Gadgetory

hey what is going on everybody welcome to another good to go from Oakland California I'm Noah Kravitz editor-at-large for TechnoBuffalo calm and I'm James Kendrick from ZDNet mobile news James Hardie it today what's going on I'm good it's Thursday Thursday's are the good day before friday exactly exactly well let's just dive into it since we seem to have a time problem there's too much to talk about trying to keep the sting to it you know to a reasonable length each week we were we were talking about talking about HTC and then you were talking about how you just got an HTC device so i don't know let's talk about HTC HTC in the middle you see ya apparently they're big apparently they're popular they're making money yeah that is just came out just yesterday that their market cap is bigger than nokia and that i mean those of us who cover this is this industry know that that is just absolutely huge and that surprised everybody yeah yeah i mean we all new HTC is big and they're growing and they're the number one android phone maker and and they've grown phenomenally in the last five years but that is you chubby adam or cap is now bigger than ben ramen blackberry and Nokia I mean they're they're they're big and you know what's really impressive to me about it is that they've done it all without their own platform right brain they did it right they they they got a strategy of giving that sense in her face you know that's very distinctive looking yep we all know an HTC phone when we see it right and that's all they wanted they wanted to create their own brand and wow they good ya know they've really they've done a mean I've been a fan of theirs you know for a while and I think what they're doing i don't know how much a part of it it plays but i think what they're doing with their marketing as well you know running their own marketing campaigns with their whole theme you know you campaign and TV and web and print bus stop ads and whatever it's getting the name out there and and I'm not you know on the one hand i'm not i'm not a marketing analyst kind of guys so i don't know how much of an impact that has i don't know if people walk into the store and say i want to see an HTC phone because i saw the ad on TV on the other hand they're doing something right because you know they're they're like you said that the market cap news just kind of stunning but also well I want to say not surprising but it is still surprising that that they're you know they I mean bigger than nokia whatever whatever issues no key is having you know currently I mean they're a giant so so that that is huge and you know I think I think you hit it on the head that Android has probably done for them you know Android sort of fueled Motorola's come back and in some ways and you can say Android kind of breed second life into sony ericsson and androids done a lot for a lot of lot of carriers but for HTC HTC wasn't struggling but they really like you said with sense you know it's an HTC phone they were working on since before this but you know with Android it really just they were able to really kind of execute what seemed like the vision they kind of had for it all along now we're going to see when the flyer ships or near the evo view is Prince going to call it will see you android on a tablet and yeah you know it's a interface with the same since interface right right exactly they're brilliant their their their plan is worked really well and I knew that Brandon was working when about I don't know a couple months ago my teenage son you know who normally doesn't care about any of this stuff I mean he just wants to text on his phone and that's it right and but I'm always getting phones in for review you know there for every day it seems like and delivery came and I am packed if I was just starting to play with it he said all the sudden HTC phone huh and that's when I knew when the radiators say I nah I'm I'm familiar with HTC right right I mean that's a big deal because all android phones i think this is one of the problems that that a lot of people have with it i mean even though samsung's big in android probably almost as big as HTC and motorola as you mentioned i mean they're all the out there but nothing is that distinctive when you see one of their phones right now right you go I said angel it just kind of looks like back a lot of people think that stopped pretty stocked Android is ugly you know just like right and and and whether you do or not you know I I think that's a it's a really good point that that people who are really in the know people who really follow this stuff can tell a samsung android phone from an LG or from a motorola but a lot of people can't and especially since Motorola's backed off of their whole their whole blur system uber yes cuz it was big blur you know there's sort of more you more and more commodified now it's a it's a thin lightweight phone running android and you know to the to the consumer going into the verizon store or the AT&T store or whatever at the AT&T probably puts it the t-mobile store would have you you know they kind of look the same but an HTC phones an HTC phone and people get that similarly you know i have a family member who just got their first smartphone and wound up going with the droid incredible which at this point is not a new phone anymore but they wanted to be on verizon it was free on contract you know free with an upgrade because it's been out for a while it says it price always good price and in a lot of ways it's sort of i mean this was the phone back before verizon had an iphone when people would say to me i really want an iphone but I'm on Verizon what should i do and i would say either wait or getting edible because you know to me that was the one that offered that sort of similar blend of style features camera web browser and for my money was the most kind of consumer friendly android phone out there because of sense so yeah there's definitely something to that it'll be interesting to see you know there's news earlier this week that Motorola is working on a platform of their own you know that that's kind of come and gone with HTC a little bit talk about that I don't necessarily see it happening but I'll interesting to see what happens with that HTC this you know supporting win phone seven but is that really going to go anywhere or is it really just going to be about making Android their own as they've been doing and just building on that success well I think the way that they position themselves that one of the reasons it's so brilliant is that it doesn't matter because there they are going to come out of windows phone 7 the same way as they did windows mobile that they're doing with Android make the interface distinct it no matter what and then it doesn't matter if the platform I mean they they can't abandon a platform today right and it doesn't really affect them as far as their branding right right it's great they've done it just brilliant the other way the way they've done it it and that hit me home when you were told my the HTC incredible with your family member because we are very familiar with what's the latest version of Android or the OS or this or that the people on the street weeks we've we've noted in past shows don't they don't really care right but the HTC incredible interface with that sense you know definite look yeah to it yep looks just like the new ones so they don't care race is a new phone right yep you know but it's it's it's a great strategy that yeah it really is and another thing about them just kind of turned into the HTC lovefest episode here but they make a really good keyboard I have always loved their keyboards and this keyboard this is the this is the arrived the windows home 74 okay this keyboard isn't that much different than the touch pro 2 keyboard that came out a couple years ago and that phone was a huge phone but you know have this full five row qwerty board with the you know the offset spacing and just little things like the larger space bar and and you know shift and function latkes with lights and just those little touches that they've always you know they've always for my money paid attention to that sort of they make good cables for detail they make they make a keyboards and I just sent the HTC EVO shift back yesterday and that had a nice keyboard too i really like Ted keyboard yep yep there also you know that there I i was thinking back to we're talking about amazon recently and all the different things Amazon's have been doing you know HTC now is starting to build their own media offerings into things the the flyer you know is going to have the gaming service built in and I forget the name of the company they acquired a media company recently you know that I am I'll be interested to see if this shakes out and it may well not but you know there's definitely something of a trend towards and again Android is kind of leveled the playing field in some ways these devices now all have a certain level of spec and feature set that's more than enough for the mass consumer and so rather than looking at you know oh we got to get a decent camera on there or it finally has you know a full web browser that kind of thing everything has these has these features now so what else can you build in and you know a music store streaming video gaming services you know whatever other things they are and and it'll be interesting to see if Amazon you know if this really comes with a piece of Amazon hardware with these services built around at the sort of challenge Apple's model HTC might be in a position to do that sort of thing if it if it if it's the right move for the just based on a couple little moves they've made recently that I noticed when they were launching the flyer in particular well they're big enough and their global enough something I mean I think they're certainly feeling out things I mean who knows where this all going to go you you mentioned cameras a few minutes ago if I did have to slap them around a little bit right right they need some work in the area of cameras because I don't find that their cameras are quite as good as some of the competitors right right with that yeah that's hardware wise that's probably the only consistent complaint right what's the best what's the best camera phone out there for your money you know I have I seem to have the best luck with Samsung models I mean just in general but I'll say that there they just I don't know their autofocus is outstanding is I mean I cover even even the galaxy tab which actually that's where we first met out of the HP webos event right I covered that whole event in video using the galaxy tab camera oh that's right that's right I being it was incredible i mean fact the the HP e PR folks who you know who we're presenting all this stuff we're really watching this out of it alive you know their eyes breasts if you can well it must be better than we thought right good what she could do that doing it just with that yeah right anyway but wow where there's our time again all right the the we're approaching the shot buzzer and anything and anything of you know extra special importance going on on the blog right now well no this is the same most of review and stuff i'll be reviewing the a thunderbolt when it comes along i I just reviewed a a budget android tablet which is I'm fine that's pretty good the identity tab okay so Wi-Fi only for 29 I in right it's pretty full featured for that price again just typical business as usual I'm actually and this might speak to my still lingering Android burnout from last summer I'm actually really excited to get the the new samsung android phone for boost because it's it's smaller 3.2 inch screen i thing it has access to the android market 50 bucks a month unlimited voice and data and then they've got this thing where with boost if you pay your bill on time six months in a row i think it is your monthly fee gets knocked down five bucks that's pretty cool yeah so apparently it can go all the way down that I think it's $35 a month if you've paid your bill on time for 18 months in a row I guess it'll get knocked down that far but you know even 50 bucks a month unlimited for a full-on smartphone you know it's a lot cheaper than what a verizon or AT&T is asking to run you know an iphone or a top of the line android phone so i'm kind of excited for that just to see if I you know I don't know to see if somebody like me could see how good the network is yeah right it doesn't matter if there's not enough bandwidth for everybody but yeah also I iphone users on AT&T have been putting up with it for several years now and still ranking highly and all the surveys seriously alright James for for people who want to check out that that tablet review you mentioned and everything else you're up to what's the what's the URL for the blog it's zdnet com / blog / mobile dash news terrific and folks know technobuffalo com for whenever I get that boost phone we put a review up there and get some other mobile phone reviews that went up this past week so there you go James always a pleasure we will we'll have to think about doing it again next week yeah let's do alright till next time we'll see you later alright see