Motorola, it seems, has suffered an embarrassing bout of premature release.

Monday afternoon, the company announced on its Facebook page that the Android 2.1 update would beginning hitting Droid handsets this week. The reaction was huge: nearly 800 “likes” and pages upon pages of excitement-filled comments.

Now, however, the company says the announcement was made in error.

Where’s that damn undo button when you need it?

Motorola’s Android Announcement

Android 2.1 entered the world with the release of Google’s Nexus One last month. At the time of the launch, Motorola said the software update would be reaching the Droid and other Android phones at some point in the near future.

Fast-forward to this past Monday, when the following message appeared on Motorola’s official Facebook fan page:

“Hi all — we know you are frustrated with the lack of details regarding Android software upgrades and we sincerely apologize for not being able to share info sooner. We’re happy to relay the 2.1 upgrade to DROID will start to roll out this week, and we will have more information to share on other device upgrades later this week as well. Thanks for your patience and continued support.”

All seemed peachy until yesterday, when a manager at Motorola’s official support forum posted a message saying the update was not, in fact, ready to go.

“How embarrassing,” he wrote. “Apparently we jumped the gun on these details.”

He reiterated the mistake in a later posting, saying: “The details posted here and on the support site were prematurely released for public view. They have been removed from both places.”

(See? I wasn’t lying about that premature release business. I guess it really does happen to everyone.)

Motorola’s Droid and Android 2.1

All right, so what’s the story now? A representative from Motorola tells me the Android 2.1 update is expected to roll-out to Droid owners “soon,” though she was not able to provide a specific time frame for its debut. She did confirm that it would be sent over-the-air as a free download, as typically occurs with mobile OS updates.

So stay tuned, my fellow Droid owners. With any luck, this delay won’t last long.

In the meantime, if you want somewhere else to channel your frustrations, go read this story. It’ll make you appreciate Android’s open nature — or, at the very least, give you an uplifting chuckle.

[via PC World]

Motorola announced via its Facebook page yesterday that the Droid will be getting an over-the-air (OTA) update to Android 2.1. The new version of the Android OS (a.k.a. Eclaire), is currently running only on Google’s Nexus One.

Motorola announced the forthcoming update for later this week and apologized to Droid users for a lack of details on which functions will be included.

“Motorola Hi all – we know you are frustrated with the lack of details regarding Android software upgrades and we sincerely apologize for not being able to share info sooner. We’re happy to relay the 2.1 upgrade to DROID will start to roll out this week, and we will have more information to share on other device upgrades later this week as well,” Motorola posted on its Facebook page.

The Droid was released running Android 2.0 and has since received one OTA to version 2.0.1.

[via Wireless Week]

In my last post, “Smartphones’ biggest drawback? Terms of service,” I shared my experience with my previous smartphone, the HTC XV6800 (TyTN), and how I came to acquire Verizon’s new Droid.

As far as terms of service, Verizon has changed their stupid GPS policy with new devices. GPS is a sweet experience, despite the fact that Google MySQL DBs are surely recording every action of every moment of your everyday life and trying to figure out how to monetize all of those things by delivering ads that will make you spend more money.

The ads, which appear as you move from app to app within the Droid, are so non-intrusive that when you DO realize that there are ads on the screen, it’s somewhat startling. But the most surprising, unexpected thing about the Droid, is that it’s actually, truly, a stealthy Google Phone (gPhone). That fact seems to have been lost by the tech industry and journalists. You don’t really activate the Droid until you enter your Google account – and once you do, watch out.

My Droid grabbed all kinds of information – contacts from my corporate account, personal account, and Facebook – and integrated it into the most cohesive and well-organized address book I’ve ever had. And it did this without asking me, telling me, or with me even realizing that this was going to happen. It did this flawlessly, but it was also a little spooky going into my Contacts book and seeing profiles of friends from FB, along with their FB pictures, who had never been in my personal contacts list before.

Google has successfully consolidated and seamlessly integrated YouTube, Facebook, Twitter, and LinkedIn, plus GoogleDocs, GoogleVoice, and GoogleReader, which all come together within the cloud. In fact, my experience with the Droid illustrates how neatly Google has been working to position themselves as the central broker in all transactions that take place in your digital life.

For example, I decided to use my Droid to post a video to YouTube and share the YouTube post via FB. To my surprise, when I opened the YouTube app, it took me to a YouTube account I’d forgotten that I had. Google hadn’t forgotten this account, though. Google is the giant, pink cyber-elephant in the room – and Google doesn’t forget.

I’m convinced that Google’s master plan is to get you to use as many services and features as possible so that your smartphone is always turned on, in your hands, and in front of your eyes. Ultimately, Google isn’t a search engine or a cloud-based app delivery company – it’s an information warehouse. Google is advertising, as much as McDonald’s is actually a real-estate company.

If this sounds like a negative review, let me be clear – creepy invasion of privacy and being cyber stalked by a multi-national global company has never been so enjoyable. The Droid’s ability to integrate, organize, and consolidate your entire digital life — your accounts, apps, sites, and digital information – is super convenient. I’d even go so far to say that it’s the world’s most efficient, accurate, and effective PDA to date.

And that’s the one HUGE thing Droid does that the OTHER one – the one with the fruit on the back of it – DOESN’T. The iPhone cannot match the level of integration that the Droid delivers because of the nature of the Google-ness underlying the device, services, and features. And even if that weren’t the case, Google threw in the turn-by-turn GPS to seal the deal.

However, these benefits don’t mean that the Droid is an iPhone “killer.” Droid apps are rougher, less-polished, and there’s a lot more evidence of the DIY, home-rolled Linux community core in the Droid apps – and frankly, that isn’t going to appeal to the broader consumer audience in the way that iPhone apps do.

Despite that, the 10,000 or so apps in the official Android marketplace are overwhelming. There are also several sources for “non-market” apps that don’t require you to do any special “jailbreak” of your phone or otherwise bypass security. We’ll see if Verizon leaves this untouched in the future – but for right now, that’s a significant advantage to the Droid market.

Clearly, the iPhone is the primary competition for the Droid and vice versa. Having 100,000 apps versus 10,000 apps seems kind of like having 40,000 nuclear missiles versus 4,500 nuclear missiles, when 1,500 would be enough to wipe out life on the entire planet. I understand that there are some “special” titles on the iPhone, especially commercial games, that haven’t made their way to Android yet. Time will tell if this is a technical limitation or simply that Android didn’t have the critical mass to attract those game makers. I suspect it is more the latter than the former.

Here are a few drawbacks of the Verizon Droid:

• Application management seems a little clunky. Apps exist in a folder or drawer, and if you download an app, it goes into this bucket. You can drag and drop your apps onto one of three desktops, but there isn’t a lot of “management” or organization to the scheme.
• Having MultiTouch disabled, even though PicSay illustrates that the device is MultiTouch-capable, is probably an attempt to avoid a patent lawsuit by Apple – and the touch to zoom works ok, but it still sucks to have to make concessions like that.
• I also think Verizon’s insistence to charge an outrageous additional fee for tethering is ill-advised. Your 5GB unlimited data should be yours to use however you like, hooked up to whatever you want. However, if Verizon wants to put a “high-bandwidth usage” cap on anything exceeding the 5GB unlimited plan, that seems fair to me. What would truly be ideal is if some other major carrier (no, not T-Mobile… I said a MAJOR carrier) responded by allowing free tethering with an unlimited data plan.

Together, Apple and Google will begin to influence how wireless communications companies do business. I also think that Apple and Google will see the benefit in adding free and inexpensive features that are a value-add to consumers, whereas wireless carriers only have the incentive to monetize every bit of service they can in any way possible.

Frankly, I expect AT&T and Verizon will experience what it feels like to be a faceless customer that can easily be replaced and is only welcome as long as they are useful and generating positive growth and income (after all, Google wants to deliver ads – and they don’t exactly care where you are or what you’re using when you get those ads). I’m kind of excited by that prospect, because wireless carriers have got it coming.

The big change that the Droid brings isn’t the device itself, but rather how it positions Google – and how it exposes how carefully Google has been positioning themselves. The proof of concept is finally there in a way that’s going to start attracting people outside of the tech bleeding edge.

For good or bad, the experience delivers in a way that’s bound to appeal. I’m just not sure what we’re giving away to get to that point. At some time in the future, I may wish for the simple days back, when Verizon took advantage of me by charging me twice for the same service. Of course, that will be my last laugh – if Google, using Linux, delivers themselves to a place where they are far worse than Microsoft ever dreamed of being.

[via Tech Republic]

What was making the Droid camera go out of focus?

Verizon’s launch of the Droid has been marred by a handful of bugs that Google and/or Motorola and/or Verizon appear to be squashing pretty quickly (seriously, how much buck-passing goes on behind the scenes when there’s a bug with this device?). One of the most interesting bug stories I’ve heard in a while has to do with the auto-focus bug. Apparently it just didn’t work. The on-board camera would focus, then blur out again.

And then it suddenly started working properly for everyone. The first theory of why it would fix itself was that there was some film on the lens when a Droid was fresh from the factory, but it got cleared off with use somehow. Folks claimed that directly cleaning the lens with a soft cloth would fix the problem, and that much made sense, but other theories had the film getting cleaned by the action of sticking the Droid in your pocket? I wish I lived in a world where things got cleaner the more you used them!

The next theory was that some kind of stealth patch got pushed to the Droids without the owner’s knowledge. Officials quickly denied this rumor. Probably good news that they can’t (or at least, won’t) patch your phone without your choosing to accept the patch.

Finally the real reason for the bug and fix was revealed, and maybe it’s just because I write web scripts for a living, but I really got a kick out of this. The auto-focus routines somehow make use of a timestamp, and the bug was due to a rounding error. In a comment on an Engadget post, someone claiming to be Google engineer Dan Morrill said:

There’s a rounding-error bug in the camera driver’s autofocus routine (which uses a timestamp) that causes autofocus to behave poorly on a 24.5-day cycle. That is, it’ll work for 24.5 days, then have poor performance for 24.5 days, then work again.

The 17th is the start of a new “works correctly” cycle, so the devices will be fine for a while. A permanent fix is in the works.

How crazy is that? Engadget says they tested this by backdating their Droid to November 11th and sure enough, the problem returned. I pity the engineer who had to uncover this one; talk about finding a needle in a haystack.

Anyway, let’s hope they get this patched up before the current ‘good’ cycle ends.

By the way, I’m considering springing for a Droid; if any readers have one, I’d love to hear comments on it. Are you happy with your purchase?

[via IT World]

If the iPhone didn’t finish off Windows Mobile in the smartphone market, the Motorola Droid may.

Windows Mobile is losing the last vestiges of its mojo–if it really had any to begin with–as the Droid and other phones based on the Android 2.0 operating system push the buzz meter needle into the red zone. Many in the media–which can play a big role in steering users to one technology platform or another–sense that Windows Mobile has now been relegated resolutely to has-been status.

The Motorola Droid’s high-resolution screen.

(Credit: Verizon)

Let’s do a quick canvas of what some in the press are saying now that we’re at the start of the Droid era. A post on SFGate.com (the Web site of the San Francisco Chronicle) is, like other commentary out there, clearly dismissive of Windows Mobile. “Curiously, Microsoft is nowhere to be seen in this battle royal,” the author states, referring to the iPhone and Android.

And there’s this more damning comment from a blog at SeattlePI.com. “Rarely mentioned, however, is another player in the mobile OS market–Microsoft. Why not? Because not many people in the smartphone world seem to really give a hoot about Windows Mobile anymore.”

The litany of like articles is long. This post on PC World asks: “Has Microsoft Placed Its Last Mobile Bet?” The article cites research from Canalys showing Windows Mobile slipping from 13.9 percent of the worldwide smartphone market in 2002 to 9 percent in the second quarter of 2009.

The numbers are even less favorable in an accounting by ad service Admob, which compiles data on which operating systems are in use on mobile devices that access online ads. In August, according to AdMob, Windows Mobile had only a 4 percent share of the mobile OS market worldwide, down from 7 percent in February.

But getting back to my original premise of no mobile mojo for Windows. The fact is that consumers don’t care about Windows on smartphones. In other words, while Windows seems to be a prerequisite for many consumers when buying a PC, it just doesn’t come into play in a big way in a smartphone purchase.

This will have ramifications beyond Microsoft of course. Companies like Toshiba (and its attractive TG01 smartphone) will probably not be as successful on Windows Mobile as they would (will) be on Android 2.0. Or, at the very least, will not get the necessary buzz.

Then there’s the Intel factor. Intel also wants to be a player, eventually, in the smartphone space. If it is indeed able to beat back Texas Instruments (whose chip is used in the Droid), Samsung (iPhone), Qualcomm (BlackBerry), and Marvell, it probably won’t do it by sticking to the tried-and-true “WinTel” combination that’s been so outrageously successful in the PC space.

And Intel is chasing a fast-moving target. TI, and all the other ARM-based chip suppliers cited above, are slated to bring out dual-core designs that can hit speeds as high as 2GHz (think next-generation tablets and media pads). In other words, they’ll also be able claim the coveted speed mantle on phones, such as the Droid, where Windows Mobile is no where in sight.

So the Droid may not be the iPhone killer but rather the Windows Mobile slayer. Microsoft, of course, will always have the unassailable PC franchise. But, wait, isn’t Android coming to Netbooks next year? Maybe the real battle royal for Microsoft is yet to come.

[via cnet]

Motorola

This business of iPhone killing is a lot harder than it looks.

Putting together a package that can overtake Cupertino’s magic device has proven extremely difficult, mostly because Apple has created a tight product that is extremely elegent, fun to use and boasts not only a powerful piece of hardware but an almost infinite amount of third-party software.

But there are ways to blunt Apple’s advantage, even if you can’t go toe-to-toe with the iPhone’s overall experience. The Motorola Droid, which goes on sale today for $199.99 (after a $100 rebate), is a study in just that kind of striving.

While it doesn’t match the iPhone’s simplicity and produce the same end result, Droid creates a hugely compelling package that is the best challenger yet to the iPhone. In some ways, it even surpasses the iPhone though its list of advantages doesn’t provide the one killer punch necessary to knock the iPhone down.

Perhaps, the best edge for Droid is its network. On Verizon Wireless, the Droid has a powerful network that finds me in the nooks and valleys of San Francisco. I’ve had a better time finding a 3G signal with the Droid than with my iPhone 3GS, which is an AT&T exclusive.

This is not a trivial matter because Verizon folks are very loyal. Some have already left for the iPhone but they would love to stay on the Verizon network if possible. With a Verizon iPhone looking pretty far-fetched at this point, the Droid is a great device to keep those Verizon customers happy and away from the door.

Aesthetically, the Droid hardware won’t set any hearts on fire. Its best attribute is its beautiful 3.7-inch screen which is not only bigger than the iPhone’s but, at 854×480 with a 16:9 aspect ratio, it boasts a better resolution.

The rest of the phone design is rather ho-hum. It’s got a glossy black body framing the screen with four touch buttons for back, menu, home and search. The back of the phone has a more rubberized black matte finish with gold accents.

Despite being just about a millimeter and a half thicker than the iPhone 3GS at its thickest point, the Droid manages to hide a slide-out QWERTY keyboard. Unfortunately, it’s not a great type pad. To accommodate the thin body, the buttons are flattened and offer very shallow channels to differentiate one from the other. The result is some inaccurate typing.

The biggest head scratcher is the inclusion of a directional pad just to the right of the keypad. It’s also on the same side as a lip that extends beyond the body beyond screen. What it all means is that your right thumb has to extend a lot further than your left just to type, which gets annoying.

I’m more of a fan of the virtual keyboard, which thankfully has improved auto-correct software. Even for longer messages, I was tempted to just type using the virtual keyboard in landscape rather than pull out the physical keyboard.

The Droid is the first to run Google’s Android 2.0 software. The highlight of this operating system upgrade is the inclusion of Google Maps Navigation, a free turn-by-turn direction service that works pretty well. Since it’s Internet connected, the service can also pull up live traffic, nearby searches and also Google Street View for points along your path.

Android 2.0 also provides some other nice touches including the ability to collapse contacts and information from multiple sources into one view. You can sync your contacts list from Google, Exchange and Facebook. Your different e-mail accounts can also feed into one in-box. It’s not as elegant as HTC’s Sense user interface, but it creates some intuitive connections and integration that you can’t find on the iPhone.

Some other less pointed advantages for Droid over the iPhone is its ability to multi-task, customize and support widgets. The iPhone has multi-tasking for many Apple apps but third-party apps have to be typically closed out before a user can access another application. Android lets you leave things running in the background though it doesn’t provide a huge benefit. The ability to customize your home screen with your own picture is a nice perk but hardly a game changer. The widgets, like a Facebook status update widget, can actually be pretty helpful though with only three home screen panes, they can take up some valuable real estate.

Android 2.0 also provides support for more camera features. The Droid sports a 5 megapixel camera with a LED flash and some nice effects and modes like sepia or portrait. Despite its higher megapixel count, the pictures aren’t noticeably better than the iPhone’s though the video is pretty good. The flash helps at a certain range but too close and it casts a garish glare.

One of the iPhone’s strength’s is its tight integration with iTunes. You can not only sync media easily, you can buy songs, videos and apps easily right from your iPhone. Droid offers access to Amazon’s MP3 service but there’s no equivalent to easy video downloads. You can move your own media over just by plugging your droid into a PC or Mac and dragging and dropping your files onto the Droid.

The web browser is very nice especially on the Droid’s larger screen. It’s too bad you can pinch to expand and shrink the page but double tapping is a good alternative for getting a closer look. Pulling back is more tedious, requiring multiple presses on an on-screen magnifying glass. Another addition is the ability to see thumbnails of bookmarked Web pages. Overall, I’ve gotten quite used to the user interface of Android and the way a press of the menu button or a long press takes you where you want to go. The iPhone set my expectations for responsive touch screen interfaces but Android’s experience has been easy to grasp.

Finally, the app story is still very much in Apple’s favor. It’s not just the huge numbers advantage 100,000 to Android’s 12,000 apps. But Apple just has some very polished software coming out from both independent guys and big name publishers.

In the end, the Droid doesn’t kill the iPhone so much as offer a credible alternative. The iPhone still has an edge but considering the amount of distance the Android platform has closed in just one year, you have to wonder what the competition will look like in another year. That’s where Android can press its advantage. While the internal innovation that happens on the iPhone comes from Apple engineers, Android is managing to ramp up faster because its open source nature invites innovation from a host of developers.

The days of a true iPhone killer are still not here and in truth, that title is a misnomer. Nothing’s gonna just appear and mop up the floor with the iPhone. But we’re now with the Droid and its Android successors, you’re seeing a future line-up that could turn this argument into a toss-up pretty quickly.

We’ve got the DROID in our hands… and it is sweet. Moto claims that this is the thinnest full QWERTY slider on the market, and we’re apt to believe it. The phone is incredibly slick and solid, and we’re definitely looking forward to putting it through its paces. We’ll have more photos, video, and a full review coming, so stay tuned!

Some quick observations on the phone:

• That big screen is killer. Bright, crisp, and tons of room for your icons and widgets.
• Speed is noticeably improved — particularly when moving from app to app. We did notice that some of the home screen scrolling looked laggy.
• Android 2.0 is definitely cleaned up — but it’s most definitely still Android
• The browser seems significantly improved — pages now load up in a fully zoomed-out mode, and the load times and scrolling are way snappier.
• The keyboard takes some getting used to, and it suffers from a similar hand-position issue as the G1, but it’s fairly usable. We think it’ll be second nature once we spend some time with it.
• Facebook is integrated into accounts, which means some of that BLUR functionality is here (though now it’s part of Android 2.0 natively). The good news is that when you add a Facebook account you can choose to pull all Facebook info and contacts, or just info related to your existing contacts — a real clutter buster.

Update: We’ve added a new gallery, and video is on the way!

Update 2: Video is up after the break! More coming too…

Update 3: And we’ve got a browser speed test to round things out.

Update 4: We’ve added another gallery of the car and home docks, which are pretty neat — the phone detects the dock magnetically, and switches to the appropriate mode. We’re told that there’ll also be third-party docks, and that Google’s the one behind the different interface modes, so this could be just the tip of the iceberg.

by Joshua Topolsky

[via engadget]

NEW YORK (TheStreet) — Apple’s (AAPL Quote) iPhone success has provoked backlash among its partner AT&T (T Quote) and would-be Verizon (VZ Quote).

The Androids are lining up for battle.

AT&T, looking beyond these iPhone glory days at a post-Apple era, has taken a big step toward offering its own Google (GOOG Quote) Android devices, some say as early as this year.

This shift in allegiance comes as Verizon and Motorola (MOT Quote) prepare to unveil the hotly anticipated Droid, the anti-iPhone — iDon’t, Droid Does — Google Android phone at a press conference Wednesday.

Invitation to a Google Android event hosted by Motorola and Verizon

Not to be left out of the Android party, AT&T made some unusually favorable comments about the magic that could be made with a Google phone on its new, fast 3G network.

“I think those devices will actually work best on our network,” AT&T wireless chief Ralph De La Vega told analysts on an earnings call Thursday. “We have kicked the tires on Android,” he said, adding: “Now we are working with handset manufacturers to bring products to market.”

Apple’s exclusive iPhone agreement with AT&T is set to expire in June. So it isn’t exactly a shock to see Ma Bell moving more quickly to get on the Android bandwagon. An AT&T representative said the shift from evaluation to production is a new development but would only reiterate statements saying the company expects to have an Android phone in 2010.

Dell (DELL Quote) is expected to bring its Android phone to AT&T early next year, but there may be an even better and quicker option for AT&T to enter the Android camp.

As TheStreet reported earlier this week, Google is working with a phone design manufacturer to have its own Google-branded Android phone available this year.

People familiar with the production plans say Google has ordered phones in a quantity large enough to suggests a full blown rollout, and not a trickle of developer’s trial models.

Google doesn’t have its own retail outlet to sell an Android phone, and AT&T, the top phone seller in the third quarter, may just have room on its Christmas inventory list.

Says one analyst: “Now that AT&T has decided to go with Android, why wouldn’t they go with the best version, the one developed by Google.”

The iPhone raised the bar on smartphones. Apple proved that cool devices need strong software to make a winning combo. Research In Motion (RIMM Quote), Palm (PALM Quote), Nokia (NOK Quote), Motorola (MOT Quote) and Samsung are among the current rivals competing against the iPhone standard.

Google’s open, Web-friendly, easy-to-customize Android operating system is now seen as the most compelling alternative to Apple’s software.

“From a carrier perspective, this couldn’t have come any sooner,” says Northeast Securities analyst Ashok Kumar. “Google is the only vendor that can get them immediate market share by virtue of its software strength.”

By Scott Moritz

[via TheStreet]