Apple sells 1.7 million iPhone 4s in just three days

Mind blown! If you had to guess how many iPhone 4s would Apple manage to push in three days, you wouldn't guess 1.7 million would you? And you'd be wrong, because that's exactly how many they sold.

We wrote about iPhone 4 shortages, but when we're talking about 1.7 million units sold in just three days, it's perhaps more appropriate to call it "overwhelming, I can't believe it's true demand" rather than "shortage".
By the way, starting tomorrow, AT&T stores should be able to offer walk-in sales - they couldn't do that so far, because of said overwhelming demand.
Even Apple is impressed, quoth Steve Jobs - "This is the most successful product launch in Apple's history". No, really? The iPhone 3G and the 3GS sold "just" 1 million in three days, so yes, we'd say the iPhone 4 sales are doing pretty good.
Mr. Jobs also apologizes "to those customers who were turned away because we did not have enough supply". No mention of all those customers crying foul over the poor reception. They were told to stay tuned even though there was no problem (aside from users holding it wrong that is). Makes sense, right?
Ah, well. We guess the problems reported by the first people to get an iPhone 4 didn't scare the crowd away. Plus, there are already rumors of a 4.01 update to iOS that will solve the reception issues in software.

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Sony Ericsson Vivaz pro review: HD gets a Pro flavor

Introduction

Modern always-on web-connected generation need so much equipment to get through the day it’s a small wonder they don’t have to lug tool bags around – the small wonder in this case is the Sony Ericsson Vivaz pro. It’s a full-featured smartphone with a QWERTY keyboard for great messaging and 720p video recording, all in an impressively compact body.

 

Sony Ericsson Vivaz pro official photos

The term “cameraphone” emerged soon after pictures taken with a mobile phone began to look less like impressionist paintings and more like actual photos. Today we’re at a point when 5MP are nothing to write home about.
So, this here pro is the lesser cameraphone of the Vivaz pair. And “camcorderphone” does sound clumsy. But if competing phones are any indication, 5MP stills and 720p video is quite an exciting combo.
Less attention grabbing, but no less useful is the hardware QWERTY keyboard. Sure, there are plenty of phones around with a full keyboard, but how many of them can match the Sony Ericsson Vivaz feature set?
To answer that, we need to know what those features are of course, so here’s the traditional list of pros and cons.

Key features

• 3.2" 16M-color resistive touchscreen of 640 x 360 pixel resolution
• 5 megapixel autofocus camera with LED flash, face and smile detection, geotagging and touch focus
• HD 720p video recording @ 24fps with continuous auto focus
• Symbian OS 9.4 S60 5th, topped with a custom-brewed homescreen and media menu
• 720 MHz CPU, PowerVR SGX dedicated graphics accelerator
• Quad-band GSM support
• 3G with HSDPA 10.2Mbps and HSUPA 2Mbps support
• Wi-Fi b/g; DLNA
• GPS with A-GPS support
• microSD card slot (up to 16GB, 8GB card in the box)
• Built-in accelerometer; Turn-to-mute
• TV out
• Wisepilot navigation software preinstalled (30 day trial)
• Four-row QWERTY keyboard
• Office document viewer
• Stereo FM Radio with RDS; TrackID
• microUSB and stereo Bluetooth v2.0
• Web browser with full Flash support
• Decent audio quality

Main disadvantages

• Camera downgraded from 8MP on the regular Vivaz
• No camera lens protection
• The S60 5th edition UI isn't the best in usability
• No auto locking of the screen during a call
• No DivX or XviD support out-of-the-box
• No smart or voice dialing
• No secondary videocalling camera

The scales are swinging both ways. A point in favor of the Vivaz pro is the mature Symbian platform. It cannot hide its age and is struggling to catch up with the best in business. But it’s been around since the dawn of time (the time of smartphones that is), which makes it well supported and very reliable.
The QWERTY keyboard, the document viewer and the ActiveSync support are real must-haves for the business crowd. High-quality photos and videos may be a teenage thing but they can help be creative with a presentation too.
Another way to look at the Vivaz pro is as a great travel companion. Posting status updates on Twitter and Facebook is a breeze thanks to the keyboard and dedicated apps. And so is uploading 720p videos to YouTube. There’s even voice guided navigation included.

Price and launch date announced for the 14MP packing Altek Leo

We've seen the Altek Leo before - an Android smartphone that thinks it's a 14MP point-and-shoot camera or vice versa. At CommunicAsia, Altek showed off a working unit of their lion and added some info about price and release date.
The camera specs read like a typical point-and-shoot camera - 14MP resolution, 1/2.3-inch CCD sensor and 3x optical zoom and xenon flash. Altek typically make digicams, so that was to be expected. The Altek Leo also features smile detection and sweep panorama.

 

Altek Leo live photos

To check how the Leo stacks up against other camera phones, check out our blog post about image sensor size in various phones, including Nokia N8, Sony Ericsson Satio and the Samsung Pixon12.
Smartphone part of the Altek Leo runs Android 2.1 with the company working on bringing the 2.2 Froyo update to the Altek Leo. The other phone-related specs are scarce though.

The Altek Leo will hit Asia first - Hong Kong, China and Taiwan - some time in Q4. Unfortunately, Altek didn't say if the Leo will be heading west. As for the price, it's estimated at 499 US dollars (400 euro).

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HTC Smart review: First grader

Being a veteran in the smartphone market is huge advantage when you decide to come up with something new. After so many Windows Mobile and Android devices, HTC surprised us with a completely different product – HTC Smart. It’s a semi-smartphone that runs on the unusual Brew Mobile platform strengthened with the fancy Sense UI.

 

HTC Smart official photos

Throwing another mobile OS on the market is hardly the right move since the smartphone arena is already over-crowded. But it seems HTC Smart is HTC’s way of making a feature phone. The Linux-based Brew Mobile platform used for the HTC Smart hardly makes it a proper smartphone to boot. Truth is, there are modern touch feature phones that have more “smart” in them than this one.
But enough about software, let’s see what HTC Smart has to offer in terms of hardware.

Key features

• Quad-band GSM/GPRS/EDGE support
• 3G with HSDPA 3.6 Mbps
• Brew Mobile software platform with HTC Sense UI and social networking integration
• 2.8" resistive touchscreen of QVGA resolution
• 300 MHz processor, 256 MB RAM, 256 MB ROM
• 3.15 megapixel fixed-focus camera with LED flash
• Standard miniUSB port for charging and Mass Storage data transfers
• Stereo Bluetooth (A2DP)
• microSD card slot, up to 16GB support
• Standard 3.5mm audio jack
• Smart dialing
• Stereo FM radio with RDS
• Excellent loudspeaker performance

Main disadvantages

• No Wi-Fi connectivity
• QVGA resolution doesn’t do Sense UI graphics justice
• Screen has poor sunlight legibility
• No video-call camera
• No voice dialing
• Camera lacks auto focus, records QVGA@15fps video only
• Only few applications preinstalled and no access to app repository for native BREW apps
• Limited organizer functions – no notes/memo, no voice recorder or an office document-viewer
• No multi-tasking
• Web browser poor and rather slow

 

HTC Smart at ours

Exploring its features and the possible drawbacks leaves us with mixed first impressions from the HTC Smart. But we are still in the beginning of our Smart meeting and things may still change.
HTC Smart is a stylish, pocket-friendly device powered by a new OS and skinned with one of the best mobile user interfaces – the Sense UI.
Follow us on the next page to see what this Smart is made of.

Nokia C5 - The first model in the new C-series

Nokia today announced the Nokia C5 and unveils a new naming convention. From now on all Nokia handset will be named using one of the N-series, E-series, X-series or C-series names
Like many mobile phone manufactures, Nokia is trying to keep up the sales figures and doing things in a new way. Other manufactures are jumping on the Android bandwagon or release a completely new OS like Samsung's Bada. Nokia have already released the Maemo, but that OS is for more powerful handsets. The E-Series is full of business models already, N-Series should be familiar and we have two phones in the X-series. The Nokia X3 and Nokia X6. C5 is the first phone in the C-series. Why the new naming convention? The new Nokia C5 is a C-series device of course. The number 5 hints that this is a mid-range model. C5 is running on Symbian S60 3rd Edition, Feature Pack 2. Other mentionable features are 720 minutes talk time, SMS, MMS, Email, Bluetooth, FM-Radio, Java, 3.2 megapixel camera with LED flash, 15fps VGA video recording, QCIF front-camera for video calls, built-in A-GPS, networks 850/900/1800/1900 WCDMA 900/2100, HSDPA with max speed up to 10.2 Mbps, 50 MB internal memory expandable up to 16 with microSD card. A 2GB microSD card is included in the package.
It is interesting to see the number of standby time hours the C5 has got from of the 860 mAh battery. An impressive 630 hours according to the official Nokia specifications. The display size of 2.2 inch and the 240 x 320 pixel resolution is not very large, but nevertheless gaining 630 hours out of a 860 mAh battery is very good. Besides the battery capacity, C5 is a phone without that something special. And it should be reflected in the retail price. Now that Nokia has made the Ovi Maps available for free for many of its older mobile phones it is no surprise to see that C5 also will have version 3.0 of the navigation solution pre-installed.
Expected retail price is EUR 135 is a little more than a Nokia 5220 XpressMusic model and should be considered quite reasonable.
The Nokia C5 will be available in the second quarter of 2010.
Nokia C5 Specifications

• Size: 112 x 46 x 12.3 mm
• Weight: 89.3 gram
• Networks: GSM 850/900/1800/1900, WCDMA 900/2100, HSDPA 10.2 Mbps, HSUPA 2 Mbps
• Display: 2.2 inch, 240 x 320 pixel resolution, 16.7 million colours TFT
• Talktime; GSM 12 hours, WCDMA 4.9 hours
• Standby time: GSM 630 hours, 670 hours on WCDMA
• 3.2 megapixel camera with VGA video recording. QCIF video call (front) camera
• OS: Symbian OS 9.3, S60 3rd Edition, Feature Pack 2
• Messaging: SMS, MMS, Email
• Browser: Nokia Web Browser with Mini Map
• Applications: YouTube, Facebook, Twitter, Ovi Share, Quick Office, Video Editor
• A-GPS
• Nokia Ovi Maps 3.0

Apple Presents iPhone 4

As anticipated, Apple announced the the next generation of iPhone. The iPhone 4 is running on Apples own A4 Processor, has a larger display resolution than previous models. It has a 5 megapixel main camera and a front camera for video calls

Apple® today presented the new iPhone® 4 featuring FaceTime, which makes the dream of video calling a reality, and Apple's stunning new Retina display, the highest resolution display ever built into a phone, resulting in super crisp text, images and video. In addition, iPhone 4 features a 5 megapixel camera with LED flash, HD video recording, Apple's A4 processor, a 3-axis gyro and up to 40 percent longer talk time—in a beautiful all-new design of glass and stainless steel that is the thinnest smartphone in the world. iPhone 4 comes with iOS 4, the newest version of the world's most advanced mobile operating system, which includes over 100 new features and 1500 new APIs for developers. iOS 4 features Multitasking, Folders, enhanced Mail, deeper Enterprise support and Apple's new iAd mobile advertising platform. iPhone 4 will be available in the US, UK, France, Germany and Japan on June 24, starting in the US at just $199 for qualified buyers with a two year contract.*

"iPhone 4 is the biggest leap since the original iPhone," said Steve Jobs, Apple's CEO. "FaceTime video calling sets a new standard for mobile communication, and our new Retina display is the highest resolution display ever in a phone, with text looking like it does on a fine printed page. We have been dreaming about both of these breakthroughs for decades."

FaceTime is as mobile as your phone, so you can see your loved ones and friends anywhere there is Wi-Fi. Using FaceTime is as easy as making a regular voice call, with no set-up required, and you can instantly switch to the rear camera to show others what you are seeing with just a tap.

Apple's stunning 3.5 inch Retina display has 960 x 640 pixels—four times as many pixels as the iPhone 3GS and 78 percent of the pixels on an iPad. The resulting 326 pixels per inch is so dense that the human eye is unable to distinguish individual pixels when the phone is held at a normal distance, making text, images and video look sharper, smoother and more realistic than ever before on an electronic display.

iPhone 4 is the thinnest smartphone ever—9.3 millimeters—with an all-new design and build quality like no other mobile device. The front and back are made of aluminosilcate glass, chemically strengthened to be 30 times harder than plastic, more scratch resistant and more durable than ever. The front and back glass have an oil-resistant coating that helps keep it clean, and encircling iPhone 4 is a highly finished stainless steel band made of a custom alloy that is forged to be five times stronger than standard steel.

iPhone 4 features a new 5 megapixel autofocus camera with a 5x digital zoom, a backside illuminated sensor and built-in LED flash that allows you to take amazing pictures even in low light and dark environments. iPhone 4 lets you record and edit incredible HD video and the popular tap to focus feature now works while recording video. You can use the iPhone 4's LED flash for both still photography and video recording. The new iMovie® app for iPhone lets you combine movie clips, add dynamic transitions and themes and include photos and music, and users can buy it for just $4.99 through the App Store right on their phone.

iPhone 4 is the best mobile device ever for games and entertainment, with access to tens of thousands of games and entertainment apps on the revolutionary App Store. Every iPhone 4 has a built-in 3-axis gyro that when combined with the accelerometer provides 6-axis motion sensing such as up and down, side to side, forward and backward and pitch and roll, making it perfect for gaming. Developers can access the gyro using the new CoreMotion API to make games and other apps that go well beyond what other mobile devices offer.

iPhone 4 comes with iOS 4, the newest version of the world's most advanced mobile operating system. With over 100 new features, it includes Multitasking, Folders, enhanced Mail, deeper Enterprise support and Apple's new iAd mobile advertising platform. With Multitasking, users can now instantly switch between any of their apps while preserving battery life. With Folders, users can easily organize their apps into collections by simply dragging one app on top of another. A folder is automatically created and named based on the category of apps selected. Users can change the name of any folder at any time. In addition, users can now customize their lock and home screens with an array of supplied wallpapers or with any of the photos on their phone.

The new iBooks® app will be available for iPhone 4 as a free download from the App Store and includes Apple's new iBookstore, the best way to browse, buy and read books on a mobile product. The iBooks app will sync your current place in a book, along with any bookmarks, highlights and notes you have created, between copies of the same book on your iPad, iPhone or iPod touch®. iBooks users can also now read and store PDFs right in iBooks. There are now over 60,000 books available in the iBookstore, and users have downloaded over five million books in the first two months.

More than five billion apps have been downloaded from the revolutionary App Store and more than 225,000 apps are available to consumers in 90 countries. Almost 100 million iPhone and iPod touch users around the world can choose from an incredible range of apps in 20 categories, including games, business, news, sports, health, reference and travel.

iPhone 4 delivers an amazing seven hours of talk time on 3G networks, up to 10 hours of web browsing on Wi-Fi and up to six hours on 3G, and up to 10 hours of video playback and up to 40 hours of audio playback.** iPhone 4 is powered by Apple's new A4 processor that provides exceptional processor and graphic performance along with long battery life. iPhone 4 features a second microphone and advanced software to suppress unwanted background noise for improved call quality when in loud places. iPhone 4 also offers 802.11n Wi-Fi networking and adds quad-band HSUPA to provide 7.2Mbps downlink and 5.8Mbps uplink capability.***

Pricing & Availability
iPhone 4 comes in either black or white and will be available in the US for a suggested retail price of $199 (US) for the 16GB model and $299 (US) for the 32GB model in both Apple and AT&T's retail and online stores, Best Buy and Wal-Mart stores. iPhone 4 will be available in the US, France, Germany, Japan and the UK on June 24 and customers can pre-order their iPhone 4 beginning Tuesday, June 15 from the Apple Online Store or reserve an iPhone 4 to pick up at an Apple Retail Store. iMovie for iPhone will be available on the App Store for just $4.99 (US).

Also on June 24, a new iPhone 3GS 8GB model will be available for just $99 (US). iOS 4 software will be available on June 21 as a free software update via iTunes® 9.2 or later for iPhone and iPod touch customers.****

iPhone 4 will roll out worldwide to 88 countries by the end of September. iPhone 4 will be available by the end of July in Australia, Austria, Belgium, Canada, Denmark, Finland, Hong Kong, Ireland, Italy, Luxembourg, Netherlands, Norway, New Zealand, Singapore, South Korea, Spain, Sweden and Switzerland.

Details and specs:

Size and weight
- Height: 4.5 inches (115.2 mm)
- Width: 2.31 inches (58.6 mm)
- Depth: 0.37 inch (9.3 mm)
- Weight: 4.8 ounces (137 grams)

Capacity
- 16GB or 32GB flash drive

Color
- White or black

Cellular and wireless
- UMTS/HSDPA/HSUPA (850, 900, 1900, 2100 MHz)
- GSM/EDGE (850, 900, 1800, 1900 MHz)
- 802.11b/g/n Wi-Fi (802.11n 2.4GHz only)
- Bluetooth 2.1 + EDR wireless technology

Location
- Assisted GPS
- Digital compass
- Wi-Fi
- Cellular

Power and battery
- Built-in rechargeable lithium-ion battery
- Charging via USB to computer system or power adapter
- Talk time:
-- Up to 7 hours on 3G
-- Up to 14 hours on 2G
- Standby time: Up to 300 hours
- Internet use:
-- Up to 6 hours on 3G
-- Up to 10 hours on Wi-Fi
-- Video playback: Up to 10 hours
-- Audio playback: Up to 40 hours

Display
- Retina display
- 3.5-inch (diagonal) widescreen Multi-Touch display
- 960-by-640-pixel resolution at 326 ppi
- 800:1 contrast ratio (typical)
- Fingerprint-resistant oleophobic coating on front and back
- Support for display of multiple languages and characters simultaneously

Audio playback
- Frequency response: 20Hz to 20,000Hz
- Audio formats supported: AAC (8 to 320 Kbps), Protected AAC (from iTunes Store), HE-AAC, MP3 (8 to 320 Kbps), MP3 VBR, Audible (formats 2, 3, 4, Audible Enhanced Audio, AAX, and AAX+), Apple Lossless, AIFF, and WAV
- User-configurable maximum volume limit

TV and video
- Video formats supported: H.264 video up to 720p, 30 frames per second, Main Profile level 3.1 with AAC-LC audio up to 160 Kbps, 48kHz, stereo audio in .m4v, .mp4, and .mov file formats; MPEG-4 video, up to 2.5 Mbps, 640 by 480 pixels, 30 frames per second, Simple Profile with AAC-LC audio up to 160 Kbps per channel, 48kHz, stereo audio in .m4v, .mp4, and .mov file formats; Motion JPEG (M-JPEG) up to 35 Mbps, 1280 by 720 pixels, 30 frames per second, audio in ulaw, PCM stereo audio in .avi file format

- Support for 1024 by 768 pixels with Dock Connector to VGA Adapter; 576p and 480p with Apple Component AV Cable; 576i and 480i with Apple Composite AV Cable (cables sold separately)

Full specs: http://www.apple.com/iphone/specs.html

Nokia Announces Dual SIM, Low End Phones

Nokia today announced 4 new models fitting in its C series, aimed at audience in developing countries. Two of these phones will support dual SIMs while other two are going to be good for multimedia – but at good price.
Nokia C2
Nokia C2 will cost around Rs. 4,000. It is a dual-SIM phone and interestingly, the second SIM card is easily accessible and hot-swappable.
The battery is estimated to last 16 days on standby and 4 hours of talk time. The Nokia C2 also features VGA camera, GPRS Internet connectivity, Bluetooth and FM radio with broadcast recording. There’s also a microSD card (up to 32GB, but those cost more than the phone itself), 3.5mm audio jack plus an MP3 player.
Nokia C1-00
The other dual-SIM phone is the Nokia C1-00, which will cost around Rs. 3,200. It doesn’t have two active cards – just one, but there’s a quick shortcut to switch between the two.
The phone has a smashing standby of 48 days. It features an FM radio, 3.5mm audio jack and a flashlight.
Nokia C1-00 is expected to hit the stores in the third quarter 2010.
Nokia C1-01 and C1-02
The Nokia C1-01 and Nokia C1-02 only have a single SIM card slot, but offer GPRS, Bluetooth, microSD card slot (up to 32GB), 3.5mm audio jack, FM radio and MP3 player.
The Nokia C1-01 features a VGA camera, which the Nokia C1-02 lacks.

Nokia C2

BlackBerry's slider Bold 9800 pops up again, HQ images and video

Images or partial specs of the rumored BlackBerry Bold 9800 have been showing up several times for the last few months but now we get to enjoy the company's first slider on a bunch of really nice pics. Oh, and there is a BlackBerry OS 6 video demo at the end of the article.
The BlackBerry Bold 9800 is like the ultimate business device: it's a BlackBerry, packs a large capacitive touchscreen (no SurePress tech this time) and a hardware QWERTY-keyboard. Thanks to its form factor the thing is still compact enough to fit in a jeans pocket.
While the few low quality images that popped up some months back could only give us an idea what to expect from the first BlackBerry slider, these 12 pictures of great quality should answer all questions concerning Bold 9800's design.

BlackBerry Bold 9800 caught in the wild, again

Motorola MILESTONE XT720 now official, the first Xenon-ish Droid

Motorola unveiled today the MILESTONE XT720 - the QWERTY-less MILESTONE brother. It brings 8 megapixel camera with Xenon flash, 720p video recording and Android 2.1 ticking inside.
The MILESTONE XT720 is the European sibling of the previously announced Korean XT720 MOTOROI.

Motorola MILESTONE XT720

Motorola MILESTONE XT720 packs a 3.7-inch capacitive touchscreen with 480x854 pixel resolution and multi-touch support, 600Mhz ARM Cortex A8 processor, 256MB RAM, and 512MB ROM.
The connectivity is all-inclusive featuring 3G with HSDPA, Wi-Fi, GPS with digital compass, Bluetooth, 3.5mm audio jack and microUSB. Stereo FM radio and microSD card slot are also on board.
The MILESTONE XT720 runs on Android OS v2.1 Eclair, but still there is no information on future upgrades.

Motorola MILESTONE XT720 will hit stores across Europe at the end of this month, but the pricing or US availability are not announced yet.

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