Hasta La Gadget!

At a quick glance, without any background information, your eyes might tell you that the HTC Thunderbolt is little more than a Verizon remake of Sprint’s EVO 4G and AT&T’s Inspire 4G. After all — like its contemporaries — the Thunderbolt features a spacious 4.3-inch WVGA display, 8 megapixel camera, and dual-LED flash. In reality, though, the Thunderbolt is something more: from the Inspire, it borrows a better, crisper display with a wider viewing angle and a newer-generation (though still single-core) Qualcomm Snapdragon processor. From the EVO 4G, meanwhile, it borrows a cool integrated kickstand and the addition of a second “4G” radio, making this a spec Frankenstein of sorts — the best of both worlds. Of course, instead of Sprint’s WiMAX for that 4G radio, the Thunderbolt grants you access to Verizon’s LTE network — a network so fresh, it still has that new-network smell. There’s a lot of horsepower here.

In other words, the Thunderbolt has a very real opportunity to be the finest 4.3-inch device HTC has ever made — for the moment, anyway. Let’s see how it fares.

Continue reading HTC Thunderbolt review

HTC Thunderbolt review originally appeared on Engadget on Fri, 18 Mar 2011 16:30:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Road warriors riding the Sprint WiMAX truck will be pleased to know that there’s a new mobile hotspot device in the house. Dubbed the Overdrive Pro 3G / 4G, users can now simultaneously connect up to eight devices — as opposed to just five previously — to the mobile web via this little 802.11n router from Sierra Wireless. Better yet, Sprint has halved the price for this new model to $49.99 after a $50 rebate with a two year $50 service agreement, yet you still get the usual goodies like microSD expansion and built-in GPS support to boot. You can pick one up at Sprint stores starting on March 20th, but of course, the previous Overdrive is probably sufficient for most humble uses, anyway.

[Thanks, r0fl]

Continue reading Sprint announces Overdrive Pro 3G / 4G mobile hotspot router, available on March 20th

Sprint announces Overdrive Pro 3G / 4G mobile hotspot router, available on March 20th originally appeared on Engadget on Fri, 18 Mar 2011 02:03:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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The Sidekick line’s newest installment, the Android-running Sidekick 4G

The T-Mobile Sidekick, which recently got its data services put to rest for good, will be getting a second life as the Android-based Sidekick 4G.

The Sidekick 4G will be the first Sidekick to include a touchscreen, in this case a 3.5-inch display, but other than that, the looks stay true to the brand’s signature stylings: the same overall shape, the same 5-row QWERTY keyboard. The display slides out with a “pop-tilt” hinge (not the swiveling screen of old), and an optical trackball has been put in place of the old physical trackball.

Group Text and Cloud Text apps appear to be key features of the device, letting users send messages in a reply-all fashion while texting groups and friends from multiple devices, such as your laptop or desktop computer, in addition to the Sidekick.

“We’ve reinvented the messaging experience that made the Sidekick such an iconic device, and supercharged it with communication and entertainment experiences that take full advantage of our 4G network,” says Andrew Sherrard, T-Mobile’s senior vice president of product management.

The T-Mobile Sidekick is the phone that (arguably) started the smartphone revolution in 2002. Before the iPhone burst onto the scene, wowing us with its capacitive touch display and light, slender form, the Sidekick kept us connected with instant messaging through its signature spin-out display and QWERTY keyboard. It was an especially big hit among teens, whose texting habits primed them to see the value of a keyboard (and who were about as likely to use a BlackBerry as they were to wear a navy blue blazer).

Over the years the Sidekick got upgraded, and upgraded again, but it eventually lost out to a new breed of app-filled, touchscreen smartphones.

The Sidekick 4G built by Samsung is an attempt to make the iconic name competitive with today’s best smartphones. Accordingly, it’s got the obligatory 1-GHz processor (a Cortex A8 Hummingbird). It runs Android 2.2 Froyo, a respectably recent version of Google’s mobile operating system.

According to a T-Mobile statement, “Android continues to be a strategic bet for T-Mobile, and we’re expanding the current lineup to offer a robust messaging experience on a popular platform — at speeds as fast as your home broadband.”

The Sidekick will also act as a mobile hotspot for up to five devices, and it will connect with T-Mobile’s 4G network, wherever that is available.

Of course, 4G doesn’t mean what it used to. In this case, it refers to T-Mobile’s HSPA+ network, which the carrier claims will give you 5 to 10 Mbps of download bandwidth.

If you used to own a Sidekick, would you ditch your current phone for a 4G Android version? Sound off in the comments.

Sidekick 4G [T-Mobile via MobileCrunch and Android Community]

If we had a dime for every time Sprint CEO Dan Hesse (or spectrum partner Clearwire) has talked about a possible migration to LTE, we’d have… well, at least several dimes. A new rumor that’s popped up from a couple sources today — consulting firm Gerson Lehrman Group and GizmoFusion — claims that the LTE move is now a done deal, with Sprint signing contracts with infrastructure supplies Ericsson, Alcatel-Lucent, and Samsung to roll out service over the course of the next two to three years as it decommissions iDEN on its 800MHz spectrum. That said, CDMA isn’t about to go away: the company has already committed to upgrading its CDMA footprint with 1X Advanced over the next several years, too. GLG claims that Sprint’s going Lone Ranger on this — it’ll be looking to partner up with other companies like Clearwire or T-Mobile where it makes sense, but the decision to move to LTE so far has been purely internal.

On a related note, GizmoFusion is claiming that Sprint will start shipping the WiFi-only BlackBerry PlayBook between late March and mid-April ahead of the WiMAX version later this year, along with touchscreen / QWERTY hybrid and full-touch BlackBerry handsets — both of which we’ve seen rumored recently. LTE-compatible hardware, assuming this is all legitimate, is probably a ways off yet.

[Thanks, Stoopered]

Sprint ‘Project Leapfrog’ rumors claim LTE network upgrade is underway originally appeared on Engadget on Wed, 16 Mar 2011 16:42:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Verizon execs have been clear as crystal that unlimited smartphone data will follow the dodo — perhaps as soon as summer of this year — but in the meanwhile you can drink your fill of the best as the HTC Thunderbolt will launch this Thursday with an unlimited LTE data plan. While we’ve no guarantees how long it will last, or whether you can grandfather the $30 monthly option into bigger and better devices down the road, it does open up a whole new avenue of opportunity for the Thunderbolt. Considering that Verizon’s 4G USB modems top out at 10GB of LTE data for $80 a month, the HTC handset just became the most powerful, affordable MiFi you could possibly own. Assuming battery life is decent, of course. Find the full PR below.

Continue reading Verizon offers unlimited LTE data plan for HTC Thunderbolt, don’t expect it to stick around

Verizon offers unlimited LTE data plan for HTC Thunderbolt, don’t expect it to stick around originally appeared on Engadget on Tue, 15 Mar 2011 18:15:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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