It may be on the slow track, but the Xoom LTE is set to receive Jelly Bean nearly a year after its ICS update

As it tends to do shortly before releasing an official update, Motorola is sending out "soak test" invitations to owners of the Verizon Xoom LTE for an impending Jelly Bean update. The soak test is usually the final line of testing with a slightly wider number of users before an update is pushed out for general availability. While it doesn't guarantee an immediate release to everyone, it's a pretty good sign. The soak test invite refers to "Jelly Bean" nondescriptly, but we have to assume this will just be a bump to Android 4.1 rather than 4.2. 

We're not going to shun an update of any kind though, as a jump to Jelly Bean brings a whole bunch of welcomed improvements. If you're part of the Motorola Feedback Network, be sure to check your email and see if you've received an invite as well. Otherwise, keep an eye out for the official update to be hitting devices sooner rather than later.

Thanks, Dave!

More: Motorola Xoom Forums

Comments are closed folks. Look for more spring cleaning soon!

Let's make a pretty big dent in the pile on my desk, shall we? The ASUS MeMO Pad might be far from our favorite 7-inch Android tablet out there, but that doesn't mean we don't want it to go to a good home. Despite what the box shows, we're giving away the same one we reviewed, in its "cherry pink" color. (Which really is more cherry than it is pink.)

To win this guy, just leave a comment on this post. We'll shut things down at midnight EDT tonight and pick a winner. (And, yes, we'll be announcing all the winners later this week.) Good luck, everybody!

AOL and Verizon bringing a new Internet portal to Verizon customers' phones and tablets this summer

America OnLine has announced that a new partnership with Verizon Wireless will allow them to bring the complete AOL.com portal to Android, Windows, and BlackBerry smart phones and tablets. They say they will be the "exclusive provider of the VZW Home mobile web portal." We're not exactly sure what that means, but they go on to say:

Beginning this summer, existing and new Verizon Wireless customers will have the AOL portal bookmarked on their smart phones and tablets’ web browsers. The multi-device experience will feature the recently refreshed AOL homepage -- with breaking news, weather and maps -- as well as live streaming events and popular videos. Personalization features will allow users to customize news sources, categories and other tools to their needs.

So it appears that a bookmark will be added to the device's default browser, leading users to an AOL page that provides curated news and events for Verizon subscribers. We're pretty sure you'll just be able to delete the bookmark should you feel the need, so we can't rail on them too hard. Look for your new portal to the Internet this summer.

At least it's not Bing.

Source: Business Wire

There's a fine line between a quality, low-cost tablet and an underpowered, low-resolution tablet that happens to run Android and also doesn't cost all that much money. And that line, we've discovered, is about $50.

It's not often that we pick up a new device -- and quickly want to put it down again. A phone or tablet might not be the cream of the crop, but we try to find some good in it. Some reason to buy. But with the top-of-the-line hardware hitting a bit of a plateau over the last year or so, and with prices continuing to drop, we've raised our minimums. There's less room for low end these days, plain and simple.

That brings us to the 7-inch ASUS MeMO Pad Android tablet.

New Halo notification system is ready for testing, Nexus 4 and Nexus 7 owners can download today

A couple of days ago we talked about the upcoming Paranoid Android ROM and its new Halo feature. Part chat heads, part awesome, and a rewrite of the Android framework make this one of the neatest tricks we've seen in a while from any third-party development team.

Starting today, those of you with a Nexus 4 or a Nexus 7 can give it a try, as the team has made some early testing builds available for download. Be warned, these are by no means finished, and will surely have a fair share of bugs. We know that's hardly going to stop a slew of people from giving this a try.

A build for the Oppo Find 5 is also in the works, and a Galaxy Nexus version is promised when there's time. If you are feeling a little adventurous, and not afraid to try something new, hit the source link for the details and download links. The video of Halo in action is after the break as a refresher.

Source: +Paranoid Android. Thanks, David!

Acer today in New York City announced the Iconia A1 tablet, a 7.9-inch endeavor it says is "targeted at modern-day explorers, adventurers, digital freaks and mobile executives requiring an all-day mobile companion." So, uh, yeah.

The Iconia A1 has an IPS display, but it's going a different route than most Android tablets, sporting a 4:3 aspect ratio. We'll have to see if that makes up for the 1024x768 resolution, which puts it (on paper at least) a little below the 7-inch, 1280x800 Nexus 7. It's also got a quad-core tablet of unknown origin running at 1.2 GHz, a 5MP rear camera, GPS, Bluetooth and the other bells and whistles you'd expect.

The Iconia A1 comes in 8- or 16-gigabyte flavors, with the latter running $169 and hitting stores in June.

Barnes and Noble team up with Google, will significantly increase the availability of apps for both Nook HD tablets

While the Barnes & Noble Nook HD and Nook HD+ each have access to the B&N online stores for books and apps, tonight CEO William Lynch has announced that with an update due to start rolling out today, the Google Play store will be added to the 7-inch and 9-inch tablets.

We saw coming off holiday the market moved to multifunction tablets. Consumer research showed us the breadth of applications available is really critical.

The update will be a standard automatic over-the-air affair, and will include plenty of other Google services as well. Confirmed are Chrome browser, Gmail, YouTube, Google Maps and Google Play Music. 

The tablets are moderately spec'd by today's standards, but are also moderately priced at $199 for the 7-inch Nook HD and $269 for the 9-inch Nook HD+. We're not sure that the addition of Google's apps and services will generate new sales, but they should be welcome additions for everyone who purchased one last year.

If you're using a Nook HD, be sure to share your experiences with everyone once you get the update!

Via: Huffington Post

There were more Android-based tablets shipped in Q1 2013 than all others combined, and here's why that matters

The Q1 2013 numbers from IDC, a technology and telecommunications research firm who keeps track of this sort of thing, show that Android tablets now lead the market with a 56.5-percent share. The 27,800,000 units shipped in the quarter is a 247-percent improvement from this time last year, when just 8,000,000 units were shipped. It's important to note that this increase doesn't come at the expense of Apple, who shipped 65.3-percent more tablets in Q1 2013 than they did in Q1 2012 -- it shows the market is growing, and the lions share of new purchases are Android.

These sorts of numbers make CEOs and people who count pennies pretty happy, and will be the fuel for fanboy wars across the Internet, but why are they important? I'll tell you why -- because the available selection of applications designed for Android tablets sucks.

Google keeps telling developers exactly how to build their app to take advantage of the real estate on a tablet, but because there weren't that many out there, nobody listened. Sure, there are some really great applications done "right" and look fabulous on our tablets, but most of them are just the phone version blown up to fill the seven or ten inch screen on your tablet with unused white space. Have a look at iPad apps, and you'll know exactly what I mean.

Hopefully, with more Android tablets being sold than any others, developers will take notice and change this. You simply can't afford to ignore over half the market, and we saw what happened when Android took the phone market away from everyone else. I'm looking for big things now that we can no longer be ignored.

Source: IDC