Palm Pre Drops to $80 on Amazon

The Palm Pre from Sprint was a pretty big success when it was first released not too long ago and now what was already a great mobile device just got even better thanks to Amazon.com. In what marks either a slowing of Palm Pre sales or just an extremely generous price cut from Amazon, you can now get the Palm Pre off of Amazon's website for just $79.99. But the good news doesn't stop there. Not only do you get the Palm Pre for just $80, but that price also includes free activation for you Pre right out of the box. The only thing is that this comes with a two-year service agreement from Sprint.

In addition to the cut back Palm Pre, Amazon is also offering the Palm Pixie for a mere $24.99 also with free activation. Compare these prices to Sprint's prices of $149.99 for the Palm Pre and $99.99 for the Palm Pixie and you got yourself a pretty sweet deal from Amazon. Two days ago, Palm did ship an update to the Palm Pre's webOS (1.3.1). This was created with the Palm's hack in trying to get iTunes sync working and it also fixed some bugs in the system and added a few new features.

The Palm Pre is a great device but is nowhere near the iPhone killer it was made out to be. The Pre has faced stiff competition from Apple's iPhone as well as the BlackBerry 9700 and even the hyped up Droid. With companies like Apple, Android and Research in Motion racing up the charts as fast as they are, thanks in large part to Nokia and Windows Mobile, the piece of the smartphone market that Palm Pre occupies is growing thin. However, maybe this new price drop from Amazon can help put some new life in the Palm Pre.

Verizon Wireless Doubles Early Termination Fee

According to reports from Engaget Verizon Wireless has doubled its early termination fee from $175 to $350. It's applied to anyone who has purchased a phone on the "Advanced Device List" after November 14th, 2009.

On bright side, for each month you complete of your contract, $10 is deducted from the $350 total. Unfortunately, even if you complete 23 of the 24 months of a contract, you're still sitting with $120 early termination fee. But that's still better than paying the $350 fee.

Its clear that Verizon is trying to keep its customers and their contracts. The low prices on phones offered to new customers isn't enough to keep them, so Verizon probably felt this is the best way to make sure they're getting their money's worth.

I'm not sure that this will keep anyone from second guessing choosing Verizon as their provider, but if you're looking to get a subsidized price on a Verizon phone just for the sake of reselling it on e-bay, you might want to think again.

Walmart Giving Away $100 Gift Card with BlackBerry Purchase: One Week Only!

Walmart has come up with this crazy idea to help shoppers actually save money over this holiday shopping season. The company has promised that it will deliver a deal a week this holiday season to help people keep more cash in their pockets. And in keeping with their promise, Walmart has decided that every customer who purchases a BlackBerry device at Walmart Wireless and signs up for a two-year contract will receive a $100 Walmart gift card.

According to Greg Hall, Vice President of Media Services with Walmart, "We know customers are very focused on value, and we have promised each week to deliver new savings to help them stretch their dollars this holiday season." He goes on to say that, "With our expansion of Walmart Wireless products over the last year, we look forward to providing an exciting offer on our BlackBerry assortment and give cellular customers an extra boost on holiday needs."

Walmart offers BlackBerry devices on all four major carriers: AT&T, Sprint, T-Mobile and Verizon. Smart phones continue to be one of the most selling cellular devices on the market. Walmart has a total of 7 BlackBerry devices on sale: The AT&T Curve 8310, AT&T Bold 9000, Sprint Curve 8330 (Red and Titanium colors), T-Mobile 8520 (Black, White and Frost colors), T-Mobile Pearl 8120 (emerald color), Verizon Storm and the Verizon Storm II.

Walmart also offers this special deal to online customers as well. If you prefer to buy your BlackBerry online at Walmart's website then you will receive a $100 Walmart.com eGift Card. With the tough economic times we are in right now, seeing a company as profitable as Walmart doing what they can to save shoppers money is a definitely cool. The sale starts this Saturday, November 14th at 8 a.m. and runs until next Saturday, November 20th so you better get moving if you want one of those niffty $100 gift cards.

Verizon's HTC Droid Eris

So as much hype as there has been about the new Verizon Wireless Motorola Droid and the HTC Droid Eris, sales have started out relatively slow. Friday was when the phones officially went on sale across the country. There were very short lines or no lines at all outside Verizon stores on Friday morning. Reports claimed that if there were any lines outside one of the many stores, they really only consisted of about 15-20 people.

A Verizon spokesmen said that the lack of lines outside the stores was not a concern at all. He said that what Verizon really wants is not a line but a steady stream of people coming throughout the day and the following few weeks to examine the new phones.

Some people claimed that they liked the look and the feel of the HTC Droid Eris better than the Motorola Droid. Compared to the Motorola Droid, the Eris is basically just a slimmed-down, lighter, less powerful Droid phone. It is based off the HTC Hero that Sprint has, but it has been reworked.

The Eris measures 4.45 x 2.19 x .51 inches (HWD) and weighs 4.23 ounces. The front of the phone features a 3.2 inch touch screen. Below the screen is a navigation trackball and several physical buttons. The Eris does not feature an actual physical keyboard but instead has two virtual keyboards.

Although the Eris and the Motorola Droid share a name and 12,000 Android applications, they are very different phones. The Motorola Droid runs Android 2.0, while the Eris runs Android 1.5 with HTC’s Sense extensions. The differences that these bring up include various things. With the Eris’s Web browsers you use mutitouch pinch-to-zoom, while with the Motorola Droid you double tap to zoom. The Droid Eris has seven home screen panels and some very useful widgets, and the Motorola Droid has only three panels and a lot less interesting widgets. The virtual keyboard is much more accurate and easy to use than the keyboard on the Motorola Droid. You can keep going and going on all the various differences between the two phones, but none of them are really huge. Most of them involve personal preferences.

The Eris handles messaging well. It supports Microsoft Exchange, Google, and POP3/IMAP e-mail. Unfortunately for some, it does not support Yahoo mail. There is an SMS/MMS application for text and picture messaging, but regarding instant messaging there is nothing included but Google Talk. Fortunately, you are able to download a free IM application from the Android Market.

The music player on the Eris is quite decent. It supports tracks in WMA, AAC, and MP3formats. The video player on the phone though definitely has some issues. The playback of most videos is fuzzy and disappointing. The 5-megapixel camera is also very frustrating with the soft images that it captures. If you looking for a good video recorder and camera, the Motorola Droid is definitely the better phone for you.

So to pick between the Motorola Droid and the Droid Eris, you really just need to consider what it is that you want in a phone. Your decision should be purely based on preferences. They are both great phones from Verizon and are both going to serve you well. I hope you are able to figure out which phone suits you best and then go on to thoroughly enjoy your new Droid smartphone.

Touch-Screen Phone Usage Soars

According to market research firm ComScore, touch-screen cell phone usage is on the rise and continues to grow at a rapid rate. Between August 2008 and August 2009, touch-screen mobile-phone usage grew by over 159%. The number of touch-screen mobile-phone owners also doubled. In August 2008, just 9.2 million people were using touch-screen phones, but by August 2009, over 23.8 million people were using the phones.

The overwhelmingly rising numbers aren't limited to just touch-screens; it appears as if smartphone usages in general is growing throughout the United States. From August 2008 to August 2009, the number of smartphone users grew by 63%. In August 2008, there were about 20.7 million people using smartphones compared to over 33.7 in August 2009.

So what was the most popular phone? Not surprisingly, it was the iPhone, of course. With 32.9% of the touch-screen market using an iPhone, it was the top device for users ages 13 and older. With 8.7% was the LG Dare came in at a distant second. Other ranking touch-screen phones included the LG Voyager (7.8%), BlackBerry Storm (7%), and the Palm Treo (6.5%).

Another interesting tidbit ComScore found was that touch-screen users tend to be younger than standard cell phone users. Over half (51.4%) of smartphone users are under the age of 35, with a whopping 57.7% of touch-screen users being in the same age range. About 20.6% of touch-screen users are between the ages of 18 and 24, while only 5% of touch-screen users are over 65.

A Mood-Based App for Your iPhone

How many iPhone apps can they come up with? Well here’s a new one! As if status updates weren’t enough to inform your friend how depressed, ecstatic, infuriated, or bored you were, you can now let them know exactly what you are in the mood for.

Moodspin is a social-networking add-on that has just been endorsed by the iPhone App Store. Currently you are only able to use Moodspin through Twitter, but through it you are given the capabilities to broadcast exactly how you feel to everyone that follows you.

To make Moodspin even better, it is not just text that appears when you set your mood but a mood-related emoticon is added to your photo. This allows people to see how you feel no matter what it is that you just tweeted about.

So the big question about this app would be…is it useful at all? Honestly, not really, but it doesn’t have to be useful for you to enjoy it. It is interesting how Moodspin will track your moods. Every time that you update your mood status it will be charted on a timeline. This can show others what you have been up to throughout the day if you wish to display such information. You can easily compare and contrast your mood graph with your friends or everyone else on Moodspin.

Moodspin is relatively easy to use on your iPhone. You simply select your in mood in three taps and it instantly becomes a personalized Twitter update. It also will tack on a URL that can lead others to your Moodspin profile so they can view your moods in the past 24 hours.

Supposedly sometime this month Moodspin will update to also allow Facebook users to access their service. This way you can include your mood right along side your status.

So no this isn’t the most incredible app for your iPhone, but for those that obsess over social-networking sites this could be an app that can add some flair to your constant tweets and updates.

Scan Your Business Cards On The Go

If you have a huge amount of business cards sitting on your desk, or in your wallet waiting to be entered into your contacts list on your iPhone, you're not alone. Well a new app for your iPhone will take all the hassle out of entering business card information The Business Card Reader for iPhone/iPod Touch makes the process simple and virtually pain-free.

The app, available on iTunes for $5.99, and scans/"reads" your business card information from a picture you take of the business card you want to enter. It uses ABBYY’s text recognition technology to read the business card image and enters it directly into a new contact in your address book. It will read names, phone numbers, fax numbers, and email addresses. Before finalizing, you can check to verify that all the information is correct and hit save and its done.

The Business Card Reader will also read in a few different languages including: English, French, Italian, German and Spanish business cards. Another great feature is that it has a built-in browser and its possible to make LinkedIn search of a contact you've just scanned, all without leaving the program.

For a quick and easy way to enter all your business contacts into your iPhone, this app is a great choice to get the job done.