DFW Tech Blog

BlackBerry-maker Research in Motion says it still doesn't know why its service collapsed on Monday for the second time in less than a year (the first time was a software glitch).

Check the link for grouchy comments from CrackBerry addicts.

By the way, in case anyone forgot, RIM is establishing its U.S. headquarters in Irving.

If we're lucky, maybe we'll get to host some riots the next time there's an outage.

Samsung G810

-HSDPA
-5-megapixel camera with face detection and image stabilization
-2.6-inch screen
-GPS
-WiFi
In Europe by March 2008 release for a rumored €580 ($840).

see the rest below...

Nearly every big player in the world of mobile communications will be in Barcelona, Spain, this week for the industry's largest trade show.

Insiders are excited for the opportunity to strike multi-million-dollar deals. The rest of us should be excited to see some really awesome new handsets.

Manufacturers and suppliers all tend to save some huge announcements for the show, so I'm pretty excited.

I'll post the best suff I see right here, so keep checking in for updates, and for God's sake, don't buy a phone this weekend.

Check out the new mobile browser from the Norwegian software company Opera. Judging by the speed test against the woeful mobile browser from Microsoft, the Scandinavians seem to be fast approaching a decent mobile Web experience.

How would this compare to the Skyfire browser I previewed last week? I'm not sure. They both look cool. I think I'm going to have to test both products and get back to y'all. Of course, there's no reason I should have all the fun. I'd welcome guest reviews from anyone who'd like to try the two browsers and post their thoughts.

You'll have to wait till Feb 11 to try Opera Mobile 9.5 but you can sign up now to download Skyfire.

It sure looks like the folks at Skyfire have beaten all their competitors in the mobile browsing business with this program, now in private beta. It's free.

Neither the iPhone, nor the Opera browser that I've recommended before, can display that much content on a hand-held device.

If you have a device that runs on Windows Mobile and has 3G data service, sign up at Skyfire's Web site to get in on the beta test.

The Wall Street Journal, citing unnamed sources, says that Sprint Nextel and Clearwire have resumed negotiations to partner on a high-speed wireless data network, one that would bring a DSL-speed connection to customers anywhere.

The plan could dramatically lower the price tag of Sprint's WiMax project and allow newly installed Chief Executive Officer Dan Hesse to focus on fixing the company's core cellphone business -- answering two concerns Sprint investors have had.

There's no guarantee the joint venture will materialize, or that Sprint and Clearwire will secure external funding, despite the advanced discussions. Last year Sprint and Clearwire tentatively agreed to a more modest cost-sharing partnership on WiMax, but the deal was scrapped in November, partly because Sprint was operating without a CEO at the time and was reluctant to make any major moves. Since then, the two sides have re-engaged on a more ambitious plan that would involve spinning off Sprint's WiMax unit and merging it with Clearwire, people familiar with the matter say.

Given that WiMax would seem to be Sprint's only chance for overtaking archrivals such as AT&T or Verizon Wireless, I can't see why Sprint would spin-off WiMax operations to focus on a declining business.

That said, this sounds like good news for folks like me who want fast Internet connections everywhere.

Last year, YouTube launched a site optimized for Web-enabled cellphones. It worked pretty well, but only provided access to a very limited number of videos.

Now the site has rolled out a vastly improved version of its mobile site, m.youtube.com.

The new version provides easy access to most videos. It also allows you to sign in from your phone and see customized content. Heck, ambitious users can even transfer video directly from their phones to the site.

The improved site comes at the same time as a YouTube application that will make the experience even better for folks with certain handsets, most of them from Nokia.

The new site and the application are both free, but remember that they could cost you plenty if you don't have an unlimited data plan from your cellular service provider.

Here are the details.

This is the P-Per, a concept by the Chocolate Design Agency. The entire surface of the phone is a screen, presumably a touch screen. Great idea. Let me add my voice to the chorus: Me want.

Via: Swongled and Gizmodo.

My story today notes the almost total absence of new cellphones at this year's Consumer Electronics Show. It may seem strange that the big handset makers would make so little news at the world's biggest technology trade show, but there's an easy explanation.

There are two wireless-only trade shows coming up soon and handset makers are doubtless saving their big guns. The Mobile World Congress, which is better known as 3GSM, will take place early next month in Barcelona. CTIA Wireless will take place in Las Vegas during the first few days of April.

Talking to execs from all the major handset makers Tuesday, I asked if I should expect some major handset news from them at one or both of the shows. Nearly all of them smiled broadly before saying, "We haven't given any guidance about new announcements -- but historically we have released new products at one or both of those shows."

New handsets, in other words, are on their way.

If you spend an hour a day in the car, cellphones probably cost you at least that much time, says one professor at the University of Utah.

"The distracted driver tends to drive slower and have delayed reactions," said David Strayer. "People kind of get stuck behind that person and it makes everyone pay the price of that distracted driver."

Strayer's study, based on three dozen students driving in simulators, found that drivers on cellphones are far more likely to stick behind a slow car in front of them and change lanes about 20% less often than drivers not on the phone.

Overall, cellphone drivers took about 3% longer to drive the same highly traffic-clogged route (and about 2% longer to drive a medium congested route) than people who were not on the phone...

Combine those factors and Strayer figures distracted drivers are adding an extra 5 to 10% of time to your commute.

I'm not sure that a study of 36 college kids justifies such blanket statements. Not only is the sample small, it skews far younger than rush-hour commuters.

The real question is whether cellphones slow average drivers more or less.

On the one hand, college kids have far less experience behind the wheel than older drivers, so they may need to slow down more to deal with the distraction.

On the other hand, younger people generally have quicker reflexes than older folks. Plus college kids presumably are presumably smarter than average so they should fare better at high-speed multi-tasking.

Pantech/Samsung/Motorola

A couple readers have chided me for not comparing the battery life of the three phones I reviewed in Friday's paper, so I will do it now.

The Pantec Duo claims 3 hours of talk time and 240 hours of standby time. The Blackjack II claims 7 and 336. The Q 9h claims 9 and 720.

I must confess that I did not run all three phones down to zero, so I cannot confirm the accuracy of these numbers.

They should give readers the gist, though, and add one more reason to choose the Q over its competitors.

Intuit, maker of Quicken money-management software, will start selling a web-based version for $3 a month. The company hopes this online version of its software will appeal to folks who have never bought its traditional software, which costs $30 at its most basic and $90 with all the bells and whistles.

The new Quicken, which should go live on Jan 8, will work on any machine that's tied to the Web, but it will have a special version designed to work with iPhones. Another special version designed for Blackberry devices will come later.

Intuit, according to Reuters, "hopes the product, which launches on January 8, will vastly expand Quicken's 14 million users and boost the market penetration of a brand that already generates about 1.7 million new copies of software a year, Intuit senior vice president Rick Jensen told Reuters in an interview on Tuesday.

"Intuit has designed the product to appeal to younger consumers, people who may have used online banking for most of their adult lives, but do not use software to track those transactions."

Folks who plan to be traveling when their favorite college football teams play their bowl games this year might want to make a dash for the Verizon Wireless store. The company's V Cast Mobile TV service will air a shocking 24 bowl games this year.

Granted, a tiny cellphone screen isn't the best place to see a football game, but as I noted in my review of the service, the pictures actually look a lot better than you'd think. The real problem is that Verizon got shut out of the biggest bowls.

Here's a list of what viewers will see...

Windows Mobile has a well-deserved reputation for being a pain in the butt to use, particularly when compared to the elegant operating system on Apple's iPhone. Fortunately, hope appears to be on the horizon.

Details have been leaking out about WM 6.1, which should hit the street soon with improvements such as threaded text-message conversations. Far more ambitious improvements apparently await in WM 7 and WM 8.

Microsoft has briefed some technology writers about the WM road map. Those writers are sworn to secrecy about the specifics, but the lead bloggers from both Engadget and Gizmodo hint that good things are on the way.

Here's hoping they're right.

The current version of Windows Mobile actually allows users to do an incredible amount with their smart phones. Indeed, you can do almost anything you can do on a regular computer; you just can't do it easily.

An elegant version of WM would be a big step toward striking the word cellphone from America's vocabulary and replacing it with handheld, the term that geeks use for tiny computers.

Photo: TSA

USA Today reports that Continental Airlines has launched a 3-month experiment down in Houston that lets customers clear security and board planes without paper tickets. Instead, ticketed customers download information into their cellphones or PDAs that creates bar codes on device screens.

The two-dimensional bar code, a jumble of squares and rectangles, stores the passenger's name and flight information. A TSA screener will confirm the bar code's authenticity with a handheld scanner. Passengers still need to show photo identification. The electronic boarding pass also works at airport gates.

If the pilot program saves as much time and money as Continental expects, the cellphone ticket program will likely expand across the country and eventually around the globe.

As someone who wants to minimize the amount of stuff I have to carry around, I think this sounds pretty cool. I'd be even more excited, though, if someone figured out how to put my credit cards and driver's license inside my cellphone so I could stop carrying my wallet.

Consumer Reports rates Verizon's cell service as the best for the DFW area (SOURCE: Consumer Reports)

Actually, CR gave Verizon Wireless pretty high marks nationwide, calling it "among the better carriers this year and in our earlier surveys."

Err, that's great. What about us Sprint users?

"Bottom-ranked of carriers we rate. Consistently among the lowest-rated for
satisfaction, dropped calls, and customer service."

Ah geez.

But it's not like Consumer Reports was all that thrilled about any of the companies they examined:

Cell-phone service seems to stubbornly resist improvement. The Annual Survey of Cell-Phone Service conducted by the Consumer Reports National Research Center found that fewer than half of respondents were completely or very satisfied. That makes cell service among the lower-rated services we survey, as it has been for the past six years.

Summaries of the findings of the five major carriers after the break, or you can go to Consumer Reports' Web site for more info.

According to market research firm Informa, the number of cellphone subscriptions worldwide is now equal to half of the world's total population.

That does not mean that half the people in the world have a mobile phone, since some people own more than one, and in fact, Informa says there are 59 countries where cellphone penetration is over 100 percent.

Not bad for a technology first activated in 1981 in Saudi Arabia, Sweden and Norway.

Via Slashdot.

We've been blogging a lot about televisions and next-generation DVD players, but tech-loving shoppers should not forget about cellphones. All of the major carriers are unveiling new models right now, many of them considerably improved from their predecessors.

Second-generation models of two smart phones, Motorola's Q and Samsung's Blackjack, have just hit the streets as is the next version of Samsung's SCH u900, which has been slimmed down and given a more memorable name, the FlipShot.

And most phone sellers are offering deals on these newer models. AT&T stores, for example, are offering 50 percent off all models except the iPhone today. And online stores such as Amazon always have good deals, often far lower than the carriers offer directly to consumers.

Cellular carriers traditionally charged the same early termination fee whether you broke a contract 1 month early or 23 months early.

Last year, however, Verizon broke with tradition and began prorating termination fees. AT&T followed suit last month.

Now Sprint and T-Mobile have said they'll begin prorating early termination fees in the first half of next year.

Sprint has also announced that it would let customers switch service plans without signing a new contract, a practice that Verizon began last month.

Pandora, the Internet service that feeds you music based on songs or artists you like, has struck a deal with AT&T. Folks who have compatible phones and subscribe to AT&T's 3G data network can listen to up to 100 Pandora stations created just for them.

I've always liked Pandora, and I've always thought that cellphones were the key to bringing Internet radio everywhere. (Now they just have to plug into car radios so you can hear your stations through good speakers.)

That said, there's one downside. The service costs $9 a month on top of the $20 a month you pay for 3G data.

This may be worthwhile for some music listeners, but it's a great illustration of why so many people hate cellphone carriers. Pandora is a free Internet service. The $20 spent on 3G is to provide Internet access. Where in God's name does AT&T get off charging people extra?

It's not just AT&T. Sprint, which also offers Pandora on some phones, also charges for it. And all the other carriers charge for crazy fees for other services, like unlocking the GPS technology in the phone you supposedly own.

Still, if you're an AT&T customer who's interested in Pandora, here are the phones that work with the service: Samsung SYNC, a717, a737, Moto V3xx, RAZR 2, LG trax, LG Cu400 or CU405.

If you hate the Web browser that came with your cellphone, check out the new version of Opera Mini 4. This is a different product than Opera Mobile, the smart-phone browser that I wrote about a couple weeks ago.

Opera Mini is designed specifically for small phones that can use Java and while it's never going to make you forget your full-sized computer, it's much better than anything else I've seen for small phones. The product went through three beta releases before Opera decided it was ready for this full-fledged offering.

Before downloading here, check out Opera's Web site to see the features and make sure the program works with your phone and carrier.

By this time next year, Sprint Nextel should be serving Dallas and many other big cites with wireless broadband at speeds of 8 mbs for downloads and 1 mbs uploads.

That sounds pretty fast to me, but folks who think it sounds achingly slow should take heart. Nokia has just announced a successful test of technology that will offer wireless Internet at speeds of 100 mbs, supposedly by 2010.

Why would anyone need speeds like that on mobile phones? Beats me, but they'd come in handy for laptop computers and other serious devices. Read below for specifics from Nokia.

About a month has passed since Apple released the infamous iPhone software update that that disabled third-party applications (and turned some iPhones into bricks). Folks like me predicted that hackers would have a work-around in just a few days. Others predicted that Apple's update would forever block outsiders.

Both camps got it wrong. The update did stymie hackers for a couple weeks, but they eventually devised jailbreak software that's easier than ever. A single click and opens up a world of video games, digital books and lots more.

If you want to give it a try, point your iPhone browser to jailbreakme.com. The same site will also unlock and iPod Touch. After you do that, you can find lots of applications here and here.

Is it safe to try? I know many iPhone users who got burned by the last update and don't want to risk it again.

That said, my best guess is that Apple won't punish users again. The company recently announced that it would officially open its iPhone software to third-party applications early next year, so it's unlikely that the company would hammer people who want to jump the gun a bit.

Screen shot of Opera Mobile: Not the iPhone but not bad

Speaking of Opera, the little-known Scandinavian browser maker, the company also makes great browsers for both smart phones and smaller cellphones.

Unlike the Opera browser for desktop and laptop computers, Opera Mobile (for smart phones) and Mini (for smaller phones) costs money, but both products are worth the $10. They far, far outclass the mobile version of Internet Explorer and bring something resembling the real Web to your palm (or your Palm).

Will they make your cellphone as cool as the iPhone? No. But they're very fast and very good and deserve to be better known.

yeah, it's a test post.

but I have to admit, it's a pretty cool handheld.

check out my full review in the paper on friday.

(photo and link added after the fact using my laptop, because there are limits to what I'm willing to do on a thumb keyboard and touchscreen)

Research In Motion, makers of the quite popular Blackberry phones has finally released a Blackberry Pearl smartphone that runs on CDMA networks. This is great news for Sprint and Verizon users.
According to RIM, the new model, the Blackberry 8130 features:

--A new “Page View” option which allows users to quickly zoom in on a specific area of a full web page
--New font rendering technology for clearer type even at small font sizes
--Rich multimedia capabilities, including a 2 megapixel camera and an improved media player that allows users to create and edit playlists right on the handset
--Bluetooth® 2.0 support for hands-free use with headsets, car kits and Bluetooth peripherals
--Enhanced phone audio quality and background noise cancellation for better performance in loud environments
--Built-in GPS and BlackBerry Maps navigation program
--Support for high-speed EV-DO networks

The folks at Hawk Electronics were curious where customers drew the line when it came to cellphone use, so they decided to email customers and ask. They got responses from 213 women and 245 men, most of them from the DFW area. Here's what they found:

- 58% said that cell phone users should never send text messages while in a movie theater

· Only 6% believed having a downloaded musical ring tone was appropriate in a work setting

· Respondents were almost evenly split on the possibility of being able to use cell phones on airplanes during flights

· 90% of respondents said that phones should either be turned off completely, not answered and / or checked only during a free moment at a restaurant

- 80% of the respondents admit to talking on their cell phone while driving without the use of a hands-free device;

· Of that same group, 57% believe that it should be against the law to drive and talk on a mobile device without the use of a hands-free device;

· Only 32% admit to having checked e-mail or sending a text message while driving.

I find it hard to believe that 20 percent of these people have never talked on the phone while driving. I find it impossible to believe that anyone supports a move to allow phone calls on airplanes.

A handful of technology writers were on the Chicago River Monday night to participate in a live demonstration of Sprint Nextel's WiMax network.

In theory, this next-generation wireless technology can transmit data over vast areas as quickly as your cable modem can shoot it over a wire. But no one had ever tried to build a big WiMax network until this year, when Sprint announced that it would install WiMax in many of the nation's largest cities.

None of those networks are open to the public yet, but reporters generally praised what they saw Monday night. Here's an excerpt from the review at Ars Technica:

We also watched some talking heads on CNN.com. In both windowed and full-screen modes, the video quality was very good: no dropped frames or hiccups of any kind. It was similar to what I get at home with my 8Mbps/1Mbps cable service from Comcast....

Both the performance and experience were far superior to Verizon's EV-DO service....Speed aside, the browsing experience was much different than any other mobile broadband I've used. Unlike other wireless services, which feel "laggy" and offer a markedly different experience than a wired connection, the WiMAX demo was more akin to DSL and cable.

The first two cities -- Washington and Chicago -- were to have come online late this year, but Sprint has pushed that back to March or April. Dallas is slated for launch later next year. Sprint has suffered some hard times of late, but if this roll-out goes smoothly, it's going to be a real game changer both for the company and for wireless devices.

Everyone touts the potential of mobile video, but there's just one problem: anything small enough to be genuinely mobile is too small for a decent monitor. Some tech companies have tried to solve the problem by getting users to wear video glasses. Others are developing flexible plastic monitors that roll up like window shades, but Texas Instruments has devised a third approach.

The Dallas-based company has a prototype device that projects video from a cellphone onto a wall, a sheet of paper or whatever else you point it at. I first saw it at a trade show in Florida and I was pretty impressed. It wasn't quite as bright as you'd like and it was a bit heavy, but it looked like the company was on the right track. Apparently, I'm not the only one who thinks so.

New research suggests they may. A 2.4-year-long study of 300 people from Britain, Australia and the Netherlands found slower brain function in frequent cellphone users.

The scientists behind the study, published in the International Journal of Neuroscience, note that no amount of cellphone use slowed brain speed below "normal" levels -- just to the very low range of normal.

PC Magazine has the full story in layman's terms. The journal story is a bit more complex, probably too complex for cellphone users like me. I plan to spend my time thinking simple thoughts and waiting for my new Amish overlords.

If you'd like nutritionists to provide a meal-by-meal analysis of your diet, look no further than your cellphone.

A Canadian company called Myca offers a service that asks users to snap a cellphone photo of everything they eat and send in the pictures. In return, subscribers receive a video every other week that offers suggestions on how they could do better.

The videos, which come via email, cost $10 a month, but the service has proved a modest success. MyFoodPhone has attracted more than 5,000 customers in just over a year of operation.

Now Myca is branching out into more ambitious territory, video consultations with doctors.

This video from iPhone Unlocking shows how easy it is to unlock an iPhone if you have this software, which will doubtless appear online soon.

AT&T is very lucky that Sprint and Verizon operate on a totally different technology or a lot of Americans would be doing this in the very near future.

T-Mobile operates on the same technology of AT&T, though, so this should be a possibility for T-Mobile customers who want an iPhone (and don't mind risking the wrath of Apple/AT&T).

Note that the entire video was shot with another cellphone, a Nokia N95. A bit fuzzy but impressive for a cellphone.

It looks exactly like an iPhone, so I initially assumed it was a gag, but apparently not.

Engadget reports that Nokia cheerfully admitted to copying the iPhone in designing the software for this device. Phones with some of these features should apparently come out next year.

Some viewers are disappointed by the video because the phone doesn't appear to do anything the iPhone can't. Others noted that Nokia's phone won't have to do anything new to be a big improvement on the iPhone -- if Nokia launches an unlocked version of the phone that operates on 3G data networks.

Gizmodo notes that Nokia execs say they were only trying to demonstrate new software on a mock-up device -- not a real handset. However, Gizmodo also notes that Balda, the company that makes touchscreens for Apple's iPhone, says it has gotten an order for 6 to 8 million touch screens from a leading handset maker. Hmmm.

Via the wonderful blog Marginal Revolution, I learned of an interesting study on the whether cellphone use increases car crashes:

...we document a 20-30% rise in cellular call volume during the time of the day-- 9pm on weekdays-- when cell phone providers systematically transition from "peak" to "off-peak" pricing. We then measure the resulting increase in fatal and non-fatal crashes during this period as compared to weekends and earlier periods which serve as controls. We find no evidence for a rise in crashes, and estimate small positive upper bounds for the effect size at 9pm (~1% for all crashes, and 2.4% for fatal crashes).

Here's the full paper: Driving under the (cellular) influence. Here's a press release from UCal Berkeley.

Author's plea: Please do not test the validity of this paper by talking on your cellphone will driving around near the editorial offices of The Dallas Morning News.

Many mobile phones come with voice recognition software, but most of it requires users to limit themselves to very specific commands, and all of it struggles to understand what you say. Vlingo, a new company from suburban Boston, is rolling out a product that may represent a significant improvement. Of course, it's easy to look cool on a demonstration video like the one below. I'll report back when the company releases something that works with Verizon.

A Gizmodo reader from India reports that someone there is selling the right to play with an iPhone. The price is 500 rupees -- about $12 -- for a 15-minute session with the device. Here's Gizmodo's take.

I've had an iPhone on loan from AT&T for about a month now, and I do love it. That said, I don't love it to the tune of nearly $1 a minute. I hardly love air enough to pay $1 a minute for it.

At least, it probably wouldn't be as annoying as getting a 300-page bill for your new iPhone.

And it's not like she's the only one getting her iPhone bill shipped by steamer trunk.

Apparently, the bills itemize every single file downloaded when using the EDGE network, even if you've signed up for the unlimited data plan and each download costs you nothing at all.

Granted, there's no real harm done here -- except perhaps to the gigantic swaths of forest harvested to make the paper -- but surely someone at Apple or AT&T will put a stop to this insanity, since it makes both companies look dumb.

I lost my aging cell phone last Thursday, and while I had been planning to get a new phone for some time (I was eligible for a $150 contract renewal rebate from Sprint), I did want to keep the photos of my kids I had stored on the phone.

Even losing the contacts on my phone wasn't a huge deal, since I can reconstruct those as needed.

But the pix are gone for good.

So make sure you e-mail or offload in some form on a regular basis any important photos you have stored on your phone.

Guess what?

Driving while text messaging is a really bad idea!

And yet, despite a new survey from mobile messaging firm Pinger Inc. that found that roughly 90 percent of American adults believe that texting from behind the wheel is as dangerous as driving drunk and should be outlawed, lots of people still do it.

According to the survey, two-thirds of adults who drive a car and have used text messaging said they read the messages while steering and almost as many (57 percent) said they have actually composed and sent instant messages or mobile e-mail while driving.

Yikes.

Of course, Pinger is using those findings to sell you something, in this case a mobile voice-mail messaging service that they say is safer than punching out a text message (you basically send a voice mail rather than a text message, so you can use a hands-free system to record your thoughts).

But I have to imagine a lot of those messages go something like: "...so I'll be back in the office soon and then aiieeeeeeee!!!!" *crash*