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HTC Incredible shown above with battery cover removed. Verizon’s not going to be too happy about this one. From everyone we’ve spoken to, they really wanted to keep details surrounding the Android-powered HTC Incredible underwraps for a while longer. That’s understandable, given that the Incredible blows their current flagship Android device, the Motorola Droid, to smithereens on just about every count. Alas, all it takes is one device to slip into the wrong hands — and fortunately for us, it has! A bunch of new shots of the HTC Incredible (with brand new, Verizon-brand-friendly colors) have just leaked out, and a gaggle of spec details came with it. All of these shots and details come by way of Androidforum user/super spy NKT. The specs confirmed so far: 8 megapixel camera with autofocus Memory: 512 MB ROM, 512 MB RAM (320 free to the user) Android 2.1 with HTC’s Sense UI Optical Trackpad 3.7″ WVGA (800

We figured this would happen: Apple issued a press release claiming they were filing suit over HTC’s alleged infringement of 20 iPhone related patents but said little else. Now the filings have been found and Apple calls out Android by name, taking issue with only HTC’s phones that feature Google’s mobile OS. You can check out scanned images of the 41 page document at Engadget and TechCrunch also found 10 of the 20 patents Apple claims HTC infringed upon: Patent No. 7,362,331 : “Time-Based, Non-Constant Translation Of User Interface Objects Between States” Patent No. 7,479,949 : “Touch Screen Device, Method, And Graphical User Interface For Determining Commands By Applying Heuristics” Patent No. 7,657,849 : “Unlocking A Device By Performing Gestures On An Unlock Image” Patent No. 7,469,381 : “List Scrolling And Document Translation, Scaling, And Rotation On A Touch-Screen Display” Patent No. 5,920,726 : “System And Method For Managing Power Conditions Within A Digital Camera Device.” Patent No. 7,633,076 : “Automated Response To And Sensing Of User Activity In Portable Devices” Patent No. 5,848,105 : “GMSK Signal Processors For Improved Communications Capacity And Quality” Patent No. 7,383,453 : “Conserving Power By Reducing Voltage Supplied To An Instruction-Processing Portion Of A Processor” Patent No. 5,455,599 : “Object-Oriented Graphic System” Patent No. 6,424,354 : “Object-Oriented Event Notification System With Listener Registration Of Both Interests And Methods” Some of these just sound ludicrous – I mean, “Unlocking a device using a touchscreen”? Give me a break. I’m sure there is some substance to Apple’s lawsuit or they wouldn’t be making it. Or maybe they’re just hoping that something holds up and they’re taking a long shot. I get the idea Apple is scared – very scared – of Android’s potential and HTC is currently their champion, although Motorola is trying to make a case. The show is just starting ladies and gentlemen – I’m thinking we’ll see some type of public response from HTC and probably a long drawn out behind-the-scenes process before we know how it will all turn out. Any patent lawyers in the room? Anyone going to sift through all these documents? If you uncover any juicy details you know who to share them with! UPDATE: Engadget is doing a blow by blow of the patents – check it out .

The entire Android-loving public has been waiting for Flash 10.1 support on our beloved Android phones like the Droid and the Nexus One. Some lucky users of select handsets like the HTC Hero and Motorola Devour are graced with Flash Lite, but that has its fair share of limitations. So as we desperately wait for Adobe to bring Flash onboard, who will and won’t be getting a ticket to ride? A post on the Adobe forums suggests it won’t be decided exactly how we thought: Hi all, You can expect the final release for Android to be available mid-year. All Android devices that meet our minimum s/w and h/w requirements will be supported. Unfortunately, I cannot say a lot more publicly about our port to the Android platform at this time. As for WinMo, we have made the tough decision to defer support for that platform until WinMo7. This is due to the fact that WinMo6.5 does not support some of the critical APIs that we need. As for your other questions: * Yes, we will support the Motorola Milestone. * No, the HTC Hero will not be supported b/c it does not have the correct Anroid OS version and it’s chipset is not powerful enough. We require a device with an ARM v7 (Cortex) processor. Examples include the Qualcomm Snapdragon chipsets and TI OMAP3 series. Best regards, Antonio Antonio is an Adobe employee and this suggests something different than what we may have assumed – just because a handset is upgraded to Android 2.0 DOES NOT mean it will be eligible for Flash 10.1 and in fact, many phones won’t be able to enjoy Flash 10.1 regardless of OS updates. In addition to requiring Android 2.0, each phone will also require a minimum processor spec. Taylor from AndroidAndMe did a little research and made a list of US phones that, based on this information (and assuming its true), will not ever have Flash 10.1 capabilities: Sprint Hero Sprint Moment T-Mobile G1 T-Mobile myTouch 3G T-Mobile CLIQ T-Mobile Behold II Verizon Droid Eris Verizon Devour What a shame, what a shame. Hopefully they’ll at least release it to those ready, willing and able by the first half of 2010 as they’ve promised. And hopefully we can have some more clarification on exactly what phones will and won’t enjoy Flash in the future. Afterall, there are people making purchase decisions NOW based on what features their phone might have in a few months from now. We just want some transparency so we can make informed buying decisions! [ Adobe Forum via PocketNow , Thanks Reese!]

Until I held the Motorola Devour in my hands, I assumed it would be a lighter, more plasticky version of the Motorola Droid with weaker specs but a better keyboard. As you’ll learn in this review, my perception gradually quickly changed. It’s difficult to review the Devour on it’s own merits when it has the same manufacturer, is available on the same carrier, and has a mirroring form factor with (virtually) the same operating system. But we’ll try… and in the end draw the necessary comparisons and conclusions because let’s face it – context is everything. Hardware Review Within 2 seconds of holding the Motorola Devour I knew it wasn’t the “light, more plasticky” younger brother to the Droid I had expected. It was heavy. It was sturdy. It screamed “tough” and wanted to be its own man phone. The aluminum body with black, ruggedized rubber contributed to the look and feel and honestly it seems like the most solid Android phone out there. The problem is that the sturdiness seems like the main attraction of a phone that’s aspiring to be things it shouldn’t: Don’t get me wrong, I like the Devour hardware and it isn’t bad when judged alone. But with a small screen (3.1-inch), average resolution (HVGA), mediocre camera (3MP/fixed focus/no flash) and other less than stellar specs, I almost wished it would just take its place in line. It’s way too big and heavy for what’s stuffed inside and while an outstanding keyboard could have come through with a buzzer beater in the clutch, it was only decent. Better than the Droid keyboard? Absolutely… but by no means one of the best keyboards out there. Keyboards: DEVOUR vs DROID vs G1 I was really hoping the Devour keyboard would knock one out of the park. In press pics it looked quite spacious, contoured and clicky. I tried to do quite a bit of typing with the Devour, even publishing a Phandroid article from the device , so I got pretty comfortable/familiar with it: The Devour keyboard is DEFINITELY an upgrade over the Droid keyboard. Not only was the Droid keyboard sub-par, the accuracy of the large 3.7-inch landscape keyboard nearly render the physical keyboard pointless (at least in my own opinion). It’s a good thing the Devour improves here then, as the 3.1-inch screen is less than desirable for typing out Emails and long text messages. Unfortunately I’d only give the Devour keyboard a “decent” rating – not terrible and not great, somewhere in the middle of the pack. You can see how HTC did a great job configuring their sliding mechanism to allow for maximum keyboard surface area. I’m hoping a few other companies make this a priority, and if you ask me, LG is a prime candidate by emulating their Voyager/enV clamshell style form factor. Software Review The Devour runs Android 1.6 with Motorola’s custom build of Android – MOTOBLUR. The idea is to aggregate all your points of communication into two virtual “filing cabinets: Happenings and Messages. Happenings are status updates from friends on Twitter, Facebook and the like – stuff that flies in by the barrels but isn’t essential to your existence. Messages are 1-to-1 points of communication that are more critical to your everyday life – Emails, TXT messages and that sort of thing. They’re displayed on your home screen as widgets and a universal status updater allows you to push your own updates to numerous social networking sites all at once. The most dedicated Android fans could have 2 main complaints about the Devour software: It runs an “old” version of Android They don’t particularly enjoy MOTOBLUR – it’s information overkill I totally dismiss those 2 arguments in the above video and I think it’s worth pointing out why. While most readers of this blog always want the most up-to-date version of Android so they can have all the bells and whistles, there are a lot of customers who this won’t bother. Even Android 1.6 is pretty darn good and coming from a dumb phone or feature phone, they’ve already got so many new features to enjoy that an extra thing here and there isn’t going to kill them. And don’t forget – Motorola says they WILL eventually update the Devour to 2.x, but until they you’re still able to enjoy the vast majority of Android goodness including Google Navigation. I understand why people don’t enjoy MOTOBLUR – it’s just not for them. Either they’re not social networking fiends, it is information overkill, or they prefer other 3rd party apps on Android Market. While I think MOTOBLUR is an interesting idea and I especially enjoy the News/RSS widget, I can appreciate that we all have personal preferences. What I can’t understand is people making a decision to purchase or NOT to purchase a phone based on whether or not it has BLUR. If you don’t like it, simply drag all the widgets into the trashcan, turn off the notifications and set up your phone as if it were a Google Experience phone. With the 1.6 and BLUR discussion out of the way, I have to say I was surprised how snappy and quick the UI of the Devour seemed. I didn’t put it under a ton of application stress, but it seems as though the processor had an easy time with the smaller and less resolved screen. The Voice Activation feature on the right side is a nice touch, especially useful if you’re in the car or multi-tasking – definitely a plus. The biggest detraction of the Devour’s UI isn’t the software at all, but the hardware. If you’ve gotten used to a Droid or Nexus, the smaller screen size and lower resolution are apparent, but all-in-all the screen is decent (although sunlight caused problems). When all is said and done, despite being an older version of Android the Devour software holds its own and all but those demanding the Android elite should be satisfied. Camera Review There are two sides to reviewing a camera/camcorder: the actual experience TAKING the picture including UI/Options/Features and then of course the result – how your pictures and videos turn out. I’m sorry to say that on both accounts the Camera is mediocre at best. The camera is only 3MP fixed focus with no flash so I wasn’t expecting amazing results, but I thought the MOTOBLUR integration might offer a little more in terms of customizing, editing and other options: The pictures are actually pretty bad. When the pixels are condensed and you’re viewing small versions of the full images they don’t look so shabby, but if you click through an image to see it’s original size you’ll notice how fuzzy and poor the quality truly is. For example in this picture there were actually several Robins jumping around the forest floor. Click on the picture, which is the full size taken at 3MP, and see if you can spot any of them. You probably can’t so here is some help – I cropped the Robin at full resolution and it looks like an Atari character: But again, you just have to know what you’re getting and why/when you’re using the camera. Other pictures came out fairly well if you just want to use them as 8

I’m writing this post from the Motorola Devour. To write a review of worthwhile substance you have to know the subject matter and in this instance I get a lot of hands on time with the keyboard. I was expecting a lot out of this keyboard and at first was a bit disappointed but there is definitely a learning and familiarity curve when it comes to keyboard layouts and feel. I promised a bunch of reviews and insight today – and I will provide some of that – but my full review will come tomorrow morning once I’ve had more time to really dig in and review things in a little more depth. Fingers crossed I can meet this timeframe – I will be pulling an all nighter either way. If you are interested I’m writing this from the wordpress application on android market. Typing in the browser didn’t work so well and it wouldn’t let me put the cursor in the post body text box. Oh well. Stay tuned for more moto devour!!! PS: That is a picture of my tail-light taken from the Devour. If there is one thing I’ve learned thus far from this post, it’s that writing Wordpress posts in a mobile browser and through the wordpress android app both suck. PPS: now I’m typing this on my droid keyboard for reference sake. There is definitely a tradeoff. Dedicated number row is nice but there are some drawbacks as well. I will be sure to share the details in a video review.

The Motorola Quench / Cliq XT that was announced at this year’s MWC will soon be available in Brazil via TIM. Currently, the Quench will be the first device without a physical keyboard to launch with MotoBlur. If you missed the specs the first time , the Quench is rockin: 3.1 inch HVGA touchscreen display Accelerometer HSPA Wi-Fi A-GPS 3.5mm headset jack Bluetooth FM radio 5MP autofocus camera with flash 512MB ROM 256MB RAM Qualcomm MSM7201A 528 MHz processor. With specs like those the Motorola Quench will hold its own as a mid range smartphone. Check it out in action: Like I said, this should be a great mid grade Android phone. Brazilian’s and TIM won’t be disappointed.  It is scheduled to launch in the US next month as the CLIQ XT. [via UnwiredView | Press Release ]

As if gadget choices weren’t complicated enough, Best Buy might be making your Verizon Android handset decisions a lot more difficult. According to Best Buy’s Facebook page , the DROID is dropping down to just $99.99 with the DEVOUR going for the same exact rate when it’s released on February 25. So many choices, so little time! Need some help? If you’re eligible for an upgrade or you’re looking to pick up one of these devices whilst hopping onto the Verizon bandwagon, check out this video of CrunchGear’s initial impressions of the device. Still not convinced? Stay tuned for a full hands-on review of the DEVOUR and maybe your mind will be made up then. Oh, and if $99.99 seems pricey for these hot handsets, you’ll be glad to know that the Droid Eris can be had for free with a new two-year activation.

Motorola is cranking out Android handsets and its latest phone, the Devour, is here. The Devour has a 3.1-inch touchscreen, an aluminum body and a custom user interface called MotoBlur that aggregates contacts and feeds from different social networking sites, such as Flickr, Twitter and Facebook, into a single stream. Priced at $150 with a two-year contract, the Devour will become the third Android phone to run on the Verizon Wireless network next month. “The Devour is about streaming your social life into the phone,” says Dan Rudolph, director of product marketing for Motorola. “The more social networking accounts you have, the more value you will get from the phone.” Still, our first look at the Devour was disappointing. Under the hood, the phone isn’t state of the art in terms of its technical specification–it lacks multi-touch, it doesn’t feature the 1 GHz Qualcomm processor seen on the Nexus One and runs an older version of the Android operating system. Nor does it impress with its looks. The much-touted aluminum body aside, the phone is bulky, big and very retro in its styling. Here’s a closer look at it. The Devour is a slider phone with a physical keyboard that’s much more pleasant to use than the Motorola Droid . The keyboard, which seems carved directly into the aluminum body, has buttons that are soft yet respond firmly. But at 5.9 ounces the phone is a bulky beast. It weighs almost the same as the Droid but it is positively plus-sized when compared to its lightweight peers: The iPhone 3G S is only 4.8 ounces and the Nexus One is just 4.5 ounces. What makes the Devour seem hefty is its harsh, boxy look. Unlike the softer, rounded corners that are popular among most smartphones today, the Devour is a rectangular slab with sharp square edges in a hardware design that is reminiscent of the Palm VII. Motorola and Verizon say that they want to evoke a masculine look with the phone but hey, don’t boys want pretty devices too? The Devour screen is bright but not as vivid as the OLED display on the Nexus One and it seems to smudge very easily. Just a few minutes of using it left fingerprint marks all over the display. In an interesting twist, the Devour has a tiny touch-sensitive thumbpad on the right that can be used to scroll through the icons on the screen and select one. The slider, itself, though feels flimsy because it is also a toggle button on one of its sides. The phone has a 600 MHz Qualcomm processor that is a tad faster than the Droid’s but is significantly slower than the 1 GHz Qualcomm Snapdragon chip used in the Nexus One. Instead of a removable back plane, the Devour has the cover for the battery and the microSD card at the side of the device–similar to what we see in a compact digital camera. It’s an attempt  to make the phone more stable, says Motorola’s Rudolph, since smartphones users have complained about the battery cover at the back slipping off in some phones. Beyond that, the Devour has its basics covered. It includes a camera capable of both video and still photos, a 8GB microSD card, accelerometer, Wi-Fi and GPS. Though it’s the latest phone from Motorola’s stable, the Devour runs Android 1.6, which is a surprise considering that most of the latest Android phones use version 2.0 or 2.1 of the OS. The older Android flavor also means that Devour users have to manually download an update to get turn-by-turn navigation on their phone. But what Motorola says will give the Devour its edge is the use of the MotoBlur skin, which is missing on the Android. After a quick initial set-up, the MotoBlur brings in your Twitter feed, Facebook updates and messages including e-mail and text messages into little widgets on the homescreen. Integrated contacts and data is the name of the game so the interface aggregates corporate and personal e-mail accounts and display them on a single screen–though you can keep them separate if you want. You can also arrange to view new messages in a card-like view (similar to the Palm Pre) or in an easily scrollable list. There are some sweet extras. User can back up their phone for free on the MotoBlur website through their MotoBlur account. They can also track their phone for free and remote-wipe it if it is lost, a service that Apple charges $100 a year for with its MobileMe service. Clearly, Motorola wants to get as many Android handsets out as it can, ostensibly in an attempt to give consumers the choice they want. But at this point, it feels like the process has lost its soul. There’s not much innovation in hardware design or in the user interface. The Devour is yet another cookie cutter phone churned out to keep the corporate coffers full. But in an extremely competitive smartphone market,  it’s an approach that may not be enough cut it with choosy consumers. See Also: Motorola Introduces New Android Phone, the Backflip Motorola Backflip Will Be the First Android Phone on AT&T Hands-On With The Motorola Quench Motorola’s First Android Phone Takes Aim at Social Networks Photos: Jon Snyder/Wired.com

Acer recently announced its growing presence in the Android realm and Rogers was quick to snap up the manufacturer’s latest device – the Liquid e . If you can get past the drug-related name, the handset doesn’t seem to sound so bad on paper. When the Liquid e hits Rogers, it will be the first Android 2.1 device in Canada assuming the Motorola Milestone doesn’t get the update first. And while Acer doesn’t have the reputation in the mobile handset business like Motorla does, the Liquid e does have a faster Snapdragon processor and holds its own everywhere else, albeit a smaller screen. Rogers doesn’t have an official release date and no pricing, either. So if you’re holding out for one of these, try to find something to pass the time until things get official. [via Electronista ]

Motorola has over and over claimed that they need to put all their efforts and energy into one clear vision and that vision has been Android and MOTOBLUR. Doing so has pretty much saved the company (or their division) from extinction – they can thank Android. But rather than continue down the path that saved them, Motorola is exploring other options based on diversifying their portfolio and just wait until you hear what those options are: But it’s still curious to hear him openly step away from Android, the software that arguably saved Motorola, telling the WSJ, “If I had more money for R&D, I’d be developing an operating platform.” And talking more specifically about phones and Windows Phone 7, Jha says, “I’m open to it…I think I need diversity in our portfolio.” — (quotes found at Gizmodo ) You can’t blame Motorola for wanting to diversify. It’s the smart thing to do. Putting all your eggs in one basket is a good way to screw yourself over in the long run. And yes, as much as I love Android and love to hear Motorola  focusing on Android, I would be working on Windows Phone 7 – ESPECIALLY because their ecosystem has stabilized and Windows Mobile has improved. But building their own operating platform? Samsung has built their own operating system which launches soon called Samsung Bada and it’s more of a “basic” way to give their entire portfolio of feature phones more smartphone-like capabilities. It isn’t supposed to REPLACE Android… at least not yet. With some recent success it will be very interesting to follow where Motorola takes their handset division. Will they still entertain producing their own operating system? For feature phones I wouldn’t doubt it. And as you start to improve that operating system with time, you have options to take that to the next level when the window of opportunity opens. I’m fine with Motorola expanding their horizons but let’s hope it isn’t at the expense of their Android initiatives.