Although NEXUS ONE, the Google Phone is already making the geek crowd crazy with its leaked snaps, an exclusive thing to NEXUS ONE, the next version of  Android OS has already been hacked by now. Now, if you carry a Moto Droid in your palms, you have got the chance of downloading and porting ‘hacked’ version of Android 2.1 on your beast smartphone.

The only problem with this hacked Android 2.1 version is that its Unstable right now. Even the site which is offering the download of the ‘yet to launch’ Android version is giving statuary warning on the site itself. At worse, this experiment can brick you Droid.

Even we wouldn’t recommend the download of this Unstable version of Android 2.1 until a completely stable version comes your way. To see the booting of Android 2.1 on Moto Droid, look at the video embedded below.

Credit

This weekend was wholly dedicated to Nexus One (the Google Phone) whose pictures flooded like anything across the Twitterverse. You could literally see tech bloggers and journalists turning into paparazzi for getting a glimpse of the breathtaking Google Phone. And yes, a huge count of Twitteratti has now witnessed what was limited to Googlers until two days back.

Here are some of the technical specifications of Nexus One known so far and some more pics taken by Googlers while playing with it in Googleplex. Now that most of us know the surprising fact that Nexus One (Google Phone) will be sold online by Google directly, bypassing any conventional retail sale structure, an even shocking surprise is that Nexus One will be sold unlocked.

Nowadays, most of the well hyped smartphones come locked with a mobile carrier, mainly to subsidize the phone pricing and in the middle of all this, Google deciding to launch Nexus One unlocked, would make it a costly affair for end users.

But staying unlocked will have its own advantage for Google Phone as well. Here are some of them…

• There will never be an embaressing situation for Google, similar to what Apple is facing right now, because of network incapabilities of a particular mobile carrier (AT&T for iPhone)
• All existing users using unlocked mobile subscription services will just have to buy Nexus One and put their in-use SIM cards into Nexus One and that’s it ! Users will also be able to opt for cheap internet plans due to non-exclusivity.
• We aren’t sure about it but if Nexus One will stay unlocked and will be sold Online by Google, it might be a case that Google will start selling it globally starting January. It means that Google will start getting millions of orders across the globe, not just from U.S. but elsewhere as well.

Nexus One might not be damn cheap but in the longer run, it will save more money to the buyers.

Stay hooked for more on Nexus One…

Sony Ericsson is planning to launch another Android phone called J10 but there are hardly any reasons to feel excited about it. We’re so used to touchscreen phones now that any conventional numberpad phone, specially when it’s coming up with Android Mobile OS at its heart, seems a dumb decision by the handset manufacturers. This time, the dumb manufacturer is Sony Ericsson.

This phone is rumored to be coming with 5mp camera and WiFi support but that’s not enough. The phone will most probably come unlocked and shouldn’t be more than $199 by any chance. According to the rumor mill, this phone is going to join the Greenheart line, which is good coz the manufacturing and packaging of the phone would be eco-friendly but the lame approach towards eco-friendly J10 isn’t something to appreciate about Sony Ericsson.

It’s not only smartphones and netbooks but also the nascent but hugely promising tablet industry, that’s seeking interest in Android has the open platform. The rumor mill isn’t stopping to boast about Apple Applet but in reality, many internet tablets have made their way to the market already.

Surprisingly, two of the very few tablets out there are Android powered ! Take a look at these Android tablets !

Camangi WebStation

It ‘s a newly launched Android tablet that’s primarily meant for web browsing but isn’t limited to doing just that. It also multi-functions as digital photo frame, music player and e-book reader as well. It comes with a 7 inches touchsecreen and able to show pictures with a resolution of 800 pixels by 480 pixels.

It comes with in-built support for WiFi 802.11 b/g and MicroSD Card for data storage. The device looks cool and ready to sell at a price of $399.

Archos’ Tablet

Archos 5 Internet tablet is an Android powered tablet which boasts a 4.8-inches touchscreen and serves all basic entertainment and communication requirements such as pictures, video, GPS, basic gaming and web browsing, of course. Storage capacity goes upto 250 GB.

The price is much cheaper than Camangi WebStation by the way. You can grab it at mere $250.

More Android tablets are about to turn up next year. Stay tuned !

Motorola Droid, the flagbearer of Android battalion has already got overwhelmed response from the tech fraternity and now, a well recognised magazine, T.I.M.E. has ranked it the best gadget of the year 2009. Android platform has taken a long leap with the thrust that Droid has provided to it and all this is just the warm-up before the real supernova of Android phones and apps in 2010.

There’s no doubt over the fact that there couldn’t be a better mobile carrier than Verizon to launch Droid as past history is evident enough that poor 3G service leads to poor customer response, no matter how capable the smartphone is.

Check out this video of the ‘Top 10 Gadgets of 2009′ by T.I.M.E.

During recent Google event that took place in Mountain view, there’s something extraordinary that has landed in favor of Android. An app that could easily be one of the most desirable geek fantasies is now a reality for Android phone users running Android 1.6 and above, i.e. Donut or Eclair (poor iPhone fans).

Branded as Google Goggles, this latest Android app from Google empowers you to take a snap of various things such as landmarks, books, artwork, places, wine, company logos etc and use that snap as a search input to explore associated stuff about it on the web.

For instance, if you come across a novel in a library, you can instantly take a snap of coverpage of that novel through your Android phone and search about that novel through Google Goggles Android app. Similarly, you can snap and search about dvds, landmarks, places etc.

As Google admits by itself, Visual search through Goggles android app is in nascent stage and shouldn’t be assumed perfect at all. You can’t just start snapping pictures here and there from your android phone and expect magical stuff from Google. It’s only a start of an unexplored search landscape and further development is pretty much in progress from Google’s end. You can notice that Google Goggles is still a part of Google labs.

For now, android phone owners (present and future) have a huge thing to boast about. They’ve got the power to search visually. Love you Google !

Well, just for information sake, it has got nothing to do with Gmail Goggles !

With recent leak of HTC’s portfolio of first half of 2010 on the web, it’s clear that HTC is heavily betting on Android as their Mobile platform and Windows Mobile 6.5 is, well, on the backseat of course. Still, one big shot from HTC that was speculated to get an Android treatment has gone in favor of Windows Mobile, its HTC HD2.

A monstrous touch screen(over 4 inches), 5MP camera with autofocus and LED Flash and lighterning fast processor, makes HTC HD2 stand apart. It may take years most other OEMs to beat such a swashbuckling hardware configuration.

But we feel sad to say that HTC, although going Android for almost all its High end smartphones, has exclusively gone for Windows Mobile 6.5 as its OS. To us, it seems thatHD2 is a

“Old Generation Software over a Next Generation Hardware“

The only reason HTC puts forward when questioned about No Android policy for HD2 is that they have to take care of Windows Mobile as well. Well, that’s just Microsoft !

Well, many folks are also interested when HTC HD2 is going to enter Indian markets. And at what cost will it priced. HTC has announced that HTC HD2 will enter European and Asian markets first and then U.S. markets will follow up.

It will soon be available in HTC retailers in India and the price is suspected to be between Rs.35-40k

A recent analysis from IDC experts boasts about 10 predictions for  the year 2010. One of them is about the App trends for the year 2010. Nobody is really surprised with the obvious prediction being made that mobile apps are going to multiply tremendously in the year 2010.

As Apple is aggressively leading the App world with over 120k apps in its store and Android is chasing it fiercely with some 20k apps in Android Market, the future of mobile apps is just awesome. Apple is expected to double (may be triple) its current app count and Android is expected to hit 100k apps mark by end of 2010.

With more and more cellphone users switching to smartphones for regular use, hundreds of millions of apps are expected to be downloaded each and every month by end users. With plenty of android phones lined up for launch in 2010 already, industry experts are emphatically anticipating that Android population might surpass iPhone userbase by 2010 end, which would make this growing competition more interesting and fierce than what it is now.

PCWorld says that there might be an App Explosion in the year 2010, we bet, it will be an App Supernova ! But we have some doubts over the quality of apps delivered to end users. We hope, Google has some definite plans for quality assurance of android apps as well.

Timely surprises seem to be an integral part of The Cult of Android now. At one side, we keep hearing about product launches of latest android handsets and on other side, the number of android apps keep on piling up within App Market.

But today, there’s something to share that’s probably been attempted for the first time in the short history of world of mobile apps. All android fanatics have something to cheer about. They now have privilege to download an all exclusive ‘Adults Only’ App store called Mikandi, which is NOT available for iPhone, Symbian and other popular mobile platforms at the moment.

As the App store is ‘Adults Only’, the apps are definitely going to be ‘A Rated’ and will not face any approval process before becoming a part of Mikandi. Mikandi will give third party developers, a platform to freely deliver and market their adult apps without bothering about approval procedures and similar stuff.

On the other side, users will be required to download Mikandi App store on their smartphones, after which they will be able to access and download free and paid apps under Mikandi App Store.

One big reason why Mikandi has landed on Android and not iPhone is because of the stringent app approval procedures that iPhone lets every app pass through. Looking at the past treatment of Apple with 18+ apps, adult app developers are hardly interested in spending time and money on pornish app development.

On a darker side, as users need to download Mikandi app store on their android phones explicitly, it will be very tough for Mikandi to manage a large userbase out of the android population, which would result in poor interest from app developer’s point of view. We doubt if Mikandi will really take off that well but who knows…

Anyways, adult stuff lovers now have a strong reason to buy an android phone, isn’t it !

Here’s an introductory video of Mikandi. Take a look !

According to a recent study by Skyhook Wireless, a large majority(over 80%) of  Third party app developer community feels dissatisfied with the current state of Android Market, making it difficult for them to keep investing time and money in building apps for Android platform.

Such an analysis brings no surprises to us as we ourselves wrote about the inefficiencies of Android Market and ways by which Google can cover up the pot holes and make things better for Android Marketplace. According to the survey, one good thing about Android that came out is that most of the developers are very much excited about Android as an open platform and want to keep building apps for it. The current problem with developers is only the weak financial returns as a result of poor Android app download volume in case of most of the app developers.

Most often, android app download comparisons are made with App Store but the developer community isn’t accounting the fact that App Store entertains tens of millions of iPhone user demands, which isn’t the case with newer competitor, Android. The volume sales for Android apps will certainly take more time as the Android userbase is on the verge of explosion(but not exploded yet).

Year 2010 has tens of android phones lined up for launch and things will only get tough for iPhone to breathe. Developers who’re little frustrated with the current Android Market very well know about the bright scope of Android and can’t afford to leave it, just because their returns aren’t encouraging at the moment.

On one side, there’s a populated App Store from Apple that restricts apps from entering App Store every now and then, which leaves developers with too little options left and go seek early bird opportunities in Android Marketplace.

With spectacular response to Motorola Droid, the market sentiments for the future of Android have only become stronger. One thing that’s definitely needed for Android now is to enhance Android Marketplace and make it as lucrative place for developers as App Store.