Hasta La Gadget!

During Deutsche Telekom’s press conference this morning at MWC, Cole Brodman — T-Mobile USA’s CTO — went on record with the news that it’ll be launching its first 21Mbps HSPA+ USB modem next month across the country, the webConnect Rocket. Of course, there isn’t a lot of live 21Mbps footprint in T-Mobile’s network right now — in fact, only Philly is fully operational — but there should be plenty more cities from coast to coast where you can enjoy DSL-shaming wireless speeds later this year. That might not be the most exciting news, though: Brodman also finally fessed up to the HD2 (unbranded version pictured above), which will be exclusive to T-Mobile in the US. It’s arguably pretty bad timing in light of the Windows Phone 7 Series announcement yesterday, but a huge win nonetheless — the phone is a legitimate beast. Like the webConnect Rocket, it’ll be hitting in March, though exact dates and prices for either have yet to be revealed.

Update: T-Mobile had previously hinted that there’s be some surprised in store for the US release of the HD2, and indeed, there are; it’s got Blockbuster On Demand integrated for downloading movies directly to the device, a Barnes & Noble eReader app for enjoying the Nook’s digital library right on the phone, and — for some reason we don’t fully appreciate — Transformers and Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen bundled on the included microSD. Full PR after the break — and reader Qasim points out that T-Mobile’s HD2 website is now live as well.

Continue reading T-Mobile launching 21Mbps webConnect Rocket, HTC HD2 next month

T-Mobile launching 21Mbps webConnect Rocket, HTC HD2 next month originally appeared on Engadget on Tue, 16 Feb 2010 04:39:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Not a week goes by that we don’t hear of investor pressure on Deutsche Telekom to strengthen its financials and offload underperforming units — T-Mobile USA included — and the American outpost is back in the spotlight this evening coming off a report out of The Wall Street Journal that a spinoff might indeed be in the works. According to our favorite “people familiar with the matter,” DT has reached out to a few banks with the goal of raising enough capital for T-Mobile through an IPO that it’d be able to continue to fund its network build-out, something that’s going to become increasingly critical as it fends off 7.2Mbps HSPA and 4G competition from all of its national competitors. There are a few scenarios allegedly being discussed, ranging from a full-on excision of T-Mobile from its corporate parent to a merger with another US wireless firm — but the plan gaining most traction internally is said to involve selling around 20 percent of the carrier to investors while hanging onto the rest, a situation that would get the underperforming unit’s financials off DT’s books. Ultimately, whatever comes of this probably won’t happen for a few months while the options get mulled, but considering what went down in the UK, this certainly seems plausible.

Deutsche Telekom rumored to be eyeing T-Mobile USA spinoff originally appeared on Engadget on Thu, 04 Feb 2010 20:54:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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As the late, great Rodney Dangerfield would attest, DoubleTwist has been jonesing for some respect for quite some time. For those unaware, said software essentially acts as an iTunes for everything else, giving users of all those non-Apple devices a somewhat familiar interface and portal to sync media, playlists, etc (video demonstration is after the break). Up until now, Android users have been forced to figure out content management on their own, and while geeks have obviously had no issue, those expecting iTunes to take the wheel have found themselves in an uncomfortable position. Reportedly, T-Mobile USA has decided to partner with the company and pre-load the software onto a number of new Android devices — not just the Fender myTouch 3G. The only real pitfall here is that Amazon’s MP3 Store integration is missing, but we should learn more as T-Mob goes official with the details later today. Is this the big break DoubleTwist has been waiting for? Time shall tell.

Continue reading DoubleTwist partnering with T-Mobile for Android music management

DoubleTwist partnering with T-Mobile for Android music management originally appeared on Engadget on Mon, 25 Jan 2010 08:31:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Those of you making use of T-Mobile’s VOIP offerings to save some minutes, hang onto your WiFi. The newly Google-favored carrier has decided to axe its HotSpot@Home service, meaning no more landline VOIP calls through the service calls over WiFi from home. T-Mo will allow existing subscribers to carry out their existing contracts (if only to avoid giving them an early out), and everyone can still make calls over WiFi at the company’s public hotspots, but no new folks will be able to add the service to their accounts, meaning this old offering won’t die, it’ll just fade away.

Update: As a number of you pointed out it seems we’ve got things a bit wrong here courtesy of some conflicting reports. The HotSpot@Home service will live on, but the @Home service, which provided VOIP access through landline phones, is the one being put out to pasture here.

T-Mobile killing @Home service, softly originally appeared on Engadget on Tue, 12 Jan 2010 09:49:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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You know those times when you’re sifting through an undercooked ROM, dumping .nbh files right and left, asking yourself: “is this even worth it?” Well, the folks at WMExperts can answer with a resounding fist pump after digging up references to T-Mobile US in an HTC HD2 prerelease ROM that was recently leaked their way. At this point we’re looking at a new 2.01 version of the HD2 software in the T-Mobile version, a big jump from the 1.61 seen in previous leaks, which maybe will smooth over some of those performance woes we experienced with the device. WMExperts also claims a March 2010 release date, which seems a while to wait, but somebody told us once about “good things” coming to “waiters” or something like that, so we’re cautiously optimistic.

[Thanks to everyone who sent this in]

T-Mobile bringing HTC HD2 to the States? All .nbh files point to ‘yes’ originally appeared on Engadget on Fri, 18 Dec 2009 18:19:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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