Motorola Mobility outlines Android Ice Cream Sandwich plans

Motorola Mobility has outlined extensive plans for upgrading its smartphone range to Android 4.0, otherwise known as Ice Cream Sandwich (ICS).

The company previously announced plans for ICS availability on its Droid Razr, Droid Razr Maxx, Droid 4, Droid Bionic, Droid Xyboard 8.2 and 10.1, and Xoom WiFi +3G/4G models, but Motorola has released details of plans to bring ICS to many of its other devices.The only dates revealed so far are vague estimates that primarily fall in the second and third quarters of this year, and are subject to change, while most other models are still too early in the development cycle to release an upgrade date.Motorola also outlined its upgrade development cycle, which features four stages: 1) evaluation and planning; 2) development; 3) testing; and 4) availability. Most models are still in stage one, with around a dozen in stage two. Since none are in stage three we should not expect a release anytime soon, especially considering how long the testing process could take.Google recently secured approval from the US and EU for its bid to acquire Motorola Mobility, which leaves few obstacles remaining in the way of the deal. If the acquisition closes within the next few months we could see a faster process in rolling out ICS upgrades to Motorola devices, and it is likely that todays outline of the plan going forward was made in anticipation of this.For a full list of Motorola devices receiving the ICS update, check here.

NVIDIA GeForce Go 6800 Ultra Mobile GPU

NVIDIA today introduced the GeForce Go 6800 Ultra mobile GPU. Availableimmediately, the Dell Inspiron(TM) XPS Gen2 is the first notebook with theGeForce Go 6800 Ultra mobile GPU and features unprecedented notebook gamingperformance -- achieving more than two times the performance of the previousInspiron XPS, based on industry-standard benchmarks. The NVIDIA GeForce Go 6800Ultra mobile GPU delivers 3D performance that is unmatched by any commerciallyavailable mobile GPU today. The XPS 2 also delivers superb video qualitycourtesy of NVIDIA PureVideo(TM) technology, the industry's only embedded videoprocessor for HD multimedia content.

"The GeForce Go 6800 Ultra mobile GPU was designed specifically for hard coreenthusiasts," said Rob Csongor, general manager of mobile business at NVIDIA."It takes a company like Dell to leverage the GeForce Go 6800 Ultra mobile GPUand create such a remarkable product. The GeForce Go 6 mobile GPU series is ourmost scalable mobile architecture to date, enabling NVIDIA to penetrate everymobile market segment from thin-and-light notebooks to desktop replacements. Theultimate execution of that architecture is the GeForce Go 6800 Ultra mobile GPUin the XPS 2 -- a perfect solution for any mobile user."