Just a few quick bites before the weekend turns over. We’ll wrap up an exciting week the included the introduction of two new Motorola handsets for Sprint with word from Virgin Mobile that they have made a decision to not include custom UIs on any of their Android phones. Yep, it was a request from the carrier that let to the beautiful stock experience that is the Motorola TRIUMPH More follows below.

• Sony Ericsson may launch the Xperia Pro in July. [SE Blog]
• The Samsung Fascinate is getting a minor ED04 update. [Android Police]
• The Otterbox Defender case is now available for the Motorola XOOM.
• Amazon and Wirefly are both offering deal on the Sony Ericsson Xperia Play seeing the handset priced at less than $ 1.
• The Samsung Infuse 4G will carry Android 2.3 when it launches in Canada.

Android Phone Fans

UPDATE: Commentor Vrusabh suggests to click on places to check in and nearby places offering facebook deals will show a yellow icon next to to their name. I guess nobody near me is offering any FB deals!

UPDATE 2: AHA! I found a deal! “Patterson Perk” has a deal offering 50% off any Specialty Latte if you check-in 3 times!

Check out Android Market and you’ll notice that Facebook has an update available for download. The main inclusion in version 1.5.1 seems to be the inclusion of “Deals” but I couldn’t seem to find them anywhere on the apps interface. Perhaps they’ve added support for deals but haven’t yet integrated them. Or maybe you need an available deal in your local area to actually receive a notification.

Immediate Android Market comments reflect mixed opinions on the update. Complaints of poor notifications, messed up Groups, and other shortcomings are abundant, but then again we’ve come to accept that negative experiences are more inclined to attract comments – plenty of others have said they like the update.

Also noted in the recent changes to this version are Facebook Chat and Push Notifications, but unless I’m mistaken, these have both been available for the past several version. Keeping them in the recent changes is probably just a reminder for others to get a move on and upgrade their app.

Download the update and let us know how you like it. And if you spot those “Deals” be sure you let us know in the comments!

[Thanks Leo!]

View full post on Android Phone Fans

Newegg is synonymous with the best deals on everything from PC components to smartphones and televisions, and those deals are now available at your fingertips thanks to Newegg Mobile. This version 1.0 app for Android gives you access to everything you’d expect from the tech retailer including guided search, wish lists, reviews, and product images. If you could do it on the Newegg site, you best bet you can get it done on your mobile handset.

You can simply browse items by category, or search using text, barcode, or voice. Pretty nifty if you find yourself at Best Buy and want to make sure Newegg doesn’t have that TV or laptop for less (pro tip: they normally do). If you are serious about saving some money on your geek goodies then you will want to check out the app. Be sure to let the Newegg team know what you think on their Facebook page, too. They are asking for user feedback to improve future versions of the app.

[via Facebook]

View full post on Android Phone Fans

These digital camera and camcorder Black Friday deals will make finding that perfect “something” a lot easier to find when shopping for the shutterbug on your gift list.

View full post on Macworld

Can you feel the excitement curdling in your blood for Black Friday? I sure can’t, but if you are the type who loves subjecting yourself to masochistic holiday shopping it’s only fair to let you in on all the deals. The latest list of holiday specials comes from Verizon who will be offering many an Android phone at discount this weekend.

The LG Vortex drops to the low price of free on contract tomorrow (with $100 rebate) and Friday (sans rebate), the Samsung Continuum goes to $99 starting tomorrow (after rebate), and the HTC Droid Incredible drops to $149. The Incredible (as well as the Samsung Fascinate and standard Droid 2) is being offered with a BOGA (buy one get any phone of equal or lesser value free) deal, which could net you multiple slick Android devices at a steal of a deal.  Full sales info:

Black Friday and Black Friday Weekend only! See the special pricing and promos for VZW devices.
Let the holiday shopping begin!
Black Friday Specials:
· LG Vortex: FREE ($100 MIR) (11/25-11/26) – Instant Rebate on 11/26 only
· Samsung Continuum: $99 ($100 MIR) (11/25-11/26)
· BlackBerry Bold: $49 ($100 MIR) (11/25-11/26)
Plus, on Black Friday (11/26) ONLY, Buy any of the above devices, and Get a FREE Jawbone Icon Hero – a $100 value! (while supplies last).

Black Friday Specials Weekend Specials (11/25 – 11/29): Android
Droid Incredible $149 ($100 MIR) BOGA
Droid2 $149 ($100 MIR) BOGA
Droid2 Global $199 ($100 MIR)
Droid X $199 ($100 MIR)
Droid Pro $179 ($100 MIR)
Motorola Citrus $29 ($100 MIR)
LG Ally $99 ($100 MIR)
LG Vortex $79 ($100 MIR) (11/27-11/29)
Sam Continuum $199 ($100 MIR) (11/27-11/29)
Sam Fascinate $199 ($100 MIR) BOGA

[via DroidLife]

View full post on Android Phone Fans

Amazon has some amazing deals for those of you looking to pick up a new Android handset this holiday weekend.  These devices are from all four major carriers and run the gamut of handset makers as well.  The Black Friday deals week features a great selection of phones from top to bottom.  Bear in mind that some of the phones might not be in stock at the moment, but are promised to ship out shortly.  

• Samsung Captivate (AT&T) Price From: $0.01
• HTC DROID INCREDIBLE (Verizon Wireless) Price From: $0.01
• Motorola DROID X (Verizon Wireless) Price From: $49.99
• Samsung Fascinate (Verizon Wireless) Price From: $29.99
• HTC EVO 4G (Sprint) Price From: $99.99
• Samsung Epic 4G (Sprint) Price From: $99.99
• T-Mobile G2 with Google (T-Mobile) Price From: $49.99
• HTC Aria (AT&T) Price From: $0.01
• T-Mobile myTouch 4G (T-Mobile) Price From: $79.99
• Motorola FLIPSIDE (AT&T) Price From: $0.01
• Samsung Intercept (Sprint) Price From: $0.01
• Motorola BRAVO (AT&T) Price From: $0.01
• LG Ally (Verizon Wireless) Price From: $0.01
• Motorola Defy (T-Mobile) Price From: $49.99
• LG Optimus T (T-Mobile) Price From: $0.01
• Motorola Citrus (Verizon Wireless) Price From: $0.01
• Motorola DEVOUR (Verizon Wireless) Price From: $0.01
• LG Vortex (Verizon Wireless) Price From: $0.01

Amazon’s Smart Phone Deals Features Oodles of Android originally appeared on AndroidGuys.

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View full post on AndroidGuys

Navigon says it is reducing the prices of selected smartphone navigation apps in the US up to 40 percent on Black Friday. MobileNavigator for iPhone will be available starting as low as $19.99 for the MyRegion version.

Here is the full list of Black Friday price reductions:

• MobileNavigator iPhone USA: $29.99 instead of $49.99
• MobileNavigator iPhone MyRegion: $19.99 instead of $29.99
• MobileNavigator Android USA: $39.99 instead of $59.99

MobileNavigator transforms Android phones and the iPhone into an inclusive navigation device that saves the maps on the phone and relies on the GPS receiver, independent from a cell or wireless signal.

It features premium functions such as Traffic Live, Reality View Pro, NAVIGON MyRoutes and branded in-route Points of Interest.

The big two commercial map makers are NAVTEQ and TeleAtlas, while a third, OpenStreetMap, publishes map data under an open content license, with the intention of promoting free use and re-distribution of the data (both commercial and non-commercial).

TomTom acquired TeleAtlas maps. Automotive navigation systems as well as mobile and internet companies use their mapping services. Nokia bought NAVTEQ maps which are used in portable GPS devices made by Garmin, Magellan, Lowrance, NDrive and web-based applications, such as Yahoo! Maps, Bing Maps, and MapQuest. Open Street Map is largely crowd-sourced and is often used when maps need updating during an emergency or for providing specialized mapping applications.

Walt Mossberg reviewed popular iPhone Navigation Apps. None stood out as much better than the others at navigation, says Mossberg, though they have different styles and features:

• Navigon MobileNavigator: This app costs $79, and it takes up 1.3 GB on the iPhone because it also stores all the maps. There is no recurring fee.
• TomTom for the iPhone: The U.S. and Canada navigation app costs $100 and takes up a 1.2 gigabytes of space on your phone. But there is no subscription fee and the maps are always present.
• AT&T Navigator: Downloads maps and info on the fly, but it takes up less space on the phone—just 2.3 megabytes. That means you need a good connection at the start of a trip. Though the app download is free, a $9.99-per-month subscription fee will automatically be added to your AT&T account.
• MotionX-GPS Drive: The main screen has a clever menu arranged in a circle. It’s also fairly small—just 10 megabytes or so. But it must download maps and other info each time you start a route. Drive also is potentially the cheapest of the four apps. It will cost $1.99 and include a 30-day free trial. After that, it’s $25 a year.

Of course there’s Google Maps Navigation (Beta) that works on the iPhone and Android devices. It includes all the latest features in a GPS navigation system, like 3D views, turn-by-turn voice guidance and automatic rerouting.

Google Maps Navigation is free. It uses your phone’s Internet connection to supply maps and other information. In addition, Google Search by voice is now available for French, German, Italian, and Spanish speakers. English, Mandarin Chinese and Japanese were already supported.

View full post on dailywireless.org

It looks like Amazon is offering some pretty sweet deals on Verizon’s Droid line, including the Incredible for only a penny. The Droid X can also be had for $99, the Droid 2 (regular, not global) is $80, and the Droid Pro is $150.

You have to order between 12 midnight PDT on November 19, 2010, and 11:59 p.m. PDT November 29, 2010, but that gives you plenty of time to decide. All of these deals require a new 2-year contract, so if you’re in the market for a new Droid and need a new contract as well, Amazon certainly has some good deals.

Great deals on Droid line from Amazon

View full post on Android News, Rumours, and Updates

The busiest shopping day of the year, aka Black Friday, is only two weeks away. Best Buy is always a major shopping destination on that day, and they have a few great Android deals to be had. A couple of them require a new 2-year agreement, but if you’re in the market for one of those the price for a couple of these is out of the world. Check out the deals below:

• Samsung Transform – $69.99 with 2 year contract
• Samsung Galaxy Tab – $549.99
• LG Optimus S (Charcoal and Purple) – $1 with 2 year contract
• HTC Droid Incredible – $1 with 2 year contract
• Samsung Fascinate – $1 with 2 year contract
• Samsung Galaxy Tab -$549.99

Any of those one dollar deals are pretty sweet, but again you need to get that pesky new contract. We’d love to hear from you! Are you planning on heading to Best Buy in two weeks and grabbing one (or more) of these Android devices? Leave us a comment below and let your voice be heard!

Best Buy offering up some good Android deals on Black Friday

View full post on Android News, Rumours, and Updates

Facebook introduced today a feature that will allow retailers and other merchants to offer coupons and special deals through its mobile application.

Places on the iPhone already lets you share where you are and find nearby friends. You also can access Places from touch.facebook.com if your mobile browser supports HTML 5 and geolocation.

Now with the iPhone 3.3 application, you can also find nearby deals from nearby businesses. A yellow icon indicates a deal is available nearby. Users can then use the application to “check in” at the store or restaurant and show their phone’s screen to an employee to claim their deal.

Facebook also plans to work with nearly two dozen major chains like H&M, 24-Hour Fitness and McDonalds for special offers. But eventually all merchants and small businesses with a Facebook Places page will be able to offer deals.

Deals are only available from Places in the U.S, for now. To start, the new feature is available only through the Facebook iPhone application. Android users can find local deals through a dedicated mobile Web site (touch.facebook.com).

View full post on dailywireless.org

The Samsung Galaxy Tab has nailed down three deals to carry media content. They include WHSmith for books, the Financial Times for news and Gameloft for gaming.

The Financial Times is also developing an HTML5 app specifically to run on Android OS, while WHSmith and Gameloft both have apps optimized to run on the Galaxy Tab. gameloft is also continuing to develop more games to run on the Galaxy in the near future, most likely after the Galaxy tab gets launched November 10th.

This is a great way for Samsung to position itself as an iPad competitor (killer) by doing content deals like this. Lets hope that the deals keep coming! I’m thinking EA Games, Netflix and Amazon would be awesome additions too…and Google TV of course!

Samsung Nails Three Content Deals for Galaxy Tab!

View full post on Android News, Rumours, and Updates

S4BB just let us know that they are running an incredible sale for Halloween on most all of their best selling applications. From now until November 3rd, celebrate the scary time and enjoy their bloody good deals! You can grab some great stuff for your BlackBerry for as little as $.99. That’s up to 97% off in some cases!

S4BB has developed so many different types of BlackBerry apps (both free and paid) I can’t even list them all here. They have everything from games and ebooks to foreign language lessons and utilities. There truly is something for everyone here, and at these low prices you’re going to want to check them out right now! Don’t miss out, the sale ends soon.

• Click to check out S4BB’s amazing Halloween sale going on right now >>

CrackBerry.com‘s feed sponsored by ShopCrackBerry.com. Halloween Monster Madness Sale from S4BB – Check out the incredible deals!

View full post on CrackBerry.com blogs

It’s time for another Amazon deal. This time, the G2 gets a $120 price cut if you sign up for a new two year agreement. This – like many of their other deals – includes free two-day shipping and no mail-in rebates to deal with. If you’re an existing customer and would like to upgrade, Costco has a nice alternative: $20 more will get you the same device, but there’s that $50 mail-in rebate associated with the cost of admission. If you’re familiar with Costco’s rebate plans and know what you’re getting into, it couldn’t hurt to take your business to their front door.

[via TmoNews]

View full post on Android Phone Fans

Google Music — or a version of what Google plans for Music to be — was shown off way back at I/O along with the debut of Android 2.2. It has since then been assumed that the launch of Music would most likely coincide with the launch of Android 3.0 (Gingerbread). From what has been revealed so far, the service will offer cloud-based functionality such as streaming from a desktop system to your Android handset as well as the ability to push song and album downloads directly to your phone. But when, exactly, does Google plan to unleash their counterattack on Apple’s iTunes?

The word is Andy Rubin has been hard at work in an attempt to get the service up and running by the holiday season, which does go hand-in-hand with the rumored release timeframe for Gingerbread. The problem is, so far Rubin and Google have failed to get any record labels to sign on to their music store. It isn’t that they don’t want to. One exec speaking on conditions of anonymity said, “finally here’s an entity with the reach, resources and wherewithal to take on iTunes as a formidable competitor by tying it into search and Android mobile platform. What you’ll have is a very powerful player in the market that’s good for the music business.”

See, music execs would love to have someone come along and take the power out of iTunes’ hands, or at least alleviate some of the hold Apple has on the digital music distribution industry. But for the same reason negotiations with Google may take a while. Record labels are very protective of their intellectual property, if you hadn’t noticed, and are pretty hung up on big profits at the same time. We expect most if not all major distributors to hop on board, though whether or not negotiations will delay the debut of Google Music remains to be seen.

[via BGR]

View full post on Android Phone Fans

Apple steps up pace of deals in race for startups
Mobile-device market appears to be prime target area for both

Read more on San Jose Mercury News

Apple steps up pace of deals in race for startups
Mobile-device market appears to be prime target area for both

Read more on San Jose Mercury News

Product: Presentation Master Swiss Army Knife

Manufacturer: Victorinox

Wired Rating: 9

Looking for a gadget you could use to deliver a PowerPoint presentation and to amputate your own arm?

Look no further than the Presentation Master, the newest tool from Victorinox. At first glance it looks like your average Swiss Army knife, brandishing the requisite scissors, mini-blade, and nail file found in most tools of this ilk.

But this red wonder also crams a Bluetooth remote control, a laser pointer, a USB flash-memory drive loaded with up to 32 gigs, and even an espionage-friendly biometric fingerprint reader.

Because the PM is aimed at corporate stiffs who prize data security above all else, anything you load onto the flash drive is protected with multiple layers of encryption, passwords and your fingerprint.

The fingerprint reader is a tad fussy. It took about eight tries before our swipe was accepted. Were we done yet? Nope. The software asks for a second, backup fingerprint to be recognized, and it has to be from your other hand. (In case of emergency field amputations, one assumes.) Again it took no less than eight swipes for the print to be accepted.

Security measures aside, the rest of the components are pretty cool. On either side of the familiar red plastic housing is a trio of buttons: one for the laser pointer and another pair for the forward and backward navigation of your presentation.

Syncing the Bluetooth-enabled remote is much like pairing a cellphone and took about a minute to complete. It’s powered by a single lithium-ion battery (the same kind found in your Timex).

But despite the gadget’s numerous data-protection measures, there’s one bit of security the PM lacks: airline security. Victorinox does offer a castrated version of the PM that lacks scissors, nail file and knife, the better to get past the TSA goons. No thanks. We’re more than happy to check our luggage, rather than risk having this beauty confiscated.

WIRED Integrated Class II laser is plenty powerful for presentations. Solid construction. Near-impervious data protection. Knife, nail file and scissors are actually usable.

TIRED Registering your fingerprint takes persistence. Bluetooth drains batteries dead. Works only with Windows XP SP3 or higher. No Mac support.

View full post on Wired Product Reviews

Nokia Seals Handset Deals With China Worth $2 Billion
Nokia has renewed two handset deals with Chinese distributors worth $2 billion that will help it continue being the world’s largest mobile phone maker.

Read more on paidContent.org via Yahoo! Finance

Nokia wins China deals worth more than $2B
The world’s top mobile phone maker Nokia said Thursday it had renewed cell phone contracts worth more than $2 billion with two distributors in China, one of its key markets.

Read more on Philippine Daily Inquirer

Nokia wins China deals worth more than US$2 billion
HELSINKI – The world’s top mobile phone maker Nokia said Thursday it had renewed cell phone contracts worth more than two billion dollars with two distributors in China.

Read more on ABS-CBNNEWS.com

Nokia wins more than US$2b China deals
HELSINKI – The world’s top mobile phone maker Nokia said Thursday it had renewed cell phone contracts worth more than two billion dollars with two distributors in China, one of its key markets. “China PTAC is expected to purchase mobile devices valued at more Read more…

Read more on Malaysian Mirror

Nokia wins $2 billion in handset deals with Chinese distributors
Today Nokia announced it had won distribution agreements with two Chinese companies: China PTAC and Telling Telecommunication Holding Co. Ltd. Both contracts were said to be worth over $1 billion each, but Nokia’s China PTAC agreement fell for the third year in a row. In 2009 Nokia’s contract with China PTAC was worth $1.76 billion

Read more on Mobile Burn

Nokia says wins China deals worth over $2 billion
The world’s largest mobile phone maker Nokia (NOK1V.HE) said on Thursday it had won handset deals with distributors in China worth over $2 billion.

Read more on Reuters via Yahoo! News

Nokia wins China deals worth more than $2 bln
The world’s top mobile phone maker Nokia said Thursday it had renewed cell phone contracts worth more than two billion dollars with two distributors in China, one of its key markets.

Read more on AFP via Yahoo! News