“The idea a year and a half ago was to do the Nexus One to try to move the phone platform hardware business forward. It clearly did. It was so successful, we didn’t have to do a second one.” So spoke Google CEO Eric Schmidt back in July 2010, confirming the search giant’s hardware motivations with the HTC-made smartphone and downplaying any intention of a second-generation phone. Now, with the Samsung-made Google Nexus S (aka the Nexus Two or Samsung GT-i9020) confirmed as imminent in all but press release, the question is what Google hopes to achieve with their next self-branded device.
Back when the Nexus One was announced, the Android smartphone market was lagging. Manufacturers needed a push to take the next step in hardware, and the 1GHz Nexus One, with its high-res AMOLED display and handsome chassis gave them that motivation. It’s a model that has continued to shape the segment in the almost twelve months since; Qualcomm’s 1GHz Snapdragon is still pretty much a standard, and the 3.7-inch WVGA screen has become the mainstream.
As Schmidt said, the Nexus One was “so successful” there was no real need to motivate the hardware race again. Already the Verizon DROID 2 Global has picked up the next 1.2GHz processor, neatly maintaining the silicon race, and dualcore mobile CPUs are likely to show up in force in Android handsets come 2011. Instead, the bugbear in Android today is fragmentation.
Contrary to the well-structured iOS ecosystem, Android has been plagued with issues caused by different versions of the OS rolling out from different manufacturers. The accelerated pace of the platform is partly to blame in itself, as Google pushes out each improved iteration in response to developer-submitted code, its own market share aspirations and in the name of keeping Android competitive with iPhone, webOS and other platforms. For consumers, though, it can be a frustrating mixture of hardware and software, where updates are handled not by Google but by an uneasy combination of OEMs and carriers. The fall-out over the rumors of the Nexus S itself are a good example: many would-be buyers dismissed the handset out of hand, when it was revealed that Samsung was the most likely manufacturer. The company has earned a patchy reputation for poorly supporting its Android devices with subsequent updates, though to be fair it’s by no means alone in that. The delays in Sony Ericsson’s XPERIA range getting even Android 2.1 are evidence of that.
In contrast, Apple rules iOS updates with an iron grip – not difficult, you might say, when there’s only one person manufacturing the phones – but Microsoft too has taken sole responsibility for their new smartphone platform. Windows Phone 7 updates will be pushed out by Microsoft themselves, despite various OEMs having stakes in putting out devices, as part of the company’s drive to better control the overall ownership experience.
How does a centralized software management system sit with Android? At face value, not well; part of the company’s ethos with Android has been its flexibility, with manufacturers free to either buy into the full Android experience – and get the coveted “with Google” branding and exclusive apps and Android Market access – or pick and choose their own custom installation instead. “The word ‘control’ is not such a strong word at Google” Schmidt said, going on to suggest that within three to five years we’ll consume most of our information online “on devices that are live not static.”
Google’s frustration, then, may be that while manufacturers have caught on to the hardware race – realising that a fast CPU and gobfuls of storage make for useful selling points – they’re not moving fast enough to keep pace with Google’s long-term data strategy. The sluggish release of ROM updates has made those “live” devices “static”, and when you’re fighting for as much access to user data as possible, that’s simply not good enough.
Will the “with Google” branding evolve alongside the Samsung Nexus S and become more stringent in its criteria? A commitment, perhaps, to leaving iterative updates in Google’s hands, or buying into a more holistic ecosystem that progressively reduces the slice of the pie that’s still languishing on earlier versions. With Froyo in the wild for some time now, the search giant can’t be pleased that OEMs are still using Android 2.1 for devices only now hitting the market; that was never the idea for their fast-moving mobile strategy.
So what comes after the Nexus Two – should we expect the Nexus Three on the cards in another twelve months time? Or, as the persistently simmering rumors suggest, might a Google Nexus Tab be more realistic? As the Nexus S has shown us, Google isn’t afraid to wade back into the hardware market when they’ve a point to prove or an example to set, even if – as with their failed plans to bypass carriers and solely sell devices direct – they’ve had their knuckles wrapped before.
Well, this was rather unexpected. Earlier today, Best Buy Mobile published a humble (if not incomplete) ad for the “Nexus S for T-Mobile,” touting both its “pure Google” experience (i.e. vanilla Android) and holiday availability exclusively from Best Buy. It’s gone now, saved only by the grace of Google cache. To be honest, all we can do is speculate beyond that. An anonymous tipster to RadioAndroid pegged the Nexus S name late last month and claimed it would feature Android 2.3 Gingerbread, a 4-inch Super AMOLED screen, and a Hummingbird processor. TechCrunch later described a Samsung-borne “Nexus Two” that has since been delayed due to some serious hardware issue. Is this a placeholder from the online devs? Does / did the S stand for Samsung, or something else entirely? And most importantly, is this presumed follow-up to Nexus One actually coming out, or did you just get your hopes up for nothing?
Don’t tell anyone! Component makers are whispering that the fabled Google Chrome OS will ship in November – THIS November. That’s THIS MONTH. Acer made promises that Chrome OS devices would be released this fall, while Digitimes reports the launch of the OS to be this month, with Google supposedly planning the launch its own brand Chrome notebook along the lines of Nexus One.
Also supposedly, Google’s Chrome notebook is expected to be made by Inventec and will be shipping 60,000 to 70,000 units in their initial shipment. After this Chrome notebook is announced, the source that spoke with Digitimes reports that Acer and Hewlett-Packard will follow up with products in December. Both follow-up products will be manufactured by Quanta Computer.
Google and UK retailer Carphone Warehouse are tipped to be collaborating on a second-gen Google-branded Android smartphone, currently known as the Google Nexus Two, scheduled for a holiday release. The news comes via UK business paper City AM, whose source suggests that Google is attempting to use the retailer’s broad sales network to bypass customer-reluctance encountered in web-only sales of the Google Nexus One.
“It looks like Google is experimenting with the future of its mobile model in the UK. It tried releasing through a single carrier, now it is trying a single retailer. It could be a solution to the problems it experienced when it tried to sell the Nexus One exclusively through its website. People like to be able to go to a store – this solves that” anonymous source
The Nexus Two would apparently run Android 3.0 Gingerbread, according to the rumors, though the OEM responsible for the hardware has not been identified. Rumors that Samsung would be Google’s partner on this occasion, rather than HTC, have apparently been debunked.
The news conflicts with comments made by Google CEO Eric Schmidt back in July, when asked whether the search giant was planning a second-gen Nexus handset. ”The idea a year and a half ago was to do the Nexus One to try to move the phone platform hardware business forward” Schmidt said at the time, “It clearly did. It was so successful, we didn’t have to do a second one.”
If you have a Nexus One, you plan on having it for a while, and you want to talk about it, you’re going to have to find another place to do it come November 1 — because that’s the day Google has chosen to shut down its own Nexus One support forum, archive it, and make its contents read-only. Seems like an extraordinarily illogical and user-hostile move to us — especially considering that the phone is still thoroughly modern, runs the latest available version of Android, and was released this year… but if there’s a silver lining to this mess, it’d have to be the fact that there’s no shortage of third-party sites and forums that will be happy to pick up the slack. Meanwhile, Google, we’d love to hear a reasonable explanation for this, preferably before this rumored Nexus Two breaks loose.
If you have a Nexus One, you plan on having it for a while, and you want to talk about it, you’re going to have to find another place to do it come November 1 — because that’s the day Google has chosen to shut down its own Nexus One support forum, archive it, and make its contents read-only. Seems like an extraordinarily illogical and user-hostile move to us — especially considering that the phone is still thoroughly modern, runs the latest available version of Android, and was released this year… but if there’s a silver lining to this mess, it’d have to be the fact that there’s no shortage of third-party sites and forums that will be happy to pick up the slack. Meanwhile, Google, we’d love to hear a reasonable explanation for this, preferably before this rumored Nexus Two breaks loose.
This is kinda out of the blue, but British publication City A.M. is claiming that Google has inked a deal with wireless retail giant Carphone Warehouse to exclusively sell a Nexus Two — the mythical successor to the Nexus One — in time for Christmas this year. Little else is offered, though the story claims that it’ll run Gingerbread and probably won’t be manufactured by Samsung. Of course, Google has already gone on the record basically declaring the Nexus One’s sales model a failure, though it specifically cited customers’ inability to get hands-on time with the phone before buying it as a big problem — and signing up with a behemoth like Carphone Warehouse would certainly solve it. It’s unclear whether regions outside the retailer’s sphere of influence would also be on board, though it’s important to note that Carphone Warehouse is in bed with Best Buy Mobile in the States… so if you believe the rumor, feel free to start lining up in front of your local big box right now.
If you’re a numbers geek, you’re trying to be scientific about your next smartphone purchase, or you just like pretty colors, you might appreciate DisplayMate’s latest report rounding up examples of all (well, most) of the latest and greatest display technologies out there: IPS LCD, Super AMOLED, AMOLED, and TFT, represented by the iPhone 4 and Droid, the Galaxy S, the Nexus One, and the iPhone 3GS, respectively. Noticeably missing is SLCD, the technology HTC has been using to make up for lost ground on its AMOLED shortage from component supplier Samsung, but we’ve got a hunch DisplayMate’s hard at work at adding that into the mix.
Anyhow, considering the sheer number of variables the firm takes into consideration — everything from color depth, to brightness, to reflectance, to color gamut — there’s no clear-cut winner, but the Droid and iPhone 4 are obviously a cut above the rest with generally higher scores and better performance across the board. The Galaxy S’ Super AMOLED turns in a decent performance, too, but takes a little hit for its 16-bit color depth and blown-out colors. Of course, if you consider any of these — even the crappy TFT on the 3GS — to a phone from five years ago, it still looks like science fiction… so you really can’t go wrong, can you?
If you’ve a taste for MeeGo and a Google Nexus One lying around – or, for that matter, a Dell Streak or an HTC Desire – then you’ll be pleased to hear that the open-source team over at the MeeGo Wiki are busy slapping the Intel/Nokia collaboration onto all manner of Android handsets. As you’d hope, much of the device functionality is working, so you could feasibly have a MeeGo smartphone long before Nokia get their act together.
The Nexus One port seems to be the most advanced right now, though the UI doesn’t take advantage of the hardware acceleration on offer and so is a little slower than you’re likely used to from Android. There are also a few errors, while although the touchscreen is working it does require rotating.
There’s more information on the various installations – and their current limitations – at xda-developers.
We’re told it’s merely bug fixes, but Nexus Ones across the land are getting updated to Android 2.2.1 — “FroYo.1,” if you will. Whether Gingerbread will ever make an appearance on this bad boy remains unclear, but hey, at least Google’s still hustling to keep it updated in the meantime.
