Motorola Gives Us a Hint of Its Future with the QA30

Today Motorola announced the QA30 Hint messaging phone. The Hint is a squarish slider that has a full QWERTY keyboard, threaded SMS and IM conversations, and access to multiple email accounts. The Hint comes with a 2 megapixel camera with video capture and supports microSD cards up to 8GB. It has dedicated music control buttons and a 3.5mm headset jack for regular headphones. According to FCC documentation, the Hint is a CDMA phone with Bluetooth and EVDO, in both 850/1900 and 850/1700/1900 versions, meaning network operators with AWS spectrum could sell the Hint. The Hint will be available with Alltel starting November 28th for $99 with contract, after a $50 mail-in rebate.

Verizon Wireless Announces the Samsung Omnia

Today Verizon Wireless announced that it will be selling the Samsung Omnia. The Omnia, which was first announced earlier this year, includes Samsung's TouchWiz user interface as well as Windows Mobile 6.1 Professional. Features include a 3.2-inch wide touch display, GPS, stereo Bluetooth, WiFi, and 8 GB of internal memory plus a memory card slot. It has a 5 megapixel camera with auto-focus, geo-tagging, auto-panorama, stabilizer, face detection, smile detection, and video editing. FM radio and auto-rotation round out the features. The Omnia will be one of the first phones able to access Verizon's new VZAppsZone, where users can discover and download third-party content. The Omnia will be available via sales channels starting November 26 and in Verizon Wireless retail stores on December 8. It will cost $250 after rebate with new agreement.

Nokia Introduces the 6260 Slide

Today Nokia announced the 6260 Slide, a new quad-band GSM/EDGE phone with HSDPA 10.2Mbps / HSUPA 2Mbps 3G capabilities. Other radios include GPS, Wi-Fi, FM radio and stereo Bluetooth v2.1. The 6260 Slide also has a 5 megapixel autofocus camera with Carl Zeiss optics, dual LED flash and video capture. The 6260 runs Series 40 6th Edition, supports microSD cards up to 8GB, and has stereo speakers. The 6260 has a 2.5mm headset jack that supports TV out. It will cost $385 and will be available in the first quarter of 2009. At the same time, Nokia also released a new SDK for Series 40 6th Edition. The SDK provides application developers and network operators with new tools to create applications and services for Series 40 phones.

HTC TouchPRO Available from Verizon Wireless

Today Verizon Wireless announced the availability of the HTC TouchPRO Windows Mobile phone. It costs $350 after rebates with new agreement.

Nokia to Launch MVNO in Japan

Nokia is planning to offer wireless services of its own in the Japanese market. It will use NTT DoCoMo's network and launch a high-end MVNO with its most advanced and expensive models. Nokia has only 1 percent marketshare in Japan and the move may help Nokia better penetrate the market there. The service is expected to launch in in the second quarter of 2009.

Apple Adds More Features to the iPhone

Today Apple released firmware version 2.2 for the iPhone. The updated software brings several new features to Google Maps, including Street Views; Public Transit and walking directions; the ability to see the address of dropped pins; and the ability to share user location information via email. It brings some updates to the email application, including fixes to mail retrieval and better formatting for HTML emails. The update also stabilizes Safari, decreases call failures, improves the voice quality of visual voicemail messages and makes podcasts available for download from within the iTunes application. The update is free.