Author: Sean Riley

According to Engadget’s sources the inside dope from inside Sprint HQ is that they are homing in on June 13th as the release date for the Evo 4G. They are quick to point out that this isn’t 100% confirmed with June 6th apparently being bandied about as a less favored option, but it is encouraging that June 13th is the latest date under discussion.

It seemed unlikely that Sprint would let the release of their new flagship device slip behind Apple’s new iPhone, but it is gratifying to have internal chatter confirm that they are going to get this out on the early side of their previously stated summer window.

Sadly the pricing of the almighty Evo 4G remains a mystery; however, the same source revealed the 4G hotspot access would be just an additional $10-20 with no price bump to the standard “Simply Everything” plans for using 4G on the phone itself.

So with the last real unknown being the price, what’s everyone’s guess as to what the Evo 4G will set you back come the 13th?

Related Posts

• Watch the Sprint EVO 4G demonstration
• Official HTC EVO 4G first look video
• Sprint HTC EVO 4G: Hands on wrap up
• 7 reasons to choose the Sprint HTC EVO 4G over the Nexus One
• Watch Sprint’s HTC EVO 4G announcement

Hot on the heels of the news that Android 2.1 is undergoing internal testing on the original Samsung Moment comes a not so steady snapshot of the Samsung Moment 2 for Sprint with a fresh coat of Android 2.1 on it.

This device certainly has a lot of the original Moment in it, but it has picked up a search key to go along with the menu, back, and home keys (interesting that Samsung is adding keys on some while dropping them on others). The only other change apparent in the photo is some slight tweaking of the keyboard layout.

Details are light on the specs, but what is being reported so far is:

• Android 2.1 (Yay!)
• Touchwiz 3.0 (Meh)
• Full Qwerty (Yay!)
• No Super AMOLED (BOO!)

There are enough QWERTY fans out there that if this just slots in at the $99 price point held by the original Moment it could certainly sell well for those that don’t want to pony up for whatever the Evo is going to run when it releases this Summer.

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You saw it announced,  you saw it handled, and you saw it demonstrated, but until now you haven’t seen it floating and rotating in blank white space with some quasi-techno music bumping in the background.

It’s just a quick 90 second video extolling the virtues of the device, but at the moment I can’t get enough of the EVO 4G and I’m guessing many of you feel the same way.

HTC definitely needs a little work on their marketing as they highlight some of the ridiculous specs that the EVO 4G is packing, but they gloss over some standout features. For example: they tout the 8 megapixel camera without adding that it takes 720p video; they hold on a shot of the front facing camera, but don’t actually draw attention to what it is; they mention its ability to function as a personal mobile hotspot, but only show 2 laptops when it is capable of providing coverage for 8; they even forget to mention the 4.3″ screen.

Sprint has a remarkable device on their hands here and they really need to hit this one out of the park to get off of death watch. Considering they don’t have the best track record with their device specific advertising I thought we could give them a little help on how to pitch the EVO 4G to customers.

Personally I think a two-pronged attack could work well with one ad being a more polished version of this first look video by HTC with a more complete listing of the specs and a second styled after the Nexus One: Day One video. Among other things the day in the life ad really needs to convey the size of the screen which can’t come through in a device only ad and it also needs to show the user pocketing the device to alleviate any concerns that a device with a screen that big can’t be portable.

So if you could speak directly to Sprint’s marketing department what advice would you give them for the EVO 4G?

Related Posts

• Watch the Sprint EVO 4G demonstration
• 7 reasons to choose the Sprint HTC EVO 4G over the Nexus One
• Sprint HTC EVO 4G: Hands on wrap up
• Watch Sprint’s HTC EVO 4G announcement
• Introducing the Sprint HTC EVO 4G

In the interest of helping out those being hampered by AT&T’s current non-Market app lockout here are instructions, courtesy of XDA developers forums, on how to get around the problem. This solution could be of considerable interest if AT&T really sticks to their current path as they release more compelling Android devices down the line.

1. Download the USB drivers from Motorola; there is a separate version depending on whether you are running Windows 32bit or 64bit.
2. Now you are going to need to download the Android SDK from Google. The most recent version can always be found here.
3. Now extract the SDK to a folder, name it Android,  FUAT&T, Guadalajara, or whatever.
4. On your phone go to Settings -> Applications -> Development and check the box to enable USB debugging.
5. Now take the .apk file (that’s the extension for apps) that you want to install and place it in the “tools” folder within the Android SDK folder you created.
6. Time to bust out the old command prompt (or terminal). You will need to navigate to the “tools” folder and type in “adb install application.apk“ (without quotes and replacing application with the actual name of the app).
7. Congratulations on all your success!

Keep in mind this won’t let you install apps that aren’t supported by Android 1.5. If you have any difficulties you might want to check out the XDA forums link at the beginning of the post as there are several pages there of individuals posting their experiences with the workaround.

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