Isaiah's Tech

The Sony Ericsson XPERIA Arc looks like it's about to hit its first carrier in the future. T's reportedly going to hit O2 UK in April which is just a few months away. Price is unknown right now, but this smartphone is actually one of the best in the market. You might want to wait until the goodies at MWC before you set your heart on this one though.

Update: Another Phandroid post has just mentioned that the XPERIA Arc will also hit Vodafone UK and 3 UK as well. Check out the sign-up page for Vodafone here, while 3 posted the video you see below.


[Phandroid]

The BlackBerry Curve "Sedona" has just leaked once again. This time it's been spotted with Verizon branding so you can bet that it's headed there. Not really much left to tell you here but this one should be running at least OS 6.0 when it launches - should actually be version 6.1. It's a CDMA device so it does have a chance of hitting Sprint in the US as well.

[N4BB]

Amazon Germany has just put up two new Android-based smartphones from LG on their online website. Like the title says, it's the LG Optimus 2X (above) and the Optimus Black (below) - they're here and here, respectively. They're not available to purchase right now but they're both priced at €499 ($680 USD). Both of these smartphones are pretty great. They're both sporting 4-inch WVGA displays, a microSD card slot, WiFi b/g/n / Bluetooth support, and Android 2.2. The Optimus 2X sports a dual-core Nvidia Tegra 2 chipset along with 1080p HD video recording capabilities, while the Optimus Black is the world's thinnest smartphone at 9.2mm and also features a 2MP front-facing camera and WiFi Direct capabilities which is quite a new technology. Pretty impressive from LG which is something they're going to have to do after announcing their poor Q4 results.

[Engadget]

DROID-Life is hearing that the LTE-packing HTC Thunderbolt will be hitting Verizon on February 24th which is 14 days after the iPhone hits the carrier. The Thunderbolt is a much better device than the iPhone 4 on paper and will actually do data / voice over 3G simultaneously which the iPhone won't be able to do. Prices are pegged at $249.99 on a 2-year contract, $329.99 on a 1-year contract, and $599.99 contract-free. It's definitely worth the buy.

[DROID-Life]

Coming from the BBC is word that HP's CEO, Leo Apotheker, wants you to know that the new webOS devices that get announced at their February 9th event will be shipping just weeks after the announcement. Maybe even before the end of the month. That's not all though. Apparently, that event is just the "starting gun" for whatever HP has up their sleeves. Furthermore, they're saying that they actually have another event that will be taking place on March 14th. That event could be even bigger than the one that will be taking place in about a week and half.

[Engadget]

Telus has just put up the HTC Desire HD on their website (here) and it's listed as "Coming Soon". We don't know exactly when or for how much it'll be available for so we'll have to wait around for that. Bell is getting the HD7 soon so Telus should price this one right so that they'll be able to sell more of them. I do believe that the Desire HD is the better smartphone though.

[Mobile Syrup]

In case you needed more confirmation that Bell Canada is going to be launching the HTC HD7 on February 10th then here you go. Price is still unknown right now but the placeholder is $599.95 which means just about nothing - could be the contract-free price though which is expensive. This will be the carrier's second Windows Phone 7 handset and features a 4.3-inch LCD display, a 1GHz Snapdragon CPU, a 5MP AF camera with HD video recording and a dual-LED flash, 16GB of internal storage, and WiFi / Bluetooth support.

[Mobile Syrup]

There's a piece of unconfirmed news regarding AT&T's HTC Inspire 4G that will be hitting their line-up in the near future. According to one of PocketNow's sources, this HSPA+ capable Android handset will be launching on February 13th for $99.99 on a 2-year contract after a $50 mail-in rebate. If this is true then everyone should know why. It's because their biggest competitor, Verizon, will be getting the iPhone 4 a few days before they launch this one. For $99.99 I think the Inspire 4G on AT&T is a better buy than the Verizon iPhone 4 since it only has CDMA 3G connectivity - no LTE 4G.

[PocketNow]

CrackBerry has just got a nice exclusive on upcoming BlackBerry's from RIM. Clearly, you can see that they're expecting to launch the Playbook in Q2 2011, the Montana and Monaco in Q3 2011, the Sedona in Q3 / Q4 2011, and the Malibu in Q4 2011 / Q1 2012. To recap, the Playbook is the company's 7-inch tablet that should stir up the market. The Montana is said to be the touchscreen Bold, the Monaco is the next Storm, and the Sedona is the next Curve. The Malibu is something new though.

Coming from another CrackBerry post is the "Malibu" which is the BlackBerry Curve Touch. Like I said, this one's expected to hit the market in late 2011 / early 2012 and it's a CDMA device. Specs include: a 3.25-inch HVGA touchscreen display, a Qualcomm 800MHz CPU, a 5MP camera with HD video recording, Bluetooth 2.1 / WiFi b/g/n support, 512MB of RAM, 1GB of internal storage, a microSD card slot, NFC capabilities, and likely BB OS 6.1. These specs seem decent right now but when this actually does hit the market it'll be way behind.

Update: According to another CrackBerry post, the BlackBerry "Montana" is a CDMA touchscreen Bold device. Specs reportedly include: a Qualcomm 1.2GHz CPU, a 2.8-inch VGA resolution, a QWERTY keyboard, 768MB of RAM, a microSD card slot, 8GB of internal storage, WiFi b/g/n / Bluetooth support, NFC, an optical trackpad, a 5MP camera with HD video recording, quad-band GSM/GPRS/EDGE / dual-band UMTS connectivity, and likely BB OS 6.1 as well.

[CrackBerry]

Thanks to Mobilicity's CEO (in Canada) we already know that at least four carriers in Canada will be getting the Google Nexus S running Android 2.3 "Gingerbread". If that's the case then the model they get could hit the US as well and that exact model would have 3G bands capable of running on AT&T. A new Bluetooth SIG filing, the GT-i9020A, may be what you're looking for. Seeing how the GT-i9020T is the T-Mobile version of the Nexus S then the 'A' in i9020A could be destined for AT&T. It just makes sense. It's unconfirmed right now but you can bet on it happening. The Nexus One hit most of the major carriers in the US so the Nexus S should as well.

[PocketNow]

Yes, what you see above looks like the T-Mobile bound Sidekick 4G in the wild. Clearly, you can tell that there's a front-facing camera and on the back of the device (below) there's a nice but barely visible Samsung logo on it which confirms what the blogosphere was saying this morning. Futhermore, TMoNews mentions that this will be running Android 2.2.1. The exact price and release date for this device is still unknown so we will have to wait for that.


[TMoNews]

Two new HTC handsets have just been spotted in the wild. The first one is above and comes from Engadget. This looks like it could be the Desire's successor since it's running the Android OS. If you take a look at the phone it looks exactly like the render that PocketNow leaked a week ago. Not much left to say about this one though, but it does look like it has a front-facing camera which is a good start.

There's another HTC handset that has leaked and we've also seen this one before - in the latest HTC Sync update from almost two weeks ago. This one comes from AndroidGuys and could be the successor to the DROID Incredible which launched last Summer. It's obviously Verizon-bound and packs a camera with a dual-LED flash along with the Sense UI. Sadly, the specs for both of these new leaked phones are unknown right now but MWC is right around the corner!

HTC Desire Successor Leaks: Engadget
HTC Leaks: AndroidGuys

If you're one of the many people who will be picking up an iPhone 4 on Verizon then the wait is just a few weeks away. It has just been announced that pre-orders for the smartphone will start exactly a week from now, on February 3rd, at 3AM. As you may already know, the launch will be on February 10th so you can expect to see line-ups where ever there's a Verizon store.

[IntoMobile]

This is the day that's been marked on my calendar for a while. It's Sony's press conference where they kicked things off by announcing the upcoming PlayStation Suite. This functionality will bring PlayStation content to other devices and will be available before the end of the year; this includes Cross Platform and Cross Device and that basically means it'll bring the content to Android phones and tablets (think XPERIA Play / PlayStation Phone). Sony also announced that they'll be launching the PlayStation Store for Android devices and, yes, that's definitely for the XPERIA Play - as long as all of the other Android devices which is pretty amazing.

Of course, we had to wait about a half hour for the juicy stuff. What you see above is what we know as the Sony PSP 2 but they kept on referring to it as the NGP (Next Generation Portable). It features a 5-inch OLED touchscreen display with a 960 x 544 resolution, a quad-core ARM Cortex A9 CPU, a quad-core Power VR SGX543MP4+ GPU, dual analog sticks (thank you!), dual cameras, 3G / WiFi b/g/n / Bluetooth 2.1 + EDR support, GPS, a six-axis motion sensing system, and even front / back touchpads. Unlike the original PSP and PSP Go, this new gaming handheld from Sony will use flash cards for games which looks quite similar to SD cards but they might be slightly different. The NGP will be available this holiday season (in black and white) so it's still about 9 months away or so.

Sony was quick to tell us what games would be headed to the NGP, including: Killzone, Call of Duty, Reality Fighters, LittleBigPlanet, Resistance, Hot Shots Golf, Metal Gear Solid, and Uncharted. Some of them got a demo and some of them didn't but it's good to see that they'll definitely be keeping a great line-up when it comes to the games. Engadget mentioned that they look pretty darn good, but they're not PS3 level graphics which was a rumour that was clearly too good to be true. Sony went through a lot of boring stuff that was probably important but I really didn't feel like throwing them into the post. If you want a recap of the whole event then just head over to the link below! And no, you won't find a true name for this product, everyone that got on stage called it the NGP. We'll definitely be seeing this again at E3 later this year! Check out the official word from Sony here.

[Engadget]

A new handset from Nokia, the X1, has just been approved by the FCC. Yes, it's the Nokia X1 which hasn't even been announced by the company yet. This handset packs 850/1900MHz GSM connectivity and it's definitely going to be budget-friendly. Unwired View is actually guessing that this handset may only costs around $50 when it hits the market. Check it out at the FCC if you want.


[Unwired View]

Let's just get right to it. At CES, Motorola announced a bunch of new products and their XOOM "Honeycomb" based tablet is one of the best products that will be hitting the market this year. Motorola's CEO, Sanjay Jha, has just announced that the AT&T-bound Motorola Atrix 4G and the 3G-capable XOOM for Verizon will be available before the end of February. Furthermore, the LTE (4G) packing DROID Bionic and the LTE capable XOOM will be available on Verizon at the end of Q2 which could be pointing to a June launch. We're definitely excited!

[Engadget]

We heard about the Motorola i686 this morning and Telus has actually released their latest Motorola handset on their MiKE network. The one you see above is the Motorola i576s, which is a rugged flip phone. It scores an 810F military specification which means that it'll withstand dust, shock and vibration. The handset itself weighs 100.1 grams and packs Bluetooth / GPS support. This is available on Telus right now for $79.99 on a 3-year contract and for $279.99 contract-free.

[Mobile Syrup]

There's a new rumour going around that Motorola may be set to unveil their next Motorola DROID in the near future. The rumour states that it will be the successor to the DROID X (above), dubbed the DROID X 2. Apparently, it's being codenamed the "Daytona" and could be cruising with a dual-core Nvidia Tegra 2 chipset along with a 540 x 960 resolution 4.3-inch display. This handset could be hitting Verizon in the Summer and other specs could include a better (8MP) camera with 720p (hopefully upped to 1080p since it does have the Tegra 2 chipset) HD video recording, possibly just Android 2.2 (hopefully "Gingerbread"), a microSD card slot, an HDMI port, and possibly even LTE (4G) connectivity. Maybe it'll be announced at MWC, we'll just have to wait and see.

[Hot Hardware]

Looks like a European e-tailer has just let Sony's latest notebooks slip. It's going to reportedly be the Vaio SA and SB. They're both sporting 13.3-inch displays along with Intel's new "Sandy Bridge" Core 2011 CPUs. The former will be packing Intel's new Core i7-2620M CPU, while the latter will have the new Core i5 CPU as a standard. There's a model, the SA1X9E/XI, which will actually feature a 1,600 x 900 resolution, the aforementioned CPU, 4GB of DDR3 RAM, a 128GB SSD, and AMD Radeon HD 6630M graphics. According to the e-tailer, you'll be able to get this one for £1,571 (almost $2,000 USD). The release dates are still unknown right now but it could be available within the next month or so.

[Engadget]

Samsung just couldn't wait until MWC to reveal their upcoming mid-end Android line-up. The four handsets you see above are the Samsung Galaxy Ace, Galaxy Fit, Galaxy Gio, and Galaxy Mini. They're all running Android 2.2 "Froyo" (Touchwiz UI) along with a microSD card slot and Bluetooth 2.1 / WiFi b/g/n support. They all should be hitting Europe in the very near future; the Ace should be available in Russia "immediately."

Getting to the specs, the Ace features a 3.5-inch HVGA display along with an 800MHz CPU and a 5MP AF camera with an LED flash. This one's the best of the bunch. The Fit features a 3.3-inch QVGA display, a 600MHz CPU, and a 5MP AF camera. The Gio packs a 3.2-inch HVGA display, a 3MP AF camera, and an 800MHz CPU. Last, and least, is the Galaxy Mini which features a 3.1-inch QVGA display, a 600MHz CPU, and a 3MP AF camera. If you want the full specs sheet for each of the four devices then just check out the pictures below!


[Engadget]

TMoNews picked up some incredible information today. They've just picked up the leak you above which tells us that the Dell Streak 7 will be available on February 2nd, the Samsung Galaxy S (Vibrant) 4G on February 23rd, and the LG G-Slate on March 23rd. And while all that is great things to mark on your calendar, it looks like another picture they picked up (below) tells us that the Dell Streak 7 will be available for $299.99 after rebates which isn't too bad.Of course, I do suggest waiting for the LG G-Slate which will be running Android 3.0 "Honeycomb" when it actually hits the carrier.

[TMoNews]

The Sony Ericsson XPERIA Arc is now up for pre-order in at least one place. On Play it's up right now for £459.99 ($728 USD). This is a bit expensive but it's definitely cheaper than when the XPERIA X10 hit the market. The Arc features a 4.2-inch LCD LED-backlit display with a 480 x 854 resolution, a microSD card slot, 512MB of RAM, WiFi b/g/n / Bluetooth 2.1 support, an 8MP AF camera with an LED flash and 720p HD video recording, Stereo FM radio with RDS support, a Qualcomm MSM8255 1GHz CPU, an Adreno 205 GPU, and Android 2.3. If you want all of that then you might want to head over to the site and pick one up.

[IntoMobile]