mobile world congress

Photos: Spyker unveils iPhone-a-lot-like

While wandering through the mobile theme park that is the 3GSMA Mobile World Congress, we stumbled across a strangely familiar-looking phone at the Spyker stand. Spyker is mostly known for making cars, which gave us pause.

There was no model name on the handset, but of course the first thing we thought of when we saw it was the iPhone. The available press materials failed to shed any light on its name, but when we asked the man at the stand whether or not it belonged to the Spyker portfolio, he responded with a straightforward "yes." Click here … Read more

GSMA Day 3 wrap-up

The GSMA Mobile World Congress in Barcelona, Spain, is winding to a close, but that doesn't mean mobile phone news have stopped streaming in. The third day of GSMA 2008 saw AMD announcing big plans for mobile phone processors, RIM's co-CEO downplaying the recent BlackBerry outage, and the LiMo Foundation possibly giving Google's Android a run for its money with its own effort at an open, Linux-based operating system. Of course, we also took the opportunity to look at phones and carriers off the beaten path.

For starters, Senior Editor Kent German explored the large Vodafone plaza (… Read more

GSMA Day 2 Wrap-up

Phone madness continues on in Barcelona, Spain, as the second day of GSMA Mobile World Congress comes to a close. Vodafone's CEO said he sees the mobile web as the future, Microsoft announced MSN Direct availability on Windows Mobile devices, and Yahoo launches OneConnect, a new tool that lets mobile phone users to aggregate their social-networking updates and messaging in one spot on their phones. T-Mobile also finally announces plans to launch 3G in the U.S. by summer 2008. There's also hope for an Android phone, as well as an Austrian version of the iPhone by the … Read more

GSMA Day 1 Wrap-Up

February 11 has come and gone, and it turned out to be a busy first day at the GSMA Mobile World Congress in Barcelona, Spain. Before the show even began, Senior Editor Kent German gave us a little preview of the convention scene, and Bonnie Cha tells us her woeful tale of her stolen wallet. But work must go on, and Kent managed to get a hands on with the Samsung Soul, a slider handset packed with HSDPA, a 5-megapixel camera, and a new navigation pad with a display that changes its icons depending on what feature is being used.… Read more

Samsung introduces ARM-based smartphone chip

Samsung Electronics introduced a new ARM-based processor for smartphones at Mobile World Congress 2008 in Barcelona, Spain. The S3C6410 "mobile application processor" includes special hardware accelerators to handle motion video processing and 3D graphics, thereby freeing up the main processor for other tasks and speeding overall performance.

At the heart of the S3C6410 is an ARM1176 processor core that can be clocked up to 667MHz. The chip is made on Samsung's advanced 65-nanometer manufacturing process.

By embedding a hardwired Multi Format Codec on-chip, the S3C6410 can perform video capture in MPEG4/H.263/H.264 formats and … Read more

Buzz Out Loud 656: Rumor-palooza

EPISODE 655

ARM plans Android demonstration at MWC

ARM plans to demonstrate prototype phones based on ARM processors and Google's Android operating system next week, possibly paving the way for the chip designer to join Google's Open Handset Alliance.

It won't be the first Android prototype to get a public airing, but this one will come on one of the biggest stages of the year for the mobile-phone industry. An ARM representative distributed invitations Wednesday to come see and play with the Android prototypes next week in Barcelona at the Mobile World Congress.

ARM's technology is found at the heart of almost every mobile … Read more

Barcelona or bust: GSMA Mobile World Congress preview

On February 11, thousands from around the world will converge in Barcelona, Spain, for the annual GSMA Mobile World Congress (formerly known as the 3GSM Mobile World Congress). The four-day show brings together the cell phone industry to discuss and showcase the latest GSM technologies and developments. This year Senior Editor Kent German and I, along with CNET News.com's Maggie Reardon, CNET UK's Andrew Lim, and CNET TV's Ariel Nunez, have the fortune of traveling to Barcelona to cover the show so that we can bring you the latest news through blogs, pictures, and videos.

What … Read more