Android Community |
- T-Mobile Changing Restocking fees based on device type
- Motorola Droid X2 and Xperia Play both available now from Verizon
- Logitech launches Keyboard and Mouse for Honeycomb Tablets
- HTC Sensation hits stores today
- Fujitsu preparing 7-inch Android tablet for Q3 2011
- Amazon Trade-In Beta now Live, Trade that iPhone for some Andy
- LG P930 a new Android Phone sporting a Retina killing 1280×720 display
- Adobe Flash 10.3 and Air both have updates in Market
- Amazon Appstore Free App of the Day: The Impossible Game [Mini Review]
- LG Optimus 3D Out in the Wild, on eBay
- Motorola Droid X2 in Costco stores before Verizon [update]
- Updated PayPal App with Mobile Check Cashing Hands On
- Interviewing a DROID Charge Hunter from Start to Delivery
- AT&T Upload speeds and caps, who is to blame?
- OmniVision Launches Out to Get Rid of Camera Humps With 5 mm Camera
- Angry Birds RIO Update on Android Market by Friday
| T-Mobile Changing Restocking fees based on device type Posted: 19 May 2011 10:22 AM PDT It looks like starting May 22nd T-Mobile is all set to be making some pretty drastic changes to the return and restocking fee policy. According to the leaked screenshot they will now be charging a different restocking fee based on the specific device that is being returned. All the way up to a $75 dollar fee for a tablet, looks like it will be Ebay or Craigslist for some. They said it was "an effort to offset the costs of processing and restocking devices for certain types of device exchanges and return."
So starting May 22nd, depending on the type of device you are returning or even exchanging a fee will come along with it. I would understand returns if there is no defects, but exchanges should be different. The new changes are: * $25: Phone-first handsets and laptop sticks Like I said above this is a drastic change from the current $10 dollar fee that they don’t always enforce to begin with, so either they are tightening up or are looking to stop the amount of returns and exchanges. Hopefully employees will try to set the customer up with what will work for them better the first time, and this shouldn’t be an issue. That or test the device plenty in store and you should be fine. Either way the steep increase is something I hope others don’t start to follow. We will see. [via TmoNews] )
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| Motorola Droid X2 and Xperia Play both available now from Verizon Posted: 19 May 2011 10:00 AM PDT Today is the day just like Verizon told us all recently, the Motorola Droid X2 and its dual-core CPU is available for order online right now and they are offering free overnight shipping. Get it Friday if you order fast. There are reports of the X2 also being available in corporate stores and Costco so try your luck and maybe get one today.
If you’ve been patiently waiting for the Motorola Droid X2 go ahead and click here to get started. It may not come with 4G LTE, but that high-res screen and powerful CPU should make up for the difference and will still be a big hit I’m sure, after all it is a DROID. Next up, launching today and also available on Verizon Wireless at this very moment is the phone you gamers have all been waiting for, the Sony Ericcson Xperia Play with those playstation controls you should be busy gaming for hours. It is available for online order right now as well and it also has the same Free overnight shipping. Click Here to get your game on and order the Xperia Play. Again I’ll post both the links below to make things easier for you. So what will you choose, the powerful Droid X2 or the game changing Xperia Play? Tell us below in the comments. Motorola Droid x2 Order Page
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| Logitech launches Keyboard and Mouse for Honeycomb Tablets Posted: 19 May 2011 09:29 AM PDT Logitech has recently outed a few new accessories coming to their long list of well made keyboards and mice. They now have a pre-order page live for all those that need the convenience and ease of use of having a bluetooth keyboard and or mouse for their Android Tablet. We all know Logitech makes some of the best stuff so I have no doubts on build quality. With media and volume controls and all, I sure want the keyboard for my Xoom.
I’ll start with the Logitech Android Keyboard it connects via bluetooth and even comes with the fancy case you see in the photo. The case doubles as the stand, and it seems they designed in pretty well. It isn’t cheap, but available for pre-order now starting at $69 and should be a great addition for any tablet owner. I’m wondering if it would work with the Galaxy Tab or other tablets with bluetooth that are not running 3.0 but I doubt it. Next up is the Logitech Android Mouse it connects via the same way as the keyboard and that is over bluetooth. It comes with a micro fiber carry pouch for those that like to keep things in their case. Logitech said the keyboard and mouse should both work up to around 30 feet away from the device, but may vary by use environment. It will run you a pretty penny also starting at $39
Stay tuned for more as they plan to also release a speaker dock and a few other things, we will update once these start shipping, and hey they might even work with your Google TV once it gets updated to Android 3.1 but we wont know til they launch. [via SlashGear] )
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| HTC Sensation hits stores today Posted: 19 May 2011 05:55 AM PDT The Vodafone HTC Sensation has been up for pre-order since early May, and now the dual-core smartphone is headed into stores. Vodafone tells us that pre-order customers should be receiving their Sensation today, while everyone else can pick one up from free with a new, £35 per month, two-year agreement.
Your money gets you a 4.3-inch, qHD 960 x 540 touchscreen, 1.2GHz dual-core MSM8260 processor, 8-megapixel rear camera with autofocus, flash and 1080p Full HD video recording, and the front-facing camera for video calls. There’s also the latest iteration of HTC Sense on top of Android 2.3 Gingerbread. All in all, it promises to be a mighty impressive smartphone. There’s more information in our hands-on video below, and in our report from the Sensation’s launch.
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| Fujitsu preparing 7-inch Android tablet for Q3 2011 Posted: 19 May 2011 03:14 AM PDT
DigiTimes tips that Fujitsu is getting a tablet ready for the third quarter of 2011 that will run the Android OS. The tablet is said to have a 7-inch screen and was expected to run the latest version of Android available at that time, thought to be Android 3.1. The tablet is expected to sell for $347 to $694 here in the States. If Fujitsu wants to sell the thing it had better be on the low end of that scale. To hit the price range targeted the production will be farmed out to Taiwanese ODMs for the build. Exactly which company will build the tablet is unknown at this time. What do you think about Fujitsu offering up a new Android tablet? The market is getting crowded, and I think many will agree that the prices many companies are asking for their Android tablets are more than most want to spend. At $347 I can see it being popular, at $694 its going to be a hard sell. [via DigiTimes] )
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| Amazon Trade-In Beta now Live, Trade that iPhone for some Andy Posted: 18 May 2011 09:07 PM PDT It looks like Amazon is joining the likes of Best Buy, T-Mobile and others and are now offering a full trade-in program. The Trade-In Beta was explained in a little more detail today and you can see the full press release below. It looks like Amazon will be accepting things like Electronics, Books, DVD’s, Games and more all for the trade-in program. I like this idea as I have plenty of old games I don’t need, not to mention that iPod Touch that I never use now I have a 32GB MicroSD in my Android phone, and Google Music Beta to top that if needed.
So if anyone of you readers are like me and have friends or co-workers that really love your new 4.3″ Thunderbolt Android phone, or the blazing fast speeds and HDMI out on your G2x and wish they could get out of their old iPhone and into some Android it is your duty to tell them all about Amazon Trade-In. The shipping is free, they will deposit a gift card in your account in return and then all you do is buy a new or used phone from Amazon. Its now that easy to switch to Android. Tell your friends and family. I decided to check it out myself and a few Blu-Ray DVD’s only got me about $3 dollars each, but my mint condition Nexus One was worth about $130 using Amazon Trade-In, I’d say that is a decent price for a device almost a year and a half old. The iPhone 3G is worth around $113, so for those that made that mistake feel free to trade it in immediately and get a HTC EVO instead, you’ll be glad you did. I didn’t get into trading in old books, or video games much as I was mainly curious about the electronics and mobile part of this. To try this yourself click here. Press Release: )
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| LG P930 a new Android Phone sporting a Retina killing 1280×720 display Posted: 18 May 2011 05:22 PM PDT What we have here seems to be a few lines in particular that looks a little odd from a LG XML file. They have a few Android phones out or on their way, and they’ve already released the Optimus Pad aka G-Slate on T-Mobile and that was their first tablet. For now most of the upcoming phones like the LG Revolution all sport the andy standard 800×480 resolution, so could this be a new 4, or 4.5″ high-res phone in the works, or possibly a 7″ Android 3.1 Honeycomb tablet, we don’t know but it looks to have the makings for a phone.
From past devices by LG we have a pretty good indication that this will in fact be a phone. The Optimus 2x internal model number was the P990, the G2x was the P999, then you have the LG Optimus Black P970, and many others like the Optimus 3D named the P920. When you look at tablets the LG Optimus Pad name or model number was the V900. So it is safe to say phones start with P, while slates or tablets will probably all start with V. From the information in the XML file, and from our sources we do know that the P930 will be an Android device with a 1280 x 720 display, and brings with it GPRS/EDGE and HSDPA/HSUPA connectivity. Taking all of that into account with the P930 name it looks like we have a sweet 1280x720p LG phone in the works. Sounds like the iPhone 4 and upcoming qHD display phones will have something to look up to soon, that will be the P930 and any other phone with this high-res screen. We have recently heard about Toshiba having the same resolution on a 4″ display so this might be the same size, or something bigger. We don’t know much for now but feel free to look over the XML file.
[via UnwiredView] )
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| Adobe Flash 10.3 and Air both have updates in Market Posted: 18 May 2011 03:29 PM PDT It looks like Adobe hasn’t wasted any time adding some fixes or updated to these two popular apps in the Android Market. Just last week Flash got updated to 10.3 and brought some welcomed changes and updates for Android 3.1 and Honeycomb tablets. This update today doesn’t say much, but updates must be good right.
They don’t mention much for a change-log, as usual but Adobe Air got a few good updates, as well as a compressed size to speed up download and update times. Adobe Air Changes: * AAC audio will now decode and play back correctly on Android 2.3 (Gingerbread) devices. Get the latest Adobe Air for Android by clicking here Adobe Flash Changes: * Flash Player 10.3.185.21 – Important bug fixes and security enhancements Latest Adobe Flash 10.3 by clicking here From the look of things, and after checking adobe.com for the release notes this is just a simple bug fix update, as well as a few security enhancements. Nothing has changed in the release notes and it still mentions OMAP 4 support and things for Android 3.1 either way go ahead and get the updates, they should be available on the Android Market any minute now. )
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| Amazon Appstore Free App of the Day: The Impossible Game [Mini Review] Posted: 18 May 2011 02:58 PM PDT Ahh the Amazon Appstore Free App of the Day! If nothing else you’ll always be there for me to look forward to each day. Of course today’s free app has given me more than my fair share of pain… The Impossible Game is an app which is remarkably true to its name, and very addictive in a sort of masochistic way.
The game is simple, as most games which claim to be this hard are. You control a square. Touch the screen, the square jumps. Your little boxy friend scrolls along the level with you trying to make sure he doesn’t run into, or land on any spikes, or the black sections of the “ground.” Somewhere around “attempt 13,” (the game is kind enough to keep count) it started to sink in I was still on level 1.
The key here is that the game managed to destroy me over and over without making me get so angry I’d uninstall it. This is no small feat. The game keeps you engaged and on your toes enough to stay fun so long as you don’t take your failure too personally. Now, I wasn’t able to confirm there is more than one level (not for lack of trying), but assuming there is this game will be a great way to burn some time, especially for those of you who want a break from Angry Birds. Remember its free just for today, so if you don’t have the Amazon Appstore yet, check out our Android Community 101, then head on over there and grab it. Once you do, help the game humiliate me some more and post how many attempts it takes you to get to level 2.
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| LG Optimus 3D Out in the Wild, on eBay Posted: 18 May 2011 02:40 PM PDT It looks like more Google I/O gear is making its way on to eBay. I would keep the cool things like that for myself, but that is just me. From what we are hearing, and seeing there is now multiple LG Optimus 3D phones showing up on Ebay and they are listed as “dev” phones. Listed as new in box, and never used. From what we understand LG gave a few of these out to developers from Google I/O at a LG side event, and some are deciding to sell them rather than keep them… or develop for the device.
We reached out to our contact at LG and were informed that it was an Analysts only event and should there be any media there, they were sure lucky. Especially lucky if they’re getting prices like these for a phone that’ll certainly be out quite soon for a lot less cash. One is listed and currently the bidding sits around $535, but the rest are over $700. Still a decent price for the hardware and technology you are getting early. Or for those that don’t like the bidding and waiting game one is listed Buy It Now for the low low price of $900. That is one expensive smartphone, I hope it will make my coffee. For those that might not know a lot about the Optimus 3D we have a hands-on here as well as full specs at that same link. It boasts a dual-core TI OMAP 4 processor, not a Tegra 2 and it will be sporting a 4.3″ glasses free 3D display, as well as the same powerful PowerVR SGX540 GPU in all those Galaxy S phones, as well as those other exciting features like dual 5MP cameras on back to record 3D, as well as HDMI out. Basically it is a beastly workhorse of a phone. Obviously buying something like this from Ebay will have its risks, I’d use some caution and email the seller with any questions. A few are reporting the phone as quad-band and working on AT&T as well as T-Mobile so that is interesting to read, but I’d take that with a grain of salt. Here is a link to all the listing currently up, click here. )
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| Motorola Droid X2 in Costco stores before Verizon [update] Posted: 18 May 2011 02:25 PM PDT It looks like Costco is getting in on some Droid X2 action also. I am sure you all know plenty about the Droid X, and its bigger brother the X2 coming this week with an improved higher resolution display and blazing fast dual-core CPU to speed things along. We recently posted about it officially heading to Verizon online and stores starting tomorrow and the 26th in store. Costco might beat them to in-store access.
According to the Verizon announcement the Droid X will be available for purchase on Verizon starting tomorrow May 19th, and then in-store on the 26th, but after seeing the photo above Costco has it listed as “launching in kiosks starting as early as May 20th”. I doubt Verizon would let Costco sell them physically in store, before Verizon stores themselves so maybe that is why it mentions “as early as” May 20th, and not actually for sure on Friday. Either way the Droid X2 will be making it into buyers hands starting early next week, or some lucky buyers online tomorrow might get it Friday if they do overnight shipping. For now we only have the screenshot above to go on, so it is possible they will be “in stores” at Costco starting Friday May 20th but I have a feeling they wont be physically there until the 26th just like at the Verizon stores. Stay tuned as we will update this story once we hear more. Update: It looks like new information just dropped again, and according to AndroidCentral the Droid X2 has been ready to sell for more than a week now, and most stores probably already have stock. The last information we just received shows an email stating sales “can start” starting Thursday at retail locations. So if your not busy tomorrow, or really want the Droid X2 feel free to check with some Verizon retail stores and hope you get lucky.
[via AndroidCentral] )
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| Updated PayPal App with Mobile Check Cashing Hands On Posted: 18 May 2011 02:06 PM PDT Today PayPal brought a major update to their Android app, which brought, among other things, the ability to cash checks by taking a picture of them. This has been a killer feature for their iPhone App now since October, and starting today you can use your phone to add checks directly to your PayPal account, or transfer it to your savings account, skipping a trip to the bank!
The PayPal app, has let handle simple transfers between your PayPal and bank accounts for some time now, but the latest update has put a big focus on getting users the features they have been asking for. First and foremost among these is PayPal’s mobile checking that iOS users have been enjoying for some time now. The process is fairly straightforward, allowing you to take a picture of your endorsed check, which is put in your PayPal account with the ability to transfer the cash to your bank baked right into the app. The app has plenty of other cool stuff built in for you to do with your newly deposited check. There are options to donate straight from your PayPal account, or bump two phones together to exchange contact information or money. Another feature we loved was the “split the bill option.” You can put in a total, tip percentage, and the number of people to split the bill between. The app then lets you adjust the fraction of the bill each person is paying, and put in their email or phone number to send requests to their account for a cash transfer back to you while you cover the bill. Waiters and waitresses everywhere just lept for joy.
The other big feature included with the update is the ability to store the app on your SD card for any device running Android 2.2 or later. While a lot of people may take the concept of using your SD for extra app space for granted, it has personally saved me from having to delete apps more than once. Reading over comments in the Android Market though, it sounds like people updating their already installed version of the app have had trouble with this feature, but simply uninstalling the old version before installing the new one seems to be the fix to that problem. So go get the app and cash checks to your heart’s desire! Just don’t endorse your checks with people taking pictures on their cell phone over your shoulder…        )
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| Interviewing a DROID Charge Hunter from Start to Delivery Posted: 18 May 2011 01:29 PM PDT As you may know, if you’ve been following Verizon’s DROID hub on twitter, on their DROID DOES site, or on basically every Android-centric blog on these internets, Verizon is running a contest where people are winning DROID Charge units. They’ve been running this contest for a few weeks now, straight through the days when we didn’t know if the phone was dead before being released all the way to now, when you’re able to run right in to a Target or a Verizon store and pick one up. We’ve got San Diego winner David Baldwin on the line here with all the juicy details of those uncertain days. How did he survive such terror of not knowing? We shall see.
The following interview took place between yours truly and the real David Baldwin, finder of the San Diego Anomaly winning him his very own DROID Charge unit via Verizon. Have a peek at the video showing him and a few other people running around like mad, then head down to the full talk. This interview takes place over the course of several days, so be sure to note the date changes over each section. The interview began on May 9th, 2011: Chris Burns: Hi David, this is Chris Burns from Android Community. Which city did you win the contest in? CB: It looks like in the video you’re handed a Droid Charge box – was it a dummy box? Have they not let you know when you’re going to receive a fully functional model? CB: What’s your past regarding DROID and Verizon? Have you been staying “brand-loyal” to DROID or Verizon Wireless as a carrier? How about Android?
CB: Have you hear anything additional about the Charge at this point? CB: Are you referring to tracking down the original flyer or tracking down Verizon more recently? CB: How far back did you get in touch with Verizon? CB: Did you get it? Thusly the saga did end, and David and his wife lived happily ever after with their load of DROID devices they kept with them at their bedside. Will they continue to be in love with the big D after they take the Charge for a ride for a few weeks? Only time will tell. And you, the other proud owners of this lovely device – what are your thoughts on the device thus far? Loving it? )
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| AT&T Upload speeds and caps, who is to blame? Posted: 18 May 2011 01:25 PM PDT AT&T has been in an ongoing battle with users and blogs over the upload speeds on recent android phones. Who do we blame for it AT&T, Speedtest.net, or Both? You might remember all the talk the Atrix 4G got when it launched as a 4G phone, then users all learned 4G upload speeds were currently disabled. AT&T even responded to the complaints. We have done a little digging and have some interesting results regarding AT&T, and Speedtest.net for you all to enjoy below.
Above you can see an image of the Infuse 4G from AT&T both running some speedtests only a few minutes apart. On the left you have XtremeLabs Speedtest and Speedtest.net on the right. Are you seeing that right, or are we crazy. Speedtest.net must really hate AT&T because we have ran these tests time and time again and things are always faster with XtremeLabs. Oh and the Infuse 4G recently got a OTA update to fix the upload speeds, the fix gave about a 15kb increase and that is basically not even worth the news. See our hands-on here. So what is going on, that update didn’t seem to help anything, and neither does speedtest.net and the inaccurate results or whatever you want to call them. We have tested this on more than one AT&T device, and they all seem to perform pretty poorly not only on upload speeds in general, but in speedtest.net as well. Next I have some screenshots of the Samsung Galaxy S II unlocked and running on AT&T, I mentioned we tested on more than one device. It also gets just outright terrible results on speedtest.net
Above you see the results of the Galaxy S II speedtest.net results running on AT&T also, and clearly those results are sloooow. The Galaxy S II is much, much faster than that on any network, but again it gets extremely slow upload speeds. I thought AT&T had addressed the upload speeds issue, but apparently not. It looks like they are still trying to steer around the fact that they are not allowing people much, and are severely still capping upload speeds. The Infuse, and Atrix updated barely made a difference for users. Why do I say that AT&T is still severely capping upload speeds, because we have some proof. I mentioned we had an unlocked Galaxy S II running on AT&T right. Well it is not tied down with AT&T’s software and OTA updates that seem to be limiting those on AT&T. It gets blazing fast download, and upload speeds as long as we don’t use speedtest.net. Our next screenshot is the Galaxy S II unlocked on AT&T using XtremeLabs for our download/upload testing, and what do we get– 4100 kb/s download and 2500 kb/s upload.
You can clearly see the difference, not only are scores extremely low on speedtest.net, but even when compared to the Infuse 4G with XtremeLabs the Galaxy S II is just blazing, and i mean blaaazing fast. Obviously speedtest.net is either highly inaccurate, or they hate AT&T because I don’t get hugely different numbers like that on my T-Mobile devices. So who is to blame? This must mean that it is AT&T. Two phones both from Samsung running on AT&T 4G. The Infuse 4G gets dead slow speeds most likely because AT&T is still capping data way more than we would expect them to, especially upload speeds. Do you see those upload results from the Galasy S II? It got around 2500 kb/s consistently. That sure beats 246 kb/s and maybe 350 kb/s (if your lucky) that the Infuse and Atrix seem to be getting. I don’t want to rip on AT&T to much, or speedtest.net for that matter, but what is up with the huge differences. Clearly the Galaxy S II being unlocked is not being capped by AT&T and because of it being free of their caps it is able to pull in some fairly solid numbers. Basically what we are getting at is blame AT&T. They are still capping data in huge numbers. Obviously all carriers have caps to even the network load and things of that sort, but this just looks ridiculous to me. AT&T needs to address this fully, and soon. )
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| OmniVision Launches Out to Get Rid of Camera Humps With 5 mm Camera Posted: 18 May 2011 12:31 PM PDT Phones and tablets are getting so thin these days we’ve seen several phones that have needed dedicated camera humps in their design, such as the Droid X, or the G2x. Someone over in OmniVision, a digital imaging company based in California, must not be a fan of that extra width. Today they’ve announced a brand new camera that is cutting the height of the current leader by 20%
The new camera, dubbed the OV5690, is 5 MP and comes with all the shiny bells and whistles you’d expect out of a standard phone camera, including support for 1080p recording and digital zoom. At 5mm, (or less than 0.2″ for the less metrically inclined) this camera is just over half the height of the ultra thin phones coming out like the Samsung Galaxy S II. When you consider that this is a decrease of just over a millimeter it may not sound like much, but when OEMs are boasting over FRACTIONS of millimeters this could be big news in the race to see who can get me a phone that will fit in my wallet first. Press release follows: )
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| Angry Birds RIO Update on Android Market by Friday Posted: 18 May 2011 12:13 PM PDT The cards are tossed, Rovio’s released their newest update for their RIO expansion of the Angry Birds franchise, and customers only willing to use the Android Marketplace are digging their fingernails into their kneecaps waiting for it to be out for them. Turns out they’ll only be waiting a couple more days is Rovio ain’t lyin – at the end of Friday at the latest. Meanwhile everyone else in the world on both Android and iOS are enjoying the fruits of their beaches.
Have a look over at our Angry Birds RIO Beach Volley full spoiler if you’d like to spoil it for yourself early. If you’d like to download the game right this moment, head to your local Amazon Appstore, where they’ve had the game for several days. If you’d like more information on how to set up the Amazon Appstore for yourself or if you’d just like more information on what it is, head over to Android Community 101: Amazon Appstore. We’ve got learning for ya! Then I’ve got a question for all of you: are you one of those people refusing to use the Amazon Appstore to get Angry Birds updates? Are you protesting, or are you just lazy? Or are you in-between: not caring too much about when you get the updates to Angry Birds, just that you do? [via Twitter] )
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Fujitsu has been peddling some tablet style computer for a long time before the iPad hit the market. Many of those machines were convertible notebooks more than the true tablets of today though. My kids’ doctor office used Fujitsu tablet style machines for taking notes in the office for years now. Fujitsu has some tablets that it has been offering for the consumer market like the 10.1-inch screen TH40/D that it showed off not long ago, but that machine didn’t run the Android OS.
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