smartphone

It's been a while since Palm has caused a stir, but the company certainly has people talking with its planned January 8 CES event. As CNET News reporter Tom Krazit reported last week, it's expected that Palm will preview its new operating system, codenamed Nova, at CES 2009, and the rumors look to be true based on new information from a Business Week article.

According to Peter Burrows at Business Week, Palm will unveil Nova and the first of a family of products in Vegas, but it's not looking to go after the iPhone or BlackBerry. Instead, … Read more

First introduced at CTIA Fall 2008, the RIM BlackBerry Curve 8350i is finally available through Sprint. The Curve 8350i can be purchased online and through telesales now for $149.99 with a two-year contract; the smartphone will be in stores starting January 11. This is particularly good news for Nextel Direct Connect users, who haven't seen a new BlackBerry model since the RIM BlackBerry 7100i, which was introduced back in June 2006.

In addition to supporting the iDEN network for use with Direct Connect and Group Connect push-to-talk services, the BlackBerry Curve 8350i also features Wi-Fi, Bluetooth 2.0, … Read more

As the holidays approach, we're thinking about more than gift shopping and spiking the eggnog; we're thinking about CES, which looms soon after New Year's Day. Though cell phones tend to play a supporting role at CES, I guarantee that we'll see a few new handsets debuting. Of course, Apple always shuns the event for its own Macworld--it runs the same week as CES--but most of the major players will be in Sin City. Since most announcements are shrouded in secrecy until the show opens, we don't have anything firm to report just yet. But … Read more

On Tuesday, 14 new members joined Google's Open Handset Alliance, showing their support and furthering the development of the Google Android mobile operating system. Among the fresh additions is Sony Ericsson, and it looks like the company isn't wasting any time and has hit the ground running.

According to several sources, Sony Ericsson is planning on releasing an Android handset by summer 2009 and a company spokesman has gone on to say that the first models will be on the higher end while it will release more mass-market devices at a later time. In addition, HTC is said … Read more

Skype for Windows Mobile 2.5 beta, released on Tuesday, essentially brings changes made to Skype's desktop VoIP client (download|review) to Windows Smartphones and Windows Pocket PCs.

The application's display is compact, intuitive, and full-featured.

The mobile version places tabs for your various actions at the bottom of the app. By switching among them, you'll be able to change your online status and see missed calls and instant messages, initiate IMs, or place a call to your contact's Skype account, mobile number, or land line if you've purchased Skype Out. There's also a … Read more

Motorola will hold onto its market dominance in the U.S. handset market in 2008, but the company's market share is rapidly declining, according to a report from market research firm MultiMedia Intelligence.

Motorola is expected to provide 21 percent of all handsets bought in the consumer market in the U.S. in 2008. But without any new hit products coming on the market, Samsung and LG are poised to surpass Motorola in terms of market share in 2009.

BlackBerry maker Research In Motion and Apple's iPhone are also expected to gain market share in 2009. Rick Sizemore, … Read more

Earlier on Friday, we reported on rumors that Verizon Wireless would release a firmware update for the RIM BlackBerry Storm, but it's now official.

The carrier has begun rolling out the software upgrade via the Desktop Software Manager and Web-based software first, while the over-the-air update will be pushed out at 9:30 p.m. PST on Friday so you have three choices as to how you want to get the new software. You can check Verizon's support Web site for specific instructions.

We'll be installing the update on our review unit and making adjustments to our … Read more

The RIM BlackBerry Storm has been out for about two weeks now, and the reviews of the first touch-screen BlackBerry have been mixed, skewing slightly more on the negative side. While the touch screen and features list get a thumbs up, there have been numerous complaints about the sluggish performance (check out the CNET user reviews for a sampling), but it looks like there might be a fix coming soon.

Verizon Wireless is expected to release a firmware update 4.7.0.75 for the BlackBerry Storm, though there's a bit of confusion as to the exact release date. … Read more

NEW YORK--Nokia's new N97 smartphone is cool, but it's still no iPhone.

I got a chance to look at Nokia's latest smartphone, the N97, on Thursday at the company's annual Capital Markets Day here. While Nokia's marketing team wouldn't actually let me play with the phone, since it won't officially go on the market until 2009, I got a demonstration of some of the phone's features and functionality from Jukka Heiska, director of product management for the N97. A video of the phone demonstration will be posted Friday on CNET News as well as on CNET TV.

In some ways it's unfortunate that every touch-screen phone that comes out these days is compared to Apple's iPhone. But given the popularity of the iPhone, especially here in the U.S., it's difficult not to do the comparisons.

My first impression of the new N97 is that even though it has impressive specifications, like a total of 48 gigabytes of potential storage and a 5-megapixel camera and video recorder, the phone seems more like an evolution of Nokia's N-95 or N-96 smartphones rather than a ground-breaking new touch-screen device that could potentially be the next iPhone killer.

For one, the touch-screen wasn't terribly sophisticated. Icons could be dragged and dropped using a finger, but unlike the iPhone, which allows you to pinch text to magnify it or reduce it, or even the new BlackBerry Storm that allows you to double click on text or images to make them bigger, the N97 didn't offer these features.

Design-wise the phone looked more like Sony Ericsson's Xperia X1. It has a slide-out QWERTY keyboard and a tilted screen. In this way, it's an improvement over the N95 or the N96, which offer tons of features and functionality, but lack full QWERTY keyboards.

That said, there are a few key features that the N97 offers that the iPhone doesn't. For example, the Nokia Web browser on the N97 supports Flash and Flash video, something that Apple's Safari browser doesn't support. And of course, heavy texters and e-mail enthusiasts, will like the full QWERTY keypad. I've had several iPhone owners tell me that they still carry around a BlackBerry for sending e-mails on the go, because they don't like the iPhone's virtual keyboard for typing longer messages.

The phone, which Nokia's marketing team calls a "mobile computer" also offers a whopping 32GB of storage on the device with the option of adding up to another 16GB of storage through a microSD card. And then there is the 5-megapixel camera, which also records DVD-quality video.… Read more