And if that Tegra 2 scoop yesterday was not enough, today we have a little bit extra. Nvidia will be releasing an Android app called Tegra Zone, which should be the easiest way of finding Android applications that make the most out of the power the dual-core beast provides.

For your convenience, the Tegra Zone will offer reviews, high-res screenshots and HD trailers for the apps that it lists. After you have chosen an app, the Tegra Zone will use the Android Market to wrap up the purchase. NVIDIA points out that the current Market poor support of large files has been putting developers off to provide great games to the Android community. The company addresses this issue by giving the devs unlimited storage to host their applications.

Gameloft, one of the largest game developing companies, has also been invited by NVIDIA to join the Tegra Zone. As you may know, Gameloft does not offer its games on the Android Market, but maybe this will change if the two companies come to some sort of agreement.

The parent company produces equipment similar to tractors. JCB Mobile on the other hand offers phones. This British brand started shipping handsets in December of 2010 in UK. Employees of the company argue that the sales exceeded their expectations. The product range has 4 models manufactured in China, which is not surprising. As big companies apart from Samsung do not offer protected models, while second tier manufacturers like Sonim charge around $500 for an ordinary budget model, JCB Mobile has a chance. Pricing policy is right, because JCB asks adequate amounts of money for their products. Lets go back to the phones first.

All models use one slogan ToughPhone followed by a proper name:

• Tradesman – budget phone with IP67 protection level. It can swim and costs £75 in the UK and $72 in the USA. The difference is quite visible, but this price was named at the exhibition.
• Sitemaster – protection level is only IP54, so you should not put it into water. On the other hand owners can drop it from the height of 2 meters and assault in any other way. The price is £115 or $170.
• PRO – protection level again goes up to IP67 coupled with GPS and camera. The price is £245 or $350. There is also a PRO-TALK version, which cost £10 or $10 more and includes an in-built Walkie Talkie.

The model has a flashlight, but more importantly it boasts Bluetooth. A 1.44-inch cSTN screen must have the resolution of 128х128. You should not expect more from a budget handset. The size is 111х49х20 mm. It sports a 650 mAh Li-Ion battery. You can also find radio here and the support of GSM 900/1800/1900. The manufacturer disclosed only these specifications. The main point is the price. A fully protected phone is used for calls only. Nobody cares about screens in similar circumstances, so it could have been a monochrome one. The model looks and is accessible.

Site-master got a bigger 2-inch TFT screen of 262K. The size is 115х53х23mm, while the battery has 1300 mAh. Surprisingly we find a laser pointer in this phone. I cannot imagine why you may need it outdoors, but who knows. It looks more expensive, but the protection level is only IP54, so it is not waterproof. At the same time it handles physical impact well. Screws are reliable and the handset is not inferior to offerings from Sonim, which cost way too much.

The flagship PRO model (and its PRO Talk version) comes with a dynamo generator enabled charger. A 2.2-inch screen boasts a QVGA resolution. GSM 850/900/1800/1900 bands are supported. The handset can work with two SIM cards at the same time, but if you wish you can insert only one. An in-built camera has 2 MP, while the overall memory amounts to 256 MB. The battery has 1800 mAh. The size is 126х60х22 mm. You can find GPS here and an 8 channel radio in the walkie-talkie modification.

Look at this graph from Forrester Research, which is rather eloquent. Even if their forecast turns to be pessimistic and the market will enjoy faster growth, it will simply make those changes more vivid even sooner.

Have you paid attention to the dropping sales of traditional computers? Intel and AMD were present on the market of laptops and netbooks from the very outset as it was only too logical to branch out into adjacent segments of a bigger computer pie. The market of tablets was created by Apple. Before iPad was unveiled we had a dozen of related devices, but they never enjoyed high popularity. Only Apple managed to create a special environment around the product and connect it with other offerings. Suddenly, after the market started growing Intel and AMD were left on the sidelines as their place was taken by ARM.

We cannot underestimate the dependence of hardware manufacturers from Microsoft. For example, MeeGo was created when Microsoft decided not to develop a version of Windows 7 for netbooks on Intel Atom. To sell its hardware Intel had to come up with its own OS. They went for Linux Moblin, which was hardly developing at that time. Together with Nokia Intel created MeeGo and paid it more attention ever since. By the way, MeeGo is available both for Intel Atom and ARM.

During the press conference of Nvidia the room was packed. Not everybody could get in. Its CEO compared the current event with COMDEX 1995, when Microsoft unveiled Windows 95. Things happening now are as important as those historical developments. On one slide he showed the evolution of sales for desktop systems and respective figures for iOS and Android. The world has changed and became more mobile.

Nvidia began the development of Tegra 2 5 years ago. The task was to create an energy efficient chip to support many tasks vital for a smartphone games, browser and camera. Nvidia managed to come up with the first commercial sample of a dual core chip. Capitalizing on its expertise in graphic processors the company added GeForce GPU here. It means that games for this solution will start to be released soon. Nvidia believes that similar products should be present not only in the top segment, but they target the mass market as well. Surely, you will see flagship models first, but already this year the number of models on offer will be impressive and the price will start falling. Mass market is the key to success and Nvidia is fully aware of it. The same applies to its partners.

Comscore have released their most recent set of numbers for the American mobile market and it paints the same general trend as we have been seeing over the past months, but this time Comscore has handed Android the distinction of surpassing the iPhone for the first time.

The September to November 2010 period saw iOS increase its marketshare from 24.2% to 25%, but in the same period Android went from 19.6% to 26%, just pipping the iPhone. However, neither platform was the most popular according to Comscore, that honour went to RIM, which held a 33.5% marketshare, down 4.1% from August though so they may not hold that title too much longer.

In terms of the wider market including feature phones Samsung saw its U.S. marketshare increase from 23.6% to 24.5%. Everyone else saw their marketshare decline, LG losing 0.3% to stand at 20.9%, Motorola down 1.8% to 17% and RIM losing 0.2% for a total of 8.8%.

Its a pretty safe bet to assume that these trends will continue when we get the first results for 2011 and Android may be near, or even at, the top of the heap by then.