Although the dock weighs less than the slate, which could result in the device tipping over, it adds tremendous functionality to the Transformer Prime. The 0 price may put some off but it adds more than just a keyboard and trackpad.

You gain another 6 or more hours of battery life because the dock has its own battery. Between the slate and dock, you could push this package for around 18 hours on a single charge. The dock also adds a full sized USB port, which I’ve used for with an Xbox 360 controller for gaming, and a full-sized SD memory card slot.

New this week to the Prime and any other devices running Android 4.0 is Google’s Chrome beta for Android. After using Chrome for just three minutes, I made it the default browser on my Galaxy Nexus for a number of reasons. It’s at least as fast as the stock browser, if not faster. The user interface is better suited for touch, with easy methods to swipe between open tabs. And it brings a seamless web experience between Chrome on the desktop and Chrome on a mobile device. On my Nexus, for example, I can see a list of the open Chrome tabs from my Mac; one tap and I’m able to view the same web page on my phone. Here’s a short video overview:

Unfortunately, very few devices have Android 4.0, so most can’t yet take advantage of the new Chrome browser. HTC aims to change that situation with software upgrades to its four Sensation models next month. The company announced through its Facebook page that Android 4.0 would roll out to these devices starting in March. Additional handsets will follow this year, but HTC didn’t provide specific dates for these devices, which include the following: HTC Rezound, HTC Vivid, HTC Amaze 4G, HTC EVO 3D, HTC EVO Design 4G, HTC Incredible S, HTC Desire S and HTC Desire HD. No word on the HTC Flyer, a 7-inch tablet that currently runs on Android 3.2.

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Wired Top Stories

Logos from the new Timeline app makers

Facebook on Wednesday unveiled a host of new apps — more than 60 in total — that integrate with its new Timeline user interface. The social networking company also announced it will begin approving Timeline apps running on its Open Graph API from all developers.

“The apps launched at f8 in the music, news and video verticals have seen tremendous success so far. But really, that was just the tip of the iceberg. Our vision for Timeline is that whatever you love, whatever story you want to tell, you can add to your platform.”

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I saw several quad-core tablets at the Consumer Electronics show, but no smartphones. Luckily, Sascha Pallenberg, my friend who runs the Netbook News site, captured video of a Fujitsu handset running on the Nvidia Tegra 3 processor. From the looks of it, this phone’s performance will rival that of the Asus Transformer Prime tablet.

Fujitsu doesn’t target the U.S. market, so I don’t expect to see this Android 4.0 smartphone for sale here. However, Sascha’s video gives us an idea of what to expect from the Mobile World Congress show in Barcelona next month: console quality games on a large screen piped from a smartphone and played with using a wireless controller. Although this demo uses a wired HDTV connection, I anticipate we’ll see more wireless video solutions introduced  this year.

I’m still holding to the idea that throwing hardware alone at Android’s problem won’t solve any issues. However, I’ve used Android 4.0 for the past 6 weeks. The user interface improvements in Google’s platform, along with more powerful hardware, will allow Android to better contend against Apple’s iOS system.

I wouldn’t be surprised to see a number of quad-core handsets shown off, with a few available in the first half of 2012. By mid year, we’ll start to see a larger number of these powerful handsets hit the market. Samsung, Qualcomm, Texas Instruments and others will also be touting quad-core chips. But if my mobile predictions for 2012 hold true, far more dual-core handsets will be sold this year.

Then again, Apple is rumored to include its own quad-core chip in the next iPad and would be likely to use the same in a future iPhone design. That means 2012 will be more exciting to watch than 2011 when it comes to tablets and smartphones from a consumer perspective: Two great mobile choices in combination with what I think will be a third up-and-comer in Windows Phone handsetsand possibly in Windows 8 tablets.

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Google launched a news-reading app called Currents on Thursday, something it has been working on for some time — ever since it was a much-rumored skunkworks project called Propeller — and much of the coverage of the new app has called it a challenger to existing tablet and iPhone news-readers like Flipboard and Zite. But while Google Currents is superficially similar to these other services, there are some important differences that make me wonder whether Google really understands how media has changed and is changing. For a company that’s usually so forward-thinking, Currents as it stands now is more than a little disappointing.

Like Flipboard and Zite, the new Google offering (available here — U.S. only at this point) allows you to pull in content from a number of sources and then read through it in a kind of digital-magazine format on a tablet or an iPhone or other mobile device (my colleague Darrell has a hands-on look at the app). As mobile media consumption becomes an ever-increasing part of our lives, this kind of app is becoming the way that many people take in a lot of their news — at least those who wish to browse rather than simply following their favorite news sources on Twitter or Facebook. And Flipboard has shown, particularly with its excellent new iPhone app, that this can be done in a way that’s just as visually appealing as a traditional magazine, if not more so.

Currents is missing some crucial elements

Google’s app, while well-designed in many ways, lacks much of the polish and user-interface elements that make Flipboard so compelling (to me at least). And at least in my limited usage of it so far, it doesn’t even manage to rise to the level that Zite provides — and Zite, a Canadian startup that was acquired by CNN earlier this year for an estimated million, is much more utilitarian in its approach than Flipboard (Zite also just released an iPhone app). It’s entirely possible Google’s app will improve over time, and it does offer some interesting features — such as the ability to sync the content you’ve read between devices — but I still think it’s missing some crucial aspects.

For example, Google Currents is social in at least one way, in that it lets you share articles you read to Twitter and Facebook, provided you click through the default menu (which promotes sharing on Google’s own Google+ network first). But it isn’t social in another important sense: Unlike both Flipboard and Zite, it doesn’t pull in your Twitter lists or streams from those you follow, or content from your Facebook social graph. In other words, you can push content out to these networks, but you can’t pull content in from them and view it inside your news reader. To me, that means Currents is only one-half of a proper social-news app — and not even the most interesting half.

Why isn’t Google helping us filter content?

The second element Google Currents seems to be missing is recommendations or some form of smart filtering of content, apart from the limited amount that appears in the “trending” section. This is something Zite has pursued aggressively, both via its algorithms and through explicit recommendations from users — thumbs up, thumbs down, etc. — and is likely one of the reasons why CNN was interested in acquiring it. Flipboard hasn’t done much in terms of recommendations so far, but has begun to do so through its iPhone app “Cover Stories” feature, which apparently learns based on a user’s activity.

As we’ve noted many times, the massive rivers of information that pour into our lives from all kinds of sources makes the need for a smart filter more compelling every day. That seems like a problem virtually tailor-made for a company like Google, which has boatloads of programmers who specialize in filtering and understanding massive amounts of real-time data, yet the company has done virtually nothing in that space — despite having a long-established platform called Google News to draw from and build on. The only thing Google has done that seems remotely interesting is adding +1 recommendations to Google News, but even that seems designed mostly to promote the Google+ network.

An app like Currents should — particularly if it wants to actually be competitive with Flipboard or Zite — be pulling in news content from every source available, especially real-time sharing networks like Twitter and Facebook. Then it should apply smart filters and recommendations to those streams, to help news consumers sort and understand that information better. Instead, Currents feels about as innovative as your garden-variety app from a traditional magazine — in other words, not very innovative at all. More than anything, it feels like a giant missed opportunity.

Post and thumbnail photos courtesy of Flickr users Izzard

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The phone includes a pentaband radio, meaning it works fully on both AT&T’s and T-Mobile’s networks. I haven’t tested it on AT&T yet, but a popping a T-Mobile SIM card in has already provided download speeds of 9.4 Mbps.

I shared a brief video overview of the Galaxy Nexus within 24 hours of it arriving, so I was still learning the ropes of Android 4.0. It impressed me then and continues to do so with more usage. The phone has very capable hardware to power Google’s mobile operating system: a 1.2 GHz dual-core processor, 1 GB of memory, fast mobile broadband and a gorgeous 4.65-inch Super AMOLED display with 1280 x 720 resolution. See for yourself:

But no phone is perfect and some may not care for the 5 megapixel camera sensor Samsung used for the Galaxy Nexus. With limited use, I find it to be more than adequate for still images in good light and also for high-definition video capture up to 1080p resolution. During the next week, I’ll try to connect the phone to my HDTV to see the output on a larger screen.

Where there may be gaps in the hardware, the software is excellent. Android 4.0 is the best attempt yet for any company to compete against Apple’s iOS 5 operating system. Google has refined the user interface by bringing the most positive aspects of Android 3.x (aka: Honeycomb) to the smartphone screen. Gmail’s revamp is superb as is the overall consistency of the entire user interface.

It’s not all peaches and cream though: There’s an issue with Facebook integration and I’m seeing some strange text formatting problems in the otherwise very impressive stock browser. And I love how my Google Chrome bookmarks on the desktop are kept in sync with the Galaxy Nexus. In fact, I like Android 4.0 so much, I’m going to install it on my old Nexus One smartphone when time allows.

This week wasn’t all good news though. A demonstration of software called Carrier IQ showed the service to be collecting data from smartphones; mainly on Android devices. The story continues to develop, but some are concerned — rightly so — about Carrier IQ’s lack of transparency. The service is apparently installed at carrier’s requests and consumers aren’t aware of this. Nor is there a choice to opt-out or shut down the service; it simply runs silently in the background.

This type of practice is one of the several reasons I’d rather have a Nexus phone, which doesn’t include any carrier software. My bigger reasons were faster Android updates and the ability to easily customize the phone with other Android software, but diagnostic tools that are hidden in the background got added to my list this week.

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Engadget HD Podcast 275 – 11.22.2011 originally appeared on Engadget on Tue, 22 Nov 2011 18:00:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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The internet was ablaze upon the release of the Steve Jobs’ biography about a particularly interesting quote that seemed to reveal that Apple would release a TV. This is just as exciting a proposition as it was four years ago to smartphone users who dreamed that Apple would fix the mobile phone. But the fact is that Apple, and many others, have been trying to “fix” TV for years, and to date we are still stuck with hundreds of channels that have nothing on, a dozen remotes and a textbook example of how not to make a user interface. It seems, though, that people are ignoring another Jobs quote, from just over a year ago at All Things D, that seems to explain very plainly why Apple has yet to release anything more than a hobby. When asked about Apple and the TV market, Jobs’ reply showed how well-versed he was in the TV industry, but the choice quote was “it’s not a problem with technology, it’s not a problem with vision, it’s a fundamental go-to-market problem.” Jobs also explains that Apple made an iPhone and the iPad instead of a TV because there wasn’t a choice, “there was no way to get it to market.” So as much as we’d like to shed the chains that are channels and grid guides, as long as the monopolies that own the wires that run into our homes control the bits that travel over them, there just isn’t a way to change TV.

Editorial: Why Apple isn’t releasing a TV originally appeared on Engadget on Sat, 12 Nov 2011 14:49:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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The launch could happen as soon as next month, with mid-January 2012 being mentioned as another possibility. I’ve heard that the channel is basically ready to go, with the only hold up being contractual negotiations between Roku and Spotify.

One should note that I haven’t been able to confirm these plans with either company. Spotify didn’t reply in time when asked about the app, and a Roku spokesperson told me that the company doesn’t comment on “rumors and potential partners.”

However, I do have two early development screenshots of the Spotify on Roku user interface:

Spotify has been working on bringing its platform into the living room and recently rolled out an app for the WD TV  platform as well as Boxee. There has been a lot of demand for bringing Spotify to Roku as well, which means that a Spotify channel on the device could make many Roku owners very happy.

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That up-front cost also gets you a 1.5 GHz dual-core processor, 1 GB RAM, 16 GB internal storage with support for a 16 GB microSD card and an 8-megapixel camera. It also includes Beats Audio technology for improved sound. Not included on the Rezound, however, is Android 4.0; at least not when the phone launches on Nov. 14. Instead, the handset runs on the Gingerbread version of Android. HTC said the device is “Ice Cream Sandwich ready”, and that an update to Android 4.0 is expected early in 2012.

No tablets yet have Android 4.0 either, but perhaps the secret to Android tablet success has less to do with the underlying operating system and more to do with the user interface and available content. That’s why I think Amazon and Barnes & Noble are both going to sell millions of their Android-based 7-inch tablets in the coming months; something no other Android tablet-maker has done yet.

Between the Kindle Fire and the upcoming Nook Tablet, both products use Android 2.3 with a clean, heavily customized interface that completely hides Android. They also focus on the key, primary activities that most people want in a mobile device: Reading digital media, browsing the web, consuming video content, checking email and running a handful of popular applications found in curated application stores. And they both do this with a relatively low price and no expensive monthly mobile broadband contract: 9 and 9 for the Kindle Fire and Nook Tablet, respectively.

In contrast, traditional phone and computer makers haven’t figured out this tablet strategy, or they don’t have the content to leverage. Instead, they’re focused on computer-like specifications and hardware and are trying to compete with Apple’s iPad.

A perfect example is the new Motorola Xoom 2, just introduced this week for the U.K. and Ireland. There’s little change from the first Xoom, which hasn’t been a popular seller: a 20 percent faster chip, weight savings, and a splash-guard screen coating are some of the differences. But none of these address why the Xoom hasn’t been selling millions of units.

Motorola, Samsung, HTC, LG and a score of others are likely to do better when the improved interface of Android 4.0 arrives on slates, which at this point is looking like a 2012 event. We may see one or two tablets with Ice Cream Sandwich before year-end, but I anticipate most will be shown off at January’s Consumer Electronics Show, with availability some time after that.

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