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Google unveils its 'super phone' (photos)

A recap of Google's Tuesday press event, in which it took the wraps off its much anticipated Nexus One smartphone designed by HTC.

CNET Reviews staff
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1 of 10 Josh Lowensohn/CNET

Nexus One with Mario

Google fully entered into the realm of consumer electronics with the launch Tuesday of its new Nexus One smartphone, which you can now buy online from the company with or without a service plan.

The following is a photo recap of the press unveiling and demo of the Android-based device at the company's headquarters in Mountain View, Calif.:

Vice President of Product Management Mario Queiroz (shown here), who has been leading Google's efforts in this area, kicks off the presentation by calling the device a "super phone."
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Actual device

Queiroz says the Nexus One is now available for purchase at Google.com/phone. The phone, captured here from Google's product page, will be available for $529 without carrier service, or $179 with a two-year contract from T-Mobile. Verizon and Vodafone are on track to sell the device by spring 2010, but their prices aren't available yet.

The phone is 11.5 millimeters thick and weighs 130 grams. A slide from the presentation showed that it is about as thick as a pencil and as heavy as a small Swiss Army knife.

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Peter Chou

Queiroz then brings up Peter Chou, CEO of HTC, whose company designed and is manufacturing the Nexus One.

Chou, shown here with the Nexus One, starts off by remembering two years ago when Google announced the Android platform with HTC and others. HTC made the G1, the first Android phone, and with the Nexus One has developed seven Android phones.
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Live Wallpapers

Erick Tseng, Google's senior product manager for the project, demos the Nexus One's Live Wallpapers feature. That's the background image behind the home screen. The device lets you set moving images behind the applications and widgets on the home screen.
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5 of 10 Josh Lowensohn/CNET

Gallery features

One theme for the Nexus One is media. Photos and videos stored in the phone can reside in a new gallery application, which lets you organize and view photos in 3D.
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Gallery with accelerometer

Tipping the phone triggers the accelerometer to "dip" the photos, so they appear to be on a 3D angle. Photos are also organized around the day they were taken.
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Typing with your voice

Tseng says Google wanted to make Android's voice recognition better with this phone. Google already offers search by voice and voice commands on advanced Android phones like the Droid. But a new Nexus One feature is the ability to use speech to enter text into every text field in the device using your voice.

Tseng demonstrated Gmail dictation, recording a short demonstration that accurately translates the speech into the correct text.
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Google Earth for Android

Another application soon to be released is Google Earth for Android, which is made possible by the Nexus One's 3D capabilities. You can also use the voice features in Google Earth, searching for things like "Mount Fuji."
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Personalizing the Nexus One

Google's brand is prominently displayed on the back of the phone, with a much smaller HTC brand at the bottom. You can also engrave your own message in a little silver band on the back.
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Q and A

The press event closes with a question-and-answer session with (from left) Motorola CEO Sanjay Jha, HTC CEO Peter Chou, and Google's Andy Rubin and Mario Queiroz.

See also: Unboxing the Nexus One (photos)

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