Hasta La Gadget!

LG announced a new noise-cancellation technology called “DSE” at its CES press conference today. DSE uses dual-microphone noise cancellation and digital signal processing to kill off background noise coming through the microphone on phone calls. According to LG president and CEO Dr. Woo Paik, LG will be adding this technology into many of their phones during the second half of 2009.

Dual-microphone noise cancellation is a popular approach in many noise-cancelling Bluetooth headsets. Motorola has been shipping phones and headsets with their own noise cancelling technology, called CrystalTalk, for more than a year now. But more noise cancellation is better, especially in a popular phone brand.

For PCMag’s full CES coverage, go to http://www.pcmag.com/category2/0,2806,2235882,00.asp.

Not every smart phone has to have a touch screen, thank goodness. For a few months now, the HTC S740 has been a cult object among a certain set of technorati: folks who want a good-looking, modern Windows Mobile phone with a full keyboard and none of that touch-screen nonsense.

The S740 is just well put together. It’s got all the requisite specs, including a 528 Mhz processor, 2.4″ 320×240 screen, 3.2 megapixel camera and Wi-Fi, but it also has that ineffable build quality that causes you to say, yeah, sure, it’s a bit thick, but it’s sexy. I tried one for a while, and the design is definitely desirable (though the model I got had a bad ROM version, so I couldn’t finish testing it.)

The downside, at least for North Americans, is that the S740 doesn’t have the US 3G bands. It works with AT&T and T-Mobile, but only at 2G EDGE speeds. In 2009, that doesn’t cut it.

Enter the S743. Today HTC announced the S743, which seems to be identical to the S740 except for one thing: its 3G comes on the AT&T-friendly 850/1900 Mhz bands. The S743 will also be sold officially through various unlocked-phone channels like Dell and CDW.com when it launches this quarter, so it will be easier to get than the S740. Sadly, T-Mobile users must continue to live without the 3G love. (Why, HTC, why?)

HTC hasn’t announced a price for the S743, but unlocked S740s currently sell for $500, so it’s got to be somewhere around there.

The biggest cell phone story of this week’s upcoming CES show, Palm’s new Nova operating system and phone have remained startlingly unleaked. There are no spy shots out on the Web, no product sheets, not even a carrier name. For something that Palm’s been working on for years, this is information control worthy of Apple.

(I’m assuming Palm will announce Nova and a phone at their press conference on Jan. 8, but so is everybody else. Palm hasn’t confirmed that they’re making the announcement, but if they don’t, they’re toast.)

We do know a bunch of things about Nova, though, and we can speculate on others. Here’s what we know so far.

• Nova is a Linux-based OS.
• Nova will launch with third-party software already available.
• Nova will focus on integrating different kinds of data stored in different locations.
• Nova will integrate into Web-based social networks.
• Nova will be driven around the Internet and Web-based applications.
• Nova will focus on the “prosumer” market, leaving consumers for Centro and business for Windows Mobile Treo products.
• The phone will hit shelves by June 2009.

I also think it’s pretty safe to guess what carrier will get the Nova phone first: Sprint. I have no inside information, but Sprint has been Palm’s best friend in hard times. Every single Palm phone that was first introduced with a US carrier since May 2006 has been launched with Sprint.

Since the Treo 650 in 2004, Palm has released ten smartphones: the 650, 700w, 700p, 700wx, 680, 750, 755p, Centro, 800w and Treo Pro. Seven were initially launched with US carriers; the 750 was first launched overseas, and the 680 and Treo Pro were launched without US carriers attached. Of the seven initially launched with US carriers, Sprint got six first.

But what will the phones look like? How about the OS? Am I even right about Sprint? Make sure to check back here on Gearlog on Jan. 8, when all will be revealed.

I finally got a chance to comb through the response letters AT&T, Sprint, and T-Mobile sent to the Senate Judiciary Committee about their text messaging rates, and they all took offense to accusations of climbing prices.

“T-Mobile’s average revenue per text message, which takes into account the revenue for all text messages, has declined by more than 50 percent since 2005,” T-Mobile president and CEO Robert Dotson wrote.

In September, Sen. Herb Kohl, chairman of the Senate Judiciary Subcommittee on Antitrust, Business Rights and Competition, asked AT&T, Sprint, T-Mobile, and Verizon Wireless “to explain why text messaging rates have dramatically increased in recent years.”

“Text messages were commonly priced at 10 cents per message sent or received in 2005. As of the end of the month, the rate per text message will have increased to 20 cents on all four wireless carriers,” Kohl wrote.

All four carriers responded to Kohl’s inquiry, though Verizon did not consent to having its letter released to the public.

“While it is true that the rate for casual text message usage has increased, Sprint does not agree that its overall rate for text messaging have increased over the past three years,” wrote Vonya B. McCann, vice president of government affairs for Sprint.

It’s been a long time coming, but soon, people living in Vermont will finally be able to get an iPhone.

AT&T recently announced that AT&T Mobility and Consumer Markets will add about 75 new jobs in Vermont as a result of its Rural Cellular Communications acquisition; that company provides rural and suburban wireless connections under the Unicel brand in the state.

The result is that AT&T’s full portfolio of products and services, including the iPhone 3G and the Blackberry Bold, will be available at ten former Unicel retail locations in Vermont starting mid-January. By the end of February, they’ll all be rebranded as AT&T locations.