pocketability make it a strong contender for your Android dollar.

Thin, Light, Big Screen

It feels good in the hand

Posted By Haytham Ahmed to Blogger to HI-TECH-MOBILE-PHONE fox-hi-tec.blogspot.com | Hi-Tech-Mobile-Phone