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Two years ago, Google revealed the open handset alliance, or the Google’s initiative to dominate the mobile market. The idea sounds crazy for many observers, but since there is a giant called Google behind it, everything is possible. An open source mobile operating system is not something new, many other initiatives are there even before OHA but nobody talk about then … Google knew how to make everybody talk about their Android and it was obvious for everybody that a Google phone is coming someday…

That day is today, and Google have just announced officially the availability of their Nexus One phone the new “Superphone” where “Web meets phone”. That’s already two slogans to market the new nexus one, it’s a Superphone, forget about smartphones. It’s also a new Web experience for mobile users and people who still new to Android.

The hardware is pretty attracting : Thinner and lighter than iPhone, automated brightness adjustment , amazing sensors, noise canceling headphones, 5 megapixel camera with flash and autofocus, … and get ready to see all of these features running under Google Android 2.1 !

There are some downs for Nexus One since Android still missing some features mainly the multi-touch support, the Nexus One screen is amazing but seems to be very gourmand in energy so stay near charger or avoid using full-brightness screen all the time.

Google Nexus One is already available at http://www.google.com/phone/

The unlocked edition is available at $529 in US, UK, Hong Kong and Singapore. T-mobile provides also an unlocked edition of Nexus One at $179 with a $80 monthly plan including  500 minutes/unlimited SMS/unlimited data. You can still get the T-mobile version without any plan by paying an additional $379 !This is the Google phone number One, and there will be certainly more Android phones coming in 2010.

The mobile market war is not only about Android and iPhone, many other mobile giants are already in the market including Nokia with their Symbian OS, MSFT with Windows CE, Palm with their amazing WebOS… We don’t forget also that Google have just acquired Admob, the largest mobile advertising network, for $750 million.

If 2009 was the year of Android, what do you think about 2010 ?!

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Since OHM have a UK address, we ordered the developers edition of the G1 so we could have more interesting experiments and applications for you. It’s $399 USD as announced, but the total is slightly different. First we tried to use our US address to profit from the free shipping, but unfortunately it was not accepted. We will have an extra $42.60 for shipping and handling, that’s a total of $441.6 - still acceptable.

After entering the shipping, now time to finalize order but I just noticed a different total of $527.25. There is another Tax to be paid of $85.65. So the overall price of the developer edition is $399 Tax Free, or to be more precise for US only. There will be an extra $100 or more depending on the country you are shipping to.

The case of UK for example the total will be $527 USD, I don’t know about other countries, but I think the price remain acceptable for us to get a gadget that you can use to test your android applications on real device. Selected specs for Android Dev Phone 1:

• Touch screen
• Trackball
• 3.2 megapixel camera with autofocus
• Wi-Fi
• GPS-enabled
• Bluetooth v2.0
  • Handsfree profile v1.5
  • Headset profile v1.0
• 3G WCDMA (1700/2100 MHz)
• Quad-band GSM (850/900/1800/1900 MHz)
• QWERTY slider keyboard
• Includes 1GB MicroSD card (can be replaced with up to 16GB card)

Just a reminder that the G1 Dev phone is available in 18 international markets, including the US, UK, Germany, Japan, India, Canada, France, Taiwan, Spain, Australia, Singapore, Switzerland, Netherlands, Austria, Sweden, Finland, Poland, and Hungary (free shipping in the US only).

Check android project page for more information on Devices availability for developers. Android Dev G1 could be ordered from Android market.

Update : We have information that the G1 Dev Phone cost $537 USD for France ($95 taxes and $42 shipping)!

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