Posts in Mobile Phones
Bang & Olufsen Serenata in the wild
Damian Koh | Oct 23, 2007
It's an absolute beauty. And it's a little bigger than what we would have imagined it to be. But nothing beats taking a babe out to the beach on a lazy afternoon. We can totally imagine the beautiful curves and an aluminum stand. Aluminum stand? Ok wait, we kind of lost ourselves writing this while reminiscing about our date with the Serenata last week. It was the Serenata that has the aluminum stand to prop the music phone at an angle. We have a hands-on impression coming right up this week, but for now, feast your eyes on the pictures and a short video walkthrough of the Serenata.
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Tap your phone to pay for bus rides
Reuben Lee | Oct 22, 2007
These people are part of the Near-Field Communication (NFC) phone trial jointly organized by Singapore service provider StarHub and partner EZ-Link. According to the press release, the trial is the first public NFC trial in the Republic and possibly one of the largest of its kind in the world.
Since the middle of last week, 1,000 selected trialists have been given a handset from Singapore phone manufacturer iWOW and a Sony PaSoRi card reader (EZ-Link card reader) which they can use for the next six months for free.
The iWOW SZ1.0 phone contains two chips. The EZ-Link chip, which can be used for payment of rides on public buses and trains or to make purchases at selected retail outlets such as McDonald's and 7-11, works like a regular EZ-Link card. One added advantage of using an NFC handset is that users can now check the value instantly using the phone LCD display.
The second chip, which is an NFC-enabled chip, lets you download promotional materials or useful information such as bus route details via GPRS from smart tags embedded in selected posters. StarHub has tied up with several partners for this service, among them the Land transport Authority, Citibank, Golden Village and Sony retail outlets.
How it works: Paying for KFC with your NFC phone
Nokia's E61i and E65 get new colors
Damian Koh | Oct 18, 2007
In how many ways can you induce/encourage/coerce people to spend more on a particular product without them having to turn to third-party accessory makers? One, offer new face plates (boring). Two, introduce new colors and convince unsuspecting users that they need to have a second set, even though they may have the product already.
So, what's the deal here? Apparently, Nokia has introduced new colors to its existing E61i and E65 handsets in Singapore. (We are currently awaiting confirmation from Nokia on the availability of the new color offerings in other parts of Asia.) The E61i now comes in Titanium Black and the E65 in Pink and Plum. Well, we're not complaining and we're pretty sure some people out there will welcome the new shades, too. Yours to grab at S$658 for the E65 and S$758 for the E61i. The handsets are bundled with a 256MB microSD card preloaded with Gizmo SIP VoIP, Widsets, Pict2Theme (for E65), games (for E65) and new call/device/messaging management solutions (for E61i).
Update: We got it wrong for the second color of the E65. It's actually Plum instead of Blum as reported earlier.
Analyst: Google OS to go on HTC handsets
Elinor Mills | Oct 18, 2007
Taiwanese handset maker HTC is expected to ship about 50,000 cell phones by the end of this year that use a mobile operating system from Google, according to a Fortune article that cites a report from a UBS analyst.
The phones won't be for sale until next year; the initial shipment will go to developers, says analyst Benjamin Schachter. Google is likely talking to other handset manufacturers, he says.
Google has declined to comment on rumors of its phone plans. Google is hosting an analyst day on October 24, and Schachter expects the company to talk about its phone strategy then.
Picture credit: T3
Via CNET Crave
Eat that, Apple! S60 goes touchscreen
Damian Koh | Oct 17, 2007
S60 (a.k.a. Symbian Series60) has gone touchscreen! Isn't that wonderful news? Or am I the only one who feels that it's a long overdue announcement on Nokia's part. At the recent Symbian Smartphone Show held in London, the Finnish company showed off its new S60 touch interface that brings several added features to the handheld platform. It includes support for tactile feedback, backward compatiblity to run existing S60 apps (without any modification), detection of motion, orientation, proximity, light as well as the capability to display Flash videos on the S60 Web browser. The new technology is expected to be available to device manufacturers only in 2008.
When exactly? We are not sure. And Nokia is certainly not going to give more specific details. Hopefully, we can see the first products based on the touchscreen Series60 platform before the Apple iPhone reaches Asia. We'll be keeping our fingers crossed.
Picture Credit: Symbian
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