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JAMM Reviews Galactic Bowling for iPhone

29.10.09

Over at Just Another Mobile Monday, Doug released his latest review for the iPhone.  This time he covered Galactic Bowling.  The game is a bowling game with, erm, a galactic flare.  The game, which has multiple modes of play, has great graphics and intuitive controls according to Doug.  He does however have a few challenges with the game, the least of which is it is too easy to win sometimes.

Click here to read the full review at JAMM

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Giorgio Armani Windows Phone from Samsung

29.10.09

In case you missed it on Friday, Giorgio Armani has teamed up with Samsung and Microsoft to release a Armani-branded Windows Phone.  You will find the full Press Release below.  The specs are pretty darn impressive - and so is the price.

Can a Louis Vuitton Windows Phone be far behind?  Oh please, oh please, oh please....

Milan, October 9th, 2009 - Giorgio Armani, Samsung Electronics Co. Ltd., and Microsoft are proud to present the new Giorgio Armani-Samsung smartphone, the most elegant and functional mobile on the market. Giorgio Armani himself personally designed this stylish smartphone, as he did with the first Giorgio Armani Samsung mobile in 2007 and the Emporio Armani Samsung “Night Effect” mobile in 2008. In 2009, the new smartphone makes its debut with more powerful functions and superior usability. The next rendition of this style and technology partnership includes a Microsoft Windows Mobile 6.5 operating system, a unique two step tilt hinge form factor with both full touch screen and QWERTY keyboard hybrid, and a stunning 3.5 inch Ultra Brilliant AMOLED display.

The Giorgio Armani-Samsung smartphone is part of an innovative brand alliance of portable electronics and household products by Giorgio Armani and Samsung Electronics. This phone stands out due to the innovative blend of Giorgio Armani’s refined style and Samsung Electronics’ cutting-edge technology.

Giorgio Armani, President and CEO of Giorgio Armani S.p.A., commented: "Today more than ever, elegant dressing is part of daily business life. When Samsung asked me to design the new business and lifestyle smartphone I decided to use my fashion aesthetic to create it. I simply aim to create a smartphone which is not only an elegant tool but also functional and useful, perfect for today’s managers. The result is a unique smartphone perfectly suited to every moment of one’s business and private day. This is the Armani aesthetic – to combine beauty with function in a simple and timeless way."

JK Shin, Executive Vice President and head of the Mobile Communications Division at Samsung Electronics, said: "We are delighted to have reached another milestone in the collaboration between Giorgio Armani and Samsung Electronics. This latest-generation mobile masterfully combines our experience in technology with a design from one of the world's best known designers, and the functions offered by Windows Mobile 6.5 operating system. What's more, the Giorgio Armani-Samsung smartphone is a demonstration of our commitment to offering customers cutting-edge technology in our products, along with exclusive design and fashion."

"Mobile phones armed with Windows Mobile bring together the best of the Web, the PC, and mobile phones so that people can connect instantly to the experiences they care about," said Steve Ballmer, CEO of Microsoft Corp. "But people want more than just a useful device - they want a phone that offers design qualities that match their personality and lifestyle. The Giorgio Armani-Samsung smartphone we're announcing today with Giorgio Armani and Samsung combines technology innovation and fashion to deliver a great mobile phone that also fulfills the desire for style and elegance."

Designed to standout in the crowd
Like previous Giorgio Armani Samsung Mobile, the new device is designed by Giorgio Armani, reflecting his simple and graceful design philosophy. The unique two-step 30-degree tilt hinge form factor combines sophisticated design with exceptional usability. The phone also comes in a distinctive and elegant bronze gold color, which coordinates perfectly with Giorgio Armani’s suits.

Your mobile business partner
The new Giorgio Armani-Samsung smartphone offers always-on connectivity tools including 7.2Mbps HSDPA, 5.76Mbps HSUPA and WiFi access. With its unique form factor supporting full touch and QWERTY at same time, the phone provides a dynamic mobile internet experience through Push e-mail with Microsoft Exchange and full internet browsing.
The Giorgio Armani-Samsung smartphone comes with the new Windows Mobile 6.5 operating system. It’s one of the first phones available with the innovative Windows Mobile 6.5 operating system, which will lead the way to a new generation of mobile services and applications. Windows Mobile 6.5 includes a new start page and dashboard that simply and intuitively displays key productivity features such as e-mails, text messages, missed calls, and calendar appointments.

It also includes a touch interface that provides quick access to the main functions of the smartphone. The free My Phone service, which is a newly added Windows Mobile 6.5 application, lets users access, manage, and easily run backups of the personal information contained in the device using a password-protected Web-based service. Synchronization and automatic backups guarantee users that their contacts, appointments, text messages, and other information is kept up-to-date and is always easy to retrieve if the phone is lost or when changing phones.

Work hard but play harder
To satisfy business professionals, who want to easily and efficiently manage their work and personal lives, the Giorgio Armani-Samsung smartphone offers the latest multi-media features such as a 5-megapixel camera, a music player and a video player supporting various types of multimedia formats. The phone comes with 3.5” ultra brilliant AMOLED screen for viewing videos and slide shows in high-resolution and with reduced power consumption. Furthermore, it offers 8 Gigabytes of internal memory and an extendable microSD slot up to 32GB to store multimedia content.

The Giorgio Armani-Samsung smartphone also offers GPS navigation, so users can get their bearings wherever work or life takes them.

The Giorgio Armani-Samsung smartphone will be available in Italy, the UK, Germany, the Netherlands, Spain, Russia, China, and the UAE (Dubai).

The Product Specifications

Network	HSDPA 7.2Mbps, HSUPA 5.76Mbps (900/1900/2100) GPRS/ EDGE (850/900/1800/1900)
Camera	5 Megapixel camera AF
Display	3.5” WVGA AMOLED (480x800)
Multimedia	Audio: SP-Midi, SMAF, MP3, AAC, AAC+, WMA Video: H.263, MPEG4, WAV, MMV, DivX, XviD
Features	BluetoothÂŽ 2.0 +EDR/ USB 2.0 high-speed/ WiFi TV-Out / micro USB
	A-GPS Navigation
	8GB internal memory micro SD™ external memory slot (up to 32GB)
	Opera Browser 9.5, Online Widgets, Mobile SNS, MS Office
	FM Radio
Size / Weight	118.5 x 58.3 x 16.4 mm / 164g
Battery	1500mAh

Giorgio Armani S.p.A.
The Armani Group is one of the leading fashion and luxury goods groups in the world today with over 5,000 direct employees and 13 factories. It designs, manufactures, distributes and retails fashion and lifestyle products including apparel, accessories, eyewear, watches, jewellery, fragrances and cosmetics, and home furnishings under a range of brand names: Giorgio Armani PrivĂŠ, Giorgio Armani, Armani Collezioni, Emporio Armani, AJ | Armani Jeans, EA7, A/X Armani Exchange, Armani Junior, Armani Teen, Armani Baby and Armani Casa. The exclusive distribution network of the Group comprises: 75 Giorgio Armani boutiques, 19 Armani Collezioni shops, 166 Emporio Armani shops, 165 A/X Armani Exchange shops, 17 AJ | Armani Jeans shops, 8 Armani Junior shops, 10 Giorgio Armani Accessori shops, 2 Emporio Armani Accessori shops, 14 Emporio Armani CaffĂŠs, and 27 Armani Casa shops in 46 countries in the world.

Samsung Electronics Co., Ltd.
Samsung Electronics Co., Ltd. is a global leader in semiconductor, telecommunication, digital media and digital convergence technologies with 2008 consolidated sales of US$96 billion. Employing approximately 164,600 people in 179 offices across 61 countries, the company consists of two business units: Digital Media & Communications and Device Solutions. Recognized as one of the fastest growing global brands, Samsung Electronics is a leading producer of digital TVs, memory chips, mobile phones and TFT-LCDs. For more information, please visit www.samsung.com.

Microsoft Windows Mobile
Founded in 1975, Microsoft is the worldwide leader in software, services, and Internet technologies to manage information for individuals and companies. It offers a full range of products and services that help everyone improve their businesses using software, anywhere and with any device.
All the information you want about Microsoft is available on http://www.microsoft.com/italy/ or at the e-mail address infoita@microsoft.com

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Shazam coming to Windows Phone

29.10.09

Windows Phone fans rejoice!  One of the coolest applications for the iPhone is coming to the Windows Marketplace!

London, UK - October 06, 2009 - Shazam, the world's leading mobile music discovery provider, today announced the availability of its music discovery application for WindowsÂŽ phones via the just-launched WindowsÂŽ Marketplace for Mobile. Shazam will be offering a free version as well as a separate full-featured version which users can access for a one-time fee. This will be the first time Shazam is simultaneously offering two versions of its applications at once, giving Windows phone users the choice as to how they want to experience and use Shazam.

Windows Marketplace for Mobile, Microsoft Corp.'s new mobile store that allows users to browse and download mobile applications to more than 50 million existing WindowsÂŽ Mobile devices, operates on an innovative new operating system that gives users access to quality applications through a seamless shopping experience. Shazam allows users to discover and share music simply by holding a phone up to a song as it is playing. The Shazam application has been downloaded by more than 8 million users on the iPhone App Store and is among the most popularly downloaded applications on BlackBerry App World, Nokia's Ovi Store and Google's Market.

"Windows Mobile is the latest platform for which we have developed our music discovery application that has been used and enjoyed by so many people around the world already," said Andrew Fisher, CEO of Shazam. "We are delighted to have been included as part of the debut of Windows Marketplace and we are very pleased to be working together with Microsoft to deliver the Shazam service to a whole new population of users."

Users of the free Shazam application will have the ability to discover up to five songs per month and have the option to share their discovered music. Premium users will get unlimited tagging capabilities plus additional features that include:

-Access to Shazam's Tag Charts which indicate what music and which artists are hot and are being tagged by Shazam users in country
-Recommendations for similar tracks based on the tagged songs and artists
-Biographies of tagged artists and bands
-Music and album reviews, and discographies
-New users will be offered the opportunity to trial the full-featured Shazam application for seven days, after which they will be prompted to purchase it or revert to the limited, free edition.

"Shazam has proven to be a popular application across numerous devices and platforms," said Jason Lim, director of ISV and developer experience at Microsoft. "With this in mind, we're excited to have Shazam as part of the global launch of Windows Marketplace for Mobile. The Shazam application will provide people with a unique and compelling music discovery experience and we're very pleased to offer it."

At launch, the Shazam applications on Windows Marketplace for Mobile will be available in English in more than thirty markets around the world. Shazam expects to roll out multi-language versions in the coming weeks.

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MobilityMinded Reviews the HTC Touch2

29.10.09

My good friend Remo Knops over at MobilityMinded has posted a fantastic review of the new HTC Touch2 Windows Phone this morning.  Remo always does a great job on his reviews and this one is, I think, one of his best.  

He covers the Touch2 in tremendous detail, providing you all of the specifications as well as picture after picture of the device itself and the new HTC TouchFLO Sense UI built into the phone.  It's a detailed review so it's not a quick read but well worth it.

Click here to read the full review at MobilityMinded

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GSM Palm Pre comes to O2 Germany

29.10.09

Thanks to Arnie over at the::unwired for posting on this one...

Palm has announced that the Palm Pre will be exclusively available from O2 Germany.  This European version of the Pre will be GSM, sporting tri-band 2G and dual-band 3G (UMTS/HSDPA).  

What's interesting is that the phone itself is unlocked and SIM-free so customers of other networks like T-Mobile and Vodafone can actually get the phone and use it.

Reference article from the::unwired

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pocketnow.com reviews the Acer neoTouch S200 F1 Windows Phone

29.10.09

Over at pocketnow.com, Brandon has posted a detailed review of the new neoTouch S200 from Acer.  This new Windows Phone has a 1GHz Snapdragon processor coupled with 512MB of ROM and 256MB of RAM.  

Brandon has a lot of praise for the neoTouch S200 but he does have some concerns as well, most notably around the quality of the ROM build.  Hopefully Acer will address that soon.

Read the full review at pocketnow.com

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15% off all iPhone Wallpaper Packs

29.10.09

At the software store I have put all of the iPhone wallpaper theme packs on sale through the rest of the month.  Each pack contains anywhere from 20-100 wallpapers in each pack and come in 11 different categories:

- Abstract
- Gradient
- Landscapes
- Nature
- Neon
- Oceanlife
- Sky
- Space
- Sunset
- Tropical
- Business

To get the 15% discount, enter the coupon code appletheme when you check out.  There is no limit to the use of this coupon.

To view all of the categories of wallpapers in the store click here.

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MobilityMinded Reviews SPB Quads

29.10.09

My friend Remo over at MobilityMinded has posted a great review of the latest game from SPB Software, SPB Quads.

The game, designed for Windows Phones with a touchscreen, is highly addictive (trust me, I know) and is played by creating a square of four blocks of the same color.  The bigger the square the more points you score.  

Remo covers the game in great detail, providing several screenshots of the game for you to see.  

Give it a full read over at MobilityMinded

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iPhone user and a F1 fan?

29.10.09

If you are an iPhone user and a Formula 1 fan, go to the App Store and pick up the official timing and scoring application.  You can find it here.  It gives you real time information on current sessions plus you can go back and re-live any race this season.



Yes is $9.99 and you only have two races left in the season but trust me, it's worth it.

It has been nice watching Practice 1 while continuing to work. :-)

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Rock Band for iPhone Available

29.10.09

In the App Store this morning the much anticipated Rock Band for iPhone has been released!

The game allows you to play guitar, bass, drums or vocals and you can play solo or as a team over bluetooth or WiFi.  

Rock Band requires iPhone OS 3.0 or later and is available for $9.99 in the App Store.

Click here to go to Rock Band in the App Store

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Review of the DIRECTTV App on iphonemvp.com

29.10.09

Over at iPhone MVP, Chris has posted a review of the DIRECTTV application that is available for iPhone.  

The app, created by DIRECTTV, allows you to search shows up to 14 days in advance, set up recordings for a show or a series of shows and program Pay-Per-View to be recorded so you can watch it any time.  

Chris covers the review in great detail, providing plenty of screen shots.

Check it out over at iPhone MVP

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HTC Tilt2 now on AT&T's Website

29.10.09

This weekend the HTC Tilt2 became available on the AT&T Wireless website.  It lists for $299.99 with a renewal or new 2-year contract.  

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Tilt Mobility reviews the HTC Tilt2

29.10.09

If you are looking for a comprehensive review of the new HTC Tilt2 on the AT&T network, look no further than Tilt Mobility.  Doug Smith over at that site has put together a fantastic review, providing a lot of details about the phone's hardware, software and overall performance.

Read the review at Tilt Mobility

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Review of SPB Wallet for iPhone

29.10.09

Keeping your personal information safe and secure is always critical no matter if you are on a laptop or mobile device.  SPB Software has made this easy with their SPB Wallet product on Windows Phone.  Now they have this same award winning application for iPhone and it work exceptionally well.  SPB Wallet allows you to create virtual cards that are stored in one file, called a wallet.  This wallet, which is 256-bit encrypted, allows you to store any personal information - PINs, passwords, Social Security number, bank account information, credit cards and so forth - in a secure yet quick and easily accessible application.  Even better, your wallet file is synchronized with your PC if you purchase the optional desktop version of the application.  This assures you that you always have your wallet in two places in case you lose your iPhone.

Read the full review on ClintonFitch.com

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Twikini updated to v1.6

29.10.09

Twikini updated to v1.6



Trinket software updated their popular Twitter application, Twikini, to v1.6 yesterday.  The update includes:


Bug fix: Fixes connectivity issue many T-Mobile users were experiencing when downloading timelines.

Bug fix: After a re-tweet, the highlighted tweet would be lost, and the newest tweet would be highlighted. Fixed this.

Improved: Tapping on a user's picture in the profile or tweet window will show a large picture of the user.

Improved: The profile window will show the date on which a user joined Twitter (this can be useful when deciding whether to follow someone).

Improved: Added "My Profile" (under the Tools menu) to quickly check your own profile.

Improved: URL shortening will use http://j.mp instead of Bit.ly, which will give you 2 extra characters. (Note: j.mp is part of Bit.ly).

You can read my review of Twikini here.

To try or buy Twikini, visit Trinket Software

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