Two new Android Gingerbread smart phones from Sony Ericsson have been furtively snapped and leaked onto the Web — the ST18i, code-named ‘Asuza’, and the CK15i. Both bear Xperia branding. The touchscreen Asuza is thought to be similar to the Xperia Mini, while the CK15i has a physical Qwerty keyboard and is more akin to the Xperia …

Android is the top mobile platform in North America, according to mobile ad network InMobi, but the iPhone’s iOS is close behind thanks to a recent surge. InMobi’s Mobile Insights Report for April found that Google’s Android remained in the lead among mobile platforms in North America with 37 percent of all ad impressions on its network, a slight increase …

While Pantech has a relatively modest presence in the U.S., it has a number of impressive handsets in Korea. One such offering is the Vega Racer, which claims to be the world’s first 1.5GHz dual-core smartphone. That’s certainly a lot of power in a tiny device–it uses Qualcomm’s MSM8660 Snapdragon chip, 1GB of RAM, and an Adreno 220 GPU. It’s …

Sprint Nextel may be considering a hosting deal that could help it and its close partner Clearwire deploy a 4G LTE network to compete with rivals Verizon Wireless and AT&T. Earlier this week, the blog Fierce Wireless reported that Sprint’s CEO Dan Hesse said at a JP Morgan conference in Boston that Sprint may consider striking hosting deals that would …

Screenshot by Joshua Goldman/CNET TuneWiki was already a favorite music player for Android, mainly for its timed, subtitled lyrics (available translated into more than 40 languages), displayed while keeping the album art on screen and not navigating away from the player controls. The application got a major update today, getting a new interface and enhanced social-networking and music-discovery features. The …

Android 3.1 as it appears on an unspecified Android tablet. Google When Google announced Android 3.1 Honeycomb was coming to the Xoom last week, I was pretty excited. Honeycomb’s already a great tablet OS, so any improvements could only add to its functionality and efficiency. Unfortunately the version 3.1 update was released over the air and was rolled out in …

We can stop with the leaks now, as Verizon Wireless officially introduced the Motorola Droid X2 today. The Droid X2 will be available online starting May 19 and in stores on May 26 for $199.99 with a two-year contract, replacing the aging Motorola Droid X. As the successor to the Droid X, the X2 ups the ante with a 4.3-inch, …

Android tablets could outsell Apple’s iPad in less than three years, says Nvidia CEO Jen-Hsun Huang, according to Reuters. Nvidia CEO Jen-Hsun Huang Nvidia Speaking at the Reuters Technology Summit in New York on Monday, the outspoken CEO noted that it took Android smartphones less than three years to outpace the iPhone. “The Android phone took only two and a …

Clearwire has signed a deal with wireless equipment supplier Ericsson to manage its 4G WiMax network in an effort to save on operating costs. Today, the company announced the new seven-year deal, which entails Ericsson managing Clearwire’s day-to-day network operations. As part of the deal, about 700 Clearwire employees will become Ericsson employees in the middle of 2011. Ericsson will …

Hot on the heels of its iOS counterpart, online backup service Mozy just released an app for Android. That’s a major perk for anyone already using the service to archive their data. Mozy, of course, is the quiet desktop tool that automatically copies your critical files to the cloud. I’ve been a user for years, and just this week I …

Google officially launched its Google Voice integration for Sprint on May 6, giving Sprint customers the option of getting Google Voice calling features on their Sprint phones with only minimal setup. Although my personal experience has so far been smooth, others have reported frustrations, including being thrown into account limbo after a Sprint customer service representative accidentally disabled a Google …

The cost of broadband globally has dropped around 50 percent in the past two years, according to data out this week by the International Telecommunications Union, but such access is still beyond the income of many around the world. As individuals may still be getting hit with high bills for broadband Internet, the ITU said that the overall drop was …

Nokia could be about to launch the Nokia N9 smart phone. An authentic-looking video has appeared online, courtesy of Pocket Now, which shows a phone very similar to that we speculated over last week. The sleek, shimmery video doesn’t do anything useful like give the phone a name, except to say it’s part of the N series, so it could …

Earlier this week I broke down some of the elements it takes to create an outstanding cell phone screen. Coincidentally, this week is also SID 2011, a conference in LA devoted entirely to display technology. Toshiba’s LCD panel pictured above is one gem on exhibit. It boasts a 720×1,280-pixel HD resolution on its 4-inch screen, which gives it a pixel …

A recent smart phone user-experience study suggests Android narrowly edges out the iPhone for the usability of their apps, though it’s a close call. The analysis was conducted by Jacob Creech from IntuitionHQ.com, who works with usability testing and experience design, after he read some disparaging comments about Android. Though he has more experience with Apple iOS devices, he set about …