Screenwipe — changing touchscreen tech
HTC’s move from the HTC Tattoo to the HTC Wildfire parallels what’s happening to touchscreens across the market. Resistive screens are on the way out, being replaced by capacitive models. Resistive screens are great if you have a stylus to hand, but under a finger they feel slow and clumsy compared to capacitive alternatives. Capacitive touchscreens don’t rely on pressure, just contact, so you barely need to press down on the screen at all.

The HTC Wildfire’s screen is a tad larger than the HTC Tattoo’s, at 3.2 inches against 2.8. HTC was pushing how small it could make the Tattoo’s touchscreen without adding a custom UI, and large-fingered folk started to feel the pinch. A 2.8-inch screen isn’t very comfortable to type on without a stylus. Sadly, the HTC Tattoo doesn’t come with one. It’s affected by a kind of shame that inflicts many phones that use a resistive touchscreen out of compromise. It badly wants to be a capacitive-screened phone, but it isn’t.

The HTC Wildfire’s shame-free capacitive touchscreen is a big improvement, with finger responsiveness way up. It’s not quite as slick in use as the super-quick HTC Desire, but it’s not too far off.

Android OS generations
HTC has a bad reputation when it comes to Android updates, with the HTC Hero update having taken its sweet time to arrive. Back in March of this year, HTC confirmed that Android 2.1 would come to the HTC Tattoo (it’s currently on Android 1.6) but now that almost 6 months have passed and there’s no sign of it, we think the HTC Tattoo may have to spend the rest of its days lingering on Android 1.6.

The future is looking much brighter for the HTC Wildfire though. It currently uses Android 2.1, but HTC has confirmed that Android 2.2 Froyo is on the way. More hot air from HTC? possibly, but there’s more evidence that the updates are close at hand this time. Chinese product pages indicate that the HTC Desire and HTC Wildfire will run Android 2.2 at launch over there, so upgrades for UK users can’t be too far away.

The Wildfire also features a newer version of the HTC Sense user inferface than the HTC Tattoo, giving you Leap view, which lets you check out all your home screens at once. More brownie points for the Wildfire.

Power, speed, and a surprise
The HTC Wildfire is bigger, beefier and more advanced than its predecessor the HTC Tattoo, but the two use exactly the same CPU, the Qualcomm 528MHz model. Still, we noticed a tad more lag on the HTC Tattoo than on the HTC Wildfire. That’s software optimisation for you.

The HTC Wildfire also has an extra chunk of RAM, which doubtless helps speed the phone up throughout.

Is it worth it?
If you can afford the £20 a month premium the HTC Wildfire commands, we strongly recommend choosing it over the older HTC Tattoo. Low screen resolution niggles aside, it’s a phone that doesn’t feel too compromised by it’s “affordable” origins — a worthy relative to the HTC Desire.

YOU SHOULD READ — HTC Wildfire Android 2.2 Froyo update coming soon

Amzer Emergency charger (£12.99)
Equip yourself with an Amzer emergency charger, stash it away in your bag and you’ll never have to worry about that last bar dropping off your Nokia C3’s power indicator. It runs off standard AA batteries and plugs straight into your Nokia C3. We recommend pairing it with a couple of Eneloop rechargeable batteries, which won’t lose charge when not in use, unlike standard rechargeable batteries.

Nokia CC-1004 silicone case (£5)
The Nokia C3 is a cheapie phone, but it has a rocking bod that wouldn’t look out of place on a handset twice the price. The best way to keep your Nokia C3’s bod in good nick is with a case. There’s no reason to splash out half the cost of the phone for a case either. Nokia’s own silicone case, which protects the phone’s back, is only a fiver and comes in black, pink and lime green.

Nokia BH-104 Bluetooth headset (£17.99)
These days, Bluetooth headsets aren’t just for city boys that secretly love walking around looking like they’re talking to thin air. Bluetooth headsets have been around for so long that you can get now get a decent one for less than twenty quid. Granted, use one while having an animated conversation when walking along the road and you’ll still look like a loon, but they are very handy.

Sennheiser CX300/CX400/CX500 earphones (£15-20)
With a 3.5mm headphone jack in tow, the Nokia C3 is almost ready to be a mini jukebox right out of the packaging. But real audio fans know — you should always ditch the bundled buds as soon as possible. You don’t need to spend an arm and a leg to reach near-audiophile standards of musical bliss though. Great earphones are available for under £20, and at the top of the pile are the budget offerings from Sennheiser and Ultimate Ears.

The Sennheiser CX series offers  powerful sound, great sound isolation and good looks at a great price.

8GB microSD card (£10-15)
Want tunes on your Nokia C3? You have to get hold of a nice big memory card. 8GB cards offer a fab cost-per-megabyte ratio, and will store more than a hundred albums at 160kbps quality. Shop around and you should be able to find a high-quality 8GB microSD card for around a tenner.

YOU SHOULD READ — BlackBerry tablet to be called Blackpad?

OS face-off
The Nokia N8 features an all-new version of the Symbian operating system — Symbian^3. This takes the long-term Nokia staple OS and brings it closer to rivals like Android by giving you more customisation options. Widgets and home screens are in, making the Nokia N8 more flexible than the iPhone 4 in simple personalisation terms.

Early reports on the Symbian^3 OS aren’t entirely complimentary though. Mobile-review’s Eldar Murtazin, who got his hands on an early, leaked version of the OS, says that in spite of improvements over the newest Symbian S60 OS, Symbian^3 just isn’t as good as Android. Symbian^4 is hot on Symbian^4’s heels too, suggesting that Nokia knows Symbian^3 isn’t quite as bombastic as originally intended.
In summary — Symbian^3 is better than S60, but not up there with the latest editions of Android and iOS

Camera crunch
Choosing the Nokia N8 over an iPhone 4 or top-end Android involves making a few smartphone sacrifices, but they’ll be worth it if you’re after an excellent camera phone. The Nokia N8 uses a fantastic 12-megapixel sensor that’s larger than seen before on a mobile.

It’s larger even than the sensor used in many digital compact cameras, and should secure the Nokia N8 the title of “best mobile phone camera ever”. The iPhone 4 surprised us by packing an excellent snapper, but with an LED flash and only five megapixels to its name (even if it makes great use of them), it can’t compete with the Nokia N8.

Further down the competence scale is the Samsung Galaxy S. It can record 720p HD video and uses touch focusing, but image quality isn’t as strong as either the Nokia N8 or iPhone 4, and without a flash it’ll only be of usem in decent sunlight. Down at the bottom of the barrel is the HTC Desire.

It’s another 5-megapixel camera, but image quality is just OK at the resolution and there’s no HD video recording. There is an LED flash though, making it ready for some party photography.
In summary — The Nokia N8’s camera sounds simply fantastic, blowing these rivals out of the water, even the iPhone 4

Apps
The Nokia N8 can rock apps made with the QT dev kit — which is the force  behind the Nokia N900’s apps. Although the Nokia N8 uses an all-new operating system, its app scene won’t have to start completely from scratch. Nokia N900 apps will just have to go through a quick porting process to be up and running on the Nokia N8.

The Nokia N8’s app scene may be heading towards a healthy start, but it’s unlikely to ever have anywhere near as many apps as iPhone 4 or Android phones like the HTC Desire. There are more than 30,000 Android apps available from the Android Market and more than 200,000 from the iPhone App Store.

Sheer numbers aren’t enough to provide a good app experience — the quality of the app store itself means a lot too. The iPhone App Store is just too packed to make app discovery a doddle, but navigating its virtual shelves is painless, with desktop navigation via iTunes helping out too.

Android’s Market is less friendly, with poor structure making discovering apps even trickier than on the App Store. It needs work.

However, the Ovi Store, which is where the Nokia N8 will have to grab most of its apps from, is the least advanced of the three. It caters for dozens of handsets across a handful of platforms but doesn’t offer the same centralised experience as the Android Market and App Store — although a link to Ovi will almost certainly feature in the Nokia N8 as standard.

The Nokia N8 will want to roll with the big boys, but on the apps front, that’s a very tall order.
In summary — The head start Android and iPhone have on the Nokia N8 make sure it’s not the best choice for appaholics

The skinny
The Nokia N8’s in a difficult spot. It’s a high-end handset that’s held back by the software under its hood. Symbian^3 isn’t bad, but it doesn’t fare well in a comparison with iOS and Android, which have after all been updated, tweaked and changed regularly for 2-3 years now.

Symbian’s been around for a lot longer, but its path has been less focused, letting it slip quietly behind rivals. What the Nokia N8 has over every other smartphone on the market is a truly impressive camera. The only thing it’s missing is the optical zoom — if Nokia one day finds a way to drop one into a mobile without creating a chunky beast, we’ll be first in the queue to put our old compact cameras up on eBay.

Want apps? Go for Android or iPhone. Want a simpler phone that’ll play your vids and music, and do a fab job of making its own vids and snaps? Give the Nokia N8 some serious consideration.

YOU SHOULD READ — Nokia N9 – make or break for the Nseries?

These Android 3.0 features aren’t necessarily the most popular. They’re the ones that got us thinking, drooling or excited about Android’s next big step.

Integrated Podcast support
Phones are perfect podcast companions. You take them everywhere, and almost all Androids have a 3.5mm headphone jack these days. So, why no podcast support? With a first-party app, your phone could automatically check for new podcasts in the background every day, downloading new episodes in the background. Over Wi-Fi, most likely. Podcasts would make light work of your 3G data allowance.

IR Universal remote functionality
C’mon readers, how cool would this be? One button from your Android’s home screen could switch on your TV, Blu-ray player and home cinema system, set everything to the right channel and dim your IR-controlled lights, ready for a movie. All it needs is enough support for home entertainment devices and hey-presto, Android has another killer feature to boast about.

Wi-Fi printing
In our wireless world, printing is become a bit old hat, especially when there are green considerations to factor-in too. But occasionally you just have to print something off, whether it’s an important email or a voucher for a restaurant.

With push email, your Android phone is likely to be the first place you see your new emails, so integrating Wi-Fi printing would come in very handy. You could print out an email while watching TV, then pick it up during the ad break.

A decent built-in drawing app
Apple’s iPhone has a slew of fantastic drawing apps, such as Brushes, but Android doesn’t offer anything quite as great, yet. With a sensitive capacitive screen, you can make mini masterpieces without having much skill at all. If you have a bit of creativity in you, doodling away on your phone can be even more fun than playing a game. A first-party arty app would be a wonderful, constructive boredom cure.

SWYPE keyboard
SWYPE is a virtual keyboard sensation, and is officially the fastest touchscreen typing method — according to the Guinness World Records association. Instead of tapping away at keys, you drag a path over the letters you want to use and SWYPE works out the letters you landed on.

It’s clever enough to work out when you make a mistake too, and correct it. The Samsung Galaxy S offers Swype as standard, but how about building it into all Androids as an option?

Google Music store
Google is the ultimate archivist, so why hasn’t it put its scary omnipresent skills to music yet? Knowing Google, it has probably been working on just that for a while now, but if anyone could cobble together an even more exhaustive music store than Apple’s iTunes, it’s Google. An integrated Android music store would up Android phones’ music cred no-end too.

Contacts proximity alert
Virtually all Android phones feature GPS, so why not put it to work in an interesting way, not just to find the nearest Pizza Hut? With a contacts proximity alert function, your phone could give you an buzz whenever you’re near one of your mates. It’d come in just as usual for avoiding people as finding them. Surveillance doesn’t have to be all bad, you know. Let’s make it fun.

YOU SHOULD READ — 100 ways Android could improve

Body and looks
The HTC Wildfire may be a mini version of another Android phone, the HTC Desire, but it makes the Sony Ericsson Xperia X10 Mini look positively tiny. With a 2.55-inch screen, the Sony Ericsson Xperia X10 Mini is the smallest Android phone we’ve ever held in our hands.

Although it uses colourful backplates to let you give your mobile a bit of spark, the Sony Ericsson Xperia X10 Mini features the same sober frontage as the Sony Ericsson Xperia X10 — it’s very smart, but we can’t help but feel that this mobile could do with something a little… cuter.

The HTC Wildfire takes its visual cues from the HTC Desire and is constructed out of plastic and metal. Metal for the screen surround, nice thick plastic for the oversized battery cover. Both of these are solid little phones — not hugely flash but with build quality to match more expensive rivals.
Winner — HTC Wildfire, but only on grounds of aesthetic preference

Android OS
What is Sony Ericsson thinking? All of its new Xperia Androids, the Xperia X10, Xperia X10 Mini and Xperia X10 Mini Pro, use Android 1.6, which is so out of date you wonder whether Sony Ericsson found it in lodged in the grille of Doc Brown’s DeLorean.

The Sony Ericsson Xperia X10 Mini is due to get an Android update later in the year, but we still don’t know exactly what version of Android the phone will be bumped up to. Initial rumours suggested it’d be Android 2.1. So, out of date again, then.

The HTC Wildfire isn’t bang up-to-date, but at least it uses Android 2.1 from the off. Android 2.1 features a slightly better Android Market interface than Android 1.6, support for multiple email accounts off-the-bat and fancy animated backgrounds for your home screens. HTC has also confirmed that the HTC Wildfire will make the leap to Android 2.2 later this year. Good work, HTC
Winner — HTC Wildfire

UI
The Sony Ericsson Xperia X10 Mini may have disappointed us with its outdated version of Android, but it makes up for it with a fab interface, dubbed UX. It’s designed from the ground up for the miniature screen of the Sony Ericsson Xperia X10 Mini and makes whizzing around Android a pleasure.

It works using thumb-friendly corner links that sit on the four corners of the screen. Widgets are simplified too, with each one given its own home screen — making them more like “widget pages”.

The HTC Wildfire is more conventional in its approach, porting HTC Sense wholsale to the slightly-smaller-than-usual 3.2-inch screen. All the widgets are here, from the clocks and calendars to the social networking home screen stream. They don’t look quite as impressive as they do on an HTC Desire, but we’re still down with the HTC Sense party.

Still, the dynamism of the Sony Ericsson Xperia X10 Mini’s UX UI wins it the crown.
Winner — Sony Ericsson Xperia X10 Mini

Screen and touchscreen
Both the Sony Ericsson Xperia X10 and HTC Wildfire use a capacitive touchscreen — the kind that loves fingers but doesn’t get on at all with a stylus. it’s the type of touchscreen used on the iPhone and we prefer it to the resistive type, most of the time. Both touchscreens here are highly responsive. No complaints. Two thumbs up.

The one thing to bear in mind is that, thanks to the size of the Sony Ericsson Xperia X10 Mini’s screen, you’ll use a T9-style keypad to type, rather than a full virtual Qwerty.

The HTC Wildfire’s screen is a good half inch bigger than the Sony Ericsson Xperia X10 Mini’s display — 3.2 inches versus 2.55 — but the two offer the same resolution 240×320 pixels. On the 2.55-inch display of the Sony Ericsson, this looks sharp, but stretched to 3.2 inches on the HTC Wildfire, the pixels start getting rather chunky. The blocky effect this creates is perhaps the HTC Wildfire’s biggest problem. You dropped a clunker there, HTC
Winner — Sony Ericsson Xperia X10 Mini

Camera and video
The iPhone 4’s 5-megapixel camera wowed us, out-pacing some 8-megapixel phones, but the HTC Wildfire and Sony Ericsson Xperia X10 don’t have quite as impressive camera skills. Like most Android phones, the cameras aren’t anything to write to Ansel Adams about. Low-light performance is average and colour reproduction is just OK.

What they do both have is autofocus, a must to get any halfway-decent shots, and an LED flash. These two things make both phones more than up to the task of taking casual outdoors or party shots to publish on your favourite social network.
Winner — Draw

Conclusions
The Sony Ericsson Xperia X10 Mini is the more dynamic and interesting of these two Androids, but if you’re gagging for an HTC Desire but can’t afford it, the HTC Wildfire is an excellent route to Android nirvana.

YOU SHOULD READ — HTC Wildfire — the pros and cons

While not quite up there with the mighty Apple iPhone, the HTC Wildfire’s touchscreen is just as responsive as many far more expensive Android phones.

CON — screen isn’t massive
At 3.2 inches, the HTC Wildfire’s screen isn’t huge. The iPhone uses a 3.5-incher and this phone’s bigger brother, the HTC Desire, knocks it out of the park with a lovely 3.7-inch AMOLED display.

Thankfully, the HTC Wildfire’s screen is just big enough to type on comfortably. If you have sausage fingers, we’d recommend checking it out in the flesh before buying, but the Wildfire avoids the slightly cramped feeling of 2.8-inch touchscreen phones like the HTC Tattoo.

PRO — Android 2.1 is here, Android 2.2 is coming
The HTC Wildfire launched with a relatively up-to-date version of Android on-board, which is more than we can say for Sony Ericsson’s latest Androids such as the Sony Ericsson Xperia X10 Mini. The Wildfire’s Android 2.1 OS has been upstaged by Android 2.2, but HTC has already confirmed that in time this phone will be given the Android 2.2 treatment.

Android 2.2 doesn’t offer a complete revamp of the operating system — that’s coming with Android 3.0 — but it does fix a handful of the most irritating issues. Serious offenders include not letting you install apps to your SD card and the lack of full Flash support. Fingers crossed the update will arrive this year. HTC says it will.

CON — low res screen = low res apps
For a 3.2-inch screen, the HTC Wildfire uses a disappointingly low-resolution display — 240×320 pixels. This offers half the number of pixels as the HTC Legend, which also rocks a 3.2-inch screen.

You’ll get used to the slightly blocky look before too long, but it does have a bearing on app compatibility. As the vast majority of Android phones use a higher-resolution screen, not all apps will work perfectly on the HTC Wildfire. Thanks to Android fragmentation, the same can be said about any Android phone, but the resolution amplifies this effect.

PRO — is cheap, doesn’t feel cheap
Our only criticism of the Samsung Galaxy S was that its plasticcy body made it feel a lot cheaper than it actually is. The HTC Wildfire is the complete opposite. It is cheap, but doesn’t seem it.

The battery cover, which swoops around the front of the device to make up almost the whole exterior of the phone bar the screen, is made from plastic but it’s commendably sturdy stuff that doesn’t bend easily under pressure. The screen surround is made from brushed metal, giving that extra touch of class.

CON — camera is not as good as the HTC Desire’s
When the spec list of the HTC Wildfire first leaked out, we were surprised to see a 5-megapixel camera included — on Android high-megapixel-count cameras tend to be the preserve of high-end models. With the same spec as the HTC Desire, we were hoping for a similarly-performing camera on the HTC Wildfire.

Sadly, it’s not as slick as its big brother, making snapping less silky smooth. The HTC Desire’s camera couldn’t stand up to camera-obsessed rivals in the first place either — the iPhone 4’s camera easily trumps both the HTC Wildfire and HTC Desire.

YOU SHOULD READ — HTC Wildfire vs HTC Legend — mid-range Android phone allies go to war

Losing grip
Back in the old days, when phones had buttons and the iPhone was still hidden away in Apple’s labs, Nokia was the king of the smartphone world. HTC was a niche player rather than the Android giant it has become, and the Nokia N95 was the defacto handset for power users that weren’t too geeky.  Times have changed though, and Nokia hasn’t – not enough, anyway.

With the Nokia N97 and N97 Mini, Nokia proved that its phone designs were no longer able to compete with their top rivals. Android and Apple’s iOS trample all over the aged Symbian operating system, so as well-built as Nokia’s handsets may be, they can no longer eke out much excitement from the average gadget fan.

It may not be a problem for Nokia’s lower-end handsets, a market where Nokia still rules the roost, but the high-end is where it’s at these days, Apple’s iPhone proving that there’s a killing to be made if you have a killer product.

Nokia N8 – too late?
The next flagship phone to drop from Nokia’s tech womb is the Nokia N8, but we doubt whether it’ll be the phone to bring Nokia back to the top spot. Why? Because it runs Symbian^3, which, in spite of its many improvements over Symbian S60, is still an iterative take on the aged Symbian that can’t go head-to-head with Android, iOS or even WebOS without coming out looking distinctly tarnished.

Widgets are in, but early reports from Mobile-Review’s Eldar Murtazin suggest that Symbian^3 isn’t anything to get too excited about if you’re looking for Nokia’s first truly bold smartphone in years. It may come in a series of shocking colours, but at heart it’s a conservative phone.

Nokia N9 – the turning point?
With the Nokia N8 largely continuing down the uninspiring path trodden by the Nokia N97 and co, there’s a lot of pressure riding on the Nokia N9. Its predecessor isn’t even here yet, but leaks and rumours have been blazing away for months already.

Earlier this year, a Nokia employee suggested to Cnet Australia that the Nokia N8 would be the last Nokia Nseries phone to use the Symbian operating system, casting the Nokia N9 as a dead cert for the MeeGo OS – the reborn version of the powerful Maemo OS used in the Nokia N900. The Nokia N900 was dogged by poor support and sales following its release in 2009, but it’s the closest thing to a dynamic high-end product that Nokia has released in recent years.

Since that intriguing little leak, Nokia’s head of mobile solutions Anssi Vanjoki has cast doubt on this idea, instead implying that the Nokia N9 will use Symbian^4 – by saying that it’s highly likely that the Nseries will see a Symbian^4 addition before too long. The Nokia N8 doesn’t use Symbian^4, so what else could he mean but the Nokia N9?

The tipping point
Is it better for the Nokia N9, with the full weight of Nokia’s smartphone future resting on its shoulders, to be bold and opt for the brand new MeeGo OS (spawned from the remains of Nokia’s Maemo and Intel’s Moblin) or can Symbian^4 claw its way back to the lofty heights where its rivals – Android and iOS – currently hang out. We have our doubts. Symbian’s an old dog and Nokia’s attempts to teach it new tricks thus far have felt like musty impersonations.

We’re holding out for MeeGo, but with Anssi getting antsy about Nokia’s smartphone future, every day Nokia seems to return closer to its old bad habits. And Nokia can’t afford to live in the cosy past for much longer.

YOU SHOULD READ – Nokia N9 — MeeGo vs Symbian^4

Symbian^4
To describe Symbian as a bit long in the tooth would be charitable. Current iterations of the mobile OS seem ancient next to Android and Apple’s iOS these days. Symbian^4 looks like it will takes steps forward in the Android-ification of the platform, which has already begun.

What does this mean? More widgets, more home screens and more flexibility. The first shots of the operating system in action have been revealed revealing elements of the UI. It looks nice, sure, but will it be enough?

In the past two years, Nokia has proved itself to be consistently behind the curve. It may have maintained build quality standards in its mobiles, but there hasn’t been much to get excited about in the last few years. While Symbian^4 looks like it’s better than Symbian^3, due to land soon in the Nokia N8, it’s not dynamic enough to win back our trust.

MeeGo
The new boy on the block, MeeGo is what was spawned when Maemo (as seen in the Nokia N900) and Intel’s Moblin ran into each other at high speed. It’s trickier to envision thatn Symbian^4 though, because it’s not just designed for mobiles, but netbooks and tablets too.

We’re yet to get the full expose on the smartphone version of MeeGo, but rumours suggest it could feature more convinving multitasking than  any other smartphone OS available at present. An alpha smartphone version of the MeeGo OS, shown off last month, suggests that the basic UI will be similar to iPhone iOS 3, with a multi-page app menu.

The fight
Asking which OS should feature in the OS is like asking whether Nokia should play it safe and stick with Symbian, or plump for innovation and head towards the Nokia camp. At this stage, where Nokia’s current OS is two years behind the opposition, playing sad could prove even more dangerous than taking a risk and heading for MeeGo territory.

Anssi Vanjoki, Nokia’s head of mobile solutions, has suggested that Nseries Symbian^4 devices are on the way, letting some air out of the rumour that the Nokia N8 will be the last Symbian-powered Nseries phone.

What do you think? Is it time for Nokia to jump off the sinking Symbian ship (at least for it’s high-end devices)?

YOU SHOULD READ — Nokia N8 Symbian^3 — the good, the bad and the ugly

What will the next generation of the Android platform bring? For the past two weeks, we’ve taken in your “most wanted” suggestions for Android 3.0 features. Here are the 10 most popular.

10. Improved media player
In many ways, Android is starting to lead the smartphone pack, but it’s still way behind Apple’s iPhone in the music and movie stakes. The iPhone has iTunes built-in, offering millions of tunes and thousands of movies (at a price, of course). Android has… not much. The benefit of Android is that it lets you freely move media to your phone, as if it was a pen drive. All we need is a better media player interface and podcast support.

9. IR transmitter with Universal remote function
If you have a complicated home cinema setup, there’s a good chance you’ve considered investing in a universal remote at some point. However, they’re expensive and can be tricky to program. Bundling the functionality into an Android phone could solve all these issues. If Google managed to get a big player like Logitech (with its fantastic Harmony database of devices to pick from), Android could win a whole new killer feature with this one.

8. Google Docs integration
Being a Google-based system, Android offers integration with several Google services, with Google Mail and Google Maps at the top of the list. But why hasn’t Google Docs been fully integrated into Android yet? If you’re a Google Mail user, it’s a fab service for sharing work and play docs with friends and colleagues, so it’s no surprise Android fans want to see if more on their mobiles.

7. Built-in remote desktop
You can already get a remote desktop app running on your mobile if you know your way around the Android Market, but getting them to work properly tends to be far more problematic than with most apps. C’mon Google, why not solve the problem with a good old first-party solution? Remote Desktop software would give you access to your PC’s screen from your mobile, over a net connection.

6. Better GPS on Google Maps
Google Maps offers a near-complete GPS solution, but it’s not quite up there with standalone gadgets from Garmin and TomTom. Our readers are looking for more versatility from the built-in Google Maps app, and aside from the cash it’ll cost Google to get snazzier features bunged in, we can’t see why this shouldn’t happen.

5. Real Multitasking
Apple’s iPhone caught a lot of flak before iOS 4 arrived because of its lack of multitasking skills, but Android’s not much better either, if we’re honest. You’re given very little control over which apps you keep running, giving rise to lots of demand for a proper task manager — to get rid of apps as well as keeping them running. The pinnacle would be to have two apps running on one screen, each in a panel, but we think you’d want a 4- or 5-inch screen to work with that effect, minimum.

4. Video editing
iMovie has arrived on iPhone 4 and the green monster has reared its head within the Android crowd. Some Android phones, such as the Samsung Galaxy S, are starting to gain 720p video skills, ramping up the demand for some proper video editing capabilities. A couple of video editing apps are available on the Android Market, but nothing quite as snazzy as Apple’s iMovie, yet.

3. New Android Market
The Android Market is growing at an exponential rate, but it remains woefully underequipped to deal with its thousands of apps. There’s no decent way to discover apps you don’t already know about, so you’re left scrabbling around the search facility trying out keywords and hoping for the best. It’s no way to treat the mobile app world’s second busiest app store, Google.

2. Homing/tracking facility
A surprise hit with readers, many want to see phone tracking introduced, so you’d be able to track friends and loved ones — with their permission of course. Tracking also becomes useful if you lose your phone, although naturally you’ll need another phone or a PC to track your lost phone. Let us know who you’d like to track with your phone in the comments. No stalkers, please.

1. Battery life/power management improvements
The big daddy of the most wanted Android improvements is battery life. Smartphones are notorious for having bad battery life, but Android takes the biscuit as (quite possibly) the worst of the bunch. It’s an effect that varies between handsets, but we’ve seen some shocking battery performance on some Android phones. With a sprinkling of technical magic powder, and some more dynamic scaling of power usage, Android should be able to get up there with its smartphone rivals (into slightly-less-disappointing, but still bad, territory. Roll on the nuclear-powered phone.)

YOU SHOULD READ — 100 ways Android could improve

NOTE - a few of these are already possible on Android, but we’re talking about integrated Android features here. Think one of the suggestions is crazy, a bit fab or downright impossible? Let us know in the comments. The number in brackets tells you how many readers suggested the feature.

… and no, not all of them are deadly serious.

1. Battery life/power management improvements (20 votes)
2. Homing/tracking device features (14 votes)
3. New Android Market (7 votes)
4. Video editing (7 votes)
5. Real multitasking (multi-window display) (6 votes)
6. Better GPS mapping on Google Maps (6 votes)
7. Built-in remote desktop app (6 votes)
8. Google Docs/ more cloud features (5 votes)
9. IR transmitter for universal remote function (5 votes)
10. Apple Fanboy alert system (5 votes)
11. Decent media player (5 votes)
12. 720p video recording (5 votes)
13. Biometric security (4 votes)
14. Post-it note memory jogger (4 votes)
15. Photo editing (4 votes)
16. App creator (3 votes)
17. Car/key locator (3 votes)
18. More Chrome – Android integration (3 votes)
19. Form filler (3 votes)
20. GPS map geocachingc (3 votes)
21. iPhone emulator (3 votes)
22. Night vision video (2 votes)
23. Hibernation mode (2 votes)
24. Solar charging (2 votes)
25. Upgraded anti-theft (2 votes)
26. Built-in shopping helper app (2 votes)
27. Parental controls (2 votes)
28. Stream music to PC (2 votes)
29. Better interface (2 votes)
30. Task/application management (2 votes)
31. Barcode app discovery system
32. Built-in music store
33. Wi-Fi proxy support
34. Call waiting notification
35. Built-in AR
36. Less fragmentation
37. Voice activation
38. Built-in Android upgrade feature (for instant upgrade)
39. Anti-drunkard feature
40. Virtual laser keyboard support
41. Pedometer
42. Bottle opener
43. Better exchange support
44. Built-in translation software
45. Pub nav
46. More built-in memory
47. Gyroscope
48. Better keyboard
49. Wi-Fi printing
50. App backup as standard
51. Woman’s mind reader feature
52. English language simplifier
53. GPS maps saving to SD
54. Good built-in drawing app
55. Sync suite app for computer
56. Wireless Sync
57. Better touchscreen cursor control
58. Other devices
59. SWYPE as standard
60. Google social network
61. Mobile View per window
62. Foursquare integration
63. More robots
64. Better screen resolution
65. CPU sharing with other devices over Wi-Fi
66. TV transmitter for video/pics
67. Less geeky image through better marketing
68. Push apps from PC to phone
69. Unified comms, giving better transition from 2G/3G etc.
70. Relationship mapping software
71. Full native Google Apps support
72. Webcam streaming
73. Built-in projector
74. More multiplayer gaming
75. Improved web browsing
76. Built-in gift-wrapping instructions app
77. X-ray vision
78. Cisco IPSec VPN support
79. FM transmitter
80. Thermometer
81. Sand castle app
82. Slideshow app
83. Etch a sketch
84. Compass
85. Animated on-screen Android tutor
86. eBook store/support
87. Contact proximity alert
88. BBC 6 Music app
89. One-touch home screen Facebook access
90. Home automation, using intelligent GPS
91. GPS treasure hunt game
92. Built-in retro games
93. Built-in breathalyser
94. Bump Top integration
95. One-liner/wit app
96. Podcast manager
97. DAB radio
98. Greetings/celebrations card app
99. Freeview TV built-in (over Wi-Fi)
100. Decision maker app

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