Even though Access has all but given up on its Palm OS and ALP platforms, the folks still seem motivated to leech off some goodwill and nostalgic feelings.
One side of their booth contained user comments, many of which praised Palm OS:
Not much to add here…
The first Palm Pilot devices contained a slot for memory cards – it allowed users to expand the memory of their device with ease. As devices became more compact, the slots went away…
Motorola’s XOOM shipped as a 3G handset, but was advertised to be able to get a hardware update to 4G networking via a new modem card:
iFixit now found out the following about the process:
It looks like the Xoom was specifically designed with this upgrade in mind. We had to fully delve into the device to find all the clues, but we believe this is the procedure Motorola will perform on your behalf:
1. Use a T5 Torx screwdriver to unscrew two screws on the bottom, and then slide the back panel to expose a mysterious circuit board that immediately becomes accessible. In fact, there are retaining clips on the back of the rear panel that prevent it from sliding any further (which of course we immediately circumvented).
2. Disconnect two antenna connectors, unscrew the two Torx screws holding the board in place, and swap it out with a 4G LTE board.
3. And… Thats it
Sounds cool to me…
We surely never expected this one from HP. It had previously said that there would be no updated for the Pre Plus to WebOS 2. But today updated for the Pre Plus were rampant in Germany that took the device to WebOS 2.1. This welcome update is available as of now Over the air.
With such a move, HP will surely gain some traction in the market, being one of the very few companies who still care about the old devices. Pre users will definitely like to stick with the company if the same path is followed by HP in the future too.
More coverage from the event is coming shortly!
Recapitulating many of the speeches and talks with other attendants, it looks like the GSMA’s motto of embracing the transformation was indeed accomplished: we saw little truly new, yet a lot of traditionally high-tech stuff is now on its way to price-conscious consumers.
From a device manufacturers viewpoint, the focus areas were clear: tablets with Android (one webOS) and loads of cheap smartphones using outdated screens. Power users were treated to a few dual core Android phones and a 3D phone from LG.
Speaking of 3D: industry pundits have long stipulated that content would be the the next battle area. This turned out to be true: hundreds of very happy content providers were roaming the scene.
Day four traditionally is rather useless, as most important people leave in the morning. However, the Fira showed an especial lack of talent this time: not only was security onerous as always, but they actually managed to have queues in front of most male toilets (!!!).
WhatAMap.com (the supplier of the on-device catalog) didn’t shine too much, either. Last year, the app was just a disaster to use – this year, it wasn’t even able to display contact information or booth addresses:
If you add in the normal traffic queues and the onerous waits fort a taxi, you get a very tiresome event. This was echoed by more than one participant, who wished that the next event would be held at another city…
Even though it runs Android, we have covered the LG Optimus 2X on more than one occasion.
The device was now released at Mobile World Congress. A picture of such a device sitting at the LG booth is here:
I proceeded to downloading a benchmark app from the Android market, and ended up with the following results:
As I do not use Android much (so far), I cannot say much. However, the system felt performant…and was real. Welcome to dual core age, folks!
As yours truly is heading away from the congress after a day’s worth of running around, it is time for a little bit of recapitulation.
This year’s Mobile World Congress has presented itself less splashy than last year’s – except for three webOS devices and a bunch of Android phones from just about every vendor, not much device showing happened at the show so far.
Nokia didn’t show a single of the expected devices (including the VGA QWERTY), RIM showed nothing and Microsoft had nothing to show off either.
Instead, operator economics and app development take more of a center stage at this year’s event. There’s loads of networking going on – but not much which leads to newsworthy stories.
We will obviously continue to scan the place for newsworthy stuff – if you want us to cover something, let us know!
Access Co has the questionable honor of having received the first post before the congress even started – they got it because Access Linux Platform seems to be dead for good.
Nevertheless, they still had a stand this year. It was at the same place as always, but their neighbor changed from Palm to the 3GSM embedded house:
Palm OS nostalgists will be delighted to see that Graffiti is still around. If you look carefully at some of the shots, you can even see the Palm OS fonts of lore:
In addition, a launcher for Android was shown as end user product:
Carriers were offered a variety of solutions ranging from synchronization to video calls:
Finally, something funny – the piano player in front of the booth used an iPad:
If you ask me, Access is transitioning from an OS vendor to a crossplattform software / solutions company. It remains to be seen how successful they will be…
Nokia’s decision to gang up with Microsoft was not too well liked by anyone – the stock price is down, and developers are pissed as hell. However, Nokia is not their first “strategic mobile partner”!
The folks from AsymCo have now written a very interesting post:
Microsoft’s new “strategic partnership” with Nokia is not its first. For a decade the software company has courted and consummated relationships with a variety of companies in mobile and telecom. Here are the ones I can remember:
Hit the link above to find out more – it’s more than worth it!
It’s official now..!! More than 100 million people use an Opera browser each month on their mobile phones.
According to the numbers issued today in Opera’s State of the Mobile Web report:
90.4 million people now use Opera Mini every month and approximately 15 million people use Opera Mobile each month. In all, 105 million people use Opera on their phones.
“Experts all have some date when they claim the mobile Web will overtake the PC web – we’re watching that transition now,” said Jon von Tetzchner, Co-founder of Opera Software. “But, rather than think of numbers, we think of people. 100 million is the beginning of a new era for the Web. In the next few years, hundreds of millions of people will take their first baby steps online. They will make their voices heard across their country and around the world. They will not only discover new ideas, but contribute their own. We defend those voices and celebrate those ideas. It is why we believe access to the Web is a universal right, and no device is more universal than a mobile phone.”
We sure are to see newer browser for all the platforms at MWC’11
Veer, Pre3 and TouchPad are the three devices that have been revealed by HP as their new WebOS powered devices. As they have mentioned “WebOS now in S, M, L”.
The Veer is the “S” and we consider it a tad tiny, featuring a 2.6″ touchscreen and a slide out keyboard.
The Pre3 is the most anticipated. Dons a 3.5″ touchscreen, a slide out keyboard, a 5mpx camera, a 1.4 GHz CPU and much more.
And finally we have the TouchPad which is HP’s answer to the tablet world. A 9.7-inch XGA display, GPS, loads of sensors and WebOS makes this worth a look.
Actually there is so much to know about these devices that we would request our readers to head over HERE and look for themselves. We sure promise you nice things over there.
According to Chitika Research, HP has announced some serious things at it’s press conference today. It has stated that the WebOS might be coming to PCs soon. Given the fact that HP is one of the major manufactures of computers out there, and can be a serious thread to windows if HP takes the right steps.
According to Chitika:
Looking at our own data, we see that WebOS is currently sending very little traffic – as a purely mobile operating system, it’s outnumbered 47 to 1 by iPhones and 31 to 1 by Android devices (although I should note we see twice as many WebOS devices than Windows Phone 7 ones).
While we believe that to break the ground of Windows would be a tough one for HP. But who knows when the underdog can outplay the champ…!!
When Access took over PalmSource, many(yours truly included) expected all kinds of cool new products from the manufacturer. Unfortunately, we never saw a single ALP handset – the Emblaze Else found itself canceled before it hit the road.
Access’s PR team now sent me the following message about their Mobile World Congress 2011 presence:
Sorry for not getting back to you sooner. I’m afraid ACCESS won’t be discussing ALP at the show. If there’s anything else you’re interested in please let me know and I can arrange a meeting for you.
Looks like Access has written off the platform once and for all…
When it comes to device data, getting more is merrier. We have now partnered up with the UK mobile phone accessory retailer MobileFun, and hope to bring you data from them regularly.
MobileFun’s data is different to the one provided by Krusell for two reasons: a) we get raw data which we can process, and b) their presence is strongest in the UK and thus gives their data high significance for the UK market.
Breaking down over platforms, the most successful devices look as following:
| Platform | Device | Rank |
|---|---|---|
| Palm OS | Palm TX | 379 |
| Palm webOS | Pre | 215 |
| Windows Phone 7 | HTC HD7 | 27 |
| Windows Mobile | HTC HD2 | 11 |
| Symbian | N8 | 7 |
| iPhone | 4 | 1 |
| BlackBerry | Curve 8520 | 6 |
| bada | 8500 | 23 |
Finally, here is the top 100, as provided by MobileFun:
| Rank | Handset | |||
| 1 | Apple-iPhone-4 | |||
| 2 | HTC-Desire-HD | |||
| 3 | HTC-Desire | |||
| 4 | Samsung-Galaxy-S-I9000 | |||
| 5 | HTC-Wildfire | |||
| 6 | BlackBerry-8520-Curve | |||
| 7 | Nokia-N8 | |||
| 8 | BlackBerry-Torch-9800 | |||
| 9 | Apple-iPhone-3GS | |||
| 10 | Sony-Ericsson-X10 | |||
| 11 | HTC-HD2 | |||
| 12 | Samsung-Tocco-Lite | |||
| 13 | BlackBerry-Bold-9780 | |||
| 14 | BlackBerry-Curve-3G-9300 | |||
| 15 | HTC-Desire-Z | |||
| 16 | Samsung-Galaxy | |||
| 17 | BlackBerry-Bold-9700 | |||
| 18 | Nokia-C3 | |||
| 19 | Sony-Ericsson-XPERIA-X10-Mini-Pro | |||
| 20 | Apple-iPhone | |||
| 21 | Apple-iPhone-3G | |||
| 22 | Dell-Streak | |||
| 23 | Samsung-Wave-S8500 | |||
| 24 | Sony-Ericsson-XPERIA-X10-Mini | |||
| 25 | Nokia-E72 | |||
| 26 | Motorola-DEFY | |||
| 27 | HTC-HD7 | |||
| 28 | Google-Nexus-S | |||
| 29 | Sony-Ericsson-XPERIA-X8 | |||
| 30 | LG-KP500-Cookie | |||
| 31 | Nokia-X6 | |||
| 32 | Orange-San-Francisco | |||
| 33 | Nokia-5230 | |||
| 34 | Samsung-Omnia-7 | |||
| 35 | Nokia-C7 | |||
| 36 | Sony-Ericsson-Vivaz | |||
| 37 | Samsung-Monte-S5620 | |||
| 38 | HTC-Legend | |||
| 39 | BlackBerry-8900-Curve | |||
| 40 | HTC-Hero | |||
| 41 | Nokia-6700-Classic | |||
| 42 | Sony-Ericsson-W995 | |||
| 43 | HTC-Mozart | |||
| 44 | Nokia-5800-Xpress-Music | |||
| 45 | Orange-Rio | |||
| 46 | Nokia-6300 | |||
| 47 | Nokia-E5 | |||
| 48 | Nokia-E71 | |||
| 49 | Samsung-Google-Nexus-S | |||
| 50 | LG-GT540-Optimus | |||
| 51 | Samsung-Galaxy-Europa-I5500 | |||
| 52 | LG-KU990-Viewty | |||
| 53 | BlackBerry-Pearl-3G | |||
| 54 | Nokia-N97 | |||
| 55 | Samsung-Jet-S8000 | |||
| 56 | LG-Optimus-One | |||
| 57 | Sony-Ericsson-Satio | |||
| 58 | Nokia-N900 | |||
| 59 | LG-Viewty-Snap-GM360 | |||
| 60 | Nokia-X3-02-Touch-And-Type | |||
| 61 | BlackBerry-Bold | |||
| 62 | Nokia-C3-01-Touch-and-Type | |||
| 63 | Samsung-F480-Tocco | |||
| 64 | Sony-Ericsson-K800i | |||
| 65 | Nokia-N95 | |||
| 66 | 3-INQ-Chat-3G | |||
| 67 | Samsung-Galaxy-Apollo-i5801 | |||
| 68 | BlackBerry-8310-Curve | |||
| 69 | Sony-Ericsson-Elm | |||
| 70 | Samsung-M8800-Pixon | |||
| 71 | Nokia-E63 | |||
| 72 | Google-Nexus-One | |||
| 73 | Nokia-N73 | |||
| 74 | Nokia-C6 | |||
| 75 | Nokia-2330-Classic | |||
| 76 | Nokia-6303i-Classic | |||
| 77 | Vodafone-845 | |||
| 78 | HTC-Trophy | |||
| 79 | Samsung-Genio-Touch | |||
| 80 | HTC-HD-mini | |||
| 81 | Sony-Ericsson-C905 | |||
| 82 | Nokia-6310i | |||
| 83 | Nokia-N97-mini | |||
| 84 | Samsung-Genio-Qwerty | |||
| 85 | Sony-Ericsson-C902 | |||
| 86 | Nokia-6500-Classic | |||
| 87 | Samsung-B2100-Solid-Extreme | |||
| 88 | Nokia-2730-Classic | |||
| 89 | BlackBerry-Storm2 | |||
| 91 | Nokia-N95-8GB | |||
| 90 | Nokia-C5 | |||
| 92 | Nokia-6303-Classic | |||
| 93 | Nokia-X3 | |||
| 94 | Alcatel-Tribe-OT-800 | |||
| 95 | Motorola-Milestone | |||
| 96 | HTC-Smart | |||
| 97 | BlackBerry-8300-Curve | |||
| 98 | HTC-Touch-HD | |||
| 99 | Sony-Ericsson-W595 | |||
| 100 | Sony-Ericsson-Spiro | |||
P.S: The folks have pretty cool iPhone 4 cases, BlackBerry Curve 3G cases and HTC WildFire chargers.
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