Digital Tech News - Digital Technology & Consumer Electronics

Microsoft Announces Windows Mobile 6.5, Windows Phones With Marketplace, and My Phone Services

At the 2009 Mobile World Congress in Barcelona, Microsoft Corp. CEO Steve Ballmer was joined by key mobile partners including HTC, LG and Orange to announce next generation Windows phones which will be based on Microsoft's new Windows Mobile 6.5 OS. Two new services were also announced for Windows phones: My Phone, which lets users sync text messages, photos, video, contacts and more to the Web, and Windows Marketplace for Mobile, which is basically Microsoft's new mobile Apps store where direct-to-phone mobile applications can be accessed from a Windows Phone, and the Web. The new Windows phones should be available in the second half of 2009.

iPhone 3G Unlocking Software Released

UK based iPhone unlocking Ltd. has launched its new 3G iPhone Unlocking software, which gives iPhone 3G owners the ability to use the smartphone with any network provider worldwide and also enables MMS, video recording, instant messaging, and the use of third party applications. The company promises full 24 hour customer support via email, live chat and by phone. This 3G iPhone Unlocking software costs about 16 pounds, or 23 bucks.

iLife ’09

Apple's iLife '09 software package, featuring upgrades to iPhoto, iMovie and GarageBand, will be available tomorrow, January 27 through the Apple Store, Apple's retail stores and Apple product retailers.  The package also includes iWeb '09 for authoring custom websites and iDVD '09 for creating DVDs. iLife '09 is included with every new Mac and is available as a $79 upgrade for existing users, and an iLife '09 Family Pack includes five licenses for $99. A Mac Box Set is also available for $169, and includes iLife '09, iWork '09 and Mac OS X v10.5.6 Leopard. 

World of Warcraft: Wrath of the Lich King Midnight Release

Blizzard Entertainment's World of Warcraft: Wrath of the Lich King expansion set officially hits stores tomorrow, November 13th, but retailers are setting up for world-wide midnight madness release events tonight.  With millions of World of Warcraft, or WOW subscribers, the next chapter of the game should do brisk business for the company this holiday. 

Participating stores will begin selling copies of World of Warcraft: Wrath of the Lich King ($39.99) for PC or Mac one second after midnight, and at official launch events in New York, San Francisco, Anaheim, or Austin you can enter contests and buy a copy of the game signed by Blizzard Entertainment reps. It's first-come, first-serve so get to the US locations, or locations in Paris, London, Berlin, Madrid, Stockholm, Amsterdam, Mexico City, Taipei, and Seoul early. A special Collector’s Edition of World of Warcraft: Wrath of the Lich King will be available for purchase as well. 

G1 Phone and Google Android Market Apps Now Available

The Google Android-powered T-Mobile G1 phone is now on sale, and can be purchased ($179.99 with a 2 year contract) in T-Mobile stores, select retail stores in the U.S., and online.  Read the latest T-Mobile G1 reviews and see why everyone's talking about this HTC designed 3G smartphone with touch-screen and QWERTY keyboard.  As you would expect, the G1 phone handles Google Maps Street View, Gmail, and YouTube videos much better than most cellphones, and a bunch of Android Market applications including games, social networking, shopping, and other apps are already available free-of-charge for T-Mobile G1 users.

Android Developers Blog writes:

"With Android Market, users can easily download apps to their Android-powered phone. Users can also rate the apps they've downloaded and leave comments. These users' ratings along with anonymous usage statistics help determine how apps are ranked and presented within Android Market."

iPhone App Store Launched, iPhone 2.0 Software and iTunes 7.7 Download Now Available

Apple’s iPhone App Store has been launched, and can be accessed after first downloading the new iTunes 7.7 update. Be aware that iPhone owners will have to install iPhone 2.0 software to use the new Apps from iTunes on the iPhone. Those who purchase an iPhone 3G starting tomorrow will have the new iPhone 2.0 software already installed.

Michael Arrington of TechCrunch took an early peek at the iPhone App Store, and says that there are 27 pages of new applications currently available, or 552 applications total. 135 apps are said to be free, the rest are priced from $0.99 to $69.99.  Fortunately, 90 percent of the new apps will cost $9.99 or less. A selection of books are also found at the iPhone App Store for about 99 cents each.

Techcrunch have posted a bunch of video demos of some of the new iPhone apps for your viewing pleasure.

Android Touchscreen Mobile Phone Demo Video

Last year we got a hint of what to expect from Google's Android open source operating system and software platform for mobile phones in a brief  Android demo video, when Google announced the Android SDK release.

It looks like Android developers have been hard at work since then.  There's a new video of Android in action showing off some very nice capacitive touchscreen features on a mobile device that is said to be based on a 528MHz Qualcomm processor, with 128MB of RAM and 256MB of flash, using 3.6Mbps HSDPA connectiivity. The Android phone prototype demo took place at the Google I/O conference in San Francisco.

Windows 7 To Feature Multi-Touch - Demo Video

At All Things Digital's D6 conference, Windows 7, Microsoft’s next operating system showed some of its touchscreen skills.  The OS is not expected to be released until 2010, but the new multi-touch functionality, as seen on Microsoft's Surface computer, is something for Windows Vista users to look forward to. Apple iPhone fans will say that Microsoft is playing catch up, but we have yet to see a multi-touch display on a Mac. This Windows 7 multitouch demo was conducted on a Dell Latitude XT tablet.

Twitter Explained in a Twitter How-To Video

Let's face it, though many people use Twitter around the world, there are millions who have no idea what Twitter is, or how to use Twitter. Well, here's a very well done 2.5 minute video that explains Twitter in plain English.

Now there's no excuse for not signing-up (free) to the micro-blogging service, and following DigitalTechNews.com Twitter updates.

Watch video below:

2007 Crunchies Awards Winners and Video

At the first annual Crunchies awards, leading tech startups were honored and recognized for being the most compelling startups, with the best internet and technology innovations of the year. A joint production between Read/Write Web, VentureBeat, GigaOm, and Michael Arrington's Techcrunch, the 2007 Crunchies award winners were also chosen by the Internet community so it's no surprise that social networking giant Facebook took the "Best Overall" Crunchy monkey award. The ceremony took place on Friday, January 18 at the 900 seat Herbst Theater in San Francisco. Watch 2007 Crunchies video highlights below.