Category: Android Nougat

The new LG G6 is coming to T-Mobile on April 7th.  The carrier announced that the latest LG flagship would be coming to them at a price of $26 per month for 24 months & a $26 down payment.  That roughly works out to $650 for the phone which is about what expected to the street price.  The G6 has already caught a lot of people’s attention with its 5.7″ display that has an 18:9 aspect ratio. Having held a near-final version of the phone, it feels long in your hand but is comfortable.

The specs of the LG G6 are solid.  It is powered by the Snapdragon 821 processor and is coupled with 4GB of RAM.  Storage wise, it has 32GB onboard which can be expanded up to an additional 256GB thanks to the MicroSD slot.  It is powered by a 33oomAh battery and supports Quick Charge 3.0 technology for rapid charging.  The G6 has a fingerprint scanner in the back which is also the

LG G6

physical power button for the device.   Finally, do remember that the G6 is the first phone to ship with Google Assistant out-of-the-box and runs Android Nougat 7.0.

For those of you who are wanting to pick up the G6, if you place your order at T-Mobile before April 30th, you will also get a Google Home at no additional cost.  That’s a $129 value so not a bad deal at all.  Head over to T-Mobile to get all the details.

While the ability to run Android apps on Chrome OS continues to roll out, the question for many is when or if it will be updated.  The answer is yes and pretty soon.  This week while attending Google Cloud Next in San Francisco, I posed the question to Chrome OS product management in a breakout session and it was confirmed that Android Nougat will be coming to the platform build 58 or 59.  Given that it is already in the beta channel, I suspect that it is likely 58.

As readers may know, Android Framework in Chrome OS currently is based on Android Marshmallow.  So, in theory, if an app will run in Marshmallow, it will run on Chrome.  The tricky bit has been that some apps can’t go full screen in 6.0 and features like multi-window support for apps is not something that is supported at all in Marshmallow.  All of that changes under 7.0 obviously as the framework allows for it.

The March Android Security Update has been released for Nexus and Pixel devices and, the good news, the update is already rolling out to devices.  The update was officially released yesterday and has become the way of things, consists of two patches.  The first patch, dated March 1st, contains three critical patches and 8 high priority patches.  This patch is generally for all Android devices while the second patch, dated March 5th, has 8 critical patches and contains a whopping 21 high priority patches.  This update is mostly for Nexus and Pixel devices.

Like previous releases, this month’s security update has been released as a full factory image for those who want to flash their devices manually and so has the OTA patch to do an incremental update.  For those who want to wait until Google actually pushes it to your phone or tablet, you won’t have to wait long.

Good news this morning for Verizon customers using the Samsung Galaxy S7 or S7 Edge – Android Nougat is finally coming your way.  The update is being released today and you are looking for build  NRD90M.G930VVRU4BQA2 for the Galaxy S7 while the S7 Edge is getting build NRD90M.G935VVRU4BQA2.  Both updates come in at just over 1GB in size so you will want to make sure you are connected to Wi-Fi to download the update for your phone.  Once you have it downloaded, the install process should take about 30 minutes all-in.

By now readers will know what comes with Nougat so I won’t bore you with the details once again.  If you aren’t clear on what Nougat brings, check out my review.  As for this particular update, you aren’t going to find much different than the Galaxy S7 updates that have been on T-Mobile, AT&T and Sprint.  Essentially the updates are the same with very minor tweaks between them for each carrier.  That, frankly, is good in that you don’t have a different experience just because you are on a different carrier.

The rise of the phoenix that is Nokia continues as the company made some key announcements at Mobile World Congress.  First, they announced that the new Nokia 5 and Nokia 3 are soon to be available for the low and mid-range market.  The bigger news however is that their flagship device, the Nokia 6, is going to be released globally.  To this point, the 6 has only been available in China.  It will come to Europe first followed by other markets throughout the first half of the year.

This global version of the Nokia 6 is the exact same phone as the one in China but with an updated software package.  It will be running Android Nougat with Google Assistant, has a 5.5″ Full HD display, Snapdragon 430 SoC, 4GB of RAM and 64GB of storage.  It has a dual-SIM configuration, a MicroSD slot and a 16MP rear camera with phase-detection auto focus.  Add to that a 3000mAh battery and a fingerprint scanner and you have a solid performing phone that will likely be met with open hands throughout the world.

After being exclusive to the Google Pixel phone lineup, Google Assistant is making its way to Android Marshmallow and Nougat devices starting this week.  The news is certainly welcome.  Google Assistant has expanded to being in Google Home, Android Wear 2.0 and Google Allo but for adoption to really take off, it needs to be on phones and not just the latest Google flagship.  Google made it pretty clear which devices are going to see Assistant.  First, it has to be running Android Marshmallow or Android Nougat.  If you are running Lollipop or earlier, you are not going to get the update.  Second, your phone has to be running Google Play Services.  The vast majority of devices out there do run Play Services but you can check on your phone by going to Settings>Apps then tap the Show Systems option in the menu then scroll down and it (they are in alphabetical order).

Assuming your phone meets these two criteria, Google Assistant will automatically be pushed to your phone via Play Services.