Shout About Mobiles

Last weekend we were treated to an unlock solution for the latest iPhone firmware. Now you can have the latest firmware with any SIM card. Unfortunately the 3G iPhone is not supported just yet, but we would imagine it won’t be long until it is.

The iPhone Dev Team have designed a new version of the Pwnage tool. This is software that lets set your iPhone free, much like on Windows Mobile devices. What you essentially do is download the original iPhone firmware, run it through the Pwnage tool customizing whatever you want such as preinstalled apps and apply it through iTunes. Easy as pie.

If you have recently update your software on the iPhone Apple then you will need this tool.
An extremely popular tool, breaking download records every day. This really makes the iPhone what it should have been from the start, a fully customizable device.

The Samsung i900 Omnia, one of the latest Windows mobile phones is about to go on sale in Europe and as part of its launch is set to come free with an Xbox 360 when you preorder the phone.

This is no joke, anyone who shows interest and preorders will get this superb games console. Now I know mobile phones have always come with promotional items of some kind but this is ridiculous!

What’s the downside? Well that would be the price. At €499 it is not the cheapest device, but once mobile phone companies add it to their offering it will come down in price a fair bit. With promotional items on offer like this, is it a sign of desperate times for mobile phone makers?

The Omnia has WM 6.1 installed and has a 3.2 inch display. There is a 5 megapixel camera too with face and smile detection. Geotagging is also supported thanks to the built in GPS receiver. There are plans for an 8 and 16 GB version, both supporting a microSD card slot.

Very soon we will be comparing the Samsung i900 Omnia to the other Windows Mobile phones out on the market.

Last.fm, the legal online music station has now got its very own application for the iPhone and iPod and it is available to download from the iTunes App store.

The application gives access to loads of information on the artist including biographies, events and more, all from the simple little application. One disadvantage of the iPhones stubbornness when it comes to running applications in the background is that any links you use to boot up safari (the phones browser) will cause the application to quit automatically.

To download the new application, simply head towards the music category on iTunes.

Well with all the difficulties in getting stock of the iPhone, it seems that there were a total of one million iPhone 3G devices sold since its release, breaking the original iPhone record of 74 days. So clearly the new device is off to a good start.

Also, the iPhone 2.0 firmware was released last week and Apple saw 10 million downloads in the first weekend, breaking yet another record.

Steve Jobs of Apple, said, Developers have created some extraordinary applications, and the App Store can wirelessly deliver them to every iPhone and iPod touch user instantly. On the App Store, there are around 800 applications ready to download for the iPhone, with at least 200 free to use.

Unfortunately the HTC Touch Diamond, as good as it is has a rather low battery life and a such quite easily drains away should you use it more than twice a day. Why on earth all this modern technology cant produce a smaller, more powerful battery, I don’t know. Why couldn’t HTC just give it the same battery as previous models.

Well if you’re a little fed up of having to charge the device up every five minutes then never fear, there is a replacement battery available, along with the replacement battery cover to match the Diamonds finish.

Obviously there is a downside to the new battery; the thickness of the device has increased as has the weight. But that shouldn’t be a problem as the extra battery life it brings will be quite welcome. Now if only HTC could have made the new back flat to help the usability issues that the device has been plagued with.

The cost of the new cover and battery is estimated to be around the £40 mark.

Blackberry finally has an answer to the latest breed of touchscreen phones. After a long time in the making we can introduce the world to, the Blackberry Thunder 9500 with new Touch UI OS interface.

RIM are out to prove that its not all about Apple and Windows Mobile. The new device will have a large touchscreen TFT display with 360 x 480 resolution. Browsing the internet on the device will be amazing and easily match the Safari browser on the iPhone. It is hoped that there will be an auto screen rotation feature too.

The Thunder will more than likely run on a 624 MHz CPU which was recently seen on the soon to be released Blackberry Bold. Vodafone will apparently have the rights on the new device with pricing and availability yet to be announced.

Well the pick up in store only rule has been revoked as O2 have now started accepting pre orders for the new iPhone 3G. The device itself is to be released on the 11th July.

At the moment the online store has some rather large banners that give the terms and conditions about the iPhone 3G. Customers choose a tariff online, sign the 18 month contract online and as if by magic the phone arrives by courier on the 11th July free of charge. The only limitation is one iPhone 3G per order!

People who purchase their iPhone online will of course have to activate their phone by connecting it to iTunes. Tariffs for the phone vary from £30 per month up to £75 per month and all come with options for 8gb or 16gb version.

O2 has said it will only offer the black version and not the white version. Don’t think this should really bother people that much, as white will get dirty and totally devalue the phone.

Will you be buying an iPhone 3G, or are you happy with your current phone?

The mobile phone industry will try to stop strict price caps on texts and data downloads today by warning that such regulation will cut capital spending and profit margins considerably. Mobile operators are complaining that their capital spending fell from 13% of revenues in 2005 to 11% last year. This could fall even further if the plans get implemented.

The industry has also been asked to introduce specific measures such as warnings to prevent phone bill shocks for data roaming services such as downloading videos when travelling abroad.
The GSMA says that a few mobile operators have cut prices for data roaming. T-Mobile has cut prices by 80% and Vodafone have reduced the price per Mb by 45%. Text charges when roaming are still far too high.

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