Author: pdasnews

“You can stop squinting at all the blurry camera phone pictures and cease swapping stories about what a carrier rep told you in confidence, for the Palm Treo 700p is finally here. And though the new Palm OS-based smart phone was announced for both Sprint and Verizon Wireless, Sprint is first out of the gate to offer the device, with availability expected at the end of May. So is it worth picking up? We think so. The changes aren’t revolutionary, but as the successor to the Treo 650, the 700p brings some welcome improvements, such as EV-DO support and increased memory. Of course, it isn’t perfect. There’s still no integrated Wi-Fi, and Palm OS 6 has yet to see the light of day, but with solid performance and enhanced connectivity and multimedia capabilities, the Treo 700p is a winner. Sprint’s pricing is set at $399.99 with a two-year contract or $549.99 with a one-year contract. We should also note that as of this writing, Sprint says it has no plans to offer a cameraless version of the 700p.” Read this review of Treo 700p (Sprint) at reviews.cnet.com

“You have to keep in mind, though, that a “sport-centric” model is not the one packing all its functionality in an impenetrable casing – in fact it may feature a standard shell. The sharpest distinction is presence of a sensor, tracking your speed, when you are running or walking. Having this tool on its board, a handset instantly moves to sport-centric range, in other words targeted at people who would really love to keep an eye on their loading. Naturally this holds true not only for sportsmen, but also for common people, going in for sports occasionally. So far only Nokia 550 and Sony Ericsson W710i may be considered as truly sport-orientated handsets. The biggest difference between these two is that Nokia offers more solid casing and runs S60 third edition operating system, which implies it originates from smartphones, while the solution by Sony Ericsson is just an ordinary feature-packed cell phone. And in light of the fact both of them share a motion sensor, it is really hard to say which looks more appealing. Nevertheless, it’s a bit too early to talk about this, so let’s move on the actually reviewing Sony Ericsson W710i.” Read this review at mobile-review.com

There are some lists manufacturers love to be on, like the most popular or best selling. But a list of phones with the highest levels of radiation emissions is probably not going to make them smile. Regardless, consumers need to know, so here is the data.The following list was compiled by calculating the SAR, or Specific Absorption Rate, of the phones. The SAR measures the quantity of radiofrequency energy that is absorbed by the body. The higher the SAR, which is measured in Watts/Kilogram, the higher the ability of the phone to cause cell damage. The one thing that jumps out when you look at the list is the dominance of Motorola. The company likely isn’t thrilled that they have secured the top 9 spots on the list of eleven phones. But it could account for why they have the best reception. Here are the top phones, followed by the SAR:1) Motorola Slvr L6 – 1.582) Motorola V120c – 1.552) Motorola V265 – 1.554) Motorola V70 – 1.545) Motorola C290 – 1.535) Motorola P8767 – 1.535) Motorola ST7868 – 1.535) Motorola ST7868W – 1.539) Motorola A845 – 1.519) Palm Treo 650 GSM – 1.519) Panasonic Allure – 1.51″ via mobilemag.com

“Using mobile internet has become a part of everyday life. We use it for email, we send IMs using Causerie, learn and buy new things. With mobiVoip technology, you can now actively talk to your friend around the globe 24×7 at competitive calling plans.What is VoIP and mobiVoip? VOIP, or Voice Over IP (pronounced ‘voyp’), is a new technology that lets you make phone calls over the Internet. mobiVoip is MantraGroup’s propertiary technology which brings VoIP to mobile phones.When you make a VoIP phone call, you use a normal touch-tone telephone and dial the normal phone number just as you would any other time. The people on the other end can’t tell that whether you are calling from a traditional telephone or a VoIP phone. The main difference is that the phone call travels over the Internet rather than through the local phone company’s wires. mobiVoip™ takes it to next step allowing you to use your PDA and make VoIP calls. Will mobiVoIP technology change everything?Yes, we believe so. Carriers charge huge prices for international and roaming calls. With mobiVoIP patented technology, you can now use Bluetooth, Wifi, EVDO on your PDAs or Smartphones to call your friends. mobiVoIP™ also is been tested for low bandwidth connections like GPRS and IrDA.” Find out more at mobivoip.net

“”There’s good news and bad news coming from Korea-based Tinnos.The good news is that this company is bringing out a handheld running Windows CE 5.0 that will include a 30 GB hard drive and a 4.3-inch screen. The bad news is that it’s currently only slated for release in Japan.The Blufin, which is obviously intended as a mobile multimedia player, will have a 3.4 mm stereo headphone jack and a USB 2.0 port for quickly transferring large files.It will also include a 2-megapixel camera. Tinnos 30 GB HandheldTinnos says that this handheld’s 1.8 inch hard drive will be able to hold about 20 movies or 5,000 songs. If that isn’t enough, the Blufin will also include an SD/SDIO slot for additional storage.This device will use an Au1200 processor from AMD and include 128 MB of RAM.It will not come with any wireless capabilities built in, but these can be added through the SD/SDIO slot.Unfortunately, its screen resolution is not known at this time.Physically, it will be 5.2 inches wide, 3.0 inches tall, and 0.9 inches thick (131 mm x 76 mm x 22 mm). It will weigh 7.0 ounces (200 g)This Windows CE device is expected to be available in July for around $600.” via brighthand.com

“London, UK- 18 May 2006 – The evolution of Sony Ericsson’s successful Walkman phone range takes another step forward today with the announcement of the UMTS enabled W850. Sony Ericsson’s first GSM/UMTS ‘slider’, the W850 has been uniquely combined with a full horizontal mode camera experience and the latest Walkman player 2.0 for easy music download. Available in Precious Black or Golden White, the phone has an attention grabbing ‘heartbeat illumination’ feature to light-up the control keys in rhythm with your music. Visually stunning and appealing to use, this phone isn’t just about good looks – it also offers blisteringly fast music downloads direct to the handset. The phone is configured for operator over the air (OTA) music download services and accepts many popular music file formats including e-AAC+, which reduces download time and space needed for tracks. Memory isn’t an issue either with a 1GB memory stick PRO Duo supplied which is enough for around 1,000 songs in e-AAC+. This can be expanded to 4GB so that you can store a much larger music collection and have it with you all of the time.

The Walkman player 2.0 simplifies navigation through music genres, playlists, individual songs or music albums and there’s also a TrackID feature powered by Gracenote Mobile MusicID. This is a new service which means you can record a few seconds of a song, either via the microphone or the in built FM radio, and then with one click send that clip to the Gracenote worldwide music database which will identify the track and relay the information back to the phone.“The W850 is really empowering our users to listen to what they want, wherever they are,” said Jan Wäreby, Corporate Executive Vice President, Head of Sales and Marketing, Sony Ericsson. “Many people now have existing music collections stored in MP3. The W850 allows users to identify and buy music in a new and spontaneous way – hearing tracks they like, identifying them with TrackID and downloading them to the phone.”Sony Ericsson has also evolved the Walkman music player in ways which will appeal whether you’re a new user or already familiar with the interface. The user interface is more intuitive and makes it easy to search and play tracks as well as download them. New graphics capabilities make the experience more visual and provide music metadata and album art. And the download service is integrated, so there’s no need to come out of the music player and into the web browser to visit online music stores.

There is also a high performance 2 Megapixel camera that makes it fun to capture your favourite moments and share them with friends. Fast internet access and web browsing also make it easy to use your W850 to create and maintain blogsites, so you can keep your friends posted from wherever you are. An impressive range of accessories means you can have even more fun out of your W850. Stereo Bluetooth headsets allow you to enjoy music in full stereo quality wire-free, and an advanced car handsfree set makes it safe to enjoy your music phone while driving. Music Desk stand speakers provide a boost to the sound to make the W850 the centre of any party.The Sony Ericsson W850i is a UMTS 2100 and Tri-band GPRS 900/1800/1900 Walkman phone for Europe, Middle East, Africa.It is commercially available in Precious Black or Golden White and starts shipping during Q3 2006. W850 – Features at a glance:
Imaging and messaging
2.0” QVGA TFT 260k
2 mega pixel
Landscape Imaging
4 x digital zoom
LED Light
Video Recording/Playback
Push e-mail
Macromedia Flash
Video telephony

Music
1 GB MS PRO Duo enough for approximately 1000 tracks in eAAC+
Walkman Player 2.0 [MP3, AAC, AAC+, eAAC+, m4a playback]
Up to 30 hours music playing time
Full-length music download OTA
Music/video streaming
TrackID
Speed search music
Music playback with illumination
RDS FM Stereo Radio
Audio out via system connector
A+B buttons
Java 3D gaming
OMA DRM v. 2.0

Connectivity
UMTS 2100
USB 2.0 Mass storage
Full Access Net front HTML browser
RSS feeds
Bluetooth 2.0 (A2DP)
Landscape browsing
Expandable MS PRO Duo slot
PC Synchronization
Flight mode
FOTA
Kit Content:
1 GB MS PRO Duo
Stereo headset
USB Cable
PC SW

Accessories
Audio cable out
BT stereo music headset (A2DP)
Adv. car handsfree
Media Center 3 – for wireless plug & play connection to PC an HiFi
Music Desk stand speakers (Sony Branded)
FM transmitter”

“The screen is sharp and bright. It has 1,024 x 600 pixels resolution so full-screen web browsing is possible, but would be difficult for the poor of sight. Everything in the Windows menus and input boxes was readable — nothing was so small that it became a mush — but I did find myself squinting at some things.There are a couple of handily located zoom buttons on the right hand side of the case. These helped, although the need to include zoom buttons shows how small everything on the screen is.” Check out this nice preview at digitalworldtokyo.com

“Here’s Inkel’s latest navigator, the Widetouch 5.6. Needless to say that you get DMB and GPS, and the device also has a 5.6″ screen, a 400Mhz Samsung ARM9 CPU and an SD slot. The kit will be available in Black and White for 438000Won (367 EUR) for the version without DMB and 558000Won (467 EUR) for the interesting version (the one with DMB that is). Once again, apply for Korean citizenship, because this is Korea-only gear…” via akihabaranews.com

“HP has introduced 3 new iPaq models in Asia – the hw6965 GPS-communicator and ultra compact rw6818 and rw6828. The last two devices have the same design and are considered to rival with O2 XDA Atom communicator, they have been rumored for some time in the Internet. Dimensions are 102x58x19.5 mm. The rw6828 differs from the other model in the integrated support of Wi-Fi wireless networks. Both communicators feature tri-band GSM networking, a 2.7” QVGA (240×320 pixels) LCD, Bluetooth and IrDA interfaces, a 2-megapixel camera, an FM-tuner, a miniSD slot. They are powered by Windows Mobile 5.0. The sales of the rw6818 and rw6828 are expected late in May. The GPS-communicator hw6965 is made as a candy bar with the QWERTY-keyboard and is a heir of the hw6515. It is powered by Windows Mobile 5.0 working on Intel PXA270 416 MHz processor. There is 64 MB RAM and 128 MB flash memory onboard. It supports quad-band GSM networking and Wi-Fi (802.11b). The hw6965 is equipped with a 1.3-megapixel camera, an expansion slot for miniSD cards, Bluetooth, USB and IrDA interfaces. It is expected to come out in the end of June.”

“ACCESS, a global provider of mobile content delivery and Internet access technologies, today announced the release of NetFront v3.3 for Pocket PC, the latest version of its award winning Pocket PC web browser. The trial version of NetFront v3.3 for Pocket PC is available now for free download on the ACCESS website. The final version will be released at the end of May and will be priced at $29.80 USD. NetFront for Pocket PC has garnered a Smartphone & Pocket PC Magazine “Best Software” award in each of the last two years and has received rave reviews worldwide. NetFront v3.3 for Pocket PC, which supports Java and Macromedia Flash, provides Windows Mobile users an optimal mobile Internet experience through a variety of features and capabilities. NetFront v3.3 for Pocket PC also features a wide variety of popular capabilities including tab browsing (allows users to switch between multiple web pages in one browser window) and Smart-Fit Rendering (automatically resizes Web pages to fit mobile terminal screens). New features include VGA LCD support and support for RSS and Atom feed (data description formats used mainly to display information updates). In addition, NetFront v3.3 for Pocket PC includes a page translation function for languages. NetFront v3.3 for Pocket PC is being offered with ACCESS’ Java platform JV-Lite2 CE Edition. A trial version of NetFront v3.3 for Pocket PC is available now as a free download on ACCESS’ Website. NetFront v3.3 for Pocket PC will go on sale at the end of May for $29.80 (regular price), and will be available at download sites including Handango, PocketGear, Bitway, GoodCrew Leche, and Vector. Please see http://nfppc.access.co.jp/english for more information about NetFront v3.3 for Pocket PC”.