Mobiles reviews

Research firm Pew Research has released highlights from a report on adults and how they use their cell phone. The study shows that the number of adults sending and receiving text messages has increased from 65 percent to 72 percent since this time last year, but says that teens 12 to 17 in age still account for 5 times as many messages, on average. The report also says that 5 percent of adults send 200 or more messages per day, while 15 percent of teens send that many. The study also shows that adults near universally consider the cell phone to be a safety feature. More statistics can be found at the Pew link, below. Read the full story here.

At the 2010 IFA consumer electronics show in Germany, Samsung Mobile head J.K. Shin said that his company expects to sell a total of 25 million smartphones for calendar year 2010, up significantly from earlier estimates of 18 million. Mr. Shin also said that Samsung is targeting a double digit market share figure for global smartphone sales, and that next years smartphone sales will likely be double the 2010 figure. Read the full story here.

Apple has posted a page on its website that highlights some of the new features that Apple iPad users can expect when the iOS 4.2 operating system for their devices becomes available in October. The new features mentioned are multitasking support, home screen folders, wireless printing, AirPlay streaming support, Game Center multiplayer gaming, a unified inbox, and some enterprise and text input enhancements. Read the full story here.

Almost as a side note to Verizon's earlier announcement today that it is offering two new pre-paid data packages for select smartphones and multimedia feature phones, Verizon told us that these new smartphones and multimedia devices will also be available for purchase directly from Verizon without a contract. The newly available devices are: BlackBerry Curve 8330, Curve 8530, Storm 9530, Storm2 9550, Tour 9630, and Bold 9650; Palm Pre Plus and Pixi Plus; Motorola DROID, DEVOUR, DROID X, and DROID 2; HTC DROID Eris and DROID Incredible; LG Ally, enV Touch, enV3, Chocolate Touch, and VX8360; Samsung Alias 2 and Renown; Nokia Twist; Casio EXILIM. The phones are now available for purchase without a contract from Verizon Wireless retail shops and will be available online on the 28th of September. Read the full story here.

At the IFA consumer electronics show in Berlin today, Samsung confirmed that Google's future Android operating system will be called Honeycomb. Prior to the event, speculation swirled that the next iteration of the OS would be called Honeycomb, but that had never been confirmed. The name falls in line with Google's alphabetic naming scheme, which includes Cupcake, Donut, Eclair, Froyo, and Gingerbread, which will be Android 3.0 and is expected before year's end. Read the full story here.

According to a story posted by Fortune, Google is claiming that the assertion Steve jobs made during yesterday's keynote, that "our competitors" (implying Google) are counting upgrades in their daily activation figures, is incorrect. Google told Fortune that the "200,000 per day" figure that it gave back in August was for new activations, and did not even count Android phones sold without Google services. Jobs said during his keynote that Apple was activating 230,000 new iOS devices per day. Read the full story here.

According to a tweet posted on an O2 Germany Twitter account, the new Samsung Galaxy Tab tablet sized smartphone will be available to O2 customers for 27.50 EUR per month with an upfront 99 EUR cost starting in October of 2010. No word yet on when the Galaxy Tab might reach O2 customers in other markets. Read the full story here.

Starbucks consumers can now check and reload their Starbucks Cards directly from their BlackBerry - thanks to a new application. The app syncs with both Starbucks cards and My Starbucks Rewards cards for easy and simple management. The app offers users the ability to reload and check account balances, locate a nearby Starbucks, and also offers mobile payments directly from a smartphone. The new Starbucks Card Mobile App for BlackBerry is available now for download at http://www.starbucks.com/coffeehouse/mobile-apps/starbucks-card-mobile-bb. The new app works on RIM's BlackBerry Bold, Curve, Storm, and Tour handsets. Read the full story here.

Skyfire, a mobile web browser developer, has submitted to Apple an app that would give iPhone users a way to view Flash-based video directly on their phones. Skyfire's developers believe that they have found a solution to convert Flash video into HTML5 video that will fit within Apple's application guidelines, including the use of the WebKit browser core partnered with Safari and h.264 adaptive streaming. Read the full story here.

At a Q&A session that took place in Berlin, Germany alongside of the IFA consumer electronics show today, Samsung confirmed to MobileBurn that we should expect to see other sized Android powered tablets from the company in the future. Read the full story here.