Filed under: Handsets, Samsung, Sprint, EV-DO, CDMA

Looks like Sprint’s gargantuan marketing blitz for the Instinct is in the process of paying off, because the carrier has announced that the Samsung device has become its best-selling EV-DO device ever in the first week of availability. Long-term popularity will depend largely on word of mouth as early adopters decide whether they made the right buy, of course, but it’s a promising sign for a company that hasn’t had a ton of good news to report lately. They’re reporting that the overwhelming popularity has led to shortages in some areas, but go on to assure us that “Samsung has increased efforts to deliver new supplies of Instinct on a daily basis and manufacturing plants are operating at full capacity to keep up with the demand.” Here’s our question, though: Sprint makes a point of saying that it’s their best-selling EV-DO device, so what’s their best-selling device regardless of technology — the Sony Z-100, perhaps, also known as the baddest cellphone of all time?

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Via Engadgetmobile

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Filed under: Handsets, Software, HTC, Sprint, Windows Mobile, EV-DO, CDMA

Hey, Vogue users — jealous of your Mogul toting friends, are you? Put all that angst aside, as an official Sprint firmware update has just been loosed that adds Windows Mobile 6.1 among other things. Not much else to say beyond that, and besides, shouldn’t you have that download started already?

[Via phoneArena]

Update: Whoa there, just a word of warning — Sprint has reached out to us to let us know that this is actually not an official update, and it “does not support unauthorized or beta software updates for its devices.” xda-developers often does good work, but just be careful with this one and make sure you comprehend that Sprint won’t be bailing you out if you get yourself up a creek with this one!

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Via Engadgetmobile

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The University of Massachusetts, Amherst is working on a robot that can learn to use unfamiliar objects. According to MIT’s Technology Review, UMass’s Robot, called the UMass Mobile Manipulator, or UMan, ‘sees’ an object with the help of a Web cam and then pushes it around to see how it moves, identifying and recording the […]

The University of Massachusetts, Amherst is working on a robot that can learn to use unfamiliar objects. According to MIT’s Technology Review, UMass’s Robot, called the UMass Mobile Manipulator, or UMan, ‘sees’ an object with the help of a Web cam and then pushes it around to see how it moves, identifying and recording the objects’ parts and joints.

Doctoral student Dov Katz is working on the UMan along with computer science professor Oliver Brock, Katz told the review that the UMan learns similarly to how a baby does, moving around the world, picking things up and playing with them to see how they work. He didn’t state whether or not the UMan also tries to put everything in its mouth.

The researchers at UMass believe that enabling robots to adapt to unstructured environments will allow them to perform more “meaningful” work such as exploring new planets and helping around the home.

Via [crunchgear]

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Filed under: Handsets, Features, Sony Ericsson, Windows Mobile, GSM, EDGE, HSDPA, UMTS, HSUPA

So here’s the scene. We’re at the Digital Experience show, trying to get our hands on a powered-up Sony Xperia X1. Sure, we found a unit that wasn’t powered up, but that does you — and us — no good. Sony told us to come back in 15 minutes, so we grabbed some press kits, made a round of booths, and came back.

Sure enough, when we came back the X1 was powered up, but the nice booth lady tried to tell us that things weren’t working just right and the unit was stuck on the config screen. After some jiggering, we determined the tiny X1 was just stuck on the touch screen calibration, and we were cruising through menus within minutes. It’s pretty clear this unit wasn’t ready for primetime — you’ll even see some HTC test apps in the below gallery — but we were impressed by the screen’s resolution and brightness. Windows Mobile 6.1 showed it face often in the UI, but the phone app and general utilities were looking good.

Overall, the X1 is a pleasure to behold — it’s one sexy device. That stated, we’ll have to wait how Sony Ericsson’s user interface shapes up and just look at the pretty pictures in the gallery until mid-September.

You can find the gallery over here at Engadget Classic.

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Interactive Apple iPhone Style Driven Business Directory, Touch Screen Search Engine, Revolutionary Interactive Touch Screen Business Search Engine, better than Yellowpages

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Filed under: Handsets, HTC, T-Mobile, Windows Mobile

We’ve seen the HTC-sourced T-Mobile Shadow II peeking out from around the dark corners of eBay and the harsh lights of the FCC, but the latest word is that the WinMo slider will also come equipped with UMA, allowing it to work with HotSpot@Home. That’s a first for an HTC handset and a first for Windows Mobile, but before you get all excited, check the source of those whispers: “market sources” quoted by Digitimes. Yeah, we’ll believe it when we see it.

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Via Engadgetmobile

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We’ll all be dead before XM and Sirius merge, but the two companies would like the whole wide world (or whoever reads PR Newswire) to know how they think they’ll end up financially once they’re one company. (What an awfully constructed sentence.) The headline here is the combined company will have positive cash flow in […]

We’ll all be dead before XM and Sirius merge, but the two companies would like the whole wide world (or whoever reads PR Newswire) to know how they think they’ll end up financially once they’re one company. (What an awfully constructed sentence.) The headline here’s the combined company will have positive cash flow in 2009.

They did re-state that, technically, Sirius will be taking over the assets of XM.

So, pretty boring financials that might please Wall Street, but we couldn’t really give a toss about. I’d like to know what sort of “clerical error” led to XM not paying Opie & Anthony for the past two months.

Via [crunchgear]

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Anyone else bought their tickets for the midnight showing? I’m watching it at the IMAX. *Joygasm* via techamok

Anyone else purchased their tickets for the midnight showing? I’m watching it at the IMAX. *Joygasm*

via techamok

Via [crunchgear]

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