Nokia, Microsoft and AT&T spent hundreds of millions of dollars on the development of the Lumia 900 Windows Phone smartphone in order to effectively relaunch the middling platform in the US after a fairly unsuccessful 2011 filled with discontinued hardware, cancelled handsets and increasingly marginalized perception despite being a critical darling since launch.
The April 8th launch did little to help matters, as the majority of AT&T locations were closed for the Easter holiday and those that were opened specifically to sell the Lumia 900 as part of a larger launch event either did not have the handsets in stock, or worse, only had one or two units to fulfill customer purchases without even taking into account the launch being overshadowed by AT&T’s change in policy that now allows for iPhones to be unlocked as long as certain requirements are met.
Now, the latest problem for the flagship Windows Phone handset centers around software issues that are affecting select owners with extensive memory management and data issues that have forced Nokia and AT&T to develop a bugfix update, spending yet more money on the initiative. In order to make up for that, Nokia is spending even more money by offering all Lumia 900 owners the chance to redeem an additional $100 instant rebate for all customers that purchased the phone, effectively matching the free after rebate and 2 year agreement promotion offered to new customers that pre-ordered the phone.
Of course, the catch is that the offer is good until April 21st. Additionally, owners will be able to exchange purchased launch units for brand new versions on April 16th with proof of purchase. The update which will fix the aforementioned memory management and data connection issues is expected to be offered within the next few days, but the rebate is meant to be an honest goodwill gesture towards any and all customers that may have been affected by the bug, as well as addressing complaints from those customers that upgraded to the phone about new customers getting the better deal over those that have been with AT&T for a substantial length of time, reflecting the attitude that wireless carriers take to longstanding customers compared to new customers.
Nokia Offering Additional $100 Instant Rebate to All Lumia 900 Owners Until April 21st
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Nokia, Microsoft and AT&T spent hundreds of millions of dollars on the development of the Lumia 900 Windows Phone smartphone in order to effectively relaunch the middling platform in the US after a fairly unsuccessful 2011 filled with discontinued hardware, cancelled handsets and increasingly marginalized perception despite being a critical darling since launch.
The April 8th launch did little to help matters, as the majority of AT&T locations were closed for the Easter holiday and those that were opened specifically to sell the Lumia 900 as part of a larger launch event either did not have the handsets in stock, or worse, only had one or two units to fulfill customer purchases without even taking into account the launch being overshadowed by AT&T’s change in policy that now allows for iPhones to be unlocked as long as certain requirements are met.
Now, the latest problem for the flagship Windows Phone handset centers around software issues that are affecting select owners with extensive memory management and data issues that have forced Nokia and AT&T to develop a bugfix update, spending yet more money on the initiative. In order to make up for that, Nokia is spending even more money by offering all Lumia 900 owners the chance to redeem an additional $100 instant rebate for all customers that purchased the phone, effectively matching the free after rebate and 2 year agreement promotion offered to new customers that pre-ordered the phone.
Of course, the catch is that the offer is good until April 21st. Additionally, owners will be able to exchange purchased launch units for brand new versions on April 16th with proof of purchase. The update which will fix the aforementioned memory management and data connection issues is expected to be offered within the next few days, but the rebate is meant to be an honest goodwill gesture towards any and all customers that may have been affected by the bug, as well as addressing complaints from those customers that upgraded to the phone about new customers getting the better deal over those that have been with AT&T for a substantial length of time, reflecting the attitude that wireless carriers take to longstanding customers compared to new customers.
Sprint and HTC Announce EVO 4G LTE
In a press event held earlier today HTC and Sprint have announced the next model in Sprint’s HTC EVO line of flagship Android smartphones with the HTC EVO 4G LTE.
The phone will be released in the second quarter for $199.99 after new 2 year agreement and pre-orders for the phone will begin on May 7. This is Sprint’s version of HTC’s flagship One X smartphone announced earlier this year.
Starting with the phone, the following key features are updated from the 4G and EVO 3D:
· Android 4.0, Ice Cream Sandwich, integrated with Sense™ 4.0
· 4.7-inch HD super LCD display at 720p resolution
· 1.5GHz Dual-Core Qualcomm™ Snapdragon S4 Processor
· Near Field Communication for information transfer and mobile wallet support
· Google Wallet support
· Android Beam™ support to quickly share Web pages, apps and YouTube™ videos with friends using NFC by simply tapping phones together
· 3G/4G mobile hotspot capability, supporting up to 8 Wi-Fi enabled devices simultaneously
· Wi-Fi® – 802.11 a/b/g/n
ENTERTAINMENT
· 8-megapixel camera with f/2.0 lens, super-fast auto-focus, digital zoom and smart LED flash; HTC ImageSense to take great photos, in adverse conditions; front-facing 1.3-megapixel camera with 1080p video recording.
· Beats Audio support at the operating system level
· 3.5 mm headset jack
SPECIFICATIONS
· Dimensions: 5.3 x 2.7 x 0.35 inches (LxWxT)
· Weight: 4.7 ounces
· Display: 4.7-inch HD 720p super LCD (1280 x 720), 16.7 million colors
· Battery: Imbedded 2000mAh Lithium Ion (Li-ion) battery
· Memory: 16GB internal memory* (ROM); 1GB RAM; supports up to 32GB microSD card (sold separately)
The phone will be one of the first phones to support Sprint’s forthcoming LTE network, expected to launch in mid-June in Atlanta, Baltimore, Dallas, Houston, Kansas City and San Antonio. Sprint has also confirmed that the carrier will allow all current unlimited data plans on the network with no restrictions of any sort.
The phone is also notable for being one of the first An
Sprint Restarting LG Optimus S Gingerbread Update Wednesday
After first being rolled out, then pulled in September due to unforeseen issues, Sprint has confirmed via its Buzz About Wireless forum that the LG Optimus S Android Gingerbread update will be made available in waves starting this Wednesday. This follows Sprint’s own assurances made to PhoneNews.com in November of 2011 regarding the status of the update and that it would be made available once the issues were addressed, but no one expected such a long delay.
While the update will fix issues that were present in the previous version and add additional functionality, there is still no word on such an update for the Virgin Mobile version of the phone, months after multiple reports confirmed that such an update would be made available in 2011.
The LG Optimus S and V were both Sprint’s and Virgin Mobile’s variants of the original LG Optimus One Android smartphone, which was notable for being the most well-rounded mid-range Android smartphone, spawning many carrier variants and really finding its niche on prepaid services. Sprint and Virgin Mobile rolled out their variants in early 2011 to shore up their burgeoning Android lineups to great success, with Virgin pushing the phone to an unprecedented sales success thank to the combination of unlimited data access at $25 (yet to be matched) and the lower than expected launch price of $179.99 while other prepaid versions and even the unlocked version were selling for as high as $249.99.
While Sprint eventually updated its version starting last year before suffering the setback with the bug-filled update in September, Sprint confirmed to PhoneNews.com that Virgin Mobile did not plan to offer the update to the Optimus V. While the revival of the update on Sprint does demonstrate that the carrier is indeed willing to update devices that are officially on the End of Life list, the same cannot be said for Virgin Mobile, boiling down to simple economics and a new Optimus device.
Previous attempts by Virgin Mobile to offer updates for its slate of Android devices were typically met with frustration and angst, as the provider continually missed launch targets for updates due to unexplained delays. By breaking with that effort and instead focusing on releasing updates with new hardware, it makes it harder for customers on prepaid to justify spending money on devices without the guarantee of timely updates and ensures that customers will be left behind in terms of support, with no real recourse other than relying on the Android mod and hacker community for an update which Virgin Mobile should have provided as soon as was possible. To add to the situation, LG even had the update ready for Virgin Mobile to rollout over the air, but just decided not to, preferring instead to offer a slightly updated successor to the Optimus V detailed below.
Rumors of a successor to the Optimus S and V have been circulating since the end of last year and this may explain why Virgin Mobile is actively refusing to roll out the update. The new replacement, which will be known as the Optimus Elite will feature slight upgrades from the Optimus variants with the key addition of NFC for mobile wallet support, as Sprint is supporting Google’s Wallet initiative. With Virgin Mobile getting ready to refresh its Android lineup beginning in May, the virtual operator has EOL’d the Optimus V for the Elite instead of offering extended support, which breaks with the provider’s typical effort to update devices and will only upset those that owned the previous phone.
Dell Ends US Mobile Device Initiative, Shifts Focus to Enterprise and Higher-Margin Laptops
Dell representatives have confirmed an internal memo dated March 8th that confirms that the Dell Venue and Venue Pro smartphones have been officially discontinued as of this month and that mobile devices will shift away from the highly competitive North American market and move to emerging markets such as Latin America, China and India, where local variants of the Venue Android and Venue Pro Windows Phone smartphones are already available as well as variants of its discontinued Streak line of Android tablets.When asked why Dell discontinued the Venue line of smartphones, the manufacturer admitted that the phones had run their course internally and that the lifecycle for phones was much shorter in the US than in the aforementioned emerging markets, while admitting that it would rather focus on its core enterprise businesses in the US and work to increase profit margins on its high-end laptop lines. Dell did not discount the possibility of re-entering the consumer-oriented mobile device market at a later date, with rumors of yet another attempt at mobile devices powered by the forthcoming Windows 8 operating system.
Dell’s latest and ultimately failed attempt to re-enter the mobile market began with the two pronged strategy of releasing Android-powered tablets in the Streak 5 and 7 with carrier partnerships as well as standard Wi-Fi only models, with AT&T and T-Mobile releasing their own variants of the Streak 5 and Streak 7 to great fanfare, only to have them fail in the marketplace compared to the strength of Android tablets from more established manufacturers such as Samsung. The Dell Streak 5 and 7 were heavily criticized for launching with the smartphone oriented Android 1.6 and 2.2 operating systems with heavily customized user interfaces that attempted to mask the limitations of the operating systems in the Stage user interface.
In fact, sales of the carrier subsidized versions of the Streak 5 and 7 were so low that both AT&T and T-Mobile actively refused to invest in updates for their respective devices in the Streak 5 and Streak 7 4G, leaving owners to fend for themselves in terms of updates via the Android hacking and modding community, compared to owners of the unsubsidized Wi-Fi versions which received their respective updates to FroYo and Honeycomb respectively last year.
The lack of updates for the carrier subsidized versions may have been the tipping point for Dell to pack in its US mobile device operations for the time being, as it discontinued the Streak 5 last Summer and only recently discontinued the Streak 7 as of last December, with the Honeycomb 3.2 update being the final update for the Wi-Fi version.
Dell also attempted to enter the equally competitive global smartphone market, first with the Android-powered Venue and then signing on with Microsoft and T-Mobile to release one of the first Windows Phone models in the Venue Pro. Unfortunately for Dell, its strategy for the release of the Dell Venue Pro doomed the device to commercial failure from the time it was launched, as it was initially exclusive to the Microsoft Store, both online and through its very limited retail footprint before being given a wider release at the beginning of 2011.
The phone also suffered a botched release thanks to last-minute hardware issues only discovered after customers had purchased the phone and attempted to use the built-in Wi-Fi radio, leading Dell and T-Mobile to issue a recall of devices and launch an exchange program for affected customers. While initially critically praised for its hardware and performance outside of the Wi-Fi issues, the phone still failed to make a commercial impact as the Windows Phone platform initially struggled and continues to struggle in the face of the market dominance of Android and the iPhone.
Dell also released AT&T compatible versions of the Venue Pro along with unlocked versions soon after the wider availability of the T-Mobile version, but they still failed to make any significant impact in terms of sales, as all three versions can routinely be found for sale on Ebay for ~$250 new in box and much less used.
On the subject of updates, Dell is remaining silent on future update support for either the Android-powered Venue and the Windows Phone Venue Pro as the next major update in Windows Phone Tango will be released next month in the US to coincide with the launch of the highly anticipated Nokia Lumia 900 with LTE support.
Browse: Home / RIM Re-names BBX to BlackBerry 10 in Wake of Court Loss Google Releases Android Ice Cream Sandwich 4.0.4, Resumes ICS Rollout for Nexus S
Google today noted that they have begun to release Android 4.0.4. The release is intended to be a bug fix release, no new features are added. The company will begin issuing the update on HSPA+ versions of the Samsung Galaxy Nexus, which Google controls in terms of firmware release and maintenance updates. Similarly, Google noted that they are resuming the rollout of Ice Cream Sandwich for the unlocked versions of the Samsung Nexus S.Both the Verizon 4G LTE version of the Galaxy Nexus, and the Nexus S 4G on Sprint will require carrier testing and approval before offering these updates. Unlike the unlocked versions of the Nexus S and Galaxy Nexus, the Verizon variant of the Galaxy Nexus, and Nexus S 4G with Sprint were released with carrier certification. As such, the carrier must approve each and every software update.
Quoting Google’s Android Google+ posting:
Some of you will be receiving Ice Cream Sandwich for the first time, while others will be receiving an update to your existing Ice Cream Sandwich experience with stability improvements, better camera performance, smoother screen rotation, improved phone number recognition and more.
On the tablet front, owners of the Wi-Fi version of the Motorola XOOM will also be receiving the update starting now. Similar to the Verizon Galaxy Nexus, 4G LTE-enabled versions of the Motorola XOOM on Verizon will need to wait for carrier testing and approval. Motorola has not issued the update for the DROID XYBOARD family of tablets that succeeded XOOM.
Android 4.0.4 may be the final update before Google begins shipping the first LTE phone on Sprint, also a Galaxy Nexus variant. The version on Sprint is expected to be unchanged from the Verizon version, with the difference of Sprint’s LTE radio bands. Also, the Sprint version is expected to not have firmware restrictions against using Google Wallet through its NFC transmitter. Verizon is blocking Google Wallet on Google’s own device, as the carrier continues to sort out plans for its own NFC mobile payment system. Rival Sprint however has embraced Google Wallet, promising several supporting NFC smartphones to be released throughout 2012.
Sahas Katta Smoked Windows Phone, Microsoft Tells Him to Go Home
Microsoft over the past week has extended their “Smoked by Windows Phone” web campaign into an in-store contest. Offering a series of challenges, the store pits customer’s own devices against a Windows Phone. If someone wins, they are entitled to a fully-featured HP laptop valued at over a thousand dollars. Losers get a chance to swap their phone out for a free Windows Phone, in a second-place giveaway. Ice Cream(ed) Sandwich
Sahas Katta, armed his Galaxy Nexus with a few Android 4.0 settings he knew of, and went into the store. Knowing Windows Phone’s infamous Live Tiles feature would be in play, he disabled the lock screen of his device. This is a new feature in Android 4.0, and one that Microsoft planners seem to have forgotten about (or simply weren’t aware of) when planning this contest.
That feature gave just about any Android 4.0 Ice Cream Sandwich owner, an actual clear edge in most of the contests. Since, most of the contests revolved around calling up Live Tiles on the Windows Phone side, one simply needed to place several widgets on the home screen to have information like weather, news, and sports appear instantly.
Mr. Katta was asked to load up weather in two different cities on his phone, as quickly as possible. And, the competition, he claims, began. While the Windows Phone was still being unlocked, Mr. Katta claims he declared himself the winner, since his home screen was instantly unlocked, and he had swiped to two Weather widgets, displaying weather in two cities via: SpaceMobiles.NET