Not that there's really any doubt that a car dock (and desktop dock) is on the way for the Google Nexus One -- after all, we've see it at the FCC -- but it has its on support page. We're still waiting to see exactly what the dock will look like, and exactly what functions it will have. But the Google support page for the dock offers a little hint:

"The first time you insert the phone in a car dock, a dialog asks whether you want to use the dock as a speakerphone and whether you want to play music and other audio on the dock's speaker. Your setting applies only to the dock you are using-you can have different settings for different docks. You can also change your dock audio setting any time the phone is inserted in that dock, as described in Sound & display settings."

That's it. Still no word on when it will be available, or for how much. [via Slashgear]

Latest rumored AT&T launch date for the the Motorola Backflip: March 7, for $324. That comes from an unidentified source talking to Phandroid. Why March 7? Why not. And if the price point is correct, that could bring the Backflip down to about $100-$150 after contract subsidy, which lines up with the supposed target market, which is the younger crowd.

That said, this is all very unofficial and very likely to change. Stay tuned. (And in the meantime, check out our hands-on with the Backflip.)

Yes! In an interview, Motorola CEO Sanjay Jha just said they're planning to bring multitouch to a majority of their upcoming devices. To quote:

I think you will see us deliver multitouch in the majority of our devices going forward. There’s a complex set of factors, not all of them technical. But I think you’ll see us being proactive on multitouch because the user feedback on multitouch is very good.

He's absolutely right. Most Android users want multitouch and those who don't certainly wouldn't mind having it as an option. We applaud Motorola for actually listening to their user base. There's no lame "I don't like two handed operations" comment here.

If you have the time, the whole interview is worth a read. Sanjay Jha discusses Google's new strategy, the Nexus One, Motoblur, Droid, and Tablets. He goes into detail on why he attended the Nexus One event and why he thinks Google will only sell Google Experience devices in their new phone shop. His takes are generally well thought out and as close to honest as you'll get from a CEO-type. 

[laptop]

We can't confirm this report but there's some word floating around that the European HTC Hero will receive the update to Android 2.1 in February. The timeframe we got was February 15-17 but obviously since no official word has come down, we can't be positive. The site with the news, android.com.pl details the changes:

• Android 2.1 is much faster
• One interesting option is a preview of desktops, you can zoom out two
  Finders as pages in your browser. Effect. Effectively reduce the deskop,
  brillant view.
• Icons have clear coat
• At the bottom of the menu we have: phone, menu, contacts
• HTC added a nice transition when you quit the application and move around
  the options.
• Lock screen is not rounded.
• Faster-running HTC keyboard.
• New widgets from HTC.
• Improved flashplayer. Operates smoothly.
• Graphic change in the gallery and video player
• We have more RAM. About 130-140mb after killing the process.

Of course things get lost in translation (they are Polish) but if this is at all true, we bet you Hero users are super excited. With all the Android attention having gone to the Droid and the Nexus One recently, it'll be good to be back in the spotlight. Now if only that US HTC Hero can get some 2.1 update love..

One of the coolest features of Android 2.1 (and the Nexus One) has to be the new voice input feature--it uses an awesome, always-learning speech-to-text engine that displays whatever you say on any text input screen. All via voice. You just tap the microphone button and say what you want, it'll process and then display those words on the screen. Really amazing stuff that works pretty darn well.

But one slight problem? That microphone button used to launch voice input is frustratingly small, it's just too hard to find and press. Luckily, if you just simply swipe your finger across the entire keyboard, you'll bring up the voice input and it'll work like usual. Swipe across the keyboard, say what you say, works like magic. Voila.

Note: this only works in Android 2.1

Hit the jump to see a video of it in action! Starts around the 25 second mark.

[lifehacker] 

Seth Weintraub at Computer World asks a good question: If Google really leaves China because of Internet search filtering, what will that mean for the future Android? There are billions of eyeballs at stake in China, and Motorola already has a strong presence there and has more Android phones on the way. HTC (not counting the Nexus One and G1, the two Google-branded HTC phones) and Samsung? Them, too.

It's a little early to sound the alarm. But it's easy for us to forget that Android is more than just a U.S. product. And to be successful, it has to be a worldwide competitor. But if finds itself out of one of the world's most populus nations, that's going to be much more challenging.

The Google Nexus One is all of one week old now, but that's not stoping the sales estimates and now total market worth from rolling in. Above is a breakdown from Trefis, by way of TechCrunch, which has rolled the Nexus One into its financial forecast for GOOG.

The bottom line: Trefis predicts the Nexus One will make up almost $20 billion, or 9.3 percent, of GOOG's total market cap. By comparison, ad and searach partnerships make up 5.1 percent, Google Apps 3.2 percent, YouTube 2.4 percent and search ads 68.1 percent.

There's an awful lot of math going on here, ans well as an awful lot of assumptions. Probably the biggest is the impact that the Nexus One will have on Google in 2016. It's a spectacular phone. But what was the last smartphone product line you remember lasting six years?

And by now you're probably thinking to yourself, "The Nexus One? With its network problems and lackluster sales?" Remember that this prediction looks into the future, not at the past week. Once the Nexus One hits other markets worldwide (and on Verizon, for starters, in the U.S.), then it's game-on.

Let's face it: The most advanced Android device on the market deserves the best storage option available. (OK, every phone deserves that, too.) Enter Samsung's 32-gigabyte microSD card, twice as big (storage-wise) as the current big boys.

Samsung expects mass production to begin next month. No word on what that much storage is going to cost us. [via]

And there you have it: The Vodafone version of Google's Nexus One in Germany looks like it will cost about 150 Euros along with a two-year contract. No word on whether it will come with the 3G issues of its American counterpart. [AllAboutPhones via Unwired View]

We're still waiting on a fix for the problem the Nexus One is having staying connected to 3G (and we don't really care who fixes it -- Google, HTC, T-Mobile or whomever). In the meantime, there's a workaround that will force your phone to only connect with 3G.

So join us after the break if that's the sort of thing you're looking for. (With a big tip of the hat to XDA Developers)