Hasta La Gadget!

Sprint will apparently be offering preorders of its HTC 7 Pro — the only CDMA Windows Phone 7 device to be announced so far — in just a few days’ time on November 8th, but there’s a fairly big catch: you’ve got to be a Microsoft employee to get in on the action. Redmond has been great about seeding WP7 models to its staff so far, so it’s definitely possible that Sprint is working with Microsoft in some capacity to get 7 Pros to its folks a little early in an effort to smooth out last-minute bugs and get feedback… either that, or it’s just doing them a solid by letting ’em preorder a few days before everyone else. Last we’d heard, the 7 Pro won’t be coming until 2011 (despite the fact that there’s already an FCC certification ready to roll), so if we were to see a few of the things floating around campus before January, we certainly wouldn’t be surprised. Pricing is yet to be announced.

HTC 7 Pro going on preorder for Microsoft employees November 8th originally appeared on Engadget on Mon, 01 Nov 2010 18:13:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Xbox 360’s long-awaited dashboard update is here, bringing a slew of new features, including a nice bonus from Netflix: a genuine UI for search on the Xbox and support for streaming on Windows Phone 7.

Let’s take the Xbox first. Xbox Live’s Major Nelson writes that the 360 dashboard update is available today and rolling out to everyone (regardless of your geography!) over Xbox Live.

That was penned this morning; if you’re reading this now, you’ve probably gotten the update. If not, signing in again might work, but bear in mind this warning: “If you keep signing out and then back in again, this will NOT force the update…it will only anger people on your friends list who will keep getting a notification. every. time. you sign. in…Be patient, everyone will eventually receive the update.” Well said.

The headlining features of the Xbox update are the new ESPN hub and Zune music. You’ve got to be an Xbox Gold subscriber to take advantage of most of them. Zune Music or ZunePass is exactly what it sounds like: subscription-based streaming music, with baked-in search.

The ESPN hub promises 3,500 live, on-demand and DVRed global sporting events from ESPN3.com annually. The selection is arguably stronger than any other digital set-top box: college basketball and football to US pro baseball and basketball and international soccer, golf and tennis, whether they’re in or out of your local market. No NFL or NHL, but sports junkies are one step closer cutting the cable cord. If only it could have rolled out in the summertime: we’d all be watching baseball, tennis and soccer and it would have taken everyone three months to notice.

ESPN also gets to leverage some of the Xbox Live social networking features, including group chat while you’re watching a game. (The chat software itself is also reportedly improved.) English Premier League fans won’t even have to leave home to heckle their friends. That is, assuming you’ve all got Xboxes.

And then there’s Netflix. Xbox Live Gold users have had discless Netflix streaming for a long time now, and it’s only been in the last few months that other consoles have caught up. Now the original Xbox gets an update too, with an improved search UI.

Plus, Netflix put a cherry on top: just like the iPhone, Windows Phone 7 is getting Netflix Watch Instantly too via a free application, which will be available at the phone’s launch.

One last Xbox 360 detail that I think is important: the new dashboard overhauls the parental controls and family programming settings. Netflix, Sports, Chat, Kinect, the casual Xbox games on WP7: all of these together suggest that Microsoft is strongly re-positioning the Xbox as a living room hub for the entire family, not just where college kids and devoted gamers blast away on Halo while their friends and families leave to do something else.

Some of those gamers are already reacting, saying that the new games for WP7 and Kinect are too watered-down, don’t offer enough of what they’re used to. I think it’s a really good thing, based on the premise that the value of any box attached to your television set increases proportionally with the number of valuable things you can do with it.

See Also:

• Microsoft Announces First Windows Phone 7 Handsets
• Windows Phone 7 Is the Real Facebook Phone
• Microsoft Releases New, Slimmer Xbox 360
• Why Xbox Might Be Microsoft's Future — and Computing's, Too …
• Mario's Anniversary Brings Remote Plus, Red Wii and DSi Bundles …
• Netflix PS3 App Ditches Disc, Adds HD and Surround Sound
• Netflix Channel For Wii: No More Disc, Still No HD
• Networks Proving A Tough Sell for Google TV (Surprise …
• Netflix Officially A Streaming Video Company With DVDs On the Side …

Why yes, yes it is another Windows Phone 7 device review. Not that we’re complaining. It’s not everyday that a new mobile operating system this polished arrives at our doorstep. Having already gone in depth with Microsoft’s entirely new OS and half dozen or so other WP7 devices, it’s now time to dive deep into the life and times of the HTC Trophy (codenamed, Spark). And it’s about time. We first saw the words “HTC” and “Trophy” on the same page in a roadmap leak all the way back in 2009. Several of the leaked handsets eventually launched — but not the 3-inch portrait QWERTY Trophy running Windows Mobile 6.5. Perhaps that original design was scrapped along with WinMo’s relevancy to the consumer smartphone market. We don’t know and we may never know. What we can tell you is what it’s like to live with a production HTC Trophy for a week — an average speced touchscreen slate offering anything but a middle-of-the-road experience.

This review is primarily of the HTC Trophy hardware. Check out our full review of Windows Phone 7 for our thoughts on the OS.

Continue reading HTC Trophy review

HTC Trophy review originally appeared on Engadget on Fri, 29 Oct 2010 11:20:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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We thought the Samsung Focus was the only Windows Phone 7 launch device that could replace its external storage, but the HTC HD7 can apparently do the same — there’s an SD card slot under that Windows Phone logo, and The Unwired managed to replace it while dodging the dreaded “There’s a storage error” screen. What sort of black magic did the publication cast to make it recognize the new card? They’re not quite sure themselves, but several factory resets and physical reinsertion of the chip seemed to do the trick, if only for an 8GB card. If you’re in a daring mood, let us know if it works for you in comments below!

Update: HTC tells us that this particular surgery’s a risky one, not only for your warranty but the connectivity of your phone. Here’s what you’re getting yourself into, according to a senior company rep:

While this is not technically impossible, one thing that is important to know is that the process of removing the cover to access these components is actually very tricky – and in many cases, will result in the antenna section being irreparably detached from the circuit board (rendering the phone unusable). Additionally, to actually replace the card, a few reasonably important parts have to be forcibly removed. So, just a good warning to anyone thinking of attempting this maneuver is that the possibility of bricking is extremely high, and will, of course, void the product warranty.

HTC HD7 has hidden microSD slot, user-replacable card? (update: risky business) originally appeared on Engadget on Fri, 29 Oct 2010 00:15:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Yes, true: T-Mobile announced last week by way of Twitter that it would be retailing the HD7 on November 8th — the same day as AT&T’s Samsung Focus and HTC Surround — for $199.99 on contract. Thing is, it turns out that AmazonWireless is going to be selling it for $169.99 on contract… which, by our calculations, is $30 less for the same product! Obviously, it’s the norm for retailers like Amazon and Wirefly to charge less for phones on new two-year deals than their first-party counterparts — but what’s notable here is that Amazon will be undercutting T-Mobile by a nice little margin on day one. Well, at least we think it’ll be day one; the site quotes “usually 1 to 3 weeks” for shipping, which should match up with the drop date, give or take.

[Thanks, Collin W.]

Update: Newegg (via seller Simplexity) has ’em for $150… so yeah, needless to say, looks like there’ll be no shortage of ways to get this thing for less than the $200 T-Mobile wants. Thanks, Matt!

HTC HD7 is hitting T-Mobile November 8th for $200… but it’s hitting Amazon for $30 less originally appeared on Engadget on Thu, 28 Oct 2010 19:12:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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