Hasta La Gadget!

Longtime Palm fans are gonna want to lock the doors and turn down the lights — our friends at PhoneScoop just got the first demo of Motion App’s Classic Palm OS emulator for the Palm Pre. Palm OS apps can be installed by just dragging the .prc files over the Pre in mass storage mode, and they’re run as though they were on an SD card. There’s no tethered HotSync, although there’s a compatibility mode of some kind and apps will be able to pull data down over the air. Check the video after the break, including a demo of ePocrates, which we know a lot of potential Pre owners are interested in.

Continue reading Palm Pre Classic emulator demoed on video

Filed under: Cellphones

Palm Pre Classic emulator demoed on video originally appeared on Engadget on Thu, 02 Apr 2009 15:57:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

Read | Permalink | Email this | Comments

When we came across this post at Brand New, it was pretty clear from the outset that it was fake (the “April Fools” in the headline didn’t hurt). Still, it got all the editors at Engadget thinking, and talking, about how badly Verizon does need some kind of makeover. Across the board, it seems that the reaction to the big V’s logo and branding is like-minded: it stinks. That cheap looking italicized Helvetica, the gaudy gradient on the check… the check itself. The whole thing looks like it was done by a first-year art student with a cracked copy of CorelDRAW. Meanwhile, in a few hours, the cats at BN managed to mock something up that not only looks clever and inviting, but almost totally washes away the bad taste the current logo leaves in our mouths.

Look, we’re not saying you should go the cloud direction here — it might not be the right fit — but maybe it’s time to reconsider your drab, staid design, and start to paint yourself in a different light. There’s one more pic after the break — a device with the “new” logo… just imagine it.

Continue reading Verizon rebranding: an April Fools’ prank that should be real

Filed under: Misc. Gadgets

Verizon rebranding: an April Fools’ prank that should be real originally appeared on Engadget on Thu, 02 Apr 2009 15:14:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

Read | Permalink | Email this | Comments

Real phones have to contend with real problems and design trade offs. But unfettered by manufacturing constraints, concept phones are a way for handset makers to imagine the future of mobile devices.

At the CTIA wireless trade show, there were some of these concepts from companies such as Kyocera, Neutrano and Chinese firm ZTE Technologies. Among the ideas on display were watch phones with USB modem built into the strap, a phone that flips open like a book to lie flat offering users a large display and a phones with a wide screen that is reminiscent of a PlayStation Portable like handheld device.

"There are some interesting ideas and though many of them are years away from reality it is a glimpse into what the future phones could be" says Chetan Sharma, an analyst who has his own telecom technology and consulting firm.

Kyocera’s concept phone, for instance, rolls up in three parts, with one third hosting the keyboard. The rest is the display that can be opened up completely to offer a wide screen.

Watch phones seem to be particularly popular among designers. Earlier this year, LG showed off a working watch phone at the Consumer Electronics Show. LG’s Dick Tracy-like watch phone doesn’t have pricing or availability listed yet but the company has said it plans to launch the device this year. LG’s watch phone has a touchscreen, 3G, Bluetooth and a camera that can do both still photos and videos.

Chinese phone company ZTE hopes to take that idea to the next level. ZTE ‘s concept watch phone offers a USB modem at one end of the watch band. Meanwhile, another manufacturer Neutrano is working on a prototype of a watch phone, according to PCmag.com, that can be detached from its band and held up to the ear to act as a regular phone.

So could the trend of wearable computing be coming to cellphones?

Photos: Top- Kyocera concept phone. Right – ZTE concept/ Priya Ganapati

LG Versa with Transformers design

(Credit: LG)

Bringing new meaning to the phrase “more than meets the eye,” LG has partnered with Dreamworks to bring you a limited edition of the LG Versa with a Transformers theme to help promote the sequel to the 2007 summer blockbuster. In fact, Michael …

Originally posted at CTIA show

We’re nearing the still unknown release date for the Palm Pre, and new details are slowly surfacing. Sprint demoed the Pre’s WebOS apps at CTIA, including PalmOS Emulator, Google Maps and Pandora. These look fantastic.

Like the iPhone, Palm gives developers a set of recommended UI design elements in the SDK, to promote a cohesive look in WebOS. While use of these buttons and menus aren’t mandatory, these early developers have embraced them. I also happen to think the design DNA of WebOS looks better than any platform on the market, even Mobile OSX.

Google Maps
Google Maps is tightly integrated with the Pre’s universal search function, so when you start typing something in search, you can launch straight to Maps, and it will zero-in on the points of interest. You can pan and zoom around the app using your fingers, and pretty much behaves like any other touch-enabled version of Google Maps.

Pandora
Pandora’s integration with WebOS will make it the best available mobile version of this music service. When you start Pandora and exit to another app a little Pandora logo remains in the bottom right corner of the screen. When you tap it, a quick launch UI pops up that lets you control the app without exiting whatever else you were doing. Serious, serious multitasking. And in general, the UI seems much more intuitive and usable than most the other versions of Pandora, with plenty of UI navigation options that make it less labyrinth, more music app.

PalmOS Emulator
PalmOS Emulator lets the phone UI look and act like the Garnet OS, and even has virtual, on screen buttons to give you full functionality. If you have old PalmOS apps you can’t bear to part with, or just really hate WebOS (but love the Pre?), you can go back in time 10 years. Also worth noting is that Palm says they will roll out a solution for migrating data from old PalmOS phones to new WebOS ones, including support at the Sprint store. But Palm says they’ll divulge details closer to release.

TeleNav GPS
The TeleNav demo wasn’t fully up and running, since the demo was indoors, but it essentially looks like the version available on the T-Mobile G1. Not much else unique going on there, but that’s not necessarily a bad thing, either.

Sprint TV
Sprint TV was probably the least spectacular of the bunch, but even that looked like a pretty nice app. There’s a main menu for Viewing options (Live, Premium, On Demand TV), and then secondary menus that let you choose channels or content. Once you hit that, it launches into the TV service, which pulls up video. Video quality wasn’t that great, and there was some artifacting/glitching going on, but it was certainly viewable. And there didn’t seem to be any sort of on-screen guide or controls for Sprint TV. Not a dealbreaker, but it would sweeten the package.

There were also other apps, like FlightView, which lets you track planes and schedules in real time, among other things, and a NASCAR app, which will let you appreciate America’s fastest growing sport (which is heavily sponsored by Sprint!). But if this is what we have to expect for future Pre Apps, I’m pretty excited.