O2 UK will lease you a smartphone for £55 per month, with minutes, texts, data, and insurance included
If you’re in the UK, you should know that O2 has just announced the first smartphone leasing programme for consumers. As the name implies, this effectively means that the operator will lease you “a new 16 GB smartphone” for 12 months. After that time elapses, you can choose to renew your lease, choose another smartphone [...]
Orange Dallas is a cheap candybar coming soon on PAYG
In the UK, Orange has just added yet another own-brand device to its website. And just like many previous phones, it sports the name of a city. This time, it’s called the Dallas from Orange (although we’ll refer to it as the Orange Dallas). This is no smartphone, let that be clear. In fact, it’s [...]
Vodafone 555 Blue is a prepaid Facebook phone
Vodafone has unveiled yet another Facebook-centric phone earlier today. And it’s the one we’ve exclusively shown you back in June, which now has a name: Vodafone 555 Blue. Unlike previous efforts such as the INQ Cloud Touch, the HTC Salsa or HTC ChaCha though, this isn’t a smartphone. It’s an featurephone built by Alcatel, and [...]
India: Micromax Q80 is a dual-SIM QWERTY candybar with its own push email service
In India, Micromax is one of the best known local brands of mobile phones, and thanks to its very affordably priced handsets, and its dual-SIM focus (that’s common among all Indian phone makers), the company sure sells a lot of low-end devices over there. In fact, it’s companies such as Micromax, and many others like [...]
India: Maxx Vista MS502 is a dual-SIM QWERTY portrait slider aimed at women
To be honest, I’ve never known whether mobile devices aimed primarily at women sell well. I have seen many of these beasts over the years, and you probably have too. You know the type: with some pink, orange or red thrown in alongside some bling items like fake crystals or something like that. All design [...]
India: Maxx Mobiles launches MX372 and MQ368, two new cheap dual-SIM phones
One of the phone manufacturers that we don’t get to write about all that often is India’s Maxx Mobiles. Well, today we’ve got something new from that exact outfit. Maxx Mobiles has launched two new dual-SIM phones, the MX372 and MQ368, the latter having a full physical QWERTY keyboard fitted. The MX372 has a ‘normal’ [...]
UK: The Atlanta from Orange is a cheap PAYG featurephone that requires a massive £50 top-up
Here’s one for you featurephone lovers, smartphone haters, or both. Orange UK has a new own-brand featurephone up its sleeves, and it’s calling it the Atlanta from Orange. At least there’s some consistency there with regard to using city names for own-brand devices. That’s where the consistency ends, though, and strangeness intervenes. The Orange Atlanta [...]
Canada: Sonim XP1300 Core launched by Rogers
The (very) rugged, IP-68 rated, built to military standards Sonim XP1300 Core phone has been launched in Canada by Rogers. From the start, you should know that this device isn’t for you if you’re more interested in how many apps a phone can run than in whether you can run it over with a car [...]
Vodafone’s Emporia RL1 is the ‘back to basics’ anti-smartphone that costs £60 on PAYG
Vodafone has launched a handset that can rightly be called an anti-smartphone, with its clear focus on just making calls and texting. However, the lack of features is something that many will find refreshing, for not every single person on this planet needs or wants a superphone, not even in 2011. For the ‘back to [...]
UK: Orange Rio II is a touchscreen + QWERTY candybar that costs £69.99 on Pay as you go
Orange UK has launched an interesting own-brand device, the Orange Rio II. This is (obviously) the sequel to the original Rio launched last year, and it’s a candybar BlackBerry-esque (or, why not, Nokia E6-esque) device that has both a touchscreen and a full physical QWERTY keyboard. But probably the best thing about the Orange Rio [...]
Intel announces Tri-Gate, the world’s first 3D transistor
Intel has created the world’s first three-dimensional transistor and will begin manufacturing with their 22-nanometer process in late 2011, the company announced Wednesday. The innovative new design represents a major advancement in transistor structure, which has used two-dimensional structures for nearly 50 years. The 3D design, dubbed Tri-Gate, differs from a traditional transistor that transports [...]
Altek’s 14MP Android phone to be available this month
Taiwan-based Altek (best known for making digital cameras) is getting ready to launch its first Android smartphone: the A14 Leo. What’s noteworthy about the Altek A14 Leo is that it has a 14MP autofocus camera with Xenon flash and 3x optical zoom – it’s the first Android handset with such a camera. The Leo also [...]
ViewSonic V350 dual-SIM Android phone announced
ViewSonic – the company that’s rumored to bring one of the world’s first Android 2.4 smartphones, the ViewPad 4 – has announced a new handset at MWC 2011 (of course, there are still a few days until the show properly starts, but that doesn’t matter much). The new device is the ViewSonic V350, an Android [...]
Facebook-centric INQ Cloud Touch and Cloud Q Android phones announced
It’s been quite many months since we first heard that two INQ-made Facebook Android phones would be introduced this year. Well, the two phones are now official, and they’re called INQ Cloud Touch (just like we told you before), and INQ Cloud Q. Both handsets run Android 2.2 and should provide an “all-new Facebook mobile [...]
Facebook cloud phone features detailed
This is the day of Facebook phone-related rumors, it seems. Earlier, we reported on HTC supposedly readying two Facebook-branded, Android-powered smartphones for Mobile World Congress. And now, BGR has got hold of some other information about what seems to be a Facebook phone. A person that claims to be in a focus group for said [...]
Akai Trio triple-SIM launches in India, yours for Rs.3295
Triple-SIM phones are a rare occurrence, much more so than their dual-SIM brethren. But leave it to the country that has put dual-SIM phones (back) on the map, India, to also get its share of triple-SIM devices. Today’s contender comes from Akai, and is the Trio. Obviously named after its most important feature, the Trio [...]
Cheap Alcatel OT-355 QWERTY phone coming to Orange UK
Orange UK will soon launch a new affordable phone made by Alcatel. The handset is called Alcatel OT-355 (just like another Alcatel phone released in 2004) and is a QWERTY candybar with a really small display and no 3G. Other features include: MP3 player, FM radio with RDS, VGA photo camera, MicroSD card support (up [...]
US Cellular: all phones free from December 17 to December 24
As far as holiday promos go, there probably isn’t anything better than “all phones free”. And that’s exactly what US Cellular is going to offer you between December 17 and December 24. So, starting this Friday, and all the way up until Christmas Eve, you can get any phone or smartphone in US Cellular’s lineup [...]
Sprint launches new rugged Sanyo Taho phone
Sprint has just introduced a new rugged phone manufactured by Kyocera and sold under the Sanyo brand. The phone is called Sanyo Taho and is a clamshell that can be yours for $99.99 on contract. It is available right away online and in Sprint retail stores. The Taho meets Military Specifications 810G, withstanding shock, vibration, [...]
Kyocera Rio now available from Cricket for $130 sans contract
Cricket has just announced that it’s adding a new affordable featurephone to its lineup. This is the Kyocera Rio, not to be confused with the Kyocera Zio (which is an Android-powered smartphone). What the Rio lacks in OS power, it probably makes up in price – $130, that is. And, as usual with Cricket, no [...]