Galaxy Nexus Ice Cream Sandwich with Face Unlock

Reading that title, you might think it is the ramblings of a guy who’s off his rocker. You’d be wrong. Instead it is the newest phone that Google is marketing heavily at the moment. Galaxy Nexus is the name of the phone. Ice Cream Sandwich is the version of the Android mobile operating system…  4.0 to be exact. And Face Unlock is a feature of the phone that allows you to unlock the phone with your face and a smile.

Marketed as the first 4G LTE phone available on the Sprint network (it was previously available on Verizon), Google’s Galaxy Nexus has the following features:

• Enhanced speed and performance
• Voice typing, a speech-to-Text feature[50][51]
• Virtual buttons in the user interface, in place of capacitive or physical buttons
• Separation of widgets in a new tab, listed in a similar manner to apps
• Pinch-to-zoom functionality in the calendar
• Ability to access apps directly from lock screen (similar to HTC Sense 3.x)
• Improved copy and paste functionality
• Better voice integration and continuous, real-time speech to text dictation
• Face Unlock, a feature that allows users to unlock handsets using facial recognition software[50]
• New tabbed web browser, allowing up to 16 tabs
• Data Usage section in settings that lets users set warnings when they approach a certain usage limit, and disable
• data use when the limit is exceeded
• Improved camera app with zero shutter lag, time lapse settings, panorama mode, and the ability to zoom while
• recording
• Built-in photo editor
• New gallery layout, organized by location and person
• Android Beam, a near-field communication feature allowing the rapid short-range exchange of web bookmarks,
• contact info, directions, YouTube videos and other data
• Wi-Fi Direct[50][53]
• 1080p HD (1920×1080 @ 24 fps) video recording with the rear facing 5 MP camera
• 720p HD (1280×720 @ 30 fps) video recording with the front facing 1.3 MP camera

You can also download Adobe Flash Player on the Google App Store which flies in the face of Apple’s refusal to enable Flash on any of their iOS devices. The folks down in Cupertino aren’t going to just sit back and watch Google steal market share however. Their lawyers are hard at work and have brought a preliminary injunction against the phone.

Personally, I use an iPhone because so far, the iOS trumps Android hands down for what I call ‘immediate fluidity’ in the interface. However, as these Android devices begin to take advantage of the latest tech and Android develops into a stable operating system, I may be tempted to switch.