Gingerbread

If you thought HTC was going to sit back and let Samsung and Motorola soak up all attention, think again. Today, HTC and Sprint introduced the HTC Evo 4G Design, the fifth model in their Evo series and the first to offer world roaming capabilities and a wallet-friendly price tag.

On sale October 23 for $99.99 with a two-year contract and after a $50 mail-in rebate, the Evo 4G Design is a dual-mode (CDMA/GSM) world phone, so you can continue to make calls and receive data while traveling abroad. … Read more

NEW YORK--It's baaaack. Motorola brought back its Razr line but in a more powerful package, with the introduction of Motorola Droid Razr for Verizon Wireless.

Measuring just 7.1mm thick, the Droid Razr is made from Kevlar fiber and features a 4.3-inch Super AMOLED Advanced qHD touch screen with scratch-resistant Corning Gorilla Glass. Despite its thin profile, the Android Gingerbread smartphone doesn't skimp on the features, packing in a dual-core 1.2GHz processor, 4G LTE capabilities, and 1GB RAM.

For full details on the Motorola Droid Razr, check out our full post here.

T-Mobile made it official today and introduced the LG Doubleplay, a unique Android Gingerbread smartphone with dual touch screens.

The Doubleplay features a slider design with a main 3.5-inch touch screen on front and a secondary 2-inch touch screen located in the middle of the split QWERTY keyboard. T-Mobile and LG say that the displays can work in tandem and independently of each other and will allow for better multitasking.

The LG Doubleplay isn't the first smartphone to have two touch screens. In April, Sprint debuted the Kyocera Echo, which had two 3.5-inch displays.

The companies are … Read more

T-Mobile is having a hard time keeping its upcoming smartphones under wraps. Yesterday, it was the LG Doubleplay and today it appears we have the official press images of the forthcoming Samsung Exhibit II 4G.

Based on early details, the handset looks to be a rebranded version of Samsung's new Galaxy W series. Specifications are said to include Android 2.3 Gingerbread, a 1.4GHz (single-core) processor, a 3.7-inch WVGA display, a 5-megapixel rear camera, and support for 3G HSPA+. … Read more

It's been about a month since Boost Mobile and Samsung announced the Samsung Transform Ultra, but we only just got our hands on it at CTIA.

The specs are nothing to sneeze at--they include Android 2.3 Gingerbread, a 1GHz processor, a VGA front-facing camera, and a 3-megapixel rear-facing camera--but the phone is much more compelling in real life than its numbers suggest, and it's more different from the original Samsung Transform than we'd expect.

It still has Sprint ID (the Transform was one of the inaugural phones to have that option), as well as that QWERTY keyboard, but the keyboard is a different model, and a bit flatter and less appealing in our opinion. What we do like are the four nicely tactile, physical buttons below the screen.

We'll soon put the Transform Ultra through our usual workout; but until then, check out the photos in the slideshow above. The Transform Ultra, by the way, is available now, and costs $229.99.… Read more

If you're one for tracking "firsts," add this to your list. The Samsung Stratosphere is Verizon's first 4G LTE handset equipped with a QWERTY keyboard. As popular as all-touch-screen phones are, there's still a strong argument for composing on a keyboard, and for the Stratosphere, that reason is business.

The handset is one of the first to showcase Samsung's B2B capabilities, including Microsoft ActiveSync e-mail and calendar syncing, VPN, and on-device encryption.

In another sense, the phone isn't a first at all--it's a second-running of the Samsung Epic 4G, originally released for Sprint in 2010. Apart from the new software, the major difference is that it comes with Android 2.3 Gingerbread right out of the box.… Read more

Even as we lick our lips over Google's upcoming Ice Cream Sandwich update to Android, I'm impressed that even the more modest new Android phones are on board with Gingerbread.

The ZTE Score is one of them. First introduced exclusively through Best Buy, the Score is also Cricket's latest Muve Music phone.… Read more

Samsung may have crushed our CTIA dreams by pulling back on its biggest announcement here at CTIA, but thankfully it still introduced a number of new handsets.

The Samsung Transfix sits on the opposite end of the grandeur spectrum from the Galaxy Nexus we were all anticipating, but it's a good add for budget carrier Cricket. We got a chance to play around with it here at the show.

The Transfix runs Android 2.3 Gingerbread on its 3.2-inch screen. That's a little small for our tastes, or would be if there weren't a slide-out keyboard … Read more

Just when you thought the world didn't need another 7-inch Android tablet that few would end up buying, here comes the T-Mobile SpringBoard, the 7-inch tablet you'd do well to look at, for the right price.

Announced just before CTIA officially kicked off in San Diego, the SpringBoard offers quite a bit--"4G" speeds, a 1.2GHz dual-core processor, 1,280x800 screen resolution, and surround sound. There's also a 5-megapixel camera that can record 720p HD video, a 1.3-megapixel front-facing camera, support for HDMI, and up to six hours of battery life. There are … Read more