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Smartphones and Cell Phones

Matthew Miller provides you with news, commentary and in-depth reviews of the latest in mobile phones sporting iOS, Android, and Windows.

Matthew Miller

Matthew Miller started using mobile devices in 1997 and has been writing news, reviews, and opinion pieces ever since. Matthew started using mobile devices with a US Robotics Pilot 1000 and has owned hundreds of devices running Palm, Linux, Symbian, Newton, BlackBerry, iOS, Android, webOS, Windows Mobile, and Windows Phone operating systems. His current collection includes the latest and greatest foldables, wearables, and more, along with classic devices like the Apple Newton MessagePad 2100 and Sony CLIE UX50. Matthew can be found on various social networks under the user name of "palmsolo."

Latest Posts

Q3 09 Canalys smartphone data shows RIM increasing 40% over 2008

Canalys posted their 3rd quarter 2009 figures and as you can RIM had an amazing year going from 15.2% to 20.6% of the global market share (an increase of 40.8%). A bit surprisingly to me, Nokia actually saw a 6% increase in its market share too while Apple predictibly increased 6.7% over the year with the iPhone 3GS release helping. Windows Mobile suffered quite a bit with a 33.1% drop in market share over the past year and with the release of the minor 6.5 update I don't see that trend changing much over the next year either.

November 3, 2009 by Matthew Miller in Smartphones

Motorola and Palm; will 2009 be designated as a comeback year?

Many of us believed that Palm was on the ropes and getting ready to go down for the count at the end of 2008, but they came out swinging at CES with the announcement of the Pre and WebOS. Motorola was a leader in the mobile phone business for years, but has not done well in the smartphone space and in early 2009 we heard they would be looking to Android in the future. The Motorola DROID is the talk of the town at the moment and the Motorola CLIQ just started selling at T-Mobile this week. Will 2009 go down as the year that Palm and Motorola showed us all they were back and ready to compete?

November 3, 2009 by Matthew Miller in Smartphones

T-Mobile experiences voice and text outage across the country

I was spending the day at the Ferries 2009 conference in Seattle and towards the end of the day tried to send some text messages and make calls home to pick up my daughter, but nothing seemed to work. My T-Mobile data connection worked just fine, but both voice and text services were down. I then checked out Twitter and heard from others around the US that were experiencing the same thing. This service outage appeared to last for about three hours for me and everything is back up and running just fine.

November 3, 2009 by Matthew Miller in Data Centers

Sony Ericsson announces XPERIA X10 Google Android device

Sony Ericsson has been known to make some compelling smartphones that had sleek, solid designs at high prices, like the XPERIA X1 I purchased and then returned earlier this year. Today we see the announcement of their first Google Android device, the XPERIA X10 and I have to say this device is lustworthy with its 8 megapixel camera, custom Mediascape interface that is highly focused on media (a weakness in all other Google Android devices), Timescape technology that recognizes connections between contacts, content, and media, and much more.

November 2, 2009 by Matthew Miller in Mobility

Do you really want to carry another device just for Twitter?

I stayed up late last night and watched Josh reveal the Twitter Peek device on the Late Night show with Jimmy Fallon. The new Twitter Peek has the same form factor as the Peek email device, but it only does Twitter. The Peek Classic cost $19.95 and has a monthly cost starting at $15 for email while the new Twitter Peek will cost $199 and includes lifetime Twitter service or $99 for six months followed by $7.95 per month after that. I guess if you are a die hard Twitter fan and don't have a cell phone that supports a Twitter client (every smartphone has clients) then this may be something to look at.

November 2, 2009 by Matthew Miller in Collaboration

Review: Celio rolls out BlackBerry client for the REDFLY Mobile Companion

I've been a fan of the REDFLY Mobile Companion for a couple of years and purchased the C8N in November 2008. If you remember there are two models of the REDFLY Mobile Companion, the C7 and C8N, that give you a large display and keyboard to use with your Windows Mobile device. Celio Corp has been working on expanding their driver support and we saw a concept for Android back at CES. Today, we see the launch of a BlackBerry driver for selected BlackBerry devices, which makes the most sense considering there are so many BlackBerry devices in enterprise.

November 2, 2009 by Matthew Miller in Hardware

Holiday Gift Guide 2009: Smartphones

The lineup of cell phones has expanded a bit, but a significant number of what we see in that category are updates to existing models. The real innovation in the mobile phone world is in the area of smartphones where we see the Apple iPhone, Palm WebOS, Google Android, RIM BlackBerry, and Microsoft Windows Mobile devices taking us to places we have never been before. This holiday season there is a huge selection for you to choose from on every carrier and several exciting devices will be launching throughout November. There are so many to choose from that we can't cover them all here so I will present you with one smartphone from each carrier and one SIM-unlocked one.

November 1, 2009 by Matthew Miller in Hardware

Holiday Gift Guide 2009: Cell Phones

Even though 2009 was a difficult one for many in regards to finances, the mobile phone market continued to grow and manufacturers continued to roll out some excellent phones for the consumer. In this issue of the 2009 Holiday Gift Guide we will take a look at two selected mobile phones from each of the four major US wireless carriers. I know the lines between feature phones and smartphones are no longer clear cut, but we will have another Guide edition for smartphones that will include those devices running Windows Mobile, Google Android, RIM BlackBerry, Apple iPhone, Symbian, and Palm WebOS.

November 1, 2009 by Matthew Miller in Samsung

Hey HTC, where is your new QWERTY Google Android device?

The T-Mobile G1 was the first Google Android device launched in the US. We also now see several other companies launching Android devices with the Samsung Moment, Motorola CLIQ, and Motorola DROID. All of these new devices from others have physical QWERTY keyboards while HTC only has the G1 with a keyboard and the rest, including the upcoming HTC Eris, all having only a touchscreen interface. I love the HTC Sense found on the HTC Hero, but no matter how hard I try to accept a touchscreen only device I keep going back to a physical keyboard. Where is the HTC Google Android device with QWERTY keyboard?

October 30, 2009 by Matthew Miller in Mobility

Did you know the BlackBerry Storm2 is also now available?

Most of the excitement in the mobile phone space this week focused on the announcement of the Motorola DROID on Verizon Wireless. Looking at the Verizon Wireless press release archive page you have to scroll down to the 6th or 7th story to find that the RIM BlackBerry Storm2 was also announced this week with availability occuring a couple of days ago on Wednesday, 28 October. Crackberry.com has a detailed review that covers the device in detail and it looks like the Storm2 is the device that the original Storm should have been. RIM tried some different things with the Storm, primarily with their clickable display, that took away from the BlackBerry experience and this no longer seems to be the case.

October 30, 2009 by Matthew Miller in Mobility

MobileTechRoundup show #188; DROID does, we don't

The biggest news in mobile technology this week was the Motorola DROID announcement from Verizon Wireless and we spent a large junk of MobileTechRoundup show #188 talking about the device and Google Android. James, Kevin, and I haven't yet held the DROID so we are reserving final judgement on it, but it sounds like James may be the only one who may pick up the device since he already has a Verizon account. Google Maps Navigation beta is installed on the DROID and may just have wiped out PNDs, but Microsoft is helping with the shutting down of the MSN Direct service on 1 January 2012.

October 30, 2009 by Matthew Miller in Google

Smartphone wars; one platform will never rule them all

With all the excitement surrounding the latest Google Android devices people are starting to make statements about Android or Apple winning the smartphone war. There will never be a single winner in the smartphone space and people should not even count out Symbian with their current double digit lead and exciting future prospects with the Symbian Foundation work. The smartphone market is exciting and fluid with the flexibility to let anyone step in and take a share of the pie while others continue to improve as well.

October 28, 2009 by Matthew Miller in Hardware

Verizon's HTC Droid Eris (aka Desire) may be priced at $99

Verizon Wireless was stagnant in the smartphone arena, but is coming out shooting with a full load this holiday season. The Motorola Droid was announced earlier today and now we hear rumors that the HTC Droid Eris will be priced competitively at just $99. Stay tuned since an official announcement for the Eris has yet to be made.

October 28, 2009 by Matthew Miller in Mobility

C'mon Sony, who is going to pay $600 for a feature phone?

I received a press release today from Sony Electronics regarding the new Sony Ericsson Aino unlocked mobile phone and have to really wonder if there are enough rich people who are willing to pay $600 for a feature phone. The Aino doesn't run any smartphone OS, but Ericsson's proprietary system. It does have an 8.1 megapixel camera and ability to work with a PlayStation3 for media sharing. It was reviewed on CNET UK and they were not at all impressed with the touchscreen interface and functionality of the device.

October 28, 2009 by Matthew Miller in Mobile Carriers

Motorola and Verizon announced DROID for 6 Nov at $199.99

Verizon and Motorola made it official today with the announcement that the DROID by Motorola will launch next week, 6 November, for only $199.99 with two-year contract and $100 mail-in rebate. The DROID is Verizon's first Google Android device and the first Android device running version 2.0 software. It has a huge 3.7 inch 854x480 pixel resolution capacitive touchscreen and comes in at only 0.54 inches thick with a full slide-out QWERTY keyboard.