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Samsung's WinMo-powered Omnia II (GT-i8000) clears FCC, eyes AT&T
There's no doubt that Samsung's Omnia II is one of the most coveted Windows Mobile smartphones out at the moment -- we mean, who can really resist a 3.7-inch AMOLED touchscreen, 7.2Mbps HSPA, a 5 megapixel camera and 720 x 480 movie recording? For Americans, however, there seemed to be little hope that GSM fans would ever see a version catering specifically to their needs (read: dual-band 850 / 1,900MHz 3G "needs")... until now. On this fine Friday, the cool cats over at the FCC have shown that there actually is a GT-i8000 headed to America with support for AT&T 3G bands, though obviously little else is known about when it'll make its expected splash. Better hurry, Samsung -- the competition's heating up over here.[Via Slashgear]
Oh, by the way: July 16, 2009
Here's some of the other stuff that happened in the wide world of mobile for Thursday, July 16th, 2009: The Samsung Omnia II will go on sale in Singapore this Saturday, July 18 for S$898 (about $619) unlocked, while the Omnia Pro will be available August 1 for something under S$550 (about $379). [Thanks, Rixter] Remember that mysterious Samsung Link for Bell? MobileSyrup has scored the lowdown on the device, and it turns out not to be a smartphone of any sort -- instead, it's just a text-centric dumbphone (isn't that theme starting to get a little played out?) with a 1.3 megapixel camera and a 2.2-inch display. It'll allegedly launch on July 30 in your choice of white or black for CAD $19.95 (about $18) on a three-year deal. HTC has already managed to roll a fix for that Bluetooth vulnerability they've been dogged by in recent days. [Via pocketnow.com] Ovi Maps 3.1, N-Gage, Ovi Contacts 2.1, and a mysterious "phone memory update" are all now available to users of North American Nokia N97s. Early reports suggest that some users are having trouble getting the goods installed successfully, so let us know how it goes. Continuing a trend it started earlier this year on other smartphones, Verizon has gone ahead and unlocked the GPS on its Samsung Omnia with an official firmware update. The release also includes an updated WinMo 6.1 AKU, Bluetooth tethering support through VZ Access Manager, and some memory fixes. [Thanks to everyone who sent this in]
Samsung Omnia II and the case of the musical guided tour
Samsung's Omnia II and its gorgeous 3.7-inch AMOLED screen is still without a Verizon release date, but don't let that stop you from enjoying Italian site HDBlog's ten-minute guided tour of the device. Hard to tell exactly how crisp is from the footage, and we also couldn't help but note a good bit of interface lag, especially when using the new cube menu. We're hopeful that'll get remedied before launch, and all in all, it's looking good, and the hardware definitely has some style. Grab some popcorn, video is after the break.[Via Slashgear]
Samsung Omnia II coming to Austria in September, WinMo 6.5 included
Samsung's already committed to offering Windows Mobile 6.5 upgrades to Omnia IIs released with 6.1, but just how necessary is that commitment going to end up being in practice? Microsoft's Austrian outpost has announced that the Korean company's latest WinMo superphone will be launching in the domestic market in September with 6.5 already installed -- suggesting that at least some of these handsets in other markets around the world could be coming out of the gate in the same configuration. It also raises new questions about the market launch for 6.5 on a broader scale; we've always known it'd be hitting toward the end of 2009, but we've never gotten an exact date out of anyone for retail availability -- presumably because it has as much to do with manufacturer partners' plans as it does Microsoft's. We're not saying the Austrian Omnia II will be the first WinMo 6.5 retail device anywhere, but at this point, it's looking likely that this'll be in the first wave.[Via WMExperts, TamsPPC, and wmpoweruser, thanks Daniel M.]
Samsung's Omnia family hands-on, Samsung Jet and Pixon 12 come along for the ride
Samsung just pulled a bit of a "Samsung" and completely blew out its Omnia lineup. We just got some face time with the new Omnia II, Omnia Pro, Omnia Lite and the Omnia-inspired Jet, along with the Pixon 12 -- which runs the same in-house Samsung OS as the Jet, but packs a 12 megapixel camera. It's hard not to notice the stunning AMOLED screens on these phones, especially up against the dull-by-comparison Omnia Lite with its petty LCD. Unfortunately, while the build quality is good and the specs are certainly all there, all the phones were fairly slow in regular operation. The Jet and Pixon were passable (and the Jet certainly ought to be, with an 800MHz "application processor"), but we can't imagine anybody finding any pleasure in the molasses Windows Mobile 6.1 experiences on the Omnia trio. The Jet has a fun little 3D UI "cube" gimmick, which involves the pointless spinning of a cube to access different media apps, but most of what we saw was pretty standard TouchWiz. We did like the speed of Pixon's camera, which does a Pre-style trick of sending photo processing duties to the background so you can snap another photo with little delay in between -- it's also pretty good at auto focus and color accuracy for a phone, but we won't be trading in our regular point and shoot in the near term. None of the phones we looked at had network access, so we weren't able to test out the WebKit browsers, but it sounds like a major win for the Jet and Pixon. Let's just work on that Omnia responsiveness a bit, yeah Samsung? Perhaps Windows Mobile 6.5 (the Omnia II and Omnia Pro are 6.5-ready) will help.Update: we added a video of the Omnia II and Omnia Pro after the break!
Samsung Omnia II now official: AMOLED touchscreen with TouchWiz 2.0 destined for Verizon
Although not exactly the best kept secret (we first caught wind last week), Samsung's Verizon-bound Omnia II / I8000 is now one hundred percent official, along with even more official US confirmations for the Omnia Pro B760 (Louvre) slider, Omnia Pro B7320 candybar, and the Omnia Lite B7300. Specs for the Omnia II are just a little different than what we previously heard: 3.7-inch AMOLED resistive touchscreen with WVGA (480 x 800) resolution, 7.2Mbps HSPA (or EV-DO Rev. A for Verizon's version), 5 megapixel camera, 720 x 480 at 30fps video recording, 2GB to 16GB internal storage with microSD expansion slot, Bluetooth 2.0, WiFi, AGPS, and TouchWiz 2.0 UI. As for the Lite, we're looking at HSDPA, WiFi, 3 megapixel camera, AGPS, and just as the name suggests, a good likelihood it'll be overshadowed by its more feature-rich brother. Update: We can't say it's unexpected, but just to be clear, Omnia II buyers shouldn't worry about living in the past. Yahoo! Tech reports its WinMo 6.1 underbelly will be later upgradeable to 6.5.
