Will hails from The City of Angels - Los Angeles, California. He spends his time playing with his numerous gadgets and looking forward to seeing what future holds for mobile technology. An avid promoter of a fully "digital" life, he promotes the widespread adoption of truly mobile, paper-less living. He dreams of the day when he can go completely digital. No more snail mail, paper receipts, bound books, notepads/spiral notebooks, credit cards, hard currency. He's a digital warrior - fighting for the converged life. He is an idealist and a realist - he has a perfect view of what the world should be but knows that the world is not perfect. Can we ever hope to see Will's dream become reality? We'll see...
Sometimes size doesn’t matter. Most other times, though, size really counts. Take smartphones, for example. We’re always looking for a thin waistline (we’re a superficial bunch), big helpings of processor power, and a huge touchscreen. It’s all about size. We would have never thought a Windows Mobile device would be the first smartphone to completely meet all those criteria. The HTC HD2 Windows Phone packs in a 1Ghz Snapdragon processor and a 4.3-inch capacitive touchscreen into a package about as thick as a No. 2 yellow pencil. It’s about as good as it gets for Windows Mobile. Heck, the HD2 massive touchscreen, powerful processor and impressive 5-megapixel camera make the handset one of the best phones of the year.
What? A Windows Mobile phone that’s actually worthy of competing at the same level as the iPhone and Android phones like the Motorola (NYSE: MOT) Droid? You bet your ass. Here’s the thing: HTC does a great job of covering up the Windows Mobile interface with its own TouchFLO 3D UI (infused with HTC’s “Sense” design philosophy, of course). So, the HD2 might be a Windows Phone, but with the TF3D interface in place, it’s easy to forgive the HD2’s WinMo roots.
Add in a dash of 4.3-inch capacitive touchscreen goodness, sprinkle on a 5-megapixel camera with dual-LED flash, and add a pinch of GPS, 3G data, WiFi and digital compass, 3.5mm headphone jack, and a microSD card slot, and the HD2’s recipe is sure to please even the staunchest Windows Mobile haters. The barely-there bezel surrounding the touchscreen really highlights the ginormous display – it dominates the handset.
Some say the display is too big, which makes the handset too big, but we have to disagree. The HD2 is just thin enough to pull off the bigscreen look without feeling bloated or unwieldy. It feels a little wide in the hand, but nothing we couldn’t get used to. And, when you’re watching a music video or browsing the web, any complaints about the HD2’s size immediately vaporize into the ether.
We’ll leave the Windows Mobile commentary for a full review, but for now, enjoy the HTC HD2 hands-on video and photo gallery!
If this were 2007, we’d be all about HP’s triumphant launch of their latest “WinMo” smartphone. But, seeing as how it’s almost 2010 and Windows Phones are losing market- and mind-share to iPhone and Android hardware, it’s hard to get excited about HP’s new business-class iPAQ Glisten for AT&T (NYSE: T). Still, it’s good to see HP finding it’s way back to the smartphone segment.
HP has announced their iPAQ Glisten as the AT&T production version of the HP K3/Obsidian that we’ve spied in the past. The smartphone sports a 2.5-inch AMOLED touchscreen (QVGA), 3G data, WiFi, GPS and a 3.1-megapixel camera – all powered by Windows Mobile 6.5 Professional. It’s good to see HP’s aging iPAQ brand coming back to market with high-tech features like the AMOLED display and integrated GPS receiver. OLED displays make for some serious color-rich pictures and videos while consuming less power than traditional LCD displays, which is a win-win in our book. Check out our Samsung Behold II hands-on video (in HD) to see for yourself how bright and crisp an AMOLED display can be.
The HP iPAQ Glisten is aimed at the enterprise segment, and will only be available on the AT&T website. Price comes in at $179.99 when purchased with a new 2-year contract.
Do you have bunch of different logins and passwords that you have to remember? Maybe all those pot brownies and bong hits in college destroyed your working memory. Whatever the case, you’re probably in need of a solid password manager app for your iPhone. Lucky for you, 1Password Pro for iPhone is now available for FREE on the AppStore.
1Password Pro is a special edition version of the award-winning password app on the iPhone. It saves your usernames, passwords, credit card numbers, notes and other sensitive information so that you don’t have to worry about remembering your password. 1Password will even log you into websites with a single tap.
1Password Pro was $4.99, but the price has been completely slashed for the Thanksgiving holiday. It’s now free and ready for your download. Even if your memory hasn’t vanished up in a cloud of skunky goodness, 1Password will probably make your life a lot easier.
If you thought Sony Ericsson (NYSE: SNE)’s high-fashion XPERIA Pureness was pretty enough to make up for its low-tech attitude and nothing-to-cough-at price, you’re in luck. Sony Ericsson is apparently planning to launch a follow-up to the XPERIA Pureness with a Pureness 2. According to Electricpig, the Pureness 2 isn’t anywhere close to an official announcement (let alone a launch), but early reports indicate that Sony Ericsson is looking to create a more simplified and stripped-down Pureness phone. Sony Ericsson’s Pureness designer, Daniel Mauritzson, says the focus right now is on “taking away” features.
Imagine that. In a world where feature-packed smartphones jockey for visibility in a crowded market, Sony Ericsson is moving away from feature-bloat and looking to bring “counterbalance” to the smartphone market. Not just that, but Sony Ericsson is slapping its highest-end XPERIA brand on the Pureness handsets. That’s saying a lot about what Sony Ericsson thinks the public wants in a mobile phone.
The XPERIA Pureness is already a good looker, we can’t wait to see what the Pureness2 will bring to the table.
The holidays are here, and that means mobile enthusiasts like us will soon flock to their favorite retail or online store to spend some hard earned money on a new mobile gadget. To help you on your quest to empty your wallets in search of the hottest mobile gadgets on market, IntoMobile is proud to introduce TopTechGifts.com. In partnership with some of the hottest gadget blogs on the internet, we’ve compiled a list of the Top Tech Gifts of 2009, complete with reviews and expert ratings. Whether your in the market for a friend or loved one, or just looking to score the coolest mobile-related gear available today, Top Tech Gifts should help you with your next purchase.
You can find IntoMobile’s EIC Will Park putting in his couple cents in the Top Tech Gifts mobile section here. Or, for the entire gadget breakdown, hit up TopTechGifts.com.
The Verizon Samsung Omnia II’s launch isn’t going to be exciting just for Windows Mobile fans, it’s going to be exciting for anyone that’s been to Swype’s continuous finger-motion typing interface. That’s because Verizon (NYSE: VZ)’s Samsung Omnia II will be the first production device to support the innovative Swype typing interface, which Samsung has dubbed “Genius Texting.” Rather than having you tap our individual letters on an on-screen keyboard to form words, Swype allows the user to trace paths between those letters. The software analyzes your finger’s path to determine your desired word, increasing accuracy and increasing your typing speed.
The Swype-powered “Genius Texting” feature will be built into the Omnia II when it launches next month. The innovative keyboard still allows you to tap out words like you’re probably used to doing on a touchscreen smartphone. Should you feel so inclined, you can start tracing your word with a single continuous “swipe” motion. Gestures are also supported for tasks like capitalizing a letter – just swipe an upside down “V” motion onto the keyboard and off you go!
Windows Mobile 6.5 Professional might not be enough to get you to buy the Omnia II, but Swype’s new keyboard sure makes a strong case for putting an Omnia II in your pocket. Or, if Android’s more your style, we’re hearing that Swype will soon make its way to your favorite Google (NSDQ: GOOG) mobile OS. Word on the street has Swype hitting the Android platform in the first quarter of 2010.
Say good-bye to the decades-old typing paradigm and make room for the new wave of Swype-powered keyboards!
The growing popularity of the iPhone platform can only mean one thing. Nope, it has nothing to do with the flakiness of AT&T (NYSE: T)’s 3G network in San Francisco. It means that we’ll be seeing more iPhone security threats rearing their ugly heads. A new variant of the original “Ikee” iPhone worm, dubbed “Ikee-B,” targets jailbroken iPhones with unsecured SSH passwords. The new Ikee-B worm infects susceptible iPhones and lies hidden until the user visits Dutch bank ING’s website. Once logged in, Ikee-B steals passwords and financial information.
To be clear, only jailbroken iPhones with default SSH passwords are vulnerable to the Ikee-B worm. Previous iPhone attacks demonstrated the need for jailbroken iPhone users to change the default password, but it’s apparently still a big enough security hole to inspire this new bit of malware. Even worse, this version of the worm isn’t just going to “Rick Roll” your homescreen, it has the potential to drain your bank account.
Now, before you panic, keep in mind that Ikee-B is only being reported in The Netherlands. It’s possible that the worm could make its way to other European countries and Australia. More importantly, you can close your jailbroken iPhone’s vulnerability by changing your default SSH password. We have instructions on how to do that here.
There’s an iPhone infection going around, so we thought it would be a good idea to post a quick “How-to” guide for changing your jailbroken iPhone’s SSH password. Unlike the Swine Flu, no amount of hand-washing or coughing into the bend in your arm is going to prevent your jailbroken iPhone from contracting a malicious infection. On the plus-side, changing the default password on your jailbroken iPhone should inoculate your handset from current iPhone worms.
If you’re using a jailbroken iPhone, iPhone 3G or iPhone 3GS, and you’ve messed around with SSH before, we highly recommend you change your SSH password.
Here’s how:
Since you’re jailbroken, you have Cydia installed on your iPhone. Fire up Cydia.
Find the “MobileTerminal” app and install it.
Fire up the “MobileTerminal” app from your homescreen.
Type in the command “su root” and hit enter (without quotes).
When prompted for your password, type in “alpine” and hit enter.
Type in the command “passwd” and hit enter.
You’ll be prompted for a new password. Enter something you’re likely to remember. Seriously, don’t put down something obscure that you’ll forget – that might come back to bite you later on.
Repeat your new password.
That’s it! You are now protected from all current SSH backdoor security threats.
The entire process takes maybe a minute, depending on how long it takes for you to download/install MobileTerminal and how long it takes you to type in the above commands. There’s really no excuse for not changing your password.
The iPhone is a data hog. Just ask AT&T (NYSE: T) and their strained 3G data network. Data-hungry iPhone users seemingly aren’t able to satisfy their thirst for online information. They’re so ravenous for the all things internet that, according to AdMob, the iPhone accounts for 50% of all smartphone web traffic around the globe. Here, in the US, the iPhone pulls down 55% of all smartphone traffic, mostly through AT&T’s 3G network. That’s a lot of data!
It’s not just the iPhone, either. The smartphone boom has raised Android awareness high enough to boost traffic from Android smartphones to 11% worldwide. In the US, the effect is even more pronounced – Android handsets are responsible for 20% of all smartphone traffic in America. Compelling new Android offerings like the Sprint HTC Hero and T-Mobile myTouch 3G (as well as their European variants) have helped drive up Android market share. Android is fast closing the gap between itself and the iPhone platform.
But, it’s not all roses and rainbows in the smartphone sector. Nokia (NYSE: NOK) has long led the mobile phone market in terms of market share, but has recently been losing share to the likes of iPhone and Android smartphones. The Finns (Nokia) are responsible for 24% of worldwide traffic, with the Symbian platform sending out 25% of all worldwide smartphone web requests. The BlackBerry (NSDQ: RIMM) OS dropped to just 7% of global smartphone requests. Windows Mobile fared even worse, claiming just 3% of global requests. Palm (NSDQ: PALM)’s webOS, despite a European launch of the Palm Pre, dropped down to 2% of the world’s smartphone traffic.
The moral to this story? Smartphones are on the rise. But, it’s not enough to just run a smartphone operating system – consumers are flocking to intuitive touchscreen platforms with desktop-class web browsers. The iPhone and Android platforms obviously meet these criteria. Nokia, BlackBerry, Palm and Microsoft (NSDQ: MSFT) should be asking themselves why their offerings don’t.
Smartphones are going to be hot sellers this holiday season. With the holidays fast approaching, HTC will be pushing hard to cash in on the smartphone boom. How, you ask? By giving $100 to anyone buying a qualifying HTC handset between November 27th and December 31st! If you’re shopping for a new smartphone, better deals will be hard to find.
As part of HTC’s “YOU” marketing campaign, the smartphone maker will mail you a $100 check for buying an HTC smartphone from Verizon (NYSE: VZ), T-Mobile (NYSE: DT) or AT&T (NYSE: T). The only catch, you have to send your old smartphone to HTC – think of it as a trade-in program for your aging mobile phone.
If this were 2007, we’d be all about HP’s triumphant launch of their latest “WinMo” smartphone. But, seeing as how it’s almost 2010 and Windows Phones 
Do you have bunch of different logins and passwords that you have to remember? Maybe all those pot brownies and bong hits in college destroyed your working memory. Whatever the case, you’re probably in need of a solid password manager app for your iPhone. Lucky for you, 1Password Pro for iPhone is now available for 
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The growing popularity of the iPhone platform can only mean one thing. Nope, it has nothing to do with the flakiness of AT&T (
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