Hasta La Gadget!

Whoops! Sprint accidentally let their upcoming Palm Treo Pro handheld out of the bag today, pulling it off their Web site when they realized their error. It turns out the Windows Mobile 6.1-powered Treo Pro hasn’t been approved by their lab guys yet, so it isn’t ready for sale. Here’s what Sprint has to say:

“Sprint inadvertently posted information on Sprint.com regarding an upcoming product, Palm Treo Pro, this morning. We apologize for any inconvenience this may have caused. Sprint looks forward to welcoming this exciting, new device into our portfolio as soon as it has been approved through our customary testing process. We will share details on the correct availability date as soon as the standard testing of both the device and its interaction with our network has concluded. Thank you for your interest in Sprint products.”

We went ahead and captured all of the Treo Pro-related screens from Sprint’s Web site anyway. If the screens are correct, the Treo Pro will sell for $549.99, or as low as $249.99 with contract. It will have the Sprint Music Store, Sprint TV and NFL Mobile Live, along with the basic features of the GSM Treo Pro we reviewed last August. It runs on Sprint’s CDMA EVDO Rev. A network, though, not a GSM network. And yes, it has Wi-Fi.

We’ll review the Sprint Treo Pro when it really becomes available.

We’ve known for a while that Chinese manufacturer Huawei was readying a Google Android phone, but not when it would be ready to come out and play. Looks like the answer is Feb. 16, at the Mobile World Congress trade show in Barcelona. According to this official Huawei page, they’ll be showing a “Smart mobile phone based on ‘Android’ platform” in a section of their booth marked “Mobile U-life.” Will we be there? U betcha.

Huawei is a large manufacturer with a relatively small presence in the US. They currently have one phone on the US market, the M328 with MetroPCS.

MWC is looking to be a big show. We already know Palm is planning an announcement, and there will also be announcements from Nokia, Microsoft, Samsung and HTC. Samsung and HTC are expected to announce Android devices, though these sorts of things can change at the last minute.

Nokia plans to expand Comes With Music, its UK-based unlimited music service, in both Australia and Singapore later this quarter, and is eyeing further expansion in Europe and the United States, according to Reuters. That indicates that the world’s top handset maker may release more cell phones compatible with the service in the U.S. like the Nokia 5800 XpressMusic.

“The next two countries which we are going to roll out in the next 10 weeks are going to be in Asia, in Australia and Singapore,” Tero Ojanpera, the head of entertainment and communities at Nokia, said at the MidemNet annual digital music gathering in Cannes. “We’ll be launching there in the first quarter of 2009, in February and March.”

Ojanpera said that the hold-up, as usual, is securing rights to the music in each of the territories; the laws differ from country to country with regard to both the recording side and the publishing side of the music business, according to the report. So far, Comes With Music appears to be a well-executed idea that lets Nokia handset owners download as much music as they want over a 12-month period, and then keep it afterward for free.

Qualcomm announced that it has bought AMD’s handheld graphics unit for $65 million in cash. As part of the deal, Qualcomm has acquired graphics and multimedia technology assets, intellectual property and resources that were formerly the basis of AMD’s handheld business.

Qualcomm said in a statement that it has offered jobs to current AMD handheld graphics design and development employees; currently they’re working on mobile 2D and 3D graphics, audio/video, display, and architecture design. Both companies have already received regulatory approval for the deal.

Back at CTIA 2007, AMD showed off its then-new Imageon line of mobile graphics chips; the company since had trouble finding a handset maker willing to incorporate them. Last year, AMD first announced that it was considering selling off its handheld graphics unit.

It’s difficult to compare prices between cellphone plans. They never have the exact same number of minutes or features. My guess is the carriers like it this way. It’s better not to compete on price because that can be very costly for them! They’ve seen what’s happened in the airline industry where service and cachet were once sold. Now flying is commoditized. Price is the only thing that matters to most consumers.

Times are changing. Boost Mobile, “a division of Sprint Corporation that offers wireless phones and services with no contracts, credit checks or activation fees” has just announced a new all-you-can-eat plan for $50 per month! That means unlimited calling, text, web and walkie talkie.