Category: Mobiles

All Stuffs related to Mobiles

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Timbaland going to Release First Mobile Album On V-Cast

V-cast

Timbaland, widely known for hits like “Apologize” and “The Way I Are,” will become Verizon Wireless’ first Mobile Producer in Residence. The program was launched to bring music fans closer to their favorite artists, according to the company.

Music-loving Verizon  Wireless customers will be getting a treat this year. The carrier announced Friday that popular music producer Timbaland will release the first mobile album as part of a service called V-Cast.

Timbaland will start working on the album in March and each month thereafter he will invite a new guest artist to produce one track. The tracks will be created from a Verizon Mobile Recording Studio Bus, which will tour different cities to give fans a glimpse into the recording sessions either in person or on their mobile phones, said Verizon Wireless.

Over the course of this year, Timbaland will use Verizon Wireless’ V-Cast music service to deliver his mobile album, which will be exclusively offered to the carrier’s subscribers. They will also get access to video through other services, including V-Cast Video and Verizon Surround.

“I am honored to be named Verizon’s first Mobile Producer in Residence and have the opportunity to create music from so many places in the country, and deliver it directly to my fans wherever they are through their mobile phones,” Timbaland said in a statement.

Verizon Wireless has been putting a lot of emphasis on its music, video, and other entertainment services, while also wooing subscribers with multimedia phones and a high-speed cellular network.

In December, the carrier began offering a “world edition” of the Moto Z6c phone by Motorola, which can be used worldwide through global roaming agreements. The phone supports both V-Cast Video and V-Cast Music. Before that, Verizon Wireless introduced the FlipShot and the Gleam by Samsung and an iPhone look-alike, the Voyager, by LG Electronics. All three phones are also V-Cast capable.

 source:informationweek

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Modus Tiny Cellphone with ‘Jackets’

Modus

An Israeli startup has convinced wireless carriers in three countries to try a new concept: a tiny cell phone that pops into interchangeable ‘jackets’ to become a bigger, smarter phone – or into other gadgets to connect them to the Internet.

The company, Modu, is set to announce Thursday that it will launch the phone, also called Modu, on October 1 with Telecom Italia SpA in Italy, OAA Vimpel Communications in Russia, and Cellcom Israel Ltd.

Telecom Italia Mobile and Cellcom are the largest carriers in their respective countries, while VimpelCom is the second-largest in Russia.

The Modu is slightly smaller than the current iPod Nano and weighs 1.5 oz. It has a small color screen and a limited keypad, which allows it to work as a rudimentary cell phone on its own.

The jackets that will come with the Modu look like cellphones, with standard numeric keypads and other features like cameras. But they lack the antenna and chips that communicate with a wireless network, and this is where the Modu comes in – it pops into a slot, turning the jacket into a fully functional phone.

Modu founder Dov Moran said in an interview that the Italian carrier is excited about the concept because it can make cellphones more like fashion, tempting consumer to update their looks every few months.

“This allows you to make a summer collection and a winter collection,” Moran said.

“The carriers really are interested in having more and more customers coming through their stores, rather than signing up and coming every two years to sign a new contract and get a new phone,” said Daniel Amir, a chip analyst at Lazard Capital Markets in San Francisco. He called the Modu a potential ‘game changer’ in the cellphone industry.

The jacket is cheap to make, has almost no electronics, and doesn’t need to be tested by the carrier to see that it conforms to its network standards. They can be themed, say, by focusing on music, with pre-loaded tunes, or have full keyboards for texting.

Moran estimates that carriers will be able to sell a Modu and two jackets as a bundle for about $280, a price that they can then subsidize to free or almost free with a two-year contract.

A shortcoming of the initial model is that it will use GPRS for data transfer. Roughly equivalent to dialup in speed, this will limit the Modu’s usefulness, but Moran said the company is working on upgrading it to use HSDPA, a 3G technology.

Modu is also talking to consumer electronics companies like Magellan Navigation Inc., a California-based maker of GPS devices, and car-stereo maker Blaupunkt, a unit of Robert Bosch GmbH of Germany.

The idea is to have consumer electronics companies build slots for the Modu into their devices to give them network connectivity. That could allow a GPS device to receive updates on traffic or map changes. A picture frame with a Modu slot and loud speakers could act as a music-playing, picture-showing charging station.

Other cellphone makers have been sniffing at the modular concept. Sony Ericsson has filed for a patent on a modular phone. But Modu appears to be furthest along in its plan, and has crucial support from large carriers.

Moran, the founder of Modu, also founded M-Systems Ltd., which pioneered USB flash drives. The company was acquired by California-based SanDisk Corp. in 2006 for $1.6 billion.

source:tech2

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More N-Gage Games, Less N-Gage?

N-Game

While Nokia continues to annoy users by failing to announce an official launch date for the N-Gage platform and restricting its usage to the N81 handset, we can console ourselves with the knowledge that the company is developing newer games for the platform. The latest releases are Space Impact: Kappa Base, System Rush: Evolution, and Creatures of the Deep.

Nokia is inviting N81 and N81 8GB handset owners to join N-Gage First Access, where they can download the application, try and buy games, and provide user experience feedback. Unfortunately, that pretty much confirms that the application is still being tried and tested and N-Gage fans will have to wait a bit longer to experience the full deal on other Nokia handsets.

source:tech2 

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New LG Viewty Camera Phone With DivX Encoding

lgku990

The famous digital media company, DivX and LG have jointly announced the new LG Viewty camera phone (LG-KU990), which is the first cellphone with DivX Certification to natively capture video using high quality DivX format. This newest LG Viewty smartphone features an 3-inch touch sensitive screen, 5-megapixel camera (certified by Schneider-Kreuznach) with auto/manual focus, image stabilizer, ISO 800 as well as SmartLight technology, which enable the users to adjust the brightness level of captured images.

“Users of the LG Viewty have come to expect innovation and quality,” said Dr. Skott Ahn, LG Electronics Mobile Communications Company. “The addition of DivX recording capability to the Viewty will open up the media experience and enable our users to do more with the videos they capture, from sharing that content online to playing it back beyond the phone on a wide variety of devices.”

According to the global leader and technology innovator in consumer electronics, the LG Viewty camera phone is able to record high speed 120 fps (frames per second), VGA resolution (640 x 480 pixels) video in DivX format.

“Our goal is to make it easy for consumers to enjoy a high-quality video experience on any kind of device,” said Kevin Hell, CEO at DivX, Inc. “The LG Viewty is a perfect example of this experience. It allows consumers to capture video on its 3-inch screen and then easily transfer that video to a computer or virtually any kind of consumer electronics device.”

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Sony-Ericsson prepping G-series for February?

sony_ericsson

Sony-Ericsson is expected to unveil a new G-series of phones, which consist of two predicted models. Enthusiast news site SEfanatics reports that the new models will be called the G900i and G700i, and are expected to be shown February 10th. The G900i, codenamed Tyra, will supposedly feature a 2.6-inch screen, WLAN, and a 5-megapixel camera. Meanwhile, the G700i, codenamed Josephine, will also feature the 2.6-inch screen, but with a 3.2-megapixel camera and sans WLAN.

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iPhone Wins Bronze

Iphone

Where Apple’s Latest News about Apple iPhone is concerned, “me too” appears to be the operative philosophy among the company’s competitors in the mobile phone marketplace.

“We need to stop thinking of the iPhone as a phone,” said Phil Leigh, senior analyst with Inside Digital Media. “Voice is merely one application of many that it will use on the wireless Internet.”

Rivals already are thinking along the same lines as they contemplate the impact the iPhone has had on a white-hot smartphone marketplace, Leigh noted.

The iPhone, which has attracted a whirlwind of media attention since it launched in the U.S. last June, captured a 28 percent share of the U.S.’ converged device market — the category includes smartphones and wireless handhelds — during the fourth quarter, market research firm Canalys reported. Mobile units with Microsoft Webroot AntiSpyware 30-Day Free Trial. Click here. Latest News about Microsoft technology had a 21 percent share.

The iPhone was not launched in Europe, the Middle East and Africa until the after the fourth quarter had begun. There, Apple trailed Nokia, RIM, HTC and Motorola.

The limits on the iPhone’s potential outside the U.S. market are crucial to the product’s bottom line, Llamas noted.

“I can’t think of an upstart company in the mobile phone industry that was able to reach those numbers,” he said.

Competitors are noting the success of the iPhone — and borrowing from its technology, Llamas added. “Look for a lot of me-too devices out there.”

Leigh agreed. “They look at it with fear and loathing because they recognize that it is a paradigm shift that has left them in the dust,” he told MacNewsWorld.

That’s because copycat products already are out on the market, Leigh said. “But none have gained more than a minute share of the market.”

source:technewsworld 

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Verizon’s New HTC Smart Phone

HTC

It’s nice to see Verizon Wireless expand its selection of Windows Mobile smart phones. The nationwide carrier recently added the HTC SMT5800, which comes hot on the heels of the XV6800, also made by HTC, and the SCH-i760, manufactured by Samsung. How does the SMT5800 stack up against the others? To find out, I got my hands on the new PDA phone and did some subjective, real-world testing.

On the outside, the 5800 is noticeably smaller than the other two–almost 0.5 inch shorter than the Samsung i760 and about 0.3 inch narrower than both the i760 and the 6800. The 5800 is 10 ounces lighter, too, though I prefer the i760’s sturdier feel.

All three handsets come with a slide-out keyboard, though the 5800’s keys are arrayed more closely together than the others’ because of the handset’s compact size. Its rounded-edge keys are flat and raised ever so slightly. Overall, I found the keyboard comfortable enough to type on.

Like the i760, the 5800 has alphanumeric keys on the outside, along with a five-way navigation key, a home key, and a back button. The dial pad on the front of the new model is essential because, unlike the i760 and the 6800, it doesn’t have an on-screen number pad. That’s because the 2.4-inch LCD on this HTC smart phone isn’t a touch screen. I find touch screens extremely helpful for quickly navigating menus and entering information; a non-touch-based system like the 5800’s requires more scrolling.

The HTC SMT5800 runs the Windows Mobile Standard operating system, which offers many of the same features as the Professional version of the OS (used on the i760 and the 6800), including the ability to synchronize with the Outlook contacts saved on a PC, and the ability to view Word, Excel, PowerPoint, and PDF attachments. You can edit Word and Excel files on the 5800, too, but you can’t create such files from scratch as you can on the i760 and the 6800.

Both e-mail and text messaging work well on the 5800. I synced my Yahoo account within a few minutes (though the process can take longer if you download a large inbox). To view my Hotmail (Windows Live) messages, I had to use Internet Explorer: The Windows Mobile software won’t allow users to sync Hotmail through the phone’s e-mail client.

The 5800 provides some fun apps, too. My favorite is the 2-megapixel camera’s panorama mode. It can stitch six (or fewer) pictures directly on the handset; and in my experiment with stitching, the resulting wide-angle snapshot came out nicely.

The 5800’s main drawback is its short battery life. According to Verizon, the 5800’s battery lasts for up to 3.5 hours, which is similar to what I experienced. I ended up recharging the phone more frequently than I would have liked. Verizon’s Web site lists longer battery-life estimates for the other two handsets: up to 5 hours for the i760’s chunkier battery pack and 5.4 hours for the 6800.

All three phones support Verizon’s 3G EvDO network, so Web page downloads were relatively speedy across the board. But unfortunately, the 5800 lacks Wi-Fi connectivity. Calls on the 5800 sounded fine, with good audio quality and adequate volume on both the earpiece and the speakerphone. You can pair the 5800 with a Bluetooth earbud or headphones as well.

At $250, the SMT5800 is the cheapest of the three phones. The SCH-i760 costs $350 and the XV6800 sets you back $400 (prices are as of January 25, 2008). I was moderately impressed by the 5800, but if I had to choose from among the three, I would go with the Samsung SCH-i760: It hits the sweet spot in price, performance, and features.

source:pcworld 

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Apple unveils higher capacity iPod, iPhone models

Ipod-iphone

aid on Tuesday it has introduced models of its popular iPod touch handheld computer and iPhone with double the memory available in previous versions.

Apple, which previously said it had sold more than 4 million iPhones since its introduction last June, says the iPhone will now also sell with 16 gigabytes of memory.

Apple has doubled the capacity of both its iPhone and iPod Touch allowing new customers to spend $100 more and get twice the storage for music, movies, pictures, and podcasts than available with previous models. Introduced today, the 32GB iPod Touch sells for $499 and the 16GB iPhone goes for $499.

Pricing on existing iPod and iPhone models stays the same. But if you’re in the market for a new iPhone or iPod Touch, spending $100 more to double your capacity is a pretty good deal.

Of course the larger capacities may rile some existing iPhone and iPod Touch users as was the case when Apple dropped the price of the iPhone.

Could this be seen as another stab at the early adopters? Of course that was not Apple’s intentions, but that is an obvious consequence of an upgrade of this magnitude less than a year after the initial release. But it’s okay, early adopters, pull that knife out of your back and listen to what Apple has to say is the reason for the upgrade.

Greg Joswiak, Apple’s vice president of iPod and iPhone product marketing said in the release, “For some users, there’s never enough memory.” This is definitely true, especially with music collections shifting completely digital, but Greg, it still stings for those of us picked up a 16GB iPod Touch merely months ago to have a new bigger and better model become available.

It’s kind of funny to think about it, but who would have thought the world would get so upset over a product improvement? Isn’t that what companies are supposed to be doing?

source:pcworld

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New Kodak Chips Could Improve Cell Phone Cameras

Kodak

Photography company Eastman Kodak Co. on Monday introduced chips that can boost the picture-taking power in mobile phones, and help manufacturers cut development costs.

Kodak says its KAC-05020 Image Sensor is the world’s first 1.4 micron, 5-megapixel device that allows capture of high quality images in small cameras, with quality that equals what is available from current devices using larger, 1.75 micron pixel designs.

“It will help manufacturers reduce their costs…because of the size – you can put more chips onto one wafer, for the same amount of money,” said Fas Mosleh, CMOS Sensors Marketing Director at Kodak. “This is the kind of technology that can help upgrade all camera phones to a real camera.”

The announcement is the latest from Kodak’s growing patent licensing arm, which has become a critical contributor to its profitability as the company emerges from an expensive transition into a producer of digital imaging and printing systems. Kodak expects to earn up to $350 million a year from royalties and related revenue through 2011.

“It could be very well happening that one of those years will be a lot larger than that,” said Antonio Perez, Kodak’s chief executive, on a conference call last week. “It may be another year, a lot smaller than that. We see significant legs to our program.”

Industry analysts have looked skeptically at Kodak’s rosy outlook, noting that few details have been delivered on its patent plans, and that incremental licensing contracts are hard to count on in the long term.

Still, Kodak has introduced some products from its patent portfolio, including its own consumer inkjet printers, which it says makes longer lasting pictures. In addition, last year it unveiled camera sensor technology that significantly increases sensitivity to light, allowing users to potentially take pictures in very low light.

Key to the performance of this new sensor is the “Kodak Truesense CMOS Pixel,” a reworking of the fundamental design and architecture of traditional CMOS pixels, the company says. A CMOS (complementary metal oxide semiconductor) sensor is less expensive to manufacture, while consuming less energy and performing more functions on a single chip.

Manufacturing customers interested in the design will likely get a chance to sample it in the second quarter of this year, but devices with the technology are not likely to hit store shelves until 2009, Kodak says.

source:pcworld 

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Cell Phones No Cancer Risk

Cellphone-cacer

Drinking coffee, using mobile phones or having breast implants is unlikely to cause cancer, according to a risk ranking system devised by an Australian cancer specialist to debunk popular myths.

The cancer risk assessment reaffirms smoking, alcohol and exposure to sunlight as leading risk factors, but allays concerns about coffee, mobile phones, deodorants, breast implants and water with added fluoride.

The five-point system created by University of New South Wales Professor Bernard Stewart lists the risk of cancer from proven and likely, to inferred, unknown or unlikely.

“Our tool will help establish if the level of risk is high, say on a par with smoking, or unlikely such as using deodorants, artificial sweeteners, drinking coffee,” Stewart said.

He found active smokers and ex-smokers to be the most at risk, although the risk is reduced for people who quit smoking.

Drinking alcohol was also a high risk factor, particularly for people who also smoke, although Stewart said no specific type of alcoholic drink was most strongly to blame.

Drinking chlorinated water and using a mobile phone was far less likely to cause cancer, Stewart said, although the risks associated with the long-term use of mobile phones had not been fully established.

He said there little risk from drinking coffee, using deodorants, drinking fluoridated water and having breast implants or dental fillings.

Stewart’s research was published in the latest edition of the Mutation Research Reviews journal to mark world cancer day on Monday.

 source:pcworld