Month: April 2010

Flash support on all ARM Cortex A8, A9 devices

Posted by Charbax – April 29, 2010

Up until last year, I didn’t like the business model around Adobe Flash at all. My theory was that Flash was basically used by Microsoft, Apple and Intel to block mass adoption of open source Linux and embedded Linux operating systems as there was no good enough Flash support on open source computers and embedded devices.

On the other hand, and as I am not a developer with access to Adobe’s source code so I can’t really know how hard it is for them to optimize their proprietary source code, perhaps Flash isn’t as bloated as I thought, but that it really represents graphics intensive animations and embedding of videos which actually are really hard to process using multi-purpose processors and which really perform much better once it can be made to use the latest hardware acceleration.

Check out my video filmed with Adobe Flash products manager Richard Galvan at Mobile World Congress 2010 demonstrating Flash support on the ARM Cortex A8 based Nexus One and Motorola Droid as well as a very interesting demonstration of the controversial Creative Suite 5 authoring software suite on which Adobe is demonstrating the infamous “Export to iPhone” option, where developers can input any Flash application based on ActionScript3 and output it in the iPhone applications format. Thus develop once and output all hardware platforms.

The big talk right now on Techmeme is the funny war going on where Apple doesn’t want to support the Flash format on the ARM Cortex A8 based iphone, ipod touch and ipad. Even though technically, Flash certainly could work on those devices. It’s probably just a question of a few megabytes of plug-in code that would have to be installed with the Safari browser on those devices.

My guess? Steve Jobs and Steve Ballmer are angry at Adobe’s Open Screen Project. Up until last year, Microsoft and Apple had the exclusive platforms to have hardware accelerated Flash support on X86. Nobody else could get full Flash support, especially as Flash 9 fragmented into ActionScript3 based Flash projects which more and more displayed either not at all on Open Source OSes or displayed really badly, without hardware acceleration. My guess also is that Microsoft’s attempt with releasing Silverlight may also be a provocation against Adobe which pushed them further to optimize Flash for embedded Linux and thus support Flash everywhere else than Microsoft/Apple/Intel.

My point? To some degree, one of the main reasons Linux hasn’t yet caught on for mass market mass consumer adoption on desktops, laptops, tablets and phones has so far been the lack of decent Flash support. Sure, there are many many other factors. But Flash support was an important problem that up until recently released Ubuntu 10.4, hardware acceleration of Flash wasn’t even available for Linux!!

Of course I still wish Adobe would bluntly just announce that they will open-source Flash and licence it out for free (they can still release proprietary authoring tools that they can sell for lots of money to developers). And for sure, I am a proponent of HTML5, Ogg Theora 2.0 (based on Google’s On2 VP8 codec), for sure I can’t wait to see Google’s Native Client plugin for Browsers, Google’s 3D plugin for Browsers (like the very impressive new Google Earth for Google Maps in the browser (not for Linux yet)).

For now, especially as I expect Flash support in Android and Chrome OS can be fully hardware accelerated, run smoothly and nicely as Adobe has been investing hundreds of full time engineers in optimizing this process over the last couple of years. As I don’t expect any other aspects of Android and Chrome OS will feel any slower or any more bloated by adding Flash support. I don’t think Apple’s choice of excluding Flash is a good choice for their users.

What will happen? I think consumers will enjoy Flash support on Android, Chrome OS and other embedded Linux it also looks very impressive and nicely hardware accelerated in Ubuntu 10.4. If Apple persists in wanting to exclude the Flash plugin for non-technical reasons, consumers will likely buy Android and Chrome OS devices instead. In any ways, competition is good and in the coming months, it will be very interesting for me to film demonstrations of Android Tablets, Phones and Laptops with hopefully full and smooth Flash support.

Vodafone 845, cheap Android phone (how cheap?)

Posted by Charbax – April 28, 2010

Vodaphone is releasing their first own-branded Android phone, described as a low-cost Android phone. It has got a 2.8-inch resistive screen, a 3.2MP camera and runs Android 2.1 Eclair. To be released in May. It also comes with a suite of Vodafone 360 Apps (for Facebook widgets integration and the like), it is to be seen how the Vodafone 360 experience as apps on Android compares with Vodafone’s previously released Linux Mobile Foundation based 360 phone.

How low will the price be? Will Vodafone go all the way and sell this phone for £99 on a pre-paid plan? Interestingly Vodafone is pointing out this feature in their press release:

2. Vodafone’s proprietary pre-pay balance indicator permanently displays the customer’s latest balance status – it is updated after each voice call, SMS, start up, and also every 12 hrs when idle mode. There is also a soft-key configured for convenient top up.

This type of task bar, status bar overview of pre-paid credit status with one-click top up could really accelerate the adoption of pre-paid plans for Android devices instead of buying them with very expensive 2-year contracts. The Android phone sold like this would still be locked to only work on Vodafone for 2 years, but would at least only require pre-paid services hopefuly reasonably priced for voice, sms and most importantly for data usage of web browsing and apps.

As manufacturing cost for this 2.8″ resistive Android phone might be below $100, this could really provide a taste of what is to come in terms of reaching huge worldwide market share for Android, reaching emerging markets as more than 4 Billion people around the world still don’t have a smart phone and Internet access. How soon the sub-$50 Android phones with sub-$3/month pre-paid Internet data access in all the developing countries?

Vodafone own-brand devices are available in 31 Vodafone subsidiary or partner markets. It is the world’s second largest mobile phone operator behind China Mobile. See an overview of Vodafone’s market share in this Wikipedia article.

Found via: techradar.com

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Android selling faster than iPhone

Posted by Charbax – April 27, 2010

The latest monthly report by AdMob on US-based web usage on smartphones (of sites and apps where AdMob is serving ads) shows that Android phones combined are now being used more than the iphone OS devices.

By these numbers, one can speculate if the overall share of Android devices sold per month in the USA is about to overtake the overall monthly share of sold iPhones, iPod touch and iPads.

Consider that most of the iphone OS share consists of iphones and ipod touch that were bought by consumers during these past 2 years. While most of the Android devices used at this point were purchased during the past 6 months. So this may increase the likelihood that Android sales per month have already overtaken the monthly sales of iPhones.

Consider that the Chinese market is getting several “Ophone” branded phones, which are based on modified Android OS source code. Consider also that the US and European market have not yet received significantly cheaper Android phones on their markets although many are planned to be released soon. Once pre-paid or totally unlocked Android phones are sold below $200 without contracts, those may expand the market share of Android phones even faster, as consumers likely much prefer a $200 unlocked phone or locked on pre-paid plans than a $200 locked phone that comes with a $3500 2-year contract.

In AdMob’s numbers the Google Nexus One device is only achieving a 2% marketshare. My guess is that Google doesn’t need to sell more Nexus Ones at this point. The Nexus One is only there to push the Android market forward. Google isn’t going to compete with its partners yet. Nexus One is basically like a Development Kit for the Android industry that is also available to early adopters who can buy it over the web. But the more interesting business models will come once Google is selling Android phones at http://google.com/phone at below $200 unlocked and out of contracts.

Source: metrics.admob.com
Found via: techmeme.com

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Dell is making ARM Powered Laptops too

Posted by Charbax – April 26, 2010

Another leak released by androidcentral.com unveils that Dell also has plans for releasing a “true “netbook”" that is ARM Powered, to run Android probably customized for Laptop form factors.

The code-name is Athens, 11″ SVGA 1024×768 screen, optional 3G, WiFi and Bluetooth connectivity modules. There is also the code-name Sparta to be released perhaps as soon as June that may be a convertible Laptop and Tablet form factor.

Source: androidcentral.com

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Samsung is preparing ARM Cortex A9 dual core processors

Posted by Charbax – April 23, 2010

ARMnews has leaked some a slideshow document featuring Samsung’s roadmap for ARM Cortex A8, A9, single, dual and quad core processors to be released.

Found via: engadget.com

Hard Kernel Odroid-T, 10″ Capacitive Android Tablet

Posted by Charbax – April 23, 2010

Hard Kernel already has a 3.5″ gaming-oriented device which I filmed a couple of months ago (see here), now they are also announcing a 10″ tablet device named ODROID-T.

Here are the full specs:

Samsung S5PC110 Cortex-A8 1Ghz with 512KB L2 cache
3D Accelerator SGX540(up to 20M triangles/s and 1000M pixels/s)
512MB Mobile DDR 400Mega data rate

10.1inch 1366 x 768 LVDS interface(capacitive touch)
1080p video playback via HDMI cable

WiFi/Bluetooth
USB2.0 Host

Accelerometer
Android2.1

External GPS

Availability for worldwide shipping : Early June

Find more information at hardkernel.com

Dell is making a 7-inch WVGA Tegra 2 Android tablet

Posted by Charbax – April 21, 2010

Today’s Dell Android product leaks continue with this 7-inch Android tablet design powered by the ARM Cortex A9 based Nvidia Tegra2 processor! It’ll also have an optional DVB-T and ATSC TV tuner module. 1.3 megapixel camera and an SDHC card slot.

Source: engadget.com

Dell Thunder, 4.1″ WVGA OLED Android phone

Posted by Charbax – April 21, 2010

Dell is announcing (or leaking) this 4.1″ WVGA OLED based (probably Super AMOLED), to run Android 2.1, AT&T and worldwide HSDPA versions to be released this year also with Dell’s proprietary “Stage UI” overlay user interface.

Source: engadget.com

Dell Flash, 3.5″ WVGA Android Froyo phone

Posted by Charbax – April 21, 2010

Here’s another new Android phone announced (or leaked) by Dell, to use the Qualcomm MSM7230 800mhz processor, 14.4Mbps download and 5.6Mbps upload HSPA, 512MB RAM, TV-out, Bluetooth 3.0 in this “curved glass” design. Dell is designing some kind of “Stage UI”, similar to HTC’s own Sense UI for their customized Android home screen and user interfaces.

Source: engadget.com

Dell Smoke, Android based Blackberry-like phone

Posted by Charbax – April 21, 2010

Here’s a design for an Android phone by Dell to be released next year, it will be based on the next generation Qualcomm MSM7230 processor, come with a 2.8″ QVGA screen, 14.4Mbps HSPA and is said that it will be sold for cheap.

Source: engadget.com