Amazon.co.uk is now offering the HTC Hero for pre-order. The Android handset has been listed to retail for £429.99 each. July 15th is the expected shipping date, but nothing is certain so don’t be surprised if the date changes.

At £429.99, that’s a pretty heavy price tag. Converted, we’re talking about $700 or more. Anyone going to bite at that price? They say it will be dispatched and sold by Amazon.co.uk themselves, so we don’t know whether other retailers and the carriers themselves will offer it earlier or later than that date.

HTC only recently announced its new Android-powered smartphone called the Hero. HTC has a number of smartphones on various wireless networks in the US and is the maker of the T-Mobile G1 smartphone that runs Android.

HTC has announced its latest smartphone called the HTC Ozone that will be a Verizon Wireless exclusive. The device is described as an easy-to-use smartphone with a simple design and lots of connectivity options.

The highly anticipated myTouch 3G (aka HTC Magic) will soon make its way to T-Mobile USA in early August. The Android-powered handset features a 3.2-inch HVGA capacitive touchscreen display and a 3.2MP autofocus camera with YouTube and Picasa uploading support.

Some other features include a microSD card slot with an included 4GB microSD card, GPS, WiFi, Microsoft Exchange support and supports quad-band EDGE, UMTS/HSDPA (1700MHz/2100MHz) connectivity. You can pre-order it starting on July 8th for $199 with a 2-year contract agreement.

My Pre is reporting that a tipster with a webOS emulator has found that the Pre will use IMAP IDLE. This means that users on GMail will have near instantaneous reception of new emails. Because it’s getting pushed to the phone from the GMail servers.

Pre users are going to love that. At the moment, the only phone to support GMail push is the G1 (and soon the HTC Magic or any other Android device). Palm’s relationship with Google is proving to be extremely awesome for Pre users.

One of the biggest games available on any gaming system is Grand Theft Auto. The franchise has proven to be one of the top game franchises going. The game has raised more than a bit of ire in the industry as groups claim it is too violent and promotes violence in the real world. Despite some opinions, the game is still one of the most successful around.

Rockstar has announced new DLC for GTA IV that is Xbox 360 exclusive. The new content is called Grand Theft Auto: The Ballad of Gay Tony. This is the second episode in the Episodes from Liberty City expansion and will launch this fall.

You’ll be happy to know that the unlocked version of the HTC Touch Pro2 is now available online in the US.

The phone comes with a sliding QWERTY keyboard, a 3.2MP digicam with auto-focus, GPS, WiFi, Bluetooth, microSD (HC) card slot, an FM radio with RDS and a 528Mhz Qualcomm CPU. If you like, you can also get the speakerphone system dubbed “HTC Straight Talk” for conference calls.

Looks like the HTC Magic will feature Microsoft Exchange support, which will allow users to synchronize with their Outlook emails, contacts and calendar entries in a hassle-free way. Just make sure you keep your HTC Magic juiced up if you’re relying on a push connection.

This is interesting because there is a lack of native Exchange ActiveSync support on the T-Mobile G1 so far, restricting its use in the corporate world.

ACE is a robot that will find humans, ask for directions, even interpret the pointing gestures of silly humans to find its way. He even says thank you before going on his way. With ACE, German scientists have shown that robots lost in urban areas don’t need to rely on their own faculties to get from place to place.

This is the real world that the robot is roaming, not a controlled environment. After 5 hours and 38 interactions, ACE reached its destination. So it is actively gathering and using real world data to find it’s way. It doesn’t seem very efficient, but it’s a huge step. As they say, knowledge is power. I’d much rather have a robot that is able to adapt then a dumb machine following a route.

The folks over at Boy Genius Report received a tip that they say has more or less confirmed that the phone is going to be manufactured by Motorola for T-Mobile. Not HTC. Why isn’t HTC in the picture on this one? They have no idea.

If you look at the keyboard font and the buttons on the front of the device there are some things that HTC just wouldn’t do. They’re Moto style. This would be good news for Motorola. We’ll keep an eye on this one.

Japan has received their first Android-powered phone from DoCoMo. It’s known as the HT-03A, and it will run on Android 1.5 Cupcake.

If you think that the HT-03A looks familiar, that’s because this is actually the HTC Magic. There’s also some word that DoCoMo has a surprise for smartphone lovers up its sleeve and will be revealing it in about two weeks.

Everybody is jumping on board the android wagon. Acer is already hard at work on several different devices using the operating system and software, and they plan to launch a smartphone using the software later this year.

Acer doesn’t want to be left in the dust, what with Samsung recently outing the I7500 and HTC pimping the Magic overseas. Gianfranco Lanci (President and CEO) says that “the entire industry is looking at Android,” and that the company “is testing Android on a lot of different solutions.”

The rumor is that Samsung might release a new Omnia Pro soon which will feature a full QWERTY keyboard and a wide touchscreen display, similar to the Touch Pro and Touch Pro2 from HTC. Word is that the Samsung Omnia Pro will arrive on the market this July.

It will retail for about €500. That’s a stunning $662. It will run on Windows Mobile 6.1 and can be upgraded to WM 6.5 when the new OS is available. Apart from the sliding QWERTY keyboard, Samsung Omnia Pro should also have a 3.5 inch WVGA (800 x 480) touchscreen display and a 5MP camera with autofocus, flash, image stabilizer and video recording.

In a surprise announcement, Vodafone Spain is set to launch Magic, HTC’s 2nd Android handset, in just an hour or so. The countdown timer appeared early this morning. Vodafone Spain subscribers will have an 8 day head start on the rest of us.

That may seem like forever to Android lovers, but somehow you’ll manage. It’s free with applicable contract on Vodafone UK, but it’s gonna cost you in Spain. Spanish users describe the rate as “outrageous.”

While it hasn’t been officially announced, German BamS (Bild am Sonntag) has received information that Samsung will launch its first Android smartphone with O2 Germany. Like the HTC Magic, the I7500 will be a touchscreen-only smartphone, running on Android 1.5 (aka Cupcake) plus Google Mobile Services.

Some other features include a Qualcomm MSM7200A CPU at 528 MHz and a 3.2″ HVGA capacitive OLED display, 5 megapixel camera with LED flash and a standard 3.5 mm stereo headset plug. Apparently, the I7500 will support quadband GSM/GPRS/EDGE and dualband UMTS/HSPA, Bluetooth, WIFI and GPS and includes 8 GB internal flash memory which can be expanded by microSD memory cards. t was previously rumored that the S8000 would be Sammy’s first foray into Android.

The T-Mobile G1, has quietly hit a milestone. It has reached over a million units sold in the US alone, which is really saying something since it’s only been six months. It’s great news for the upcoming G2-HTC Dream Android-powered handset.

Sure, that’s nothing compared to the number of Blackberrys, iPhones, and Windows Mobile devices, but you can bet they have their eye on boostig that marketshare number.