Hasta La Gadget!

Sprint finally joined the phone announcement fray earlier this morning and added a handful of new devices to its official roster. While LG’s Optimus G may garner all the love, the newly-revealed LG Mach deserves its share of attention, and I got a bit of hands-on time to do just that.

First off, let’s talk looks. The Mach’s industrial design won’t bring home many rewards, but it’s nice, well proportioned (at 12.2mm, it’s pretty slim for a slider), and largely lacking of frills. Don’t take that as a negative though — some of Sprint’s other QWERTY sliders seem clunky and overly-designed in comparison (I’m looking at you, Photon Q). That said, the Mach’s rear end is strangely nondescript silver, with a strip of lighter plastic surrounding the 5-megapixel camera, and a chrome-esque finish running around the edges.

Perhaps naturally for a mid-range device, LG opted to use a string of three capacitive navigation keys along the bottom of the 4-inch WVGA display rather than on-screen buttons, but the most annoying bit? The sleep/wake button is stuck on the top left corner of the device, a choice that flies in the face of my muscle memory.

For all that a device like this brings to the table, it’s probably going to live or die based on one thing: the keyboard. LG ran with a nicely-spaced, five row affair here, and I didn’t find much to complain about during my brief time playing with it. The keys themselves have a respectable amount of travel and yield up a satisfying click when depressed. I’ve never been sold on the need for up, down, left, and right keys on a keyboard, but hey — someone must like them.

It’s always a little tough to talk performance after such a brief spell of testing, but for what it’s worth the Mach was remained pretty darned snappy as I scrolled through app lists, settings, and menus. That’s all thanks to the dual-core Qualcomm MSM8960 (the same as the one in devices like AT&T’s HTC One X and the Droid Incredible 4G LTE) and the 1GB of RAM — nothing earthshaking, but still a clearly potent combination.

The Mach runs Android 4.0.4 Ice Cream Sandwich, but all the most hardcore users will spend most of their time interacting with LG’s custom UI. I used to be very militant about these sorts of things and railed for stock Android builds for all devices, but LG’s particular take on Ice Cream Sandwich doesn’t seem too offensive… though I still prefer the cold digitalism of untouched Ice Cream Sandwich.

There isn’t a ton of bloatware to be found either; there were only two Sprint-branded apps here and LG’s own applications (think SmartShare media streaming, a more robust video editor, etc.) are neat, if possibly unnecessary additions. The software keyboard leaves a bit to be desired, but really — chances are if you spend money on a device like this, you probably won’t be typing on-screen too much.

All things considered, there’s a lot to like about the LG’s mid-range Mach. The keyboard itself will draw its share of fans, and the rest of the spec sheet adds up to a device that’s perfectly adequate. Of course, exactly how good a buy it’ll be remains unclear — neither Sprint nor LG were willing to talk about pricing (or availability) just yet.

It’s been less than two years since Verizon first lit up its 4G LTE network, and there’s little question that it’s been growing at a quick clip. To wit, Verizon Wireless CTO Nicola Palmer at MobileCON in San Diego announced the carrier will light up its 400th LTE market (Marquette, Michigan) on October 18, well ahead of the “end of the year” timeframe the carrier previously forecasted.

To put that in perspective, it took Verizon Wireless about eight years to fully flesh out its 3G footprint. Now that Verizon has a stronger grasp on how the process works, the carrier aims to blanket the entirety of its 3G footprint in LTE by the end of 2013.

Of course, the network’s speedy growth wasn’t without its share of hiccups — VZW customers may recall that a string of nationwide LTE outages toward the end of last year made holiday gadget buying and network usage problematic. Still, those periods of network spottiness didn’t seem to affect LTE device adoption too severely, seeing as how roughly 11 million of Verizon’s 89 million wireless subscribers have access to the high-speed data network.

Palmer also said that a full 35 percent of the carrier’s wireless data traffic was sent over its 4G LTE network, but that should change sooner rather than later. She also mentioned that “it wouldn’t be long” before a majority of that data would be transmitted over LTE. To that end, Palmer also pointed to a handful of new LTE markets that will be brought online in the coming weeks, pushing the total count to 417 live LTE areas. Here’s the full list in case you’re still crossing your fingers for some high-speed data:

Gadsden, Ala.; Chico/Oroville, Calif.; Owensboro, Ky.; Waterville/Augusta, Maine; Brainerd and Fergus Falls/Alexandria, Minn.; Hattiesburg and Laurel, Miss.; Columbia, Mo.; Norfolk and North Platte, Neb.; Clovis, N.M.; Jamestown, N.Y.; Bend and Medford/Grants Pass, Ore.; Amarillo and Victoria, Texas; Aberdeen and Walla Walla, Wash.; and Morgantown, W. Va.

At the CTIA MobileCon keynote today, Zipcar CEO Scott Griffith took the stage to talk about the effect mobile technology is having on transportation. In the course of his talk, he also detailed the way that Zipcar has shifted from being a web-based business to being an overwhelmingly mobile concern, and what new changes were on the way for its app and mobile services.

On the roadmap for Zipcar’s smartphone app are changes to the way consumers use it, expanding its function to more of an in-car assistant. Griffith said that Zipcar is creating its own in-car device holder, so that users can plug in and have their devices ready to use hands-free for navigation, damage reporting and more. Planned feature additions include the ability to use your device’s built-in iTunes playlist with the car through an iPhone interface, a so-called “digital co-pilot” that provides pertinent info about the specific vehicle you’ve rented and your surroundings, and more.

There are also features planned for improved pre- and post-trip feedback, including damage  and car condition (gas levels, cleanliness, etc.) reporting and feedback from the car in question including fuel levels (all of which is actually borrowed from competitor Car2Go). Some possibilities for down the road include the ability to send texts to valet parking services that support Zipcar in areas like metro NYC, so that cars can be ready when people get there to start their reservations.

New users will also be able to on-board via the app, taking photos of their driver’s license and receiving approval “within minutes,” according to Griffith. That’s a far cry from the original system, which actually involved new members coming into the office to pick up their new physical membership cards. Moving the registration process to mobile, and making it something people can do very quickly, is a big step towards a mobile-focused future for Zipcar.

One very interesting detail shared by Griffith is that Zipcar intends to build out a personalized deal recommendation service, which would alert users to Zipcar-specific member benefits and offers nearby while they’re on their trip. This could provide another revenue opportunity for Zipcar, in addition to rentals and its FastFleet car sharing backend. It’ll be interesting to see whether these offers are opt-in, opt-out or dependent on membership level, should the make it past the testing phase to the public-facing product.

Many of these things are developments that wouldn’t have been possible 18 months ago, Griffith said, which is what’s both exciting and challenging about the way mobile tech has affected things like car sharing.

“Future generations will make their mobility decisions on much narrower timeframes, probably by the trip,” Griffith said on stage. “We’ll see a very different urban landscape all because of the connected car.”

He envisions a future where people plan trips based on what will get them to their destination fastest, using a combination of things like Zipcar, Lyft, bike sharing and public transit. That’ll lead to a shift, he says, for the auto industry, one that’s “as important as the invention of the auto itself.”

MobileCon, the show formerly known as CTIA Enterprise & Applications, is ready to get under way in sunny San Diego. Despite its more streamlined name, we expect to see the same kind of stuff as years past; in other words, the show will be much more Enterprise-centric than any other mobile-related event we cover throughout the year. Don’t let that scare you off too much — with the plethora of new device announcements over the past month, we still hope to get our hands on some new and glorious pieces of hardware. Keep your eyes peeled right here as we bring you all of the best (and worst) from Southern California.

Filed under: Announcements, Mobile

We’re live from MobileCon 2012! originally appeared on Engadget on Tue, 09 Oct 2012 11:00:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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