Keeping up with the Androids

Since I’ve now handled almost all of the following devices, I decided to re-do my “140 characters” list and just do a simple rundown of every Android phone with pictures. We’re going to see a lot more at Mobile World Congress. I really want to go, but it’s a little expensive, and I’ve got about 5 trips coming up that are going to be expensive. I also really really really want a Sony Vaio X Signature Series (VPCX115KX/S)…but that’s $1,589.99. money.

RELEASED/CONFIRMED:

G1 (HTC Dream) This is the phone that started it all one year ago: Keyboard, Chin, Trackball, Slider, and Android 1.0

Mytouch3G (HTC Magic) , (Dopod) It’s still got the chin, but no keyboard. Shellable, skinnable, endorsed by Whoopi.

HTC Hero (World) Slim and sexy, this is the first ‘droid with a custom UI #HTCSense The CDMA version is Sprint’s first Android device.

HTC Tattoo yet another all-touch device with HTC Sense bound for Europe. Mysteriously ditched the “chin” but went with custom shells.

HTC Droid Eris (HTC Desire) Launch partner of Verizon Droid, standard 528MHz CPU, very similar to the Hero.

HTC Nexus One  Sold directly through Google, all-touch, 1GHz Snapdragon, cross-carrier, world phone. Very controversial and reputed to have some problems, but otherwise a totally compelling device.

Motorola Cliq/Dext the first Android phone from Moto, which unveiled MotoBLUR, the second big UI premiered for Android. Thanks to the timing of the big data loss of 2009, this became a replacement for many Sidekicks.

Motorola Droid aka “Sholes,” “Tao,” and “Touchstone.” QWERTY slider as thin as an iPhone. VZW’s first Android and first Android 2.0 (eclair) device. A killer.

Motorola Backflip, aka “Enzo,” a weird form factor with keyboard on back of chassis and trackpad behind the screen, also rocks the MotoBLUR interface.

Motorola MotoROI, First released in China and South Korea, this powerful device features 720p video capture with HDMI output and has a fully-featured 8 Megapixel camera. Rumors say it’ll be released in the U.S. also.

Huawei U8220 aka T-mobile Pulse, the first prepaid all-touch Android device “perfect entry level smartphone”

Huawei U8230 3.2 megapixel camera on the back, VGA cam on the front, update to the T-Mobile Pulse.

LG inTouch MAX (GW620) aka “Etna” this QWERTY slider was launched in EU, turned up unlocked in France €450, and is now available in the UK on Virgin and T-Mobile.

LG GT540, don’t know the name of this one, but is all-touch, runs 2.0, and comes in various colours. Launched at CES, coming to EU/Asia

Acer A1 or Acer Liquid, like Motorola, Acer said it’s focusing on Android now. Launched UK 10/14, runs Qualcomm Snapdragon chipset.

Dell mini 3i, one of China Mobile’s first Ophones, rumored to be AT&T’s first Android phone, we’ll have more. Dell is good with staying in touch.

Lenovo O1, another TD-SCDMA Ophone for China. Pretty, but not likely to come to the U.S.

Samsung Galaxy, @I7500, typical Samsung quality display, all-touch AMOLED with light sensor, not a “Google phone,” available in Germany, Austria, and Poland.

Samsung Behold 2, shown with #TouchWiz #Cube UI, will be first Samsung droid phone in US on T-Mobile

Samsung Moment, thought to be the #InstinctQ, this 800Mhz QWERTY monster came to Sprint and is being test marketed as an ATSC TV.

Samsung Galaxy Spica @I5700, 800MHz CPU, 3.2-inch HVGA, a 3mpix cam, 180MB internal memory. Actually quite dull. Announced on Nov 16.

@GeeksPhoneONE QWERTY slider available in EU (Spain) in December “extremadamente ágil y eficiente!”

@SaygusV1 Their V1 has 2-way video calling and is a huge, heavy monster of a phone

Sony Ericsson Xperia X10, comes with slick UI and new “UX Platform,” powered by Snapdragon. SE is forgoing the Android praise and just sticking with making phones. This thing is big and burly, it’s one of 2 I still haven’t played with yet.

UNCONFIRMED:

@MotorolaDevour aka @Calgary…the name has shown up for 2 years, and only recently has any actual evidence shown up.  We’ll see at CES!

@MotorolaHeron or @IronMan This Windows Mobile phone was pulled from AT&T, listed as “specifications subject to change due to move to Android.” Whereabouts unknown.

@MotorolaZeppelin Spotted in China in a regulatory filing, with not much known besides 5Mpx camera, and HDMI output

@MotorolaOpusOne – Supposed to be the first iDen Android Device, to ship with 1.5, 3.1″ screen, 3 megapixel cam—looking cheap

@TMobile “Tap” shown on the Samsung Behold II launch paper…possibly a #ZTE device?

@INQ committed to an Android device, but we haven’t seen anything yet.

Android’s first real e-reader was born today

Never mind that bullshit about the Spring Design “Alex” yesterday. Total patent troll “prior art” move. The Barnes and Noble Nook is real and it’s making me drool.

I’m a Kindle 2 owner and fan. I love how easy it is to read, I love how thin and light it is, I love the free connection to Sprint’s “Now Network” (I wish you could add more quotes around a phrase to increase the sarcasm/attitude/cynicism) . Obviously, I’m also extremely focused on the Android operating system, ecosystem, and lifestyle. So nook really excites me.

I was tempted to rush out my first Android Bakery video podcast to talk about the nook. But I held off.

nook eReader - Android power

There’s no shortage of news about nook right now. I wrote about it on Betanews earlier today, saying that it somehow managed to combine the spirit of two most “walled garden” tech devices (iphone and kindle) to make a new, uber desirable device.

But the thing is, we don’t know where it fits in the Android family. I contacted B&N this afternoon to see if they could get me in touch with a developer who could explain, just how much of an Android device the nook really is, but I haven’t heard back from them yet. That’s how excited I am. I’m posting a story before I even have any useful info. Just check back, I’ll have something good.

It’s all gravy from here on out

It’s only Wednesday but it’s already been a huge week for Android.

Verizon’s on board with its first Android device in the next couple of weeks, and Eric Schmidt slathered praise all over Verizon like barbecue sauce on a chicken wing. I quote: “It’s absolutely a fact that Verizon’s data network is the best in the US by far, and I’m not talking ten percent here, I’m talking about many multiples.”

Now the rumors are flying that AT&T is coming out with its first Android device, and not just any device, but the Dell Dork Phone I (aka the Mini 3i) that I talked about a few weeks ago. To be honest, my interest in that was only half-hearted and if I don’t get my hands on one, it’s going to lose out to something much more concrete like the freakin’ 800 MHz Samsung Moment.

What are we looking at, then?

Pretty much what we all expected, right? It’s not world domination or anything, but Android this week stepped onto the threshold of being a viable, multi-handset option on all carriers.

Meanwhile, Gartner is predicting that Android will have a market share only exceeded by Symbian by 2012. 14.5% or roughly 72 million phones per year. That would cut Symbian down to 39% and iPhone down to 13%, Blackberry would stay at 12.8% and Windows Mobile to 12.5%.

From inception to the number 2 in the world in four years.

Let’s see how long it took Symbian…well, its roots go back pretty damn far. Let’s start at the Psion Series 5 EPOC 32 days in 1997, which turned into Symbian in 1998. It wasn’t until 2004 that it began moving like crazy. So roughly six years from birth to the top?

So maybe 2014 for Android to take the #1 spot? Heh…maybe, but it’s late and I have a headache.

AT&T, the Anti-Android (Aka “Fun with Pie Charts”)

MKM Partners analyst Tero Kuittinen told The Street yesterday that AT&T ditched its plans to carry a Motorola Android phone, referring to the HTC Heron which Motorola originally designed to be a Windows Mobile phone, and then reportedly retracted at the last minute to load up with Android instead.

A lot of pundits have put a lot of weight behind Motorola’s first two Android handsets, saying that this is the company’s “last chance” to recover its phone-producing arm, or some sort of swan song because of the spin-off that was supposed to take place in the third quarter of 2009.

Last October, Co-CEO Sanjay Jha said “While our strategic intent to separate the company remains intact, we are no longer targeting the third quarter of 2009, primarily due to the macro-economic environment, stresses in the financial markets and the changes underway in Mobile Devices.”

Not having support from AT&T is a big detriment, some say, as it’s the only carrier consistently stealing subscribers away from other carriers.

But wait, AT&T didn’t just cock-block Motorola. It’s actually given the big thumbs down to TWO companies offering an Android device. Apparently it pitched HTC’s Lancaster into the dumpster this summer as well, only that time, we don’t know exactly why. Rumors were that it could have been too underpowered or perhaps even too problematic for a successful launch.

Because AT&T is the exclusive iPhone carrier, people often forget that it offers any other smartphones. Maybe they don’t consider any other products noteworthy, I don’t know. But the point is, AT&T’s selection of smartphones is led by Windows Mobile. Check this out:

AT&T's smartphone roster by OS

If you look at these stats as a direct reflection of the U.S. smartphone market as a whole, you’ll notice right away that the OS distribution is kind of out of whack. Yes, AT&T has 70 million subscribers, and that’s an important factor in the availability of an OS…but how much does it really determine market position?

I mean, does Windows Mobile have the lion’s share of the domestic smartphone market because it is the most common OS in AT&T’s smartphones? Of course not: Blackberry does, then iPhone, THEN Windows Mobile.

Let’s assume that on September 10th, T-Mobile and Verizon get Motorola Android phones, and lets see how their charts look.

Here are our friends over at T-Mobile. We know those zany Germans love Android (they got the Samsung Galaxy before anyone else, after all.) However, we see that Android happens to be T-Mobile’s ONLY smartphone OS that isn’t Windows Mobile or Blackberry. It’s probably because they’re too busy gunking up their phone lineup with those silly Sidekicks.

T-Mobile's smartphone OS distribution

And here’s Verizon. As you can see, they’re the most balanced/least diverse smartphone carrier in our list thus far.

Verizon's Smartphones if they get Motorola Sholes

AT&T already offers the most diverse selection of Smartphones, at least by operating system…so maybe it’s not trying to thin the proverbial broth by adding any old mediocre Android device to the pool.

Now, you’re probably going to say “Hold up a second, fancy pants! Where’s the Palm Centro in all this?”

I know right? Check Sprint, they’re the only carrier still offering Palm’s (awesome) gear as of this very moment. While we’re looking at them, you’ll notice that Sprint’s got quite a diverse OS lineup…but that diversity is mostly due to Palm’s multi-platform delivery.

No Android here...yet.

So yes…my point. The carriers we expect to have Android on them also happen to be the ones with the least diverse smartphone selection.

I know there’s only a correlative link between number of OSes and likelihood of new OS adoption (and not a causal one,) so don’t bite my face off for pointing it out.