Today HTC Spain has announced their new device HTC Touch2. Behind the press release, the most important information is that it comes with Windows Mobile 6.5, includes the new software Windows Phone and that the new Internet Explorer Mobile supports Adobe Flash.

According to its design, seems to be really compact, clean, tough and comfortable. It includes a zoom bar really useful when browsing the web. As other HTC smartphones, the user interface is based on TouchFLO, which gives you direct access to weather forecast info and most used applications. It includes Google Maps and YouTube among others.

Windows Mobile 6.5 improves e-mail experience allowing to synchronize with Exchange and manage several e-mail accounts. New Internet Explorer Mobile allows to move the web content and use the zoom bar for a better experience.

About Windows Phone, it allows to download applications via Windows Marketplace service and using My Phone service you can synchronize your pictures, music and messages to the Internet. If you want more info, here you have the technical specifications:

• Processor: Qualcomm ® MSM7225 ®, 528 MHz.
• O.S: Windows Mobile 6.5 Professional.
• Memory: 512MB ROM; 256MB RAM.
• Dimensions: 104 x 55 x 12,9 mm.
• Weight: 110g with battery.
• Display: TFT LCD 2.8′ touch screen with QVGA resolution.
• Networks: HSDPA/WCDMA with 384kbps as maximum upload speed and 7.2Mbps as download speed. Frequences of 850/900/1800/1900 MHz in Europe/Asia depending on the operator.
• Controller: zoom bar.
• GPS: built-in GPS.
• Connectivity: Bluetooth 2.1 with A2DP for wireless stereo headphones; Wi-Fi (IEEE 802.11 b/g); 3.5mm audio jack; HTC USB (11pin mini-USB 2.0).
• Camera: 3.2 megapixels.
• Audio formats: AAC, AAC+, eAAC+, AMR-NB, QCP, MP3, WMA, WAV, MIDI, M4A.
• Video formats: WMV, ASF, MP4, 3GP, 3G2, M4V, AVI.
• Battery: 1100 mAh litium battery; 370/440 minutes in conversation (WCDMA/GSM); 500/370 minutes in stand-by (WCDMA/GSM).
• Expansion slot: microSD card (supports SD 2.0).

A few days ago the Skype application for iPhone/iTouch was launched. You can download it from the App Store for free. This let us make calls to other Skype users for free and to mobile and landline phones using the known Skype credit.

We have tested it making some calls between an iPhone and a computer or a Windows Mobile device. These are the results and the devices we have used:

• Test iPhone – Computer (Windows XP sp2):

We have installed the desktop application on a PC running Windows XP sp2, and the voice has been transmitted really fast between the PC and iPhone, just like in a standard call, what has really surprised us.

• Test iPhone – HTC Touch Cruise 2 (Windows Mobile):

This time we have installed the application Fring on a HTC Touch Cruise 2. This app, as we already posted, allows us to use different accounts (MSN, Google Talk, AIM, SIP, Facebook, Twitter, Skype) from our mobile device. But the voice sound did not run fast, it had a lag between one and two seconds. The sound quality decreased but just in Fring, not on Skype iPhone.

About Skype UI on iPhone:

It is simple but clear, just what we need and how we need it, so it is easy-to-use. It takes our contacts from iPhone contacts in case you want to call them using your Skype credit. And it also allows to use the camera to change your user picture. The BIG drawback is that it only runs when using Wi-fi connection, not 3G. We hope this changes…

About Fring UI on Windows Mobile:

The user interface is too simple, some features are not easy to find. And it has an old-fashion look, so that it uses WM square buttons and other resources.

It is great to see these kind of applications come to our mobile devices, so we just don’t need our computer to call for free! =)

Last week  HTC Spain prepared a meeting to present its new devices for the upcoming months. SevenClick was part of the audience, composed by some of the most important people in Spanish blogosphere, with people from Xataka, PixelyDixel, etc…

Let’s take a look at the novelties.

HTC Diamond 2

HTC focused the presentation in two devices. First one, HTC Diamond 2, focused to the consumption market, is the evolution of the HTC Diamond. The device looks a bit different, with a metallic aspect which I prefer to the plastic one.

Reagrding software, the most remarkable aspect of the device is its video playing features. We had the opportunity to watch Star Wars Episode 2 and the results are awesome. Fluent, perfect colors, nice screen size…

HTC Touch Flo interface has also been updated, getting closer to the current tendencies in button sizes and finger operation. Despite we are talking about a Windows Mobile 6.1 device, the buttons are bigger than usual, getting close to the aspect of future Windows Mobile 6.5 software. Great point here. Every new release improves this interface, but It still has to improve in terms of fluency. Nevertheless, much better than older versions.

HTC Touch Pro 2

The second Windows Mobile device presented was HTC Touch Pro 2. Focused to the enterprise market, the device features a really useful qwerty keyboard. The most important part of the device is software.

HTC has developed a new interface focused on contacts. This way, users will be able to navigate through the contact list, allowing to call, e-mail or message every person of the contact list. It’s a paradigm change. Other devices allows you tu make a call, dialing the number or chosing the contact to call. This propotition focus on contacts, not on the action you want to make. Believe me, it’s a wiser approach and you’ll get use to it very quickly.

Another feature of this device is what HTC calls “Push Internet”.  The service allows the user to set-up a number of websites that will be automatically downloaded at a certain time. How useful it is deppends on personal taste.

And the jewel of the crown. The device is prepared for multi-conference in a really easy way. Just turn around the device and put it on your table with the screen on the botton. The back loudspeaker and microphone are activated and you are able to share the conversation with more people. Do you want to mute your call? A useful button has been included in the back of the device to do so. Smart, really smart.

HTC DREAM

This device has generated plenty of noise since launched by T-Mobile. The device will be distributed by Telefonica Movistar, which is already late, since the official launch was planned for March 2009. Basically, is the same device you can find in other markets. Nothing new regarding hardware design. Anyway, an interesting device for those who don’t want to change their mobile operator and want an ANDROID mobile phone.

HTC MAGIC

First of all, I love this device. Since I fist saw it in HTC’s stand in MWC I felt in love with it. The device has been slightly modified from MWC. Now, it has 6 buttons, including a Google Search button to directly access Google Search Engine. It comes in two colours, black and white. The black model is very nice, being the white one the most appealing for people. Put both models side by side and the first one to be picked-up will be the white one.

ANDROID really means a strong competitor for iPhone. The screen is pretty similar, with a really, really good response to finger operation (oh, no  stylus here, everything must be operated with your fingers). The best thing we can say about it is: It works!!! Is nice, is Fluent, is clever (don’t miss the notification zone) and works, which in my opinion is the best you can say about a mobile operating system.

As you might now, the device will be launched next April by Vodafone Spain. I can’t wait to have one in my hands!!

Finally i’d like to thank HTC for inviting SevenClick to this event. It was really nice to share points of view with other people about HTC technology. Thanks!!!

Oh, HTC gave us a Touch Cruise 2 Device for testing purposes. Don’t miss the review!!

Finally, we have on our hands the first beta release of Fennec, the Firefox browser for mobile devices. It’s the milestone number 12 in the development roadmap and its intented for testing purposes, get wider feedback, engage community and encourage add-on developers to port existing add-ons. It’s only available for ‘Maemo’, the Linux OS running on Nokia N810 Internet Tablets.

You can look at all the features in the Release Notes. There’s nothing shocking, but some of them are really inteteresting. I specially like what they call ‘Devices services integration’: click on a phone number to initiate a call and a JavaScript API to get device location.

Anyway, I must confess I’m a bit disappointed by the pace of Mozilla’s advances in its mobile version. Two years ago, Mozilla decided to discontinue the Minimo browser project. It was the first attempt. Some months after, they announced their intention of starting a new project and Fennec development started from the ground up.

From that moment, the release of a stable version has been delayed time over time, and now we have no idea of when we’ll have a version for a mainstream platform (Windows Mobile or Symbian, the only two covered by Fennec).

Let’s hope all the feedback and re-encouraged contributions of the community will help to make Fennec a reality as soon as possible. Otherwise, it could be too late for them, as all WebKit-derived browsers take the market.

Via ObservatorioInternetMovil
Links ReleaseNotes SevenClick SevenClick

In the last Mobile World Congress, Microsoft give us a official word about new features on Windows Mobile 6.5 like MarketPlace, MyPhone or the new look. However, they forgot to tell us an important one: WM 6.5 will feature Widgets!

Last weeks we have read lots of rumours about it, but it was not clear how Microsoft will use these widgets. At last, yesterday, a member of the Windows Mobile Developer Team explained us this new feature in their blog.

Widgets are a good advance for user, who are going to enjoy using nice looking applications, and a great one for developers, who will able to develope them easier.

WM widgets will be powered by Internet Explorer. Take a look to some outstanding matters about Windows Mobile Widget platform:

• Widgets written using all the Web Technologies (Html, Ajax, JavaScript…).
• Full access to flash and ActiveX controls.
• Look like a normal standalone application.
  • Individual app in task manager.
  • Own start menu icon.
• The platform implements the latest draft of W3C standard for mobile widget applications.
• Basic things of normal applications like native support for transparent PNGs or Window.XMLHttpRequest object are considered.

On the other hand, don’t forget that widgets already exist in Windows Mobile since, some months backs, the Opera’s widget runtime engine was released. The advantage of the Opera’s platform is that it works in Symbian O.S. too, but it has a significant drawback, it doesn’t expose much device functionality to developers.

Soon we will see how the Windows Mobile Widget performance is.

Vía Windows Mobile Team Blog.

According to several of the most respected on-line sources, including Wall Street Journal, Reuters, Wired and Information Week ( the original source of the information seems to be The Wall Street Journal), Microsoft plans to announce next monday a brand new Windows Mobile Application Store.

Monday 16th February seems to be the chosen day. Well, it looks pretty clever, since Steve Ballmer is making a keynote presentation in Mobile World Congress, taking place in Barcelona.

Along with this new service, Microsoft is also presenting My Phone service, an on-line repository of personal information for mobile devices. This seems to be true, since the official website has been up and running during the last weeks (in fact, it was discovered by fault, with the subsequent confirmation by Microsoft).

Don’t expect details of the new Microsoft Service. Nothing has been disclosed yet. Nevertheless, everything seems to be true.

I believe Microsoft will use this keynote to present more products and services, like Windows Mobile 6.5, My Phone, and so on… Last year’s MWC announcementes were, you know, disappointing. Hope they have learned the lesson. At least, Steve Ballmer will be present this year, and it assures the show. If you don’t what I’m talking about, check this video.

Via Wired, WallStreet Journal, Information Week

As we already knew, Windows Mobile 6.5 (available on the second half of 2009) will have a new and more atractive interface, which is called “honeycomb interface”, as we can see in the below picture. We will see on the screen several joined polygons which form the honeycomb menu and an application will be available on each polygon. This interface gives a new and fresh look to the current Windows Mobile version which seems more like a Windows 3.11 style.

Anyway, we can turn off this interface and access the O.S. using the classic view, which consists on browsing folders, like we can see in the below pictures. The folders show a 4×4 icons grid (current version shows 3×4 grid). LIttle changes are new scroll bars, which seem thick to be on a mobile device, and the close cross button, that is too big (I guess this is a beta icon). We can also see the new WM Media Player interface menu, which looks nice and reminds of the WM 7 version.

Let’s talk about something new! These screenshots have revealed some cloud-based services: My Phone, Outlook Live, Marketplace.

• My Phone: it is a cloud-based syncing service that will come preinstalled.
• Outlook Live: this is a cloud-based mail solution that will replace Pocket Outlook. It lets the user manage several accounts from the device and over the web.
• Marketplace:a centralized applications marketplace or what it’s the same, an app store. Its codename is “Skymarket” but it’s not official yet.

Microsoft has created a new kind of custom tags. So far we had QR Code and Datamatrix Code. The new system from Microsoft is called Microsoft Tag and main difference is that it does not use square pixels, but triangle shapes and colors to store data.

As we can see in the below picture, it represents 1 byte in less area than the current custom tags. That’s because the triangles are half the size of the previous squares, and it uses 4 colours insted of black and white.

Microsoft is not the only one researching into QR codes. Movistar recently created the system Bidi, and also Orange its system Flashcode. Both introduce these encoding systems to provide services like buying spectacles tickets, share website links, download multimedia content, so to sum up, it provides automatic access to services and contents.

And what about the “future”???

Will this technology become a social reality? Will it give us some useful functionality? IT CAN!!! In Japan this technology is used everywhere, like on posters and billboards, providing anyone with a cell phone immediate access to information on consumer prize campaigns, addresses or maps for retail outlets. In the below TV ad, NTT DoCoMo explains to viewers how QR codes work, to make their use familiar.

In Barcelona the company Daem Interactive uses this tech in its solution Skuair (supports Symbian S60 3th generation). This solution could be use, for instance, in a supermarket to select the products you want to buy, send the list to the supermarket server/device, pay and wait for your products to be packed.

Software

We have talked about custom tags technology, let’s talk now about ohw to use it. This tech becomes useful if we can work with it everywhere, what means that has to be accesible from our mobile devices. This is real, nowadays we can have it in our mobile phones. There are several mobile applications for this purpose, and they consist on taking a picture to the custom tag (QR Code, Datamatrix, and others) and then the app will decode the picture into the info that was encoded, like an URL, a mobile command…

For instance you can download the application for Bidis os Flashcodes from Movistar and Orange sites. Also Microsoft has developed a mobile application for mobile devices to work with Microsoft Tag. The name of the application is the same as the custom tag, and it is available on Windows Mobile, iPhone, BlackBerry, Symbian S60 and mobile phones with Java. You can download it from this website.

Try this code on your Phone

Via iPhone Buzz | Microsoft

Although the news seem surprising is true, a few days ago Todd Peters, the Vice President of Marketing for the Windows Mobile division announced at current CES.

It seems that Windows Mobile is losing interest not only to users, but also from the viewpoint of manufacturers, because of the new systems that are emerging (Android and WebOS) and also due to iPhone and the different models of BlackBerry.

Microsoft wants to change its business model. Now prefer to have fewer devices and thus focus more on each of them to achieve better integration with the phone.

And who knows, just surprise us this year with the introduction of a mobile phone with Windows Mobile 7 developed by them.

Via XatakaMovil

China maybe is not the best point of reference of handsets, owing to we can find in its market, mobile device brands that sound too much familiar, like Nokla or HiPhone. But this time, China offers a handset with an original feature, a smartphone that runs Windows Mobile or Android. The client chooses. TechFaith Wireless and Qigi Future Technology announced it with the name of QiGi i6.

Unfortunately, instead of offering a dual-boot approach, the i6 comes in separate models: i6-Goal (Android) and i6-Win (WM 6.1). The two models differ only with respect to their operating system ROMS. On the other hand, both models share the following features:

• 2.8” LCD touchscreen display with 320×240 resolution.
• Marxvel PXA310 processor clocked at 624MHZ .
• Bluetooth connectivity.
• 2 megapixel camera.
• Wi-Fi support.
• microSD memory card slot.
• GPS navitation.
• Dimensions: 109 x 58 x 14.9 mm.
• No 3G connectivity

Pricing and availability  for both devices have not been released. However, the i6-Goal (the first Android-powered mobile phone in China) will be “shipping soon,” according to Qigi.

Vía PocketNow, LinuxDevices