We heard last week from a reliable source that we would be seeing a new Blackberry Storm soon, aptly named the Storm 2. It appears our source was nearly 100% correct. RIM’s Alain Segond von Banchet, Channel Sales manager in the Netherlands has confirmed the release of the Storm 2. It will be due out in 2009, and for Europe, late ‘09 or early 2010.
For those of you who prefer to abuse the heck out of your phones, AT&T has launched the new Samsung a657, featuring a plain old keypad. Nope, no QWERTY for your outdoor texting adventures. The a657 features a robust candybar design, with lots of rubber grips and coating to protect it from more wear-and-tear than suffered by a normal cell phone.
Apple is counting down to the 1 BILLIONTH download of an application on the iTunes App store. Every application you download enters you into the contest to win a $10,000 iTunes gift card, an iPod Touch, a Time Capsule, and a MacBook Pro. You’re allowed 25 entries per day, or you can fill out an entry form HERE to enter without downloading an App.
In addition to the emails circulating internally at Sprint, there seems to be new details about the launch date of the Palm Pre. First, employees are saying that there are now vacation freezes for the month of May, which is out of the ordinary. There is also information that Palm and Sprint will be launching the Palm Pre on Sunday, May 17th. This is a preliminary launch date, and if the Pre demand is higher than the supply, Sprint will be moving the launch date to June 29th.
The Samsung Impression is one of the many phones AT&T dropped a few weeks back that features a full QWERTY keyboard. The Impression stands out from the rest as a full touchscreen device that uses an AMOLED display. The phone mimics many smart phone features, and has a very polished UI that reacts smoothly to the user’s command. It’s honestly a great feature phone, yet the experience using it left me feeling I was using a very limited smart phone, which might be the point. As a result, I was left comparing the Impression to the iPhone, not because the iPhone is so great, but simply because the iPhone is the direct competitor for the Impression, especially at the $199 price tag. Users who are looking at the Impression need to think long a hard and analyze their needs before buying this device.
Wired managed to save some photos of a new tablet that Web 2.0 personality Michael Arrington is producing. These photos were leaked and were up for a short period of time before they were taken down, one assumes, at the request of Mr. Arrington. The Crunchpad is a low-cost device that features a large touchscreen display, and low-end components that run a specially designed version of Linux. Crunchpads would compete directly with netbooks, offering consumers a keyboard-less option for accessing the internet on the go and for running software like Skype.
Virgin Mobile has followed suit with every major carrier (and apparently the American automakers too) in the rush to offer deals to consumers in this time of economic crisis. Virgin has announced a new Unlimited minutes plan for $49.99 and “Pink Slip Protection” which waves up to three months of phone bills if you lose your job. Pretty sweet deal for those of you who shy away from contracts and aren’t concerned with having the latest and greatest phones.
DigiTimes has a report that claims that Apple has placed an order of 100 Million 8GB Flash NAND chips from manufacturers, mostly from Samsung. As a result, analysts are saying that supplies will be short until about May. As a result, prices of NAND chips have jumped as much as 16%.
Samsung announced the followup to the incredibly successful Instinct: The Instinct S30. There are a few changes, most notably the shape and form. The S30 is rounded on the corners, and is slightly wider, yet slimmer. It’s lightweight, has a textured grip, and feels good in the hands.
We might as well stop calling them phones and start calling them ultra-ultra-ultra portable computers. Maybe not. The gap between the capabilities of computers and cell phones is getting smaller and smaller thanks to devices like the Palm Pre and the iPhone. Another gap is closing up too: the divide between consumer and professional devices.
SlashGear Japan
