Mobile

It wasn't too long ago we editors--or anyone!--got acquainted with Skyfire (review), the newest mobile browser to challenge Opera Mini's dominance. Check out the fresh minimalist design and clever search options, plus one disappointing feature that's far from a thriller. (Go ahead and award yourself 10 points if you spot that reference in the video.)

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Boost Mobile is often known for their iDEN/Walkie-talkie phones, as their "Where you at?" ads would suggest. However, the youth-oriented Sprint-Nextel offspring also offers a few non-iDEN phones, and its latest is the Motorola Krzr K1m. The K1m has all the features of the Sprint version, such as an MP3 player, a 1.3-megapixel camera, GPS, as well as EV-DO support, and is available for $249.99. It also includes a preloaded service called "The Latest," which gives you access to information such as news, sports, and stock market updates throughout the day. Premium channels … Read more

Though rumors have been out there for weeks, Intel has confirmed that upcoming Montevina mobile technology will be branded Centrino 2. The chipmaker also said the Core 2 Extreme QX9770 is shipping.

This follows the official rollout of the Atom brand for ultrasmall devices on Sunday. As part of the Atom platform, Intel will offer a combination CPU-chipset wireless solution called Centrino Atom, with device suppliers shipping products next quarter.

Now Intel has added the Centrino 2 brand to the mix. The branding will break down into Centrino 2 for consumer notebooks and Centrino 2 vPro for business portables.

"… Read more

American workers apparently are getting more comfortable accessing the Web via their cell phones and PDAs.

The number of mobile devices accessing the Internet via wireless broadband skyrocketed 154 percent in the fourth quarter of 2007 compared with the same period in 2006, according to research released Tuesday by ComScore.

The study also found that mobile broadband had a higher presence on work computers (59 percent) compared with home or personal computers (41 percent).

Verizon and Sprint accounted for the majority of the mobile broadband market last year, according to ComScore.

"Though mobile broadband access is currently used by … Read more

Nearly a quarter of all cell phone users in the U.S. say they've seen an advertisement on their phones in the past 30 days, according to a report from Nielsen Mobile, which tracks these trends.

About half of those who saw advertising on their mobile phones in the past month responded to an ad, the report said. In the fourth quarter, there was a big jump in the number or people reporting that they had spotted advertisements on their mobile phones. In fact, this figure rose 38 percent to 58 million users who said they saw advertising on … Read more

Yahoo is on a mobile roll.

The Internet company on Tuesday unveiled a new bookmarking tool for cell phones that lets people keep track of favorite Web content--news feeds, search results, Web sites--from one place on their handheld. The technology, called Yahoo OnePlace, will be available in the second quarter of 2008, according to Yahoo.

The tool builds on other new mobile applications from Yahoo. Those include OneConnect, a tool to update social-networking messaging on the phone (announced in February), and OneSearch, which aggregates news, weather, financial data, photos, and Web links based on search queries.

Yahoo has heavy competition … Read more

As an extension of this morning's news about Google Gears making its way to mobile devices, online office suite Zoho is taking advantage of the new technology to give people a way to view Zoho Writer documents on their Windows mobile phones while away from a data connection. It's the type of situation that occurs frequently for commuters, and something that has historically given native software applications the leg up on their Web counterparts.

Users can view up to 20 of their latest Zoho Writer documents while connected, and view up to the last last five when in the Gears-enabled offline mode. According to CEO Raju Vegesna, an option to change how many documents you can load into the Gears cache is in the works. Also on tap is an offline editing mode to let you make changes or tweaks to your docs, although according to Vegesna more than 90 percent of users simply view documents on their mobile devices.

Zoho was one of the first adopters of Google's Gears technology, adding it to its Writer word processing service back in late November--something Google has still not done with its own Documents and Spreadsheets service, despite hints it was the next service to get the Gears treatment back in January.

Vegesna walks us through the process of installing Gears and accessing the mobile version of Zoho Writer in the video embedded after the break.

… Read more

Memory chipmaker Micron Technology has launched its image-sensor business as a more independent division called Aptina Imaging, a move the company believes will improve its flexibility and business potential.

The new subsidiary is based in San Jose, Calif., a Silicon Valley location that's a long way from Micron's Boise, Idaho, headquarters. It will employ several hundred of Micron's 19,000 employees, Micron said.

"We need the additional flexibility and identity to be able to grow the way the markets we see are growing," said Shane Thomas, director of product marketing for the imaging business.

For … Read more

Google is bringing Google Gears to mobile phones so that people on the go can access Web-based applications even when they're not connected to the mobile Net.

Smartphones and 3G data services are changing the way some people work, allowing them to access documents and applications from anywhere. But when their wireless connection is interrupted or not available at all, they're cut off.

Google Gears for mobile helps solve this problem so mobile workaholics can even get stuff done on airplanes or when they're supposed to be on vacation in some far-off destination with no wireless access. (… Read more