Motorola Droid 4 hits the shelves at Verizon Wireless

In case you are a hardware QWERTY keyboard junkie, and happen to live in the United States, we have some good news for you. Motorola's latest Droid 4 smartphone, featuring a slide-out hardware keyboard is now available for Verizon Wireless.

The RAZR styled handset packs an the edge-lit, laser-cut QWERTY keyboard, which sound like a perfect addition to its spec sheet. The latter includes a dual-core CPU, LTE radio, 8MP snapper, 4" qHD screen, and Android 2.3.5 Gingerbread. You can find the device's full specs, along with our early hands-on impressions here.

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Unknown HTC LTE droid heading to Verizon, runs on ICS

Pictures of a mysterious HTC droid have popped up today. It looks much like the Incredible 2, runs on the latest Android version - the Ice Cream sandwich and features LTE connectivity. Judging by the boot logo it should be a Verizon-bound smartphone.

   
The mysterious HTC smartphone

The specs are up to date - there is a dual-core 1.2GHz processor, 1GB RAM, an 8 megapixel

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Pink Samsung Galaxy Note on the way, will miss Valentine's day

We have always thought of the Samsung Galaxy Note as a male-oriented device, but it turns out we have underestimated it. The phoneblet obviously generates enough interest with the ladies to warrant its own feminine version, colored in Berry Pink.

We got a tip from an industry insider, containing a photo of the upcoming pink version of the Samsung Galaxy Note. Both the front and the back of the device will obviously be repainted, but we aren't sure if the S Pen (which is white in the white version) will get a similar treatment.

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Samsung 2012 La Fleur lineup - Ace, Wave Y, C3322 and C3520

Samsung just announced four new La Fleur handsets for the Russian market. We got a couple of smartphones with the Android-running Ace and the Bada-powered Wave Y, as well as two featurephones - the C3322 and C3520.

None of the new La Fleur handsets has any functional differences, compared to their original versions. They should all be on sale in Russia by the end of the month.

The Samsung Galaxy Ace La Fleur with its 3.5" HVGA screen, Android 2.3 Gingerbread, 5 megapixel camera and an 800 MHz CPU will go for 9,990 RUR, which translates to about $335 or €250.

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More photos of the LG Fantasy E740 WP phone crop up

By mistake, someone put photos of the yet unannounced LG Fantasy E740 on a Romanian online trading site. The photos were quickly taken down, but one of our tipsters managed to save them.

The device is clearly a prototype (there's a big "Not for sale" label on it) but it is a working unit. The device has the ScanSearch and SmartShare (formerly PlayTo) apps that were exclusive to the Optimus 7 back when it launched so it seems legit.

    
Leaked photos of LG Fantasy E740

Upon closer inspection, it becomes pretty clear that this is in fact the LG Miracle we saw a few days ago. Fantasy E740 sounds more like a retail name but we first heard of the LG Fantasy back in December last year, so it's still anyone's guess what the final name of the device will be.

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Motorola launches Motoluxe and DEFY Mini in Germany, UK

Motorola announced the availability of its latest Android smartphones for the German and UK markets. The company, which is soon to be acquired by Google, will be taking the Motoluxe to Germany and UK, and the DEFY Mini to Germany.

The Motorola Motoluxe will be hitting the UK in late February at a yet undisclosed price and Germany the following month for €279. Deutche Telecom (T-Mobile) will be one of the carriers offering the Motoluxe, but there's no saying what other stores and carriers will get it.

   

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Motorola unveils Gleam+ - a clamshell featurephone

We were almost going to bet that clamshell featurephones are extinct in these parts of the world, but here comes Motorola announcing one. The company just unveiled the Gleam+ - a simple folding handset that should rely on an attractive price to lure in customers.

The Motorola Gleam+ comes with a 2.8" main LCD of WQVGA resolution (400 x 240 pixels) and an external display consisting of 144 LEDs. A modest 2 megapixel fixed focus camera should cater for your photography needs, while Bluetooth 2.1 and USB 2.0 are all the Gleam+ has to offer in terms of connectivity.

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Androids lose resale value faster than iPhones, study shows

An interesting new startup called Priceonomics tackles a question that we all face eventually - how much can I sell my old phone for? According to their research, iPhones have the best resale value, while Android is almost tied with BlackBerrys in this respect.

If you try to sell your 18-month old phone, you'd get 53% of its original price on average if you have an iPhone, 42% if it's a droid and 41% for a BlackBerry. Check out this graph that shows how quickly smartphones deprecate in value.

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Nokia will launch at least one high-end device at MWC

This year's MWC, starting on February 27 in Barcelona is set to feature a big announcement from Nokia. The news was brought by Forbes, who reportedly learned it from an undisclosed industry source.

Not that we are so surprised to hear it - Nokia said it will be coming back to the MWC after missing out the previous two years and it was only logical they will have some new devices on show this year. Plus, the company is scheduled to hold a press conference on the first day of MWC and if there are no new announcements there will be hardly anything worth talking about there.

Expectations are Nokia will unveil an international version of its Lumia 900 WP smartphone. The device debuted at CES last month as an AT&T US exclusive, but it would be surprising if it retains that status for too long.

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HTC Sensation XE coming to Clove UK

The HTC Sensation already got a white dress and now it's time for the Sensation XE to change from black to white too. The white version is already available in some markets, but now the e-tailer Clove is bringing it to the UK.

The HTC Sensation XE is a souped up version of the regular Sensation and also the first phone to pack Beats audio and the iBeats headset. Clove's site shows the black headset, but we hope that's just the wrong promo image as the white iBeats headset will look better with the white XE.

The headset alone costs a cool £54, so getting it in the box is a pretty sweat deal.

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Prada Phone by LG 3.0 starts mass selling in the UK

The Prada Phone by LG 3.0 has been on sale in the UK for a couple of weeks now, but its availability was limited to Phones4U only. Now a couple of other major UK retailers have the third edition of the LG Prada Phone in stock.

UK online store Unlocked Mobiles has the LG Prada 3.0 for £424.98, whileClove sells it for £429.99. You can tell that LG have been pricing the phone and not Prada.

Moreover, considering that the Prada Phone 3.0 sports a 4.3-inch 480x800 touchscreen, 1GHz dual-core processor, 1GB of RAM and 8GB of built in storage, the price isn't all that bad. And you know, bragging about your new Prada smartphone is worth every quid.

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First-time smartphone buyers chose Android over iOS in Q4

According to analytics firm NPD, Android managed to steal the top spot from iOS by a sizable amount following Q4 last year, making Google's mobile OS the more popular choice amongst newcomers to the smartphone market.

Between October and December 2011, US buyers deliberating over which device would take their smartphone virginity, opted for an Android-based phone rather than a member of the iPhone family.

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LG Miracle WP smartphone with NOVA display press shot leaks

LG is obviously about to complete the development of yet another WP smartphone. We just got a press photo of the handset, dubbed LG Miracle, and while it's not coming from an official source, such images normally only appear shortly before the device becomes official.

Along with the image we also got information about the key features of the LG Miracle's spec sheet. The most interesting bit is that the smartphone will be using a WVGA NOVA display, which will be a first for a Windows Phone handset. The super bright NOVA screen will help the Miracle stand out in the WP crowd, which is becoming an increasingly difficult task lately.

Unfortunately, the LG Miracle will feature a Snapdragon chipset with 1GHz Scorpion CPU, instead of the 1.4GHz and 1.5GHz units which we saw on most second generation WP smartphones. Its 5 megapixel camera will be able to capture 720p videos and there will be a VGA front-facing camera on board.

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White Nokia Lumia 900 surfaces, is cool as ice

After Nokia spilled the beans for the white version of the Lumia 800, the company accidentally leaked an image of a Nokia Lumia 900 sporting the same white polycarbonate unibody.

Looks great, doesn't it? The photo doesn't reveal anything we don't already know about the Lumia 900 - the exposed microUSB port, front-facing camera and non-curved glass. The best thing about the color versions of the Lumia phones is that their colors are not applied as a paint layer but rather run throughout the plastic.

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Nokia launches the white Lumia 800 this month

Nokia has just announced it is going to launch the white model of the Lumia 800 smartphone later this month in addition to its already available black, cyan and magenta editions.

The "beautiful, dazzling, glossy, snow-white" Lumia 800 will start selling later this month in the UK, Germany, France, Italy, Spain, Netherlands, Scandinavia, Finland, Poland and Switzerland. More countries will follow soon after.

   
White Nokia Lumia 800

According to Nokia, this is the same awesome white the N9 uses.

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Samsung Galaxy S III to be 7mm thin, rumors say

It seems that thinness is the new race to the moon for smartphone makers, and Samsung, not to be outdone by Motorola's RAZR XT910 7.1mm waistline, is reportedly aiming at the 7mm milestone with the new Galaxy S III. Surprisingly, Huawei is also in the race with the upcoming Ascend P1 S, which comes in at 6.7mm, and should see a global release in Q2 of this year.

Rumors continue that the S III thickness won't be uniform, and it will allegedly have the same camera 'hump' found on the S II. This new generation should also feature LTE support, although that's almost expected considering the growing list of Galaxy models already released with LTE.

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Is the Nokia N8's successor to be the last Symbian device ever?

Say 'bye bye to Symbian' is essentially the message coming from Nokia as it looks to bring about the end of its legacy platform sooner than many expected.

Despite talks of Symbian Carla and even Symbian Donna in the works for current and new devices alike, it now appears that the successor to the Nokia N8 might be the last new Symbian device we shall see from the Finns.

Nokia had originally promised continued support for Symbian following their plans to switch to Windows Phone as their primary OS last Mobile World Congress, with the intention of selling 150 million more Symbian devices before completely phasing the OS out.

It would seem their good intentions didn't inspire enough Symbian fans out there and as such last month Nokia admitted that sales of Symbian devices were falling faster than they had anticipated (no doubt due in part to the aggressive promotion of Nokia Windows Phones).

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Sony Ericsson announces Xperia active Billabong edition

Sony Ericsson and the extreme sports brand Billabong have entered into a partnership, which will bring the Xperia smartphones closer to the adrenaline junkies, who are fans of the popular Australian clothing and gear company. The first product of the partnership is the Sony Ericsson Xperia active Billabong edition.

There is no difference between the newcomer and the tough as nails, regular Xperia active, which we came to like quite a lot, save for the Billabong branded back cover and some software additions. The latter include exclusive Billabong screensavers, preloaded videos, and an app to keep you up to date on surfing news.

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Apple pulls iPhone 4, 3GS and iPad 2 from German online store

Apple has been forced to remove some of its 3G products from the German online stores. This includes the iPhone 3GS, the iPhone 4 and the 3G version of the iPad 2.

FOSS Patent's Florian Mueller says this is due to the injunction won in Manheimm by Motorola against Apple related to the FRAND patent. Coincidentally, Motorola won another permanent injunction against Apple related to iCloud in Germany on the same day but that is a completely different case and not related to these products being pulled from the stores.

The products are only being pulled from Apple's online store in Germany and the brick and mortar stores will still have them in stock. This is because Motorola only sued the German subsidiary of Apple, which is only in charge of handling the online side of the sales.

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