New Zealanders are getting their first chance to buy a cellphone running on Google's Android operating system, albeit through an unconventional channel.

Upstart Australian electronics electronics company Kogan International has worked with a contract Chinese manufacturer and Google to create the Android-powered "Agora", just the second Google phone in the world to be released after HTC's G1, which was launched for US carrier T-Mobile.

Auckland-based Rakon could be poised to ride the gPhone wave. 

The first cellphone based on Google's Android operating system, T-Mobile's G1, will go onsale in the US today. 

T-Mobile had been targetting to sell 500,000 units by Christmas, but today said it's taken more than 1.5 million pre-orders for the G1.

That's good news for HTC, the Taiwanese company that's manufacturing the G1 handset. HTC has announced it's now tripled its initial production run.

Telecom and Vodafone may be wary of Google's foray into mobile phones, with the latter having no immediate plans to bring the first Google Android-powered handset, the 3G T-Mobile G1, into New Zealand.

But Parallel Imported Ltd – the scourge of official distributors or the champion of pushing new technology into the country, depending on your point of view – is keen to slake Kiwis’ thirst for Android.

Google has today filed a patent application for technology that lets a mobile phone automatically detect the cheapest wi-fi, WiMax or cellular plan in any given location.

The idea is that rather than being tied to a single phone company or ISP plan, your cellphone and automatically pick-and-mix from the cheapest connection options as you move around.

Microsoft today announced it will remove Windows Photo Gallery, Windows Mail, and Windows Movie Maker from the next version of its operating system, the rush-release Windows 7.

Why denude your own product? To redirect people after free photo, video and movie software toward Microsoft’s new web-based “Live” service, the company’s equivalent to Google’s online-hosted apps.

Standby for the biggest geek frenzy since Apple’s iPhone first appeared in Steve Jobs’ paws.

This morning Google co-founders Sergey Brin and Larry Page roller-bladed onto a New York stage to unveil the first cellphone to run on Google’s Android software.

The G1 Dream (the official name for the handset formerly known as the gPhone) will be sold by US carrier T-Mobile to run on its 3G network. Tied to a plan, it’s priced from $US179 – undercutting Apple’s cheapest 3G iPhone deal at $US200.