Day: June 23, 2006

“The standby screen in most Series 60 handsets was always a bit of an oddity. Often called the ‘hangup’ screen or ‘wallpaper’ screen, it used to just be your favourite picture and some status information.With the advent of the Nokia 6680, the standby screen got a big update, becoming the ‘active’ standby screen, with five configurable shortcuts to favourite applications. S60 (2nd Edition Feature Pack 3) then added display and basic control of what your Music player was doing. Finally, with S60 3rd Edition, there’s now a summary of your email (or texts) and display of your To do items. And, on the E61 at least, no less than seven extra app shortcuts. Phew!So we now have a default home screen, the one on which you’ll dial ad-hoc numbers and the one you’ll probably end up in after a phone call, which is far from an oddity and more an essential part of the S60 experience. It’s analagous to the ‘Today’ screen in Windows Mobile smartphones.” Find out more at allaboutsymbian.com

“It seems to be PMP day today, with announcements coming from Inkel, Sodiff, and Centrix. Time to add another name to the mix: Some new deets surrounding the iUbi Blue personal media player have surfaced, including the all important list of codecs and a price point.For starters, this thing will give you plenty of space for lots of audio listening and video watching enjoyment, because there is a 30GB hard drive on board the iUbi Blue (IUBI2500). The 4.3-inch widescreen LCD is a good size, and is capable of resolutions up to 480 x 272 pixels. If you want to go bigger, it can output the vid to an external display at up to 720 x 480. Perhaps best of all, however, is the long list of file formats this handy player supports. On the video end of things, it’ll take on (take a deep breath) MPEG-1/2/4, DivX (3.x, 4.x, 5.x), XviD, WMV 7/8/9, AVI, H.264, MOV, and Real. For music (take another deep breath), the iUbi Blue will blast out MP3, WMA, WAV, Ogg Vorbis, AAC-LC, and AC-3, as well as ASF. No need to fret about sound quality and output either, because Wolfson’s 3D sound chip is there to knock your socks off.Other key features include A2DP Bluetooth technology, USB on-the-go, the ability to record video via the TV-in at 640×480 (30fps), and up to 8 hours of battery life for video, 15 hours for audio. Get in your pre-orders now to await shipment by the end of the month. Pricing is expected to be around $455 USD.” via mobilemag.com

“Sony Ericsson today announced the latest addition to its line-up of Walkman-branded mobile music phones to further enhance the consumer’s mobile music experience, the sophisticated, Fusion white W810. The latest Walkman phone comes with a 512MB removable Memory Stick, which can be upgraded to 2GB currently available in retail outlets, allowing consumers to store a wealth of music tracks, photos, video and other multimedia files on the phone.Extending the highly acclaimed Sony Ericsson Walkman phone line-up, the stylish white with grey trim W810 advances the mobile music experience by seamlessly blending together entertainment and advanced mobile phone technology to offer a truly credible digital music experience supporting industry standard MP3 and AAC music file formats. The phone comes complete with quality HPM-70 stereo headphones which feature a standard 3.5 mm headphone jack for personal customization.Enjoying music on the Sony Ericsson W810 Walkman phone is extremely simple because a dedicated Walkman button quickly pulls up the music menu regardless of what other application on the phone is in use. Positioned just below the phone’s screen you can find all the most common music controls needed (Play/Pause/Stop/Skip Track/Volume) allowing users to move easily between tracks or adjust the volume on the speaker or headphones. Engaging Mega Bass improves the sound experience when listening to music through the external speaker or the high quality headphones provided.The Sony Ericsson W810 is also a great imaging device enabling users to capture great still pictures and video featuring an integrated 2 mega pixel, auto-focus camera with photo light, and easily recognisable digital still camera interface.The W810 is equipped with EDGE Class 10 technology, to allow quick and easy data transfers and Internet access, and Bluetooth Wireless technology for connectivity with Bluetooth handsfree headsets and sharing data with other Bluetooth-enabled devices.The Sony Ericsson W810 White Edition is a Quad-band EDGE phone available in Fusion white and starts shipping globally Q3 2006. ” via slashphone.com

“Some preliminary info on the upcoming, but not yet officially introduced cell phone BenQ-Siemens E81 has already popped up in the Internet. Now the German site Modopo has posted more details and live photos of the phone.

This is a 3G model supporting UMTS networks. The phone is equipped with a 1-megapixel camera (the lens is located at the back panel) and an expansion slot for microSD (TransFlash) cards. Its LCD features 176×220 pixels and 262K colors. At sides you can see media player buttons. There is the support of MP3 and AAC formats. It is also said that the business function is implemented well, but it’s unclear in which way. The menu is supposed to be like EF81 and SXG75. It’s still unclear when the new phone will be officially announced.”