In Italy you have to present your ID even when in internet cafes. It will be photocopied and kept forever along with your IP.
And there is no open Wi-Fi anywhere, because any internet user must be identified (there are free hotspots that require your local GSM number and verify it by sending you a code).
Of course you can't buy any prepaid SIM without your ID or passport (and often fiscal code).
Expect equal or better signal while using a foreign SIM (because you get to choose a network,e.g. AT&T or T-mobile, instead of being tied to just one).
Free means 0$/mo, and that's most probably not what you are paying. Maybe you can't get a cheaper plan without iPhone because all US carriers screw their customers equally, but it doesn't mean your phone is free.
You're very lucky, I've got nothing but trouble with it. It still doesn't support international input (and I need it for flash based chats), has choppy audio playback, webcam support is useless.
Adobe hasn't released a new alpha since February, hopefully the next update will fix some of the problems.
Meanwhile, I ended up installing a separate 32-bit firefox on my amd64 linux, and launching it whenever flash is required.
After installing FroYo on my N1, I lost many of the goodies in CyanogenMod (e.g. colored trackball notifications, 360 degree rotation, better battery indicator, a lot of options in Spare parts etc). CM 5.0.6 was very fast already, so I don't feel much difference in speed, only in benchmarks. And the improved launcher of FroYo is still worse than Launcher Pro. Also, I don't feel a difference in web browser speed (even with Flash disabled).
So for me, stock 2.2 is actually worse than my previous setup. However I can't wait until FroYo based CyanogenMod is released, that thing should be awesome.
Google is even worse in this regard, you can't buy applications on the android market if you are not from a few select countries.
Thankfully most apps are free, and if one really wants to buy something, it can be done elsewhere - no single app market limitation like with the iph*ne. It's also easy to install MarketEnabler hack on rooted phones (makes google think you're in the US). But I really fail to understand why no-evil Google is doing that
Apple could delay the availability of newer multiscalar designs to others, keeping the newest and greatest IP to itself. This would place others in disadvantageous position - the fastest platforms will be Apple only (which is the opposite of what we have today: Android and WinMo offering the best hardware specs).
Switching to other platform is also quite different, because of all the software and experience already available for ARM CPUs. And because of a few patents it's almost impossible to legally implement a fully compatible CPU without a license from ARM.
ARM is definitely a monopoly in mobile CPU IP. Apple is monopoly in some other areas (e.g. digital music players in the US). This should be enough to at least involve antitrust authorities. And with all the numerous ARM licenses affected by such acquisition, there will be a lot of pressure to block it.
Intel is no longer ARM's licensee, they sold their ARM-based CPUs to Marvell a few years back. A lot of other companies are: Samsung, Qualcomm, TI, Broadcom, Marvell, NXP, ST, Apple and many many others.
Can all the iPhone owners who are forced to buy the OS bundled with the hardware demand a refund now? Why should they pay the Apple tax for the OS they don't need when a better alternative is free?
Publish the link to the site on Slashdot (and don't forget to mention it has some free pr0n). The site will die within minutes, after the first 10 million slashdotters visit it.
I guess my first post was quite misunderstood.
Android is perfectly usable out of the box and is a very nice OS. No knowledge of kernels and ROMs is required to use it efficiently (although rooting is recommended for a lot of extra stuff ).
However Nexus One specifically has a few hardware glitches, and I grew tired of waiting for Google to fix them. After installing cyanogenmod the phone is much more responsive, has almost twice as much RAM (I still fail to understand why google kernels limit the RAM to just 256MB, while 512 is actually available), and the touch screen doesn't go crazy 10 times a day. Heck, the latest test kernel even improves the loudness of the speakerphone.
Unlike some other ROMs (e.g. Modaco's HTC Desire rom for N1), cyanogenmod doesn't change the interface at all. So I end up using the same android but faster and better.
It's not just a rendering, there are several Chinese ipad knock-offs with Android. Their production has just started now, so the information is pretty scarce. However none of them mention 3g support, so this particular ebay listing might be bogus.
I agree that the specs are not great at all, at least 256MB is a must for android. Some other sites claim 256MB for the knock-off.
Apple is selling a phone with outdated hardware (screen size and type, low screen resolution, bad camera etc), while Android vendors continuously improve the hardware - look at Samsung Galaxy S specs, for example. The same will hopefully be true for android MIDs
By the way, I own nexus one, and with the right firmware (latest cyanogenmod with UV kernel), it's a great phone.
There are way too many sites with intrusive ads, very low content/advertisement ratio, lots of flash banners that eat up CPU (Isn't it annoying to see 100% CPU taken by the browser?). There is even a site that displays a screaming flash ad, so when I visited it at work, it was quite embarrassing.
So it's very simple, as long as there are many such sites, we'll continue to use ad blockers. The webmasters must finally understand that in order to get some revenue they should not annoy their visitors. And it's not that hard to do, I don't think many would mind a few text ads or one static banner on a page.
And if you refuse to let us see the content without flashy ads, well, go to hell, such sites aren't worth visiting anyway.
It is no longer true. A lot of Linux drivers are written by the hardware vendors themselves, often sharing code with other platforms. In some areas Linux drivers are a MUST, and are released simultaneously for all supported OSes.
However it also means that some drivers, despite being open source, are badly written by the same people who are used to closed source standards, with very questionable quality.
The announcement is new, but the player isn't. Must be a very slow company, if it takes one year from the alpha release to the announcement.
By the way, the 64-bit alpha was always just as stable (or just as unstable) for me as the 32-bit version. I wonder if they have really made any changes since then.
I recently switched from WM to Android (N1) and I think that WM is actually more open for developers than Android. A lot of stuff on the Android requires rooting the device, while on WM it was a matter of a simple installation:
A simple example: even adding a font on android requires rooting.
More complex example: voice dialing on Android doesn't work from blluetooth headset. The bug report generated thousand of replies, but google is in no hurry to fix it. Third party developer cannot provide such functionality (and no one will develop complex software that requires unlocking and rooting). WM, on the other hand, had 4 different packages for voice commands, and it was a matter of simple installation to switch from one to another.
It depends. Ukrainians can easily understand Polish (despite different alphabets), but it is not easy for Russians to understand Macedonian.
Regarding the Mongolian language, it was just one example of a language with Cyrillic alphabet (the most commonly used one), but unintelligible to Slavic speakers. And there are others.
But, from what I understand of the languages that use Cyrillic characters, they are very similar, so a speaker of a sister language could understand the text. That would be similar to the way an English reader could understand some words in French, Spanish, or Italian.
They are different enough to make understanding quite hard (and sometimes misleading, as the same words may have different meaning in different languages). Besides, there are languages like Mongolian that use cyrillic script, but have nothing in common with Slavic languages.
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In Italy you have to present your ID even when in internet cafes. It will be photocopied and kept forever along with your IP. And there is no open Wi-Fi anywhere, because any internet user must be identified (there are free hotspots that require your local GSM number and verify it by sending you a code).
Of course you can't buy any prepaid SIM without your ID or passport (and often fiscal code).
I guess USA is slowly getting there too.
Expect equal or better signal while using a foreign SIM (because you get to choose a network,e.g. AT&T or T-mobile, instead of being tied to just one).
And expect to pay a lot for roaming.
Do you honestly believe that?
Free means 0$/mo, and that's most probably not what you are paying. Maybe you can't get a cheaper plan without iPhone because all US carriers screw their customers equally, but it doesn't mean your phone is free.
Free? Is the contract free too? TANSTAAFL, especially not Apple lunch.
You're very lucky, I've got nothing but trouble with it. It still doesn't support international input (and I need it for flash based chats), has choppy audio playback, webcam support is useless.
Adobe hasn't released a new alpha since February, hopefully the next update will fix some of the problems.
Meanwhile, I ended up installing a separate 32-bit firefox on my amd64 linux, and launching it whenever flash is required.
After installing FroYo on my N1, I lost many of the goodies in CyanogenMod (e.g. colored trackball notifications, 360 degree rotation, better battery indicator, a lot of options in Spare parts etc). CM 5.0.6 was very fast already, so I don't feel much difference in speed, only in benchmarks. And the improved launcher of FroYo is still worse than Launcher Pro. Also, I don't feel a difference in web browser speed (even with Flash disabled).
So for me, stock 2.2 is actually worse than my previous setup. However I can't wait until FroYo based CyanogenMod is released, that thing should be awesome.
SlideMe is missing many good applications and games. Just a quick example: you cannot buy Asphalt 5 on it, only on google market.
Google is even worse in this regard, you can't buy applications on the android market if you are not from a few select countries.
Thankfully most apps are free, and if one really wants to buy something, it can be done elsewhere - no single app market limitation like with the iph*ne. It's also easy to install MarketEnabler hack on rooted phones (makes google think you're in the US). But I really fail to understand why no-evil Google is doing that
Ferrari is much harder to handle, but it allows you to drive way faster. So, is Honda in your analogy an iPhone, and Ferrari - Android?
Apple could delay the availability of newer multiscalar designs to others, keeping the newest and greatest IP to itself. This would place others in disadvantageous position - the fastest platforms will be Apple only (which is the opposite of what we have today: Android and WinMo offering the best hardware specs).
Switching to other platform is also quite different, because of all the software and experience already available for ARM CPUs. And because of a few patents it's almost impossible to legally implement a fully compatible CPU without a license from ARM.
ARM is definitely a monopoly in mobile CPU IP. Apple is monopoly in some other areas (e.g. digital music players in the US). This should be enough to at least involve antitrust authorities. And with all the numerous ARM licenses affected by such acquisition, there will be a lot of pressure to block it.
Intel is no longer ARM's licensee, they sold their ARM-based CPUs to Marvell a few years back. A lot of other companies are: Samsung, Qualcomm, TI, Broadcom, Marvell, NXP, ST, Apple and many many others.
Can all the iPhone owners who are forced to buy the OS bundled with the hardware demand a refund now? Why should they pay the Apple tax for the OS they don't need when a better alternative is free?
Publish the link to the site on Slashdot (and don't forget to mention it has some free pr0n). The site will die within minutes, after the first 10 million slashdotters visit it.
I guess my first post was quite misunderstood. Android is perfectly usable out of the box and is a very nice OS. No knowledge of kernels and ROMs is required to use it efficiently (although rooting is recommended for a lot of extra stuff ).
However Nexus One specifically has a few hardware glitches, and I grew tired of waiting for Google to fix them. After installing cyanogenmod the phone is much more responsive, has almost twice as much RAM (I still fail to understand why google kernels limit the RAM to just 256MB, while 512 is actually available), and the touch screen doesn't go crazy 10 times a day. Heck, the latest test kernel even improves the loudness of the speakerphone.
Unlike some other ROMs (e.g. Modaco's HTC Desire rom for N1), cyanogenmod doesn't change the interface at all. So I end up using the same android but faster and better.
It's not just a rendering, there are several Chinese ipad knock-offs with Android. Their production has just started now, so the information is pretty scarce. However none of them mention 3g support, so this particular ebay listing might be bogus.
I agree that the specs are not great at all, at least 256MB is a must for android. Some other sites claim 256MB for the knock-off.
Apple is selling a phone with outdated hardware (screen size and type, low screen resolution, bad camera etc), while Android vendors continuously improve the hardware - look at Samsung Galaxy S specs, for example. The same will hopefully be true for android MIDs
By the way, I own nexus one, and with the right firmware (latest cyanogenmod with UV kernel), it's a great phone.
You can already buy it.
There are way too many sites with intrusive ads, very low content/advertisement ratio, lots of flash banners that eat up CPU (Isn't it annoying to see 100% CPU taken by the browser?). There is even a site that displays a screaming flash ad, so when I visited it at work, it was quite embarrassing.
So it's very simple, as long as there are many such sites, we'll continue to use ad blockers. The webmasters must finally understand that in order to get some revenue they should not annoy their visitors. And it's not that hard to do, I don't think many would mind a few text ads or one static banner on a page.
And if you refuse to let us see the content without flashy ads, well, go to hell, such sites aren't worth visiting anyway.
It is no longer true. A lot of Linux drivers are written by the hardware vendors themselves, often sharing code with other platforms. In some areas Linux drivers are a MUST, and are released simultaneously for all supported OSes.
However it also means that some drivers, despite being open source, are badly written by the same people who are used to closed source standards, with very questionable quality.
The announcement is new, but the player isn't. Must be a very slow company, if it takes one year from the alpha release to the announcement.
By the way, the 64-bit alpha was always just as stable (or just as unstable) for me as the 32-bit version. I wonder if they have really made any changes since then.
A simple example: even adding a font on android requires rooting.
More complex example: voice dialing on Android doesn't work from blluetooth headset. The bug report generated thousand of replies, but google is in no hurry to fix it. Third party developer cannot provide such functionality (and no one will develop complex software that requires unlocking and rooting). WM, on the other hand, had 4 different packages for voice commands, and it was a matter of simple installation to switch from one to another.
It surely looks like a real device to me: http://www.viddler.com/explore/engadget/videos/1095/4.249
It depends. Ukrainians can easily understand Polish (despite different alphabets), but it is not easy for Russians to understand Macedonian. Regarding the Mongolian language, it was just one example of a language with Cyrillic alphabet (the most commonly used one), but unintelligible to Slavic speakers. And there are others.
But, from what I understand of the languages that use Cyrillic characters, they are very similar, so a speaker of a sister language could understand the text. That would be similar to the way an English reader could understand some words in French, Spanish, or Italian.
They are different enough to make understanding quite hard (and sometimes misleading, as the same words may have different meaning in different languages). Besides, there are languages like Mongolian that use cyrillic script, but have nothing in common with Slavic languages.