We remember that a few months ago Motorola was planning to release a 2GHz phone this year. Considering that 2GHz+ SoCs are not coming before 2012 at least, it was hard to believe that Moto has a grasp on some unknown to mankind technology, but we loved the swirl of speculation that followed this statement.

Now it might turn out that Motorola meant two cores humming at 1GHz each, and the words could have been taken out of context. Out of all dual-core mobile chipset, only the next generation Snapdragon, and NVIDIA’s Tegra 2 have already shipped to manufacturers. The newest Snapdragon is probably going to HTC, so that leaves Tegra 2, if Motorola is to keep those 2GHz (rather 2×1GHz) promises.

Motorola is traditionally using TI’s OMAP family of chipsets for the DROID family, and OMAP4 will be a dual-core Cortex-A9 endeavor, but it is still not ready for commercial shipments, from what we know. However, Moto has claimed that it will have NVIDIA graphics in its units, and that again leaves us with only one possible chipset choice for a dual-core flagship Motorola phone later this year.

That coincides with the rumors that NVIDIA and Motorola are buddy-buddies with Google on the next version of Android codenamed Gingerbread, which just accidentally might be tailored to tablets. So, for all we know, the dual-core Tegra 2 might appear first in the Motorola Stingray tablet, considering that we are already seeing NVIDIA-powered tablets multiplying like microwaveable popcorn.

Of course, that would mean that Gingerbread will be ready for the holidays, so we just hope this chain of thoughts doesn’t turn out to be a train wreck.
source: AndroidandMe

IDC has run its numbers prediction game again, and this time it speculates on the market share of the various mobile operating systems in the next few years. By 2014, it predicts, the “wild card” Android will have reached nearly 25% of all smartphones worldwide – not hard to believe considering the low-tier push that Google is plotting.

IDC also states that the market for Windows Phone devices (presumably both Windows Mobile legacy, if it is still lurking around, and WP7) will expand from 6.8% to 9.8% – again plausible, since Windows Phone 7 hasn’t even hit the market yet. Here we will go out on a limb and say that WP7 will probably surpass the 10% mark, considering the resources Microsoft is pouring into its development, marketing and distribution.

BlackBerry OS is expected to remain almost unchanged from its 17.9% market share, and the biggest loser is supposed to be Symbian, falling from 40.1%, to 32.9%. The other dip, according to IDC, will be in Apple’s iOS market share, which could shrink from 14.7% to 10.9%. The “other” platforms will modestly increase their market share to a combined value of 4.5%.

We wouldn’t even dare to speculate what the mobile OS market will look like next year, let alone in 2014, but that’s what the IDC analyst get paychecks for. Considering the explosive expansion of the smartphone industry expected in the near future, where will the puzzle pieces fall is anyone’s guess.

Apple’s exclusivity with AT&T will be over in that timeframe, so we will be seeing the iPhone on more carriers, which will certainly boost the iOS numbers. Symbian might be declining in its current reincarnation, but Symbain^4 and MeeGo are nearing to replace it in Nokia handsets, and who knows what consumers will find attractive. Samsung is planning to put bada on a third of its smartphones, and it is the number two cell phone manufacturer, so they might stir the market as well. We are also not so sure of BlackBerry remaining unscathed with all the troubles looming over its proprietary email system.

For all we know the smartphone OS market will become increasingly fragmented, but in the end it will be Apple and Google raking in the cash – Apple from the huge margins on its tightly integrated products, and Google from the search revenue generated by Android’s proliferation.

source: eWeek

After the full pictures of the G2 leaked from T-Mobile’s servers, someone has now managed to get snaps of the keyboard layout up close and personal. Now we can clearly see three shortcut keys, which will most likely be programmable to attach any application or action to them as per your liking, nice touch.

The buttons seem very well spaced and the whole chiclet keyboard layout emits quality and comfort. The T-Mobile G2 should be available for $199 at the end of September.
source: HisAndHersAndroid

Market research firm IDC determined that the smartphone market this year will increase from 2009 by 55.4%. To better illustrate, that’s a shipment of 269.6 million units in 2010 versus 173.5 million in 2009. They attribute much of this forecast growth to models such as the BlackBerry Torch, the HTC EVO 4G, and the Apple iPhone 4.
They go on to speculate about the competing OS market shares by estimating their percentages in 2014. It’s no surprise that Android climbs by 51.2% over the next few years. Some of their other forecasts, however, might come as a bit of shock. One of these is that Apple’s iOS decreases by 25.8%. Perhaps we are just too in love with the iPhone to imagine it losing ground. Perhaps its loss of market share over the following years is due to other OS’s like Android gaining better brand recognition.

Tell us what you think…

source: Business Wire via Unwired View

So far from what we’ve seen, especially from all of its variants, the Samsung Galaxy S has only been offered in one single color. So everywhere you look, there is nothing in the way of uniqueness to be found when comparing devices between handset owners.

However, it looks as though that it’s about to change as a pink colored variant of the smartphone is going to make its debut in South Korea. As you can tell from the image, the handset sports that striking pink color that should cater to those individuals that want something that will stand out amongst the usual crop.

In the mean time, it’s unclear whether or not if this unique looking colored Samsung Galaxy S will eventually make its way to the various international versions out there, but we’re sue there are some people clamoring for something like this.
via Samsung Hub

Although some would be bold to say that the Motorola DROID 2’s luster isn’t at its potential due to its CDMA flavor, the Motorola MILESTONE 2 should appease those individuals because it’s identical in almost every way, but a GSM device. During IFA, both the MILESTONE 2 and rugged Defy were spotted just hanging out for all to see.

Needless to say that the MILESTONE 2 replicates the design of the DROID 2 in every way, which is a good thing, but it does feature some improved specs over its CDMA brother. As we reported before, the MILESTONE features, a 3.7” display with a resolution of 480 x 854 pixels, 5-megapixel auto-focus camera, HD video capture, 1GHz processor, 8GB on internal storage, and its improved QWERTY keyboard.

On the other hand, the actual device of the Motorola Defy seen during IFA has a white colored bezel that wasn’t seen with its rendered images. Still, it could potentially still be some kind of pre-production unit, but this rugged style handset features a 3.7” Gorilla Glass display, 5-megapixel auto-focus camera, 2GB of internal storage, Wi-Fi, GPS, and 3G.

Both Android powered smartphones were found over at Vodafone’s booth, so it’s looking like that the carrier will be offering both handsets some time down the road.

Motorola Defy Specifications
Motorola MILESTONE 2 Specifications

via Unwired View

Motorola MILESTONE 2

Motorola Defy

Samsung’s VP of the Mobile Display unit debunked the myth that the company has been hoarding AMOLED displays for its own perusal to hinder the production rates of some competitors’ phones. A new factory that will start production in June 2011, will increase the supply tenfold from 3 million panels per month to the whopping 30 million.

We are not sure if HTC or the others affected by the supply shortages will go back to the AMOLED goodness given Samsung’s track record, but the VP said that Samsung’s own Galaxy S has been affected and they have been struggling to keep up with the demand for the SuperAMOLED-endowed handset. He also stated that any manufacturer can use SuperAMOLED in its phones, and it is not reserved solely for Samsung’s own handsets.

Looks like the whole thing is due to production issues and underestimating demand for the vibrant AMOLED displays. Even better, word is that Samsung is finally in the black regarding its home-brewed AMOLED and SuperAMOLED technologies, after years of heavy investment in R&D.
source: OLED-Display

The Astonishing Tribe (TAT) are a Swedish design studio that does user interfaces, among other things, and was part of the group behind the Android UI. They recently came up with a short concept video combining existing and in-development display technologies like flexible and transparent screens or color e-ink, to try and visualize what the future will hold around 2014 for smartphones, PC monitors and bathroom mirrors alike.

The smartphone they are using seems to be all screen, and the whole video is a swirl of multitouch gestures, swiping, newscasting by your bathroom mirror, and other quite possible shenanigans. It’s a fascinating watch, but we’d have to say that the possibility of Sweden winning the World Cup is up there with the probability of us being able to stretch our phones in widescreen format like at 0:26 in the video below.
source: TAT

Well, well, well, look who might beat the big boys in having dual-core smartphones on the market as early as Q4! That’s precisely what LG announced today – its high-powered Optimus line will have smartphones based on NVIDIA Tegra 2 introduced in the October-December timeframe.

We know NVIDIA is counting on the world’s number three cell phone manufacturer to get a foothold in the mobile business world with its Cortex-A9 dual-core Tegra 2 chipset. Done with the 45nm process, the SoC features two cores humming along at 1GHz, 1080p video recording and decoding, as well as a low power NVIDIA GeForce GPU.

In the 3D graphics department it promises up to five times the performance of the single-core chipsets currently on the market. We don’t know if that includes Samsung’s Hummingbird or Apple’s A4, the current best-in-class mobile GPUs, or just Snapdragon, but Samsung made a similar claim about its dual-core Orion chipset today, so we might as well be seeing console-level gaming capabilities in these smartphones.

From what we learned when researching for our introductory article on the mobile chipsets topic, NVIDIA claims ultra low-power requirements by including eight processors dedicated to different tasks, something that the other upcoming SoCs are doing as well. Buried in the Tegra’s white papers, though, we found stats for 140 hours of audio on a standard 2000mAh battery, while the big boys are achieving 120 hours out of their Cortex-A9 chipsets, but from a 1000mAh battery. That is one major difference we are seeing from the already announced dual-core mobile chipsets from Qualcomm, Texas Instruments and Samsung. All of them claim 30% improvement in battery life compared to the single-core predecessors.

LG didn’t specify what operating systems will these Tegra 2 smartphones carry. It still has a way to go on the promise to deliver 20 Android phones and five Windows Phone 7 handsets this year, so both of the mobile operating systems might have a dual-core future in the works.

Well, now we really can’t wait for next Tuesday’s LG Optimus press event, moreover it could also include the rumored Tegra 2-based Optimus Pad Android tablet.
source: LG via AnandTech

After Qualcomm and Texas Instruments, it was Samsung’s turn to announce its own dual-core chipset for mobile devices. The system-on-a-chip (SoC) is codenamed Orion, it is based on the dual-core Cortex-A9 architecture from ARM, and will have the cores running at 1GHz. Samsung claims it will be 5 times faster in graphics rendering than its current Hummingbird, as found in the Galaxy S and its US carrier versions. Well, let’s hope that having full Adobe Flash on our smartphones will come standard now, no performance excuses can be possible this time.

Last time we checked, the PowerVR SGX540 GPU in the Hummingbird chipset was theoretically capable of 90 million triangles per second. That puts the Orion GPU at 450 million, only a bit less than the Xbox 360’s 500 million that the gaming console is currently offering, for example.

Apart from that amazing boost in graphics prowess, the Orion will offer what all the other 45nm dual-core SoCs like the latest Qualcomm Snapdragon, and TI’s OMAP4 will. Full HD video recording and decoding at 30fps, support for cameras up to 18MP, and support for up to three displays simultaneously – two on the device itself, and one external HDTV, for example, via HDMI-out. The Cortex-A9 chipsets also should deliver 30% reduction in power consumption, so all the goodies above will come in an even thriftier package that will further enhance battery life on mobile devices.

The other interesting thing about the Orion SoC is that it will have embedded interface support for various storage technologies – NAND flash, moviNAND, SSD or HDD providing both SATA, and eMMC interfaces. Thus the chipset can be used in netbooks and tablets with enhanced storage options as well. It has the audio and GPS chips included, but not the baseband connectivity, where Snapdragon has clear advantage – it is still A8 based, however .

Samsung’s Orion chipset has already finished sampling and will be shipped to “select customers” in Q4 of this year, with Samsung ramping up production in the first half of 2011, which means we should have an Orion-based device next year – Galaxy S 2 anyone?

We wonder what those “select customers” are, besides Samsung itself of course, which uses the Hummingbird in the Galaxy S and Galaxy Tab. We currently have only one major player left to announce a dual-core chipset for its next generation of mobile devices – Apple. Considering that the Hummingbird and A4 are developed by the same company, and Samsung’s traditional ties with Apple for the previous generations of iPhones, could we be seeing a dual-core iPhone next summer? It’s a speculation, but we doubt that Steve Jobs will allow the company to be left in the dust in that respect, moreover it now owns Intrinsity, the company behind the sizzling Hummingbird and A4 chipsets.
source: Samsung