Australia Tech Gadget: AT

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Thursday, February 23, 2012

Samsung announces the rugged Rugby Smart, coming to AT&T March 4

Just a few days after the first images of the phone leaked online, Samsung has officially announced their rugged Rugby Smart handset. The mid-range Android 2.3 handset features a 3.7-inch display, 5MP camera, and 4GB of internal storage and is military spec 810f compliant. The phone can take a dunk under 1m of water for up to 30 minutes, is dustproof, and is capable of withstanding temperature extremes. The Rugby Smart is being touted as 4G, but it isn’t of the LTE variety. The handset is coming to AT&T’s HSPA+ network on March 4th at a price of $99.99 on a two-year contract.

SAMSUNG & AT&T DELIVER BRAINS AND BRAWN
Waterproof and Dustproof Samsung Rugby® Smart Available Starting March 4
DALLAS, February 23, 2012 --
Key Facts
· On March 4, AT&T* will begin selling the Samsung Rugby® Smart in company-owned retail stores and online. The smartphone will be sold for $99.99 with a two-year commitment and monthly minimum data plan.
· Samsung Rugby® Smart is dustproof, can be submerged in up to 1m of water for 30 minutes, and can withstand extreme temperatures.**
· Runs on Android™ 2.3 with 4G capabilities and boasts a virtual QWERTY keyboard, 3.7-inch Super AMOLED™ touchscreen display, 5MP camera and an integrated flashlight.
Samsung Rugby® Smart
The Samsung Rugby® Smart is a rugged, dustproof device designed to handle the elements with water resistance (submergible up to 1m for 30 minutes) and built to mil-std 810f military spec standards**.The Android 2.3 smartphone features a 3.7-inch WVGA Super AMOLED touchscreen display and a 5MP camera with HD video recording***. It also supports 4G service, Wi-Fi®, corporate email and the full line of media including location, music and social networking services. From the work site to the camp site and beyond, Rugby Smart fulfills all your smartphone needs with the physical strength to handle whatever life throws at it.
Specifications
· Technology: GSM, EDGE, UMTS, HSPA+
· Operating System: Android 2.3
· Display: 3.7-inch WVGA Super AMOLED display
· External Memory: Supports up to 32GB via microSD™
· Internal Memory: 4GB
· Dimensions: 122.4mm x 65.9mm x 12.19mm
· Weight: 4.2 oz
· Camera: 5MP rear facing with flash and auto focus with HD 720p video capture; 1.3 MP front facing camera;
· Battery: 1650 mAh LiIon Poly
· Talk Time: Up to 8 hours
· Standby Time: Up to 16 days
Quotes
"The Samsung Rugby Smart is perfect for active customers who need another level of durability with their smartphone," said Jeff Bradley, senior vice president, Devices, AT&T Mobility and Consumer Markets. "It is water and dustproof and has all the features of a leading smartphone."

"We continue to bring the highest quality devices - the Rugby Smart is the ultimate smartphone to withstand extreme conditions," said Dale Sohn, president of Samsung Mobile. "AT&T customers are now able to stay connected with a durable smartphone while experiencing even the roughest environment."

Wednesday, February 15, 2012

AT&T on data throttling: Blame yourselves

In an effort to justify its policies surrounding data service throttling for subscribers with unlimited smartphone data plans, AT&T on Tuesday issued a brief report regarding data usage on its nationwide wireless network. Senior EVP of AT&T technology and network operations John Donovan wrote on a company blog that data traffic on AT&T’s network has grown a staggering 20,000% over the past five years. Usage has doubled between 2010 and 2011 according to the executive, due in large part to the proliferation of smartphones. AT&T sold more smartphones in the fourth quarter of 2011 than in any other quarter in its history. And because its smartphone subscribers use so much data, AT&T seems to suggest it has no choice but to put measures such as data throttling in place. Read on for more.
“The growth is now driven primarily by smartphones,” the executive wrote on AT&T’s Innovation Space blog. “Add to that new customer additions and the continuing trend of upgrades from feature phones to smartphones, and you have a wireless data tsunami.”
While Donovan did not specifically address the recent resurgence of complaints surrounding AT&T’s throttling of unlimited data users, the timing of his blog post is no coincidence. AT&T’s questionable policy regarding unlimited data plans was brought back into the spotlight recently following a new wave of subscriber complaints. While AT&T currently offers a tiered 3GB smartphone data plan for $30 per month, unlimited data plan holders paying the same amount are often seeing their data speeds throttled — or slowed significantly in an effort to reduce network strain — after using less than 2GB of data in a single billing period.
Donovan offers no real solution, however he does stress AT&T’s continued investment in its network. “AT&T has invested more than $95 billion in its wireless and wireline networks over the past five years,” Donovan wrote. “In 2011, we invested $20 billion in our networks, and completed more than 150,000 wireless network improvements. And we expect to invest about $20 billion again in 2012 with a focus on wireless, including more 4G LTE deployment, the roll-out of distributed antenna systems in key venues across the U.S. and adding even more AT&T Wi-Fi Hot Spots to the nation’s largest Wi-Fi network.”
AT&T’s plan to address network issues by acquiring T-Mobile USA from Deutsche Telecom for $39 billion was canceled late last year after the United States Justice Department sued to block the deal.

Monday, February 13, 2012

Nokia's Mobile World Congress Lineup Revealed

We've gotten wind of the names, but not the details, of the handsets Nokia reportedly plans on revealing later this month at Barcelona's Mobile World Congress. The six devices are supposedly split evenly among smartphones -- two Windows Phonesand a Symbian -- and three S60 S40 featurephones. Specifically, we're now expecting the global version of the Lumia 900, an entry-level handset dubbed the Lumia 610, and the Nokia 808 PureView, which has been rumored as a full touchscreen successor to the camera-centric N8. Also tipped were the Asha 302, Asha 203, and Asha 202.

As for the Windows Phones, we've already seen the 900 introduced at CES for AT&T; moreover, we were tipped a few months back on a handset that claimed to be the Lumia 601 (not 610), but whose renders appeared somewhat suspect. That imagery had the phone looking very much like a keypad-less X3 which, while certainly a possibility, doesn't seem to fall in line with the company's latest smartphone design language

Sunday, February 5, 2012

Samsung Galaxy Note now available for pre-order from AT&T

AT&T will begin to take pre-orders today for the Samsung Galaxy Note, the 5.3-inch phablet will be sold in carbon blue or ceramic white, and check in at $299 with a new agreement. Orders are set to be delivered by Feb. 17, just a bit too late for Valentine's Day. Also scheduled to be in AT&T stores are a few accessories, notably a desktop docking station, a spare battery charger, and a flip cover case and pen holder. Speaking of the flip cover, if you head into Best Buy and pre-order your Samsung Galaxy Note they will hook you up with one for free. Everyone loves free.

The Note is big, bad, and just what a lot of folks are looking for. It's huge as a phone, but has enough size to it that it could function as a tablet for many. The lure of carrying one device to cover both use cases is bound to attract quite a few folks, and the fact that LTE data is built into the unit is certainly a big plus. The rest of the specs are certainly no slouch either. That 5.3-inch Super AMOLED screen has a 1280x800 HD resolution, there's a 1.5GHZ dual-core processor (word is it's the same Qualcomm as in the Skyrocket), a 2500mAh battery, 1GB of RAM, and Samsung's excellent 8MP camera all running Android 2.3.5.

If you're going to do the deed and sign up to buy one of these big beauties, be sure to head into the forums and join the discussion. It won't make the wait any shorter, but it might help make it feel that way.

Pre-order your AT&T Samsung Galaxy Note online

Monday, January 30, 2012

Samsung Galaxy Note Coming To AT&T 19th February For $299

We recently heard a rumor that the Samsung Galaxy Note would land on AT&T on the 18th of February, AT&T has just announced the official launch date, and the Galaxy Note will be available with AT&T from the 19th of February 2012.

AT&T will be charging $299.99 for the Samsung Galaxy Note when you sign up to a new two year agreement with the carrier, and the AT&T version comes with LTE.

The Samsung Galaxy Note features a dual core 1.4GHz processor and it comes with Android Gingerbread 2.3, plus dual cameras, on the back there is an 8 megapixel camera with an LED flash, on the front there is a 2 megapixel camera for video chat.

The Galaxy Note also comes with a 5.3 inch Super AMOLED touchscreen display with a resolution of 1280 x 800 pixels, and AT&T will star taking pre-orders on the handset from the 5th of February.

Thursday, January 26, 2012

AT&T Sells 9.4 Million Smartphones In Q4, 81 Percent Were iPhones

US mobile carrier AT&T has announced its latest financial results which cover the last quarter of 2011, and the company sold a total of 9.4 smartphones in quarter four of 2011.

Out of these 9.4 million smartphones sold, 7.6 million of them were iPhone’s, which means that out of all the smartphones that AT&T sold in the last quarter of 2011, 81 percent of these were Apple’s iPhone.

AT&T also said that they had a record quarter for activation of devices which run Google’sAndroid OS, although they didnt reveal any specifics on exactly how many Android devices were activated.

AT&T saw an increase in the number of smartphones activated year over year by 60 percent, and the company also increased its revenues to $32.5 billion, up $1.1 billion from the same period in the previous year.

Wednesday, January 25, 2012

AT&T’s Q1 2012 roadmap: Nokia Lumia 900 to launch March 18th for $99.99

We just received a portion of AT&T’s 2012 roadmap from a trusted source, and it looks like AT&T isn’t playing around this year. There are some heavy hitters lined up for the first quarter of 2012, and one of the biggest smartphone launches of the quarter is currently scheduled to take place in mid-March. According to our source, the Nokia Lumia 900 is set to launch on March 18th, which has been rumored before. The phone hasn’t yet received technical acceptance however, so that date could change. The bigger news is the phone’s price: AT&T and Nokia are planning to launch this flagship smartphone at just $99.99 on a two-year contract. That price point would make this sleek smartphone an absolute game-changer for Windows Phone, and it makes sense when you think about how much money Nokia and Microsoft are planning to spend promoting the launch. We took a hands-on look at the Lumia 900 during CES earlier this month and Nokia could easily have a hit on its hands when this handset launches later this quarter.

AT&T’s Q1 2012 roadmap: HTC Titan II coming March 18th; Sony Crystal tablet, Xperia Ion launch later

While AT&T’s Nokia Lumia 900 could be an excellent option for someone in the market for a 4G LTE Windows Phone, there’s also the HTC Titan II — which we exclusively revealed — that will soon be available as well. AT&T is currently planning to launch the HTC Titan II for $199.99 with a two-year agreement on March 18th. The carrier is also getting ready to launch a Sony tablet for $409.99 called the Crystal, though it will feature HSPA+ and not 4G LTE. Rounding things out for the latter part of the first quarter is the Samsung Galaxy S II Skyrocket HD, the Samsung Exhilarate and Sony Xperia ion, though pricing and availability are still unknown.

AT&T Galaxy Note rumored to launch Feb. 18, along with two unannounced devices

Looks like AT&T is wasting no time bringing its version of the Samsung Galaxy Note to market. If the latest rumors from BGR are to be believed, the carrier plans to launch Samsung's 5.3-inch phone/tablet hybrid on Feb. 18 for $299.99 on-contract.
The blog also reports that two new, unannounced devices will be making their debut the very same day -- the Samsung Rugby Smart and the AT&T Fusion. The Rugby Smart is reportedly a $99 entry-level HSPA+ phone, while the AT&T Fusion, for which no specs are offered, will apparently sell for $124.99.
All unconfirmed at this stage, of course, but we don't think anyone would be surprised to see the AT&T Galaxy Note arriving in mid-to-late February with a hefty price tag. As for the other two devices, we'll just have to wait and see what materializes over the next month.
For more on the AT&T Samsung Galaxy Note, take a look over our hands-on coverage from CES, and our full review of the international version.

Source: BGR

Tuesday, January 24, 2012

UK Nokia Lumia 900 listing offers hope of Canadian launch

The 4.3-inch LTE bigger brother to the “coming soon” Lumia 800 may be coming to Canada by the summer. According to a Carphone Warehouse listing in the UK, the Lumia 900 is going to be gracing the monarchical shores of the Queen (and Queen, the band) by June.
Though nothing specific has been detailed in terms of its hardware differentiation, we know that it will be a HSPA+ version, as LTE has not yet been deployed in England. The listing also bodes well for other locales launching the device, including Canada. It’s possible we may just see a strict repurposing of the AT&T version with the LTE intact.
The main thing differentiating the Lumia 900 from its 3.7-inch sibling is the inclusion of LTE, but the 4.3-inch screen size makes typing a lot more comfortable and web browsing/media watching a lot more enjoyable. There is also a 1.3MP front-facing camera, and a larger battery to compensate for that extra power draw from the LTE chip.

Tuesday, December 13, 2011

AT&T and Verizon testing 4G LTE Nokia Lumia 800

Word on the street is that AT&T and Verizon are both testing out a 4G LTE version of the Nokia Lumia 800 for their future respective roster. We first saw this device back at Nokia World in London and it is already available throughout Europe. The device is expected to hit the US early 2012, most likely at CES 2012 in early Janurary.
We still aren’t quite sure exactly when Windows Phone devices will be ready to handle dual-core processors and LTE since there is no release date on Tango, the next update for Windows Phones. Verizon lacks a Windows Phone device in its lineup since it is waiting for an LTE WP7 device indefinitely. AT&T has a nice selection of Windows Phone 7 currently available, but the Nokia Lumia 800 will likely be the flagship device for either carrier.

It will be interesting to see how this testing goes and whether or not we will see a Lumia 800 on a carrier anytime soon. We will keep you updated on the status of the Nokia Lumia 800.

Monday, December 12, 2011

Dish Network Wants To Take A Crack At T-Mobile If AT&T Merger Fails

Dish Network is reportedly eying T-Mobile should their merger with AT&T fail. In an interview with with Bloomberg, Dish Network’s CEO Joseph Clayton revealed that if Dish could combine their network with T-Mobile’s, they could have enough spectrum to compete with the top dogs: Verizon and AT&T.

"We’re not interested in making money on selling our spectrum. We want to use it to create a national wireless network, video, voice and data. We’ve got expertise in satellite-TV, and we will in satellite broadband. The voice part, we’ll need some help with."

If the T-Mobile/AT&T merger fails, I have a feeling we’ll see a lot more companies like Dish Network come out of the woodwork and attempt to pick up the scraps.

AT&T Samsung Galaxy S II 4G now just $129.99 at Amazon, for both new and existing customers

The Samsung Galaxy S II 4G for AT&T is now more affordable than ever. So if you wanted to get some high-end Android action on AT&T but so far held back because of the pricing of the Galaxy S II, this is an offer for you.
Amazon is now letting you buy a Samsung Galaxy S II 4G for just $129.99, with a two-year AT&T contract. What’s more, this offer applies to both new customers (as these things usually do), but also to existing AT&T customers who wish to upgrade their hardware.

Truth be told, we do expect the price for the Galaxy S II 4G to go down even more in a couple of months or so – that’s just the way things are in the mobile industry. That said, if you want a top notch Android smartphone today, this is obviously a great choice. And it now comes with a decent price too – $70 off what it went for at AT&T when it launched in October, and $20 lower than what Amazon was asking for it before.

Sunday, December 11, 2011

AT&T Samsung Focus receiving OS 7740 update?

We just received word from a reader that his AT&T Focus v1.3 managed to get the coveted 7740 OS update--an odd occurrence as we're not expecting US devices/carriers to roll this out.
Couple of caveats here: Justin's Focus was a developer version that he won via a Windows Phone contest and we've interacted with him before on this site, so we're confident that this is legit. However, when we plugged our Focus in to check Zune, we're met with the "You're on the latest..." screen with us stuck at 7720.
What to make of this? Perhaps some developer phones had special firmware that allows them to get the latest update--makes sense especially for developers. On the other hand, maybe AT&T is planning on some updates? So, anyone else with a Focus seeing this update coming through--if so, let us know in comments.

Thursday, December 8, 2011

Revenue from mobile hotspots to balloon 500% over next five years

Despite the proliferation of smartphones that include built-in mobile hotspot capabilities, the market for dedicated mobile hotspot routers like Novatel Wireless’s Mifi line of products is seen growing significantly over the next five years. According to a new report from market research and analysis firm ABI Research, 7.1 million dedicated mobile hotspot devices will ship in 2011 carrying an estimated end-user revenue value of $1 billion. In 2016, ABI expects annual shipments to reach 60 million units, representing more than $5 billion in end-user revenue value. Read on for more.
“The first products to reach the market in 2009 generally overshot the mass consumer population,” ABI Research analyst Jeff Orr said in a statement. “Products were very complex to set up and catered to an IT-managed remote workgroup environment, such as a construction site or field emergency response team.” Orr says that significant headway has been made across a number of markets thanks to the introduction of smaller devices, reduced complexity and a push from carriers looking to open new data revenue channels.
Mobile hotspot routers like Novatel’s Mifi lineup connect to cellular data networks and then share that data connection wirelessly with any Wi-Fi-enabled device. Novatel announced in October that it had shipped 3 million Mifi-branded mobile hotspots to date.

Tuesday, December 6, 2011

iPhone 4S best-selling phone at three top U.S. carriers in November, Samsung sales strong

Apple’s iPhone 4S was the best-selling smartphone at Verizon Wireless, AT&T and Sprint in November according to a report released Monday night by Canaccord Genuity. According to checks performed by analyst Mike Walkley and his team, Apple’s iPhone 4S remained a top-seller across the board while Samsung’s Galaxy S II picked up momentum ahead of the holidays. Samsung’s flagship handset was the top-selling smartphone at T-Mobile and it jumped up into the No.2 spot at AT&T. Sprint’s Galaxy S II Epic 4G Touch was the second best-selling smartphone at Sprint as well in November, and Motorola’s DROID RAZR was No.2 at Verizon Wireless. Read on for more.

(click to enlarge)

“IPhone 4S sales strength continues as distribution increases – Our November checks indicated iPhone sales remained strong in the US, particularly at AT&T and Sprint. Further, our checks indicated strong global share gains,” Walkley wrote. “With the iPhone 4S launching in new markets including China, Brazil, and Russia during December, we anticipate strong December quarter iPhone sales and have increased our estimate from 29.0 to 30.5M units.”
The analyst also noted that Apple’s iPad 2 is still the world’s top-selling tablet, though he did lower his unit sales estimates to 13 million in the December quarter, down from an earlier estimate of 14 million units.
HTC lost share in November according to Walkley, in line with the expectations set last month when the Taiwan-based vendor cut its fourth-quarter forecast. “Our November checks indicated weaker sales trends for both RIM and HTC, consistent with negative pre-announcements from both companies, as we believe weak trends are company-specific for both OEMs rather than indications of a weaker smartphone macro,” he wrote in his report. “Our checks indicated HTC has lost significant share at all four US carriers following the iPhone 4S and Samsung Galaxy S II launches.”
Walkley’s checks also indicated that sales of BlackBerry smartphones in the U.S. slowed significantly in November, with the high-end Bold 9900 in particular showing slowed adoption. “Following early strength for the Bold 9900, our checks indicated BlackBerry sales slowed significantly during November due to high-end smartphone share losses combined with lower-priced Nokia feature-phones and sub-$200 Android smartphones adversely impacting BlackBerry sales in emerging markets,” Walkley said.

Monday, December 5, 2011

Droid RAZR with AT&T 3G Bands Available

In the US, the 7.1mm thick Droid RAZR is sold on Verizon as an LTE device. But did you know that the RAZR is also sold in an unlocked GSM flavor with the proper bands to do AT&T 3G with quadband UMTS (2100/1900/900/850)? You can pick up one from our friends at Clove, where the GSM RAZR is selling for £379, which comes to about $600. With the GSM version, you'll still get that 4.3" qHD AMOLED screen, the 1.2GHz TI OMAP CPU, 1GB of RAM, plus an 8MP camera on the back capable of shooting full 1080p video. It ships with Android 2.3.5, but like its CDMAversion, you can expect an Android 4.0 upgrade at some point in 2012

AT&T's LG Nitro HD, white Samsung Skyrocket available now

One new smartphone and another revamped are now available from AT&T. First up is the LG Nitro HD, the carrier's version of the LG Optimus HD. It sports a 720p display and has AT&T's new LTE high-speed data. The Samsung Galaxy S II Skyrocket -- AT&T's LTE version of the Galaxy S II (and scaled up to 4.5 inches) -- also is now available in white.

The Nitro HD is going for $249.99 on contract, as is the Skyrocket.

Saturday, December 3, 2011

Mobile Miscellany: week of November 28, 2011

This week waspackedwith news on the mobile front, so it was easy to miss a few stories here and there. Here's some of the other stuff that happened in the wide world of wireless for the week of November 28, 2011:

Last week, the FCC announced that it had approved AT&T's request to purchase 700MHz spectrum from Qualcomm -- previously used to support MediaFLO service -- but it hasn't finalized the process yet. So, the company recently met with the FCC to ask if the deal can be sped up.
The Nokia Lumia 800 is rumored to finally be available at O2 beginning December 9th
Nokia also announced the X2-02, a Series 40 dual-SIM handset geared towards music. It comes with an audio processing feature that brings clear sound, dedicated music keys and a feature that lets you play recordings directly from the FM radio. It also offers a 2.2-inch QVGA display, dedicated Facebook and Twitter clients, 2MP camera and 9.7 hour talk time. Sadly, the phone doesn't come with 3G included, and no markets or launch dates were announced, but it'll be priced around €60 before subsidy
Cincinnati Bell added the HTC Radar 4G to its lineup this week and is available for free to new customers with a two-year commitment and after a $100 mail-in rebate; existing customers eligible for an upgrade can get it for $100 on contract and after $50 mail-in rebate.
Samsung just released SDK 1.0 for the S Pen, also known as the stylus for the Galaxy Note. As to be expected, the kit will aid developers in writing apps that will take advantage of the pen.

Friday, December 2, 2011

AT&T 4G LTE now live in New York, Phoenix; tests show blistering speeds up to 40Mbps

BGR noted during our hands-on look at the LG Nitro HD that AT&T’s next-generation 4G LTE network has gone live in New York ahead of launch, and it looks like another market has gone live as well: Phoenix, Arizona. Our speed tests Thursday night on AT&T’s fledgling 4G LTE network were nothing to scoff at — we saw nearly 7Mbps down and about 9Mbps up — but AT&T subscribers in Phoenix will be excited to learn that early speed test results reveal blistering download speeds up to 40Mbps and upload speeds in excess of 10Mbps. Read on for more.
The screenshot above, supplied to BGR by a reader, was captured Thursday night outside Phoenix on a Samsung Galaxy S II Skyrocket. The same reader also confirmed that speed tests performed on his Samsung Galaxy Tab 8.9 tablet reached download speeds of 40Mbps. These speeds, while impressive, may not be an accurate indication of network performance one 4G LTE service from AT&T launches in Phoenix.
AT&T has yet to confirm official launch dates for its 4G LTE networks in New York or in the Phoenix area.

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