The Kyocera Neo E1100 is a forgettable CDMA handset save for the fact that it has a glowing blue “lightpipe” and a hidden OLED display on its minimal exterior. Other than that, it has Bluetooth 2.0 and a 1.3 MP camera. But hey, it’s nice to look at and it’s coming soon to a North American carrier near you.
Sprint’s got a bunch of devices huddled in a booth running off its Xohm WiMax network: some Nokia N810 tablets and a smattering of notebooks from different makers (like a Windows XP Asus Eee PC, but it was acting a bit wonky, so I had to move on to a more generic laptop). Basically, the internet experience is just like cable, except wireless—the buildout is aimed at 2-4Mbps downspeed bandwidth and about 1.5-2 up, which is exactly what I was pulling here, according to a stealthy speedtest.net check.
Windows 6.1 is officially out, and after a hands on with the standard and professional versions of the refreshed OS, I’m still not sold on it. There’s no denying the redesigned home screen is beautiful, and easily takes you to emails, texts and events for the day. But it still doesn’t make up for the laggy nature of the OS and the menu surfing required to perform simple tasks.
HTC’s Touch Dual is now officially headed to US markets, and after a brief hands-on with it, I’m a fan of the hardware. But at the end of the day, it’s still a WinMo phone. The phone pairs the form factor of the HTC Touch with a slide-out SureType keyboard in a (relatively) light and thin package. And though they gave it the TouchFLO interface and WIndows Mobile 6.1 Professional, it only covers up WinMo’s shortcomings to an extent.
Sound ID has taken the lid off their new HD300 Bluetooth headset featuring proprietary NoiseNavigation technology that promises “pristine sound” by isolating speech and automatically reducing wind and background nose using dual microphones and DSP algorithms. A lot of companies make similar claims, but Sound ID’s word is backed with the nerdy credibility of a staff comprised of “hearing specialists and top acoustic scientists.” We shall see if they live up to the hype when the HD300 is released in Q3 of 2008 for US$119.99. Full details are available in the press release after the break.
Straight from CTIA 2008, Everex has unveiled their new Cloudbook Max featuring built-in support for Sprint’s XOHM WiMAX network. Users can also expect a 8.9″ WVGA (1024 x 600) display, a 1.6GHz VIA C7-M ULV processor with the VIA VX800 digital media IGP chipset, up to 2GB DDR2 SDRAM, a 80GB hard disk drive, 802.11b/g WiFi, Bluetooth, an integrated GPS receiver, dual built-in 2-megapixel webcams, an S-Video port, audio in/out and the Microsoft Vista OS. No pricing info has been announced, but you can expect it to hit store shelves within a year. Press release after the break.
Maybe it’s to keep us from groping the Vu just a little bit too hard or to beat off press fiends eager for swag bags, but a life-size Iron Man is hanging out at LG’s booth looking badass in his Mark 3 suit. Whatever the reason, it probably means Tony Stark will be rocking gear from LG in the flick to match his Dell servers. Guess he’s not an Apple fanboy. Update: Check out the special Iron Man edition Shine decked out in solid 18-karat gold, which you can win here after Apr. 15. [Giz @ CTIA]
Whatever diet LG put the enV to whip it into the enV2 is fan-freakin-tastical. It’s significantly slimmer, sharper and lighter. What’s sweet about the midget dust magic is that it isn’t smaller and sexed up just to be smaller, it actually feels much better in your hand than the blubbery original. But the keys are a smidge bigger, so it’s easier to type on than the original enV to boot.
Nokia took the shroud off its WiMAX-capable N810 Tablet today, which promises 4g mobile broadband speeds for the handheld internet tablet. The updated N810 will use Sprint’s Xohm service, and adds a new mobile dimension to the device, which was previously Wi-Fi only.
Sprint’s Instinct is so special the carrier is holding its own super special event. Unfortunately, it hasn’t quite finished baking, so the full feature set wasn’t entirely ready to go—we had to visit different “stations” to check out each feature individually to keep us from diving too deep. The iPhone-challenging visual voicemail, for instance, ain’t quite live. Plus, it locked up when I was messing around with the music store, and needed a hard reset for the more money shot voice command features, which still didn’t quite work (or finding a McDonald’s is just too much). And the web browser doesn’t, um, touch mobile Safari, at least not in its present state.
