According to the Palm Treo enthusiast site Treonauts, BlackBerry Connect for the Treo is almost ready. I know that we have been hearing this for well over a year, however, Treonauts writer Blake, who is at the 3GSM World Congress in Barcelona says that BlackBerry Connect for the Treo is just waiting to be certified by Palm, RIM, and the carriers.
One huge side note that probably deserves it’s own post is that BlackBerry Connect will run on the Windows Mobile powered Treo 700w as well as Palm OS powered devices. I’ve heard many BlackBerry users (not diehard CrackBerry Addicts) say that they would seriously look at the new Treo 700w if they could get their BlackBerry mail on it. I guess that we may soon see.
Via Treonauts
BlackBerry Connect, Palm, Treo, Treo 700w
I think that we are all aware that Research in Motion doesn’t currently offer, and from the sounds of it, plan to offer anytime soon, a BlackBerry with a built-in digital camera. Security is usually the reason given and there are a lot of organizations that have a strict policy forbidding camera phones of any type on their premises, however, my guess is that there are a lot more organizations that don’t have such a policy. Lately I have been wondering if RIM just might be wrong about their no camera-phone, no way, not ever policy.
A buddy of mine just bought a new Treo 700w and although he cannot go more than a day without charging it, has to reboot it 3 or 4 times a week, and still somehow thinks that a Treo is just another kind of BlackBerry, I must admit that the ability to take a picture and immediately send it as an attachment is pretty cool. I have owned a camera phone before and honestly thought it sucked because it was so difficult to send the pictures to anyone. After playing with a Treo 700w, however, I kind of wished that my BlackBerry 7130e had similar functionality.
If you just take a look at the BlackBerry.com homepage it is clear that RIM is starting to market to the individual buyers. If they truly want to make a dent in the consumer market, I think that they will have to rethink their position on camera phones.
Funambol, a Redwood City, CA based software company has released version 3 of it’s email delivery software that provides push email, PIM synchronization, and device management for mobile devices and since Funambol is open source, is, of course free.
One of the really cool things about Funambol is that it is compatible with over 75% of all mobile phones shipping today including BlackBerry and runs on Microsoft Exchange, Lotus Notes, IMAP, and POP. Funambol v3 is open source and more information about obtaining an open source license can be obtained here, however, Funambol provides a commercial licenses as well.
Funambol commercial products provide functionality, connectivity, and compatibility beyond what the open source code base does. The commercial products are available with full support, documentation, and consulting services. Further, Funambol’s commercial license does not trigger open-source obligations (such as code reciprocity or viral licensing), and it provides intellectual property indemnification to the user organization.
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A top shareholder of Palm Inc. which makes hand-held electronic devices, has sent a letter to the company’s board urging them to explore a sale of the company, the Wall Street Journal reported on Thursday.
The newspaper said Mark Nelson, an investor who owns about 6.6 percent of Palm, sent the letter on Tuesday recommending that it “explore strategic alternatives, including a sale of the company.”
Via Reuters
The term BlackBerry Killer is thrown around way too loosely as it is given to just about every smart phone with a QWERTY keyboard on it that isn’t actually a BlackBerry, however, I have to scratch my head when this title is given to the BenQ Siemens P50 PDA Phone. In fact, I have to ask, “What is Siemens thinking?”
We first heard of the Siemens P50 way back in March of 2004. Back then it was just called the Ben-Q. For whatever reason it was delayed for a couple of years but Siemens has decided to go ahead and release now. I am not really sure why though because it is the same device with practically the same configuration that it was 2 years ago.
Here are the specs…
- Quad-band (850/900/1800/1900MHz) GSM/GPRS radio (no EDGE though)
- Bluetooth
- 802.11b Wi-Fi
- SDio slot
- 64MB RAM, 64MB ROM
- 416Mhz Intel PXA272 processor
- 1.3 megapixel camera with 4x digital zoom
- Windows Mobile 2003
Maybe Siemens has a warehouse full of these things and they just want to get rid of them, however, the price tag is as high if not higher than for newer devices with more bells and whistles running on Windows Mobile 5.
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Remember the Motorola Q? This was one of the last devices that was tagged as a BlackBerry Killer back in the summer of 05. Well, rumor has it that the Motorola Q won’t even see the light of day in Europe. This BlackBerry Killer won’t even hunt.
Bargain PDA is reporting that the GSM version of the Motorola Q has been cancelled in Europe and that the only version of the BlackBerry Killer that has even a remote chance of being released will be a CDMA version offered in the United States.
Once again, the term BlackBerry Killer has been branded to generously. I just don’t see a device seriously taking on the BlackBerry when it isn’t even available on an entire continent of mostly 1st World Countries.
Cingular has just released the 2125, the second smartphone running BlackBerry Connect competitor Windows Mobile 5, however, it is not fair to compare the Cingular 2125 to the BlackBerry… It is just not a fair competition.
Lets go over the specs, or lack there of depending on your viewpoint. No QWERTY keyboard, no memory card slots, only a 1.3 megapixel camera. It’s a Windows Mobile device and doesn’t even have a stylus. Replying to an email is absolutely brutal. There is no wi-fi and the 2125 only has 64Mb of memory. Any 710x series BlackBerry completely blows this device out of the water. To me the Cingular 2125 seems like a over-hyped, mediocre cameraphone with a Windows logo slapped onto it.
Rumor has it that the team at Fujitsu-Siemens have updated their Pocket LOOX 520 and and have BlackBerry maker Research in Motion dead in their sights with the new Pocket LOOX T800 series.
Fujitsu-Siemens will enter into the mobile phone / PDA arena currently dominated by the BlackBerry with two new Pocket LOOX devices, the T810, and the T830. Both devices are rumored to have UMTS, 802.11g, Bluetooth 2.0, 128MB flash memory, 64MB RAM, Windows Mobile 5.0 AKU2, and GPS. The T830 will also have a 2.0 megapixel digital camera. (Hopefully RIM will get the concept of multiple hardware configurations one day but thats for another post)
As rumored earlier, the Palm Treo 700w debuts today on the Verizon network. The Treo 700w is the first Palm Treo device to support an operating system other than the Palm OS. The Treo 700w hosts Microsoft’s Windows Mobile 5.