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Sprint fires employee who leaked weak EVO 4G sales numbers

posted Jun 14th 2010 at 7:14PM

You know the backstory by now: Sprint boasted that the EVO 4G was its fastest selling phone ever a couple of days after hitting the American market, before abruptly correcting itself and admitting that the EVO's sales were in fact in line with those achieved by the Pre last summer. What you, and we, didn't know till now, however, is that Sprint's self-correction was sparked off by an employee with a curious mind and posting privileges over on the xda-developers forum. On June 6, according to MobileCrunch, this unnamed hero of truthiness browsed Sprint's internal inventory system and nailed down a figure of 65,500 sold units from Sprint's own stores -- a stat far south from what Sprint would announce a day later. That number ultimately found its way onto the message board, and though it obviously shouldn't be taken as authoritative (or exhaustive), it was enough to get Sprint to hit the auto-correct button and part ways with the activist member of staff. Harsh.

[Thanks, Carol]

MobileCrunch

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How to: pre-order the iPhone 4 (update: third-party retailers best avoided)

By Chris Ziegler

posted Jun 14th 2010 at 7:07PM

How-To

It's now less than twenty-four hours until pre-orders for the iPhone 4 kick off, magic is in the air, and you're feeling good -- but where (and how) do you get your name in the system? There'd be nothing more tragic than waking up on the 24th only to discover that your phone isn't arriving on launch day, so let's get things squared away right now so you know what you need to do tomorrow morning.

Follow the break for everything you need to know!

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More Droid 2, Droid X details surface in leaked commercials

By Donald Melanson

posted Jun 14th 2010 at 6:49PM

We've already gotten a pretty good look at both the Droid 2 and Droid X and some of their purported specs, and it looks like we can now fill in a few more gaps thanks to a set of leaked slides for some new Droid commercials. The most interesting of the lot is the slide / script for a Droid 2 commercial pictured above, which not only confirms an expectedly sci-fi-themed ad for the phone (Gattaca-esque, to be specific), but Exchange support and a 1GHz processor (not 750MHz, as previously rumored). There's comparatively fewer details in the pair of Droid X commercials, but they do offer yet more confirmation of a 4.3-inch screen, and our first indication of a new EyeCon app that will apparently come pre-loaded on the phone and let you access and control media on your home network -- the script for the ad actually mentions a "720 dpi" screen, but we're going to chalk that up to adspeak rather than Motospeak. Hit up the link below for a closer look at the complete set.

[Thanks, Kellen]

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White iPhone 4 likely not available at launch

By Chris Ziegler

posted Jun 14th 2010 at 5:58PM

The popular rumor going around right now at the eleventh hour is that AT&T will only be offering the black iPhone 4 models for pre-order tomorrow and at launch, with their white counterparts coming "later this Summer." Considering the fact that the white version of the 4 is quite a bit more distinctive than the 3G / 3GS, that's a bummer if true -- but what we don't know is whether this is strictly limited to AT&T. It's entirely possible that Apple and third-party retailers will be offering the white models, and AT&T's own distribution channel might just be suffering from some sort of buffoonery (that's our hope, anyhow). Lending credence to the rumor is the fact that Japan's SoftBank has already officially announced that it'll only be offering the black models initially -- and when we pressed AT&T on the matter, we got "no comment" in return. It's not looking good, folks.

[Thanks to everyone who sent this in]

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Sprint's 4G-equipped Samsung Galaxy S Pro in the wild?

By Chris Ziegler

posted Jun 14th 2010 at 5:39PM

The Moment just got a whole lot less interesting, didn't it? What you're looking at is allegedly Samsung's Galaxy S Pro for Sprint, a potential blockbuster of a phone that's said to have WiMAX support and a front-facing cam -- basically, the QWERTY answer to the EVO 4G (and this one's presumably got a Super AMOLED display, to boot). It doesn't look exactly like a standard Galaxy S with a keyboard grafted on, so we're not sure how confident we are that the "Galaxy S Pro" name is going to stick by the time it hits retail -- but you could call it "ball of dung" and we suspect it'd still sell like hotcakes. Stay tuned for more on this one as we get it.

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Vodafone UK details iPhone 4 plans a little early, we keep the screenshots

By Vladislav Savov

posted Jun 14th 2010 at 1:13PM

We don't know what shenanigans are going on over in Vodafone HQ, but the UK carrier gave the world a quick glimpse of its iPhone 4 pricing today, before promptly removing the data sheets from the ether. Thankfully, a fast-witted reader by the name of Liam Gladdy captured the incriminating data for us, and we can now sit and ruminate on what Voda has in store. As you might surmise from above, the vast majority of users won't be getting the handset for free, though that doesn't necessarily preclude the contracts from representing good value. We note with glee that Vodafone keeps its data limit at a robust 1GB, unlike a certain other network, and the £30 ($44) a month two-year contract is looking decent from where we're sitting. Prices over 18 months just jump by £5 in monthly outlay with handset costs remaining the same. Click past the break for the full breakdown, including details for the 32GB variety.

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HTC EVO 4G and Droid Incredible suffering from unresponsive screen issues

By Nilay Patel

posted Jun 14th 2010 at 12:22PM

Uh oh: on top of reports that the EVO 4G suffers screen-detachment issues, we're also starting to hear that the touchscreen sensor is inconsistent, particularly when the phone isn't grounded. We've seen more than one report and video purporting to show the EVO's touchscreen failing to smoothly register touches when the phone isn't being handheld (and thus grounded). We haven't been able to reproduce the issues ourselves, but trust us when we say we've heard from enough unhappy EVO owners to believe that the problem is real. What's more, there's also an older video showing the same problem on three different Droid Incredibles, which obviously shares strong family ties to the EVO. We've pinged HTC, we'll let you know what we hear -- for now, get your sad faces on and watch the videos after the break.

[Thanks to everyone who sent this in]

xda-developers, HTC forums

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Motorola and RIM settle patent dispute with a good old cross-licensing deal

By Vladislav Savov

posted Jun 14th 2010 at 11:47AM

We always like to hear of companies burying the hatchet (and the lawyers with it, if at all possible), and our latest source of good vibes are two North American phone makers that have been at each other's throats over patents since early 2008. Motorola and RIM had a previous intellectual property-sharing deal that expired at the end of '07 and with the companies unable to come to a suitable extension agreement, it all spiraled out into a big and silly legal discord. That has at long last been settled now, with RIM paying a one-off fee and regular royalties, as well as licensing some of its own patent catalog out to Moto, in exchange for using the Americans' knowhow in WiFi and other areas. All in all, an inevitable conclusion to an unnecessarily legalized negotiation. Now how about both you guys get back to building us those QWERTY sliders and 2GHz Androids?

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Best Buy announces official iPhone 4 pre-sale for June 15th

By Laura June

posted Jun 14th 2010 at 10:06AM

Best Buy's just dropped the official details on its iPhone 4 pre-sale, and there are no surprises here. You'll be able to head over to any Best Buy starting tomorrow (that's June 15th) and pre-order up Apple's latest offering for delivery on June 24th. That's the same date Apple gave us so like we said -- no surprises here -- but you can hit up the full press release below if you're into that sort of thing.

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iPhone OS 4 to include Facebook video uploads?

By Joseph L. Flatley

posted Jun 14th 2010 at 9:52AM

We already knew that Apple was likely ratcheting up the social networking integration in iOS 4 -- that is, if the addition of Linked Contacts and .plist entries referring to Facebook means anything (and it probably does). Adding further flame to the fire, the gang at 9to5Mac.com have dug up a bit of code that appears to handle video exporting to the popular social networking site. As near as we can tell, users will be able to send files at 480 x 480, 30 FPS -- and since Facebook is already using HTML5, you won't have that pesky Steve Jobs / Flash thing to worry about.

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HTC Aria goes official for AT&T, gets toyed with on video (update: $130, coming June 20)

By Darren Murph

posted Jun 14th 2010 at 9:21AM

Breaking News

Um... okay? In what's easily one of the most curious product introductions of the year (in terms of method, not design), AT&T has seemingly just made official the first not-awful Android device to be sold in subsidized fashion for its network. 'Course, those who don't mind ponying up for an out-of-contract phone have been able to to pick up an AT&T-compatible Nexus One for a few months now, but contract lovers have been stuck with the Motorola Backflip and the promise of Dell's admittedly underwhelming Aero. Dante Martin, a product manager at the carrier, has followed up on a prior video with a confirmation that the HTC Aria is indeed "launching on AT&T," though he gives precisely no specifications in his address posted after the break. All we know is that the phone will most certainly ship with Sense and an optical trackball, but mum's the word on a price or release. For now, anyway. Here's hoping this is just the beginning -- AT&T needs a decent dose of Android in the worst possible way.

[Thanks, Travis]

Update: Ah, and here's the official presser. It's a mid-range phone with Android 2.1, a five megapixel camera, 3.2-inch HVGA capacitive touchpanel, inbuilt WiFi and support for 7.2Mbps HSPA. There's also a soft-touch back and a total weight of around four ounces, and AT&T says this one will be available on June 20th nationwide for $129.99 on a two-year contract (after $100 mail-in rebate, of course). As for specs? There's a 600MHz Qualcomm MSM 7227 processor, proximity sensor, integrated GPS, a digital compass, light sensor, 512MB ROM / 384MB RAM, a microSD card slot (2GB included) and a 1,200mAh battery good for up to six hours of yapping.

HTC Aria for AT&T;

YouTube (ShareATT), AT&T Specs [PDF]

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Nokia E73 Mode review

By Chris Ziegler

posted Jun 14th 2010 at 9:00AM

Review

Some two years after its release, there are still plenty of people who'll swear up and down that the E71 is the finest phone Nokia has ever produced -- and for good reason. As a platform, S60 was the product of a simpler time when the smartphone market was dominated not by touchscreens, but by numeric keypads, and the E71 was arguably the last of a string of bona fide successes that Nokia enjoyed in the platform's heyday alongside pioneering handsets like the N82 and N95. Thing is, the E71 was different than those other models in a very important way: it was elegant. Historically, Nokias have typically favored function over form and saved the highest-quality materials for the Vertu line, but the E71 bucked that trend -- it was slim, sexy, chock-full of metal, and curved in all the right places. In fact, to this day, it remains one of the best-looking, best-feeling smartphones ever made.

Customers (and reviewers) made their love for the E71 clear, and Nokia sought to recapture the glory with the introduction of the refined, upgraded E72. For Americans, of course, the biggest problem with the E72 was that you couldn't buy it from a carrier -- and unlike the E71, it never got much traction as an unlocked purchase. That's where the E73 Mode comes into play, a mildly reworked version of the E72 with T-Mobile branding and, of course, support for 3G on T-Mobile's AWS bands. Put bluntly, though, this is still just a warmed-over E71 -- and in 2010, is there a market for that? Let's have a look.

Nokia E73 Mode review

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Nokia N8 preview

By Vladislav Savov

posted Jun 14th 2010 at 8:00AM

Preview

Strap yourselves in, pilgrims. Nokia's next great handset has resurfaced in London today, and this time we were even allowed to turn it on. There's pretty much no way you could be unaware of the N8 by now -- Nokia's done the viral video thing, the teaser demo thing, the feature walkthrough thing, we've covered it to near-exhaustion. But we've never seen it, you know, doing stuff. You can now consider that omission corrected, as we've finally powered up the 3.5-inch OLED screen, entered the overhauled Symbian^3 wonderland, and come back to tell the tale. In-depth impressions and video after the break.

Nokia N8 preview

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EVO 4G receives a Palm Pre inductive charging transplant (video)

By Thomas Ricker

posted Jun 14th 2010 at 6:40AM

Oh yes, an HTC EVO has been modded with the inductive charging coil ripped from the still beating heart of a Palm Pre. The 30 minute soldering project does have the side effect of rendering compass apps useless while creating a slight bulge in the battery cover. Other than that, it just works -- or so says the creator. See the modded EVO get busy with a Palm Touchstone and do what yours can't in the video after the break.

[Thanks, Brody White]

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Dell Streak car and AV docks now on sale, HDMI may or may not be included

By Vladislav Savov

posted Jun 14th 2010 at 3:25AM

Hey England, in need of some retail therapy after an unsatisfying sporting weekend? Dell's got the goods for you with a rich new selection of cables, plugs, adapters, and cases for your new Streak. It looks like the HDMI dock we've been jonesing for has probably become a retail reality, but there's no way to be sure right now -- Dell's only listing an AV dock without going into the TV connectivity options. The fresh offerings also include the kickstand-equipped wallet case that we found intriguing, spare battery and sync cables, and an international travel kit. Of course, every silver lining has a cloud, which in this case is the pricing: nothing here costs less than £24 ($35) and the car- and TV-enabling docks will set you back a cool £55 ($80) each. Jumbo smartphone, jumbo accessory prices.

[Thanks, Kingsley]

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Samsung Galaxy S gets torn down, looks equally beautiful on the inside (video)

By Darren Murph

posted Jun 14th 2010 at 2:36AM

You'll be hard pressed to find a sane individual who'd argue that Samsung's Galaxy S isn't a lust-worthy piece of kit on the outside, and after watching the video past the break, we doubt you'll get too many takers on proving things unsightly within. Equipped with a Super AMOLED display and a bit of that Hummingbird goodness within, there weren't too many bits and pieces to tear apart. What was found, however, leaves a new appreciation for steady hands. Go on, give it a look-see -- the real deal will be out and about before you know it.

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Nokia N9 MeeGo slider leaks in early video tease?

By Thomas Ricker

posted Jun 14th 2010 at 1:10AM

Um, yeah. Let's just put this out there: the image above was grabbed from a video that could be an early, leaked teaser for the N9, Nokia's first handset to run the MeeGo OS. Could be. The production quality of the promo is certainly up to snuff and the industrial design of the slider itself features just enough N8 to make the whole thing seem very plausible. It doesn't hurt that it resembles an earlier leak... but that doesn't help authenticate it as real either. And what's with those impossibly shallow keys on the QWERTY? Watch for yourself after the break.

[Thanks, Tigran]

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Nokia X5 square slider gets official in Singapore (update: video!)

By Nilay Patel

posted Jun 14th 2010 at 12:33AM

Well, hey, Nokia just officially launched the X5 in Singapore, apparently as a followup to the Twist and the latest chubby square slider to hit in the past few months after the the Motorola Flipout and Kin One. No, we're not sure why this form factor is suddenly a Thing either. This guy is actually Nokia's second X5 --a China-only X5 with a totally different design was announced in April, so that's nice and confusing. We don't have an official spec sheet on this new X5 yet, but we're told it runs Symbian S60, and has a five megapixel camera, Facebook, MySpace and YouTube integration, as well as some sort of shake-based notification feature we don't really understand. It comes in black, hot pink, bright blue, and, um, unattractive yellow, and it's pretty thick, if the hands-on photos are to be believed. That's all we know for now -- hit the source links for a bunch more photos, and we'll let you know if we hear anything else.

[Thanks, Gabriel]

Symbianku, Tihn Te, Symbian World

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HTC EVO suffering from glass separation issues?

By Tim Stevens

posted Jun 13th 2010 at 6:17PM

HTC Evo suffering from faulty glue issues?

Potential bad news for EVO owners: we're seeing plenty of reports from folks having issues with the lower portions of their screens. Conspiracy theories say that the adhesive holding the glass is failing, causing the screen to peel up a bit and embark on a very slow journey to capacitive independence. This separation is causing excessive light leakage from below, a problem that we noted in our review but apparently gets continually worse as users spend more time massaging their screens -- even those not being as hard on theirs as this guy was. No official response from HTC yet and we're not sure just what a fix could be, but we have seen people do some wonderful things with duct tape.

Update: Still no word from HTC, but Troy, a Sprint employee, e-mailed us to say he's not seen any phones being brought in for this issue at his store. He also indicated the phone is a "repairable device" so, if indeed this is something HTC deems worthy of repair it could be something able to be fixed without requiring a replacement. Here's to hoping...

[Thanks, Brandon; image courtesy of Ryan/Selfdestruct]

Android Forums, HTC Community

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Interview: Chuck Pagano talks ESPN 3D, mobile streaming

By Darren Murph

posted Jun 12th 2010 at 9:21PM

Interview

During our time at ESPN's headquarters in Bristol, Connecticut this past week, we were able to peek inside every nook and cranny of the company's technological side. We discovered some pretty remarkable things about the culture and attitude toward innovation, and while the bulk of that discovery will be seen in a forthcoming Engadget Show segment, we couldn't help but share some insight from a kind fellow who has been deeply involved in the blinking lights portion of ESPN from day one. We sat down for a brief one-on-one interview with Chuck Pagano -- ESPN's executive vice president of technology -- following the outfit's 3D launch, and while we were both bitter over the 1-1 result in the South Africa vs. Mexico match, he was understandably excited about the future of his firm's latest channel. For Chuck's take on 3D, the move to HD and the impending arrival of ESPN streams on your phone, be sure to grab your best reading glasses and click on through.

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Engadget Mobile Podcast 042 - 06.12.2010

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FCC Fridays

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The Engadget Mobile Podcast, live at 4:30 ET!

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T-Mobile's LG Sentio launching on June 30

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Correspondences from Team Engadget out into the Twitterverse.

Best email ever? http://twitpic.com/1wuzau

nilay patel

so it's simple. if you can't clearly communicate to your employees how to handle these pre-orders, I'll tell my readers to avoid you.

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Posted Jun 2008

95%

The percentage of returned gadgets that have nothing wrong with them.

Of the $13.8 billion worth of returned products in 2007, only 5 percent were because gadgets were actually broken, according to a 2008 study.

READ

Let the hive mind of Engadget get that for you.

"I own an iPhone 3G and I'm looking for a decent speaker / alarm clock for it. I am going to listen music in a mid-sized room, so I want nice quality speakers with solid bass. I also want to use it as an alarm clock, so it would be great if there is such a feature. The price can be low-mid to mid-high range. I was looking at the Klipsch iGroove SXT; it's powerful, slick and the reviews are good, but it doesn't have an alarm clock feature. It's no deal breaker if I can set it up from the iPhone, but I'm not sure. Thanks!"

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