Hasta La Gadget!

So, maybe Microsoft meant “people don’t do that in 2010.” At the mega-corp’s UK-based Windows Phone 7 launch event, we were just informed that its hot-off-the-presses mobile OS will be blessed with a software update that’ll add copy and paste functionality in “early 2011.” That’s according to one Andy Less, and while details beyond that are scant, it’s possible that said update will also bring other magical makeovers into the fold. We’re still a little baffled that the company would leave such a seemingly vital part of the software out at launch, but we guess certain corners always have to be cut in order to get something out before a sure-to-be-profitable holiday quarter. And hey, it’s not like we haven’t seen another major mobile OS player pull this same stunt before.

Update: CNET’s Ina Fried got a quick look at an early implementation of copy and paste in Windows Phone 7, and says it works fairly well: You start by clicking on a single word, then drag your finger across the rest of the passage you’d like to transmit to expand your highlighted selection. When you let go, a paste button appears. Sound about right to you?

Copy and paste coming to Windows Phone 7 in ‘early 2011’ (update) originally appeared on Engadget on Mon, 11 Oct 2010 10:10:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Last week’s genuine Internet phenomenon, the Cigar Guy, who crashed the hearts and minds of millions after his mustachioed, cigar smoking face popped up in the background of a Ryder Cup photo featuring a shot by Tiger Woods heading dangerously close to Daily Mail photographer Mark Pain’s lens, has finally been located.

His name is Rupesh Shingadia. He’s a 30-year-old investment analyst living in London with his parents, a housewife and retired mechanic. The cigar and the mustache are fake, naturally. The “turban” is actually the top of a ponytail wig.

Ridiculous costume or no, Shingadia is genuinely surprised by all of the attention. “I am embarrassed and overwhelmed,” he told the Daily Mail. “Never in a million years could I have expected anything like this.” He called the whole experience “truly surreal.”

Shingadia says that he’s just “an ordinary guy who loves golf.”

The getup, it turns out, is an homage to Miguel Angel Jimenez, a Spanish golfer. “I love the way he walks around the course with a cigar clamped between his teeth.”

Google Computer-Driven Prius from Ben Tseitlin on Vimeo.

“[W]e have developed technology for cars that can drive themselves.” Hang on, what? It’s never a good sign when life imitates an early Stephen King novel… Those are the words of Sebastian Thrun, Google’s Distinguished Software Engineer, posted to the Official blog. The blogs of the rest of the world naturally responded with a collective, “wait–what?”

Google has, in fact, created a self-driving car–not only that, the company took it on a test drive down the coast of California, from its Mountain View campus to its office in Santa Monica. Then, naturally, they cruised the thing down Hollywood Boulevard. Word is that the car really wanted to check out the selection at Amoeba Records.

And this isn’t the first time Google has taken the car out into the wild. Past exertions have included Lombard Street (the world famous “crookedest street”), the Golden Gate, the Pacific Coast Highway, and the circumference of Lake Tahoe. The car has driven some 140,000 miles–with trained operators on-board, naturally.

The goal of the vehicle is “to help prevent traffic accidents, free up people’s time and reduce carbon emissions by fundamentally changing car use,” according to the company. The cars (yes, cars plural) utilize video cameras, radar sensors, and lasers (that’s how you know it’s from the future) to spot other traffic. Built-in maps, meanwhile, help the vehicles navigate the road.

The car is in constant contact with Google’s data centers, which process all of the information gathered by the vehicles.

In all, Google seems confident of the potential of its crazy future car, “We’re also confident that self-driving cars will transform car sharing, significantly reducing car usage, as well as help create the new ‘highway trains of tomorrow.’ ” Anyone else think that this is beginning to sound like an exhibit from the 1964 World’s Fair?

It may have “Windows” in the branding, but Windows Phone 7 is not the desktop PC experience shoehorned into a cellphone. Microsoft tried that with Windows Mobile… and we all know how that turned out. Today, eight months after the Windows Phone 7 OS unveiling in Barcelona, we’re finally seeing the official launch of the retail hardware: nine new WP7 handsets, some available October 21 in select European and Asian markets and others from early November in the US. The phones will find their way to over 60 cellphone operators in more than 30 countries this year. Microsoft tapped Dell, HTC, LG, and Samsung to deliver the Snapdragon-based handsets with a carrier list that includes AT&T, T-Mobile USA, Vodafone, TELUS, América Móvil, Deutsche Telekom AG, Movistar, O2, Orange, SFR, SingTel, and Telstra. And that’s just for the first wave — Microsoft has even more handsets coming in 2011 including the first for Sprint and Verizon in the US. Here’s the lineup of 480 x 800 pixel (WVGA) phones announced today:

• HTC 7 Surround — The 3.8-inch T8788 with slideout speaker for AT&T and Telus
• HTC HD7 — Schubert comes of age as a 4.3-inch HD2 cousin for T-Mobile and beyond
• HTC 7 Trophy — the 3.8-inch Spark headed to international carriers
• HTC 7 Mozart — another heavily leaked int’l player with 3.7-inch display
• Dell Venue Pro — 4.1-inch portrait QWERTY slider for T-Mobile we broke as Lightning
• Samsung Focus — AT&T’s 4-inch Super AMOLED slate we broke as Cetus
• Samsung Omnia 7 — the i8700 is a 4-inch Super AMOLED jobbie for Europe
• LG Optimus 7/7Q — the E900 is the official 3.8-inch global workhorse
• LG Quantum — AT&T’s 3.5-inch landscape slider first seen as the C900

• HTC 7 Pro — a 3.6-inch QWERTY slider for Sprint (2011)

“Glance and Go,” is the slogan Microsoft is using to differentiate itself from an already crowded smartphone market. Something we’ve already seen alluded to in that leaked AT&T ad. As Ballmer notes, “Microsoft and its partners are delivering a different kind of mobile phone and experience – one that makes everyday tasks faster by getting more done in fewer steps and providing timely information in a ‘glance and go’ format.” He’s referring to WP7’s customizable Live Tiles, of course. Xbox Live integration is another biggie with EA Games just announcing its first Xbox Live-enabled wares coming to Windows Phone 7 in the fall including “Need for Speed Undercover,” “Tetris,” “Monopoly,” and “The Sims 3.” The other big differentiators are the slick Metro UI, integrated support for Zune media and Zune Pass subscriptions, Bing search and maps, Windows Live including the free Find My Phone service, and Microsoft Office Mobile.

Now quit stalling and jump past the break for the full list of handsets per carrier and country.

Update: Added the official WP7 overview videos after the break.

Continue reading Microsoft announces ten Windows Phone 7 handsets for 30 countries: October 21 in Europe and Asia, 8 November in US (Update: Video!)

Microsoft announces ten Windows Phone 7 handsets for 30 countries: October 21 in Europe and Asia, 8 November in US (Update: Video!) originally appeared on Engadget on Mon, 11 Oct 2010 09:34:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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You see that? That, comrades, is what happens when Lightning strikes! Or, you know, when Venue Pro strikes. So, it doesn’t quite have the same ring to it, but no matter what you call Dell’s Windows Phone 7 portrait slider, it’s downright awesome. We got a chance to play around with an early build of the phone a few weeks ago — as you’ll hear us say in the video below, it was still codenamed the Lightning — and we haven’t been able to get it out of our minds since. The handset has a very similar look and feel to its Android brother, the Thunder — its rounded chrome sides are reminiscent of an iPhone 3G/S, the black contoured back has a nice grippy feel, and the curved, WVGA AMOLED, Gorilla Glass screen is just stunning. The 4.1-inch capacitive, multitouch display is joined by additional back, home and search touch-sensitive buttons, all of which seemed responsive in our short time with the device. The back is also home to a 5 megapixel cam with flash while there’s a 3.5mm headphone jack on the top of the device and a micro-USB port on the bottom edge.

But obviously, it’s that glorious slide-out QWERTY keyboard that makes the Venue Pro, well, so pro. The rubber-feeling keys remind us a lot of those on the Droid 2 — though, they feel a bit firmer — and the slider mechanism felt sturdy when we slid it open and closed a number of times. On the spec front, we were told it was packing a Snapdragon processor, and while the phone seemed to briskly run an early build of WP7, we didn’t get to test much out as Dell was lacking both a SIM and a nearby WiFi network. We’ll be hoping to grab some more time with the T-Mobile version today, but from what we’ve seen so far we’re fairly confident that Dell’s struck pretty darn close to gold here. Oh, and don’t forget to hit the break for a short video walkthrough of the hardware and keyboard.

Continue reading Dell Venue Pro (aka Lightning) first hands-on!

Dell Venue Pro (aka Lightning) first hands-on! originally appeared on Engadget on Mon, 11 Oct 2010 09:31:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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