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HTC won’t fix, blames Orange
The latest update to Orange’s Hero handset, manufactured by HTC, is blocking access to the Android marketplace again.…
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(Source The Register)
Posts Tagged “HTC”
Mar
03
2010
 
Most smartphone users are disappointed, claims FanfarePosted by CompareMobiles.com in Mobile News
People are buying increasing numbers of smartphones, but are they living up to the media hype? Fanfare thinks not…. Smartphone sales are growing fast, but “57% of smartphone users are disappointed with handset and application performance,” claims a report from Fanfare (PDF: registration required). However, the results reflect a very small sample: “155 members of the public” and “the survey was conducted online and filled in anonymously,” so don’t bet your lunch on its applicability to the Great British Public. Most of the issues appear to be internet related, with streaming media, web browsers and social networking applications causing the most problems. And then there’s the part that could be important to Fanfare, which offers automated testing services:
Dissatisfied smartphone users typically tell their friends and family (57%) and social networking sites (58%), which could have a negative effect on sales. Indeed, it makes social networks much more of an influence on purchasing than “traditional media” (by 64% to 40%). Fanfare marketing man David Gehringer says: “The Apple App Store and Android Market have served up billions of app downloads, giving smartphone owners the ability to use their phones in new and exciting ways. But now that the novelty is wearing off, users want their applications to be more reliable.” The report says:
I’d like this to be true, but I can’t really see much evidence. It seems to me there’s a big fashion element to smartphone sales and (based on a much smaller sample than 155) people like being one of the first to own a sexy new gadget. How well they can make it work it is another matter. Nor is this a criticism of media darlings such as Apple’s iPhone, HTC and Google Android phones, various BlackBerry handsets and the odd Palm. All of these seem more reliable and usable than what I remember of the Nokia 7110 or 8110 (The Matrixphone), while disappointed iPhone owners seem to be a very rare breed indeed. So, are you happy with your smartphone, and if not, is the backlash about to start?
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Smartphone maker HTC has denied copying patented features of Apple’s iPhone in its Nexus One – a handset it launched in collaboration with Google. Read Full Story…
Mar
03
2010
Apple sues HTC over multitouch and other patentsPosted by CompareMobiles.com in Mobile News
Mar
03
2010
Apple sues HTC over phones with Google softwarePosted by CompareMobiles.com in Mobile News
SAN FRANCISCO (Reuters) – Apple Inc sued Taiwan’s HTC Corp, which makes touchscreen smartphones using Google software, accusing it of infringing 20 hardware and software patents related to the iPhone. Read Full Story…
Taiwanese mobile-phone manufacturer backing Google’s Android OS is accused of infringing 20 Apple patents Apple is suing the Taiwanese handset maker HTC, alleging that it has infringed 20 patents relating to “the iPhone’s user interface, underlying architecture and hardware”. Among the patents that Apple alleges have been infringed are a number relating to touchscreen interfaces – for which the iPhone has become the best-known, though it was not the first, mobile device. “We can sit by and watch competitors steal our patented inventions, or we can do something about it. We’ve decided to do something about it,” said Steve Jobs, Apple’s chief executive, in a statement. “We think competition is healthy, but competitors should create their own original technology, not steal ours.” It is thought that a key element that triggered the lawsuit is that in February HTC released handsets which use “pinch-to-zoom” functionality resembling that of the iPhone. Apple has filed the suit in the US courts in Delaware, Maryland, but also with the US International Trade Commission (ITC), which has the power to halt imports of products. That would stymie HTC and Google, whose free Android mobile operating system is built into a growing number of HTC phones, and has made significant inroads into the burgeoning smartphone market in recent months. But the move was received with surprise in the technology community. “I don’t fault Apple for acquiring patents. They have to, for defensive purposes, given the current laws,” noted John Siracusa, a journalist at Ars Technica who has followed Apple closely for years. “But using them offensively sucks.” The use of the ITC could be key for Apple. A recent analysis found that where lawsuits are filed both with US district courts and the ITC, plaintiffs succeed in the latter more often than the former, by 58% to 35%. That means Apple is roughly 50% more likely to win the case with the ITC – and so could block HTC imports of newer handsets. HTC indicated that it was completely surprised by the case, and had not even received the formal complaint from Apple when the American company announced it publicly. Apple has submitted more than 700 pages of exhibits relating to its patents to the court in Delaware, Maryland, where it is filing the case. It cites a number of handsets, including the Nexus One handset powered by Google’s Android mobile operating system, and also other handsets which use Microsoft’s Windows Mobile system. HTC has in the past been the largest manufacturer of Windows Mobile handsets – although it has recently shifted its allegiance to Google’s Android, which is free and has captured significant market share since being launched in 2008. Apple has specified 10 patents in the Delaware filing, and a different 10 in the ITC filing. The case is thought to be the first in which Apple has taken the first step in suing a rival mobile phone company. Although it has an ongoing patent dispute with Nokia, the Finnish mobile handset maker, the first move there was by Nokia. Apple has since countersued. The case is ongoing.
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Touchy feely infringement accusationApple has filed a lawsuit against Taiwanese manufacturer HTC, citing 20 patent infringements including UI and hardware as well as architectural design.…
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Mar
02
2010
Windows Phone 7 blocks out popular HTC model, blames buttonsPosted by CompareMobiles.com in Mobile News
Other smartphones fail to meet criteria tooWindows Mobile 6.5 devices will not be upgradeable to Windows Phone 7.…
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Mar
01
2010
HTC Desire now available to orderPosted by CompareMobiles.com in Mobile News, New Deals, New MobilesNew Mobile & Latest Deal News!
The HTC Desire has a fantastic 3.7 inch widescreen, AMOLED display, delivering 720×480 pixels resolution. Arguably crisper and clearer than any other display on the market, it delivers touchscreen responsiveness definitely in the ballpark of the iPhone and, moreover, it is fast. The combination of Android 2.1 sitting above a Snapdragon CPU clocked at 1GHz with 512Mb of RAM and ROM really does enable you to zap through opening up applications and then moving between them. Its multimedia credentials, are quietly competent rather than superb – such as the 5 megapixel, autofocus camera with LED flash and its 32GB memory card capacity. Where the Nexus One really impresses, though, is in what could be called its charisma, if it could walk into a crowded room, heads would most definitely turn. Its Teflon-coated back and sides are simultaneously rubbery and tough yet soft and almost sensuous, a strangely compelling tactile experience. Compare all HTC Desire dealsTags: 12, 3, all, android, card, compare, comparemobiles.com, deal, Deals, HTC, iphone, latest, latest deal, mobile, mobiles, new, new mobile, phone, room, sim, sol, test, Touch
Feb
26
2010
Phone hackers’ soft targets | Brendan MontaguePosted by CompareMobiles.com in Mobile News
The most damning indictment of phone hacking is that it was almost always used to get gossip rather than expose wrong The fact investigators working for the News of the World hacked into my mobile phone to cut me out of a potential £30,000 celebrity scoop is not surprising. If you swim with sharks you expect the odd puncture wound. The fact this process is so simple, swift and apparently routine is shocking. I called the Sunday tabloid one bright afternoon with the name of a celebrity chef and tales of famous London nightclubs, glamorous hotels and sexual impropriety. The reporter I spoke to was Clive Goodman. He promised me the Screws would pay the most – but something about his conspiratorial tones turned me towards a more gregarious Sunday Mirror news editor. The News of the World was not going to let this apparent front page get away. A rapid succession of calls to my mobile followed. These allowed the caller to access my voicemail – I had not set a password. My personal greeting gave them my real name and my place of work while the messages revealed the identity of my then girlfriend, who was the source of the story. Goodman called me on my work mobile and aggressively demanded the name of the chef’s female acquaintance. I refused. It was after that that my mobile phone records were hacked. T-Mobile confirmed a bizarre call where someone pretending to be me failed the most basic security question – my date of birth. Despite this, the caller was able to try again just 15 minutes later and, this time being successful, he was given a full rundown of my recent calls. He then tried to hack my partner’s phone records. Phone hacking in this way was astonishingly easy. A few years ago, it seemed to be the default method of some News of the World reporters to use information gained in this way. While other hacks were busy knocking on neighbours’ doors or visiting relatives found through birth and marriage records, journalists from the Screws instantly had a direct line to make their offers of “a life-changing amount of money”. The true scandal here is not just the use of such illegal methods. The most damning indictment of this chequebook journalism is the fact it was only very rarely used to find real wrongdoing by the rich and powerful. Blagging your way into someone’s phone records would be morally defendable if there was a genuine and compelling public interest. Journalists rightly enjoy more latitude under the data protection act and human rights laws – if there is a real reason for subterfuge. The Press Complaints Commission code states: “Engaging in misrepresentation or subterfuge, including by agents or intermediaries, can generally be justified only in the public interest.” Muckraking has served the public good: by rummaging through the bins of solicitors Benjamin Pell discovered documents showing the then Tory minister Jonathan Aitken had been involved in Saudi arms deals. But how many of the 100 people targeted by the News of the World’s phone hacking will turn out to be rogue arms dealers, corrupt politicians and corporate killers? And how many will be minor celebrities? The full armoury of investigative reporting – GPS tracking systems and hidden cameras, “lilly-whites” and “honey traps” – was unleashed against footballers, Big Brother contestants and It girls. And now public figures of means can turn to Max Clifford as a form of defence and use “pay as you go” mobiles. So the tabloid hacks turn on less wealthy, less protected victims. This is an abuse of power by newspapers owned by one of the most powerful media tycoons in the world, Rupert Murdoch. Moreover, the man in charge of the News of the World when this abuse of power was taking place was Andy Coulson. Coulson, we know, jumped ship as the Screws hit the Goodman phone-hacking iceberg and is now captain of spin for the Conservative party as it sails towards power. This has serious implications. If the Tories win the general election, as predicted, Coulson will be at the very heart of government with an army of civil servants working for him. Yet, by his own admission, when managing a small team of reporters, he was incapable of detecting flagrant criminality on a huge scale.
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MWC longs to let them eat cakeLast week’s Mobile World Congress reinforced the trend for smartphone capabilities to migrate down the food chain in to low cost handsets, spreading the mobile internet to wider user bases.…
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Feb
22
2010
Apple and Google compete at Mobile World CongressPosted by CompareMobiles.com in Mobile News
As the battle between Apple and Google hots up at the Mobile World Congress, the smartphone boom signals good times for media firms Richard Wray Announcing the BBC’s move into the mobile phone market with its own news, sport and video applications for the iPhone last week, Erik Huggers, the director of future media and technology, said the new generation of so-called smartphones are a “great conduit to our audience”. It is a conduit that until recently has been, if not closed, then certainly constricted for media companies. But the explosion of downloadable applications, rapid rise in mobile broadband take-up and, crucially, the weakening of network operators’ stranglehold on the market have opened up a massive opportunity. The attraction is easy to see: there are already four times as many mobile phones in the world as there are PCs, and those phones are getting cleverer. In the run-up to Christmas, one in four of the phones sold by Vodafone across the world was a smartphone – that is, a phone with the same computing power as a laptop you could buy a few years ago. Within a couple of years there will be more smartphones than PCs on the planet. Even the mobile phone operators’ reaction to the weakening of their position, banding together in order to mount a fightback in the apps world, should benefit media companies. Then there is Google, which has not only provided the industry with a serious, and more importantly open, competitor to the iPhone, but looks increasingly likely to usher in a new era of mobile advertising. Huggers made his announcement in Barcelona at the mobile phone industry’s biggest annual get-together, Mobile World Congress, which showed that while the iPhone began the boom in the smartphone market, the rest of the industry is catching up and a range of devices are set to hit the shops that will help media players get to a mobile audience. The iPhone drove a wedge between customers and the mobile phone networks. Other players had tried it, such as Nokia, but Apple succeeded. For years the mobile phone companies acted as gatekeepers to their customers. Content companies had to strike deals with each operator, jostling for position on the “portals” created by the networks. Consumers, however, did not want their phone company picking what content they could view on their phones and portal usage was minimal. So the networks knocked down their walled gardens. As consumers ventured into the mobile web, many media companies – including the BBC – created mobile versions of their websites that could be easily viewed on a phone’s small screen. But usage remained low because even the mobile web, on many devices, was a pale imitation of the “real” internet. The iPhone was different and when it switched to 3G technology a year and a half ago the mobile web came of age. It has weakened the networks and given media companies the chance to bypass them. The relationship an iPhone customer has is with Apple first and their network provider second. The network is merely paid for providing access – Apple gets paid for content. It is an aggregator for media companies worldwide, and what started with music has become a wide variety of content, thanks to its App store. But Apple does not have the market to itself. Already more than 20 phones with Google’s rival Android operating system have been produced, which have a crucial advantage over the Apple device: Android supports Flash, which should help advertisers realise the potential of the mobile web. “Crucially, Apple does not and will not support Adobe Flash on its iPhone or iPad products,” explains Brad Rees, chief executive of Mediacells Limited, the mobile market experts. “From an advertising creative perspective, this has meant iPhone application specialists win most of the pitches for mobile microsites. In the online world, the language of big-budget agency creatives is Adobe Flash, and this is precisely where Android hits the sweet spot. Even though Nokia has been offering full internet phones for a while, it’s the Google proposition which resonates.” In his keynote speech in Barcelona, Eric Schmidt, chief executive of Google, promised the search engine giant is “not trying to run roughshod” over the mobile phone companies or turn them into “dumb pipes” in the air. The companies, however, are not so sure. Two dozen of the world’s biggest announced during the congress that they are getting together to produce a completely open apps platform – allowing consumers to take their applications with them when they change handsets. In return for this portability, the networks would start to get a slice of revenues – although exactly how is still unclear. This is potentially big news for media companies as it raises the possibility that they will be able eventually to develop their apps just once, and put them on a massive array of handsets straight away. And it’s another indication that at long last the mobile floodgates are open. Full coverage of Mobile World Congress including galleries and analysis at guardian.co.uk/business/ mobileworld congress
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Feb
19
2010
Breakfast briefing: Microsoft and Yahoo canoodle while Sony Ericsson says no to GooglePosted by CompareMobiles.com in Mobile News
• It may be “full steam ahead” for Yahoo and Microsoft now that their tie-up has been given the green light by European regulators, but don’t expect anything revolutionary soon – the two companies say it’s unlikely that a Bing-powered, Yahoo-designed engine will roll out any time before 2012. • Here’s an interesting one picked up by Engadget – apparently Sony Ericsson boss Bert Nordberg said that Google had asked SE to build the Nexus One before it turned to HTC. Nordberg said he turned down the opportunity, though the company is building its own Android handset anyway. Strange. • I’ve mentioned Pictory before – a new online photo magazine that pulls together elements of the Big Picture and JPG into short narratives. The latest instalment, entitled The One Who Got Away, is beautiful. I’m just waiting for a good opportunity to contribute myself. On that bittersweet note, have a good weekend. You can follow our links and commentary each day through Twitter (@guardiantech, or our personal accounts) or by watching our Delicious feed.
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Feb
17
2010
O2 gets exclusive on HTC’s Brew-based Smart phonePosted by CompareMobiles.com in Mobile News
Flash friendly budget touchphoneO2 has the exclusive on HTC’s Smart, a low-cost touchscreen handset that combines Qualcomm’s Brew mobile platform with HTC’s own Sense user interface.…
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Feb
16
2010
Mobile World Congress: HTC unveils iPhone rival on Google’s Android platformPosted by CompareMobiles.com in Mobile News
• HTC’s Legend smartphone will come to UK in April HTC has come of age. The Taiwanese mobile phone manufacturer, once known only as the maker of Windows phones under the SPV brand, today unveiled a new phone sporting Google’s Android software which analysts are predicting could steal a march on Apple in the smartphone design wars. The HTC Legend, which runs the latest Android software called Eclair, is made from a single block of aluminium and has a very bright and clear 3.2 inch AMOLED (ultra-bright LED) display. Vodafone has grabbed the handset in Europe, wary of losing out after missing the iPhone in some of the company’s key European markets. The Legend will come to the UK in April and already analysts are predicting that it will be a design classic following its launch at Mobile World Congress in Barcelona. “Legend’s clever use of milled aluminium casing could scoop Apple’s direction for the next iPhone design,” said CCS Insight. Despite its body being engineered from a single piece of aluminium, the HTC Legend has a removable battery – something which the iPhone conspicuously lacks – which slides out from a compartment at the bottom of the phone. The back of the battery casing also contains the phone’s antenna so that its metal body does not hinder signal strength. HTC has updated the user face – called HTC Sense – that sits atop Android on the device. Alongside refinements to the phone’s address book, so that contacts can be organised into groups such as business contacts and friends, it pulls information from social networking sites such as Facebook and Twitter into a single Friend Stream of updates. The Android platform has been the making of HTC. It created the first phone, the G1, using the software, while the Legend is the new version of another successful Android phone, the Hero. The Legend, however, has a rather less intrusive “chin” at the bottom of the device than the Hero. Alongside it, HTC also unveiled the HTC Desire, which also uses HTC Sense. It had previously been codenamed the HTC Bravo and several UK operators have been vying to get hold of it as it is essentially the same as Google’s own Nexus One device, which HTC also produced. However, it has an optical trackpad rather than a roller ball, and is understood to be cheaper than the Google device. Orange said it will be stocking the HTC Desire from April and it will be free on selected monthly tariffs. It is likely to be priced the same as the iPhone, a policy Vodafone is expected to follow with the Nexus One in the UK when it launches next month. The HTC Desire will also be available in the UK on T-Mobile from 26 March. The Desire has a large 3.7 inch AMOLED screen, like the Nexus One, and contains the 1GHz Snapdragon processor which is also found on the Nexus One. It includes such iPhone staples as pinching to zoom on web pages while it also automatically recalibrates text so that when you zoom into a page, you do not have to scroll left and right to get to the end of a line. Crucially, it also supports Flash, which Apple still resolutely refuses to back. HTC also announced the HTC HD mini, which uses the 6.5 version of Windows Phone rather than the series 7 platform launched by Steve Ballmer yesterday.
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Android 2.1 handset out in AprilMWC Orange will release HTC’s upcoming Android-based smartphone, Desire, in April.…
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Feb
16
2010
More questions than answers about the Windows Phone 7 SeriesPosted by CompareMobiles.com in Mobile News
Microsoft made a splash by pre-announcing the Windows Phone 7 Series phone yesterday, but it might all be forgotten by the time phones appear for the (Christmas) holiday sales season Microsoft’s launch of its Windows Phone 7 Series phone at the Mobile World Congress in Barcelona yesterday was a huge success if you judge it by the amount of press and blog coverage. But it also provided very few details, including when phones would go on sale. Microsoft says they’ll be out before Christmas, but so will a lot of other new phones. Microsoft’s list of Windows Phone 7 partners includes Asus, Dell, HP, HTC, LG, Samsung, Sony Ericsson and Toshiba, and it expects to have phones on most networks, including AT&T, Deutsche Telekom, Orange, SFR, Sprint, Telecom Italia, Telefónica, Telstra, T-Mobile USA, Verizon Wireless and Vodafone. In other words, Windows Phone 7 is still a platform. Microsoft hasn’t followed Apple’s proprietary route, though whether phone makers will still have access to the phone’s source code and the right to change it remains to be seen. The demos showed the Windows Phone 7’s roots in the attractive user interface developed for Windows Media Center PCs and reworked for the Zune HD and the free Zune 4.0 software for Windows*. They also showed the phone’s extensive integration with Windows Live and Facebook, though at the moment, it looks as though Twitter is supported via Windows Live. Email support includes Microsoft Exchange synchronisation, Live Hotmail, Gmail, Yahoo Mail and other services. But it’s not clear where Microsoft stands on supporting Silverlight, Adobe Flash, or the still-emerging HTML5 standard. Silverlight support would be welcomed by companies who want to put their business applications on the phone, and it would answer the objection that — apart from Microsoft Office — Windows Phone 7 phones are aimed much more at consumers than at businesses. Adobe Flash would be welcomed by many users and web developers, and would give Microsoft a selling point against Apple, which refuses to support Flash. However, the question is still open. The Seattle Times managed to get a quote from Karen Wong Duncan, a Microsoft product manager: “We do not support Flash. We are partnering closely with Adobe. As Steve Ballmer said earlier, we are not opposed to having Flash on the platform.” HTML5 support would be welcomed by everybody, especially if Microsoft included an expensive H.264 video codec for playing YouTube and other videos without using Flash. But we don’t know what sort of browser will be included in Windows Phone 7 phones, or what its capabilities might be. Windows Phone 7 also has an Xbox Live connection, and users will be able to score points in multi-player games, but Microsoft didn’t provide details. Apparently we’ll learn more at the Mix 2010 conference in March. Finally, there has been no mention of what has sometimes been called Pink: the code-name for putative next generation versions of the old Sidekick device. (Microsoft bought the company.) The lack of detail makes it look as though Microsoft has announced too early. Presumably it couldn’t resist the opportunity to make a splash at WMC, and there’s only one a year. Next year’s congress would be too late…. * This is worth a download if you want something to manage an MP3 player: it’s much nicer than Windows Media Player. However, you won’t be able to use the Zune Marketplace outside the US.
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• Phones with the new software will appear at the end of the year
Microsoft boss Steve Ballmer is hoping that 7 will turn out to be a lucky number again. With Windows 7 helping to bury the ghosts of the poorly received Windows Vista in its core PC market, the software group is hoping to repeat the trick with a new version of its software for mobile phones, a device that has refused to yield to the firm’s attentions despite almost a decade of trying. Windows Phone Series 7 is the result of a complete overhaul of Microsoft’s vision of the mobile phone. It has abandoned its attempts to turn mobile phones into mini-PCs, focusing instead on giving users easy access to social networking, music, video and mobile phone applications. Coincidentally Ballmer’s presentation, at the mobile industry’s annual trade show in Barcelona came hours after the world’s largest mobile phone manufacturer Nokia revealed a tie-up with chipmaker Intel that is headed in the opposite direction. The two companies have pooled their software development resources to create MeeGo, a free software platform which they reckon will pave the way for the next generation of wireless communications devices. Both companies have Apple, Blackberry and Google, with its Android mobile phone platform, firmly in their sights. Fierce competition has eroded Nokia’s share of the market over the past year, and Microsoft fears that if it cannot get back in the game now, it may never manage it. Ballmer admitted that Microsoft, which has failed to gain any significant share of the mobile phone market, had been forced to “retool and reform” its mobile phone software two years ago. “There is no doubt that the phone market is highly competitive, highly dynamic, super-exciting,” he said. “There was no question in our minds… that we needed and wanted to do something that was out of the box, clearly differentiated from our past and clearly differentiated from other things that are going on in the market.” “We’re taking a big step,” he added. “I hope seven’s our lucky number.” The first phones using the new software will not appear until the end of the year and Microsoft is being very prescriptive about what they should look like, which has raised questions about whether handset manufacturers will be willing to make Windows Phone devices that they will be unable to differentiate themselves from the rest of the pack. Manufacturers including HTC, LG and Samsung have, however, signed up, while Vodafone, O2, T-Mobile and Orange are all likely to sell the devices in the UK. The proliferation of so-called open source software platforms – such as Android – has raised the question of whether Microsoft, which still charges hardware manufacturers a licence fee to use its Windows Phone software, should adopt the same model. Refusing, as ever, to actually name Apple, Ballmer spoke about “vertical competitors” – companies that make devices as well as the software that sits on them, such as Apple – saying “their model is really clear, it’s sell devices. We sell software to companies that make devices” and that is not going to change. “My mother used to say to me, if something is free, you should take a look and find out what the real cost is.” Nokia, however, has become a convert to the idea of open source platforms. Having bought out its partners in smartphone software developer Symbian and made that available free to all developers and hardware manufacturers, it announced a tie-up with Intel under which it plans to do the same for the next generation of mobile devices. Nokia was already working on an open source platform for so-called internet tablets, called Maemo, which it used in its recently launched N900 phone. Now it is merging it with a similar programme which Intel ran for laptops, called Moblin, into a new platform called MeeGo. “It is the future of how we think people are going to use computing,” said Renee James, Intel’s head of software and services. “From Intel’s perspective, we see expansive growth which brings new users to computing and at the heart of that has always been software innovation and that happens when there is a stable platform that developers can bet on being there long-term. So I consider this critical to the long term growth initiatives of Intel.” The first MeeGo devices will start appearing in the second half of the year, but Intel already has hardware manufacturers such as Dell, Asus and Samsung making laptops for its existing open source platform and they will all be moved over to MeeGo. “They have understood the only way to beat Microsoft, Google and Apple is to do it through scale – get the platform to more devices,” according to John Strand, owner and head of Strand Consult after the announcements at the Mobile World Congress fair. Immediately dubbed MeeToo by some analysts, MeeGo will create an open source software platform which Nokia reckons will be used in a new generation of wireless devices. Both companies want to attract a wide range of operators, handset manufacturers and software developers. “This is not a closed club,” said Kai Öistämö, Nokia’s head of devices. “We are inviting everyone into this. “MeeGo will create a new strong single platform that will drive the future of mobile computing.” The announcement of MeeGo, however, immediately raised questions about the future of Symbian, but Öistämö stressed: “This is very consistent with Nokia’s software strategy. Symbian is the perfect environment for democratising the smartphone, what MeeGo allows is the future of mobile computing … well beyond what can be done with smartphones today.” The deal may raise some eyebrows at Google, however, as Intel’s chief executive Paul Otellini has sat on the Google board since 2004.
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Feb
05
2010
Google Nexus One available SIM freePosted by CompareMobiles.com in Mobile News, New Deals, New MobilesNew Mobile & Latest Deal News!
Manufacturered by HTC, Google’s first own-brand mobile phone is undoubtedly a superb piece of engineering. Ergonomically, it just slips naturally into the hand with its all-round soft curves rather than the hard edges of, say the Motorola Milestone. At 130g the Nexus One is lighter than an iPhone (136g) and Milestone (170g) as well as being narrower and thinner (at 11.5mm) than these two most striking competitors. It has a fantastic 3.7 inch widescreen, AMOLED display, delivering 720×480 pixels resolution. Arguably crisper and clearer than any other display on the market, it delivers touchscreen responsiveness definitely in the ballpark of the iPhone and, moreover, it is fast. The combination of Android 2.1 sitting above a Snapdragon CPU clocked at 1GHz with 512Mb of RAM and ROM really does enable you to zap through opening up applications and then moving between them. Its multimedia credentials, are quietly competent rather than superb – such as the 5 megapixel, autofocus camera with LED flash and its 32GB memory card capacity. Where the Nexus One really impresses, though, is in what could be called its charisma, if it could walk into a crowded room, heads would most definitely turn. Its Teflon-coated back and sides are simultaneously rubbery and tough yet soft and almost sensuous, a strangely compelling tactile experience. Compare Google Nexus One UK pricesTags: 12, 3, all, android, card, compare, comparemobiles.com, deal, Deals, free, google, HTC, iphone, latest, latest deal, mobile, mobile phone, mobiles, moto, motorola, new, new mobile, phone, prices, room, sim, sim free, sol, test, Touch, uk
Jan
14
2010
Motorola Milestone phone review | TechnophilePosted by CompareMobiles.com in Mobile News
Lauded as a contender to kill the iPhone at its US launch last year, this Motorola Android phone has already been slain itself by Google’s Nexus One For a phone that seemed to cause such a stir in the US when it launched last year, the Motorola Milestone (called the Droid in the US) has barely raised a ripple this side of the pond. No network has signed up for the device – in fact, only Orange lists Motorola handsets at all in the UK – and while enthusiasts snapped up the first batch from online retailer Expansys before Christmas, it has all gone very quiet since then. It’s easy to see why Motorola might now be feeling a little bit sheepish about its much vaunted iPhone killer. There is a new kid on the block: Google’s Nexus One, which sports an updated version of the Android operating system that the Milestone contains, a better screen and a sexier look. It’s also easy to see why Google has got fed up with mobile phone manufacturers putting its increasingly elegant Android software into a bunch of ugly bricks and decided that it needed to be in complete control of its own handset in order to stop the iPhone stealing the smartphone show. From the uninspiring T-Mobile Pulse and the chunky Motorola Dext to the HTC Hero, with its weird “chin”, and the temperamental Samsung Galaxy i7500, Android devices have hardly been trend setters. The Motorola Milestone continues disappointingly in that vein. It is a similar size to the iPhone, though slightly heavier and when placed on its side so that the qwerty keyboard slides out – in an admittedly reassuringly solid manner because the build quality is excellent – it juts out past the screen on the right-hand side. This makes using the keyboard rather awkward as it is off-centre. The screen on the Milestone is inferior to the active-matrix organic LED (AMOLED) touchscreen on the Nexus One, which certainly dazzled our reviewer Bobbie Johnson . But the Milestone does include multitouch, unlike the Nexus One, Dext and its US variant the Droid. Like all Android devices, however, the Milestone is still waiting for developers to start creating the sort of applications – not least games – that really bring multitouch to life. For an example of what multitouch can become, look no further than the game Eliss being played on an iPhone. The Milestone is far more responsive than the Motorola Dext – which in my experience suffers from dreadful lag – in part because Motorola’s first stab at an Android handset was running version 1.5 of the software as opposed to the Milestone’s Android 2.0. The Nexus One, meanwhile, is on Android 2.1. But the Milestone actually represents something of a step backwards for Motorola. The Dext – sold as the Cliq in the US – included Motoblur, which brought social networking updates direct to the device’s homescreen rather like Vodafone’s 360 service. But Motoblur is conspicuously absent from the new device. All the usual Android features are, however, present: email integration is easy, setting up contacts and downloading what applications there are from the Android marketplace is simple. The Milestone also has a better camera than the iPhone – weighing in at 5 megapixels and including a similar variety of bells and whistles, such as flash and a digital zoom, to those included on the Nexus One – but I found it incredibly slow to process images. The Milestone can take a 32GB MicroSD card, the same as the Nexus One. Both the Nexus One and Milestone, meanwhile, allow for multitasking, meaning you can flit between applications without having to close them down, which the iPhone has yet to achieve. The ultimate question with the Milestone is why bother to buy it when the Nexus One is a better phone? Yes it has a keypad, but anyone who desperately needs a keyboard should just buy a BlackBerry – RIM is the only handset manufacturer that can be trusted to produce one that will not end up inducing carpal tunnel syndrome in long-term users. The Milestone’s off-centre keyboard will cripple you in a matter of weeks. The big drawback with the Nexus One is it is currently only available direct from Google. This makes it expensive – at about £425 – as there is no network operator to subsidise it and leaves any customer who has problems with the device with no other option than emailing Google and waiting for a response. That, however, is going to change later this year as Vodafone, and possibly T-Mobile, will sell the Nexus One in the UK later this year. Anyone desperate for an Android phone would do well to wait; treating this latest Motorola attempt as a Milestone on the road to something better. Pros: It’s not an iPhone – for those that cannot bear the thought of becoming “one of those people that has an iPhone”. Cons: It’s not a Nexus One
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