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Monster's headphones get their own voice assistant (update)
Monster's latest team-up isn't with another star athlete or fellow accessory-maker: it's with music platform Speak Music Inc., which is lending the company its voice assistant named Melody. Monster says the partnership will add voice control to some of its headphones, making them the "world's first voice-powered premium" cans. The premium part may be true, but there are other voice-activated Bluetooth headsets out there. There's also bound to be more, considering manufacturers can now incorporate Amazon's Alexa Voice Service into their products.
Weekend Windows Mobile rumor roundup
For anyone concerned that all's been quiet on the HTC front (which is a pretty tough sell, considering the Excalibur news), we've got yer scoop right here. Pocket PC Thoughts is reporting that the oft-rumored but never-materialized 4GB HTC Muse / Melody may have been euthanized. Without a clear parallel in HTC's lineup, we'd like to believe that the beast has merely been pulled back for re-engineering, but we simply don't know at this point. Now turning our attention to less somber news, Smartphone Thoughts sez that an HSDPA-ready variant of Samsung's i320 might be in the works for Cingular for Q4 2006 or early 2007. Of course, we've also heard that we can expect a UMTS / HSDPA Q around that time frame, and it seems improbable that they'd pick up two head-to-head business-oriented devices like that in the same launch window. If true, though, well... the more, the merrier.Read - HTC Muse killed?Read - Samsung i320 for Cingular?
Barrage of HTCs rumored in the pipeline
HTC, making sure that the enjoyment of our fresh Star Trek is kept to an absolute minimum, looks to be preparing a spectrum of lustworthy new devices. This information is entirely unconfirmed, and we don't know much about what we're about to tell you -- some of these code names are as new to us as they are to you -- but we can tell you it comes from a reliable source.First up, the Muse has been mercifully renamed the "Melody," and the Triolgy has become "Monet." The Hermes, which is just starting to drop across Europe, has been upped to 400MHz for full-scale production; you might recall we recently reported that O2 was bringing a 400MHz Hermes to the table, and it now appears this will be standard fare for launches going forward. Trinity (pictured) specs are coming into focus, and we should expect this beast to throw down HSDPA, WiFi, and integrated GPS. There have been some rumblings of an "Artemis" recently, and that device still appears to be on the map, bringing integrated GPS and a trackball (wha?) but topping out with EDGE data. The "Herald" sounds positively gorgeous, similar in concept and functionality to the Hermes but measuring just 17mm thick. The Foreseer and Monet will be joined by the "Oxygen" in HTC's mobile TV lineup, though we don't know which standard it'll be packing. Looking to steal some of the Q's thunder, the "Excalibur" will be getting its QWERTY on and running Smartphone. Finally, look for "Vera" as a possible successor to the Star Trek, packing HSDPA and a front-facing camera for video calling.That's a lot of unconfirmed data to digest, we know, and we're still trying to make sense of it all ourselves. No word on release windows for most of these -- if we could divine you a Vera tomorrow, we would -- but as always, we'll be burning the midnight oil in our quest for deets.
