Mobile Phone News

Taking your phone into a service center for a firmware update is so 1999, but Samsung apparently didn’t get the memo, because Sprint just declare that you’ll need to head into one of the carrier’s stores with a repair facility to get your Moment re-upped. Of course, the good news in this place is that the Moment’s getting an update, period — it improves AGPS and battery life, among other things — but the bad news is that it bucks Android’s trend of magically updating over thin air and doesn’t include the promised 2.1 core. Presumably that stuff is yet to come, and happily, Sprint says that “the ability to download the update directly on your Moment will be available in the near future.” Let’s just pray this is the first and last time you need to put on pants and leave the house this year.

Windows Mobile 6.5 fever: catch it! AT&T had the good fortune of releasing the Tilt2 late enough to get 6.5 out of the gate, but the other guys have been falling in line ever since: first Verizon, then T-Mobile, and at this time Sprint’s getting in on the action. The bad news is that they’re only committing to a vague “by the end of first quarter, 2010″ window at this point, but the great news is that this appears to be more than a simple 6.5 bump — Sprint says that there’ll also be “significant enhancements to the Touch Pro2 user interface which will allow additional customization / personalization options and more integration with the applications users access most.” We’ll take it — and actually, why don’t you just go ahead and make it this mysterious 6.6 while you’re at it, guys?

Sprint outs details on WinMo 6.5 update for Touch Pro2 originally appeared on Engadget Mobile on Thu, 14 Jan 2010 17:48:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

Just a few days ago Verizon made the less-than-shocking confirmation that DROID tethering was coming, but wouldn’t say how much it would cost. at this time that the hardest of hardcore fans are already waiting in line, disconnected from the world at large, the company is unleashing the bad news: it’ll be $30. That doubles the cost of the required data plan that sits atop a subscriber’s voice plan, meaning a total of $60 per month for “unlimited” data access on handset or laptop. Mind you, “unlimited” really means 5GB of data per, a total of 10 split between the two $30 plans. Glass ceilings: we hate them.

Filed under: Handsets, Motorola, Virgin Mobile