Hasta La Gadget!

Businessweek has managed to track down an insider with information on the plans of both Sprint and Kyocera, and he (or she) has been talkative enough to confirm that a Kyocera Echo is all set for launch on the Now Network at an event later today. Sprint’s tagline for said event was that it’ll deliver an “industry first” that makes us believe “the impossible is possible,” and with all due respect to Kyocera, neither of those really sounds like the company’s upcoming Android handset. The first time we got wind of the Echo, however, it was accompanied by a tip about a Windows Phone 7-based HTC Arrive, a more likely candidate for that industrial innovation prize — there are no CDMA WP7 devices quite yet. We could imagine the Arrive being a carrier-specific brand name for HTC’s 7 Pro, which is already expected on Sprint and has even cleared the FCC in a CDMA flavor. But again, that doesn’t fully satisfy the bluster about the impossible becoming possible, so maybe Sprint will have even more to show us — we’ll be attending its shindig tonight to make absolutely sure.

Sprint expected to introduce Kyocera Echo at event later today, HTC Arrive also indirectly corroborated originally appeared on Engadget on Mon, 07 Feb 2011 02:44:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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First Sprint got a 4G-capable, 4.3-inch Android phone from HTC, then this January AT&T (Inspire 4G) and Verizon (Thunderbolt) received promises of the same. Is T-Mobile feeling left out? It might not be for long, as the rumor mill has just churned out a rather mighty 1.2GHz dual-core beast of a handset and is ascribing it to the Magenta network for a launch some time around May or June. We’re hearing it’ll come with qHD resolution (960 x 540, just like the Atrix 4G) and the SOC within will be that famed Snapdragon MSM8260 that Qualcomm teased briefly at CES a couple of weeks ago. Lending credence to this scuttlebutt is the fact that both TmoNews and Android and Me found sources affirming the Pyramid’s existence, leaving us only to wait and wonder about what we can do with a device of its kind.

{Image credit: Nina Aldin Thune]

HTC Pyramid emerges from the mists of speculation with a 1.2GHz dual-core, 4.3-inch screen, T-Mobile 4G originally appeared on Engadget on Thu, 03 Feb 2011 03:37:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Say it with us, finally a PS3 firmware update that actually does something useful! We’ve grown so accustomed to Sony refreshing the software on its console just to spite jailbreakers that we almost started to believe that’s all the word “update” entailed. But, here comes Kotaku with word that v3.6 of the PS3’s firmware will come with a neat little addition: saving games to the cloud. This seems a very logical step toward delivering Sony’s overall goal of giving users a holistic, integrated experience. Indeed, during the NGP presentation, guest speaker Hideo Kojima specifically referred to saving your PS3 game on the console and resuming it on the Next Generation Portable. “Online Saving,” as Sony’s reputed to be calling it, would be the conduit through which that can be realized, though it doesn’t appear like it’ll come for free. Kotaku‘s sources indicate it’ll be part of the PlayStation Plus subscription, at least initially. Still, we like cloud storage, and if it means never having to see another hard drive again, we’re all for it.

Next PS3 update rumored to add ‘Online Saving’ for PlayStation Plus users originally appeared on Engadget on Sat, 29 Jan 2011 13:10:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Yesterday’s leaked image of a purported Nokia tablet device seems to have been more informative than we initially believed it to be. An eagle-eyed forum member over on mobile-review has spotted the similarity between it and a reference platform for ST-Ericsson’s U8500 system-on-chip. Last we heard, that little powerhouse was running a pair of 1.2GHz ARM Cortex-A9 cores, so excuse us if we find the prospect of it driving Nokia’s next flagship a rather exciting one. You can see video of the reference device in question after the break — it ends on the delicious and unequivocal assertion from the ST-Ericsson rep that Nokia has signed up to deliver the U8500 in an upcoming device. Bear in mind, however, that the video is from November of last year and we still don’t know for sure that the Nokia slate above is its MeeGo progenitor or just a prototype. Either way, the U8500 is expected in smartphones at some point in the first half of this year, which kind of fits Nokia’s roadmap, no?

[Image credit: Cor72z]

Continue reading Nokia’s leaked MeeGo device resembles dual-core ST-Ericsson U8500 reference platform

Nokia’s leaked MeeGo device resembles dual-core ST-Ericsson U8500 reference platform originally appeared on Engadget on Tue, 25 Jan 2011 08:01:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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You’ll no doubt be aware of our (well justified) distrust for anything that passes a tech analyst’s lips, but this time’s a little different. Richard Doherty of Envisioneering Group cites “engineers who are working on hardware” for Apple’s latest project in asserting what that project actually is: NFC capabilities are apparently being built into the next generation of iPhone and iPad devices. Contactless payments via NFC have been steadily building up in hype and adoption recently — at least in the western hemisphere, the stuff is commonplace in Japan — and Doherty predicts Apple will make its move into the field with some new hardware and an accompanying “revamp” of iTunes. The idea would be to allow the use of iTunes gift card balances and the credit card info Apple already has from you to make swiping payments at compatible retail outlets. Apple is said to be planning enticements, like loyalty credits and points, to get you using its service in the place of the competition, and there are already a couple of software patent applications from the company detailing other potential uses for the technology. All of which could mean absolutely nothing, of course, but this seems like an awful lot of smoke for there not to be a fire under it.

iPhone 5 and iPad 2 will come with NFC built in, suggests well-connected analyst originally appeared on Engadget on Tue, 25 Jan 2011 02:25:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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