Smartphones and Cell Phones

Jason mentioned the new RichardSolo 1800 iPhone battery pack earlier today and after returning from my recent business trip I discovered one was sent to me for evaluation. Unfortunately, I no longer have an iPhone 3G so I am returning my evaluation unit and hope to try out their new RichardSolo 1800 for BlackBerry to use with my new BlackBerry Bold. Another very popular battery pack also arrived at my house (again, I will have to return it without an evaluation) for the iPhone 3G and it is now available for everyone to purchase. The mophie Juice Pack for the iPhone 3G can be purchased for US$99.95.

November 10, 2008 by Matthew Miller

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My AT&T SIM has been bouncing back and forth between the Nokia E71 (see my review) and Palm Treo Pro (see my review and with these two devices I have confirmed that QWERTY devices are my preferred form factor. Another couple of new devices recently launched with this same form factor, including the Samsung Epix and the BlackBerry Bold. I was just sent a BlackBerry Bold evaluation unit to spend time with and wanted to post some of my initial thoughts and experiences, along with an image gallery of the hardware and some of the software aspects of this new BlackBerry device.

November 9, 2008 by Matthew Miller

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It is pretty amazing watching the growth of the Apple iPhone in the worldwide smartphone market and the latest Canalys Q3 2008 report shows that Apple is now number 2. Nokia continues to lead with a large percentage, but others are catching up fast. There is also some encouraging news for U.S. smart phone fans, like myself, as the numbers show the smartphone market in the U.S. has doubled since last year.

November 7, 2008 by Matthew Miller

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I was reading the new article on the New York Times related to using your mobile phone for shopping comparison functions that may save you money and in the end even help offset the cost of your new smartphone. In particular, the T-Mobile G1 has a couple of bar code scanning/shopping comparison applications available to help you get the best price. While the G1 is getting all of the attention for this capability, there are also other shopping applications that may be quite helpful that require you to enter search terms using your phone's QWERTY keyboard or keypad.

November 5, 2008 by Matthew Miller

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My T-Mobile SIM continues to live in my G1 Google Android device (see my review) and I continue to be impressed with the Google integration and Gmail functionality. There are more and more third party applications appearing and I am liking the web browser more and more as I get used to the navigation methods. I just read on Ars Technica that the G1 has been jailbroken by those hard working developers over on the XDA Developers site. It is still early in the process and not everything has been made simple yet so if you are not adventurous then you should probably hold off performing the process.

November 5, 2008 by Matthew Miller

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I keep going back to placing my AT&T SIM into the Nokia E71 because it is such a powerful and slick smartphone. In the last couple of days a few new and updated applications were released for S60 that I just added myself and wanted to share with you all. A new social application from Nokia, a new piece of integration with Ovi appeared, and a powerful Office suite was updated.

November 5, 2008 by Matthew Miller

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I read through Josh's hands-on with the BlackBerry Bold and am disappointed I missed the FedEx guy by 2 hours before leaving town for the week. However, I am seriously thinking of swinging by an AT&T store on the road to pick one up for myself. If you are thinking of the Bold I read on Michael Gartenberg's site that you can even pick one up for FREE at Wal-Mart (after US$199 rebate and new contract). We usually see these devices drop to free on Amazon after a month of so and it is a bit surprising to see the Bold available for free already at Wal-Mart.

November 4, 2008 by Matthew Miller

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It wasn't until I picked up my Sunset colored BlackBerry Curve a few months ago that I really discovered how functional and powerful a BlackBerry device could be. I tried a BlackBerry Pearl about 6 months before with minor usage attempts over the last couple of years and always felt the BlackBerry devices were strong in email, but not much else. RIM has really been focusing on the consumer with devices like the Pearl and Curve and just recently launched their first flip/clamshell form factor BlackBerry device with the BlackBerry Pearl Flip on T-Mobile.

November 3, 2008 by Matthew Miller

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T-Mobile USA has a nice selection of cellphones for customers and even the T-Mobile G1 and BlackBerry Flip have been dominating the smartphone news from T-Mobile there are also capable feature phones being released. The latest mobile phone announced by T-Mobile USA is the MOTOZINE ZN5 that will be available for US$99 with a two year contract. The ZN5 has a 5 megapixel camera with Xenon flash, along with KODAK Imaging technology that makes this one very capable feature phone. The device also has WiFi so you can upload your photos to the Kodak Gallery with one click (it actually uses ShoZu).

November 2, 2008 by Matthew Miller

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There has never been any official Microsoft announcement or release date for Windows Mobile 7, but much has been leaked about this future mobile operating system. Motorola was recently talking about its future mobile strategy and let slip that a Windows Mobile 6.5 update should be coming prior to Windows Mobile 7.

October 31, 2008 by Matthew Miller

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