We know that many of you (read: almost none of you) have been going through link-withdrawal as the combination of a busy holiday season and the Consumer Electronics Show severely limited writing time, but fear not gentle readers, T&R is back and re-loaded with news and commentary from around the mobile world.
For starters, a note on CES coverage – there was simply too much announced, both in the CE world and more specifically in the mobile world to do justice to here. While we here at T&R are always happy to lend insight on specific areas that you might have questions on, we are going to wimp out on deep detail of last week and simply point you to a couple of nice roundup posts covering the “best of” for a review of who did what in Sin City last week. If there are specific details you want to explore, feel free to hit us up. With that out of the way, let’s move on to the news of this week.
So – anyone hear anything about a new phone launching soon?
As you might guess, the official confirmation of the worst kept secret in wireless was the newsmaker of the week (switching on the hyperbole engine, newsmaker of the year) and seemingly generated more column-inches than V-E Day. Much of what has been written concerns the comparisons to the AT&T version, perceived shortcomings in the device, forecasted numbers and how it might impact the growth of Android. As mentioned, there was a virtual flood of information written and opinions thrown around. T&R is working on our own take on the topic, but for now, we will give you just a few of the more relevant articles. For starters, the fascinating background story of how the phone came to be and how long the development cycle was. The fact that the process was years-long should also serve notice that this device isn’t going to simply pop-up on other CDMA carriers quickly, regardless of what sort of exclusivity Verizon may or may not have. A number of articles were written outlining why the author wasn’t planning on switching to the Verizon iPhone, most of which were simply warmed-over rehashes of the root differences between CDMA and GSM (EVDO and HSPA) but the gist of it is here while this article does a nice job breaking down just what Big Red is launching on the 10th. Finally, the revised numbers have started rolling out in terms of overall sales predictions for 2011. Obviously, much is predicated on sales by Verizon (estimated to be between 9 and 10 million) as well as what gets launched during the annual refresh cycle this Summer, but the number is big, any way you look at it.
One of the features touted by Verizon and Apple in their press conference was the launch of the mobile hotspot feature that has been rolled out in a number of Android devices already. While Verizon has announced the availability (but not the pricing) the release of iOS 4.3 to the developer community allowed for confirmation that the capability was going to be open to all devices when the new software is launched in March. Will your carrier of choice support it? That’s not so clear.
What is clear though, is that Apple’s video calling feature, Face Time, will see continued growth during this year and next, with the number of capable devices predicted to hit 200 million by the end of ’12 (ignore, if you can, the creepy screenshot in the article)
Finally, no Apple news roundup would be complete without speculation on their next device – the iPad2 is widely expected to be available in the coming months and predictions are not hard to come by concerning exactly when and what the new features might be when it does launch.
One of the things that CES showed us, if nothing else, was that Tablets were going to be a major focal point for tech in 2011. In addition to the wide variety of Android-based tablets that were shown off at the show, we can now expect full details on HP’s upcoming webOS tablets next month. Additionally, the launch of RIM’s Playbook continues to approach – though conflicting information (not the corrections at the bottom of the article)has been hitting the web, hinting at problems with the unit. Regardless of which OS platform you prefer, the numbers don’t lie – none of the them are good news for the “other Steve” and his company’s PC software. Things don’t appear particularly rosy on the mobile OS side either
RIM did make a bit of news this week – though probably not at their direction. Specs and pictures of a number of new devices started to leak out, with the Dakota, Apollo and Torch2 all finding their way onto BGR for their first close ups. While they look familiar and appear to be well-suited to slot into the RIM lineup, apparently none of them are designed to compete with the dual-core handsets launched at CES – at least not yet.
We, of course, couldn’t have a T&R without news from the robot front, as the slew of devices announced at CES and expected in the coming months looks to drive further growth from Mountain View’s favorite OS. Canalys predicts a growth rate twice that of other competitors, while Millenial’s ad research shows that Android ad impressions occupied almost half of the smartphone mix in December. Growth like this (and the proliferation of 4G) are some of the driving factors behind these predictions for the highest of HTC’s high-end devices this year. Speaking of high-end, more and more evidence (like this video) is pointing to the imminent release of the oft-rumored Android-powered PSP phone from Sony Ericsson. The one pothole on the Android-growth-highway (yeah, that’s stretching) is the continued fragmentation of the platform. Sad Robot points you to this chart and this breakdown of who is where and when updates are expected to get devices to Froyo (keep in mind that Froyo isn’t even the latest release – Gingerbread is already launched with the Nexus S)
And finally, for those of you monitoring such things, here is a handy chart and list of documents consulted, detailing the chosen fields of mad scientists over the years. Interestingly, there doesn’t seem to be a “software/internet” category, so Google is in the clear for now.
Enjoy the weekend, everyone!
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