HTC HD2 and Moto Cliq XT pricing revealed in T-Mobile database?

Alright, we know there’s a big old watermark covering it up, but the HD2’s price when it makes its eagerly awaited US debut on T-Mobile has been identified as being $199 after rebate, presumably as part of a two-year commitment with the carrier. As usual with such screen grabs, we can’t be 100 percent sure, but that number seems to be in the right ballpark, and is joined by a $129 price for Motorola’s Cliq XT and a $69 sticker for Nokia’s Nuron handset. All three are expected to arrive at some point this month, though we urge caution with the HD2 — it’s still only a Windows Mobile 6.5 device, in spite of Microsoft’s equivocations about Windows Phone 7, and should be obtained solely on the basis of what you know. That is to say, you’d better really love HTC’s Sense UI and that 4.3-inch screen, because you’ll be buying into an OS with a very short remaining shelf life, no prospects of future app development, and no guarantees about upgrades.

[Thanks to everyone who sent this in]

HTC HD2 and Moto Cliq XT pricing revealed in T-Mobile database? originally appeared on Engadget on Tue, 02 Mar 2010 07:45:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

Permalink   |  sourceTmoNews  | Email this | Comments

Windows Phone 7 Series themes for WinMo abound in dev forums

We know that it ain’t always practical or desirable to put money down on a phone every time a new OS or interface comes out — so what is a gadget hound to do when they realize their hardware won’t be supported by Windows Phone 7 Series? Well, if you’re anything like these enterprising individuals you roll your own. Both Jaxbot and LeSScro, members of the XDA Developers forum, have skins in the works that mimic the new OS on WinMo devices with varying degrees of success. The work of the former is still pretty slow and buggy but it does offer some functionality — including info on live tiles and the ability to see upcoming appointments on your lock screen. The latter theme, on the other hand, sports time, date, and notifications on the lock screen, profile settings, transitional animations, a handful of hubs (including games, media, and Office), and an apps launcher. Check out the source links for more info — but not before checking out the demo videos after the break.

[Thanks, Geever]

Continue reading Windows Phone 7 Series themes for WinMo abound in dev forums

Windows Phone 7 Series themes for WinMo abound in dev forums originally appeared on Engadget on Mon, 01 Mar 2010 17:58:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

Permalink Pocket Now  |  sourceLeSScro, Windows Phone Hacker  | Email this | Comments

Video: First Windows Phone 7 Series Prototype

A new video from Engadget briefly shows off the first prototype Windows Phone 7 Series device from LG. The device is a QWERTY slider with Windows-Phone-7-Series-dictated Back, Windows, and Search buttons below its touch screen.

No firm specs were gleaned from model, but it did have a 5-megapixel camera and dedicated buttons for camera, volume, and power on the sides. Windows Phone 7 Series is slated for “holiday season 2010,” but we’re sure to see plenty more Windows Phone prototypes and models before that time.

Microsoft sending mixed signals on Windows Phone 7 Series upgrades, HTC HD2 still in limbo

The fate of the mighty HTC HD2 seems to be getting murkier by the minute: Microsoft UK VP Alex Reeve said last week that an upgrade to Windows Phone 7 Series might be left up to hardware partners, but now Natasha Kwan, General Manager for Microsoft’s Asia Pacific Mobile Communications Business says the 1GHz handset “doesn’t qualify because it doesn’t have the three buttons” required by WP7. Making matters even less clear, we asked Microsoft’s Director of Consumer Experiences Aaron Woodman about the HD2 directly on The Engadget Show, and he politely declined to tell us about the device’s upgradability, and said that WP7’s final required specs would be revealed at MIX ’10. We’ll be honest: we’re taking all this confusion to mean that Microsoft hasn’t quite figured out how to say the HD2 is at a dead end just before it launches on T-Mobile US, but hey — maybe we’ll be pleasantly surprised at MIX.

Microsoft sending mixed signals on Windows Phone 7 Series upgrades, HTC HD2 still in limbo originally appeared on Engadget on Mon, 01 Mar 2010 15:37:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

Permalink   |  sourceAPC, The Engadget Show  | Email this | Comments

The Engadget Show – 006: Avner Ronen, the first Windows Phone 7 Series device, Dell Mini 5, and more!

Truly our craziest show yet. In case you didn’t tune into the livestream of The Engadget Show on Saturday (and if you somehow didn’t hear about the news), then you’re in for a real treat. The crew gets especially wild on this episode while talking Hulu and plans for world domination with Boxee’s Avner Ronen, revealing the first partner handset for Windows Phone 7 Series with Microsoft’s Aaron Woodman, and playing around with the Dell Mini 5, as well as the forthcoming Engadget app for Android. Oh, and there’s also a fascinating short piece on chiptune music and visuals and the folks who make the magic happen. If you do one thing today, make it The Engadget Show. You won’t be sorry. The full video is available to stream after the break, or you can download it below.

Hosts: Joshua Topolsky, Paul Miller, Nilay Patel
Special guests: Avner Ronen and Aaron Woodman
Produced and Directed by: Chad Mumm
Executive Producer: Joshua Fruhlinger
Edited by: Michael Slavens
Music by: Nullsleep
Visuals by: Paris and Outpt
Opening titles by: Julien Nantiec

Download the Show: The Engadget Show – 006 (HD) / The Engadget Show – 006 (iPod / iPhone / Zune formatted)

Subscribe to the Show:

[iTunes] Subscribe to the Show directly in iTunes (M4V).
[Zune] Subscribe to the Show directly in the Zune Marketplace (M4V).
[RSS M4V] Add the Engadget Show feed (M4V) to your RSS aggregator and have it delivered automatically.

Continue reading The Engadget Show – 006: Avner Ronen, the first Windows Phone 7 Series device, Dell Mini 5, and more!

The Engadget Show – 006: Avner Ronen, the first Windows Phone 7 Series device, Dell Mini 5, and more! originally appeared on Engadget on Mon, 01 Mar 2010 13:45:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

Permalink   |   | Email this | Comments

Exclusive: First Windows Phone 7 Series partner device unveiled (with video!)

Microsoft’s Aaron Woodman just pulled off a little surprise here at The Engadget Show: he brought out LG’s Windows Phone 7 Series pre-production prototype! The QWERTY slider is the first branded Windows Phone 7 Series device the world’s ever seen, and while the hardware and software are both obviously early, we can tell you a few things about it: it’s just a hair thicker than an iPhone or Nexus One, there are dedicated hardware camera, volume, and power buttons in addition to the back, home, and search buttons dictated by Windows Phone 7 Series, and we noticed a five megapixel camera with a flash on the back, along with a headphone jack. Can’t say much apart from that right now, since things are so early and everything is subject to change, but things are certainly moving along. It’s all going down on the show right now — see it on video after the break!

Continue reading Exclusive: First Windows Phone 7 Series partner device unveiled (with video!)

Exclusive: First Windows Phone 7 Series partner device unveiled (with video!) originally appeared on Engadget on Sat, 27 Feb 2010 17:21:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

Permalink   |   | Email this | Comments

Entelligence: Windows Phone 7 Series

Entelligence is a column by technology strategist and author Michael Gartenberg, a man whose desire for a delicious cup of coffee and a quality New York bagel is dwarfed only by his passion for tech. In these articles, he’ll explore where our industry is and where it’s going — on both micro and macro levels — with the unique wit and insight only he can provide.

It’s been a rough year for Microsoft in mobile. Despite the launch of impressive products such as the HTC HD2, the company has faced some harsh criticism: “except for gaming, it’s ‘game over’ for Microsoft in the consumer market” was just one of the choicer comments from the past year. Personally, I’d disagree, and I’d actually argue that Windows Mobile 6.5 is underrated in the mobile arena — almost as much as Android is overrated. But no matter. Whether last year’s mobile platforms are good enough or not is irrelevant; no platform from 2009 is good enough for 2010 and beyond, and every mobile platform will need to evolve this year. Last week in Barcelona, we saw the first part of Microsoft’s revamped mobile strategy, and while there are many questions that will need to be answered, there’s a lot to like about what we saw.

First, it’s important to look at the velocity of the mobile space. The tech industry is largely governed by Moore’s Law, which predicts a doubling of semi-conductor density roughly every eighteen months, but the mobile space is moving at a rate of change that’s closer to every eighteen minutes. What happened yesterday simply doesn’t matter nearly as much as it once might have. Just look at two of the hottest companies in mobile, Apple and Google. Just a few years ago, neither would have been part of the conversation, much less at the center of it.

Continue reading Entelligence: Windows Phone 7 Series

Entelligence: Windows Phone 7 Series originally appeared on Engadget on Fri, 26 Feb 2010 19:30:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

Permalink   |   | Email this | Comments

Confirmed: Windows Mobile 6.5 to become Windows Phone Starter Edition

Windows Phone 7 Series might have been the big news out of Mobile World Congress this year, but it looks like Windows Mobile 6.5 will live on as the basis of Windows Phone Starter Edition. We’d already heard some whispers to that effect, but now it’s been confirmed by ZDNet‘s Mary Jo Foley, who got some answers about the stripped-down mobile OS directly from Redmond. It’s obviously designed to be a cheaper alternative for developing and emerging markets, much like Windows 7 Starter on the desktop, and it’ll come in versions with and without Office Mobile preloaded when it ships on devices later this year. (Office 2010 will be included when it’s officially released.) Here’s the odd thing, though: when asked which features of 6.5 have been stripped to create Starter, MS replied with a list of radio support that conspicuously omits HSDPA 3G, but includes EV-DO. Simple typo, or an attempt to force international adoption of WinPho 7 in developed countries with 3G networks? We’ll do some digging and find out.

P.S.- Just to be clear here, it appears that the family will be Windows Phone 7 Series, and then potentially two WinMo 6.5 products: Windows Phone Classic and Windows Phone Starter Edition. Only Starter has actually been confirmed at this time, though, and we still don’t know exactly how Microsoft is going to organize all of this and sell it. We’ll keep you updated.

Confirmed: Windows Mobile 6.5 to become Windows Phone Starter Edition originally appeared on Engadget on Fri, 26 Feb 2010 15:26:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

Permalink The Unwired  |  sourceZDNet  | Email this | Comments

Adobe taking a pass on Flash 10.1 for WinMo 6.5, will go straight to 7

An Adobe employee over in the company’s official forums dropped a bomb earlier this month that they’ve now decided to pass on releasing Flash 10.1 for Windows Mobile 6.5, instead moving straight to 7. The official explanation is that “WinMo6.5 does not support some of the critical APIs that we need,” but frankly, this sounds like a load of crap — since the project was announced last year, there’s no way it took them this long to figure out that an official cut for 6.5 wouldn’t be technically possible. If we had to guess, the real justification also explains why Adobe has been so quiet on the matter: 6.5’s now viewed as a dead-end platform since 7 represents a clean break for Microsoft, and the company feels like it can’t be bothered to invest the necessary time, energy, and money to see the project through. In all likelihood, Adobe was briefed on 7 prior to its official announcement at MWC, and that’s when the decision was made. Of course, that’s all pure speculation on our part — but regardless, don’t get your hopes up, HD2 owners (unless you get an upgrade, that is).

Adobe taking a pass on Flash 10.1 for WinMo 6.5, will go straight to 7 originally appeared on Engadget on Thu, 25 Feb 2010 12:22:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

Permalink WMPoweruser, PocketNow  |  sourceAdobe Forums  | Email this | Comments

Nokia’s Ovi Maps headed to Windows Mobile and Android? (update: no way)

Put your skeptic hats on kids ’cause we’ve got a juicy one for you. When Greig Williams, Nokia’s General Manager for South East Europe, was asked by the German language Die Presse whether Ovi Maps would be coming to Android and Windows Mobile he responded very simply, “That will be the next step.” Well then, that’s pretty clear… but as much as we’d like to believe it, we simply can’t pin our hopes to this statement alone.

Remember, Nokia’s motivation for making its Ovi Maps service free was to sell more handsets; not handsets from its competitors but high-margin smartphones from Nokia in an effort to boost its profits. And unless it can pump out the Android version before Google Navigation goes global, there won’t be much motivation to download a presumably fee-based (it certainly won’t be free) Ovi Maps on the platform unless Android users are willing to pay to have Nokia’s localized maps on the device instead of downloading them over the air as the Google offering requires. Besides, is Nokia really going to dedicate staff to Android development when its more advanced Ovi Maps still aren’t available on its much touted Maemo MeeGo mobile computing platform? Not likely. Regarding “Windows Mobile,” well, 6.x’s days are numbered and getting Ovi Maps approved on Windows Phone 7 might not ever happen in light of Microsoft’s own efforts with Bing navigation. Of course, Greig offers no dates, and on a long enough time line anything is possible. We’ve already contacted Nokia for clarification and will update you just as soon as we hear back.

Update: Nokia just got back to us with an unsurprising response: “have spoken to Greig and he absolutely didn’t make that statement. As I understand it, this has now been, or in the process of being, taken down by the De Presse journalist at their site.” So much for that.

Nokia’s Ovi Maps headed to Windows Mobile and Android? (update: no way) originally appeared on Engadget on Thu, 25 Feb 2010 08:25:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

Permalink Electric Pig  |  sourceDie Presse  | Email this | Comments