Articles By Alex Angove
Google Acquiring Motorola Mobility
The internet has gone crazy over Google’s recent announcement of its plans to acquire Motorola Mobility – the wing of Motorola responsible for the design and manufacturing of mobile devices. Despite being huge news, this move certainly raises the question: “why?”
Samsung Galaxy S II US Launch Date
It’s taken a while, but the Samsung Galaxy S II finally has a likely US announcement date. That’s right, American customers will finally be able to purchase the already iconic and internationally successful Galaxy S II ‘superphone’. The believed launch will happen on August 29th during a major Samsung product announcement in New York.
HTC Status Review
The HTC Status (aka the HTC ChaCha outside the US) is one of the new breed of Facebook/Social Media centric phones we’re starting to see crop up around the place. Much like the INQ Cloud Touch, the HTC Status has a user interface (UI) experience based heavily around efficient Facebook navigation. However, unlike during the INQ Cloud Touch review we did a couple of weeks back, we were pleased to discover that HTC managed to not only make an easily navigable interface, but a responsive one as well.
Facebook Displaying Cell Numbers
If you haven't seen it for yourself, Facebook has been abuzz today with this viral status update: The cause of the concern being that many users have suddenly realized that their Facebook contacts now have ‘handy’ cell phone numbers attached to them, seemingly by magic. The way Facebook has achieved this is through the iPhone, Android and BlackBerry Facebook apps, which now use cell phone number information by default whenever you sync your phone with Facebook.
Samsung Galaxy 10.1 Blocked in EU
As part of the ongoing (and ridiculous) saga of what is fast becoming known as the Patent Wars, Apple has successfully blocked the sale of Samsung’s Galaxy 10.1 tablet in the European Union, with the Netherlands being the sole exception. Any violation of this ban carries a maximum penalty of over $350k and possible jail time for Samsung executives if they are found to be allowing the continuance of sales.
America Not Getting the Nokia N9
Nokia’s first and final handset to run on the Meego operating system – the Nokia N9 – sparked worldwide interest when it was discovered that, despite low expectations, it was actually a responsive and intuitive device with a range of innovative functionality. Sadly, it will apparently not be coming to America.
WinPho is Keeping Customers Happy
According to Microsoft’s official Windows Phone blog, Windows Phone 7 users are the 2nd happiest customers in the US when it comes to the mobile operating system (OS) experience. The graph provided shows that Apple iOS had the most “very satisfied” customers with 70%, followed by Windows Phone 7 with 57% and Google Android coming in at a surprising 3rd with 50%.
Gingerbread Coming to ThunderBolt
The first 4G LTE enabled smartphone on Verizon’s network, the HTC ThunderBolt, is soon to finally receive the Android Gingerbread update. The news comes as welcome relief to ThunderBolt users across the nation who have been waiting for the update since HTC accidentally leaked the information about a Gingerbread update around 4 months ago.
HTC HD7 Review
At first glance the HTC HD7 is an elegant, but not unique looking device. Its 4.3 inch screen has a remarkably thin bezel surrounding it, the speaker and microphone are concealed stylishly between the bezel and frame of the handset and the dark yet shiny edge definitely adds an element of class. However, the effect was diminished when we realized that the framed sticks in to your ear when making a call. This was uncomfortable and only became more annoying with time.
Next iPhone in Testing Phase?
The UK website The Guardian, has reported that the iPhone 5 (or whatever it ends up being called) has been sent to carriers for network testing. The alleged phones were transported in locked and sealed boxes under high security. If true, this is pretty exciting news and could even mean that the next iPhone is in line for a September or early October release. It’s not really shocking news, as many online tech journos have expected a September release for the iPhone 5 for a while now, mainly due to both iOS5 and iCloud looking to make their debuts around the same time.
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