Frequent the custom DROID ROM scene? If so, there’s a high probability you’ve heard of the Sholes team and sholes.info at least once. First, a quick back story…

They are an awesome custom ROM droid development team that develops one of the best custom DROID ROMs. A few weeks back, the Sholes team, together with developer Scott Anderson released SMUpdater, an awesome auto-download/install app for Sholes.info ROM users. Long story short, there was some drama and it turned out that the dev wasn’t giving any of the donation money to the devs. As you can imagine, ties with the developer were split. (And my donation refunded). After that drama a few days ago, the ship seemed to be leveling itself. Then sholes.info went down.

Since I’m not actually in the Sholes team, I don’t know the full story. All that needs to be said however is that the site went down yesterday at some point and has stayed down. However, when searching for some answers, I came across this thread at AndroidCentral that pointed to a “new” sholes.info page — DroidMod.org.

This post is purely informative, put out there for all of the DROID users wanting to know at least a little bit about where sholes.info went and where things are headed. Look for continuing sholes ROM updates in the near future.

DroidMod

The US variant of the Moto Sholes is the Verizon DROID. For the last several months, I’ve been monitoring AllDroid, the DROID forums in particular, as it has begun filling up with some truly amazing stuff that will make you say “Android 2.1 what?” The whole beauty of Android is it’s open nature that allows devs and 3rd parties to tweak the OS ’til their hearts content.

The Eurpean Sholes (Milestone) is a very different story. Quoting Steve Jobs: “It’s a bag of hurt”. You see, the US Moto Droid doesn’t check for signed packages (in this case, ROMs) which is why it’s so easy to play around with the DROID’s digital code book. The European Milestone does check for authentic signatures however. The biggest hurdle is the bootimage on the Milestone being not all that eager to 3rd parties tampering with it’s code.

In reality, the Milestone isn’t completely void of any after market baking. There’s some program and slight performance tweaks here and there. But taking a quick trip through the dev forums for both the DROID and Milestone show two very different stories. The DROID dev forums are full of no less than 5 different custom ROM’s currently being developed. The Milestone — zero.

Why the cold shoulder for European Motorola Sholes/Milestone users? Your guess is as good as mine. According to the Motorola copy/paste PR/CS response on an official Facebook topic featuring this very same problem seems to point to Motorola basically not caring about dev channels. I mean, when you get a reponse as cookie cutter as:

Hi, everyone!

Thanks for your feedback on customs ROMs – here is where we stand:

It is Motorola’s policy that customised ROMS are not supported on our products, as it may void the warranty on a consumer device or violate the copyright on the applications that we and or others have created. If you are a developer interested in manually updating the device with custom system images, please refer to the official Android developer guidelines at http://developer.android.com/guide/developing/device.html. If you’d like access to other tools and resources for Android development, or would like to apply to be a part of our MOTODEV App Accelerator Program, please visit http://developer.motorola.com.

We hope this addresses the questions and comments you’ve raised – post here if you have any additional feedback and we’ll do our best to respond to you all!

Thanks,
Motorola Europe

….you know you’re pretty much the least of their cares.

Pretty disappointing. Looking at the responses on that Facebook topic, while not too lengthy yet, has users sharing the same basic feelings — disgust and disappointment with numerous “my Milestone’s going on eBay” talk. I hope Motorola reverses course quick. Alienating the people that due the messy clean up work for you isn’t the smartest of ideas to choose from.

It just goes to show you — the grass isn’t always greener on the other side. Sure they (European Milestone users) received multi-touch and pinch-to-zoom functionality out of the box, but they also got a digitally signed hot mess. Which would you choose? Me? I’m perfectly happy with my rooted DROID running the Milestone factory apps. You?

DroidForums

[Image Source 1] [Image Source 2]

Normally I wouldn’t be all that interested in some “leak” of a Chinese bound handset. I don’t live in China so why would I want to buy a device designed for China? Easy enough, right? Every now and then however, a foreign device slips by and reveals itself and does catch my attention. One such device is the Motorola XT701.

Several weeks ago, the internet was full of Sholes Tablet images depicting a keyboardless version of the Moto Sholes (think Droid). While I like the added physical keyboard, some do not — hence the totally touch version.

Unfortunately for Motorola, the cat’s ‘otta the bag now — sort of. A full page for the XT701 on Moto’s website went live, if only for a few minutes, was shortly thereafter promptly removed. Though with millions of geeky eyes crawling the internet for the latest and greatest in gadgets, their slip up was not done without someone noticing.

I guess the real question is: Are these images of an actual Sholes Tablet? If you look at the two images compared on the right, the headphone port and surrounding case look awfully similar (similar as in identical). If you ask me it’s the same device. But I’ll leave a few images of this leak as well as the old Sholes tablet images from a few weeks back and let your decide. Regardless if it is or not, it’s a fairly attractive device is it not?

Unwired

Now US users can pick up a GSM Milestone without going through as many hoops or currency exchanges as they did just a few weeks ago. Instead, a simple trip on over to eXpansys or Amazon whom currently feature the Milestone unsubsidized at $700 and $790 respectively. As you all know, unsubsidized phones are a wallet raping experience to put it not quite so mildly. Is it worth it?

Don’t forget that while a GSM Milestone is much easier to grab for US GSM users, it does come with one big caveat — no 3G support. Truthfully, that’s a massive caveat that I couldn’t live without. Because of the different 3G bands used in Europe, the Milestone is nothing but a 2.5G/WiFi mini monster when brought state side.

I don’t really think too many people are going to be super early GSM Milestone adopters here in the U. S. of A. as it’s simply too expensive and only half functional. Don’t go calling the funeral home yet however as there is a wee bit of light peering out from the distant, dark end of the tunnel. Leaked documents from many weeks back show T-Mobile getting their own Milestone/Droid/Sholes at some point in the not too distant future.

Now if you don’t like Verizon or T-Mobile and Motorola hasn’t released that tri-band 850/1700/1900 3G Module that we’re already wetting ourselves over, a simple four letter explative preceded by “You’re” seems most appropriate about now. Quite a conundrum isn’t it?

Brighthand

[Image Source]

Typically the iPhone is the talk of the town when sales numbers and “sell outs” are concerned as such things often include large sales volumes and quick sell outs when considering how many phones they actually push out. But they’re not the only cool kid in town anymore. For the last month, our European friends have had to sit back and watch us poke and prod our lovely Moto Droid’s in jealousy, longing for the day that such happiness can fall upon them. That day came in the form of December 10th — yesterday. Anyone who had doubts about Android’s European presence and outlook can effectively bury such fears. The Moto Milestone sold out in 2.5 hours via the exclusive sales partner “eXpansys”.

According to eXpansys, pre-orders quickly surpassed 1,00 units. In fact, pre-orders sailed past the millennium mark so quickly and easily that eXpansys had to increase their order for Moto Milestones — twice. For that feat, the Milestone has earned itself the gold medal in fastest sell outs with eXpansys claiming it’s the fastest device sell out in 11 years of operations. Those feeling bummed they didn’t order before on-hand stock dried up can cling to hope as another shipment of Milestones is set to arrive before Christmas giving eager buyers a second chance to score the Android handset of the year.

Those interested can keep checking eXpansys’s website an impatiently hitting that refresh button like it’s goin’ out of style.

Pocket-Lint

Upon hearing news of a keyboardless Moto Droid (Sholes), two groups will instantly form. For one group the lack of a keyboard and thinner overall construction depict the perfect Android device. Others however will find the lack of the keyboard a major knock as that was one of the big selling points of the phone to begin with. Personally, I’d fall into the latter as I love the Droid’s keyboard and don’t find Android’s onscreen keyboard quite refined enough to be the sole provider for text input. Remember, I have slender, long fingers. Because of that, the close non-existent spacing between keys doesn’t bother me nor does the small chin on the right side of the keyboard. Still, removing the keyboard on the Sholes was one of the most voiced reasons for not picking up the first iteration. Apparently the old saying “Ask and ye shall receive” still holds true. Thanks to Mobile Android China, shots of a Moto Sholes prancing around the camera without any legs have surfaced.

Specs for this touchable beast are fairly similar to the keyboard toting cousin with the same 3.7″ 800 x 400 display, 550MHz OMAP processor, 3.5mm audio jack. Some small differences on the “Sholes Tablet” do seek to differentiate the two siblings with the most notable being the tablet’s HDMI port and higher quality 8mp camera. On that camera: hopefully Motorola does a better job on the software front concerning the camera as the Droid’s current 5mp shooter isn’t exactly stellar. With the specs listed and the pictures above, how stoked are you? Feeling buyers remorse on that keyboard equipped Sholes/Droid you bought, totally loving the Sholes Tablet touch only design? For me, I’m interested, but not enough to drop my current love.

BGR > Mobile Android China (Beware — Mandarin ahead)

Wetting your pants in excitement that AT&T is finally, finally getting on board with Android? Sorry to say that your little accident was for naught as AT&T is still stiff arming Google’s baby. Why? Well there’s many reasons why. (1) They don’t care about all of this “openness” crap. (2) Don’t want to harm exclusive agreements with Apple. Or (3), they’re just plain stupid. My vote’s for three, but this entire issue is best reserved for another article.

Don’t go just yet. I wasn’t lying when I said the Motorola Milestone was coming to AT&T. The only thing is you’ll have to do a little cross boarder magic yourself by picking up one of these GSM beauts from our friends up north. Telus Canada is launching the Milestone in “early 2010″. Since they use the same frequencies as AT&T, any interested user simply has to go ahead and purchase one unlocked. Full price isn’t going to be pretty as it looks to be easily north of $500. Still, if you want to get in on some GSM baed Android action via AT&T, this is your best and only bet for the time being.

Android Central

So Big Red is like a disease to you and you can’t fathom moving to Euro-land just to purchase and *fully* use a Euro-spec Droid Milestone? No worries dear reader as a screenshot showing a reported “dev only” section of a MotoBLUR site shows something very interesting indeed. See that circled bit of info? It points to a TMO edition of the Motorola Sholes -> Droid. If a GSM version exists outside of the country, it isn’t hard to believe a GSM version would come state side. On one had it would make sense for AT&T to get it because they have a much larger 3G network. Of course if you divide by the sum of suck, you more or less walk away with TMO having the larger, useful 3G network. Let’s not forget that TMO is in love with Android. So far, AT&T hasn’t put forth any emotion in regards to Android. Sad indeed. But I digress. TMO users hoping for a second touchscreen + qwerty slider now have something to bank on in the near future. Holiday even?

Phandroid > TmoNews

While I could go on and on with senseless ramblings and other useless banter, just taking a minute to stop and really take in what is above you right now is more important. We’ll leave on a good note by saying that the upcoming Android love on Verizon has a very nice home on the Sholes. *Picks up drool cup*

BGR

You’re speculation/rumor light should be going full bore right now as what is about to be presented to you is pretty lofty though not so much so that it is completely unbelievable. Starting off, the rumor is based off of a DigiTimes article (please bare with me…give it a chance) that Verizon will be launching both the HTC Desire and HTC Passion (Google phone) in the 4th quarter, bringing the end of year Android count to 3. The reason for the speculation and thought provoking conversation comes from a quote by DigiTimes that doesn’t quite add up.

Verizon is expected to cooperate with HTC to launch its first Android-powered smartphone, the HTC Desire, in the fourth quarter, Commercial Times said, noting that the pair will also launch a mobile TV handset, the Whitestone, in the fourth quarter.
“HTC is also likely to cooperate with Google again to roll out the next-generation Google phone, the Passion, in the fourth quarter, the paper added.”

The big problem however stems from the fact that the HTC Whitestone, the phone that DigitTimes is claiming to be the release name of the HTC Passion coming to market packing Android and all, has been spied on multiple occasions sporting WinMo 6.1 garb both software based and physical. Case in point: this picture and spec list from from HTC Pedia gives strong credibility to the fact that these two names/phones are getting mixed up by DigiTimes.

Of course, then the question of what is the HTC Passion gets bantered about in your little cranium. You’re guess is as good as mine. Is DigiTimes correct with their assumptions above? (*Update: No*) Or, as PhanDroid is highlighting, the HTC Passion and HTC Whitestone are two completely different phones with the Whitestone bringing another WinMo handset to Verizon and the Passion…well…start speculating.

Further adding fuel to the fire, the last part of the quote listed above which references Verizon as the first carrier for the HTC/Android device and also remembering the fact that the Motorola Sholes which was expected to have been announced at Mobilize ’09 (and wasn’t) leads one to also speculate that Verizon instead went with HTC as their “first” experience with Android. My my. Such is a web of speculation, rumors, and unknowns. Can you make sense of any of it?

Going on the tiny twig of a limb barely hanging from the tree, if the above speculations from DigiTimes materialize, we could very well see 3 Android handsets charging into Verizon before 2009 comes to a close. Excited? Pessimistic? Nothing like waiting until the last minute huh? What’s your take on all of this unknown identity crisis?

*Update: It appears the Times was wrong again as today, 9/18/09 BGR has shed light on the Whitestone’s early October release as a WinMo 6.5 smartphone as originally thought. The Android ’09 count on Verizon just dropped to 2.

Source: PhanDroid, DigiTimes, Image Source

Personally, I really like Android’s darker UI and color scheme throughout. For a tired iPhone owner, it is a welcome change to the grey/silver/blue hues found throughout the iPhone OS. If you happen to feel slightly different and instead prefer a tad bit more european complexion to the Android Market, leaked photos showing upcoming changes to the Market highlight a shift in UI coloring. Before, the background was black and darker greys with orange highlights. In these latest leaked images, the Market as you can see makes a complete color reversal — the lights go darker and the darks go lighter. These images were reportedly from a Cnet reader’s Motorola Sholes (lucky guy). Even though I like the current UI color scheme on Android, I can’t help but like the new look as well. True it is much closer to what I’ve been using for the last year and a half, but the Android twist makes it seem new at least. For now, these cosmetic changes appear to be the only changes, though, we won’t know for sure until the Sholes drops along with updated firmwares. I certainly can’t wait…you? So what do you think of UI overhaul so far? Do you think it will start creeping OS wide?

Source: Engadget, Cnet