Not to be outdone by its Korean rival, LG's reportedly preparing a potent new phone with some of Qualcomm's latest SoC hardware. According to BriefMobile's leak, it'll pack an LTE-friendly http://www.engadget.com/2011/02/14/qualcomm-ships-dual-mode-gobi3000-wwan-chip-intros-lte-hspa/">MDM9615 alongside the Adreno 320 GPU and 2GB of RAM -- something LG has already announced for its Optimus LTE2. A 2,1000 mAh battery will apparently power the 4.67-inch 1280 x 768 LCD display, while a Sony-matching 13-megapixel camera will face out the back. The leak -- which includes the decidedly abstract photo above -- reckons the LTE slab will arrive on Sprint, which tallies with the LS970 model number. We're cautiously holding out for something more official soon -- perhaps once the Now Network's flipped that 4G switch.

The latest refresh of the Linux kernel, 3.3, is now available, and the second release of 2012 brings with it the long-awaited merging of code from Google's little side project. While that is particularly interesting to developers looking to boot Android or run apps on the stock Linux kernel (FYI: optimized power management and other infrastructure that didn't make it this time will arrive in the next release, 3.4) and represents a resolution to the issues that kept the two apart for so long it's not the only new feature included. There are improvements to file systems like Btrfs, memory management, networking, security and much, much more. Hit the source link below for the full changelog or grab the code and from the usual locations and get your compile on directly.

If you're going to steal, steal from the best. JXD has just released its S7100, a fairly conspicuous 7-inch Android-powered gaming tablet marketed towards playing old-school arcade games. The device features a D-pad, face buttons, an 800 x 480 capacitive touchsceen, ARM Cortex A9 CPU, Mali 400 GPU, 512MB of RAM, 16GB of internal storage, 0.3 megapixel front camera, 2.0 megapixel rear camera and HDMI-out. A video trailer shows the unit playing a variety of touchscreen games and classic ROMs including Metal Slug, Mario Kart 64, Angry Birds, Plants Vs. Zombies and Fruit Ninja HD. Not to be undone, the device also features the actual PlayStation button icons on its own buttons (sound familiar?), while the marketing website for the device sports icons from Apple, Google, Microsoft and others. If you're thus far undeterred, there's a must-watch promotional vid hosted just after the break -- nothing justifies a $140 price tag like Bieber, right?

Hark! The first renders of the HTC Rezound have appeared online, thanks to some of the device's cases going up for pre-order. You can see that, like the Sensation XE, the phone has red-glowing soft keys -- a bit of a departure from HTC's traditionally conservative design language. If you recall, the phone formerly called Vigor is said to have a 4.3-inch screen, a dual-core 1.5GHz processor, 1GB RAM, Beats Audio and an 8MP rear camera. Now that you know what the Verizon 4G cellular telephone will look like, you'll be able to pick one out of a lineup when it's available, which should be on November 10th for $300 on contract.

Korea's finest have been very coy on the dual-core and Honeycomb update to the Galaxy Tab 7, the 7 Plus. We knew that Austria and Indonesia would get it by the end of October but didn't know when it was likely to land in the States, or how much it would cost when it got here. Fortunately, it has now been spotted at J&R.com, where you will be happy to know that the 16GB version will cost $400, while the 32GB costs a bit more at $500. Now they just need to tell us when the thing will actually arrive.

It seems like only yesterday that we got the full specy treatment from Samsung's QWERTYriffic Stratosphere -- 4-inch Super AMOLED display, Android 2.3 and 5MP rear-facing camera included. There was an important bit of information missing from the proceedings, however -- namely a release date. Droid Life has shed some light on that little mystery -- according to the site, the LTE handset should start offering up its Gingerbread goodness on Verizon starting October 13th.