Tag: Android Oreo

The November Android Distribution Report has been released by the Android team at Google and it reflect improvement in adoption of the latest two major versions of the platform.  Only Android Nougat (7.x) and Android Oreo (8.x) showed gains in this months reports, with all previous versions showing declines.

For those who may be new to Android, each month Google releases an Android Distribution Report that reflects the versions of Android that hit the Play Store over the course of a 7-day period.  This month’s report was for the seven days ending November 9, 2017.

The biggest loser in this month’s report was Marshmallow (6.x).  It saw a 1.1% drop in usage, down to 30.9% over the October report.  Marshmallow remains the most widely used version of Android at that 30.9% with Android Lollipop (5.x) a close second at 27.2%.  Lollipop, like Marshmallow, saw a drop but only by .5%.

Today, HTC has announced the new HTC U11 Life, their mid-range Android phone that is also part of the Android One program (outside of the US).  The phone is a well appointed device for its $349 price tag and you can order it now on the HTC site.

The U11 Life is a 5.2″ Super LCD display device that renders 1920 x 1080 to give you a very comfortable ~424ppi.  That display is also protected by Gorilla Glass 3.  It comes with 3GB of RAM and 64GB of storage with up to a 2TB thanks to the MicroSD slot.  All of this is powered by the Snapdragon 630 octa-core SoC.  Quick Charge 3.0 is supported via the USB-C charging port and the battery is a 2600mAh model.

Nokia has opened up a beta program for Nokia 8 owners to give the upcoming Android Oreo build a test drive.  The news came via Twitter from HMD Global’s Juho Sarvikas.  Mr. Sarvikas is the company’s Chief Product Officer.

Announcing Nokia phones beta labs! Be the first to test #AndroidOreo on #Nokia8 (physical Oreos not included!) https://t.co/91uhqstnnm pic.twitter.com/GNiNrK31B0

— Juho Sarvikas (@sarvikas) October 25, 2017

As a general rule, once these types of major updates hit the public beta realm, they are pretty well baked. But, the keyword here is “beta”.  There are likely still bugs to be found and other issues so if you are not comfortable with that, don’t download the update.  For those that do and find it unstable to the point of needing to revert back to Nougat 7.1.1, Nokia has confirmed that you will be able to do it.

Full details on how to join the beta can be found on the Nokia Beta Labs site.

It looks like owners of the latest Samsung Galaxy devices have a bit of a wait before they see the Android Oreo update.  The company’s Turkish site has posted that the testing of the new Oreo build has begun and that it will begin rolling out next year.

Our work on our pilot model for Android 8.0 (Oreo) has begun. We aim to present the new operating system to you at the beginning of the new year.

The problem, of course, is when exactly it will be in the new year but this all-but confirms that the update won’t hit in 2017.  Samsung has been very quiet about a timeline on when the update will roll out and this is the only confirmation that has been seen to this point.

If it is indeed 2018 before the Galaxy S8 phones and the Note8 see Oreo, it will once again make Samsung one of the last of the major OEMs to get the update out to their current devices.  Huawei, OnePlus, LG, Sony, HTC and Moto have all confirmed that at least some of their devices will get the update prior to the end of the year.

As planned, Huawei has announced the new Mate 10 lineup of phones.  There are three variants of the phone, including an updated ultra-high end Porsche design model.  Designed with AI built into the phones, the Mate 10 offers excellent performance and camera quality, building on last year’s Mate 9 line up.

The first phone in the lineup, the Mate 10, is a 5.9″ Quad HD LCD display with a 16:9 ratio.  It has 4GB of RAM, 64GB of storage and can be expanded up to an additional 256GB thanks to the MicroSD slot.

The Pro and Porsche Design models are fundamentally the same phone.  They have 6″ Full HD+ OLED displays that render at a 18:9 ratio.  The Pro model has either 4 or 6GB of RAM and either 64GB or 128GB of storage.  The Porsche Design has 6GB of RAM and 256GB of storage.  Both of these models do not have a MicroSD slot so the storage you buy is the storage you have on the phone.  Also, these two models do not have a 3.5mm headphone jack.  All three models are essentially bevel-less.

Google has officially announced the 2nd generation of Pixel phones, the Google Pixel 2 and Pixel 2 XL.  The two phones are updates to last year’s first Pixel lineup and bring a handful of tweaks and improvements to the devices.

One of the most noticeable change is the updated Pixel launcher for the devices.  It has been heavily redesigned with the search bar at the bottom of the display and a more personalized top widget with weather and calendar information.

As for the devices themselves, there wasn’t much of a mystery on either given the leaks about both devices over the course of the past few weeks.  The HTC-built Google Pixel 2  will come in three colors:  Kinda Blue, Just Black and Clearly White.  The first color is very similar to the Ice Blue that was on the Nexus 5X  while the Just Black and Clearly White are similar to the color options on the Pixel today.

The phone is powered by the Snapdragon 835 SoC and is coupled with 4GB of RAM.  It has a 5″ display