Hasta La Gadget!

Sure, Verizon has the lock on Gossip Girl product placement, but even the technological reality of CDMA must bow to plot development, and if that means Serena’s Droid X sprouts a SIM card so Lil’ J can steal it and surreptitiously swap in a new one, well, so be it. Of course, this clever plan assumes that Serena doesn’t text or call anyone using her new SIM, but, you know, just go with it. Video after the break.

Continue reading Screen Grabs: A Droid X with a SIM card? XOXO, Gossip Girl

Screen Grabs: A Droid X with a SIM card? XOXO, Gossip Girl originally appeared on Engadget on Tue, 16 Nov 2010 20:41:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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It’s unclear whether Verizon will ever get HTC’s 7 Pro, but it’s a lock that Big Red will eventually have some manner of Windows Phone 7 gear in its lineup — and now we’ve got one in the flesh. Looks like HTC will be remixing the Trophy for use on CDMA networks, featuring a 3.8-inch WVGA display, 5 megapixel cam, 16GB of storage, and 802.11n, and Verizon is circulating a brochure for Microsoft employees saying they’ll be able to buy the Trophy in “early 2011” for $199.99 at launch when they renew their contracts now (they’ll also get a leather case and a car charger for free, but hey, they’re Microsofties). Oh, and that’s not the best part: the Trophy is also identified as being a “quad band global phone,” meaning you’ll be able to roam on GSM networks when you leave the US behind — a feature Verizon seems to be pushing pretty hard across its smartphone lineup now. Follow the break for a bigger version of the pamphlet.

[Thanks, anonymous tipster]

Continue reading HTC Trophy with Windows Phone 7 coming to Verizon in ‘early 2011’

HTC Trophy with Windows Phone 7 coming to Verizon in ‘early 2011’ originally appeared on Engadget on Mon, 15 Nov 2010 14:04:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Yes, Verizon’s calling them “Windows 7 mobile devices,” but the underlying message is clear — Verizon’s tossing the Windows Phone 7 CDMA ball squarely into Microsoft’s court. There are no CDMA-ready smartphones running Microsoft’s latest mobile operating system (save the late-blooming HTC 7 Pro for Sprint) and Verizon doesn’t intend to take any of the blame for that. You’re up, Microsoft. Time for a three-point basket.

P.S. We suppose this could also be a coy reference to CDMA-ready Windows 7 tablets.

[Thanks, Daniel R.]

Verizon happy to offer Windows Phone 7 devices ‘as soon as Microsoft has ’em ready’ originally appeared on Engadget on Sun, 14 Nov 2010 17:41:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Some leaked literature suggests that Verizon will continue selling Microsoft’s discontinued Kin phones this year. But perhaps this isn’t as surprising as some publications have made it seem.

Spotted by PPCGeeks, the below screengrab purportedly shows Verizon’s Q4 roadmap. The Kin One and Kin Two, which were discontinued just weeks after their launch in June, sit at the bottom of the chart.

Microsoft declined to comment today. Some publications have interpreted the screengrab as evidence that the Kin is “returning” to Verizon, but in actuality Microsoft never said Verizon was abandoning the Kin in the first place.

In fact, Microsoft’s June statement clearly said Verizon would continue selling Kin phones:

Microsoft has made the decision to focus on the Windows Phone 7 launch and will not ship KIN in Europe this fall as planned.  Additionally, we are integrating our KIN team with the Windows Phone 7 team, incorporating valuable ideas and technologies from KIN into future Windows Phone releases.  We will continue to work with Verizon in the U.S. to sell current KIN phones.

To be clear, Microsoft did discontinue the Kin, and that means the company is not going to invest further in developing new Kin phones. That doesn’t mean it halted all sales of existing Kin units. It appears Verizon is just clearing out inventory.

When I visited Microsoft about a month ago, the designers behind the Kin project made no indication of a possible revival of the Kin. Rather, they described the Kin as an important learning experience for developing Windows Phone 7.

Unbelievably, against all odds and better judgment, we are able to independently confirm that Microsoft’s short-lived Kin One and Kin Two are coming back for an encore performance on Verizon, possibly as soon as this quarter — but it won’t quite be the same product you remember from earlier this year. The phones were famously bashed for the unrealistic plan pricing model that put them head-to-head with actual, full-fledged smartphones — despite the fact that the devices were targeted squarely at tweens, teens, and twentysomethings — and we’re hearing that the revised phones will be totally, completely debundled from data services. Data-centric features like the Loop “are out,” we’re told — but the good news is that you’ll still be able to use one of the product’s most redeeming qualities, Zune Pass, over WiFi if you’re not signed up for a proper data plan. Of course, the value proposition of a Kin without… well, without its only value proposition is questionable at best, so we’re thinking this might just be a way to clear huge backlogs of hardware inventory before pulling the plug on the program. Seriously, who wants a Kin without the unlimited photo uploads?

Confirmed: Kin One and Two are returning to Verizon. Wait, what? originally appeared on Engadget on Thu, 11 Nov 2010 20:57:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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