FreshPhoneNews.com

Holding your breath for the Motorola CLIQ are you? Well, you can ease up as T-Mobile has announced pre-order details and pricing for Moto’s first Android handset. Existing customers can place pre-sale orders from October 19th through November 1st. The device will debut in stores the day following the end of pre-sales, which would be November 2nd. There had been some pretty strong rumors that T-Mobile would offer the first ever Android handset for free, and as much as we love rumors (they give us reason to hope after all), sometimes they turn out to be…rumors. If you want a CLIQ, you’ll have to break you piggy bank and count out exactly $199 worth of dimes and quarters boys and girls. That’s the price of a new two-year contract and a $24.99 data plan. The CLIQ features a 5 megapixel camera and snappy UI with memory expansion support for up to 32GB. Not a bad offering.

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More good news for iPhone 3GS owners and prospective owners, not only is the iPhone 3GS available in an 8GB version, but now USAA bank has allowed you to fill up your piggy bank through the touchscreen. No kidding, USSA, which is a privately-held bank and insurance provider, is updating its iPhone app to allow you to deposit checks. As the image shows, account holders will be allowed to make deposits by taking pictures of the check and deliver them to the bank’s server (all secure). The bank will then process the check and you get a credit in your account. No branch follow-up or bank verification needed. The new feature will only be available to certain customers; those “who are eligible for credit and have some type of insurance through USAA.” According to the bank’s EVP however, about 60 percent of the bank’s customers will meet these requirements and therefore be able to use this great new feature when it becomes available. Now cross your fingers that Apple approves the app.

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Back at the CES it was announced that a GSM version of the Palm Pre would also come out and soon. Now with the Pre out on Sprint and Bell for a while, it was a painstaking wait to see if the U.S. 3G bands would be part of the deal or not. And a recent bit of info given out by the Wi-Fi Alliance reveals that indeed U.S. 3G bands are indeed on board the new GSM version of the Palm Pre. Yay! So this means with 850/1900MHz UMTS/HSPA we may hope to see the Pre on AT&T after Sprint\s exclusivity period ends. As for Canada, probably either Rogers or TELUS may get it after Bell’s exclusivity ends. Looking good.

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Among the latest software to become the victims of Apple’s relentless stance on annoying the world is mobile video streaming service Qik. The Qik app for the iPhone 3GS is ready to go…with two modifications; a. Wi-Fi only and b. no live streaming. Right. That definitely serves our purpose. Not. Another app build of Qik which makes for live video streaming over 3G has been sent to the App Store for approval, but lately, Apple’s been on a roll with apps. Downhill, but a roll nonetheless. Qik without the ability to stream live videos…does the extent of the insanity even dawn on Apple?

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Sling has just made public the fact that it has submitted version 1.1 of its popular SlingPlayer app for the iPhone to Apple. Guessing that after Google’s app got rejected, all third parties are letting the public know just-in-case. The new app brings true 16×9 wide-screen support, improved remote control interface, faster speeds all around including channel changing, initial connection, remote control response. The U.S. version of the app doesn’t have 3G support but SlingMedia has submitted an app specifically for out-side the U.S., mainly for Europe that will have 3G support. Now we wait for the approval.

Still want that LG watchphone? Well we have some good news and some bad news. The good news is the LG GD910 will not cost you £1000, the bad news is, it will cost you €899 instead. This is an on-contract price. Orange has finally made the LG GD910 official, and well…we frankly hoped for more sanity. The stylish 3G touchscreen watchphone is immediately available from the French carrier if you your willing to put up with “an Origami star, first, jet or Origami plus package (12 or 24-month contract).” And to nobody’s surprise, there is no non-contract retail price listed, probably because Orange couldn’t un-choke that many people. Right so a $1300 watchphone…if you have this kind of cash to blow on a watch-that-is-a-phone you probably already have a pretty decent watch and phone in their own right. How many people out there would actually want this? For once, I’d like to see a quarterly performance report. Yeesh!

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Alright now that the tech blogs have had a crack at AT&T and its data network speeds, they took their testing kits to Verizon Wireless…which was of course coming. Now these tests were conducted using EV-DO Rev. A handsets. These are not official tests, they were conducted by Verizon users and posted to a popular blogsite, but they are actual usage results so they give a fair idea of what’s going on with Big Red, even if it isn’t all encompassing. So here’s what they’ve uncovered;

• Average download speed, EV-DO Rev. A: 701kbps
• Median download speed, EV-DO Rev. A: 440kbps
• Average upload speed, EV-DO Rev. A: 322kbps
• Median upload speed, EV-DO Rev. A: 286kbps

Time to fess up, Verizon fell short of expectations. Sadly short. With download link speeds almost 33 percent below those of AT&T, which averages at 701Kbps, this really is sad. The median download speed is also below AT&T’s with 440Kbps compared to 840Kbps at Verizon. Of course upload speeds are in a whole new country as Verizon’s raw average of 322kbps trumps AT&T by 142kbps; a massive 79 percent promotion.

So what have we learned, if you eat data for breakfast, Verizon will probably starve you. On the other hand, if you love to upload videos share images of nose hair and such delicacies, you’re going to love Verizon with your EV-DO Rev. A handsets. And in honest absolute terms, both Verizon and AT&T need to up their game, this is the 21^st century after all.

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Right for all those people who for some unimaginable reason have not yet picked up the iPhone 3GS, Palm Pre, BlackBerry Tour, this summer, T-Mobile is now giving you the chance to grab the myTouch 3G for $199.99. The handset is available online, in stores and over the phone, whatever makes you comfortable. And while it may be easier to grumble, try to be friends with your myTouch 3G (uurgh…that name) and try not to think about the gorgeous HTC Hero that T-Mobile won’t get for you.

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Fresh up for grabs is the HTC Touch Pro2 and Snap on good ole TELUS. Both handsetsroar with Windows Mobile 6.1 and will cost you $0 and $249.99 respectively on 3-year deals with voice and data discount (that would be $399.99 and $649.99 retail). The devices are a sure win with features for everybody in both consumer and business users categories, you really cant go wrong with email support, Wi-Fi, GPS, Bluetooth, speakerphone, visual voicemail, global GSM roaming and well over five hours of talk-time per device (apart from the other goodies you should know by heart by now. So which is it gonna be?

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Both Canadian and U.S. users may soon have a pretty good reason to twitter and widget about. The royal family at the FCC has knighted the Samsung Omnia 2 and this is a pretty good spanking reason for us to believe that it will come to the U.S. and/or Canada soon. Not all documentation is out there but as for so much that is, it can be deducted that the Omnia2 has UMTS 850/1900. An all go for both the AT&T and Rogers’ networks. Whether either of them will carry the handset is not clear but for fans of the Omnia2 and of Samsung here is a refresher of the specs.

• GSM/GPRS/EDGE 850/900/1800/1900 MHz, UMTS 850/1900 MHz, HSDPA 7.2Mbps, HSUPA5.76 Mbps
• 3.7-inch WVGA (480×800) AMOLED touchscreen, Advanced R touch (Resistive)
• Memory: 8/16GB storage memory, hot-swappable microSD card slot (up to 32GB total)
• Windows Mobile 6.1 Professional, TouchWiz 2.0 UI with 3D effects
• 800 MHz processor
• 5 megapixel camera with auto-focus, dual LED flash, geo-tagging, face and smile detection, image stabilization, Wide Dynamic Range (WDR) and D1 video recording at 15 fps
• Wi-Fi, Bluetooth with A2DP, standard microUSB port, standard 3.5mm audio jack, GPS receiver with A-GPS
• Accelerometer
• DivX/XviD video support
• FM radio with RDS
• DNSe
• Dimensions: 118 x 59.6 x 11.9 mm
• 1500 mAh battery

Here’s another in a long line of hot WinMo touchScreen handsets. But we still love it.

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