Friday, April 8, 2011

MobileCrunch

MobileCrunch

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“Folded Leaf” Phone Is Minimalist, But Not Necessarily Practical

Posted: 07 Apr 2011 03:20 PM PDT


I appreciate good design, but attractive design isn’t always good. This “Folded Leaf,” for instance, is a very good-looking device, and the bent design is unique and cool. But isn’t this thing supposed to go in your pocket?


While I share their frustration with kitchen-sink phones when many people still just want a basic mobile telephone, that doesn’t necessarily mean going back to a Nokia-style candybar and adding a quirk, in this case a permanently bent chassis, which isn’t really a step forward. Although to be fair, this thing would be nice to talk on.

The design was done for Huawei by Claesson Koivisto Rune. No information on availability or anything like that, but there’s lots more info and pics over at MoCoLoco.

Assurance Wireless Expands To 23rd State: Arkansas

Posted: 07 Apr 2011 01:33 PM PDT

This is a great service, and one I’m surprised isn’t offered in the other 27 states. Virgin Mobile operates it as a sort of combination good deed/foot-in-the-door service; you get 250 free minutes and a phone if you qualify for stuff like food stamps, and if you need more, you can pay a small fee to add stuff on. They just announced they’re operational in Arkansas, so if you’re short on funds but still need a mobile, see if you qualify.

I applaud the no-strings-attached thing, but I also see that this makes sound business sense. The burden on the network of a bunch of 2G phones is negligible, the old handsets would never have made money, and it gives their new customers an incentive to stay with Virgin after they get back on their feet.

If I still worked in social service (did until a couple years ago), I would definitely recommend this to the people I worked with.

[via Mobile Burn]

Sadly, The iPhone 5 Pictures Floating Around Are Fake

Posted: 07 Apr 2011 11:28 AM PDT

Throughout the course of this morning, we’ve seen these images — purportedly showing off the iPhone 5 (tiny bezel and redesigned antenna and all) — hit a number of blogs. It showed up in our tips box a few times, as well.

Something about the shots just didn’t ring right, so I got to sleuthin’. First step: find the original source. After a few minutes of navigating the Googletubes, I ended up here — a Taiwanese forum that appears to be the first appearance of the shots. Alas, there was no new information. Hmph.

Next approach: translate the watermark. The fact that the Chinese characters were on an image made things a bit tough (can’t just throw an image like this into Google Translate, you know?), but eventually this character drawing/translation tool saved the day. Literally, the watermark translates to “Four Month Fish”. Less literally, it translates to “April Fish” — which, as it just so happens, is the english translation of the French name for April Fool’s day, “poisson d’avril”.

Mystery solved.

fake iphone 5 iPhone-5-2110407112734-300x279 iPhone-5-1110407112732-300x300


The BlackBerry Bold Touch Gets Handled In Its First Hands-On

Posted: 07 Apr 2011 10:24 AM PDT

RIM’s doing their damnedest to keep their BlackBerry World announcements a secret, but it just doesn’t seem to be working. Just last week, a photo gallery of their next full touchscreen device (don’t call it a Storm) leaked out. This week, it’s something even more exciting: the BlackBerry Bold Touch got pawed at.

Combining RIM’s pretty-much-universally loved Bold keyboard with a touchscreen display on top, the Bold Touch is something straight out of any BlackBerry addict’s most private dreams. It is — at least in concept — the best of both worlds. BGR spent a bit of hands-on time with a pre-release unit, and here’s the gist of what he had to say:

  • The keyboard is “great and spacious”
  • The device itself is “extremely solid”
  • The touchscreen is “very responsive”
  • The Bold Touch uses a new battery that RIM hasn’t used before, though there’s no word on what the new capacity is.
  • Global release tentatively scheduled for June/July, with it being announced at BlackBerry World in May

What do you think: would you carry it? If you’ve strayed from the BlackBerry, is this enough to pull you back in?

Be sure to check out BGR’s full hands-on gallery over here.

In Japan: Smartphones Outsell Feature Phones For The First Time

Posted: 07 Apr 2011 09:51 AM PDT

Revolution in mobile-crazy Japan: Market research firm GFK Japan is reporting [JP, PDF] that more smartphones than feature phones have been sold in the country between March 28 and April 3. To be more concrete, 50.1% of all devices sold in Japan in that week were iOS, Android, Windows or BlackBerry phones (see chart).

GFK says that the main driver here was Android, with carriers having started to offer more and more models in recent months. Unfortunately, GFK doesn’t provide absolute numbers.

The report doesn’t come as much of a surprise, seeing Android phones have been topping the sales charts in Japan, for example the Galaxy S (in January) or the NEC Medias (in March).

This site [JP] provides a good, up-to-date overview of the smartphone situation in Japan.

Microsoft On The Windows Phone 7 Early Update Hacks: “Wait.”

Posted: 07 Apr 2011 09:49 AM PDT

Remember that clever hack we mentioned earlier this week? The one that allows just about any Windows Phone 7 handset to get the copy-and-paste update right this second, rather than waiting for Microsoft and the carriers to send it your way? Microsoft has weighed in on the matter (and they’re not too happy):

As an engineer and a gadget lover, I totally understand the impulse to tinker. You want the latest technology and you're tired of waiting. Believe me, I get it.

But my strong advice is: wait. If you attempt one of these workarounds, we can't say for sure what might happen to your phone because we haven't fully tested these homebrew techniques. You might not be getting the important device-specific software we would typically deliver in the official update. Or your phone might get misconfigured and not receive future updates.

A reasonable request. As with any hack — especially one involving an update process known to have issues — there are dangers. That said: chances are, anyone with the drive to update their handset right this second and the technical know-how to get it done is probably already well aware of the dangers — and they probably don’t care.

You can read Microsoft’s full post here.

Alltel Launches 4 Android Phones, Including The Mythical HTC Merge

Posted: 07 Apr 2011 09:38 AM PDT

There aren’t too many people still on Alltel these days, given that the terms of the company’s acquisition by Verizon left them operating in only 6 states. That doesn’t mean those left lingering in Alltel’s territories should be stranded without some awesome phones though, right?

Right — and for them, Alltel has just launched a quartet of Android phones (including one that no one else has yet).

The four phones launched today (from left to right, above):

  • The LG Axis, a QWERTY-sliding handset running Android 2.1 with a 3.2 megapixel camera on the back
  • The Samsung Gem, also running 2.1, is a candybar phone with a 3.2″ display, 3.2 megapixel rear camera, and an 800 Mhz CPU.
  • Essentially the same phone as the Droid X that launched on Verizon in June of last year, the Milestone X has a big ol’ 4.3″ display, 1Ghz CPU, an 8 megapixel camera, HDMI out, and 8 gigs of internal storage. It’s not exactly cutting edge these days, but it’s still a pretty beastly superphone.
  • Last, but not least: the HTC Merge. At this point, it’s almost shocking to see this handset actually hit the shelves. Word of its existence (as a Verizon phone) first leaked out waaaaay back in the third quarter of last year. Eventually, word on the street said that it’d been delayed in an effort to add LTE support — but around 6 months later, nary a peep regarding the handset has come out of VZW. Today, however, Alltel’s picking up the (LTE-less) HTC Merge in all of its QWERTY-sliding goodness, along with its 3.8″ (480×800) touchscreen and a 5 megapixel rear camera.

    • Anyone out there on Alltel? Planning to pick one of these up? Drop us a comment below and let us know which one.

T-Mobile To Launch The G2X (Optimus 2X) On April 20th

Posted: 07 Apr 2011 09:06 AM PDT

We just found out the Android-tastic Sidekick 4G would be launching on April 20th, and it looks like he’s bringing friends: also launching on the 20th will be the T-Mobile-branded version of LG’s Optimus 2X, dubbed the “G2X” here.

While this won’t be the first dual-core Android phone in the US (that title went to the Atrix), it’s the first one to hit T-Mobile — and power comes with a bit of a price tag. Expect the G2X to cost you $250 out the door on a 2-year contract, though a $50 mail-in rebate will take some of that sting off.

T-Mobile Confirms: Sidekick 4G To Launch April 20th

Posted: 07 Apr 2011 08:59 AM PDT

Waiting patiently for the Sidekick’s Android-flavored rebirth? Looks like you won’t have much longer to wait.

T-Mo just dropped a knowledge bomb on the Twitters, confirming the whispers that have been going around for a few days: the Sidekick 4G will be hitting the shelves on April 20th — and if what they told us before is holding true, it’ll launch for $100 on a 2 year contract.
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