Hasta La Gadget!

Look up at the sky — is it falling? It sure seems as if that kind of doom is imminent, at least if this whole iPhone 4 pre-order situation is any indication of future tragedy. We’ve received hundreds of tips this morning from friends near and far that iPhone 4 pre-orders aren’t going through, though a few of us here on staff were able to get a confirmation during the wee hours of the morning. From AT&T in the US to O2 over in the UK, it seems that just about everyone ambling to get their name on a future iPhone 4 is experiencing a great deal of frustration. AT&T’s servers seem to be completely hosed here in America, and since Apple’s own online order process has to ping those to check on your contract status, neither option is… um, working. Those who decided to line up at a local store are facing similar issues; employees aren’t even able to fully process pre-orders in store due to systems being overwhelmed, and no one seems to exactly know when things will be back to normal. And you thought the most enraging part of this was the inability to select a white model. Let us know how your experience has been in the poll and comments below, won’t you?

Update: So, it sounds like Best Buy is taking pre-orders (even for white units), but chances are remarkably high that you’re not actually getting in any line. Still, it’s a working option for the moment. In other news, the Apple Store app is seeming to allow iPhone 4 orders, but it looks as if they’re reserving off-contract phones (read: full price ones), so we’d only recommend this avenue if you enjoy things like “arguing about contract dates” and “yelling at brick walls.” We’re guessing you’ll be doing both on the 24th.

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iPhone 4 pre-orderers overwhelm servers, world on the brink of ending originally appeared on Engadget on Tue, 15 Jun 2010 11:56:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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HTC and Sprint are moving fast to fix a storage card-related bug that left some early users of the Evo 4G smartphone frustrated.

As Wired reported Thursday, a problem with the 8-GB MicroSD card that ships with the HTC Evo returned error messages to some people when they tried using the phone’s camera app. The bug also prevented some people from saving files and documents to the card.

HTC has started pushing out a software fix to current and new Evo users, the same day the phone goes on sale at all Sprint stores.

HTC spokesman Keith Nowak confirmed that the updates started streaming out Friday morning so “anyone who currently has an HTC EVO 4G and people who are lining up to buy it today should not experience the issue.”

HTC and Google gave about 5,000 of the devices to attendees at Google’s developer conference two weeks ago, which is how many early users discovered the problem.

The Evo has been a much anticipated phone because of its position as the first 4G smartphone. HTC and Sprint unveiled the Evo in May. The feature-packed gadget has a huge 4.3-inch touchscreen, 1-GHz Snapdragon processor, a front-facing 1.3-megapixel camera for video conferencing and a 8-megapixel camera for shooting photos and videos. (Evo’s MicroSD card has been manufactured by SanDisk.) Evo runs the 2.1 version of the Android operating system, and costs $200 with a two-year contract. Despite poor battery life, the phone has gathered positive reviews.

See Also:

• Wired Video: HTC Evo 4G Dissected
• HTC EVO 4G $200, on Sale June 4
• EVO 4G Hacked, Rooted Before Arriving in Stores
• Strapped to Android, HTC Takes a Dizzying Ride to the Top

Photo: (closari/Flickr)

Look, there’s no arguing that Apple charges a boatload for its first-party adapters, and this isn’t the first time that one of those overpriced dongles has caused an uproar (Mini DisplayPort to Dual-Link DVI Adapter, anyone?). But when the company trots out an iPad Dock Connector to VGA Adapter and promises to enable users to “see their videos and slideshows on the big screen,” it should probably make a few clarifications. Instead, more than a handful of consumers are revolting over on Apple’s own webstore, noting that any video laced in any type of DRM (iTunes flicks and Netflix streams included) won’t output at all. Contrary to popular belief, this adapter doesn’t actually mirror the iPad’s display, which is fairly absurd in our eyes — teachers are even stating that Apple’s own Pages and Keynote apps won’t output via the dongle, making this effectively worthless for blowing up presentations for all to see. We (sort of) get the DRM thing, but not including support in your own presentation app? Unacceptable. A tipster has noted that Apple informed him that “it’s up to the app makers to enable the video out function,” so we suppose all that’s needed to solve a lot of controversy is for some switch to be flipped in some direction. Any other hang-ups with this thing that the world should know about? Drop ’em in comments below.

[Thanks, Tony]

Update: A few tipsters have noted that Keynote does in fact work here. Here’s a growing list of what does and doesn’t work with the adapter.

Apple iPad Dock Connector to VGA Adapter not accomplishing the simplest of tasks originally appeared on Engadget on Mon, 26 Apr 2010 16:49:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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You know us, we like to keep an ear to the ground and, while our own iPads have been purring along with no more than the occasional crashed app, we’re hearing others have not been so fortunate. A number of persistent issues have been reported by anxious iPadites across the USA, including weak or intermittent WiFi signal, overheating, broken PDF exports from Pages, and the iPad completely forgetting your network settings and password. So we figured what better way to see how widespread these problemos are than to ask the collective Engadget brain trust? Have you experienced any of these symptoms? Found a fix? Returned the iPad, bought a skateboard, and started a new gadget-free lifestyle? Vote in the poll, pretty please, and drop by in the comments to let us know how it’s working out for you.

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[Thanks to everyone who sent this in]

Dost thine iPad trouble thee? originally appeared on Engadget on Tue, 06 Apr 2010 17:50:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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We’ve held off as long as possible, but the tips just keep flooding in — Xbox Live has a problem, and evidently it’s a rather noticeable one. Word on the street has it that a new Modern Warfare 2 map update has made a number of Xbox Live features unusable, including online MW2 gameplay. We’re also hearing that the Xbox Live Marketplace is off-and-on, and even Microsoft admits that quite a few other things are acting quirky. The good news is that a fix is on the way, so we’d suggest grabbing that lunch you’ve been denying yourself and trying again later. Hey, aren’t you supposed to be working right now, anyway?

P.S. – Let us know if you’re running into any issues in comments below, cool?

Update: Things seem to be working their way back to normal. Phew.

[Thanks to everyone who sent this in]

Modern Warfare 2 map update leaves Xbox Live in a world of hurt originally appeared on Engadget on Tue, 30 Mar 2010 13:28:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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