CES 2009

(Credit: Samsung )

Even at a show like CES there's always room for basic phones. Just take the Samsung SGH-T119, which T-Mobile debuted in Las Vegas. The candy-bar design is about as simple as you can get, as is the pale gray color scheme. It will be available in February.

Features are equally minimal. You'll find a speakerphone, a voice recorder, a calendar, a calculator, an alarm clock, a currency converter, messaging, speed dialing, support for T-Mobile's myFaves, and a Web browser. You also get photo caller ID, though the T119 doesn't have a camera. It's only dual-band (GSM 850/1900), so don't count on using it outside of the United States or Canada.

The Consumer Electronics Show tends to be about small gadgets, the kind that fit in the hand or a pocket, or at least don't take up too much space on a desk or TV stand.

For Advanced Micro Devices, however, CES 2009 was an opportunity to talk about a supercomputer, the sort of high-tech machinery that even today tends to require at least a modest-sized room.

AMD said Thursday that by the second half of the year, it will be ready to go with the massively parallel "Fusion Render Cloud" supercomputer. And where supercomputers typically are used for rather wonky projects in energy research, weather forecasting, and such, the AMD machine is intended to help in the "deployment, development, and delivery" of high-definition content--and this brings us back to CES--to mobile devices.

Think video games and movies. Says AMD:

The system is being designed to enable content providers to deliver video games, PC applications and other graphically-intensive applications through the Internet "cloud" to virtually any type of mobile device with a web browser without making the device rapidly deplete battery life or struggle to process the content. The AMD Fusion Render Cloud will transform movie and gaming experiences through server-side rendering - which stores visually rich content in a compute cloud, compresses it, and streams it in real-time over a wireless or broadband connection to a variety of devices such as smart phones, set-top boxes and ultra-thin notebooks.

To deliver on that promise, chipmaker AMD is working with a company called Otoy that specializes in software and special effects for the video game and film industries.

The Fusion Render Cloud will use AMD gear including the Phenom II processors, AMD 790 chipsets, and ATI Radeon HD 4870 graphics processors. It is being designed to break the petaflop processing barrier--in layman's terms, to run with the fastest of the fast supercomputers--and "to process a million compute threads across more than 1,000 graphics processors," AMD said.

Cloud computing is one of the most loudly proclaimed topics in information technology these days. Although there are a number of interpretations of what it entails, the basic idea is that applications and heavy-duty processing live in some centralized data center, connected to via the Web, taking much of the workload off individual PCs and other devices.

(Credit: Hoover's)

If knowledge is power, then salespeople in the field and roving business execs can now wield their share of it thanks to two new mobile apps. Hoover's Mobile and Hoover's MobileSP tap into the Hoover's business directory to bring instant company and employee information to sales, financial, media professionals, and just about anyone else drenched in B2B.

The free Hoover's Mobile for iPhone, BlackBerry, and Windows Mobile phones looks up company information, phone numbers, the building address, executive organization, competitors, and financial overview for any company you enter--like the one whose doors you're about to waltz through.

Pony up $20 per month for Hoover's MobileSP--BlackBerry or Windows Mobile only--and get an interactive GPS reading that can build you lists of prospects near you based on any number of filters, including business size, earnings, and the mile radius of your choice.

Hoover's MobileSP can also fetch in-depth financials, and industry and company details that you can then save on your phone, down to a roster of the company's employees. Extremely useful, and creepy.

New T-Mobile phones

Sprint may have the Palm Pre, but T-Mobile wasn't a wallflower at CES. The carrier announced five new cell phones that span the range of usability. In the smartphone category there's the T-Mobile Shadow and the Rim BlackBerry Curve 8900, the Nokia 7510 is a midrange handset, and the Motorola Renew W233 and the Samsung SGH-T119 weigh in on the basic side.

It's a decent assortment in most regards, and we're glad to see T-Mobile starting the year off with a bang. So you can see all the handsets together, we've wrapped them up in this convenient T-Mobile slide show. Browse away.

(Credit: 3DVU)

For the hopelessly turned around, 3DVU announced Way2Go at CES this week, a mobile app and online mapping service that will let you put personalized 3D routes on your mobile phone.

Subscribers to the new Way2Go service will be able to create up to 30 3D aerial picture routes online, which they'll then be able to access from their cell phones through a downloadable viewer. GPS tracking and verbal and written directions will also be there to keep you on course.

In addition to using routes to get from point A to point B, the service lets you forward routes that your contacts can view and use themselves for free.

Way2Go's service will cost about $5 per month and will be available by the end of March on Symbian S60 and Windows Mobile phones, and to users in the U.S., U.K., and select Western European countries.

It will be interesting to see this service go head-to-head with Google Maps for Mobile, which currently provides driving directions and street view for free to select phones.

INQ Mobile boasts a handset made for social networks

(Credit: INQ Mobile)

The idea of a "social networking phone" seems redundant at first--don't all phones have an ability to connect to a social network of some kind? But INQ Mobile, a company based in the U.K., claims that it is the first to really bring social networks in the form of Facebook, MySpace, et al. to those of us who prefer to have regular, affordable phones. INQ's argument is that most handsets with dedicated Facebook and Skype applications have so far been of the smartphone variety, and thus out of touch with the mainstream. But with the INQ1, as it's called, these social networking applications are now available in a simple and affordable phone.

Indeed, as we played around with a sample model at a CES press event yesterday, we could go directly to Facebook with a single push of a button from the device's home screen. Facebook and other similar applications are laid out along the bottom row of the home screen, allowing for simple and direct access. The INQ1 comes with Facebook, Skype, Yahoo, Google, eBay, and Windows Messenger built-in, but since it also supports Java and BREW, you're able to add other applications like MySpace. The phone's contacts list is closely integrated with these applications, allowing you to see the online presence of all your contacts directly from the address book. For example, as you scroll down your contacts list, you can see the person's Facebook online status, Skype availability, and IM status. And then you can just choose whichever way you wish to contact him or her.

The hardware itself is decent, but nothing out of the ordinary. It has a nice display and a slider form factor. It also has a 3.2-megapixel camera, and once you take a picture, you can immediately upload it to Facebook, MySpace, or any site you want. The INQ1 also has a music player, which you can then connect to last.fm right out of the box, allowing you listen to your favorite streaming music. Of course it also has stereo Bluetooth, text messaging, and a speakerphone.

The INQ1 slides open.

(Credit: Nicole Lee/CNET)

You are prompted to enter your login and password the first time you use the device, but from then on you'll always be connected. We asked the INQ rep about security concerns, and he said that the phone does prompt you to enter the password every once in awhile. That said, the surest way to prevent a security breach in case your phone is stolen is to just change the password on the Web site.

So the big question is: is it affordable? INQ said that for now, the handset will go for 79 pounds, and right now the handset is only available in the U.K. and Australia. The company is shopping around for U.S. providers at the moment, and hopes to expand its partnership to other European carriers this year as well. We're not too sure how this will sell in the U.S., but perhaps its simplicity and ease of use will appeal to some.

T-Mobile Shadow revisited: not just a rumor anymore.

(Credit: T-Mobile)

We've been hearing rumors about it for a couple of months now, but the T-Mobile Shadow (yep, just the Shadow, not Shadow II) had its officially coming out party on Tuesday night at CES 2009.

Taking over for the original T-Mobile Shadow, the updated version, which was manufactured by HTC, sports a fresh look with curved edges, a shinier face, and comes in two new color combinations: black with burgundy and white with mint. The other major additions are a faster processor (260MHz) and UMA support, so you can now make calls over Wi-Fi using T-Mobile's HotSpot service.

Aside from those differences, the T-Mobile Shadow is very much like its predecessor. The smartphone features a QVGA non-touch display and a slider design with a SureType-like keypad. Under the hood, it runs Windows Mobile 6.1 Standard Edition and features integrated Bluetooth (stereo Bluetooth supported), Wi-Fi, a 2-megapixel camera, and a microSD expansion slot that supports up to 8GB cards.

Though T-Mobile did not announce an official availability date or pricing, the carrier did say it would be released in the coming weeks and we're guessing the pricing will be around the $149.99 range. In addition to the Shadow, T-Mobile also added the RIM BlackBerry Curve 8900 to its lineup earlier this week. Good to see some new smartphones at T-Mobile finally.

This story was co-written by Marguerite Reardon.

LAS VEGAS--Microsoft is hoping two new distribution deals will give its Live Search a much-needed boost.

The company is announcing on Wednesday a global deal with Dell that will see Live Search be the default search engine and a Windows Live toolbar bundled on the bulk of consumer and small-business PCs sold by the computer maker over the next three years. That deal is in addition to a five-year deal with Verizon Wireless, which leaked out earlier on Wednesday.

It's the latest effort for Microsoft, which has been trying--and struggling--for the past four years to build a search business that can offer a substantive rival to Google. But the latest market share numbers indicate that Microsoft is falling even further behind. Searches at Windows Live Search fell 16.7 percent year over year, giving Microsoft 9.1 percent market share in the U.S. in November, according to Nielsen Online figures released earlier this week. Google's searches rose 21.7 percent, for 64.1 percent market share, and Yahoo's searches dropped 1.4 percent from November 2007, for 16.1 percent share.

In an interview, Microsoft Senior Vice President Yusuf Mehdi said that the search product has gotten good enough that the time is right to start promoting it more heavily. Microsoft has already struck deals with HP and Lenovo to increase the distribution for Windows Live and Microsoft's search engine.

"We've gotten to a point where the product is now in a good enough state that we want to start to get it out more formally in front of more customers," Mehdi said. "These two partnerships are very significant for us, because it...gives an opportunity to put our search offering out before a broader audience now in a pretty mainstream way, and I think you should think about it as the first step of us slowly bringing up the dial on how we start to promote our product.

Microsoft has also made other moves, including building its own ad-serving engine, spending billions to acquire Aquantive, and trying promotions such as its Live Search Cashback and other efforts designed to give consumers a financial incentive to use its search engine.

The Dell deal will kick off next month, while the Verizon deal will begin in the first half of this year and includes both mobile search and other mobile advertising services. "It's a big win for us and by far the largest search and mobile display relationship we've entered into with any mobile operator," Mehdi said.

Mehdi acknowledged that Microsoft needs more than distribution deals to truly compete with Google. "These distribution partnerships are part of our strategy," he said. "We know we have to do a lot of other things, including improve the product, including being able to market direct with consumers, and build loyalty and brand around our offering."

Mehdi wouldn't say how much market share Microsoft expected to gain with the Dell deal or talk about Microsoft's other plans, including a rumored rebranding effort. He did say the Dell deal is flexible enough to accommodate a name change.

Microsoft had supposedly been in a bidding war against Google for the Verizon deal, according to earlier reports from The Wall Street Journal. Verizon Wireless and Microsoft have declined to discuss financial details of the deal. But a source close to the company said the five-year arrangement is worth a minimum of $650 million with Microsoft paying Verizon on a per handset basis.

This is believed to be the largest mobile search and advertising deal to date. The Journal reported last year that Google's deal to offer search on Sprint Nextel phones was about half what Microsoft was willing to pay for the Verizon deal. Details about Yahoo's deal with AT&T announced last year weren't disclosed either, but it's believed that Yahoo promised AT&T about $400 million in guaranteed revenue to become its default search provider.

As for the details of the Microsoft/Verizon deal, starting in the first half of this year, Microsoft Live Search will be preloaded on new Verizon Wireless phones and smartphones to provide all local and Internet searches. Microsoft will also power search for Verizon Wireless' VCast content, allowing subscribers to search for ringtones, full music tracks, videos, and other VCast entertainment content and news.

Depending on which device they use, Verizon subscribers will be able to search for content either by voice command or by typing their queries. And the search tool will also provide location-based results, meaning subscribers will be able to search for restaurants, movie theaters, and other businesses nearby.

Also as part of the deal, Microsoft will manage all search and display advertising for Verizon's mobile Web services.

Today mobile search is still in its early days. Only about 9 percent of cell phone subscribers search the Net from their cell phones, according to ComScore M:Metrics. But usage is growing, especially as more consumers upgrade to smartphones like Apple's iPhone or Research In Motion's BlackBerry devices.

Despite its small size today, the big search companies see the mobile market, with more than 3 billion subscribers worldwide, as a huge opportunity. Winning Verizon Wireless, which is currently the second largest cell phone carrier in the U.S., is a big deal for Microsoft. Yahoo is powering search for AT&T, the largest cell phone U.S. carrier. And Google has a deal with Sprint Nextel, the third largest U.S. operator.

But it's still unclear how important these carrier deals will be. Microsoft and Yahoo have previously struck similar multi-year portal deals on the PC side with Verizon Communications and AT&T, but Google still dominates the overall search market. And just as they can on the PC, users still have the option to use any search engine they wish from their cell phone browsers.

So far, Google has managed to continue its search dominance on mobile devices with 60 percent of mobile subscribers who search the Internet from their phones using its search engine. About 36 percent of subscribers use Yahoo and 10 percent use Microsoft, according to ComScore.

Google may also have another advantage in mobile, as carriers start rolling out more devices that use its Android operating system. Android is an open-source mobile operating system that tightly integrates several Google services into phones, including Google's search products.

So far, T-Mobile is the only carrier selling a Google phone, the G1. But other Android phones are expected to hit the market later this year. HTC, the maker of the G1 is planning another Android device, as is Sony Ericsson. Motorola has also said it plans to use Android as one of its main operating systems in future phones. And LG and Samsung, members of Google's Open Handset Alliance, are also expected to release Android phones.

Audiovox and Media FLO partner to bring FLO Live Mobile TV to the car.

(Credit: CBS Interactive)

At its press conference today, Audiovox/Jensen announced a partnership with mobile media provider MediaFLO USA to bring live mobile TV to Audiovox's mobile audio/video offerings.

MediaFLO's FLO TV service currently allows users to watch ten mobile television channels on certain Verizon and AT&T Wireless handsets for $15 per month. The channel lineup is expected to increase to about 25 channels by the time the in-vehicle service launches in Q3 2009. Whether this will also mean an increase in subscription fees has yet to be determined. According to Audiovox representatives, users will be able to add its FLO TV module to any factory or aftermarket video system with no visible hardware and no roof-mounted satellite receiver.

Audiovox says it's aiming for a sub-$500 price point on its first generation of FLO TV hardware, but final pricing hasn't yet been nailed down.

(Credit: T-Mobile)

On Monday, we reported on rumors that T-Mobile would release the RIM BlackBerry Curve 8900 on February 11, and while the date has not been confirmed, the carrier did go ahead and make the official product announcement on Tuesday.

Yes, the BlackBerry Curve 8900 will make its way to T-Mobile some time in February and is being touted as the thinnest and lightest full QWERTY BlackBerry to date. As expected, it will have integrated Bluetooth and GPS and we now know it will have built-in Wi-Fi as well as support for T-Mobile's Unlimited HotSpot Calling service. Unfortunately, there is no 3G love.

There are plenty of other highlights, though, including a 3.2-megapixel camera, a 3.5mm headphone jack, a microSD/SDHC expansion slot (supports up to 16GB cards), and a 512MHz processor. Pricing and an official release date were not released, but customers can sign up for alerts on T-Mobile's Web site.