Hasta La Gadget!

We associate the Hyundai name more closely with cars and ten-year warranties than we do phones in these parts of the world, but Hyundai Mobile does a little business selling low-cost phones in parts of Europe, the Middle East, and Asia (cars… phones… right, makes sense). We had a chance to check out some of the offerings today, and yeah, let’s just put it this way: some of these devices are a bit off the beaten path. Pictured above from left to right are the MB-400 (bearing absolutely no resemblance to any existing device), the MB-910 touchscreen watch phone, and the lovely MB-105 “Chico” (which — interesting fact — features a whopping 50-message SMS storage capacity). The Chico wasn’t functional for us, but follow the break for some hands-on time with the unfortunate iPod rip and one of the nicer watch phones we’ve seen come to market. Odd couple, isn’t it?

Continue reading Hyundai’s phones are creatively ridiculous

Filed under: Cellphones

Hyundai’s phones are creatively ridiculous originally appeared on Engadget on Tue, 17 Feb 2009 13:04:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Acer made a lot of noise about launching “eight” handsets yesterday, but we only got hard details on the four Tempos — which was probably the wrong way to go, because the prototypes of the F1, white C1, L1, and the E1 due to launch later this year are way hotter. Too bad Acer won’t turn ’em on or tell us anything about them — we can see the F1 has a five megapixel camera, but the lack of a Windows Mobile 6.5-required hardware Start button on any of these doesn’t bode well. Check ’em all out in the gallery.

Filed under: Cellphones

Acer’s four other phones in the flesh, not powered on originally appeared on Engadget on Tue, 17 Feb 2009 11:47:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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In light of its fresh tie-up with Microsoft, we can understand how any LG smartphone not running WinMo might be perceived as a black sheep this week. Still, it bums us that the the company has launched its latest S60-powered handset — the KT770 slider — at MWC this week with little more than a brief mention on LG’s official MWC site and a couple of forlorn demo models stuffed in the corner of the company’s booth. The good news is we decided to make good on LG’s oversight and give this little beauty the love it deserves with a mention, a gallery, and a quick video of its tweaked S60 3.2-based UI in action.

The faux carbon fiber back is a little cheesy — particularly for a device that otherwise looks fairly businesslike — but with 7.2Mbps HSDPA, GPS, a WQVGA display, and a 5 megapixel camera on board, it’s hard to argue that this device can’t be competitive (put this up against the far bulkier, uglier N95, for example). The UI seemed reasonably responsive, and though we weren’t able to test the browser without a connection, we imagine the stock S60 apps work every bit as well as they do on Nokia fare. Check out the video after the break!

Continue reading LG doesn’t rock the WinMo boat, launches S60-powered KT770 on the downlow

Filed under: Cellphones, Handhelds

LG doesn’t rock the WinMo boat, launches S60-powered KT770 on the downlow originally appeared on Engadget on Tue, 17 Feb 2009 09:42:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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In October of 2006, I wrote a Switched On column entitled “Rebooting Retail in Redmond” in which I noted how much Microsoft’s consumer business had changed since the days of the original microsoftSF store in Sony’s Metreon. This was a world before Windows XP, before Zune, before rich touch interfaces on Windows Mobile devices, before Media Center, and before the original Xbox. I concluded that column by noting:

Microsoft’s consumer lineup today is far more compelling, sophisticated, media-rich and, with a growing group of hardware products, tactile than it was back in the 20th Century. The marketing strategy of Windows Vista — with its various usage scenarios — presents a nearly perfect foundation from which to structure showcase environments. The entertainment products that Microsoft wants to bring into the consumer’s home would benefit from a home of their own.

That argument will be even more relevant in 2010 as Windows 7 begins to roll out and Microsoft takes its “Life Without Walls” campaign to the next level by highlighting the integration of the desktop, the mobile phone and the Web. We are already seeing a sneak peek at this via the MyPhone service that Microsoft is rolling out for Windows Mobile.

Microsoft stores will be in a unique position versus nearly every other physical direct technology channel. For while Microsoft certainly has its own consumer products such as Zune, Xbox 360, keyboards, mice and boxed copies of Windows and other software, a key charge of these establishments will be to highlight the promise of the digital lifestyle as powered by Microsoft in products produced by its partners or developers..

Continue reading Switched On: Walls for a “Life Without Walls”

Filed under: Misc. Gadgets

Switched On: Walls for a “Life Without Walls” originally appeared on Engadget on Mon, 16 Feb 2009 18:33:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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We’ve been waiting to get our grubby mitts on the LG Arena KM900 and try out the S-Class 3D UI for ourselves, and well — it’s a nice featurephone interface, but it’s not exactly revolutionary. The widget interface is nice, and we’re into the picture-based contacts screen, but the icon-based home screen just feels cluttered, especially when viewed in the expanded horizontal orientation. It’ll be interesting to see how LG refines these elements in its upcoming onslaught of Windows Mobile phones — we wouldn’t drop back to a featurephone for this stuff, but we’d be plenty interested in seeing more phones like the GM730 with this interface. Video after the break!

Read – Engadget Spanish coverage of the KM900
Read – Press release

Continue reading LG Arena KM900 hands-on with video interface tour

Filed under: Cellphones

LG Arena KM900 hands-on with video interface tour originally appeared on Engadget on Mon, 16 Feb 2009 12:47:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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