Mobile Phones Blog

Apple seemingly file patents with the US Patent and Trademark Office every five minutes, so new of a new application from the Church of Jobs doesn’t really spark much interest, unless it’s a new generation of iPod, iMac or Macbook, or it’s something downright weird.

Apple’s most recent application most certainly falls into the latter catergory. ‘Patent #20090000010′ is for a ‘a glove system for operating an electronic device’, that has been quickly, if unofficially christened the ‘iGlove’.

The patent details how the glove is designed to allow you to use a touchscreen device, like an iPhone in cold weather, without losing any tacitility, by way of tiny apertures cut into the middle finger, index finger and thumb.

The patent application says, “When users, in cold weather, wear thick or bulky gloves … the loss of tactile feedback to the user may prevent the user from properly operating the electronic device, and may lead to frustration. Alternatively, if the user has to remove his gloves … the user’s hand may become cold and uncomfortable, which may also lead to user frustration.”

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First, it was phones such as the contra-rotating Motorola AURA and handsets from Nokia’s Vertu range which brought levels of precision usually associated with high quality watch making to the mobile world. Then, luxury timepiece manufactures such as Tag Heuer responded with mobile handsets of their own. Now, the movement has come full circle with the announcement of LG’s forthcoming GD910 ‘watch phone’ handset, which, given that its worn around the wrist like a traditional watch, really ought to be called a wrist set.

The GD910 is a tiny touchscreen phone which doubles as a keypad for dialling numbers and tapping out texts and emails, and, allegedly, high speed internet navigation.

It will also boast a front facing camera allowing for videocalling, MP3 playback, and – thankfully – comes with Bluetooth, meaning that you don’t have to hold the watch phone up to your mouth when you want to talk to someone.

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If you’re thinking of ordering a mobile phone in time for Christmas Day, then you’d better make sure to order before midday on the 22nd of December, and I’m telling you why; cos that’s when the networks are shutting up shop for the season.

So if you had set your sights on having an iPhone under your Christmas tree or wanted to get a T-Mobile G1, LG Renoir, INQ1, or Sony Ericsson C905 for your friend, partner, mum, dad, sibling, or you just fancied treating yourself, then place your order before next Monday lunchtime to avoid disappointment!

We’re also closing shop here at Mobile Phones for Christmas and the New Year – congratulations again to the winner of our Nokia N96 competition.

Have a Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year!

- the Mobile Phones team

If you’ve been wanting to get your teeth into an iPhone 3G, but have been understandably cautious about the inability to unlock the handset, then look no further – the totally unofficial iPhone Dev Team, a group of h4XX0Rz (hackers) have been busy beavering away at an iPhone unlocking tool, due for release after Christmas.

Appropriately named ‘yellowsn0w’, the piece of code will allow owners of iPhone 3Gs to unlock their handsets and insert whatever SIM they like.

However the code will only work on iPhone 3Gs with baseband version 2.11.07 or earlier – the firmware which runs the modem hardware – that have been ‘jailbroken’ with an app such as QuickPwn or ZiPhone first.

The yellowsn0w unlock will also require the phone to be jailbroken first, and will be installable through the Cydia app installer tool.

If the last couple of paragraphs have left you a bit misty eyed, but you still like the idea of owning an unlocked iPhone, then don’t worry – the iPhone Dev Team say that once they’ve perfected yellowsn0w, they’ll upload a live demo of the unlocking process on their site.

For more info, head over to their blog here:

We all knew that after the 5800 Xpress Music, Nokia were working on a big ass touchscreen smartphone, but we weren’t expecting an announcement so soon.

The wraps had barely been taken off the forthcoming N97 smartphone, before Nokia unveiled this beast at the Nokia Capital Markets Day 2008 presentation.

Dubbed the ‘unseen touchscreen’ due to the inevitability of it’s release and the mystery and speculation surrounding it, the as of yet unnamed Nokia handset is said to come with the latest edition of the S60 Symbian OS.

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If you’ve been longing to put an Android phone through its paces, but don’t want to sign up for the T-Mobile service, the only option has been to obtain a code to unlock the phone – but this comes with serious compromises in functionality.

Now, if you’re prepared to shell out £265 (plus a £20 sign-up fee), you can get a G1 with its hardware and SIM completely unlocked, and no need to commit to a T-Mobile data contract for two years (although the minimum contract was reduced recently from £40 to £30 a month, that still makes the unlocked version cheaper over a year).

Officially, the unlocked G1 – the HTC handset that is currently the only device available based on Google’s Android software platform – is for developers only, but anyone can register as a developer for a one-off fee of $25 (likely to be £20 in the UK). This option will also be available to users in countries where there is no T-Mobile network – 18 countries at first, with more to follow next year, including India.

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The print screen function on the Apple iPhone has to be one of my favourite newly found features. The ability to take a screen shot of a website or search results while browsing is a big plus point in my opinion.

If you don’t already know how to take a screen shot (or print screen) using an iPhone it is incredibly easy to do, all you need to do is:

1. Press and hold the home key (bottom round button).
2. Then press the lock key (the key at the top of the phone).

That’s it! The screen should then flash and it will save a new image in your photo directory as a PNG file with your screen shot as the source. This has been documented across the web quite a lot, you can find it here, here and here for example.

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The iPhone continues to attract interesting applications, despite concerns about Apple’s rigid policing of its App Store, and the latest highlights include software from online retailer Amazon, and a complex search engine from Proximic.

But according to the vendor, games dominate the league table of most popular premium (paid-for) iPhone apps.

In the five months since the App Store opened for iPhones and iPod Touches, some of the star performers in the gaming sector have included Apple’s own ‘Texas Hold ‘Em’, Freeverse’s ‘Moto Chaser’, Vivendi’s ‘Crash Bandicoot Nitro Kart 3D’, Sega’s ‘Super Monkey Ball’, and Pangea Software’s ‘Cro-Mag Rally’ and ‘Enigmo’. Other apps in the paid-for top 10 are Koi Pond, PocketGuitar, Retronyms’ Recorder and Hottrix’s iBeer.
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T-Mobile is raising its UK game to try to attract customers in the run-up to Christmas, launching a Game Club that tests out a new approach to the difficult mobile gaming market – and reducing the amount you have to spend to get an Android G1 for free.

Suscribers to T-Mobile’s Web’n'Walk mobile internet service can get at least one game a week for free, with the carrier being the first to test out an advertising-funded free model in this sector. Some mobile operators like Virgin Mobile have already tested the demand for other forms of content, or even voice minutes, provided free in return for the user accepting ads on their handsets.

The T-Mobile Game Club will launch with the title ‘Poker Million II’, sponsored in part by Paramount Pictures’ new movie ‘Madagascar: Escape 2 Africa’. This takes one step further the common marketing tactic of tying major film releases into mobile phone content, as seen with the Batman and James Bond franchises.

Each free game will include two full screen, targeted advertisements before play begins, and two more after the game concludes. T-Mobile said it would not limit the number of games a consumer downloads or how many times each game is played.
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Italian police have seized a gun disguised as a mobile phone during a recent raid on a suspected drugs stash in Naples.

We’d like to say that this covert weapon was something that Q and the boys had whipped up for James Bond in one of his latter day outings, but unfortunately, the truth of the matter is a quite a bit more shocking than Madonna’s cameo in Die Another Day.

As the picture to the right shows, the ‘phone’ is capable of firing up to four .22 calibre rounds, each one triggered by pressing the 5 6 7 and 8 buttons – the rounds are shot through a short barrel which is disguised as the phone’s aerial.

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