Mobile

Things that aren’t static

Sony Ericsson K618 3G Phone Announced
Sony Ericsson has announced the latest addition to its popular ‘K’ series, with the ‘candybar’ shaped Sony K618 promising super fast video, music streaming and Web browsing.
Claiming to offer a “perfect mix of mobile phone, multimedia applications and business solutions,” the K618 mobile phone is a slim, lightweight 3G phone, sporting a 176×220 pixels, TFT 1.9″ 262k colour display, 2 MegaPixel camera (plus 2.5x digital zoom) and QCIF video recording & streaming.
The onboard music player supports MP3, AAC, AAC+, eAAC+ playbacks with the bundled 256MB Memory Stick Micro (M2) able to store up to 230 (highly compressed, natch) music tracks and over 700 photos.
The memory card can be upgraded up to a maximum of 1GB of storage.
Connectivity
The handset offers tri-band (900/1800/1900 MHz) and UMTS(2100) and 3G connectivity, with Bluetooth Streaming letting users send full-length music tracks (or video clips) to compatible Bluetooth enabled devices, like such as Sony’s Stereo Bluetooth Headset HBH-DS970.
Also bundled with the phone is a full HTML browser with RSS and comes with support for push email, enabling messages to be sent directly to the phone.
For keen bloggers who like to update their personal diaries when you’re on the move, the K618 can send images direct to their own blog via Mobile Blogger.
Decked out in Vibrant Black or Bright White, the K618 will be available in selected markets from Q3 2006, but Sony hasn’t made a peep about pricing yet.
K618 – key specifications:
Entertainment
Music player (with MP3, AAC, AAC+, eAAC+ support)
OMA DRM phase 1
Phone speaker
Full streaming Audio/Video
Polyphonic >64 ring tones
Java MIDP 2.0
3D games
Music DJ
Video DJ
Photo DJ
PlayNow
Disc2Phone computer ripping software
Stereo headset
256MB M2 card
Imaging & Messaging
176×220 pixels, TFT 1.9″ 262k colour display
2.0 Megapixel camera
2.5x digital zoom for still images
QCIF video recording & streaming
QVGA video playback
VGA Video Telephony camera
Consumer push email
SMS and MMS
Instant Messaging
Mobile Blogger – Picture blog application
Connectivity
UMTS 2100
Bluetooth EDR
PC Tools & Software
USB 2.0 Mass storage FS
USB charging
USB cable
Fast port connector
External antenna connector
Flight mode
HTML Full Browser with RSS
Core Accessories
Stereo Bluetooth™ Headset HBH-DS970
Stereo Portable Handsfree HPM-65
Flash MXE-60
Music Cable MMC-60
Music Desk Stand MDS-60
Other Accessories:
Desk Stand CDS- 60
Travel charger CMT-60
Bluetooth Headset HBH-GV435
Bluetooth Headset HBH- IV835
Bluetooth Car Speakerphone HCB-100
Sony Ericsson.com
9 August, 2006
PDA Shipments Notch Up Record High in Q2, 2006
Like the Black Knights in Monty Python’s ‘Holy Grail,’ PDAs are refusing to be beaten, despite almost monthly declarations of their impending obsolescence.
Far from shuffling off into that big technology dustbin in the sky (or, more likely, some landfill site somewhere), Personal Digital Assistants managed to register the highest PDA shipment total of any second quarter on record.
The new research from Gartner saw PDA shipments totalling 3.7 million units in the second quarter of 2006, up 2.7 percent from the second quarter of 2005.
Much of the growth is coming from GPS-enabled new kids on the PDA block like Mio Technology, Motorola and Danger Research, while old boys like Research In Motion (RIM), Palm, Hewlett-Packard and Dell all saw steadily declining shipments.
When it comes to PDA operating systems, Microsoft’s Windows Mobile kept pushing ahead with 54.2 percent of PDA OS shipments, followed by RIM OS with 22.5 percent of the market and Palm OS with 13.4 percent.
“The ongoing integration of WAN technology into PDAs, and the marketing push of these devices by wireless operators has produced most of the growth compared to one year ago,” said Todd Kort, principal analyst in Gartner’s Computing Platforms Worldwide group.
Although shipments are up, revenues are down, as Kort explained: “The average selling price of PDAs fell by 6 percent from one year ago to $373, mostly due to aging product lines, the increasing impact of wireless operator subsidies and relatively few new PDAs being launched thus far in 2006.”
This explains how worldwide PDA end-user revenue fell by 4.1 percent last year to $1.38 billion in the second quarter of 2006.
The report breaks down PDA shipments by manufacturer, Q2 2006 shipment estimates, market share and 2Q05- 1Q06 growth.
Research In Motion 830,720 shipments, 22.5% market share, -1.1% growth
Palm 470,458 , 12.7%, -26.7%
Hewlett-Packard 382,653, 10.4% -15.1%
Mio Technology 303,377, 8.2% 65.4%
Nokia 163,600, 4.4%, -40.5%
Others 1,545,596, 41.8%, 27.8%
It’s worth noting that these totals don’t include smartphones, such as the hugely popular Palm Treo phones (which shifted 656,000 units over the same quarter) and BlackBerry 71xx (467,000 units excluded), but include cellular PDAs, such as the iPAQ 69xx and Nokia E61.
Which rather makes the results a bit confusing to our eyes.
Gartner
7 August, 2006
Why I love the Palm: Conclusion
For a self confessed, gimme-gimme-shiny-new gadgets nutcase like me to be using a phone several years old speaks volumes of the strengths of the Treo 650.
It’s not a perfect phone by any means, but after trying out various Nokias, Pocket PCs, Motos, Sony Ericssons and other wannbe contenders, I’ve come to the conclusion that the Treo remains the best smartphone on the market.
It’s not for everyone of course, but after a recent weekend in Wales, I realised that I had in my possession the first smartphone that was actually clever enough for me to leave my laptop at home.
Despite being out in the wilds of lovely Cymraeg (with ne’er a wisp of Wi-Fi in the air), I was able to download images for approval from a client; download, edit and send off a Word doc; surf the web; chat with some friends on IRC; send and receive a ton of email; download weather forecasts; read RSS feeds; play some games; update my blog; send text messages; take pics and a few silly videos and, of course make and receive calls – and the Treo performed faultlessly throughout.
If I’d have taken my Windows Mobile phone I dare say I would have been very well acquainted with stylus (and the reset button) by this time, but the Treo’s fabulous one-handed operation and rock solid performance made it a practical laptop replacement.
The future
After Palm decided that it wasn’t worth the outlay to re-jig the Treo to fit incoming European regulations, there sadly won’t be any more 650s shipping to the UK, although there still should be plenty about – especially on ebay.
In the US, Palm has already released the 650’s successor, the Treo 700p, but it looks like us here in Euro-land are going to have to wait till around Christmas for an updated, antennae-less Treo to appear. Possibly.
Palm has remained tight-lipped about their European product roadmap, with the web rife with rumours of both Windows and Palm new models going under ggroovy codenames like Hollywood, Lowrider, Nitro and Lennon.
Vodafone UK, however, have recently confirmed that they will be launching a Windows Mobile 5-powered 3G UMTS Treo at an unspecified date, but we’re not interested in that.
We want a much needed fix of new Palm gadgetry, running a Palm OS!
4 August, 2006
Cricket Mobisodes On The Ashes To Launch
The mobile division of TV production company Twofour and Player One Sports are working together to create a weekly short form TV show covering the Australian portion of the Ashes tour for portable devices.
The six minute shows will be formatted for mobile phones, iPods, or PSP’s. They’ll be chunked into one to two minute blocks, “for ease of use on different delivery mediums.”
Coming this Winter, sports presenter, Mark Durden-Smith (no we haven’t heard of him either, but when it comes to sport, that’s doesn’t mean anything) will be fronting the show where they plan to cover analysis of the action and try to give an understanding of life on tour in Australia.
It appears that they’re hoping to pull in the interest of posh types who like cricket, and more than likely don’t care how much it’s going to cost them to keep up to date. It may be of course turn out that these are the sort of people who don’t currently have the kit to play the content.
Twofour are clearly planning to flog the maximum amount of ‘media’ to lighten with heavy-wallets of their punters. Alongside the mobisode (and we suspect, cross-promoted during it), there will be a range of associated content including Freddie Flintoff’s Allround Cricket, a Web and mobile fantasy cricket game and a range of other downloadable content such as wallpapers, ring tones and video blog.
A rather over-excited Mr Philip Bourchier O’Ferrall, Director of Twofour Mobile gushed, “We are in the midst of a media revolution and I’m excited that Twofour is leading the way.”
Twofour mobile
4 August, 2006
Vodafone Admits That Video Calling Has Flopped
Vodafone is hotly denying that its enthusiasm for 3G has waned, after rumours began circulating that the operator was cutting handset subsidies and abandoned all hope of the technology ever becoming a lucrative commercial success.
What are your thoughts/actions about Video calling on your mobile? Take 10 second survey
Reports that the rumours began to circulate after Enders Analysis revealed that sales of 3G phones had crashed from 20 per cent of all handsets bought to a mere 12 per cent, in just one quarter, CNet tells us.
Vodafone insisted that the figures were “definitely an overestimate,” before the spokesperson engaged industry-speak overload:
“The share has dipped as we’ve rebalanced investment across our customer base. We’re now perhaps seeing lower ARPU (average revenue per user) from lower ARPU customers, so the kind of commercial investment we were making into customers is no longer justified.”
What this means in a language approaching English is that Vodafone is no longer keen to plough its own cash into subsidising 3G handset sales, because punters aren’t shelling out for enough of their extra services to make it worth their while.
Video calling
Vodafone hoped that its 3G-equipped customers would be making use of what was supposed to be one of the great selling points of 3G, video calls, but yesterday the company admitted defeat, sighing, “Video calling is not a service that is used by a lot of people.”
Mobile TV
Mobile TV has, however, proved popular, with Vodafone claiming that, “more than 50 per cent of people who buy a 3G phone in our UK stores are taking a mobile TV package, and most are adopting the [premium] £10 package.”
This claim is rather at odds with the Enders report, which found that 76 per cent of all phone users surveyed said they had no interest whatsoever in mobile TV.
Alice Enders, the big cheese of the analyst firm, explained that this disparity may be down to the very small number of people using 3G services being the ones interested in mobile TV.
3G obsessed
Enders suggested that Vodafone’s “obsessive over-engagement in 3G” – reflected in the less popular 3G handsets sharing the same amount of store-space with non-3G devices – had led to the company suffering financially because most punters simply weren’t interested in anything other than voice and text services.
Not surprisingly, the UK’s only 3G-only network, 3, were quick to quibble about the claims, insisting that the wild popularity of their downloadable music and mobile TV services is proof positive that the demand is there – if the technology is marketed correctly.
Frothing like a cappuccino machine on overdrive, 3’s spokesperson insisted that, “Uptake is phenomenal and growing day by day…..We’re even rivalling traditional music suppliers. We’re second only to iTunes in terms of downloads… and the World Cup really put mobile TV on the map.”
The spokesperson went on to blame a “lack of maturity” from the other 3G operators, claiming that “some incumbent operators” had found it could “suit their commercial model to keep some of their users on old technology.”
With Vodafone rapidly cooling on 3G, it begs the question whether any of the operators who invested vast amounts of moolah on 3G licences and infrastructure will ever get to see their flthy lucre again.
What are your thoughts/actions about Video calling on your mobile? Take 10 second survey
Vodafone
3 August, 2006
Vodafone 3G On Apple MacBook Via USB
Well they got there finally, Vodafone UK have announced that they’re releasing the less than catchy named Vodafone Mobile Connect USB Modem in the Autumn. It will support their 3G data service and, surprise, surprise, connect to computers using a USB lead. Rather neatly the software disks aren’t needed, as they’re installed directly from the modem.
This advance will broaden out the service to any machine that doesn’t have a full sized PCMCIA/PC Card slot because it’s too old, or it’s too modern, like the some of the new laptops which only support the smaller ExpressCard, or their Apple Macintosh’s that might not support either.
Connection to the HSDPA network, in optimum conditions, will be a healthy 1.4Mbps receive and 384Kbps transmit. Currently Vodafone high-speed 3G network covers the major conurbations in the UK, but not the whole of the UK. Their stated plans are 75% of the population by summer 2007.
There will be a suggested limit of 1Gb of data transfered a month. Those who do not comply “may be asked to moderate their usage,” and persistent usage in excess of the limit “may also result in suspension or termination of the customer’s service.”
1 August, 2006
Annual Global Mobile Shipments To Reach 1.5 billion By 2011
Global sales of handsets are set to reach 1.5 billion in five years, according to a new report by IT research firm Analysys.
The “Evolution of Mobile Handsets to 2011 and Beyond” study forecasts that mobiles will evolve into three broad categories, comprising voice-centric, converged-function and specialist handsets.
After imbibing deeply on a large bowl of buzzwords, report author Dr Yanli Suo-Saunders exploded into a frenzy of tech-speak, “The handset market is transforming as traditional voice-centric devices diversify with the incorporation of a range of multimedia functions.”
“Future handsets will develop into voice-centric, converged-function and specialist categories, driven by increasingly segmented consumer demand,” he continued, as we grappled to sync up with his mindshare paradigm shift.
The good doctor reckoned that voice-centric handsets will remain the largest single product category in emerging markets; while developed economies will see converged-function and specialist handsets taking the lead in 2011.
Ball rubbing
After giving their crystal ball a good rub, the report authors predicted that annual global handset shipments will reach 1.5 billion in 2011 – up from just over 800 million in 2005 – while voice-centric handsets will still make up more than half of shipments in emerging markets in 2011.
Converged-function handsets look set to become a mainstream product in developed markets by 2011, hogging over 30% of the market, with a range of specialist handsets looking to be the biggest sellers in the majority of developed economies by the same time period.
Analysys
26 July, 2006
Live Traffic Updates Added To Google Maps For Mobile
The ever-expanding selection of Google features just grew by one as they announce that they’re providing Live Traffic updates to mobile phones in 30 US cities and partial information in many others.
The traffic-concious will be able to fire their mobile phones up, look at Google Maps For Mobile (or GMM as those in the trade call it) and see the masses of traffic jams appear before their very eyes.
The most up-to-date traffic information will be sent directly to the users’ call phone, showing the severity of the delays on commuter routes using red, yellow, and green overlays. The amount of time the travelers are likely to be delayed is also shown on the mobile.
Google are slightly playing catchup with Yahoo on this one, as they been plotting live traffic on Yahoo Maps since March 2005.
Back in November 2005 we broke the story about the existence of GPS-using code in Google Local For Mobile, but this has yet to be officially enabled.
On the back of the Mobile Maps news, Google also announced that users now have the ability to customize the content that appears on the mobile version of their Personalized Homepage, making it even easier for mobile phone users to quickly get the information they need when away from their computers.
Google Maps For Mobile
25 July, 2006
Brits Love Affair With Mobiles Continues
In the largest UK study of its kind, the Mobile Life Report has revealed our attitudes towards mobile phones and how they have impacted on our lives, with more than 90% of UK mobile users saying they can’t get through the day without using their phone.
More than 16,500 people were surveyed for the report, which was published by The Carphone Warehouse in collaboration with the London School of Economics.
Text-tastic
The report revealed that the British love affair with texting is still in full flow, with people sending an average 3.6 mobile text messages a day compared with 2.8 voice calls a day.
Not surprisingly, it’s amongst da yoot that texting is the most popular with 51% of 18-24 year-olds sending/receiving at least six text messages a day, but with only 15% troubling themselves to have six or more mobile phone conversations a day.
Better than the tele
In the same 18-24 years old age bracket, mobile phones were declared to be more important than television (26% to 11%), with the figure jumping to 32% for women in the same age group.
Thievery
Mobiles continue to be hugely popular with muggers/thieves, with nearly one in ten people (9%) reporting that they’ve had a mobile phone stolen.
Not unexpectedly, 18 to 24 year olds were found to be at the most at risk, with 17% of women in that age group having had their phone purloined compared with 10% of men.
Citizen journalism
People were also found to be ready and willing to use their camera phones to record evidence of a crime (50%), or to snap a crime in progress (47%), with more than a third (36%) saying that they’d use their mobiles to grab a mugshot of a passing celebrity or newsworthy event.
Sex and mobiles
With a keen eye to garnering some press in the tabloids, the research bothered to ask about ‘relationships and mobiles’.
Lord knows why people bothered to answer these questions, but the survey found that a quarter of people bothered to disconnect their mobiles before indulging in a bit of hanky panky, with 11% switching them to silent (writer resists cheap joke about vibra-alerts) and 14% turning their phones off altogether.
The study also found that phones could be used to ward off unwelcome suitors, with over half of women under 25 admitting to getting out their mobiles in public situations to deter people from approaching them.
Tribes
For reasons best know to itself, the study also identified six tribes or groups of mobile phone users.
These are:
Generation Mobile – single, style conscious, 18-24 year olds who are students or working in their first jobs
Phonatics – single, employed folks aged 18-34 who elevate their mobile into being their most important electronic possession.
Practical Parents – young, cost-conscious families aged 18-34 who choose their mobiles for practical rather than style or function.
Smart Connecteds – affluent families and professionals aged 25-44 who use their mobile to organise their hectic work and social lives.
Fingers & Thumbs – married, middle-aged or retired folks with children or grandchildren.
Silver Cynics – affluent, married with children rapidly heading for retirement.
Mobile Life Report
25 July, 2006
Microsoft Zune Targets Apple’s iPods, Finally
After an eternity of denials, obfuscation, rumour and counter-rumour, Microsoft have finally confirmed that they will be launching their own rival to Apple’s iPod range.
In a statement late last week, the company said, “Today we confirmed a new music and entertainment project called Zune. Under the Zune brand, we will deliver a family of hardware and software products, the first of which will be available this year. We see a great opportunity to bring together technology and community to allow consumers to explore and discover music together.”
This announcement posits Zune as a brand name for an entire family of hardware and software products, supported by music, movie and media services, much like Apple’s iPod, iTunes and iTunes Music Store offering.
Billboard Magazine, who broke the story, has speculated that the Zune-branded range of products will include music players, video players, WiFi-enabled devices and possibly even a portable video game device, with Microsoft incorporating social networking and mobile media purchasing.
The first Zune device (which may or may not look like the one illustrated) is scheduled to be launched late this year ready for Christmas, with further devices following in 2007.
Microsoft has already busied itself with the dreadfully punned ComingZune.com viral marketing site which, bizarrely, features a big bloke and a tiny bloke stroking a rabbit to the strains of the excellent Regina Spektor song, ‘Us.’
Because we’re all being strung along by Microsoft’s teaser campaign, details are still very sketchy (like the illustrations on the site) although some rumours suggest that there’ll be a 30GB Zune with the “same pricing, look and feel as the 60GB iPod,” with Wi-Fi functionality letting users share music with up to 10 nearby chums.
We’ll keep you posted with more information just as soon as we hear summat.
24 July, 2006