Guess what’s officially on its way to US Cellular in October? The headline probably gave you a pretty good clue — it’s the HTC Hero S. And it’s not coming alone: apparently the new device is big enough to warrant its very own entourage. Its brethren, the Wildfire S and Flyer, will both waltz into stores at roughly the same time. The Gingerbread-running Hero S will offer a 1.2GHz Qualcomm MSM8655 CPU, 4-inch qHD (960 x 540) display, a 1,520mAh battery and a 5MP CMOS rear camera accompanied by a 1.3MP front-facing cam. Add it to the lineup next to the Motorola Electrify, and we’d say the carrier’s got some good options for the getting. The Hero S will be available sometime next month for $200 after $100 mail-in rebate, while the Wildfire S (which will come in grey and purple) will go for $80 after rebate and the Flyer can be yours for $400 — once again, after rebate. Head below to find the full press release.

Continue reading HTC Hero S coming to US Cellular next month alongside Wildfire S and Flyer

HTC Hero S coming to US Cellular next month alongside Wildfire S and Flyer originally appeared on Engadget on Wed, 28 Sep 2011 16:10:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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This week was packed with news on the mobile front, so it was easy to miss a few stories here and there. Here’s some of the other stuff that happened in the wide world of wireless for the week of September 19, 2011:

• Opera Software, builder of the popular mobile browser, announced it was acquiring Handster, an app store platform that supports Android, WP7, BlackBerry, and Symbian. [TechCrunch]
• Samsung unveiled three new HSDPA feature phones destined for India: the Champ 3.5G (S3770), Primo (S5610) and Chat 527 (S5270). [UnwiredView and SammyHub]
• A leaked image indicates the HTC Hero S will be coming to US Cellular in the near future. The device appears to be the Kingdom, and is expected to feature a 1.2GHz single-core Qualcomm CPU, 768MB of RAM, a 4-inch qHD display and Gingerbread. [PocketNow]
• Speaking of US Cellular, the Motorola Electrify officially became available for purchase online this week (expected in stores on September 26th), and can be yours for $200 after a $100 mail-in rebate. [AndroidCentral]
• Wirefly accidentally outed press renders of the Samsung Stratosphere — on the retailer’s Pantech Breakout page. The images have since been removed. [OwenJohnston]
• A white version of the Samsung Galaxy S II is making the rounds in the UK, but we learned this week that Bell Canada will be launching it well before the holidays. Interestingly, the device in the image (seen above) has retained the international version’s three-button layout. [MobileSyrup]
• Among the barrage of new phones Sprint’s releasing on October 2nd is the BlackBerry Curve 9350, according to another leaked employee memo. The price will likely be $80 after a $50 mail-in rebate. [CrackBerry]
• T-Mobile MVNO Simple Mobile announced a new unlimited prepaid plan for BlackBerry devices for $60 / month, which includes access to T-Mo’s HSPA+ network. [N4BB]
• Huawei appears to have outed press images of the Honor, which is said to have a 4-inch FWVGA LCD, Gingerbread, 1.4GHz CPU (no specifics known yet), and an 8MP rear camera accompanied by a front-facing cam (again, no details on the resolution here). [EuroDroid]
• A member of the iPhone Dev Team has released a new version of Redsn0w, its popular iOS jailbreaking software, known as 0.9.9b1. Check the link to get the full list of new features. [Technobolt]

Mobile Miscellany: week of September 19, 2011 originally appeared on Engadget on Sat, 24 Sep 2011 09:00:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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It looks like Tess Mercer’s got more than one hero in her life, but only one of them is running Windows Phone 7. In this week’s episode of Smallville, Lois Lane places a call to Tess Mercer, who appears to be packing a white HTC Hero. Oddly enough, though, it’s not rocking Eclair. That’s right, this Hero’s a Microsoft man — which has us wondering: what OS is Superman running?

[Thanks, Rich]

Screen Grabs: HTC Hero caught running WP7 on Smallville, Tess Mercer due for an upgrade originally appeared on Engadget on Sun, 17 Apr 2011 19:12:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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While we have no word which HTC Hero handsets will receive it, an update is currently going out bringing the phone’s firmware version to 3.36.405.1. The update won’t provide any major changes to your Hero’s software, but rather does some maintenance on the built-in Twitter application Peep.

The update is a small 6MB file and shouldn’t take too long to patch and be done with. Your Hero shouldn’t feel too much of a difference.

[via EuroDroid]

If you went ahead and tried out any of the CyanogenMod 7 nightly builds, you’ve surely noticed the new Gapps builds.  This is something that the fellows on the CM team has been working on as well, and it’s a pretty big change from what everyone is used to. 

Whenever things change, we try to get on top of it all and keep you guys informed.  Hit the break for the skinny, and if this is all old-hat to you, jump in the forums and help those who need it! [CyanogenMod Forums]

Flashing the new CM7 Gapps posted originally by Android Central

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Gingerbread ROMs are being ported from the 2.3 SDK device emulator left and right.  As of this writing, we have the Eris, the Hero, the Wildfire (pictured, and video after the break), and the Evo 4G all booting up Gingerbread, and I’m sure we probably will see more, the OG Droid and Droid Incredible can’t be far behind. 

It’s awesome, just because it’s awesome.  Booting up Gingerbread and looking through the UI on a device it a load of fun.  Don’t expect too much going in, and be sure to have a good backup to return to, then give it a whirl.  There’s a video after the break to give you an idea of what to expect for the most part. [Eris; Hero; Wildfire; Evo] Thanks everyone who sent these in!

Gingerbread SDK ROMs everywhere posted originally by Android Central

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The 2.32.651.2 OTA for the Sprint Hero is still rolling out, and so are some bug reports.  I’m hearing and seeing a bit too many reports of things like serious lag, to the point of a battery pull, or problems with contacts since accepting the OTA than usual.  According to Sprint, the only thing users should see is an updated Sprint Zone, but there are a couple other bug fixes.  Hopefully these are just isolated incidents, as you would think they have the Hero software down pat by now. 

In any case, be warned before you click accept.  Of course if you’ve rooted your Hero, you have nothing to worry about, because you shouldn’t be accepting OTA updates.  Get the update yet?  Share your experience (and help out a fellow Hero user) in the forums.  [via @dwthrman]

Sprint Hero OTA rolling out, may have issues posted originally by Android Central

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A bit of good news for all you HTC Hero owners out there.  Sprint just announced a maintenance release that should begin rolling out sometime today.  HTC Hero Maintenance Release 2.32.621.2 brings a few fixes, including:

• Correct a non-customer impacting issue (device diagnostics)
• MMS issue with contact number format
• Updated Sprint Zone application

And there you have it.  No FroYo — ain’t gonna happen, people — just a little Friday afternoon maintenance update. We haven’t got a manual update method just yet, but that should change once it starts rolling out (if it hasn’t already).  Give us a shout if you’ve got the update package and want to share it with other eager Hero owners.

Want to discuss this update with other Hero owners?  Head into our Hero forums and chat it up. [Sprint Forums] Thanks, Simon!

Sprint HTC Hero to receive maintenance update starting today posted originally by Android Central

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Good news for HTC Hero owners in Canada, as the 2.1 (Eclair) update for the TELUS version is now available for download. The Hero is not even available to buy new, but owners who have been devout to their device can rejoice as they can now enjoy a major upgrade. 

Here are some of the improvements:

• Flash support 4.0
• Google Maps Navigation
• Voice-dialer
• Multi-touch navigation
• People Group Widgets

If you want the update, you need to go to HTC’s website. Sorry, Sprint Hero users, this update does not apply to your device. [HTC via Mobile Syrup]

Posted originally at Android Central

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The Fall season brings new colors of leaves, the return of children to school, pumpkin pie (om nom nom), and new TV shows. If you’ve had your boob tube set to CBS in the past few weeks, you’ve probably seen "Hawaii Five-0" advertised a billion times. What you might of not noticed was the HTC Hero that appeared on the television series first episode. In its brief few minutes of fame, and its short lived life, the Hero was used and then tossed out the window of a moving car. More screens after the break. Thanks, Android Amateur!

Posted originally at Android Central

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