Hasta La Gadget!

Just in case you had any doubts about Samsung’s commitment to the physical keyboard, here’s a slide of the Korean giant’s Bada OS roadmap, filled with rubbery QWERTY buttons aplenty. At top left you can see the Wave — which Samsung places in its “premium image brand” together with the Galaxy S — priced at 20,000 Rubles (just under $700), followed by its as yet nameless and spec-less Bada siblings. Our interest is piqued most by the QWERTY slider that’s sat so perfectly atop the 10,000-Ruble line, we wouldn’t mind seeing the Super AMOLED screen tech trickling down to such a price point. We wouldn’t mind that at all. All About Phones has also spotted two Windows Mobile and one Android handset during the presentation, though Sammy has been predictably recalcitrant about specs on those as well. All we’re told is to wait for the autumn. Guess that will have to do.

[Thanks, Muhammad]

Samsung Bada handsets of the future revealed in presentation slide originally appeared on Engadget on Mon, 05 Apr 2010 06:46:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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There’s a surprising abundance of tech geared toward helping out people with visual impairments, but you won’t find too many smartphones populating that sphere of electronics. Aiming to reverse this trend, LookTel is in the Beta stage of developing so-called artificial vision software that combines a Windows Mobile handset with a PC BaseStation to provide object and text recognition, voice labeling, easy accessibility and remote assistance. It can be used, much like the Intel Reader, to scan text and read it back to you using OCR, and its camera allows it to identify objects based on pre-tagged images you’ve uploaded to your PC. Finally, it allows someone to assist you by providing them with a remote feed of your phone’s camera — a feature that can be useful to most people in need of directions. Skip past the break to see it demoed on video.

[Thanks, Eyal]

Continue reading LookTel’s ‘artificial vision’ makes Windows Mobile useful to blind people (video)

LookTel’s ‘artificial vision’ makes Windows Mobile useful to blind people (video) originally appeared on Engadget on Wed, 31 Mar 2010 05:40:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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If you’ve yet to lose faith in Windows Mobile 6.5, or if you’re holding out hope for community-made Windows Phone 7 patches magically upgrading your OS, here’s another handset for your consideration. Toshiba’s K01 comes with a 1GHz Snapdragon inside and a QWERTY keyboard plus 4.1-inch AMOLED touchscreen (capacitive) on the outside. Its stroll through the FCC today revealed support for 850/900/1800/1900 GSM/EDGE frequencies, meaning you may get a choice between AT&T and T-Mobile’s networks. So now that we’ve narrowed down the carriers a little bit and certified this WiFi- and Bluetooth-equipped beastie, all that remains is to wait and see if the pricing is sufficiently alluring to entice all those starry-eyed T-Mobile subscribers who keep giving the HD2 lusty looks. Not long to go now. FCC label pictured after the break.

Update: Looks like this one is headed to Europe and Asia with test reports indicating support for UMTS Bands I and VIII and some expensive 1900MHz data while roaming North America.

Continue reading Toshiba’s QWERTY-equipped K01 slides through the FCC

Toshiba’s QWERTY-equipped K01 slides through the FCC originally appeared on Engadget on Mon, 29 Mar 2010 05:32:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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In the wireless industry, $100 is a rather magical psychological barrier — a price point below which consumers generally have a much easier time pulling the trigger on a sweet upgrade. So when you offer a phone for $200, a percentage of your target demographic is generally going to drop out of the race with cries of “too rich for my blood.” No worries with this new HTC HD2 for T-Mobile, though, because it turns out that a number of resellers are already discounting the phone right down into that $99.99 sweet spot despite the fact that it was just launched this very week. Most notably, anyone agreeing to a two-year contract through Amazon can get the phone for less than a Benjamin, and that’s upfront — no mail-in rebate craziness to contend with. Certainly makes the phone — arguably WinMo 6.5’s last real hurrah — a more appealing buy, doesn’t it?

T-Mobile HD2 can be had for $100 from Amazon, others originally appeared on Engadget on Thu, 25 Mar 2010 13:01:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Color us resolutely unsurprised at the news that devs are starting to abandon the Windows Mobile platform in favor of, well, longer-lived opportunities. Firefox’s maker, Mozilla, has come out with a statement that it’s ceasing development of its WinMo builds and — perhaps more importantly — it’s also curtailing work on a Windows Phone 7 offering until Microsoft opens its new platform up to native apps. So basically, no Native Development Kit from Microsoft equals no Firefox for Windows Phone from Mozilla. The browser maker does express hope, however, that Microsoft will make it possible to deliver the popular IE alternative in the future, pointing out that the underlying Windows CE 6 architecture suits Firefox well and the company is “well positioned to have an awesome browser on Windows Phone 7.” For now, the focus in Mozilla’s mobile HQ remains on bringing out a great product on the less restrictive Android and MeeGo platforms.

Mozilla halts Firefox development for Windows Mobile, won’t offer it on Windows Phone 7 without NDK originally appeared on Engadget on Tue, 23 Mar 2010 06:29:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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