Gizmodo gives the IPhone a "Don't Buy" Rating

Tired of being pushed around by Apple's greed and ham-fisted approach to locking down its hardware, gadget giant Gizmodo has brought down the hammer by giving the Apple iPhone a (rare) "don't buy" rating. Ouch, that smarts.

Gizmodo (which is hardly alone in the new Apple bashing) originally told users to "Wait" on the device for more applications to be included, hoping that a 1.1 firmware update would correct some earlier, obvious defects like the inability to send MMS messages, record videos, make your own ringtones, or use the device for mass storage. But Apple's latest release infamously fixed little of that. Yes, you can purchase ringtones now and access iTunes via Wi-Fi, but Apple also went out of its way to disable all unlocking and customizing that more enterprising users have developed. That's a picture of Gizmodo editor's iPhone just before upgrading it with the latest firmware. Afterwards, it looks just like any other device.

Gizmodo's ire on behalf of hardcore gadget enthusiasts is rightfully placed: Apple was probably never going to introduce these features on its own and intentionally "bricked" the devices as part of its most recent update. Gizmodo even goes so far as to call the update "malicious," after washing his hands of the device until its opened to third-party apps.

source: yahoo news

Sony Ericsson K850i Available!

According to Stuff.tv, this 5 megapixel wonder will be in stores by October 1, Monday! For UK residents, they're giving away 3 of these phones...just go to www.stuff.tv.

Nokia 6300 New Colors

Red and white versions of the Nokia 6300

Vertu Ascent Ferrari 60 Limited Edition Unboxing Video

The Ascent Ferrari 60 has been created to celebrate the motoring marque's 60th anniversary and is based on the Ferrari 612 Scaglietti.

Modeled on the motor itself, it is built with a titanium shell, a leather back made of the same material as the car's seats and even features the same Philips screws as the Scaglietti.

It will also come complete with Ferrari-themed wallpapers and ringtones.

Only 60 units are due to be made and will be presented in a special case that will also contain a valve from a Ferrari F1 car.

The service plan that comes with the handset is just as snooty as the phone itself - it's a biannual maintenance plan that replaces the leather as and when necessary.

With no pricing or availability announced, it's likely this is invitation only. And you aren't on the list.

source: arturelis, pocket-lint

Introducing shePhone, the Ultimate Phone for Women

Marie Claire asked popgadget.net founder Mia Kim to help create an ideal all-in-one gizmo for women. Move over, iPhone.

Features include:
1. Mini "Rabbit" vibrator
2. Perfume/Mace atomizer (just be sure to pick the right setting!)
3. Xanax dispenser (also works for other meds)
4. Dental floss
5. Corkscrew (for when the pills run out)
6. Home pregnancy test
7. Condom dispenser

From the interface:
Camera
Portable tanning laser
Cell-phone signal jammer (silence others in mid-call!)
Voice analyzer (is your BF where he says he is?)
Breathalyzer
GPS Universal remote (override other remotes)
Phone, Wi-Fi Web, MP3 player, and, finally, TiVo (record 24 when you're stuck at a client dinner)

source: Marie Claire

Cubic Mobile - World's First Truly Global Phone

Cubic Telecom unveiled what many industry watchers are calling the world's first true global phone. Presenting onstage at TechCrunch40 before a 800-plus crowd of hi-tech entrepreneurs, journalists and other industry influencers, the company announced Cubic Mobile, a mobile phone package that effectively makes "all global calls local calls," dramatically reducing costs for both callers and recipients of global phone calls when roaming internationally.

Cubic Mobile is a dual-band GSM/Wi-Fi phone that comes with several major innovations enabling callers to make and receive low-cost calls around the planet, wherever they may roam:

* MAXroam, the world's first universal SIM, offering consumers the best country-to-country phone rates anywhere. The MAXroam SIM, which can also be purchased separately, is a major breakthrough, and the result of years of negotiations with GSM carriers around the world.

* Full PBX functionality on the handset. Consumers get a single phone number, but can create multiple permanent local numbers for themselves -- up to 50 -- anywhere around the globe. All calls are forwarded to their Cubic Mobile phone, no matter where the calls originate, at the best rates for the callers.

* All Voice over IP (VoIP) calls within the Cubic network are free. All Cubic Mobile customers get a short code that they can use to make free VoIP calls to any other customer on the Cubic network. This is an especially attractive feature to families who live across borders and globally distributed companies and workgroups.

Pricing and Availability

* Cubic Mobile, which comes in two models, will be available October 1st at www.cubictelecom.com. The basic model will sell for $135 and a Windows Mobile version at $219 (both handsets come with a MAXroam SIM included and an initial $8 calling credit).

* MAXRoam, which operates on any unlocked GSM phone, can be purchased separately for $40 (with an initial $8 calling credit) and is available on September 27th at www.maxroam.com.

source: fiercewireless

Nokia N95-3 Available at US Flagship Stores

Available for $699...

TruPhone Voip for the IPhone

Blognation has just learned of (and witnessed) the first ever VoIP calls made from an Apple iPhone. TruPhone, the company that is slowly but surely bringing VoIP and affordable international calling to mobile phones all over the world has just added a very important feather to its cap with the alpha-alpha version of what is sure to be a major buzz-generating application.

According to the company, they expect a true beta release in about four weeks, however they cautioned me that they weren’t sure initially how many simultaneous connected clients they could support using the new application so they’re taking registrations on their site at TruPhone.com and will be allowing only a limited number of beta testers to get the application on a first come-first served basis.

source: Blognation

Armani Phone Video

Video shown during the launch of the Armani Phone at the Milan Fashion Week.

source: kimcyoung

Apple May Face Legal Trouble for Voiding Warranties

"Apple's recent decision to void warranties for folks that unlocked their iPhones may wind them up in legal hot water. The site Phone News points out that Apple appears to have broken a key warranty law relevant to SIM unlocks. The Magnuson-Moss Warranty Act, a law decades old, would seem to prevent Apple from voiding warranties in the way it is threatening to do with the iPhone, or so the site argues. 'The Magnuson-Moss Warranty Act states that Apple cannot void a warranty for a product with third-party enhancements or modifications to their product. The only exception to this rule is if Apple can determine that the modification or enhancement is responsible [for] damaging the product in question ... The legal [questions are]: Is the SIM Unlock process that has become mainstream doing damage to iPhone? And, also, is Apple designing future software updates to do damage to iPhone when said SIM Unlock code is present?"

source: posted at slashdot

IPhone Dev Team Statement re Apple's Claim that Hacks can Damage the Iphone

"From the current download numbers we assume an amount of about 500,000 free phones worldwide, still growing every day. The removal of the lock bug was a major step forward in the iPhone development made the iPhone free and useful to anyone, not only to those in certain countries.

Speaking of "damage" done to the firmware and unauthorized access to our own property (?), Apple now announced the next firmware update we may expect later this week will possibly break the handset of all of us free users in the world intentionally.

As we know better and that the removal of the firmware problems build in in favor for ATT is not causing "damage" as they want to make us believe, we will provide you with a tool in the next week which will be able to recover your nck counter and seczones and even enables you to restore your phone to a factory like state if you are really minded to update your phone to the "damaged" new firmware still having the lock bug, which prevent you of the usage of your property.

The motivation in this planned massacre on user phones is questionable, as if we can prevent the handsets from breaking, why can't apple do this too?

In the meantime we advise you not to update your free iPhone with the upcoming firmware as the important parts will be floating around the net anyways and wait for the next version to be fixed to work proper with your carrier and not break your phone."

THERE IS NO NEED FOR YOU TO UPDATE, DON'T DO IT!

Some Tips for user:
- snatch a copy of a 102 fw restore package now and keep it
- don't update to new firmware
- if you want new features, I am sure they will pop up somewhere around you shortly for single install.
- wait for new firmware being analyzed

Armani Phone UI

Armani Phone - All Angles and Included Headset

Nokia E51 Live Pictures

Finally! Someone with live pics of the silver Nokia E51...


source: mobilehub.fr

Related Posts:

E51 Unboxing Video
E51 Hands-on Video
Nokia Fan's Wet Dream
More Live Pics of the Nokia E51

Giorgio Armani Samsung Phone Specifications

For the first time Giorgio Armani’s signature elegance and simplicity is applied to mobile phone design. A large 2.6-inch QVGA TFT LCD screen maximizes the user’s visual experience and optimizes the full touch-screen user interface (UI). Along with the outer appearance of the phone, the graphical user interface (GUI) and audio user interface (AUI) also reflect Giorgio Armani’s modern simplicity. By adapting a haptical UI, users can feel an immediate mild vibration when they touch icons on the display. Being the size of a credit card and a mere 9.9 mm in thickness, the Giorgio Armani-Samsung Phone fits sensuously into a user’s palm.

Despite its compactness, the phone is loaded with the latest powerful multi-media features. It is equipped with a 3-megapixel camera, a music player supporting various types of music formats and a full internet browser. Furthermore, the Giorgio Armani-Samsung Mobile offers a microSD type external memory slot and comes with a Bluetooth® stereo headset.

A specially designed Giorgio Armani leather carrying case is also included for protection.

Standard	GPRS/ EDGE Tri-Band (900/1800/1900)
Camera	3 Megapixel camera
Display	2.6” QVGA TFT LCD (262K Colors)
Multimedia	H.263, AAC+/MP3/WMA, MPEG4, AAC, e-AAC+
Features	Bluetooth® 2.0 / USB 2.0 high-speed/ MTP 2.0
	Mobile Printing (BPP, PictBridge)
	micro SD™ external memory slot
	Bluetooth® Stereo Headset (A2DP)
	Full Touch Screen & Touch UI
Size	87.5 x 54.5 x 10.5 mm / 85g
Battery	880mAh

What's Worse than Unwittingly Buying a Cellphone Clone? Read on...

According to cable television channel ETTV, a Taiwan man bought three Nokia N73 cellphone with a built-in digital camera at a cellphone store in China because the handsets were cheaper than in Taiwan.

But after he returned to Taiwan, he realized that the cellphones did not work. When he opened the case, he found the circuit board was a piece of plastic board painted to look real.

The man took the fake Nokia cellphone to a Taipei cellphone shop and found that the Chinese fakes looked the same as the real Nokia N73 cellphone sold by the Taipei shop.

"I think the Chinese shop owner showed him a real Nokia cellphone, but sold him fakes which he hid under the counter," the shop owner said on ETTV.

For 600 US dollars, the Taiwan man bought three toy cellphones.

source: cellular-news

Iphone Modifications Voids Warranty

Less than a week after CEO Steve Jobs said that Apple Inc. would fight hacks that unlocked the iPhone, the company said any modification, unlocks included, voids the phone's warranty.

Saying it had found that many of the unlocking programs "cause irreparable damage to the iPhone's software," Apple spelled out the policy. "Users who make unauthorized modifications to the software on their iPhone violate their iPhone software license agreement and void their warranty," the company said in a statement. "The permanent inability to use an iPhone due to installing software is not covered under the iPhone's warranty."

Several unlock hacks are circulating, including the free open-source anySIM unlock created by iPhone Dev Team, and iPhoneSIMFree, a commercial unlocking program that sells for between $45 and $90 online. The unlocks let users insert a SIM card programmed with account data from another mobile provider so the phone can make calls on that carrier's network, rather than solely over AT&T's.

source: computerworld

W880i Successor?

Here's a leaked photo of a Sony Ericsson Walkman phone...speculated to be a 3.2 megapixel successor of the W880i.

Armani Phone Picture

Launched today at the Armani Fashion Show during the Milan Fashion Week.

MySpace Mobile

The social networking Web site MySpace is launching a free, advertising-supported cell phone version Monday as part of a wider bid by parent News Corp. to attract advertising for mobile Web sites.

The company said it also plans to offer a mobile version of its Photobucket picture sharing site in coming months.

The company already offers premium, subscription-based versions of MySpace through AT&T Inc. and Helio wireless services. Those versions include special features integrated into specific handsets, such as uploading cell phone photos directly to a user's profile page.

The new version set to launch Monday will work on all U.S. carriers and will allow users to send and receive messages and friend requests, comment on pictures, post bulletins, update blogs, and find and search for friends.

source: yahoo news

No Escape from Advertising!

Your cell phone may be one of the last spots around that's relatively free of advertising -- but not for long. Media and advertising companies have found a way of latching on to people's handsets by beaming ads to them via Bluetooth, the same technology used in some hands-free headsets.
Here's how it works: When you're standing less than 10 meters away from a Bluetooth interactive billboard, window display or concert hall booth, you'll be asked if you want to switch on your Bluetooth function and accept a file. That file could be a video, a song or an offer of rebate coupons.

As you are strolling down the Champs Elysees, for instance, don't be surprised if one day Lancome, using the technology, invites you to test its newest perfume in a nearby shop. You may also find yourself on the receiving end of ad clips from Coca-Cola or a Warner Bros. preview of its "Happy Feet" animated film.

"A mobile phone is the one electronic device most people carry with them at all times, so it is too good of an opportunity for media companies and advertisers to miss," says Nick Jones, wireless technology analyst at Gartner research house.

source: reuters

Samsung Suits up with Armani

Italy's Giorgio Armani and Samsung Electronics Co. Ltd said Sunday they have agreed to an alliance that will allow the South Korean company to sell consumer electronics products designed by the one of Italy's fashion icons.

Giorgio Armani will create the aesthetic design, while Samsung will provide the technology, the Italian fashion group said in a statement.

The first jointly-developed product, the Giorgio Armani-Samsung luxury mobile phone, will be presented Monday during Milan's Women Fashion Week. It said it expects the phone to "quickly achieve an iconic status."

It will be available in selected mobile phone stores and Giorgio Armani boutiques in major European countries from November. It will be available in other markets in 2008.

source: marketwatch

Nokia E51 Hands on Video Preview

Here's a hands on preview of the new Nokia E51, looks great, but am guessing the silver one is much nicer...

source: phonescoop.com

Apples and Oranges

France Telecom's Orange will sell Apple's iPhone handsets in France from the end of November, Chief Executive Didier Lombard said during an industry event in Hanoi on Thursday.

A company spokeswoman confirmed Lombard had unveiled the long-expected deal for France, which follows similar deals earlier this week to bring iPhones to Germany via Deutsche Telekom's T-Mobile and to Britain through Spanish-owned O2.

France Telecom said it was sure the unsubsidized phones, which combine Apple's popular iPod music player, a video player and a Web browser, would spur sales in France.

source: reuters
pic: dano at flickr.com

Iphone Possible Security Problems

Apple’s iPhone is a tough target for hackers, but a security researcher warned that there are ways the sleek device could potentially be compromised.

The iPhone has no security software, but Apple doesn’t let people load third-party programs on the device, reducing the risk of infection from malicious software. But when the iPhone is connected to the Web, possibilities emerge, said Marius van Oers, a security researcher with McAfee’s AVERT Labs in Amsterdam.

“It’s fairly easy to send someone an SMS (Short Messaging Service) or an e-mail with a Web link,” he said. “And once you go to the Web link, then that server can inject code into the iPhone, and if that happens, [a hacker] can have full control.”

source: http://tech.yahoo.com/news/macworld/iphonesecurity20070921

One USB Cable Fits All

London UK, 17th September 2007: The Open Mobile Terminal Platform (OMTP) today announced that following industry consultation a recommendation paper has been agreed to help pave the way for a single, universal cross manufacturer USB (Universal Serial Bus) cable connector that enables mobile consumers to connect and charge their mobile devices.

Members of OMTP include: Cingular Wireless, Hutchison 3G, Orange, SK Telecom, Telecom Italia, Telefónica, Telenor, T-Mobile and Vodafone. OMTP also has the support of 4 sponsors: AOL, Ericsson, Nokia, and SanDisk. There are a total of 39 participants from all parts of the industry; including Application software, hardware and the OS space. OMTP is operator driven, but it is scoped to serve the industry as a whole.


source: omtp.org

Samsung U700 awarded as "European Mobile Phone 2007-2008"

The Convergence Panel of European Imaging and Sound Association (EISA) voted Samsung’s U700 for ‘the European Mobile Phone 2007-2008’ because of its high speed data communication capability, 10 times faster than normal UMTS, and various multimedia features such as audio-compression technologies, an embedded 3.2-megapixel camera. Also, they highly praised U700’s U GO feature which shows a special landmark on the phone’s display and changes it automatically wherever users are travel.

source: samsung.com

Nokia releases the E51

Nice and slim business phone...

Key features

* Thin design loaded with features to help balance your business and leisure time
* Access your email while on the go with support for most leading personal and business email applications
* Browse the web and email with high speed 3G, HSDPA, or WLAN connection
* Make lower cost voice calls over the internet with the built-in WLAN
* Stay connected to the people and information you need with a long battery life and large internal memory
* Take pictures and capture video with the 2 megapixel camera with 4 x digital zoom
* Listen to the latest hits with FM Visual Radio or play your favorite tunes on the MP3 music player

Source: europe.nokia.com

Cellphone news, rumors, pictures and videos...enjoy fellow addicts!