Posts filed under Coming Soon

There’s another Sony Ericsson phone on its way, currently codenamed the Sony Ericsson Alicia, and as you can see from the pics, it looks like something straight from the age of LED watches. Those of you under 35 may not be aware that there was such a thing as LED watches, but it’s true. Before LCD there was LED, with big bright red numerals set against a black backgroud – which, if you look at the Alicia, is exactly what Sony Ericsson’s new phone offers.

It also offers a few other tips of the hat to certain other style icons, such as what looks like an iPod-esque scroll wheel. Other than that, details are a bit sketchy, but there will apparently be animations on the screens (both internal and external) that change according to the time of day, or some other event such as the weather.

More pics of the Sony Ericsson Alicia after the jump.

Oh, you can tell there’s an Apple announcement imminent, as the Apple fanboys are stoking up the fires of hypeville. The latest rumour is that the next generation iPhone will not only have 3G (which is a given), it’ll also come with GPS and, wait for it…mobile TV!

The news comes from a Swiss website, of all places, which doesn’t actually provide any authoritative sources backing up its claim; rather, they simply add the news that Swiss Telco Swisscom has secured distribution rights to the iPhone in Switzerland to other news that Swisscom is rolling out a mobile TV service, and come up with the answer that the mobile TV service simply must be for the new 3G iPhone!

Er, right!

All the rumours for the next-gen iPhone are just that – rumours – but we can be sure that it’ll come with 3G, hopefully with HSDPA, probably with GPS, and probably not mobile TV. Not exactly a concrete list of iPhone features, granted, but while news from Apple is so scarce, the fanboys will fill the vacuum, and nobody can accuse them of being impartial!

[Source: LeMatin.ch, via MacRumors]

The iPhone in its current can no longer be bought online in either the UK or, more significantly, the US. Apple has apparently declined to comment on why there’s no more stock left, but rumours are reaching fever pitch that a new 3G iPhone is on its way in June, and will be announced at the Apple Worldwide Developers Conference in San Francisco.

The current model didn’t have 3G as it would apparently drain the battery too quickly. So what’s changed now to enable Apple to launch a new 3G model? Well according to some reports, you’ll be able to turn off 3G when you don’t need it, meaning the radio buried deep inside the iPhone can be switched to the less power hungry 2G protocols when you don’t need super high-speed access (in other words, when you’re not using the Internet).

This seems, at best, a hack, as no other 3G phone requires you to keep switching between different communication modes, and it doesn’t exactly fit Apple’s mantra of ease of use. How many ordinary phone users even know of, let alone care about, 2G or 3G, or when to use each type of communication technology?

Still, a 3G iPhone at last makes Apple’s Uber-phone fully usable, so however they manage, it, let’s hope we see it soon.

[Source: MyMotherLode]

Heading this way real soon is the Sony Ericsson P5i, the latest in a long line of glorious Sony Ericsson smartphones. Still codenamed Paris, the P5i hasn’t yet been officially announced, but as these new pics show, it certainly won’t be long before it’s launched in blaze of hype.

It looks superb, despite the fact it’s got one of those annoying rocker-style keypads first seen on the M600i. It’s features aren’t too shabby, either, with touchscreen, 5 megapixel camera, GPS, WayFinder 7.0 software, and a weather application as well.

More pics of the Sony Ericsson P5i after the jump.

The Sony Ericsson Xperia X1 is one of the most-anticipated new smartphones to come from Sony Ericsson in years. Previous smartphones from the company focused on their P-range, with the P900 and its successors perhaps the most well-known. Although these have always been well-regarded, I’ve also found them a bit too fiddly to use. You either had to rely on stylus-based hand-writing recognition, which only recognized a single character at a time, or a keyboard so small only a 5 year old child could use.

The Xperia X1 changes all that, as it comes with a slide out keyboard similar to other manufacturers’ smartphones (such as HTC’s range or the Nokia E90). Better still, Sony Ericsson have had the good sense of stuffing the X1 with every conceivable feature they could think of!

Read on for a sneak preview of the Sony Ericsson Xperia X1 in action.

While Sony Ericsson are busy teasing us with the specs of their forthcoming XPERIA X1 smartphone, they’re also working quietly on another smartphone currently codenamed the Sony Ericsson Paris. The phone will probably be called the P5i when it’s launched, and comes with some serious firepower.

For starters, it’ll have a touchscreen (which is par for the course these days), together witha 5 megapixel camera, GPS, WayFinder 7.0 software, and a curious weather application as well. From the sounds of it, this will give you a heads-up on what the weather will be doing where you now, by combining your current position with an online weather service.

More details and tonnes of pics of the Sony Ericsson P5i/Paris after the jump.

Although Sony Ericsson have already announced a positive plethora of new phones (is there such a thing as a negative plethora?!), there are yet more on the horizon. Fortunately, Sony Ericsson phones seem to have the keenest set of fan boys of any of the major manufacturers, so there are no shortage of spy pics to keep us all freshly tantalized for the coming months.

Take these pics of the Sony Ericsson Bei Bei for example. Bei Bei is, of course, just a codename for the new phone, which as of yet hasn’t actually been given an official name. What we do know about it is that it will be a touchscreen Walkman phone with WiFi, an MP3 player (not a difficult guess, that one, given that it’s a Walkman phone), and, er… well that’s all we know about it!

Oh, and it’ll be a clamshell. But you can see that in the pics! Not sure about the UI, myself. It’s nice (though unsurprising) that it’s touchscreen, but the icons and colour scheme of the UI seem a bit lame.

More pics of the Bei Bei after the jump.

Now here’s a phone that’s had me all excited ever since it was first announced at the Mobile World Congress back in February. The Sony Ericsson XPERIA X1 is a smartphone set to challenge the mighty Nokia E90. If looks are anything to go by, the XPERIA wins hands down, but as with any smartphone, it’s not the looks that matter, it’s the features and how easy they are to use.

Sony Ericsson are keeping tight lipped about the applications on offer with the XPERIA X1 for the moment, but they have released a set of specifications for the phone, if it’s incomplete.

Full spec of the XPERIA X1 after the jump.

LG will be releasing the third generation of its highly successful LG Black Label series of mobile phones on 24th April. The Black Label brand has been LG’s top designer brand for some time, and has featured phones that exude style and good looks while toning down the features. The new LG Black Label looks set to continue the trend for good looks, and it’s not exactly under-endowed when it comes to features either. Details are scarce at the moment, but LG have said it’ll come with a 5 megapixel camera.

The new Black Label phone hasn’t been named yet, and won’t be until the official launch. I’m betting they’ll name it Keith. OK, not the usual name for a mobile phone, perhaps, but “Keith the LG Phone! has a bit of a ring to it, doesn’t it?!

Actually, I tried to think of a more sensible name for it, but looking at it, nothing immediately springs to mind. The LG Chocolate looked good enough to eat, while the Shine was, well, Shiny. This new Black Label phone, though? I’m at a loss! So Keith it is.

Feel free to add your own name in the comments.

Motorola has been working on a 5 megapixel camera phone in collaboration with Kodak for what seems like years. Finally, the partnership might be about to bear fruit with the launch of the new Motorola Zine ZN5 camera phone at the CTIA Wireless conference in Las Vegas tomorrow.

The Zine will be the first phone released since Motorola split itself in two in an attempt to stop the company’s mobile phone division slipping even further into the red. This won’t make the Zine any good, though, as it still comes from a company whose last innovation was to paint the RAZR pink and sell it as a new phone!

More pics and derision after the jump.