Motorola Tegra 2 Olympus phone may be missing Gingerbread
The first Motorola smart phone packing a Tegra 2 chip looks like it will now be called Olympus, and there's a chance it'll be released without any Gingerbread. Double disappointment.
The Olympus name had been thrown around, and now a posting of what looks like the raw device ID has been sent to Androidandme.com, which seems to confirm the name as well as the use of a Tegra 2 chip. The note states that the phone is currently in pre-production, and running Android 2.2 Froyo.
The 'Terminator' was always just a made-up moniker, more's the pity. But the revelation that a developmental Olympus is running Motoblur with Android 2.2 is of more concern. Upcoming phones like the LG Optimus Star and the Google Nexus S are marked to run Android 2.3 Gingerbread, virtually and totally untouched respectively.
Hopefully Motorola will be able to stick Android 2.3 on the device before its release next year, but judging from its previous history with Android, that might be a tall order. Its Backflipand Dext phones are stuck on Android 1.5 in this country, while the Android 2.2 rollout for the Milestone hasn't even started yet.
The Motorola rumour mill has been pretty busy recently, with a Motopad said to be in development -- a 7-inch tablet running Android 3.0, codenamed Honeycomb. It would be Motorola's entry into the burgeoning tablet market, and also likely to run with a Tegra 2 chip, designed for tablets as well as smart phones.
Apart from the latest leak, there's very little in the way of hard facts about the Olympus, but it has been rumoured to sport a 4-inch display and front-facing camera. If you're looking for a new Motorola in the meantime, check out the Milestone 2, which runs Android 2.2 and has been put up for sale at around £380 unlocked.