Slashgear got their hands on an HTC Legend. With a trusty video camera, they took a video of an unboxing and a demo of the aluminum clad Android device. Running on Android 2.1 (minus a few incidental things like the animated wallpaper), the new version of Sense UI gets to debut here and one of the new features allows you to take a “helicopter view” of all seven home pages at once while the new “Friend Stream” aggregates all of your social network updates into one single feed. With its aluminum body keeping finger prints away and making the handset practically indestructible, this is the stuff that legends are made of.
source: Slashgear

With Spring Training already underway, the 2010 Major League Baseball season is just around the corner. If you are a big fan, the MLB At Bat app is a must-have for your mobile phone. Last year, the app was available on the iPhone and this year, MLB has upgraded it and has now made the app available for Android phones running 1.5 or higher, and the BlackBerry Storm and Storm2, besides the iPhone. The price has risen 50% to $14.99, but for the fan who eats, drinks and breathes the American Pastime, it is worth every penny.

The app brings you streamed audio of every regular season and post season games (you can select to hear the home team announcers or the road team announcers), in-game pitch tracker, box scores, video highlights and more stats than you can swing a Louisville Slugger at. iPhone users will be able to view selected out of market games through streaming video and a separate subscription to MLB.TV. While currently the Storm and Storm2 are the only BlackBerry handsets that the app will work with, right after Opening Day, other ‘Berries using the 5.0 OS will be able to use At Bat 2010. At Apple’s iTunes app store, At Bat 2010 is already the highest grossing app ever. You might say, it’s a hit! For information on subscribing to the At Bat 2010 app, visit the source link.
source: MLB via CIO

Microsoft’s Tag Reader is an app that allows you to scan a product’s bar code using your phone’s camera. Your phone will then give you information on the product including promotions, videos and special offers. This is the Redmond based firm’s first application for Android and Tag Reader has already been released for the iPhone, Symbian, BlackBerry and of course, Windows Mobile platforms. The app is free and can be downloaded from the Android Market. If you Pre and Pixi users feel a bit left out, start bugging Microsoft and perhaps the next build will be for webOS.
source: Microsoft via Engadget, UnwiredView

Macy’s doesn’t tell Gimbels went the old saying. It would be even stranger for Macy’s to tell customers to go shop at Gimbels. As strange as that seems, imagine Steve Jobs telling would-be iPhone buyers to pick up a Palm Pre Plus instead. That is akin to the situation that Motorola found itself doing to Android developers. While the Motorola DROID can load custom ROMs, get overclocked past 1GHz and basically can be hacked into without a problem, the handset’s European relative, the MILESTONE is locked up tighter than the Queen’s Jewels. Digitially signed firmware makes it impossible to load custom ROMs on the MILESTONE and developers were asking Motorola for some help.The response came from Lori Fraleigh from the Motodev team. Her response was that the company knows there are Android developers who want to go beyond application development to experiment with Android system development and re-flashing phones. She recommended that for those doing such work, buying a Google ADP1 developer’s phone, or a Nexus One as both of those models were “intended for those purposes”. Motorola’s Android phone, she explains, are made for the consumer. the DROID, she added, was a deviation from their common business practice and when such deviation occurs, it is because of a specific business reason.

Motorola has released 9 different Android handsets under 12 different names and the DROID is the only one to accept unsigned images and the manufacturer won’t discuss the business reason that made the DROID different. With talk of a Motorola built device heading for Google’s phone store, will the latter force the former to open up that model? In the meantime, developers have the answer to their question. It might not be something that the Schaumburg based company wants repeated like a mantra, but developers looking to experiment with Android should buy HTC.
source: MOTODEV via MotorolaOwnersForum, AndroidandMe

You’ve probably been seeing a decent amount of commercials on TV showcasing the Samsung Behold II. It really makes you wonder why it took Samsung so long for it to start heavily advertising its Android smartphone geared towards the US market. Some would suggest that it got lost in the myriad of Android offerings that fell through during the holidays or that it didn’t live up to the complete experience that its rivals offered. In any case, it looks like Samsung is teaming up with T-Mobile again for their next Android powered smartphone in the US – enter the Samsung T959 which is speculated to run Android 2.1 from the start. In addition, it features a screen resolution of 320 x 480 (no word on the screen size itself), Bluetooth 2.1, support for T-Mobile’s 3G bands, aGPS, and an unspecified megapixel count for its camera. Even though there weren’t too many people thrilled with Samsung’s last Android offering with T-Mobile, let’s hope they take those criticisms and use it to their advantage with the T959.
source: Cell Phone Signal

At this point it’s pretty much safe to say that we’ll eventually see the HTC Incredible make its way to Verizon’s lineup alongside the Nexus One – which of course has been officially confirmed during the Nexus One’s unveiling back in January. After we reported on how the Nexus One was experiencing some issues with multi-touch, Big Red has ceremoniously placed the brakes on its launch indefinitely until things have been ironed out with it – there’s no questioning the strict tests and guidelines that Verizon imposes on its handsets before making it available. With that in the books, it looks like the Nexus One might be delayed by Verizon until the end of this month. Now there are juicy pieces of news are surrounding one of its brothers – the HTC Incredible. It’s rumored to utilize the same exact touchscreen as the Nexus One, so Big Red is also dishing out the same grueling process on that handset to meet its expectations – potentially causing it to be delayed until May. Additionally there were some shots taken of the HTC Incredible with red colored accents used on its buttons and possibly a red colored rear cover. We know that Verizon customers are really aching to see these handsets already, but its good to see that Big Red doesn’t want to see any headaches come out of its launches – it only accentuates their stance on providing the best handsets out there.
source: Phandroid

A leaked copy of the Android 2.1 firmware for the HTC Droid Eris has made its way to the XDA developers forum. The leak came frim someone who claims to work for HTC in China. The initial version that was posted had some problems, but after a spit and polish shoe shine by the developers at XDA they were able to repair it and flash it onto their phone. The ROM is totally functional and even includes the new Sense UI. As we previously reported, not all of the 2.1 features were part of the upgrade, such as the animated wallpaper. It still could be a while before the official release is launched. Web site Android and Me feels that Google is working on a coordinated release among carriers for the second quarter. Oh, and if you decide to download XDA’s handiwork on your phone, well, you could end up with an Android flavored brick. Some other developers are working on porting the code over to the CDMA version of the HTC Hero.Those with the Hero over at Sprint could soon have a leaked 2.1 upgrade of their own. Or, we could all just take a chill pill and realize that the official release probably is not too far away.
source: XDAdevelopersforum via AndroidandMe

ou’re on the go and you want to look up a contact or open an app, but can’t sort through a hundred names, what do you do?  Well, if you have an Android phone running 2.0 or higher, and you speak English, you can use Google Gesture Search. Gesture Search lets you look for something by scribbling a letter on the touchscreen of your device. Look for a contact, a bookmark, an app or even a music track. It allows you to get through a list quickly without typing. You can download the app by visiting the source link.
source: Google via AndroidandMe

Remember when Motorola told DROID owners to expect the Android 2.1 update by the end of the week? Of course you do. The update never came, and DROID owners have been waiting ever since for Android 2.1, like a jilted lover who keeps waiting for her/his beau to return. But imagine what your handset would be like had Motorola actually done what it promised to. Web site droid-life was able to update a DROID with what they believe to be the official Android 2.1 update that the phone will actually receive-when it finally does come down from the heavens above like manna. What you are about to see is not some custom 2.1 ROM. And, as droid-life warns, following in their footstep could easily brick your DROID, make you miss the OTA upgrade, and turn the universe upside down. Note how smoothly the device runs, especially scrolling and the pinch-to-zoom feature. The handset seems to run faster, too. Now back to reality. The update still is MIA, but hopefully it will be coming soon.
source: droid-life

Motorola is going all out by making its trio of Android handsets enter the market to our friends to the north. Consumers in Canada can really jump up for joy as Motorola has announced that the QUENCH, BACKFLIP, and DEXT are all slated to be available for sale some time within the first half of the year. That looks pretty promising because we’re already heading into the last leg of the first quarter – so there’s a slight possibility it could be released within the next few months. These Android powered smartphone will undoubtedly offer MOTORBLUR to keep owners connected to various social networking sites all from their home screen. The trio of handsets is scheduled to be available through the three major Canadian wireless carriers – that consists of Rogers, Bell, and Telus. One specific thing to point out is that Motorola didn’t exactly specify if all three handsets will actually be available on each of the carriers or if one gets some kind of exclusivity on a handset. Motorola’s latest Android offerings will supplement its growing presence in the Canadian market as the Motorola MILESTONE is already making some headlines over there.
source: Motorola via Unwired View