News

BlackBerry Bold 9900 launching soon?

We all know from last weeks announcement that the new BlackBerry 9900 is coming soon but the question is how soon is soon.

I made my daily visit over to the UK BlackBerry website today and was not only pleased to see the 9900 there but even more glad that it says on the site ‘launching soon’.

If you are interested in getting the BlackBerry 9900 with its touch screen and BlackBerry 7 OS then you can head on over to the site and register your interest. RIM will then email you when more news regarding the launch is available.

With a 1.2 GHz processor and 8GB of expandable memory, the BlackBerry Bold 9900 Smartphone is the very definition of high performance. It also features the best in Wi-Fi technology – so you can quickly tap into Wi-Fi hotspots whenever you need to. And with an HD video recorder, you can even capture exceptional moments in all their vivid detail.

Sleek, high-end, and loaded with the ultimate tools, the BlackBerry Bold 9900 Smartphone is the thinnest, sleekest BlackBerry Smartphone yet. Made of high-quality brushed stainless steel, with sculpted surfaces and refined touches, it’s got the looks to match its power.

Continuing to build on past success, the BlackBerry 7 OS has been powerfully enhanced. Enjoy a fluid touch screen experience – swiping, zooming and scrolling around apps and websites with ease.

Our new operating system is integrated with BlackBerry® Maps, giving you immediate access to Location-Based Services such as the sights and amenities in your local area. Plus with NFC (Near Field Communications) you have the opportunity to pay for travel, redeem coupons or even gain secure access to your office – all with just a swipe of your BlackBerry BoldT 9900 Smartphone.

This phone gets me all hot and bothered!

You can register your interest here.

Posted by: James

Pay your taxi fare via your mobile

This month sees the launch of a clever new initiative from mobile giants, Vodafone.

The networks customers are able to add their taxi fares to their phone bill thanks to a special fleet from Vodafone. The companies branded black cabs are offering customers the option to pay via their mobile phones putting a stop to stopping at cash points and paying by cash.

Not only that, but the 500 modified taxis will be fitted with mobile phone chargers to give your handset a free boost on the ride home.

Genius. Great for both the company and customer.

Vodafone customers will simply text the taxi’s licence number and individual code to have the fare added to their monthly mobile phone bill.

Posted by: Tracy

Microsoft wont support unofficial Windows Phone 7 upgraders

Bad news for anyone who has taken the unofficial route when upgrading their Windows Phone 7 handsets, Microsoft have come out to say that the latest WP7 update will probably NOT work on their phone.

Microsoft did issue a warning before but Microsoft’s Brandon Watson posted:

"Despite the fact that many people have claimed that an unofficial update mechanism worked fine for them, we cautioned that phones which were updated via this method were not going to be able to update past build 7390"

"Unfortunately for those customers out there who acted on information from sources outside of Microsoft, the rubber meets the road today."

I suppose for those with unofficial builds on their handsets will simply have to wait for this update to also come through from unofficial channels?

More on this below.

"With Windows Phone update build 7392 going out to phones via the official update mechanism, those people who have used the unsupported method of forcing 7390 onto their phones will find that their phones will not update to 7392"

"With the official update process there is a requirement that the package on the phone also be official in order to update itself."

"Phones updated via the unsupported method do not contain an official image and cannot be updated further at this time”

"Due to scheduling of engineering resources, we did not anticipate having to undue the changes made to phones by these unsupported methods. While we are not ruling out having a fix in the future, for now there is no fix."

Posted by: Matt

A quick look at the Samsung 8.9″ Tablet video

Johannes over at NewGadgets.de got his hands on a working sample of the 8.9 inch tablet, and has shot a short video. The Samsung Galaxy 8.9 and 10.1 are probably the two most anticipated tablets this year. Samsung had a decent debut with the 7 inch Galaxy Tab, and hopes to really hit the big time with its pair of new Android 3.0 (Honeycomb) Galaxy Tabs. Check out the video below.

Qualcomm demonstrates MSM8660

There is an obsession at the moment with dual-core CPU’s in phones with the Optimus 2X  already on sale and HTC’s Sensation due out soon both sporting whizy new dual-core mobile CPU’s.

Now we’ve already see the benchmarks of Qualcomm’s latest MSM8660 CPU which runs at 1.5GHz, impressive enough for sure but a few days ago Qualcomm uploaded a demo video of the new Snapdragon in use within one of their own development devices. In the video, which I’ve embedded below, you can see them show off HTML5 video streaming, Flash video streaming, and 1080p playback. Not only that but there’s multichannel audio support and a phenomenal user interface.

Oh and they’ve crammed in a 13 mega-pixel camera on the back.

Check out the game demos too! I WANT ONE!!

Android 2.3.4 to have Video Chat

According to the Google Mobile blog, Google has begun it’s roll out  of Android 2.3.4 which will begin being sent to Nexus S handsets sometime in the near future. Google will bring a new key feature in 2.3.4, Video Chat. The chat will operate on your android device through the Gmail and GTalk applications and will allow video chats to take place with someone else on a compatible phone, tablet or any computer. Video chat fans can breathe a sigh of relief as the video chat feature will be available over the mobile network and Wi-Fi.

Using the new features is simple. On your Android device, from the Google Talk contacts list, you’ll see a video and voice chat icon next to each contact. Touch the button for the feature you’d like to use, and chat away.

Video can be paused while audio chat continues if you need to navigate elsewhere during a video session. During voice or video chat, text chats from that contact are overlaid on the device screen.

White iPhone 4 thicker than the black

This is one of those odd titbits that popped up on my radar this morning and initially I was like ‘So what!?’ however, upon reflection it’s not only a bit curious but also potentially annoying.

Despite the iPhone 4 being announced last year and a delay of close to 10 months the white iPhone 4 model went on sale here in the UK this past week. Even the Apple website say ‘Finally!’.

So it turns out that the white iPhone 4 is actually 0.2mm thicker than the black model, the difference caused by the white glass on the front and rear being 0.1mm thicker each. No big deal I hear many of you say, and in itself I would agree. BUT, where the annoyance lies is in that quite a few of the cases designed for iPhone 4 wont fit the white model, particularly the more rigid plastic cases.

0.2mm doesn’t sound like a lot but the difference is visible when you look at the two side-by-side and is enough to mean that a number of cases manufacturers may end up back at the drawing board!

Posted by: Matt

Google Docs Android App hits

A dedicated Google Docs application has finally been released on the Android Market by Google, for all devices with Android 2.1 or above. The app allows access for documents, images, text, spread sheets, and presentations. It also boasts a built-in OCR (optical character recognition) feature, which converts pictures to text. The application also supports account syncing. It isn’t a full fledged office application yet, but it is a good start for a long awaited feature.

Get it here.

Posted by Gareth

Toshiba Tab specs finally Revealed

For a few months now, many have been waiting anxiously for the official announcement of the Toshiba Android 3.0 Honeycomb Tablet that has been teased since CES. We now have the announcement from Toshiba of the 10.1-Inch Honeycomb Tablet dubbed, "Regza AT300". Here are the released specs:

Nintendo reveal plans for next generation Wii console

With the extraordinary success of the original Wii, it’s hardly surprising that Nintendo are lining up a successor, and it’s been revealed that it will be arriving sometime next year. There will also be a working demonstration at the E3 gaming show in June. Although sales of the current Wii having been slowing down in recent quarters, talk of 86 million units sold globally is no mean feat, despite it arriving around 5 years ago; I still remember the mad scramble that would drive people to pay double the retail price on eBay for the always-out-of-stock console.

The Wii was the first console with motion controlled gaming and it wouldn’t be surprising if Nintendo had another unique gameplay aspect up their sleeve. Nintendo’s CEO Satoru Iwata said that "It will offer a new way of playing games within the home" which does sound like a new gaming concept. Mind control maybe? We’ll find out later this summer.

Posted by: Vince