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Continue reading EVO 4G shortages may hurt 4G adoption, Sprint gives customers in seven new cities the chance to be disappointed

EVO 4G shortages may hurt 4G adoption, Sprint gives customers in seven new cities the chance to be disappointed originally appeared on Engadget on Mon, 12 Jul 2010 12:57:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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T-Mobile might be busy expanding its we-swear-it’s-like-4G HSPA+ network to all sorts of metro areas in the US, but those theoretical 21Mbps speeds have been limited to those wielding WebConnect Rocket data cards, not any actual phones. It looks like that’s about to change, though: a spokesman for T-Mobile parent company Deutsche Telekom told Light Reading that an HTC-built Android phone capable of HSPA+ speeds will launch in September, followed by another device in the fourth quarter sometime before the holidays. That lines up with what we’ve been hearing, as we’ve been told that the first device will actually be the leaked HTC Vision QWERTY slider (pictured above) that’s been popping up in the wild lately. We’re not so sure what the second phone will be, but we’ll get there — for now we’re just stoked that another high-end Android set with a hardware keyboard will be making the scene.

[Thanks, Rod]

T-Mobile and HTC to launch first 21Mbps HSPA+ smartphone in September originally appeared on Engadget on Wed, 07 Jul 2010 17:06:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Care about Samsung‘s GT-B3730? Probably not… but what if we told you that that very device is the planet’s first commercially available dual-mode LTE / 3G WWAN modem? Now that we’ve got your attention, you may be interested in knowing that overseas operator TeliaSonera — hailed as the first carrier on the planet to fire up an LTE network and make it available to Joe and Jane last year — is just about ready to start shipping the aforesaid Samsung. As of now, the only way to hop onto their LTE superhighway is with a 4G-only modem, and while it had promised a two-faced stick in the second quarter of 2010, we’re elated to finally put a face to a promise. The primary downside is that there’s no current way for the USB modem to switch from LTE to 3G (or vice-versa) on the fly; instead, you’ll need to kill the connection and start a new one when you leave / enter a 4G zone. Purportedly, the stick will play nice with both Windows and OS X, and it can hit real-world download rates as high as 80Mbps and upload rates of 16Mbps. Suddenly, a relocation to Sweden seems altogether more inviting, no?

TeliaSonera gears up to ship first dual-mode LTE / 3G USB WWAN modem originally appeared on Engadget on Wed, 30 Jun 2010 07:31:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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The HTC Evo has competition. Samsung has introduced its first 4G handset, called the Samsung Epic, on Sprint’s network. The Epic will be the second 4G smartphone on Sprint, following the Evo 4G’s debut earlier this month.

The Epic 4G will have a 4-inch Super AMOLED touchscreen and a slide-out keyboard. Inside, the device packs a 1-GHz Hummingbird processor from Samsung, and two cameras: a 5-megapixel camera to shoot movies and photos, and a front-facing VGA camera (0.3 megapixels) for video chat. The phone will run Google’s Android 2.1 operating system.

Samsung’s 4G phone is up against some strong rivals. The HTC Evo 4G has become the best-selling device on Sprint’s network. Meanwhile, Apple launched its latest iPhone, the iPhone 4, last week. Though the iPhone 4 runs on AT&T’s overloaded 3G network, the device has some features such as video chat and a luminous, high-resolution display that are drawing in customers. Apple sold 1.7 million iPhone 4s in the first three days of the device’s launch.

The Epic is part of a new family of Android smartphones called Galaxy S from Samsung. The Galaxy S phones feature 4-inch screens, run Android, and integrate social networking feeds from Twitter and Facebook — plus e-mail messages, calendars and contacts — into a single screen.

Sprint did not reveal pricing or availability for the Epic 4G.

When it comes to 4G services, Sprint is ahead of other wireless service providers in the United States.  Sprint’s 4G network is currently available in 36 cities. Sprint claims its 4G service can deliver up to 10 times higher speeds than existing 3G networks. Major areas such as San Francisco, New York, Los Angeles and Washington, D.C., will get 4G connectivity later this year, says Sprint.

Verizon is testing its 4G ‘LTE’ network this year and expects to start rolling it out next year. AT&T is likely to start trials of its 4G service next year.

Not surprisingly, Sprint is pressing its advantage with 4G handsets.

Samsung’s Epic is largely comparable to the HTC Evo in its hardware, but it lags behind in a few areas. The Evo has an 8-megapixel camera, compared to the Epic’s 5-megapixel. The Evo can provide wireless access for up to eight devices as part of its hot-spot capability, while the Epic an support only up to five Wi-Fi enabled devices simultaneously.

But Samsung hopes to offer content that will put the Epic ahead. For instance, over the next few months, Epic users will have access to the Samsung Media Hub, a video store with movies and TV available for purchase or rental, says Samsung. A 4G network should help make downloads much faster, says the company.

The phone will also have a service called ‘AllShare’ to wirelessly exchange music, pictures and video with other devices. For business users, the phone supports push e-mail, integrated calendar and Exchange ActiveSync.

Samsung and Sprint say the Epic will be upgraded to the latest flavor of Android, Android 2.2 Froyo.

As for other cellphone service providers, Samsung isn’t neglecting them. In the next few weeks, Samsung plans to offer Fascinate, a 3G phone running Android 2.1 OS on Verizon and Vibrant, and an Android smartphone on T-Mobile’s network.

Photo: Samsung Epic 4G/Samsung

See Also:

• Wired Video: HTC Evo 4G Dissected
• Oops! Sprint Says it Overstated HTC Evo Phone Sales
• Storage Bug Hits HTC Evo 4G Phone Just Before Launch
• Overclocked HTC Evo Runs Almost 30 Percent Faster
• Independent App Stores Take On Google’s Android Market

That rumored Galaxy S Pro is very real and very official for Sprint this evening, ‘cept it’s not actually called the Galaxy S Pro — instead, it’ll be known as the Epic 4G when it comes to market “in the coming months.” Like the EVO 4G before it, the Epic 4G sort of blows everything out of the water on paper: 4-inch Super AMOLED display, 5 megapixel primary camera with LED flash and 720p video recording paired with a VGA front-facing cam for video calls, 802.11b/g/n WiFi, six-axis accelerometer, and a 1GHz Hummingbird core. Oh, and of course let’s not forget those EV-DO Rev. A and WiMAX radios, the latter of which will earn you theoretical downlink speeds in excess of 10Mbps — speeds that will work nicely with the phone’s five-device mobile hotspot support (three devices fewer than the EVO 4G, interestingly).

As software goes, the Epic 4G will be running Samsung’s reworked version of Android 2.1 offering features like DLNA support and Social Hub. In other words, this is the closest you’re going to get to an EVO 4G with a landscape QWERTY slide — and at 14.2mm thick, you’re only about a millimeter and a half thicker than HTC’s entry. Like AT&T’s Captivate, the Epic 4G is being described as “a Galaxy S smartphone,” so it’s pretty clear that Samsung’s looking to group all of these things under a global brand with big-time name recognition. Neither pricing nor a launch date have been announced — but hey, the EVO deserves a few more days in the spotlight, wouldn’t you say? Follow the break for Sprint’s press release.

Continue reading Samsung’s Epic 4G for Sprint seems to live up to its name

Samsung’s Epic 4G for Sprint seems to live up to its name originally appeared on Engadget on Mon, 28 Jun 2010 00:01:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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