Has it really been two years since Meizu announced their iPhone clone? If any other mobile phone manufacturer had taken two years to go from product announcement to actual product launch, we’d have written them off as a non-player in a mobile space that’s becoming fast saturated with touchscreen smartphone options. But, lucky for the infamous iPhone copy-cats at Meizu, we’re still intrigued by the Chinese-made Meizu M8.

The Meizu M8 has been reviewed by IT168.com and they’ve apparently come away impressed. The Meizu M8 sports a strong feature set and even boasts a finger-friendly user interface that does a good job of covering up the handset’s Windows CE roots. Add to that a high-resolution 3.4-inch touchscreen (480 x 720), a decent 3 megapixel camera, removable battery, and an iPhone-inspired piano-black casing, and the Meizu M8 starts to sound like a capable yet sleek smartphone.

[Via: EngadgetMobile]

RIM’s first touchscreen BlackBerry is proving to be one heck of a media-darling, the likes of which the iPhone would be proud. Some shower the BlackBerry Storm with praise, while others belittle the BlackBerry’s SurePress click-able touchscreen. Needless to say, it’s been a stormy ride (excuse the pun) for the Storm.

The latest pundit to sound off on the polarizing BlackBerry Storm is the New York Times‘ David Pogue. His take on the Storm? Disappointing, at best. A downright failure, at worst.

Pogue highlights his frustrations with RIM’s seemingly unpolished touch-based BlackBerry interface. He says the SurePress touchscreen, while innovative (and definitely interesting), is more awkward than intuitive. If you don’t know, the SurePress touchscreen uses light finger touches to scroll, zoom, and highlight keyboard keys. A harder press on the touchscreen yields a tactile click that registers a keypress. But, rather than exploit the touchscreen’s two-stage touch input setup, the SurePress touchscreen seems tailored for keyboard use only.

Mr. Pogue accuses RIM of over-extending themselves with multiple headlining handset launches over a few short months, leaving the company with fewer resources that might have more fully developed the Storm’s touch interface. Using a virtual keyboard opened up the possibility for the Storm’s keyboard to be more flexible than a physical keyboard - serving up all kinds of characters and “hot keys” like “.com” or the “@” symbol.

Continuing his Storm bashing, Pogue cites major bugs with the touch-based BlackBerry OS. Storm-plaguing bugs range from issues like the camera application spontaneously starting up in the middle of an email to excruciatingly long screen rotations and application launches.

Perhaps Pogue’s stance on the BlackBerry Storm can be summed up with his statement:

“I haven’t found a soul who tried this machine who wasn’t appalled, baffled or both.”

Agree? Disagree? Sound off in the comments section!

[Via: NYT]

Ah yes. The hotly anticipated Sony Ericsson XPERIA X1 is just a few days away, and we’ve got the down-low on the unreleased goods.

Sony Ericsson is launching their new flagship smartphone brand with the XPERIA X1. The Sony Ericsson XPERIA brand is the creme de la creme of the handset maker’s smartphone, and XPERIA X1 is the inaugural flagship handset.

The Sony Ericsson XPERIA X1 uses the Swedish-Japanese company’s new Panel UI to mask its Windows Mobile downfalls. Each Sony Ericsson “Panel” represents a customizable homescreen that can be configured to show various personal data (email, calendar, etc.) as well as application shortcuts. Different homescreens serve different functions. At work, you’ll want to use a work-oriented homescreen - email, calendar, contacts, etc. For play, a more casual homescreen might be appropriate - applications, music, games, etc. Hitting the gym? Fire up the media Panel - you get the picture.

But, the new Sony Ericsson Panel UI isn’t all there is to the XPERIA X1. With integrated GPS, WiFi, 3G data connection, and a 3.2 megapixel camera, the XPERIA X1 is chock full of the latest smartphone features that you’d expect from a high-end smartphone. And, the slide-out QWERTY keyboard ensures that this touchscreen smartphone isn’t limited to just touch-inputs.

Keep reading…

(Full gallery on last page)

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Sony Ericsson C905

I also had my hands on a C905 the other day for five minutes, and below you can also find out what I thought of it. The point of these comments are to give you a flavour of what might enamour or disappoint you if were to have same time to play with the device – and thus get a view on whether it’s buy-worthy!

build quality – superb – I am impressed. Only reservation is on the slide mechanism for the camera, as these have a history of opening in peoples pockets, and draining the battery!

key layout – very good indeed – good response too

slide mechanism – clunky, in a very good way

User interface – not really changed at all from K800i – nice, but you could argue needs an update

Camera – simply stunning!

option-finding complexity – very high – lots of layers of menus again

Speed – quick to use, nice

media handling – this is an odd one – images are excellent, videos are really not good at all!!

So in summary, would I buy one? The major problem I have with this device is that the UI really isn’t evolved much, if any, from the three year old K800i. Come on SE, you have to keep wowing us, sitting on laurels does not make me buy a phone! But but but, the camera is back to being a revelation. I suspect a proper 8MP camera would take better pics, but the pics on here are still VERY good!

Overall rating: positive – I like!
Grade: A- (a few tweaks and it would be an A or A+!)

Well look what the delivery man dropped off today. HTC’s flagship QWERTY smartphone is now available as the Sprint HTC Touch Pro, and we’ve got hands on the goods.

HTC has given Sprint first-dibs on the branded HTC Touch Pro, allowing Sprint to offer their customers the best that HTC has to offer in the Windows Mobile-powered QWERTY smartphone. The Sprint Touch Pro takes the Sprint Touch Diamond (a re-branded HTC Touch Diamond) to a whole new level by slapping on a slide-out QWERTY keyboard to the back of the full-VGA touchscreen display. RAM and ROM are upgraded from the Touch Diamond, as is the 3.2 megapixel camera that now sports a “flashlight.”

The microSD card slot is a little hard to get at, and requires the removal of the battery cover. But, despite their many similarities, the Sprint Touch Pro does indeed feel like a completely different animal from the HTC Touch Diamond. The addition of the slide-out QWERTY keyboard (with the slickest slide-mechanism on the market that gives off a satisfying “snick” as it opens) gives the handset an entirely different experience - surfing the web with the simple knowledge that a full keyboard is ready at your beck and call changes the experience altogether. The VGA touchscreen even feels more responsive and less “squishy.”

Does the QWERTY keyboard make that much of a difference? We’ll see…

Full review to follow, for now enjoy the unboxing pics!

T-Mobile G1 with full QWERTY keyboard

The T-Mobile G1 is made by HTC. We’ve been closely following HTC’s rise to fame as the premier Windows Mobile smartphone manufacturer on the planet. HTC makes some seriously high-quality hardware that never fails to impress us - with solid build quality and a penchant for the high-tech, HTC devices deliver on sensory and practical aspects. As such, we expected the HTC-made T-Mobile G1 to be a robust handset packed with the latest mobile technology.

Did the T-Mobile G1 live up to the high standards that we’ve set for HTC smartphones?

Keep reading to find out.

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“”The T3 uses airSOUND® single-point-stereo technology to power the personal stereo aura.”

Holy crap, that sounds friggin’ magical. What new age witch must I barter with to acquire this sacred talisman? What tragic curse does it bear? More importantly, how much closer to musical godhood will I be with this newfangled aura of Pure Stereo?

In all honesty, the aura thing is actually pretty cool.

The Orbitsound T3 is a wired accessory that very simply plays music from whatever you plug it into - phone, laptop, iPod, you name it. It’s biggest selling feature is the aforementioned airSOUND, which can be pretty impressive when it evades a veritable minefield of caveats.

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Today I’m playing with the apps. Not the regular ones that come with every Symbian S60 device, but with few apps that Nokia’s WOM World folks pre-loaded on the E71 that was sent to me. Without further ado, let’s start:

• First comes the Advanced Call Manager, a handy tool for those that receive tons of calls every day and need some way to get through the clutter. The app allows creation of black, white and custom lists, and setting of an appropriate action for each of the lists defined. For instance, you can reject, divert calls, or mute the ringer for those in the black list; or send personalized SMS or play personalized greeting for those in the white list. I can see this being handy for many folks, but since I don’t receive that many calls, I doubt I’ll be using the Advanced Call Manager.
• Then there’s We:offset, a Nokia’s application designed to help users do their bit for the environment. Basically it’s a mobile CO2 emission offsetting tool. As I’m trialing the E71 for two weeks, again this won’t be something I’ll use. However, if you’re an eco-aware person (and everyone should be in this time) who at the same time travels a lot, this will be a neat reminder-app to keep you always in the loop on how much greenhouse gases your travels produce.
• Finally, there’s SkyeQuiKey - a must-have for every E71 owner. The ultra-useful application lets you quickly find Contacts, Applications, Bookmarks, etc. using direct key presses from the device’s idle screen. Now when I need to call someone, I just type first few letter of the person’s name and voila - I get his name on the screen. It’s that simple!

That’s it for today. Tomorrow I’ll be pairing the Nokia E71 with my Stowaway Sierra Bluetooth keyboard in order to write an actual article with it. Stay tuned…

OK, I admit I’m lazy today. The air pressure is super-low and I’m not feeling well. I won’t go to the gym today as I previously said I will. Instead I’m going to ramble about some things I don’t like about the Nokia E71. These are all minor things, but they do stand in my way to call it the perfect smartphone. Don’t get me wrong - the Nokia E71 is the best Symbian S60 smartphone ever made, or at least that’s my take. The E90 Communicator may have a bigger screen, but can you imagine carrying it around in in your pocket? I don’t think so.

Anyway, here are three things I don’t like about the E71:

• Headset jack - there are actually two things I don’t like about it. First of all, it’s a 2.5mm instead of 3.5mm — the 3.5mm headphones are much cheaper. Let’s say that’s not a problem - you can buy an adapter for few bucks and use any standard 3.5mm headphones. However, why on Earth is the headphone jack located on the side of the device is beyond me. You can argue there were no room on the top of the phone, but I don’t buy that. It’s a must to have a headphone jack on the top of the phone. It’s way more convenient that way.
• Where’s TV Out? - I do understand the E71 is not an NSeries device, but I do want the TV out nonetheless. While I’m on the subject, I must add I hate the whole notion of product differentiation. It may drive companies profits up, but it’s bad for the high-end users who (like me) want a single all-in-one device.
• Ctrl/Chr share the same key - we saw this will be fixed in the upcoming E63 model. Both keys are very important and each of them deserves a separate key. Sure, that would require smaller space key, but I can live with that.

In addition, I could also add I would love to see an Infra-Red port located at the top. It’s not a big deal, but with an application like irRemote for S60, I could turn the E71 into a universal remote control. Having an IrDA port at the top certainly helps in that sense.

And that’s about it. I like everything else. As I said, this is the best Symbian S60 smartphone!

I’ve been wanting to get into stereo Bluetooth headsets ever since seeing the Motorokr S9s getting launched last year. That was the first time that I could picture myself actually wearing Bluetooth headphones without looking like one of those technophytes on the bus who were too cool for wires, but not cool enough to realize how bulky most stereo Bluetooth headsets looked at the time. I was a little wary of these S-2s initially, since they seemed to fall into that category, but was pleasantly surprised by the sound quality after putting them on - almost enough to ignore the pinching behind my ears.

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