As Apple Lifts Restrictions, VoIP through 3G Now Possible in the iPhone
Prior to this, VoIP through cellular networks was not possible for the iPhone. Or should say, Apple did not allow the feature. For whatever reason, you can only make VoIP calls whenever your iPhone is connected via Wi-Fi. Sudddenly, Apple realized that it’s now time to lift this restriction and allow VoIP feature through cellular networks.
As soon as Apple updated the iPhone SDK, we now have the first iPhone app to make this possible – iCall. In fact, this app will go down into history as being the first and currently the only VoIP application that uses 3G networks for the iPhone.
So, now you make unrestricted free local and long distance calling vover 3G networks using your iPhone.
iCall is already available at the Apps Store as a free download. And iCall CEO is more than happy about the release of this app and applauded Apple for lifting the restrictions.
“I applaud Apple’s decision to allow iCall to extend its functionality beyond Wi-Fi and onto the 3G networks. This heralds a new era for VoIP applications on mobile platforms, especially for iCall and our free calling model. I hope that now more developers will begin using our VoIP as a platform to integrate VoIP into their applications.”
Here’s the link to iCall iPhone App at the Apps Store.
It’s Not the iSlate but the Apple iPad, a Bigger iPod Touch
Apple’s Press Event for its “latest creation” has just ended. Finally the mystery has been unfolded. What we speculated as the Apple iSlate is now officially called – iPad. And what is it really?
Apple’s Steve Jobs describes the iPad as “our most advanced technology in a magical and revolutionary device at an unbelievable price.” Magical and revolutionary may be too exaggerated. But the price is definitely unbelievable considering that it is an Apple product with a bigger screen than the iPod Touch but with almost the same specs and features.
Yes, that’s what the iPad is – an iPod Touch, a bigger version. An iPod Touch in steroids. Specs and features would give you a 9.7-inch IPS display, full capacitive multi-touch screen, 16GB to 64GB flash storage, Wi-Fi Bluetooth, and 3G connectivity features, accelerometer,0.5-inch thick, 1.5 lbs, 1GHz Apple A4 Chips, and 10 hours of battery life.
The iPad should run almost all of the current apps available at the iTunes Store. So, it means that it is using the same OS structure as the iPhone and iPod Touch.
As expected, it will also be an e-book reader. Apple also announced the iBooks app which is actually an e-reader application. It will be supported by major publishers and in fact, Apple has already snagged a deal with four of them including HarperColling, MacMillan, Simon and Schuster and Hatchett. E-book prices will range from $9.99 – up.
Pricing starts at $499 for the base model with 16GB storage and Wi-Fi.
So, are you happy about Apple’s latest creation? Do you plan on buying it?
Walmart to Release the Nexus One for $99
Over at Walmart’s Online site, specifically under its Wireless section, a new product page showed up announcing the Google Nexus One. While it may not be impossible for Walmart to release the Nexus One soon, what is more interesting as noted by AndroidandMe is that it may be released not only under a Verizon contract but AT&T as well.
While Google may have previously announced that it is also planning to release Nexus One under Verizon, what was not announced though is the AT&T version.
The blog post also cited another blog reporting that Walmart might offer the Nexus One for $99 under a 2-year service contract. What is not clear is whether Walmart was able to negotiate a lower price with Google , if indeed the rumor is true. As you all know, the Nexus One is available under T-Mobile for $179.
Again, these are both unofficial and does not really came from Google. Although we could not discount the fact that Google might resort to this plan to increase the Nexus One’s userbase. If indeed the $99 Nexus One is true, those who have not yet bought the phone should start hoping that Google will also reduce T-Mobile’s offering price for the phone.
So, what do you think? Will this push through or not?
Palm Pre Plus and Palm Pixi Plus Land on Verizon
There you go, Verizon has finally made the Palm Pixi Plus and Palm Pre Plus available for its customers. As announced earlier, the Palm Pixi Plus and Palm Pre Plus are available for $99.99 and $149.99 respectively. Both phones require a two-year activation.
Now, here’s the best part – Verizon is offering some great deals tied up with the two phones. If you get the Palm Pre Plus, you will be entitled to get 3 phones for free. The bad news is you are only given two phone choices – the BlackBerry Pearl Flip 8230 smartphone and the LG VX5500. You if you avail of these free three phone promo, you’d end having two phones of the same model.
The Palm Pixi is on a buy-one-take-one promo. That means you’d get two units for the price of one but would also require you another 2-year activation plan.
As a review, the Palm Pixi Plus features full QWERTY keyboard, Palm webOS, widescreen display plus all the goodies you’d normally find in most smartphones available in the market today.
The same thing goes true for the Palm Pre Plus but it has an advanced touchscreen, full keyboard display. This phone’s keyboard was built on a slide out style.
So, are you getting any of these Palm Phones? Which one are you most likely to get?
Apple Tablet News Round-Up
Since Apple’s big event is just a few days away, the anticipation over what Apple will actually announced next week continues to sizzle. The whole week, tech news aggregator Techmeme’s front page has nothing for the main news but anything about the Applet Tablet. So here we go rounding-up the latest information available, be it official or unofficial about the Apple Tablet.
First issue has something to do with the fact that the rumored Apple Tablet will help wireless capability. This is pretty obvious since Apple definitely wants to compete against the Amazon Kindle. The question is which carrier will it be supporting. Words on the streets point to both, Verizon and AT&T.
Then people are also predicting how the Apple Tablet could possibly look like. Apple Insider pointed to the closest rendering of the Apple Tablet created by Flicr user Fotoboer.nl. From what we can see from the photos, the Apple Tablet looks like a bigger iPod Touch.
iLounge joined in the fun with their own predictions, this time regarding the Apple Tablet having double dock connectors and antennas. They mentioned that these information came from reliable sources. The double dock connectors are fine but I just hope that the antennas are not true.
Apple is said to be holding talks also with several possible content partners including McGraw-Hill and Hachete Book Group. This is a very important concern that Apple must iron out, possibly before the January 27 event. If Apple is posing the Apple Tablet primarily as an e-book reader, having a content partner in tow would be a plus for the device.
Finally, how about those who are eagerly anticipating this Apple Tablet, the consumers who are actually going to buy it, what are they expecting from Apple’s new device? Retrevo has some interesting findings from a quick poll it did among selected people. Interestingly, solar charging as the main feature is what most respondent want to have on the Apple Tablet.
Interesting bits and pieces, right? Now, we should all put this into a rest for the weekend and resume the waiting game on Monday.
Palm Pre Plus and Palm Pixi Pricing Finalized
Finally Verizon and Palm have set the pricing scheme for the soon to be released Palm Pre Plus and Palm Pixi smartphones. According to the blog Electronista, the Palm Pre Plus will have the same pricing as its older Sprint counterpart on Verizon, that is – $150 under a two-year Verizon plan. The Palm Pixi on the other hand will cost $100 under the same two-year Verizon data plan. But in addition, the Pixi will be offered on a buy-one-get-one deal.
In relation to the pricing schemes of the said Palm smartphones, Verizon is also offering the Palm Mobile Hotspot which uses the Palm Pre or Palm Pixi as access point. Cost of said hotspot access is at $40 and will be added to existing plans owned by users. It will also have the same 5GB transfer cap and 5 cents per MB overage fees as a stand-alone modem.
Seems like a pretty good deal, right? All you have to do now is wait for January 25 when both the Palm Pre and Palm Pixi smartphones become available on Verizon. Both smartphones will carry the latest version of Palm’s webOS which currently – version 1.3.5.1. But come February, this will updated to version 1.4 and will have video recording plus other features as enhancements.
WhiteHouse.gov Jumps into the iPhone Bandwagon
Available now for free download from the iTunes Apps Store is the White House App. This iPhone app will bring in real-time dynamic content from the WhiteHouse.gov site to the palm of your hand.
The WhiteHouse iPhone app is loaded with great features, more notable of these is of course live video streaming capability. This means that after installing this on your iPhone, you will be able to watch President Obama’s public events at the White House, visit web chats with Administration official as well as witness other official events include key speeches and press briefing.
To kick off the launch of its iPhone app, The White House iPhone app will be streaming Pres. Obama’s State of the Union address scheduled next week.
Other features of the White House iPhone app include access to the White House Blog as well as from the Briefing Room, browse behind-the-scenes photos and watch on-demand videos. The White House app gives you instant access to full videos from the most recent speeches, speeches, press briefings and other special events.
iPhone 4.0 Features Leak Out, Apple Tablet to be Named iPad?
Following last week’s rumor that Apple is also announcing iPhone 4.0 during the big event that it is holding on January 27, rumored features of the said iPhone OS started leaking out. Boy Genius Report is running some of these iPhone 4.0 features.
Some of the more promising iPhone 4.0 features include:
- multi-touch gesture OS-wide
- new ways to run apps in the background (probably referring to multitasking capability as a response to Google Nexus One’s app multitasking feature)
- changes in GUI to make navigation easier and more efficient
- iPhone OS 4.0 update will be available only for iPhone 3G and 3GS as Apple aims to make these phones smarter than they are right now
- new ability to sync contacts and calendar apps
As for the Apple Tablet that will be announced on the same event. Another rumor surfaced indicating that Apple may actually name it iPad instead of the recent speculations that it will be called the iSlate. MacRumors is citing several patent applications for the name iPad filed by Apple’s dummy corporations in various countries recently.
So, there two new juicy rumors about the January 27 Apple event that is making everybody excited right now. Whichever is true among these rumors, it will certainly rock us all once again next week.
Google Nexus One Hands-On, First Impressions and Photos
You’ve probably read tons of Google Nexus One coverage from those who got it a day or two after it was released by Google. So, pardon me for posting this late since I just received my Google Nexus One a couple of hours ago. Being in a non-supported country, my Google Nexus One arrived 10 days after I ordered it, which was actually the day after it was announced. After going through some work-around, I finally did it – ordered my Google Nexus One, and waited impatiently for it to arrive. And so it did.
So, after practically using no other phone the the iPhone for two years, I’m so glad that the Google Nexus One runs almost the same as the iPhone. I mean, the interface is almost identical. The touchscreen feature, the apps screen and the display resolution make the iPhone and Google Nexus One almost like siblings.
But of course there differences. And based on a few hours of using it, I came up with a conclusion. If you have to compare the Google Nexus One and the iPhone using the usual mobile phone brands, I would have to say that if the iPhone is the Nokia of smartphones, the Google Nexus One can be considered as the Sony Ericsson. In other words, the Google Nexus One is geared more for the tech-savvy mobile phone users.
Aside from the looks, what more can I say about the Google Nexus One? Oh yes, the Android OS is simply fantastic. It’s fast, lightweight and plain straight-out mobile phone OS. Being an iPhone user for two years, did I find any difficulty learning the ins and outs of the Android-powered Nexus One? None.
Using the Nexus One for the first time is a breeze. Nothing difficult about it. Although, I’m not pretty sure how it fares when it comes to tinkering and tweeking. That’s what I’m going to do next. Will post a review of the Google Nexus One after I’ve used it for a couple of days.
In the meantime, check this site if you want to see some more photos of the Google Nexus One.
Apple Might Introduce a New Multi-Gesture Control to the iSlate
If you think that Apple’s success with the current multi-touch control of the iPhone and it’s MacBook products will stop the company from revolutionizing some more, well think again. As Apple just might come up with some new bright ideas when it comes to multi-touch controls on it s future products, particularly the now almost confirmed iSlate.
Patent documents dug up from the U.S. Patent Website revealed that Apple might just be cooking up another ground breaking technology relating to multi-touch control. The patent was from Fingerworks, a company which Apple bought before and just might be tapped to carry out the new technology that will be implemented to the iSlate.
Based on the documents, two patents were applied for by Fingerworks and just might be used for the iSlate. One of the patent was for the ability to write on a touchscreen just like you would on an ordinary piece of paper. If indeed this will be applied to the iSlate, I would be the first one to line up to get it because admit it or not, it is indeed pretty cool.
The other patent was for the ability for a machine to identify whether you are typing or not if you happen to have your hand on the screen. Of course, this would be in support of the first patent.
Now, whether these two patents will be used on the iSlate remains to be seen. But if in case Apple does so, then I can bet you my one month’s pay check that the Apple iSlate will certainly be one of the coolest gadgets to be ever released for consumers, so far.