Hasta La Gadget!

It’s no secret that Verizon wants the Pre; in fact, as much as we’re sure they’d like to be showing a corporate poker face, it’s pretty obvious they want it badly given how swiftly it sought to take the wind out of Sprint’s sails with comments around the time of the initial launch. Sprint’s Dan Hesse moved just as quickly to quash the thought as best he could by publicly slamming his company’s archrival, telling media that Verizon needed to cut it out with the assumptions that Sprint’s exclusivity period was six months and reiterating that he’d have the Pre in his back pocket through the end of 2009. The obvious response from Verizon? Revise your language just a little bit and keep at it. Big Red is now saying that it’ll have the Pre “early next year” in comments made during its earnings call today — in other words, the very moment Sprint’s exclusivity ends if Verizon has anything to say about it. From Palm’s perspective, sitting pretty atop the States’ largest carrier is a good place to be, so we’re sure they’re stoked to hear the depth of Verizon’s interest — not to mention that we’ve still got that Eos floating around somewhere.

[Via PreCentral]

Filed under: Cellphones, Handhelds

Verizon reiterates it’ll have the Pre — early next year originally appeared on Engadget on Mon, 27 Jul 2009 17:01:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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The old adage goes “be careful what you wish for; you just might get it.” After years of bellyaching (we’re as guilty of it as anyone) that Nokia was giving Europe first dibs on its hottest handsets over North America, we’re now seeing perhaps the most dramatic, positive shift in North American strategy in the company’s history — in fact, they’re straight-up saying that they want to push all the way to number 1 in the local market. But is it enough of a shift to fend off aggressive moves from Samsung, LG, Apple, and the rest of the gang across every conceivable market segment?

Nokia’s product portfolio manager for the region, Ira Frimere, sat down with Computerworld recently to discuss the renewed push, admitting that the company has had to rethink some fundamental things about its products and its business model to help its cause in the States; one small example is the fact that the Surge is launching without the typical four-digit model number or Nseries / Eseries code that is found on virtually every Nokia sold worldwide, ostensibly because Americans apparently prefer names to numbers (it’ll launch as the Surge 6790 internationally, it turns out). Additionally, the company has dedicated a facility in San Diego to working with its North American carrier partners — AT&T and Verizon, most prominently. It’s still early on, but the labor there seems to already be bearing fruit, considering that AT&T will be stocking three S60 devices once the Surge launches — a record — and Verizon’s rumored to have some interesting stuff in the pipeline.

Frimere adds that Nokia believes services are key to winning American hearts and minds, an area the company has been putting extensive R&D into lately with its Ovi line (unfortunately, so is everyone else — and getting to iTunes and App Store-level acceptance with Nokia Music and the Ovi Store is going to be an uphill battle, to say the least). Ultimately, the conclusion seems to be Nokia’s reluctant admittance that breaking into the US market requires a willingness to give carriers far, far more respect than they deserve by bending and breaking to their somewhat odd demands — and that’s going to be an ongoing problem for consumers, whether you’re a Nokia fan or not.

Filed under: Cellphones, Handhelds

Nokia talks shop about its revised US strategy, but is it enough? originally appeared on Engadget on Thu, 16 Jul 2009 16:13:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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If you’ve had you eye on the Tour, we bet you didn’t forget they were going on sale today — but just in case you had, consider this your official reminder. Both carriers are now offering RIM’s latest and greatest CDMA BlackBerry for $199.99 on contract, so you’re probably not going to see a lot of defections between carriers this time around. Pardon us if we don’t shed a tear for the lack of exclusivity on this one.

Read – Sprint
Read – Verizon

Filed under: Cellphones, Handhelds

BlackBerry Tours, come and get ’em on Sprint and Verizon originally appeared on Engadget on Sun, 12 Jul 2009 11:59:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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It’s here, folks. The BlackBerry Tour has been unboxed, and now that we’ve had a few days to mess around with it, we’re able to tell you how we truly and deeply feel. There have been countless leaks and unofficial reviews circulating for the past few months, but now that it’s finally legit we can give this sexy piece of tech a proper shakedown. It’s been roughly described as a CDMA Bold, but does it surpass its GSM counterpart? Be sure to head over to Engadget Mobile for the full review!

Filed under: Cellphones, Handhelds

Verizon BlackBerry Tour 9630 review originally appeared on Engadget on Tue, 07 Jul 2009 13:30:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Firms like Cradlepoint have been dishing out generic portable hotspots for years now, but it wasn’t until recently that US consumers had a carrier-branded option for creating their own WiFi zone via EV-DO. Novatel’s shockingly diminutive MiFi 2200 portable EV-DO router has officially arrived on both Sprint and Verizon Wireless, and while GSM followers have been unfortunately left out for the moment, we’re still eager to hear how early CDMA adopters are faring. Are you pleased with the convenience factor here? Have you had any odd and unexpected connection issues? Are you kosher with that 5GB limit on monthly throughput? Let us know if you think this thing’s worth its asking price, and if not, what would make it so. And… go!

Filed under: Cellphones, Wireless

How would you change Novatel’s MiFi 2200 portable EV-DO router? originally appeared on Engadget on Sat, 27 Jun 2009 03:30:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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