Categories

3G HTC BlackBerry Cellphones Iphone Ipod-Mp3 LG Motorola Nokia O2 Samsung Smartphone Sony Ericsson Vodafone

We probably won’t be seeing Philips X800 full touchscreen handset here in Europe or U.S. anytime soon.

Philips left the European mobile market eons ago and sold off it’s mobile unit to Asian investors. And they concentrated on selling Philips mobiles over there.

Well, it’s a shame. But noting prevents us checking out the latest phones under a Philips brand from a far.

Their newest creation - Philips X800 has been reviewed by ePrice today, and looks really cool.

The specs on Philips X800 - tri-band GSM connectivity (900/1800/1900), 2 megapixel camera, 2.9″ 262K touchscreen and microSD memory card slot - are not too exciting.

Except for a battery stand-by time - Philips claims 850 hrs of it, which sounds mighty impressive. The talk time is not that high though - about 8 hrs, so I guess most of the savings are achieved through some clever energy conversation tricks, when inactive.

Still, Philips X800 looks like an interesting handset and I would love to see it sold outside of Asia too.

Labels: Philips

Sharp’s 923SH has one of the most incredible displays! Have a close look at the display specifications and you can see that it is out of this world: 3.3″ LCD with a 480 x 845 pixel format!!! Compare it to the iPhone’s 3.5″ with just 320 x 480 LCD and you can see that Sharp’s 923SH has more than double the number of pixels in a slightly smaller display. Wow.

The clambshell mobile phone is angular and has that minimalist Euro-look to it. Of course there is nothing minimal about what it can do. Back to the display. It can swivel so when you want to watch TV via the 1-Seg tuner, you can watch it in wide format. Cool.

Want to take a picture? Well, you won’t need to bring your digital camera. The 923SH has a 5.2MP digital camera built-in. Not only that it has image stabilization to get clearly pictures even when your hands are not completely still. But.
But I just can’t get over something. What if. What if the 923SH was designed more like an iPhone? Or a slider with a full QWERTY keyboard? What if the beautiful Sharp 3.3″ ASV TFT LCD was multitouch enabled? What if.

Sharp 923SH Specifications

Display: 3.3″ AQUOS TFT LCD Advanced Super View (ASV)
Pixel Format: 480 x 845
Camera: 5.2MP, Auto-focus, Image stabilization
Connectivity: GPS, Bluetooth, 1-Seg, GSM, HSDPA
Storage: microSDHC
Dimensions: 50 x 113 x 18.6mm
Weight: 135g
Availability: July 5, 2008 in Japan via Softbank

Labels: Sharp

with due diligence and a little time, you’ll find that it’s very easy to swap the outer casing of your Nokia N810. But have you ever thought about swapping its operating system for another one?

Probably not, but in case you’re interested in trying out Google’s Android OS before it finally comes out, here’s your chance. There’s actually a two-step process that will let you run the Android OS on a Nokia N810, which is so easy, in fact, that you just wasted your time with reading those last three sentences. Here’s the secret.

First, download “android.img.bz2″ from this drop off point. [Link]

Then, when you’ve finished downloading that, install “android-installer.deb” from either of the following links.

[Link 1] [Link 2]

I believe you’d have to do the downloading part on the Nokia N810 itself. And then afterwards, all you have to do is reboot and run the thing by hitting the new Android icon that will appear in the Extras Menu subfolder.

Better head on over to Internet Tablet Talk for more instructions and tips from those who’ve already tried it. You don’t want to brick your device now, do you? Better safe than bricked, as I always say. And remember this only works with N810’s running Diablo, the latest firmware.

Labels: Nokia

Who woulda thunk it? Canada has has just proved to be the first North American market to offer the hottest new touchscreen flavor from HTC. Our favorite Taiwanese ODM-turned global smartphone-manufacturing powerhouse has finally made good on their promise to bring their highly acclaimed HTC Touch Diamond to the North American market. Unfortunately for us Stateside, Canada will be the first North American market to show off the HTC Touch Diamond.

The full-body touchscreen, sleek design, and slim-waistline of the HTC Touch Diamond aren't going to be exclusive European treats for much longer. HTC is bringing the HTC Touch Diamond to Telus later this summer.

A $149.99 admission price (with 3-year contract, of course) gets you all the Windows Mobile 6.1-powered, 2.8-inch VGA display (complementing the new TouchFLO 3D UI), GPS, WiFi, and 3 megapixel camera goodness that you can handle. Oh, and HSDPA data connectivity rounds out the HTC Touch Diamond's massively impressive feature-set - ensuring that you're never more than a button click and a few seconds away from accessing all the web's knowledge-base.

And, with Telus offering a $15 unlimited email and IM (instant message) data package alongside a $30 unlimited internet, email, and IM data add-on, the HTC Touch Diamond will likely be ready to throw down with Bell Mobility's Samsung Instinct. Of course, there's the iPhone 3G hitting Rogers next week, but with a cheaper data plan and that glorious VGA display on the HTC Touch Diamond, Rogers is going to have to work hard to keep customers interested in the iPhone.

We can't wait to get our hands on the HTC Touch Diamond. VGA, WiFi, GPS, and TouchFLO 3D? Yes, please.

Labels: HTC

Samsung’s newly announced Eco Phone, the SCH-W510, has a nickname: Bio Cover Phone. The reason? The cover is made from bioplastic material, which in turn is made from corn starch. The manufacturing process is an environmentally friendly one and does not use brominated flame retardants (BFRs) and polyvinyl chloride (PVC). In addition, there are no Mercury, Lead or Cadmium. The SCH-W510 is quite sensitive to the environment and seems like it lives up to both its name of Eco Phone and nickname of Bio Cover Phone. The display seems to be about 2.2″ to 2.4″ in size and the pixel format should be 240 x 320, just a guess. I am not thinking that it is touch-enabled.
Mobile phones are used like fashion accessories, especially in Asian countries like South Korea and Japan. So for many teenagers and slightly older folks, the lifetime of a fairly high-end mobile phone is at most 2 years, and generally just a single year. With more than one billion mobile phones to be sold in 2008, that’s a lot of wasted electronics. Where do the so-yesterday mobile phones go? Unfortunately, most of them go to the dump. There are a lot of efforts to recycle the parts and even reuse them, but I am not sure if recycle and reuse percentages are that high. With the advent of Samsung’s Eco Phone, I think it is safe to say that being friendly to the environment is becoming more and more important to major corporations. I am glad to see this trend started by one of the largest mobile phone manufacturers in the world. I hope Nokia, LG, Motorola, RIM, Palm and Apple move toward this direction soon.

Samsung Eco Phone Specifications

Camera: 3MP with Flash
Connectivity: Bluetooth, CDMA
Availability: Now, South Korea

Labels: Samsung

Samsung and Bell Mobility have confirmed the highly popular Instinct will be released in Canada. The launch date is August 8th and is perfect to compete with the iPhone and Bold.

The Samsung Instinct will be available from Bell Mobility for $149.95 on a three-year contract, $249.95 on a two-year contract or $399.95 on a one-year contract. Or if you want this with no contract it is $449.95.

The Instinct is what some are calling the iPhone killer as it has features such as a touch screen interface, full QWERTY keyboard, GPS, a music player that has the ability to call, text or surf the net (full HTML browser), watch movies, mega pixel camera with 4x digital zoom and video camcorder.

Paul Brannen, General Manager, Wireless Terminals Division, Samsung Electronics Canada said: “Millions of people around the world own Samsung wireless handsets. Our company is known for its innovative, stylish and reliable wireless products and now, with the upcoming launch of INSTINCT, we’re raising the bar higher in terms of delivering the ultimate mobile experience”.

Adel Bazerghi, Vice President, Products for Bell Mobility said “We are thrilled to offer Canadians this beautifully designed and intelligent device. Accessing the Internet, listening to downloaded music or satellite radio, watching TV or using it as a GPS system, it’s all a real pleasure with the Samsung Instinct thanks to its powerful touch screen and easy interface. Data pricing plans available with the Samsung Instinct will offer also exceptional value and let clients take full advantage of Bell Mobility’s wide range of data services.”

To compete with the iPhone data plans, Bell seems to have it correct: voice and data plans include the $10 Unlimited Mobile Browser add-on data plan that allows unlimited Internet access.

Labels: Samsung

Equipped with the latest communication technologies and optimized for online work on the go, the new HP iPAQ 910 Business Messenger allows you to download files at up to 7.2 Mbps speeds via tri-band UMTS/HSDPA connectivity, roam internationally via the quad-band GSM support, and share information with others through the email and Instant Messaging.
Coming at a price of $450, the Smartphone brings wireless connectivity, 3G support, modem functionality, and built-in Microsoft Internet Sharing, a service that enables dial-up connection to multiple users sharing the same local area connection.

It’s easy to type on a QWERTY keyboard and edit the images captured with the built-in 3MP camera on the large 2.4-inch transflective TFT touch-sensitive display with a resolution of 320 x 240 pixels, and using the scroll wheel you can browse through emails and documents. Windows Mobile adds corporate email and advanced business applications, which you can handle while talking on the phone using Voice Commander and HP Voice Reply.
The Voice Reply capability can be used to reply to your emails verbally and use your hands to finish something else.

In addition, Google Maps with the GPS module work together to find the best directions so you to arrive anywhere you need in the shortest time, watching turn-by-turn instructions.

In your free time you can simply relax while listening to the music via Windows Media Player, watch cool videos or play some Java games.
HP iPAQ 910 Business Messenger runs on Microsoft Windows Mobile 6.1 Professional operating system powered by a processor reaching 416MHz speeds. The memory is of 128MB SDRAM and 256MB Flash ROM. Other features include miniUSB for stereo headsets, microSD card, CMOS camera type with 4x digital zoom, stylus input, Bluetooth 2.0 with EDR, and a 1940 mAh Li-Poly battery.

The handset measures 2.5 x 0.6 x 4.5 inches at a weight of 5.4 oz.

Labels: HP

Remade is an interesting concept and now let’s see what the new Nokia cell phone concept is all about. It’s called Nokia Eco Sensor and it’s all a green design. It works together with a sensing device companion and it allows the users of such handhelds to share environmental information collected by the phone.

The sensor is wearable on the neck or wrist and can observe the environment changes, your health, as well as local weather conditions, while with the cell phone connects to it via the Near Field Communication technology using touch input.
Eco Sensor is customizable with green tools so you can choose between a heart-rate monitor, motion detector for walking, and others.
It could analyze the gas level in the air, ultraviolet radiation, noise level, air pressure, humidity level and temperature.
What would a green phone be made of? It would include printed electronics like conductive inks on plastic, polyactic acid plastics with plant modifiers, elastomers, and recycled steel for the entire casing.
Eco Sensor would be powered by solar energy, heat energy from the user’s arm or kinetic, as much as it needs because the sensing device could be self-powered eliminating the need for external sources.
For the display Nokia could use electrowetting, a next-generation technology consisting of applying electrical voltage to tiny drops of oil, which leads to the expanding and contracting of droplets, so the display will turn On or Off, similar with the pixel lighting process.

Nokia designers and researchers teams try to stimulate the industry to produce environmental-friendly devices and the Eco Sensor is just an example of what green design could become.

Labels: Nokia

The official Openmoko online store will begin offering the Openmoko FreeRunner on or around July 4th. The Neo FreeRunner is the second phone designed to run Openmoko software and is the direct descendant of the earlier FIC Neo1973. Hardware specs are at Neo FreeRunner GTA02 Hardware.The Neo FreeRunner is a Linux-based touch screen smart phone aimed at general consumer use as well as Linux desktop users and software developers. The device is a black oval-shaped candybar handset and weighing 6.5 ounces

The Neo FreeRunner is available in two different tri-band GSM versions (850/1800/1900MHz or 900/1800/1900MHz) and includes WiFi for fast data speeds. AGPS and Bluetooth 2.0 is also on board. A large 2.8″ VGA resolution touchscreen display is available for input, and there are 2 3-axis motion sensors on board, which should enable some interesting applications. The Openmoko Neo FreeRunner has a suggested retail price of $399. Openmoko will sell the phone directly from it its webshop www.Openmoko.com and via distributors in the EU, India and North America.

Labels: Neonode

According to idnes.cz, Samsung is planning to launch yet another full touch screen smartphone, the Samsung SGH-i740. The i740 is the sucessor of Samsung i710. The SGH-i740 slider will run the latest version of Microsoft’s mobile OS (Windows Mobile 6.1). The device is not going to be an expensive smartphone though, according to the source it will lack of 3G support and also without the WiFi capability. The new Samsung measures 107 x 59 x 13.8 millimeters and body and a special designed dial-pad navigation button at the middle. It features a 3 megapixel camera, 2.8-inch QVGA touchscreen with VibeTonz haptics feedback, built-in GPS receiver, FM radio, Bluetooth 2.0+EDR, and a microSD expansion slot. Monahan LV 624 MHz CPU will provide all the processing power needed. Samsung i740 should be released by the end of this summer – we’ll see then what its target is as well as for what retail price it is being offered.

Labels: Samsung