As you can see from the pic, it certainly looks more like a phone than a Photoshop fake, so Lenovo are clearly working on something.

Whatever it is, it looks bloody good! If it's an Android phone, then it looks like it's set to come with an iPhone-esque virtual keyboard, which is apparently coming to the Android platform early next year. The result is a super-sleek touchscreen phone that looks very minimalist.

The rumours suggest that the phone is based on the concept of the OPhone - basically a custom version of Android that comes with support for China's TD-SCMDA 3G standard. A Lenovo OPhone would therefore give China Mobile the iPhone-like phone it's been craving without having to give any subscriber revenue to Apple.

Those are the rumours, anyway, and to be honest, I'd be more surprised if Lenovo aren't working on an Android phone at the moment! Android seems set to be the new mobile operating system of the year for 2009, with almost every company that owns a soldering iron feverishly working on building its own variant!

[Source: Electronista]

If nothing else, though, it shows the direction Nokia are working towards. Full touchscreen phone, context and presence, integrated services, multiple homescreens. Seems that direction has "iPhone" written on it in super-huge letters!

[Source: Engadget]

Nokia are making a huge announcement tomorrow that they're hyping like mad, leading some to believe that Nokia's iPhone-killer is finally on its way. Nokia's 2008 line-up of phones disappointed some, as its flagship, the N96, was only a minor improvement on the N95. Although a great phone in its own right, the N96 was no competition for the iPhone, leaving some to wonder just what Nokia's response would be to Apple's market-changing phone.

Given that the iPhone was released in 2007, that response has been a long time coming, but we should know tomorrow, as Nokia are definitely announcing NSeries phones for 2009 - and we've also got our hands on some rumoured specs. If you can't wait for Nokia's announcement, check out the specs after the jump, and come back here tomorrow morning for full details of Nokia big new announcement.

Leaked specs for 2009 Nokia NSeries phones

These specs were first leaked to EngadgetMobile about a month ago, so take them with the usual pinch of salt. However, the image of the specs was rapidly pulled at Nokia's request, so they probably won't be too far from the truth.

The specs and the phones' codenames are as follows:

IP08

Widescreen touch, Naviscroll, QWERTY, AGPS, FM radio and transmitter, 5MP AF camera, WiFi, Bluetooth, TV-out

Corolla

3.0-inch VGA display, non-touch, 8MP camera, half QWERTY keyboard, 128MB RAM, 8GB ROM, WiFI, UPnP, HSPA, AGPS, FM transmitter

Eitri

Landscape candybar with QWERTY, 3.5-inch 640x350 display, minimum 8GB ROM, microSD, pressure sensitive touch UI with tactile feedback and gestures, charging via USB, 5MP AF camera with dual LED flash, integrated compass and accelerometer, proximity sensor, FM transmitter .

Of the three, the IP08 and Eitri stand out, both having widescreen touchscreen displays with up to 3.5" VGA screens. The Eitri in particular looks very special, with its huge screen, compass, accelerometer, and, intriguingly, proximity sensor. A mobile phone that knows where it is, which direction it's facing, which way it's moving, and where you are in relation to it - now that opens up some huge possibilities!

Let's hope Nokia encourage developers to develop for their new devices in a similar way to the iPhone and Android markets.

Also from the same source comes news of another Sony Ericsson CyberShot phone currently codenamed the Yurika. Apparently, this will be a message-based phone designed for the "yoof" market, and so will feature on easy access to Facebook, Yahoo!, YouTube, etc. As it's based aroud messaging, the Yurika will come with a slide-out QWERTY keyboard as well as a touchscreen and similar iPhone-like interface (again, based on S60) to the Kokura.

Interestingly, it'll move away from Memory Sticks towards the more universal SD card storage format, which represents a departure from Sony Ericsson's existing strategy of sticking with Sony's proprietary storage technology.

That said, neither phone will come with mini USB socket or 3.5mm headphone jack, relying instead on Sony Ericsson's usual proprietary connector, so they've not exactly rushed to embrace more open technology.

Truth or dare

Now, how true are these rumours? I received the tip via email, with no pictures and no indication of where the information came from, so they are, at these stage,entirely unverified rumours. However, the details in the tip aren't just very detailed: they're also mundane in parts as well, which to me, adds to their credibility.

By mundane, I mean specifying the TI chipset and the bit about the headphone jack. Anyone can invent a wishlist of amazing features, but including details about chipsets and what connectors a phone will have reveals a surprising level of detail that your average fanboy would never think of dreaming up.

The phones themselves fit rather well with Sony Ericsson's portfolio, too. Having announced a 12 megapixel camera phone for this year, it should be no surprise that a 12 megapixel one is being worked on, regardless of whether it'll be the Kokura or not.

So I'll remain skeptical until I can find out more about the source of these rumours, but my hunch is that they're not too far from the truth.

As these leaked pics show, it's not exactly bad looking, either, although it does seem to take its styling cues from another rater more famous touchscreen smartphone that's been on the market for a while now.


Indeed, it's pretty obvious that the LG Renoir is LG's attempt to trounce the iPhone, and in terms of features, there's absolutely no contest.

The Renoir could pretty much beat any other phone around in a game of Top Trumps, let alone the iPhone's relatively weak feature list.

However, the proof, as they say, is in the accessibility, flexibility, intuitiveness, speed and all round user experience afforded by the device's user interface (not the pudding - this is a mobile phone, remember, not a cake!)

The iPhone's unique selling point is its incredible UI, and Apple have rightly realized that all the features in the world don't mean a damn if the don't actually work all that well, or they're not actually that usable due to a poor UI.

So we can judge the Renoir now as a definite success based on its feature set alone. But as a viable alternative to the iPhone?

We'll just have to wait and see the real thing in action.

Certainly these leaked pics don't exactly make me gasp with amazement, as the UI looks very plain indeed, but pictures alone can't give the full story, so I'll reserve judgment until the Renoir is released.

[Source: BoyGenius]

Being a smartphone, it could either be pure touchscreen, like the iPhone, or come complete with a physical keyboard like the majority of Windows Mobile and Symbian S60 smartphones. Thankfully, it chose the latter, and has a slide out keyboard that will be familiar to many users of other HTC devices.

Better still, the keyboard isn't just a full QWERTY keyboard, it's also got dedicated number keys as well as two ALT buttons for selecting the punctuation symbols that are doubled up on some character keys. As I found out with my MWg Zinc II review, you need two ALT buttons, as just having one leaves you trying to do finger contortions that nobody over the age of 14 can manage!

More details and pics after the jump

I have high hopes for this phone. I love my Nokia E90, but there aren't many Symbian applications you can download for it, and it has nowhere near the web/mobile application integration that the iPhone does (for example, there's no dedicated FaceBook app for the Symbian S60 platform on which it's built).

Equally, the applications on the iPhone look fantastic, but the phone itself is no good for me. Sure it has 3G now, but that's still ten times slower than my E90, and I hate the Apple store, which locks the development process and restricts innovation by ensuring Apple get the final say over which apps are developed and which aren't.

Google Android, by contrast, is entirely open, and the Android Market will be a place where any developed can upload their applications for people to use, without Google saying what can and cannot be sold.

As such, if they can get the hardware and features right, Android phones should eventually blow the iPhone out the water, as the pace of innovation within the Android market should be much faster than that of the iPhone's. Just witness how fast the Web has evolved, and Android phones are based on exactly the same open model.

The T-Mobile G1 is still scheduled for a release sometime in September,and as these pics show, it's looking pretty close to being finalized, so even if it misses its September deadline, it shouldn't be by much.

The battle for the smartphone market is shaping up nicely, something which Nokia has itself recognized in a post I'll cover tomorrow. With the market soon to have Symbian, Windows Mobile, Apple iPhone and now Google Android platforms to work with, the mobile Web is about to become a much bigger part of our lives than it is now, and feature much tighter integration with the Web applications and services we've come to rely on on our desktop.

[Source: EngadgetMobile]

Actually, I say concrete, but there's nothing all that strong to go on. The current rumour is based on a patent application by iPhone accessory company Digital Lifestyle Outfitters (DLO), who've patented a design for a "telephonic portable digital media storage and playback device" (i.e. an iPhone dock). What's exciting the fanboys is that the patent contains a diagram showing a phone whose features are remarkably similar to an iPod Nano.

The speculation surrounds the purpose of such a patent. MacNN asks:

"Why else would a prominent iPod/iPhone accessories developer invent and patent this design and/or form-factor if it weren’t to be a coming reality?"

Well, as someone who holds a patent for work commissioned by Orange that never saw the light of day, I'll tell you...after the jump.

Companies frequently patent inventions they've no intention of putting into production for many many reasons, just some of which include:

• the just in case reason ("we don't want to build this, but we don't want our competitors building it either!")
• the look how clever we are reason (we have 10,000 useless patents, 9,000 more than our nearest competitor")
• the justify the spending reason ("look shareholders, these 10,000 useless patents show where all your cash has gone!")
• the patent swap reason ("we need your patents to create our cool device - how about we swap some of ours so we can use yours for free?")
• the competition by law reason ("you can license our patents that we can't afford to bring to market, and we'll take a cut of any profits you make, while not putting our shareholders' money at risk by actually building the thing!")

These are just some of the reasons that companies churn out millions of patents each year, but believe me there are many more. So the fact that DOL developed a patent for an iPod Nano device might just be an insurance policy in case Apple build such a device, rather than explicit proof that Apple are actually working on one.

In other words, the rumour is still just that - an unsubstantiated rumour fuelled by the wishes of a million and one hype-hungry fan-boys. Sorry about that!

[Source: MacNN]

Background to the GPhone rumour

The rumour first began with a press conference that Larry Page, Sergey Brin and Eric Schmidt gave recently, during which it was reported that "the trio of Google execs also used the opportunity to talk about the inroads the company is making with its own branded mobile phone as a replacement for the iPhone" (emphasis added). Cue instant hype surrounding the GPhone: describing Google's efforts in the mobile phone arena as the company's "own branded mobile phone" is very different from describing the Android platform. However, the article by Dan Cox doesn't elaborate on what was discussed, and so could simply have been a misunderstanding on his part.

Fortunately, TechCrunch did a bit of digging, and were informed by "...a good source swearing that Ammunition Group is designing the GPhone and that it is a seriously beautiful device."

So the rumour may not be so wild after all. Indeed, TechCrunch are now actively working on it, and are speculating that the GPhone may be a best in class effort developed by Google to set the standard for Android devices that other manufacturers should seek to beat.

So who are the Ammunition Group ? They're a product design and development group with an impressive portfolio of clients that they've worked with, including Dell, Nike, HP, and more interestingly, Apple, Samsung, Motorola, and Sprint. Indeed, the images you see in this post are concept phones that the company designed for Sprint.

What's in it for Google?

Let's assume the rumours are true and that Google really is working on a GPhone. What's in it for them? At the Google I/O Developer's conference last month, I was discussing the Android platform with one of their engineers, who told me that Google's mobile plans were really win-win. If people adopted Android en mass, Google wins; if instead they adopt the iPhone, Google still wins. How? Because of Goggles dominance in online advertising. Every person who uses the Web will click on a Google ad at some point. Thus, Google's strategy for growth on the Web is simply to encourage more people to use the Web.

Web adoption, though, is slowing somewhat as it nears saturation. So all Google needs to do is effectively to grow the Web by making it mobile. The more people access the Web via their mobile device, the more people will see Google ads and the more money it makes. Whether these people see the Google ads on an iPhone or an Android phone, Google doesn't care. The only way Google's strategy won't work is if users use a mobile browser that doesn't offer the full desktop browsing experience of an iPhone or an Android phone, or that doesn't show Google ads. In other words, a phone by Nokia, for example, who themselves have big plans for mobile advertising.

So Google needs either the iPhone or the Android phone to succeed. Both would be even better. Unless a big name gets behind Android, though, it doesn't stand a chance of competing with the big boys. Now who has the brand cachet to whip up hype and get everyone salivating for a brand new phone that's not a Nokia? Google!

So Google releases a best of breed Android phone that not only shows the world what can be done with Android, it also creates buzz around the platform that rubs off on other Android phones that are developed by other manufacturers. Android and the iPhone eat into Nokia's commanding smartphone market share, the mobile Web explodes, and suddenly Google has a market to see its ads that's at least as big as the Web is now.

So is Google developing a GPhone? It'd be crazy not to!

[Source: TechCrunch, MediaWeek ]

The LG KC910 offers all of these features, and then crams in a whole load more just for fun. How does widescreen video recording at 30fps sound? If that's whet your appetite, read on for more after the jump.

LG KC910

The LG KC910 will be an 8 megapixel camera phone complete with image stabilization, xenon flash, and automatic face detection. All these you'd expect in a flagship cameraphone (well, you would since the announcement of Sony Ericsson's C902, anyway!).

So to help it get an edge over its rivals, LG have added widescreen 720x480 video recording at 30fps to the mix as well. In addition, you get a WVGA (800 x 400) touchscreen, and what the rumour is describing as 'completely new' user interface.

LG have focused on video recording before in an effort to differentiate their phones from the competition. The LG Viewty, for example, was a good 5 megapixel camera phone, but where it really differed from similar 5 megapixel camera phones was in its ability to shoot videos in slow motion at 60 fps.

It seems this is now part of their overall strategy for new uber-phones. It's obviously working, as they're not losing market share, and it really gives them an edge over their rivals that they can talk up.

Competing 8 megapixel camera phones

The LG KC910 should be available by October 2008, which means there will be at least two 8 megapixel camera phones on the market before Christmas. There's also rumour that Motorola are also working on an 8 megapixel monster, but I'll believe that when I see it, which just leaves Nokia and Samsung.

I find it hard to believe that the two most innovative phone manufacturers don't have a comparable phone up their sleeves; indeed, Nokia's been rumoured to be working on an 8 megapixel phone since 2007, while Samsung released an 8 megapixel CMOS sensor specifically for camera phones in March this year.

All this leads me to think that Christmas is going to see a battle royal of uber-camera phones. Enjoy it while you can, though, as next year should see the battle shift towards devices that focus more on the Mobile Web, as both the iPhone 3G and new Google Android phones bring the Web into people's pockets. Once that happens, a usable mobile Web experience will be essential for any phone, which will force the manufacturers to focus their efforts on interfaces, software, browsers and services.

[Source: MobileCowboys]