Hasta La Gadget!

Someone should really tell T-Mobile USA it’s got a rather large hole that needs plugged. Hot on the heels of the (presumably) T-Mob-bound G1 Blaze leak comes this duo, which includes a purported leak of the myTouch HD (or 3G HD) as well as a web portal that quite clearly prepares us for the launch of the carrier’s first HSPA+ smartphone. Of course, there’s no official confirmation that the handset you’re peering at above is anything more than a fan render, but it certainly has a look of authenticity to it; sadly, there aren’t any rumored specifications to tag alongside the JPG, but it’s a pretty safe bet that this one will run some flavor of Android and rely heavily on screen presses for letter input. As for the promo page? Scrutineers have drawn a link between it and the Vanguard that we peeked a few weeks back, so feel free to let your imagination run a bit wild there. Looks like it’s gearing up to be quite the second half for America’s number two GSM operator.

[Thanks to everyone who sent this in]

Purported myTouch HD leaks out alongside promise of T-Mobile’s first HSPA+ smartphone originally appeared on Engadget on Wed, 28 Jul 2010 12:43:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Over at Daring Fireball, the well-informed John Gruber suggests Apple might out a new 27″, 16:9 cinema display tomorrow, perhaps in concert with faster iMacs and refreshed Mac Pros. Update: And perhaps, even more tantilizingly, with Apple’s elusive Magic Trackpad? More »

Take this one with a grain of salt, but it’s looking like our old friend the BlackBerry Bold 9700 is getting a wee bit of an update. Yesterday evening, CrackBerry discovered a RIM document that describes a QWERTY-packing, OS 6-rocking “BlackBerry 9780” destined for a GSM carrier near you… and less than 24 hours later, handset sleuth Salomondrin claims to have the first picture of the device. While we quite honestly can’t tell the difference, the man who outed the Curve 2 says this device’s chrome bezel is a tad darker than the original, and that it’ll have 512MB of flash memory when it hits the scene. Of course, this could just be an Bold 9700 with a hacked ROM or a theme of some sort, but we certainly hope not; pepper it up with CDMA, and you’ve got a shoe-in for the Curve 3.

[Thanks to everyone who sent this in]

BlackBerry Bold 9780 leaks out with OS 6, QWERTY instead of touchscreen originally appeared on Engadget on Sat, 24 Jul 2010 14:22:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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We’ve heard this song and dance before, but DigiTimes has it that MSI is on pace to shove out a 3D laptop this September. Before you open that jaw and feign a yawn, you should know that the company is purportedly not following convention by integrating NVIDIA’s 3D Vision technology; instead, it’ll rely on Dynamic Digital Depth’s (DDD’s) TriDef 3D software for transferring 2D images to 3D. This means that users will be able to use cheap-o polarized glasses rather than the more expensive (and battery draining) active shutter variety. Somehow or another, the whole thing is supposed to launch at under a grand, so we’ll be poking around on the IFA show floor hoping that this one comes to fruition.

MSI rumored to have TriDef 3D laptops on deck, no active shutters required originally appeared on Engadget on Wed, 21 Jul 2010 18:26:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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“An iPhone, an iPhone, my carrier’s reputation for an iPhone.” Grab a cup of coffee and get yourself comfortable, fans of behind-the-scenes industry drama. Wired has published an exhaustive and fascinating expose on the “loveless celebrity marriage” that is Apple and AT&T — all from sources familiar with the matters but who cannot (or will not) be named, of course. In other words, don’t take this as gospel, but frankly, none of this sounds too crazy or outside the realm of what we’ve already surmised ourselves. In brief, the two companies have been contentious towards one another since just after the iPhone was unveiled. For AT&T’s part, the carrier was reportedly taken aback when its requests (delivered by Senior VP Kris Rinne) to restrict YouTube’s bandwidth usage (or make it WiFi-only) while the network infrastructure was built up fell on deaf ears in Cupertino. Word has it Apple also refused to allow its devices to be used in campaigns to combat Verizon’s Map for That ads: “It was [effective] because of AT&T’s network. We would have been letting them use the iPhone to put lipstick on a pig,” remarked one anonymous Apple exec.

What’s most interesting to us here is the ongoing reported discussion to drop AT&T in favor for Verizon. That chapter apparently begins just months after the original’s launch, with an investigative team (including Scott Forstall) ultimately concluding that Qualcomm‘s CDMA (or CDMA / GSM hybrid) chips would require a complete redesign of the device, not to mention a nasty lawsuit with AT&T over its exclusive contract (perhaps a minor issue, knowing Apple). Back then, Verizon wasn’t seen as a guaranteed improvement, and according to one executive privy to such meetings, the carrier switch has been discussed at least a half dozen times, with the general consensus always being that it would “cause as many problems as it solved.” We can’t imagine this is gonna help stem the perpetual VZW iPhone rumor mill.

Hit up the source link for the full tale, which does hit on a fundamental issue of the mobile industry going forward: as smartphone makers continue to push their devices’ capabilities, bandwidth concerns will continue to grow and carriers are likely to take the majority of the blame. If you ask us, David Fincher has just found his ideal follow-up to The Social Network — we’d especially love to see someone film the part where AT&T asks Steve Jobs to ditch the turtleneck and wear a suit when meeting with its board of directors.

Apple discussed Verizon switch ‘at least half a dozen times,’ and other stories about its AT&T relationship originally appeared on Engadget on Mon, 19 Jul 2010 19:25:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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