Hasta La Gadget!

Of all the Windows Phone 7 launch devices, AT&T’s HTC Surround is likely the most curious. It’s a landscape slider built on the same basic internals as the rest of its platform siblings, but there’s no keyboard under that screen — the quarter-inch slide reveals an aluminum speaker bar and integrated kickstand, which combine to create a tiny little stereo system of sorts. Mix in Windows Phone 7’s heavy Zune integration, add in a dash of Dolby Mobile and SRS Wow “virtual surround” audio processing, and top it all off with 16GB of internal memory, and you have what might be the ultimate phone for on-the-go media consumption. But does the Surround live up to all that promise? Read on to find out!

This review is primarily of the HTC Surround hardware. Check out our full review of Windows Phone 7 for our thoughts on the OS.

Continue reading HTC Surround review

HTC Surround review originally appeared on Engadget on Wed, 20 Oct 2010 19:00:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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And just like that, the rumor mill smirks. HP has just come clean with a device that we’ve been hearing more and more about over the past few weeks, and with it will come the next generation of webOS that we’ve been hearing about for even longer. The Palm Pre 2 will be the first device to ship with HP webOS 2.0, with the revamped and renamed (presumably to use on more than just Palm smartphones) mobile OS promising “true multitasking,” Stacks (for organizing apps) Just Type, HP Synergy (links your email and social networking accounts), Exhibition (enabling users to run apps designed specifically for the Palm Touchstone Charging Dock) and support for Adobe’s Flash Player 10.1 Beta. It’s also bringing along a new Favorites tagging option, Skype Mobile (on the Verizon version only), text assist, integrated Quickoffice, VPN support, a redesigned launcher and full support for Bluetooth keyboards and SPP peripherals.

As for Pre 2 itself? Little is being revealed at the moment, but we’re told to expect a 1GHz CPU, a five megapixel camera (LED flash, extended depth of field, geotagging, and video capture), glass display and a “sleeker, streamlined design” that still combines a touchpanel with a slide-out QWERTY keyboard. In other words, it’s a faster, slimmer Pre, and some would argue it’s what the Pre Plus should’ve been. At any rate, SFR customers in France will get first dibs on Friday, with Verizon and an undisclosed carrier in Canada scheduled to get it “in the coming months.” Oh, and as for US-based developers? They’ll be able to purchase unlocked UMTS versions of the Pre 2 (!) in their homeland, though pricing remains elusive.

Update: The Pre 2 portal is now live, showcasing a 3.1-inch 480 x 320 (HVGA) multitouch display, a black enclosure, Exchange support, built-in GPS, ambient light / proximity sensors, an accelerometer, 802.11b/g WiFi, Bluetooth 2.1+EDR, 16GB of inbuilt storage space, a battery good for around 5.5 hours of talking and a 3.5mm headphone jack.

Continue reading Palm gets official with webOS 2.0 and Pre 2: hitting France on Friday, Verizon ‘in the coming months’

Palm gets official with webOS 2.0 and Pre 2: hitting France on Friday, Verizon ‘in the coming months’ originally appeared on Engadget on Tue, 19 Oct 2010 09:32:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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It’s the first BlackBerry to ship with BB OS 6, and it’s the first to boast both a touchpanel and a conventional slide-out QWERTY. But is it capable of standing up to the rest of today’s modern smartphones? We definitely had a few bones to pick with RIM’s latest flagship device when we reviewed it a few month’s back, but if you’re a regular, you’ll know that this segment isn’t about us — it’s about you, particularly if you own a Torch. Are you satisfied with the revised OS? Happy with the touchscreen response? Would you have bumped the screen resolution? Changed the keyboard in any way? Thrown a CDMA module in for Sprint / Verizon support? RIM’s betting quite a bit on this new operating system (and this new design), so feel free to sound off in comments below with ideas on how you’d change things for version two dot oh. Keep it classy, though — cool?

How would you change RIM’s BlackBerry Torch? originally appeared on Engadget on Fri, 15 Oct 2010 22:35:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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We’ve already established that if you’re filthy rich, you probably don’t want the same cell phone as common folk. No, if you’re looking for something higher end, you’ll probably end up talking to Stuart Hughes, who customizes electronics by plating them in gold and diamonds. We’ve already seen his work on a $20,000 iPhone 4, but his latest achievement is downright ridiculous. Called the “world’s most expensive phone” (we’ll see how long that lasts), Hughes made two identical models for an Australian client. Each handset includes over 500 diamonds and totals over 100 karats, and comes in its own special granite box. Its total cost is £5 million — nearly 8 million dollars. Just don’t bother crying when you leave it on the seat of a cab.

Stuart Hughes strikes again with world’s most expensive, diamond covered iPhone 4 originally appeared on Engadget on Thu, 14 Oct 2010 11:39:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Micro surround speaker bar in a Windows Phone sound like your cup of tea? Best Buy’s taking your HTC Surround pre-orders right now for handsets that’ll ship on November 8th, and cost a penny under $550 on the off-chance you’re looking to buy off-contract. Hey, you can even call it the T8788 if you want — we won’t tell a soul. Get a good look at the phone right here, in our launch hands-on.

Should you live in the United Kingdom, you can order a Samsung Omnia 7 instead — T-Mobile UK’s got the Super AMOLED phone ready to rumble for the price of free on £35-and-up tariffs. See that handset in action here.

[Thanks, Sanders L.]

HTC 7 Surround slides into Best Buy for $550 unsubsidized, Omnia 7 appears at T-Mobile UK originally appeared on Engadget on Wed, 13 Oct 2010 21:41:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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