BlackBerry Curve 83XX overtakes iPhone 3G in US smartphone rankings

The handset might've been surpassed in functionality and looks by its Curve 8900 successor, but nothing's got an edge on the BlackBerry Curve 83XX series in smartphone sales. According to NPD, the handset overtook the erstwhile champ iPhone 3G in the category for the first quarter of 2009, while BlackBerry's own Storm and Pearl handsets took the third and fourth slots, with the T-Mobile G1 rounding out the ranks in fifth place. Overall the smartphone market has grown from 17 percent of handset sales in Q1 2008 to 23 percent in Q1 2009. Compared to the previous quarter, RIM's gained a whopping 15 percent share of the US market -- owning nearly half of the entire scene -- while Apple and Palm both dropped 10 percent as they prep for their heroic mid-year launches.

Filed under: Cellphones, Handhelds

BlackBerry Curve 83XX overtakes iPhone 3G in US smartphone rankings originally appeared on Engadget on Mon, 04 May 2009 10:34:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Source: iPhone watch

Nokia's flagship N97 gets its own website, pre-order link ($699)

If flash animations and S60 5th edition are your idea of a good time then you'll want to head on over to Nokia's new interactive N97 landing page. From there you can get as close as you'll ever get to Nokia's flagship slider with 3.5-inch, 640 x 360 pixel resistive touch-screen display prior to its expected June launch. So go ahead, take 'er for a spin and then hit the newly live pre-order button after you're convinced that this is the smartphone for you. Sure, there's lots of potential June competition out there but take heart: the Android-powered Samsung i7500 lacks a QWERTY, there's no guarantee that a next-gen iPhone will launch in June, and the Palm Pre might be a big fat dud. There, feel better about your choice?

Update: Tipster Chris just let us know that the N97 shows a $699 phone-only price on the "find products" tab over at Nokia USA. That's $6 cheaper than the N96, strangely enough. See screen-grab after the break.

Update 2: Pre-order is go for the US.

[Via mivadika, thanks Nikos K.]

Continue reading Nokia's flagship N97 gets its own website, pre-order link ($699)

Filed under: Cellphones

Nokia's flagship N97 gets its own website, pre-order link ($699) originally appeared on Engadget on Mon, 04 May 2009 05:40:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Source: iPhone watch

Trent Reznor rips Apple, rates smartphone OSes

Why should you care about what Trent Reznor has to say about Apple or smartphones in general? Well, for one thing, the front-man for Nine Inch Nails is a digital music visionary who's gone it alone and found gold in the deep coffers of the Internet. And that little device in your pocket just happens to be the future of mobile computing and converged media players.

The story begins last week when Apple rejected an update to the official Nine Inch Nails iPhone application on the grounds of "objectionable content" (read: too many F-bombs). In this case, as it was in the rejected Tweetie update, the offensive content isn't actually part of the application; Apple's concern is with the song "The Downward Spiral" that can be streamed to the updated NIN iPhone App. The stupidity of this is palpable, but the hypocrisy is best described by Trent himself in a forum post over at NIN.com. Steel yourselves: unlike Apple we haven't censored the material -- so if naughty words can hurt you then by all means, don't click through to the full quote after the break. But Mr. Jobs, old pal, if you're listening... Trent may not be Bob Dylan, but he is the voice of the digital music generation.

Continue reading Trent Reznor rips Apple, rates smartphone OSes

Filed under: Cellphones, Portable Audio, Portable Video

Trent Reznor rips Apple, rates smartphone OSes originally appeared on Engadget on Mon, 04 May 2009 03:56:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Source: iPhone watch

NYT: Big-screen Kindle coming from Amazon "as early as this week"

Go ahead and grab the salt shaker, 'cause this one's nowhere near carved in stone... or is it? A breaking report from The New York Times has it that Amazon will introduce a larger version of its Kindle e-reader "as early as this week," one that's tailored for "displaying newspapers, magazines and perhaps textbooks." If you'll recall, magazine publisher Hearst made its intentions public to produce such a device earlier this year, noting that a larger panel would be more conducive to traditional print media layouts, and thus, additional revenue from ads. The article also notes that Plastic Logic will "start making digital newspaper readers by the end of the year."

Coincidentally (or not), the Wall Street Journal also published a report this evening that dug deeper into the aforementioned Hearst deal. As the story goes, a number of big-shots in the publishing industry are banding together to set their own subscription rates (rather than go through a middleman such as Amazon), and this writeup asserts that Plastic Logic's reader won't actually roll out until "early next year" (as we'd heard previously). If you're seriously able to handle yet another twist in this madness, WSJ also points out that "people familiar with the matter" have stated that Apple is "readying a device that may make it easier to read digital books and periodicals," but it's hard to say if this is simply regurgitation of unfounded rumors already going around or something entirely more legitimate.

All in all, it's clear that flagging print publications are desperate for a device that caters to its layout and allows them to regulate rates -- only time will tell if there's room for two, three or possibly more of these so-called "big-screen e-readers" in the world, but this week definitely just got a whole lot more interesting.

Update: Press event invite just received, it's on for Wednesday!

Read - New York Times report
Read - Wall Street Journal report

Filed under: Displays, Handhelds

NYT: Big-screen Kindle coming from Amazon "as early as this week" originally appeared on Engadget on Sun, 03 May 2009 23:05:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Source: iPhone watch

Ex-Seagate CEO joins startup Vertical Circuits, learns secret of the silver, gadget-shrinking ooze

Bill Watkins, the oft-outspoken former CEO of Seagate, has thrown his support behind tech startup Vertical Circuits, who claim to have an uncanny knack for shrinking gadgets with the power of voodoo -- or rather, a patented silver ooze, but we prefer our theories. The goo works as a replacement for gold wires to connect vertically stacked chips, cleaning up the internal cable clutter and leaving more room for better processor, bigger batteries, larger displays, or just a tinier form factor. Right now the focus is on stacking flash memory, but the group says they can use the same technique for processors and other chips. At this stage, there's no product or partnership to show for it, but if they're as good as they say, we hopefully won't have to wait long to see the fruits of their labor.

Filed under: Misc. Gadgets, Handhelds, Laptops, Portable Audio, Portable Video

Ex-Seagate CEO joins startup Vertical Circuits, learns secret of the silver, gadget-shrinking ooze originally appeared on Engadget on Sat, 02 May 2009 09:51:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Source: iPhone watch

Quantum PI's nanoTrek sensors pick up vibration and motion your Wiimote could never dream of

Quantum PI has just built the first motion sensor chip to use "quantum tunneling," which sounds theoretically unsafe, but we'll follow along. The nanoTrek sensors are classified as NEMS (Nano Electric Mechanical Systems) as opposed to the "bulky" MEMS sensors that can be found everywhere from the Wii to the iPhone. nanoTrek's sensing area is a mere 50 x 50 microns, and its sensitivity is 5 to 10 times greater than MEMS chips. There are all sorts of boring industrial applications to such a sensor, but we're looking forward to the not-too-distant-future when we can be completely disappointed by a brand new version of Super Monkey Ball.

[Via The Inquirer]

Filed under: Cellphones, Misc. Gadgets, Gaming

Quantum PI's nanoTrek sensors pick up vibration and motion your Wiimote could never dream of originally appeared on Engadget on Fri, 01 May 2009 09:52:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Source: iPhone watch

Video iPhone to feature iMovie App?

Apple rumors seem especially rampant in this year's run-up to the Worldwide Developers Conference. With all the fuss focused upon a rumored 10-inch device that fits somewhere in between Apple's MacBooks and iPod touch, these poor ol' iPhone rumors just can't get any attention. Riiight. The latest has BusinessWeek offering further testimonial that video recording will be heavily featured in the summer release of the 3.0 firmware and presumed third generation iPhone. According to a source familiar with Apple's plans, the next iPhone will make shooting video super simple and feature an iMovie App that enables on-phone editing and uploads direct to YouTube. If true it would certainly be a welcomed update for first and second gen iPhone users and something we'd expect Apple to tout loudly as a major new feature on a new device or two sporting beefier cameras.

[Via MacRumors]

Filed under: Cellphones

Video iPhone to feature iMovie App? originally appeared on Engadget on Fri, 01 May 2009 03:13:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Source: iPhone watch