The announcement confirmed that ICS will initially be available only for high-end smartphones that were introduced this year:

• Optimus 2x
• Optimus Black
• Optimus 3D
• Optimus LTE

Other smartphone models are currently under investigation as to whether Ice cream Sandwich will be compatible with the functionality, features and performance.

The final schedule of the official Android ICS 4.0 release for the smartphone models named above will be announced in December.

source Official LG Mobile Fan Page

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Samsung Philippines has announced that the SRP of the handset is set at Php29,990.

The Samsung Galaxy S2 will be available at Globe via prepaid and postpaid kits as well as your local gray market seller.

For the full specs of this wondrous phone, please read our Samsung Galaxy S2 overview.

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The N9 is powered by the latest build of Meego, yep, the Linux distribution that Nokia has officially discontinued in the wake of the Microsoft acquisition.

Nokia calls the N9, the first-ever pure touch smartphone and from the get go this new phone really doesn’t sport any front-facing buttons. You unlock the phone by just double-tapping the screen.

On the hardware front, Nokia doesn’t skimp on the N9′s specs. It’s got a 3.9-inch AMOLED screen, Cortex-A8 OMAP3630 1 GHz processor under the hood (similar to the Optimus Black?), 1 GB of RAM, NFC capability, 8MP rear-facing camera with Carl Zeiss optics, Gorilla glass etc.

Nokia N9 specifications
3.9-inch AMOLED screen @ 854×480 pixels
Gorilla glass
ARM Cortex-A8 OMAP3630 1 GHz
PowerVR SGX530
1GB RAM
16GB or 64GB internal storage
Bluetooth 2.1
WiFI 802.11 b/g/n
3G/HSDPA 14.4Mbps
NFC
8MP autofocus camera with Carl Zeiss optics
720p HD video recording @ 30fps with stereo sound
dual LED flash
2nd front-facing camera for video calls
1450mAh battery
Meego 1.2 Harmattan
Dolby Headphone and Dolby Digital Plus

Nokia says the N9′s body is made from the best in polycarbonate material engineering today but didn’t disclose the actual materials used. The company did state that this enables the Nokia N9 to have superior antenna performance over most other competitors’ smartphones. A side jab to Apple’s “you’re holding it wrong” fiasco perhaps?

The Nokia N9 will be available in 3 colours: black, cyan and magenta and with either 16GB or 64GB of internal storage. No price or availablity for the N9 has been announced.

Below is a video from Nokia, introducing the Nokia N9 Smartphone:

More info via Conversations @ Nokia

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What attracted me to the Optimus Black was the screen (ok, the body first, the screen next).  It features LG’s new display technology called the NOVA display, claiming that it’s brighter than Super AMOLED which Samsung currently uses on it’s high-end smartphones while consuming less power.  Looking that the Optimus Black with the screen turned off, it’s easy to see where it got it’s namesake.

The P970 is black all throughout (or a darkish grey overtone if you’re really fickle about it) and sports a no-nonsense look of simplicity.  From the shot below, all you can make out from the face of the unit with the screen turned off is the capacitive buttons, the LG logo up top isn’t even clearly visible.

Note: notice the slight marring on the screen of the picture?  Yeah, LG stuck a really cheap screen protector on this one.  The scar happened when I accidentally rubbed my keys on it.  The screen itself is not scratched but the protector is flimsy at best that I’m considering to install an Invisible Shield on it… like TODAY.

Of course when you turn the screen on that’s when the beauty of this phone flies:

This is at 70% brightness.  I’ll update the picture with another one with full brightness in a bit so you better wait up for that.

Blacks are much crisper, colors are more accurate and the display is simply brighter overall.  Now, of course that’s just a subjective review on my part.  If you want a more technical look, you may want to checkout GSMarena’s look into the NOVA display.

Outside of the Optimus Black

LG’s decision to use aluminum for the back of the P970 presents both pros and cons.  In terms of pros, the finish looks stylish, no-nonsense and very, very attractive.  The downside?  It’s a fingerprint magnet .  The finish also isn’t scratch proof, something that’s apparent in 2-3 days of owning the device.  Luckily, LG sells the back of these phones by order but you do have to wait awhile for a replacement.

The capacitive buttons work well and are sensitive enough to be responsible and even get pressed when the phone is in your pocket :/.

The overall design of the Optimus Black makes it a delight for the eyes.  First off it’s THAT thin.  Here’s the phone compared to my SHB-9000 headphones.  Up top, that’s the Power/Unlock switch on the left and the microUSB adapter in the middle.  On the right there’s a 3.5 mm jack and a small mic for noise cancelling.  Judging from how it fares with everyday use, it’s doesn’t compare to what highend phones give you but it is “good enough” considering the Optimus Black’s price.

Here’s another comparison with my headphones. Slim isn’t it?

Notice the G button on the side?  That’s for gestures built in to the phone.  You can’t customize it right now (except for turning individual gestures on and off) and most of them only works with the pre-installed applications so that’s a bit of a downer.

Inside of the Optimus Black

The P970 is powered by a Texas Instrument OMAP 3630 processor clocked at 1GHz.  Compared to the A8 Cortex (or even the A9) Snapdragon processor that most of the current phones use, it performs a bit slower in terms of crunching numbers (ergo the Black is more of a looker than a performer).  Still, at 1GHz coupled with 512 MB RAM, the P970 is no slouch either.  If you have the default LG launcher, you WILL experience a bit of lag with turning screens and over all response time (with regards to the homescreen only) so I really recommend installing a 3rd Party Home App like LauncherPro or ADW launcher.. unless of course LG’s default widgets appeal to you.

The Optimus Black has 1GB for it’s internal storage and ships with a 2GB microSD for free.

Here’s the full spec list of the LG P970 Optimus Black:

LG P970 Optimus Black Specifications

Taking pics with the Optimus Black

The Optimus black is equipped with dual cameras, a VGA front-facing camera for video calls and a 5 MegaPixel with single LED flash on the back.  In terms of image quality, the 5MP camera performs much like any other camera phone in the market: acceptable image quality in bright conditions. Here’s a sample image from my phone (no post processing involved here except the resize, click the full image to see the original):

Not bad huh?  My dessert still looks tasty.

The camera has an autofocus motor but in low-light, it ends up hunting quite a bit.  As for video,  I haven’t tried using it since it saves them in 3GP .

Nitpicks
I found two annoying bugs during my first few days of handling the Optimus Black one being the wonky Bluetooth driver and the other was it forgetting my time and date settings. The first one I can live with seeing (although having my SHB-9000 bluetooth headset sync better with my year old Spica without experiencing random disconnections was a bit saddening ) as it’s a new phone and drivers are still in active development but the second one is a bit disconcerting. Basically if you turn off your phone, it forgets your current timezone (not the actual time and date but it’s annoying).

Luckily, the problem was merely my outdated firmware. Turns out that currently, there are several software versions of the LG Optimus Black:

• LG-P970-V09f
• LG-P970-V09g – what mine shipped with
• LG-P970-V10a – is the current public release

LG-P970-V10a is the latest firmware update available for the Optimus Black and is pre-installed on units sold after May 17th (that’s the day I got my unit) . So if your phone’s version is below that, be sure to upgrade immediately using LG’s software updater.

Verdict

Is it a good phone?  The current competition for the Optimus Black are the Samsung Galaxy SL,  HTC Desire S and Sony’s Xperia Arc.  Here’s a run down of pros and cons for each device compared to the Optimus Black:

Do you have comments or questions about the Optimus Black?  Post them in the comments.

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All you need to do is follow @googlenexus and solve the puzzles for the day. You are limited to one guess per entry, submitting multiple guesses won’t work since your very Google will only accept your first submission.

The Google Nexus S contest is open to all legal residents of (where you need to be physically located at during the duration of the contest) in Australia, Austria, Belgium, Canada, Croatia, Czech Republic, France, Germany, Greece, Hong Kong, Ireland, Indonesia, Netherlands, Philippines, Russia, Singapore, Spain, South Korea, Switzerland, Taiwan, Thailand, the United Kingdom or the 50 United States and the District of Columbia.

Contest period is 12:00:00 A.M. Pacific Time (PT) Zone in the United States on April 28 2011 up to 11:59:59 P.M. PT on May 8 2011.

more info via the Official Challenge page, @googlenexus

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APN Settings for Globe

Postpaid APN: internet.globe.com.ph

Prepaid APN: http.globe.com.ph

APN Settings for Smart Bro

Postpaid APN: smartbro

Prepaid APN: smartbro

APN Settings for Smart Buddy, Smart Gold

APN: internet

APN Settings for Sun Cellular

Prepaid
APN (static): minternet
Authentication: PAP
IP address: dynamic

Postpaid
APN (static): fbband
Authentication: PAP
IP address: dynamic

APN Settings for PLDT WeRoam

Postpaid: WEROAMPLAN

Important Note: If you are actively using multiple connections (i.e. switching sim cards), create a different profile for each connection.  That way when you need to switch sim cards, all you need to do is activate the proper profile instead of re-writing everything.

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If you’re wondering if your carrier will be able to support the Xperia Play, the good news is that it will be released in both CDMA and WCDMA versions at the same time. Sony Ericsson has equipped the Xperia Play with a 4-inch multitouch 854 x 480 LCD, powered by an Qualcomm MSM8655 chipset coupled with an Adreno 205 GPU, 512MB of RAM, and 8 gigabytes of built in memory expandable through an SD card-slot.

If you’re wondering about what games it’ll play, Sony has long since announced that the Xperia Play will be the spearhead of the PlayStation Suite, a service that will bring PSX and soon after PSP games into Android.

Sony-Ericsson Xperia Play Official Specs

1GHz Scorpion (Qualcomm MSM8255 Snapdragon) processor
Adreno 205 GPU
4.0″ display @ 480 x 854 pixels
Touch sensitive gaming controls
PS-like gaming buttons
Multi-touch input method
400MB RAM
up to 32GB via microSD, 8GB included
HSDPA/HSUPA
WiFi 802.11 b/g/n
Bluetooth 2.1
GPS w/ aGPS support
5MP autofocus camera w/ LED flash
Android 2.3 Gingerbread
Li-Ion 1500mAh battery

Screen
16,777,216 colour TFT
Capacitive multi-touch
4 inches
480 x 854 pixels (FWVGA)

Camera
5.1 megapixel camera
Auto focus
Flash / Photo light
Geo tagging
Image stabiliser
Send to web
Touch focus
Video light
Video recording
Video blogging

Music
Album art
Bluetooth™ stereo (A2DP)
Google™ Music Player
Music tones (MP3/AAC)
PlayNow™ service*
Sony Ericsson Music player
Stereo speakers
TrackID™ music recognition application

Internet
Android Market™*
Bookmarks
Google™ search*
Google™ Voice Search*
Pan & zoom
Web browser (Webkit)

Communication
Call list
Conference calls
Facebook™ application (from Android Market™)
Google™ Talk*
Noise Shield
Polyphonic ringtones
Speakerphone
Sony Ericsson Timescape™***
Twitter™ application (from Android Market™)
Vibrating alert

Messaging
Android Cloud to Device messaging (C2DM)
Conversations
Email
Google Mail™*
Instant messaging
Picture messaging (MMS)
Predictive text input
Sound recorder
Text messaging (SMS)

Design
Auto rotate
Keyboard (onscreen, 12 key)
Keyboard (onscreen, QWERTY)
Picture wallpaper
Touchscreen
Wallpaper animation

Entertainment
3D games
Dedicated gaming keys
Flash Lite™
Gesture gaming
Motion gaming
Video streaming
YouTube™

Organiser
Alarm clock
Calculator
Calendar
Document editors
Document readers
E-Manual
Flight mode
Google Calendar™
Google Gallery 3D™
Infinite button
Phone book
Set-up Wizard
Widget manager

Connectivity
3.5 mm audio jack
aGPS
Bluetooth™ technology
DLNA Certified
Google Latitude™
Google Location Service
Google Maps™ with Street View
Media Transfer Protocol support
Micro USB Connector
Modem
Synchronisation via Facebook™**
Synchronisation via Google Sync™
Synchronisation via Microsoft Exchange ActiveSync®
Synchronisation via Sony Ericsson Sync
USB 2.0 high speed support
Wi-Fi™
Wi-Fi™ Hotspot functionality
* The service is not available in all markets.
** Requires Facebook™ application installed on the device.

Google™ services*
* These services may not be available in every market Android Market™ Client

Gmail™
Google Calendar™
Google Gallery 3D™
Google Latitude™
Google Maps™ with Street View
Google Media Uploader
Google Music Player™
Google Phone-top Search
Google Search widget
Google Sync™
Google Talk™
Google Voice Search
Set-up Wizard
YouTube™

Facts
Size: 119 x 62 x 16 mm
Weight: 175 grams
Phone memory: 400 MB
Memory card support: microSD™, up to 32 GB
Memory card included: 8GB microSD™
Operating system: Google™ Android 2.3 (Gingerbread)
Processor: 1 GHz Scorpion ARMv7

Colour

Black
White

With Sony touting the Xperia Play as a gaming platform, it has convinced several big gaming industry entities to pitch in development support making games available at launch. The partner list includes:
Sony Computer Entertainment
Digital Chocolate
Digital Legends
Electronic Arts
Fishlabs
Gamehouse
Gameloft
Glu Mobile
Handy Games
Namco Bandai Networks
Polarbit
PopCap
Trendy Entertainment
Unity Tecnologies

As for battery life?  Sony-Ericsson has the following numbers from their press release:

Talk time GSM/GPRS: Up to 8 hrs 25 min*
Standby time GSM/GPRS: Up to 425 hrs*
Talk time UMTS: Up to 6 hrs 25 min*
Standby time UMTS: Up to 413 hrs*
Talk time CDMA2000®: Up to 7 hrs 40 min*
Standby time CDMA2000®: Up to 405 hrs*
Game play time: Up to 5 hrs 35 min*
MP3 playback: Up to 30 hrs 35 min*

The Xperia Play will arrive in the US will be the first followed by Japan shortly after.  Price is still unconfirmed.

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Key features of Samsung GALAXY S II:

• Dual-core 1GHz ARM Cortex-A9 proccessor
• 4.3″ Super AMOLED Plus display @ 480×800 pixels
• Gorilla Glass display
• 1GB RAM
• 16GB/32GB internal storage
• HSDPA 21Mbps, HSUPA 5.76Mbps
• WiFi 802.11 a/b/g/n, DLNA
• Bluetooth 3.0 + HS
• GPS w/ aGPS support
• 8MP autofocus camera with LED flash
• 1080p video recording
• 2MP front-facing camera for video calls
• FM Radio Tuner
• Li-Ion 1650mAh battery
• Android 2.3 Gingerbread
• Samsung Hubs – Social Hub Premium, Readers Hub, Game Hub and Music Hub
• Customizable Live Panel to aggregate live Web and mobile apps to the home screen

Samsung claims that the GALAXY S II is the world’s thinnest dual core smartphone (a claim that will be substatianted until dual-core phones from other manufacturers hit the market) as measures 4.9 x 2.6 x 0.3 inches and weighs just 4 ounces. If you note the spec list, you’ll see that the Galaxy S II is equipped with a Gorilla Glass display making it perfect for outdoorsy people who can afford the premium price.

No word yet on release date and pricing for GALAXY S II but it has been confirmed that it will be available in 16GB and 32GB configurations.

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What makes the launch of the Xperia Play exciting isn’t the phone itself but rather, a new service that Sony is prepping up to fill the Android marketplace with PlayStation games. Via a dedicated service called the PlayStation Suite, users can buy and play (at first PlayStation 1 games, but soon after PSP games as well) games on their favorite Android device.

While specs for the Xperia Play has yet to be officially announced, some information are at least available via the breakdown that the gadget recieved a few weeks prior.  Xperia Play specs from the Protoype are as follows:

Qualcomm Adreno 205 GPU, along with what’s likely to be a 1GHz Snapdragon QSD8255. It sports a 1,500mAh battery, the 854 x 480 resolution on a 4-inch LCD, a 5 megapixel autofocus camera with LED flash, 512MB RAM, 512MB ROM, a microSD slot, SIM slot, micro-USB, and a second mic on the back for active noise cancellation (as found in the Nexus One).

more info can be found via Sony Ericsson Facebook page, Xperia Play in Pictures

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What made the Atrix a darling of the CES floor is it’s accessories that included docks that can transform your Atrix 4G to a desktop or a notebook. There’s also an HD dock that allows you to connect your Atrix 4G to display HD video, pictures, etc on your television.

Features and specs of Motorola Atrix 4G:

• 4-inch qHD display (960 x 540 pixels)
• 1 GHz CPU processing speed
• 1GB of RAM and 16GB internal storage
• Dual-cameras
• Connectivity Options – support for AT&T’s HSPA+ network
• Battery capacity: massive 1930 mAh lithium-ion battery
• microSD card slot and 10.9mm handset
• Fingerprint scanner
• Google’s Android operating system

The new Motorola Atrix 4G comes with slim which measures 10.9 mm thick only and will available through leading retailer first quarter of 2011.

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