The news was brought to us by the FCC, which has just concluded testing an EVO 3D with T-Mobile USA 3G bands. So the handset seems fit and ready to enter the arena and face the LG Thrill 4G for AT&T (a.k.a. Optimus 3D) and its Sprint-bound twin – the mobile 3D battle is really heating up in the States.

The FCC report has this helpful schematic of the wireless antennas on the HTC EVO 3D, with the 3D dual-lens camera on there as well (not that it has anything to do with FCC tests). The tests include tests of the 1700MHz band (AWS), which points to T-Mobile USA as the future home of this new EVO 3D.

The reports don’t give away much more than that – besides a 1730mAh battery, the same as on the current EVO 3D models. There’s no mention of launch dates in there so we can only guess about that.

So, Sprint’s EVO 3D is out, T-Mobile’s seems to be coming and AT&T’s LG Thrill 4G (Optimus 3D) is “coming soon”. Your move Verizon.

There are practically no differences between the HTC Status and its European sibling, the Chacha – their appearance and specs are identical, save for the AT&T logo of the Status.

The U.S. version of the ChaCha will also get the upgraded processor which we previously told you about – it is clocked at 800 MHz unlike the originally claimed 600 MHz. There is 512MB of RAM and ROM on board respectively. The memory can be expanded through a microSD card. A 5MP camera will handle the capture of pictures before they get uploaded on Facebook. The device will have Android 2.3 Gingerbread, dressed in HTC Sense, right out of the box as well.

There is currently no pricing and availability set for the HTC Status but we seriously doubt that it will be long before it starts shipping. In the meantime, feel free to check out our hands on video of the HTC ChaCha here.

Tag Heuer have already stepped into the phone market with their Meridiist line of handsets, all precision engineered and designed to reflect Tag’s strong design language, but now they’re bringing a new device to market, one that actually offers more than just a platinum back plate or a sapphire screen. The Tag Heuer LINK smartphone is a premium/luxury handset that right off the bat proves that you can have a luxury and everyday functionality, strangely a combination that has been sorely lacking in this market so far (excluding custom built iPhone 4′s and so on).

The Tag Heuer LINK smartphone: Avant-garde communication

The LINK still ticks the boxes for the elite purchaser with material combinations that include steel, 18k rose gold or titanium paired with rubber, alligator skin or leather trim. As the video below shows the LINK also strongly maintains its watchmaker roots as well, with the SIM, USB and memory card ports hidden behind a hinged body panel locked in place by what appears to be a crown (the bit you would usually pull out to set your watch).

What makes the LINK so much more appealing than its luxurious brothers and sisters however is that it comes running a skinned version of Android Froyo 2.2, which although a little long in the tooth now still gives the LINK full access to the Android Market’s 250,000+ apps as well as a lovely looking UI with lots of room for customization and improved functionality. The spec list itself is lengthy but promises more of that solid functionality previously lacking from such luxury phones. For a start the LINK has a 3.5″ TFT LCM display, protected by Gorilla glass outputting at a resolution of 800×480 pixels with 16 million colors and on the back you get a 5MP camera with auto focus and video as well. The internals are a mixed bunch with highlights being Stereo Bluetooth, AGPS, WiFi, EDGE and HSUPA 3G and an 8GB SD card but on the downside, internal memory clocks in at a measly 256MB which in this day and age just doesn’t cut it.

Although the LINK gets Froyo out of the box, chances are that as long as Tag Heuer want to keep their clientele sweet, they’ll throw in an update to Gingerbread further down the line. Of course as the video showed the Froyo on the LINK isn’t stock, Tag Heuer have had it modified and it will most likely include exclusive apps, widgets, wallpapers and ringtones not available on any other device.

One other key issue that Tag Heuer have addressed is that such finely crafted phones usually lack the durability that they really require, after all they’re still just as likely to get dropped on your gravel drive or whilst you walking across the runway to you private jet, so they need the be able to withstand the rigors of a busy 5-star lifestyle. The LINK promises a rugged, solid design and build quality that goes beyond the addition of the Gorilla glass, not yet seen on a luxury device. But really what does this all mean? It’s certainly a step in the right direction for luxury phones everywhere but one key aspect remains, how much? Tag Heuer state that prices start at a cool EUR4700 or $6700 but of course based on your choice of trim, materials and finish, that’s only the start.

If you want to find out more on the LINK smartphone, you’ll have to register your interest here and you can read up on the watch line that the LINK gets its name from here.

Two days ago when Damian Dinning discussed the N9 camera sensor and today we finally get to see what it’s really capable of. So no more talking, here go the photos.

Nokia N9 camera samples (widescreen)

As it turns out the N9 camera produces really nice shots with lots of resolved detail and nice lively colors. The effects of the large aperture (f/2.2) lens are easy to spot in the shallow depth of field. This makes it easier (as far as easy is at all applicable to cameraphones) to separate the focused objects from the background.

The Nokia N9 processing seems really mature, though it cannot completely make up for the smaller (compared to the N8) sensor. For example the N9 doesn’t render out-of-focus areas as attractively as its Symbian sibling.

Still the published N9 camera samples are pretty good even though they are taken with pre-release hardware and software. So the MeeGo smartphone will probably be end up a viable option for all cameraphone lovers.

Nokia X7 official photos

The Nokia X7 combines stainless steel and Gorilla glass into one seriously attractive package. It boasts stereo speakers (just two, rather than four as you might think looking at it) to justify its Xseries spot and an 8MP camera with 720p video recording.

The screen impressed us quite a bit as you’ll see in our hardware chapter but that’s not all we liked about the hardware. The software changes are not as far-reaching as we would have liked, but there are some key developments that that give Symbian a usability boost.

Here’s the short version of what the Nokia X7 is about and what didn’t work out very well.

Key features

Quad-band GSM/GPRS/EDGE support
Penta-band 3G with 10.2 Mbps HSDPA and 2 Mbps HSUPA support
Stainless steel body
4″ 16M-color AMOLED capacitive touchscreen of 640 x 360 pixel resolution; Impressive brightness and Gorilla glass protection
8 megapixel fixed-focus camera with dual-LED flash and 720p video @ 25fps recording; geotagging, face detection, smart zoom in video
Symbian Anna OS
680 MHz ARM 11 CPU and 256 MB RAM
Wi-Fi 802.11 b/g/n
GPS receiver with A-GPS support and free lifetime voice-guided navigation
Digital compass
microSD card slot (8GB card pre-installed)
DivX and XviD video support
Built-in accelerometer and proximity sensor
Standard 3.5 mm audio jack
Stereo FM Radio with RDS
microUSB port
Flash and Java support for the web browser
Stereo Bluetooth 3.0
Excellent audio quality
Smart dialing and voice commands
Social networking integration

Main disadvantages

Symbian Anna is still catching up with Android and iOS
Uncomfortable volume rocker, SIM tray and microSD card slot
Camera lacks auto focus, oversharpens images
Relatively limited 3rd party software availability
No office document editing (without a paid upgrade)
Battery life is not on par with the best in business

Despite our complaints, this is the best that Symbian has ever looked and Nokia has picked excellent devices to carry it. While the other one, the Nokia E6, is a business phone through and through, the X7 focuses on the fun stuff. From taking photos and videos, through deeper social networking integration, to watching HD videos and browsing the web on the large 4″ screen.

The Nokia X7 is something you’ll want to show off to your friends. The Nokia designers have done a good job of breaking the touchscreen mould that makes so many phones look uniformly similar.

Nokia X7 in our office

The Nokia X7 comes more as a successor to the C7 than a stand-alone version. But the C7 itself will be getting Symbian Anna soon, so the X7 needs to bring more to the battlefield than just the (admittedly great) bigger screen.

The Finnish company just announced through their blog that they will be releasing an update for their Symbian 3.2 and 5.0 platforms. There’s a whole bunch of handsets running those – check out the lengthy list:

Nokia E72
Nokia E52
Nokia E5
Nokia C5-00
Nokia 6700 slide
Nokia C6-00
Nokia C5-03
Nokia 5230
Nokia 5235
Nokia 5250
Nokia X6
Nokia N97 mini
Nokia 5800 XpressMusic
Nokia 5530 XpressMusic
Nokia 5530 XpressMusic

The update will bring the new Nokia browser v7.3 to the aging phones, which should significantly improve their browsing experience. This is the same browser that owners of newer Symbian phones will get when the Anna update is released. The benefits of the new browser include improved performance, support for International Domain Names (IDNs) and also supports non-ASCII letters such as Arabic or Chinese.

The other major feature of the firmware update is the updated Ovi Maps app. The software offering free voice-guided navigation will go to version Ovi Maps 3 SR4 on Symbian 3.2 devices, bringing indoor positioning through WiFi, as well as travel and recommendation services such as those through Lonely Planet. Those with Symbian 5.0 devices will get Ovi Maps 3 SR6, adding public transport lines and check-in services to social networking sites.

The final good bit about this update is the addition of a set of emoticons to the listed devices, which can be used when sending MMS.

Nokia C6-00 and Nokia 5230 are already eligible for the update, while the rest of the smartphones will get it in the next few weeks. So make sure you have the software update autocheck switched on in your phone.

The name of the Nokia C5 5MP says it all. It’s an 5MP version of the good old C5 smartphone. It has the same measurements, processor, Symbian S60 OS and features. There are just two differences – more memory (256MB RAM and 512MB ROM) and higher-resolution (5 megapixel) camera sensor.

Nokia C5 5MP

Perhaps Nokia is mum on this fella because the Finns think there’s nothing to talk about here. Well, there might be no reason to call a press conference and heap praise on it, but it wouldn’t have hurt anyone.

Anyway you may head this way to full specs or compare it to its older 3MP C5 sibling.

The Nokia C5 5MP should become available some time in the next quarter, but we don’t have any information on its pricing just yet.

Source

The HTC’s worst kept secret – the European EVO 3D became official just a day ago. Soon after Vodafone UK launched an EVO 3D commercial and is already allowing you to register your interest in the device. If you live in the UK and you want an EVO 3D, then this is your place.

Here is the Vodafone UK HTC EVO 3D ad:

The HTC EVO 3D is supposed to hit the shelves next month, so we guess now is a good time to start saving.

They did give us some specs though – a 3.2″ nHD AMOLED screen, which points to this being a Nokia C6-01 replacement. The Nokia 700 is also reportedly quite light (a bit over 80g) and measures 110 x 51 x 10mm, which doesn’t quite mesh with the “thinnest smartphone ever” claim, but those measurements can change as its design is still being developed.

Nokia 700 spy shots

From the photo, you can see that the camera is a 5MP unit and has a LED flash. We can’t guess at whether or not it has autofocus though. Also, the Nokia 700 has NFC connectivity, which Nokia seems to be warming up to following the Nokia N9 announcement.

Other specs that the tipster managed to get out of the Nokia 700 (which as we speculated might be called N7) is that it runs Symbian Belle (an update to Anna) and packs Wi-Fi b/g/n. There’s also fast HSPA speeds (10.2Mbps or 14.4Mbps downlink and 5.76Mbps downlink). The battery was a 1080mAh unit.

That’s all we’ve got for now. We’re not quite sure what the differences between the Nokia 700 and the N5 are yet or the other devices from the leaked specs sheets.

The phone will be offered in two color versions – white and “khaki” (meaning a beige spinoff) and will be exclusively offered by T-Mobile.

The myTouch 4G Slide is joining the already pretty large family of droids on the T-Mobile shelves. Its myTouch 4G keyboard-less brother and myTouch 3G Slide predecessors were quite popular so expectations for this one will be high too.

The myTouch4G Slide brings along a 3.7″ S-LCD display, the latest Android meant for smartphones, Gingerbread 2.3, a dual-core Snapdragon processor, FullHD 1080p video recording and an 8 MP camera. T-Mobile were keen to brag that the myTouch 4G Slide
camera packs an ultra bright f/2.2 lens, just like the Nokia N9, which should benefit its low-light performance.

Naturally the smartphone also offers HSPA+ support, meaning downlink speeds of up to 21 Mbps and uplink of 5.76 Mbps. Oh and a full physical QWERTY keyboard, which slides out from its body.

With a specs sheet like that the myTouch 4G will surely be a great catch for Android enthusiasts with a thing for texting.

And here goes a short promo video, demonstrating the myTouch 4G Slide camera prowess.