Sorry to burst your warp bubble, bucko, but that text message you received the other day from a cellphone user in the year 2016 was just some stupid bug.

I really didn't want to beat up on WinMo here, because at this point it just feels tired. But man, come on Microsoft, you're giving me no choice. Windows Mobile 6.5 isn't just a letdown—it barely seems done.

T-Mobile's take on the HTC Touch Pro2, a 3.6-inch-screened, slide-out-QWERTYed refresh to the company's flagship Windows Mobile phone.

Fantastic news for current Windows Mobile users: Windows Marketplace for Mobile, Microsoft's forthcoming app store, will work on 6.0 and 6.1 handsets as well. When? Still a cryptic "Fall," unfortunately.

If you thought the Epix was the BlackJack III, nope. Meet the Jack. It's a pretty standard Windows Mobile 6.1, 3G and Wi-Fi deal, and it compels copywriters to make lame playing card puns:

HTC has confirmed that their touchscreen / QWERTY slider Touch Pro2 will be available in all major markets—including North America.

Acer has unveiled their rumored smartphones, the X960, F900, M900, and DX900. And they don't look half bad, other than lacking WinMo 6.5 and being a tad on the chunky side. Here's a rundown:

HTC's Touch Diamond, and its QWERTY'd doppelganger the Touch Pro, have formally passed into their second generation, with bigger screens, higher (WVGA) resolution, better battery life, and deeper interface changes.

Sprint has taken their sweet time pushing out the Windows Mobile 6.1 Palm Treo Pro—but with the Palm Pre on its way, is the Pro even worth releasing at this point?

T-Mobile's just launched the Shadow (Shadow II), the successor to the HTC Shadow, which features a customized UI on top of Windows Mobile 6.1. It's quite similar to the original in just about all respects.

Many of you asked for a re-do of Windows Mobile browser testing after our Battlemodo declared the platform beyond worthless for surfing. So here it is, the internet running on Windows Mobile's finest hardware.

The Gadget: Samsung Omnia for Verizon, a touchscreen Windows Mobile 6.1 phone that's been slicked up with Samsung's TouchWiz UI and a five-megapixel camera, plus it's that rare Verizon beast that also packs Wi-Fi.

Before 2007, using the internet on your phone would make you want to kill yourself, if you were dumb enough to believe the crap splattered across that tiny screen even was the "internet." But the combination of increased bandwidth and better mobile software means that more phones really are promising to deliver the …

The Windows Mobile team has confirmed that the upcoming IE Mobile 6 browser or "IE 6 on 6" will not be made available as a separate download for current WinMo 6.1 smartphones. Instead, the update will only show up on devices released starting at the end of this year or in early 2009. The reason, according to…

Rumors have been floating around for a few weeks now, but today Pharos has officially unveiled two new additions to their Windows Mobile GPS smartphone lineup—the Traveller 117 and 127. Generally, another GPS-enabled phone is nothing to get all that excited about, but tri-band 7.2Mbps HSDPA, 2-megapixel cam / front…

HTC has always known their biggest weakness: Windows Mobile. They've done their best to hide the aged interface in glossy costumes and bolster performance, but they can only do so much—the OS is slow, buggy and can drain battery life on certain hardware. Luckily, Windows Mobile responds well to per-device…

If the BlackBerry Storm isn't quite your beat, Verizon's got a surprisingly sturdy brigade of other phones coming out next month, headlined by Samsung's Omnia and HTC's Touch Pro (sorry, XV6850—why won't you just let HTC be, Verizon?). The Omnia's keeping the same crappy UI, but it'll be tarted up red, the way VZW…

You're more likely than ever to buy a smartphone, not just because they do so much more than dumb feature phones, with real email, decent web browsing and downloadable applications, but because they're cheaper than ever. With the exception of some expensive ass unlocked-but-unsubsidized European models, you generally…

Microsoft's Ballmer has just confirmed that Zune software will be coming to Windows Mobile devices as well as other phones, as sort of a really late follow-up to Robbie Bach's comments on the same subject. Ballmer goes one step further than Robbie, who just made vague comments on the platform, and said this:

Today is a good day for Palm fans because the 3G-equipped, touchscreen Treo Pro is hitting the street for $550. Again, rumor has it that it could come to AT&T at a subsidized price in December, but if you want to get the unlocked version, now is the time. [Palm]