10Feb

Verizon’s Latest LTE Smartphone Leaked: Is This The HTC Incredible 3?

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10

With MWC drawing ever closer, new handset leaks are hitting the wires hard and fast. Today alone we’ve seen the Galaxy Mini 2 break cover and new images of the LG Miracle Windows Phone emerge, and now HTC’s latest LTE-friendly Android phone has been caught on film.

As PhoneArena notes, this mysterious handset sports the same sort of curvaceous back that gave devices like Verizon’s HTC Incredible and Rezound a bit of extra visual flair. That, coupled with the appearance of Verizon’s own 4G LTE logo and what looks like the Verizon Wave wallpaper means that we could be looking at an early version of a Big Red-bound Incredible 3.

With the announcement of their renewed focus on “hero” devices still fresh in my mind, I can’t help but think that this handset doesn’t seem like much of a standout. Ice Cream Sandwich and the Sense 4.0 UI notwithstanding, the device’s 1.2 GHz processor, 1GB of RAM, and 8-megapixel camera aren’t much of a bump over previous Incredible models. Audiophiles — or at least, audiophiles who don’t mind listening to compressed mp3s on their smartphone — may also be tickled by the inclusion of Beats Audio support, and it’s a safe bet that the Beats headphones should ship with it.

Strangely,HTC opted to go for four hardware buttons rather than the three on-screen keys that are baked into Ice Cream Sandwich. A leaked demo video of the forthcoming HTC Ville clearly shows that the Taiwanese company has adopted the three key layout, though The Verge points out the possibility of this device launching with Gingerbread first before receiving the 4.0 update. Considering that HTC plans to push ICS to certain devices as early as this March though, the thought of HTC launching a handset without the latest software is more than a little puzzling.






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10Feb

Verizon’s Latest LTE Smartphone Leaked: Is This The HTC Incredible 3?

FILED IN gadgets No Comments

10

With MWC drawing ever closer, new handset leaks are hitting the wires hard and fast. Today alone we’ve seen the Galaxy Mini 2 break cover and new images of the LG Miracle Windows Phone emerge, and now HTC’s latest LTE-friendly Android phone has been caught on film.

As PhoneArena notes, this mysterious handset sports the same sort of curvaceous back that gave devices like Verizon’s HTC Incredible and Rezound a bit of extra visual flair. That, coupled with the appearance of Verizon’s own 4G LTE logo and what looks like the Verizon Wave wallpaper means that we could be looking at an early version of a Big Red-bound Incredible 3.

With the announcement of their renewed focus on “hero” devices still fresh in my mind, I can’t help but think that this handset doesn’t seem like much of a standout. Ice Cream Sandwich and the Sense 4.0 UI notwithstanding, the device’s 1.2 GHz processor, 1GB of RAM, and 8-megapixel camera aren’t much of a bump over previous Incredible models. Audiophiles — or at least, audiophiles who don’t mind listening to compressed mp3s on their smartphone — may also be tickled by the inclusion of Beats Audio support, and it’s a safe bet that the Beats headphones should ship with it.

Strangely,HTC opted to go for four hardware buttons rather than the three on-screen keys that are baked into Ice Cream Sandwich. A leaked demo video of the forthcoming HTC Ville clearly shows that the Taiwanese company has adopted the three key layout, though The Verge points out the possibility of this device launching with Gingerbread first before receiving the 4.0 update. Considering that HTC plans to push ICS to certain devices as early as this March though, the thought of HTC launching a handset without the latest software is more than a little puzzling.






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09Jan

Verizon’s Droid RAZR MAXX Seems To Be The Droid RAZR With Better Battery Life

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Razr MAxx

Remember the exceptionally long-named Droid RAZR MAXX that got spotted in Verizon’s inventory system a few weeks ago?

It’s real now — and so far it seems to be… pretty much the same as the Droid RAZR, save for extra storage space and claims of a super long battery life.

While Motorola benchmarked the original Droid RAZR at around 12 hours of talk time, they claim the new RAZR MAXX variant can pull an almost ridiculous 21 hours of chatter on a single charge. Meanwhile, the internal storage has been bumped from 16GB to 32GB. On the outside, however, they’re essentially identical — even with the bigger battery, the new MAXX maintains the Droid RAZR’s 8.99 mm thick profile.

The new RAZR MAXX will go for $299 on a two-year contract, while the two-month old Droid RAZR will slip down to $199. The latter will also now come in purple, which is.. unique?





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21Dec

Verizon’s Data Network Suffering (Another) Nationwide Outage

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4gdown

Just two weeks after Verizon’s 4G data network most recently went on the fritz, it looks like customers are once again being forced to live their lives without data. Scores of Verizon users across the country will be waking up without without so much as a 3G connection in sight until a fix is in place.

A quick look at Verizon’s support forums illustrates the extent of the data outage: the data outage has struck New York, California, Illinois, Washington D.C., New Jersey, Florida, North Carolina, and Ohio (among others).

Now the outage doesn’t seem to be affecting everyone (much like last time), and some users are reporting that their data service has been restored. I’d take those reports with a grain of salt for the time being: my Verizon Galaxy Nexus manages to pick up a 1X or 3G connection sporadically, but it never lasts for long. That said, anyone who has an LTE smartphone may want to switch into the CDMA-only mode, as that’s where I’ve had most of my (limited) success with data.

While I’m sure that it won’t be too long before Verizon sorts out this mess, it may not be the most comforting situation for customers looking to re-up their contracts with Big Red. They’ve had pretty consistent 4G service for the year that the network has been live, but now customers have had to deal with two major data snafus in one month. C’mon Verizon, I expect these sorts of data issues from RIM, not you.

Verizon has yet to acknowledge the issue via a release, although their @VZWSupport Twitter account has just started fielding customer complaints about the outage. We’ll keep you posted on any further developments.



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17Dec

Verizon’s Next DROID RAZR Already Spotted In Their System

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Maxx Headroom

Because the name “Verizon DROID RAZR by Motorola” seemingly isn’t long enough, it looks like Verizon’s already planning another RAZR with even more words in the name. I kid, of course (does the name even matter? Everyone outside of the tech scene just calls every Android phone “the Droid” anyway), but I pick on the name because it’s pretty much the only thing we know at this point.

Spotted lurking in VZW’s inventory system by the guys at Droid-Life, it looks like the next handset in the DROID RAZR series will be the DROID RAZR MAXX.

Motorola just launched a phone (the HD XT928) in China last week that could pass as the RAZR’s twin, save for two big differences: it has a 720p screen (1280×720, while the original DROID RAZR comes in at 960×540), and a 13 megapixel camera (vs 8.) The current thought is that the HD XT928 and the Droid Razr Maxx are one in the same, though it’s all conjecture at this point.

Keep an eye out and let us know if you spot anything, won’t you?



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