Are we taking a shot of the 8.1 megapixel Sony Ericsson C905 here, or is it taking a shot of us? Find out the answers to these burning questions and much, much more as we take a quick peek at the C905 alongside the Z780 and the mighty XPERIA X1 over on Engadget Mobile!

Press shots are often beautiful, but the problem with 'em is that they're usually about as real as Joan Rivers' face -- not the best way to get a real impression of what a device looks and acts like in the flesh. GSM Helpdesk scored some hands-on time today with the full range of Sony Ericsson's new wares, and the headliner of the bunch, the mighty 8.1 megapixel C905, is looking ready for battle. Not literal battle, of course, but battle in the marketplace with a whole host of feature phones being released this year from its top rivals -- particularly important at a time when market share is falling. The 2.4-inch display is apparently "clear" and plenty impressive for managing your extensive photo library, and we're digging the curvy styling; UIQ would've been nice, but we suppose the dumbphone set deserves killer cameras too. Also pictured are the low-end J132 and K330, the S302 (which with a 2 megapixel camera, may not be worthy of the name "Snapshot"), and the F305 gaming phone. We'd had high hopes for the F305 -- as we do for pretty much anything that can be shaken to control games -- but the live shots here are leaving us a little underwhelmed. Maybe the white version will do it justice?

Read - C905, S302
Read - F305
Read - J132, K330

Paris who? Sony Ericsson's let yet another one slip out of its fingers before the official announcement, this time around a killer slider said to be the Cyber-shot C905, codenamed "Shiho." If the rumors pan out, it's got one heck of a rap sheet, too, starting off with an 8.1 -- yes, eight point flippin' one -- megapixel camera with both xenon and LED flashes (for still and video capture, respectively), GPS, TV out, DLNA certification, and HSDPA in your choice of European and American flavors. The screen's apparently just QVGA, but in light of everything else we're hearing, we might just be willing to let that slide. It'll apparently be announced on the 17th of the month in gold, silver, and black for a fourth quarter release. Wowza!

[Thanks, Adrian]

As WiMax-powered 4G networks remain the stuff of holding companies and litigation, a group of providers have gotten together to form an (evil?) alliance that they say will help speed up both development and deployment. In other words, they want Qualcomm on board, which holds the juiciest 4G patents. The Open Patent Alliance (OPA) includes Intel, the recently-formed Clearwire, Alcatel-Lucent, Cisco, Samsung, and Sprint. Similar to the Alcatel-Lucent, Ericsson, NextWave Wireless, Nokia Siemens Networks, Sony Ericsson coalition that is backing Long Term Evolution, this WiMAX group looks poised to take on Qualcomm with some serious collective patents, boardroom politics, and investor cash. Meanwhile, Qualcomm is sitting in the corner saying, "We already have 4G, and it's very nice." This should be interesting. Stay tuned.

Apparently not content to let Nokia Siemens have the upgraded mobile broadband spotlight to itself today, Ericsson has now announced that it's set to demonstrate what it's touting as the "world-first end-to-end HSPA Evolution technology" at CTIA next week. That, the company says, should allow for speeds up to an impressive 42 Mbps, a feat made apparently possible by a combination of higher order modulation technology (64QAM) and 2x2 Multiple Input Multiple Output (MIMO) antenna technology. As for the actual demonstration, Ericsson is only going so far as to say that it'll be conducted with an unspecified "handheld form-factor device" that's based on the Ericsson Mobile Platforms access technology. Other details are unsurprisingly pretty light at the moment, but we're betting Ericsson will have plenty more to say about it when they actually light things up at CTIA.

While it hardly comes as much of a surprise, Ericsson Chief Marketing Officer Johan Bergendahl is now predicting nothing short of the demise of WiFi hotspots, and he's saying that they'll be replaced by -- you guessed it -- mobile broadband. Speaking at a conference in Stockholm, Bergendahl said that "hot spots at places like Starbucks are becoming the telephone boxes of the broadband era," and that "in a few years, [HSPA] will be as common as Wi-Fi is today." Leading to that widespread use, he says, is ever-decreasing prices for mobile broadband subscriptions, and the fact that HSPA is being built into more and more laptops. Of course, if other companies have their way, WiFi hotspots could become a thing of the past simply because entire cities would effectively be one huge hotspot, although we'd gladly take both options.

[Image courtesy of IDG.no]

What the heck is going on here? Despite the overwhelming popularity of gizmo-heavy mobile devices in Japan, working with megacarrier NTT DoCoMo must be a losing proposition for many of its manufacturing partners, because just days after Mitsubishi's announcement of its withdrawal, a fresh Nikkei report indicates that Sony Ericsson is raising the white flag as well to divert attention and resources to less saturated and more profitable markets. Apparently, DoCoMo will bear the brunt of the downsizing, while Sony Ericsson's partnership with KDDI -- a CDMA carrier -- will continue. [Warning: subscription required]

Update: It turns out that Sony Ericsson intends to continue working with DoCoMo by initially delivering new models through mid '08, at which point it will start buying handsets from other manufacturers and rebranding them. In other countries this would be truly egregious, but as our Japanese bureau points out, DoCoMo lays out very strict requirements for each of its lines that would probably make it difficult to distinguish a true Sony Ericsson model from a rebranded model sourced from, say, Sharp or Toshiba.

Update 2: Sony Ericsson's Japanese PR folks have denied Nikkei's report, although they did mention that they are "reevaluating" their DoCoMo line without going into any detail. Whether the report was actually false or Nikkei just managed to out the info well before Sony Ericsson wanted it out, though, remains unclear.

Update 3: The official Sony Ericsson response, and while it says that they're taking a good, hard look at their DoCoMo business, it also mentions that they'll continue to develop new handsets for the carrier. Clear as mud? Good!

Read - Nikkei report [subscription required]
Read - Sony Ericsson response

So it seems the X1 being shown off at CeBIT following its MWC debut last month is equipped with a particularly curious panel in its software load. Anyone care to take a guess? No cheating and looking at the one we've circled now. Yeah, okay, it's that big AT&T logo front and center, which makes an appearance in several of PHONE Magazine's shots of the interface. We'd like to believe that means that AT&T is a lock to pick up one of the hottest Windows Mobile devices ever manufactured, and indeed, it probably does -- its 3G radio is certainly ripe for the job -- but it's entirely possible to think that Sony Ericsson is still in the process of selling carriers on the device, and is simply trying to get 'em to crack a smile by loading their logo. Keep your fingers crossed, ladies and gentlemen.

[Thanks, Jake]

A table of release dates dug up on Sony Ericsson's own site suggests something powerfully depressing, which is that the XPERIA X1 has been pushed all the way out to February 10, 2009 (notice that the date is in European format -- we'd just give up now if it were actually October 2, 2009). While the presence of the page on the company's very own domain is pretty damning evidence, we're still holding out hope that it's a typo or an oversight; late Q2 of '08 was mentioned at MWC, and we really don't see how it's possible to push out a phone nearly three-quarters of a year just weeks after its initial announcement. Please tell us we're right on this one, Sony Ericsson. Please.

[Thanks to everyone who sent this in]

This is a phone we've seen in the wild on a couple occasions, but we had one detail dead wrong: the model number. It turns out that Sony Ericsson's newest Z series flip is actually the Z770, not the Z660 we'd heard before. The company is billing the Z770 as a phone fit for people who need access to the internet (web and email, specifically) but aren't necessarily interested in stepping up to a full-fledged smartphone, featuring "easy" email setup, zoom / pan features in the web browser along with an actual mouse pointer (anyone familiar with S60's browser will get the idea here), and integrated support for Exchange ActiveSync. The GSM / EDGE 900 / 1800 / 1900, HSDPA 2100 handset will hit shelves in the second quarter in Vogue Red, Graphite Black, and Exquisite Gold.

So that rumored K820 has turned out to be the C902, and that waterproof model? Not so much waterproof -- just "splash and dust resistant" -- and it's the C702. Starting on the bottom, the 3.2 megapixel C702 touts one-handed camera use for those spur-of-the-moment shots when you're doing something, like, totally extreme that would necessitate the use of a splash resistant phone to begin with. GPS also finds its way on board, and Sony Ericsson is bundling Google Maps for Mobile (good call) to get the mapping done. Moving up, the C902 is a 5 megapixel beast with autofocus, face detection, a generous flash, and 160MB of storage before you add anything on with the Memory Stick Micro slot. Both models feature Cyber-shot branding and will be available in the second quarter; they'll come in two versions -- one with UMTS 2100 and one rocking quadband EDGE alone. Look for the C702 in Speed Black and Cyan Blue, while the C902 will do its thing in Swift Black and Luscious Red (pictured).

Microsoft has now won a veritable superfecta of licensing, landing deals with four of the top five phone manufacturers in the world to provide handsets based on Windows Mobile. The latest, announced today at Barcelona's Mobile World Congress, is Sony Ericsson -- a company heavily vested in Symbian by way of its UIQ division, so it's unclear how the licensing deal will ultimately affect UIQ-based offerings. Stay tuned for more on the deal and details on Sony Ericsson's WinMo-based hardware!

Alright, we've got to admit, this looks like a pretty real press rendering to us, so we're going to bite. This here is allegedly Sony Ericsson's G700i, one of two members of the all-new "G" line allegedly being introduced at Mobile World Congress this week; if the previously-leaked specs hold up, it'll include a 3.2 megapixel camera and a 2.5-ish inch display but lack WiFi, which is where its G900i big sib comes into the picture. Seeing how Sony Ericsson's MWC press conference is within shouting distance at this point, we'll have this all sorted out soon enough.

[Via SEfanatics]

Sony Ericsson appears to have taken a page clear out of Nokia's book with the Z555, a fashionable flip (subject to personal opinions, of course) that looks like a hinged homage to Espoo's Prism series. The innards aren't much to talk about -- the GSM comes in one of two triband flavors depending on your region, and there's nary a hint of 3G to be found -- but the draw here is something Sony Ericsson's calling Gesture Control, which allows you to control a handful of phone functions (ringtone mute and alarm snooze are specifically called out) by waving your hand in close proximity to the handset. You also get a hidden external OLED display, 1.3 megapixel cam, stereo Bluetooth, and pretty much all the colorful rectangles you can handle. Look for both regional versions of the phone to launch by the end of this quarter.