ctia

T-Mobile CEO: We're not interested in Verizon's spectrum

NEW ORLEANS--T-Mobile USA isn't looking at Verizon Wireless's proposed spectrum auction as the answer for its needs.

"For us, this spectrum is not interesting," T-Mobile CEO Philipp Humm said during a conference call with reporters today.

With T-Mobile working toward an upgrade of its existing network as well as a move to 4G LTE, the carrier is in need of spectrum, which provides wireless capacity and allows it to deliver mobile services.

T-Mobile's dilemma is shared by all of the carriers, and has been a common theme at this year's CTIA Wireless show. Verizon … Read more

Hands-on with the Samsung Galaxy S III camera

NEW ORLEANS--Seeing the Samsung Galaxy S III at CTIA was exactly what I had hoped for leading up to the show.

Samsung's next global flagship phone packs a wallop of new software features, especially in the camera department. While there wasn't enough time at the busy conference to inspect everything, I did return for some quality time with the 8-megapixel camera.… Read more

iPhone cover acts as digital wallet, packs a programmable credit card

NEW ORLEANS--Paying for goods or services at the checkout counter with your phone is the holy grail of mobile payments, something Google, the credit card companies, and the wireless providers are all trying to figure out.

But until that goes mainstream, startup iCache has a pretty novel approach for people who want to leave their wallet at home. The company's Geode product acts as both an iPhone cover and digital wallet, while packing a single programmable smart card.

It works like this: a user enters in their debit and credit card information through an included mag stripe reader, which … Read more

Preparing a wireless network for the worst

NEW ORLEANS--Seven years after it last visited New Orleans and almost seven years after the devastation of Hurricane Katrina, CTIA has returned to The Crescent City. And as the 2012 Hurricane season approaches on June 1, Verizon Wireless uses the trade show to show how it is preparing for future disasters.

We've already seen a Verizon Super Switch that can withstand a Category 5 hurricane, but this time Big Red showed a cell on light truck, or COLT. Inside a seemingly normal truck is a fully contained cell site with power for up to three days.

Verizon can send … Read more

Create an avatar and speak Japanese with NTT DoCoMo

NEW ORLEANS--After you've covered the big news and handled the new phones, it's always fun to walk the CTIA show floor and seek out the weird and wonderful. There's usually plenty of sights to behold, and you always can count on NTT DoCoMo to lead the way.

The Japanese carrier's booth this year was smaller than usual, and it lacked a collection of high-end "only in Japan" phones, but it showcased some pretty cool technologies that I haven't used before. Some were practical and another was just for fun, but they provided a … Read more

Carrier news dominates a quiet day 2 of CTIA

NEW ORLEANS--As expected, the first day of CTIA 2012 was inundated with the release of new phones ranging from companies like Kyocera to HTC.

Now that the trade show is settling into its second day, however, most of the buzz heard around town came from carriers. Don't get us wrong; new handset announcements pop up arbitrarily, no matter what day it is. But for today, it seemed to be all about the networks and not the devices.

Cricket Wireless CNET's Jessica Dolcourt made her way to Cricket's booth and reported that it plans on releasing a slew … Read more

Hands-on Boot to Gecko: Interesting, but far from baked

NEW ORLEANS--Mozilla may not be the first thing you think of when it comes to mobile technology, but that may change early next year. Its mobile operating system code-named Boot to Gecko is developing rapidly, but it will face challenges both technical and tech cultural.

Judging from my colleague Stephen Shankland's take on how Boot to Gecko performed at its public unveiling in February, Mozilla has definitely made progress with the phone. The build I used was installed on a Samsung Galaxy S II.

The interface appears to be a mix of traditional iOS-style app icons, and Windows Phone-style … Read more

AVG to pre-scan Livewire's Android market

NEW ORLEANS--Security suite maker AVG has teamed with independent Android marketplace and mobile content provider Livewire to scan all the apps it hosts for malware before they are made available to the public, the companies announced today at CTIA. The deal will also install AVG's free Android security app Mobilation (download) on devices to scan apps after they update.

Jon Lobb, vice president of Global Business Development for mobile at AVG, said that the partnership would keep phones safe from before an app is installed through the app's updates. "It's a belt-to-bracers approach," said Lobb. … Read more

Do non-iPad tablets stand a chance?

NEW ORLEANS--A year ago, tablets were on the rise, and the industry forecast looked promising for expanding a market that Apple essentially pioneered. So why aren't non-iOS tablets doing better? That's the question posed at CTIA 2012 by All Things D's Walt Mossberg, who moderated a panel exploring the topic.

"Here we sit in May 2012, and it's still heavily an iPad world in tablets," Mossberg said, suggesting that Android tablets (and presumably Windows Phone and BlackBerry tablets, too) are hitting a dead end.… Read more