Smartphones

Hands On the Asus P527 Windows Mobile Smartphone

We just got our hands on the the Asus P527 we told you about a month ago. We confirmed that it does indeed have GPS, Windows Mobile 6 (shown here in, yes, English!) Wi-Fi and at least EDGE. (We will soon know if it has HSDPA, but don’t hold your breath.) Asus will sell it…

Symbian Boss Calls Android Just “Another Linux Platform”

Symbian CEO Nigel Clifford just told reporters at a conference that the Android phone OS presented by Google and the Open Handset Alliance is “another Linux platform.” He added: “There’s 10, 15, 20, maybe 25 different Linux platforms out there. It sometimes appears that Linux is fragmenting faster than it unifies.” He also said that…

Why Verizon and AT&T Didn’t Join the Open Handset Alliance (Yet)

Following the Open Handset Alliance getting official, we noted the conspicuous absence of the US’s two biggest wireless carriers, and dissected some of the reasons T-Mobile and Sprint were onboard but they weren’t. According to the WSJ, Verizon’s still mulling joining up, while AT&T “in part because it exclusively carries the iPhone in the U.S.,…

HTC and the Open Handset Alliance

We just talked with HTC, a major member in Google’s Open Handset Alliance that’s no stranger to making smartphones. While CEO Peter Chou couldn’t tell us much about the hardware side of the equation—or even the Dream prototype, they could tell us some plans about the new device. First, they’re going to continue their current…

Sexy LG KS20 Now Shipping (At Least For Some)

Europeans get lucky this week, as the Prada successor LG KS20 hits stores in France, Germany, Spain, the Netherlands and Italy. (What up, UK?) The final specs on this baby are in, and they make us terribly jealous. https://gizmodo.com/lg-ks20-has-touchscreen-is-hsdpa-friendly-and-ifa-boun-294515 It’s got 3.6Mbps HSDPA and Wi-Fi B and G, and what looks like a half-way decent…

Marvell Power Supply Chip Shrinks Power Bricks, Energy Use

Marvell’s launching a new chip for more efficient power supplies that cuts down energy use by automatically adjusting the amount of juice drawn by a computer depending on what it actually needs, slashing waste—it can chop peak energy use by up to 50 percent, according to Marvell. It also supposedly rolls the functionality of 20…

Samsung SPH-M4650, WinMo Smartphone with Multi-touch

Samsung answers the iPhone (isn’t everyone?) with this Samsung SPH-M4650, a smartphone running Windows Mobile 6 that takes the touchscreen concept a step further while adding a dose of tacky design along the way. Its touch screen gives you haptic feedback, goosing you with a slight vibration when you touch an icon on its 2.8″…

USA Today’s Eleventh Hour Google Phone Facts/Speculation/Hype

USA Today mostly rehashes what we’ve heard about Google’s plans, but they add a few unique contributions to the growing rumor pile. First, they peg Google’s partners as “includ[ing] Sprint, Motorola, Samsung and Japanese wireless giant NTT DoCoMo”—WSJ is betting Sprint, T-Mobile, and HTC, with Samsung and other hardware companies as possibilities. (Reuters also says…

The WSJ Ponders How Google Will Change Phones (Verdict: Feature Explosion)

The Wall Street Journal tweaks the hype for Google’s supposedly hours-away mobile announcement with a boilerplate of speculation about how Google’s open platform will bust open the wireless industry by igniting “a race among Silicon Valley developers, long shut out of the wireless industry, to come up with new applications for cellphones,” like HDTV, multiplayer…

RIM Device Users Are Having a Gay Old Time

A survey of business smartphone users has declared those using BlackBerries to be the most satisfied. Palm and Samsung offerings both drew in second place. The main six areas that were surveyed included OS, physical design, ease of operation, audio quality, battery life and utility feature set. RIM excelled in areas concerning battery life and…

NBC Hacked iPhone Video

We just told you about the hacked iPhone we spotted on NBC’s Saturday Night Live. You can spot the proof around 20 seconds in. The sketch is actually incredibly funny—some of the most edgy material we’ve seen on SNL in a while. We may even have to start watching regularly again, you know, if they…

UK iPhone Launching with 1.1.2 Firmware, Jailbreak Broken

T3 got their hands on the new European iPhone, and to their delight (and dismay), the phone is pre-installed with firmware 1.1.2—which is newer than the 1.1.1 firmware we currently have in the States. Believe it or not, it’s actually packing some new features. But before you ask, their early testing shows that current Jailbreak…

Challenger Mobile to Offer Free VOIP Without Wi-Fi

A mystery carrier in the UK will soon be partnering with Challenger Mobile to offer free VOIP from normal cellphones without the annoying necessity for a Wi-Fi network. The prospect would allow a mobile phone user to call any country in the world for completely free if the other party supports the techology. So how…

Evolution of the Sidekick Flip From the 3, iD, LX to the Slide

As part of the Slide review process, Benny G and I just made this super-quick video of all four recent models: Sidekick 3, Sidekick iD, Sidekick LX and Sidekick Slide. What will you notice? Changes in flip action, changes in the flip sound effects, and remarkable difference in screen brightness and clarity. But one question,…

For Palm Centro fans holding out until the Ruby Red ones arrive, Sunday’s the big day. That’s when they show up at “all Sprint sales channels, Palm stores and online,” says an official little birdy. [Palm Centro] https://gizmodo.com/palm-centro-unboxed-and-reviewed-verdict-yep-definit-309196

MOTO Q 9h Coming Tomorrow on AT&T for $200

OK, so we were a little off in the timing, but the MOTO Q 9h is now making its way to AT&T. The new WM6 phone is the first Motorola Q with full, quad band GPRS/EDGE support, meaning you don’t need to rent a loaner the next time you jet set to Paris for lunch.…

Japan Tracking GPS Defense Officials With Phones

Japan is going to start tracking their defense officials through hi-tech, James Bondish means—GPS-enabled phones. After a retired defense official admitted to playing hundreds of free rounds of golf (bought by a defense contractor) while on the job, officials of the officials have gotten upset, and decided that members of the defense ministry need to…

Verizon’s F700 Variant Could Actually Be the Samsung SCH-U940

Last week we mentioned a rumor that a variant of the Samsung F700 could make its way on the Verizon network sometime in the near future. Today, another rumor from Phone Arena has determined that the variant is actually the Samsung SCH-U940, and it is set to make its official debut sometime in the next…

100k iPhone Users Jailbreak’d Yesterday

Approximately 100k iPhone users, and what I’d guess as about 5-7% of all iPhone users, browsed to jailbreakme.com to put apps back on their 1.1.1 iPhones. That’s not far from the 9% owner base that Apple brags picked up 2 million Leopard copies over the first two days of sales. That’s a lot of iPhone…

Spy Shots of Streamlined New UIQ Interface

Other than these quick and dirty snapshots smuggled out a presentation somewhere, not much is known about the new UIQ interface. Although, many Sony Ericsson users will undoubtedly be excited about getting a closer look at what appears to be a much improved touch-based UI. Additional photo after the jump. [Gearfuse]