Cell Phone Hub

Filed under: Cellphones

Each week Ross Rubin contributes Switched On, a column about technology, multimedia, and digital entertainment.

In the 1999 geek classic, “Pirates of Silicon Valley”, an Apple employee watching the famous “1984″ commercial with Steve Jobs points to the Big Brother character — intended to represent IBM — and then points to Bill Gates of Microsoft, whom Jobs has just introduced as part of Apple’s family. The silent message is that the real threat to Apple is Microsoft, not IBM, and indeed the following scene depicts Jobs confronting Gates after Jobs sees Windows 1.0 running on an NEC PC.

That scene, set in 1983, could be easily recreated 25 years later, substituting the iPhone for the Macintosh, Microsoft for IBM as the iPhone’s perceived threat, and Google for Microsoft as the iPhone’s more serious threat. Like Microsoft in 1983, Google is a key Apple partner in 2008. The iPhone features Google Maps, GMail and Google as its default Web search engine, and Google CEO Eric Schmidt even sits on Apple’s board of directors. And also like Microsoft in 1983, Google is working fervently to create a wide range of competitors to Apple’s iPhone. None of these may ever match the integrated experience of Apple’s iPhone, but it’s clear that the first Android phone has come closer to the iPhone experience than Windows 1.0 did to the original Macintosh operating system.

Nevertheless, Google’s task is a lot more daunting than Microsoft’s was at the dawn of Windows for several reasons.

Continue reading Switched On: With friends like Google, does Apple need Microsoft?

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Filed under: Cellphones, Portable Audio, Portable Video

Forget everything you know about perspective, Samsung’s Haptic 2 is clearly one huge-ass handset. Amazing that the jumbo-handed product waif on the left can even hoist the beast without so much as a grimace. Otherwise, Samsung’s newest fullscreen device looks every bit the hot Korean cousin to the i900 Omnia. The Haptic 2 followup to the original Haptic features DMB television, 4GB (SCH-W550 or SPH-W5500, about $600) or 16GB (SCH-W555, about $690) of storage, integrated mobile banking, and improved (more sensitive) 3.2-inch touchscreen and an updated TouchWiz UI now sporting 50 widget applications (up from 15) and user defined vibration tones — whoa, better beef up security for the Korean launch Sammy.

[Via Telecoms Korea]

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Filed under: Cellphones, Handhelds

Never one to settle, Art Lebedev’s design shop is trying its hand at handset design, and we like the looks of it. Art is teaming up with Scartel, a Russian carrier which just launched a WiMax network in Moscow and St. Petersburg, for a flagship handset of sorts, and has left no spec unturned — at least in the wishful-thinking conceptual stage. In addition to a WiMax radio, the device has WiFi, tri-band GSM, microSD, dual cameras, 3.5mm audio, an A/V plug and a gargantuan 850 x 480 screen. There are minimal buttons at the base: a five-way joystick and call / end, and no keypad, so we’re going to assume that we’re looking at a touchscreen device. Now all that’s left is to pick an OS — would Android be too much to ask? Another shot is after the fold.

[Via Pocket-lint]

Continue reading Art Lebedev’s Scartel WiMax handset concept: we’re moving to Russia

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Filed under: Cellphones

Perhaps a nod to Samsung’s corny candybars and Nokia’s wild Earth-friendly hardware, Sony Ericsson has unveiled its GreenHeart concept, a never-destined-for-production handset that incorporates a bunch of green technologies that it’d like to bring to market over the coming years. Most of the GreenHeart’s ideas are totally logical and could be executed today — online user manuals, bioplastic and recycled plastic materials, and a charger that draws just 3.5mW in trickle mode, just to name a few — but the company is shopping around the whole lot of it to customers and “selected partners” to determine which eco-concepts should be implemented for production and in what order. Unfortunately, Sony Ericsson isn’t seeing fit to show any pictures of the GreenHeart right now, which we take to mean it looks like a tree.

[Via Unwired View]

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Filed under: Cellphones, Desktops, Displays, Wireless

After personally trying out Sprint’s AIRAVE, we’re confident that femtocells have a place in this world. Thankfully, Motorola’s already trying to make them less of an eyesore by integrating a CDMA femtocell into something we wouldn’t mind showing off in the den: an inconspicuous digital photo frame. The “3-in-1″ concept also includes a VoIP soft phone that would theoretically enable calls to be made right from the frame. Of course, Moto’s not handing out any sort of release time frame, but let us be the first to say that this thing needs to hit store shelves on the double — just make sure it’s not carrier specific, and toss in a GSM version while you’re at it, okay Moto? Check out the demonstration vid after the break.

[Thanks, Dave]

Continue reading Motorola shows off femtocell-in-a-digiframe concept

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Filed under: Cellphones

Sure, our front page got stacked with news on the launch of the world’s first Android phone — the G1 — but if you missed any of the action (and there was quite a bit), we’ve put together this helpful roundup. Below you’ll find an easy-to-use guide to all the goings-on about the T-Mobile device, complete with galleries and videos that will delight and enthrall any healthy viewer. Keep an eye on this post as we’ll be updating with a few other bits and pieces today that you’ll most definitely want a look at.

The liveblog:

Live from T-Mobile’s Android event in New York City

Hands-on coverage:

T-Mobile G1 first hands-on (updated)
Video: Android walkthrough on T-Mobile G1

Product announcement:

The T-Mobile G1

In-depth / details:

T-Mobile’s CTO on G1 unlocking and tethering — plus a few details you might have missed
T-Mobile soft capping 3G data at 1GB per month
Confirmed: T-Mobile G1 has no 3.5mm headphone jack
T-Mobile G1 site goes live for real, first ad appears
T-Mobile G1 has push Gmail with Google Talk presence

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Filed under: Cellphones

In a brief press release, LG has announced total sales of one million Prada handsets worldwide. Not bad for a March 2007 launch. The bigger news though is that LG and Prada will launch a new handset in Europe in Q4 of 2008. Prada II, we’re ready.

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Filed under: Cellphones, Portable Audio

Nothing like a pair of high-brow Europeans slapping each other in the streets, huh? In response to Nokia’s forthcoming Comes with Music service, Sony Ericsson is confirming rumors by announcing a competing unlimited music download service dubbed Play Now Plus. The service, which will be available “solely through telecoms operators,” will provide subscribers with access to millions of tunes, and customers can even keep up to 300 jams after their 6- to 18-month contract expires. According to SE’s marketing head Lennard Hoornik, it’ll be rockin’ on Telenor within a few weeks, and it will spread from Sweden into more of Western Europe in Q1 2009 and into other world markets in Q2 2009. We’re told that the service will run early adopters 99 Swedish crowns ($15) per month, and so far as we can tell, you don’t have to have a specific SE phone to get in on the action.

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Filed under: Cellphones, Handhelds, Portable Audio

Hey, that’s pretty awesome that Amazon’s thrown together an MP3 store app for the G1, isn’t it? What would be even cooler still, though, is if you could actually listen to those tracks without a crazy dongle hanging off your phone. Like many recent HTCs (Touch HD notably excepted), the G1 eschews a standard 3.5mm headphone jack for its proprietary ExtUSB connector, meaning you’ll need custom headphones or an adapter to plug in your own. What’s worse, the adapter won’t be available immediately at launch, just a bundled headset. Why, HTC? Why?

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Filed under: Cellphones

Continue reading T-Mobile G1 video hands-on

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