The Dell Streak 5 (previously known as the Dell Mini 5) is a

smartphone A smartphone is a mobile phone with advanced computing capabilities. It typically has a touchscreen interface, allowing users to access a wide range of applications and services, such as web browsing, email, and social media, as well as multi ...

/ tablet hybrid ("

phablet A phablet (, ) is a mobile device combining or straddling the size formats of smartphones and tablets. The word is a blend word of ''phone'' and ''tablet''. The term was largely unused by the late 2010s, since average phone sizes eventually morph ...

") from

Dell Dell Inc. is an American technology company that develops, sells, repairs, and supports personal computers (PCs), Server (computing), servers, data storage devices, network switches, software, computer peripherals including printers and webcam ...

that uses the Android

operating system An operating system (OS) is system software that manages computer hardware and software resources, and provides common daemon (computing), services for computer programs. Time-sharing operating systems scheduler (computing), schedule tasks for ...

, released in 2010. It comes with a

capacitive touchscreen A touchscreen (or touch screen) is a type of display that can detect touch input from a user. It consists of both an input device (a touch panel) and an output device (a visual display). The touch panel is typically layered on the top of the e ...

and two cameras, a 5 MP one with dual-

LED A light-emitting diode (LED) is a semiconductor device that emits light when current flows through it. Electrons in the semiconductor recombine with electron holes, releasing energy in the form of photons. The color of the light (corresp ...

flash on the back and a

VGA Video Graphics Array (VGA) is a video display controller and accompanying de facto graphics standard, first introduced with the IBM PS/2 line of computers in 1987, which became ubiquitous in the IBM PC compatible industry within three years. T ...

- resolution one on the front for video calling; both are capable of video. The three buttons at the bottom (or right, when held in its normal landscape mode) are capacitive. The Android buttons used are Home, Menu, and Back. It features a

skin on top and has a cradle adapter with

HDMI High-Definition Multimedia Interface (HDMI) is a proprietary digital interface used to transmit high-quality video and audio signals between devices. It is commonly used to connect devices such as televisions, computer monitors, projectors, gam ...

out. The phone lacks the navigational

trackball A trackball is a pointing device consisting of a ball held by a socket containing sensors to detect a rotation of the ball about two axes—like an upside-down ball mouse (computing), mouse with an exposed protruding ball. Users roll the ball t ...

found in many previous Android devices. While FM radio support is not an official feature, an FM radio chip was found upon inspection of the Streak's internal hardware, and can be accessed though a user's modification of the OS. A seven-inch version of the Streak was announced at the

Consumer Electronics Show CES (; formerly an initialism for Consumer Electronics Show) is an annual trade show organized by the Consumer Technology Association (CTA). Held in January at the Las Vegas Convention Center in Winchester, Nevada, United States, the event typi ...

in January 2011. The Wall Street Journal reviewed it unfavorably in February. A long-rumored ten-inch model went on sale in August in China. Dell discontinued the Streak 5 on as of August 15, 2011. Customers attempting to purchase the device were directed to a "Good Bye, Streak 5" landing page. The larger Streak 7 was discontinued on December 2, 2011; Dell continued to sell a 10-inch tablet in China at that time.

Pre-release

The development was first disclosed in June 2009 and in October 2009 it was known that the tablet was capable of making 3G phone calls.

Software

The versions released previously have had Android 1.6 installed, with

offering unlocked Streaks with Android 2.2 (Froyo) in December 2010. Dell Streak-02

Dell Streak 7 showing WP page of D S 5 jeh

Customers on the British O2 mobile phone network were given the opportunity to install Android 2.1 in early September 2010 through an

Over the Air Over the Air was an annual mobile technology-focused overnight Hackathon, hack day event held in London from 2008 to 2016. The two-day event would include practical and educational talks and a hacking competition. Sponsors of the event have inc ...

update. This update, however, caused an uproar amongst consumers, over bugs and removal of some features from the previous software.

Source code and rooting

Following protests from users that

, by not including source code, had violated the terms of the

GNU General Public License The GNU General Public Licenses (GNU GPL or simply GPL) are a series of widely used free software licenses, or ''copyleft'' licenses, that guarantee end users the freedom to run, study, share, or modify the software. The GPL was the first ...

, the source code for the

Streak became available for download. There is a root method for the Dell Streak, and many roms are available, including iterations of the

CyanogenMod CyanogenMod ( ; CM) is a discontinued open-source operating system for mobile devices, based on the Android mobile platform. Developed between 2009 and 2016, it was free and open-source software based on the official releases of Android by Goog ...

ROM. These are available from the xda-developers website along with other ROMS.

Reception

The Streak 7 received a tepid reaction from one reviewer due to its poor display and software bugs/glitches at launch. The Streak was considered bulky, and the Android 2.2 "Froyo" that it ran was geared more for smartphones instead of tablets. While almost all tablet computers released in 2011 had failed to gain much market share in the face of overwhelming demand for the Apple iPad 2, the Streak 7 compared poorly to other Android tablets such as the

Samsung Galaxy Tab The Samsung Galaxy Tab (stylized as SΛMSUNG Galaxy Tab) is a line of Android OS tablet computers produced by Samsung Electronics. The first model was the Samsung Galaxy Tab 2010 with 7-inch display, which was presented to the public on 2 Sep ...

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''InfoWorld'' has suggested that Dell treated the Streak as a "Frankenphone business", where OEMs see tablets as a short-term, low-investment opportunity running Android OS, but this approach neglected the user interface and this failed to gain long term market traction with consumers.

References

External links