"We are committed to providing convenient communications in the car - and out of it too. The beauty of the Nokia Speakerphone HF-300 is in its mobility, it goes where you go, when you want to talk. We are excited to have the speakerphone as part of our expanding enhancements portfolio to meet the needs of our consumers," said Wolfgang Gärtner, senior category manager, Nokia Automotive.

The device runs on battery power so it's totally mobile and apparently offers up to 20 hours of talk time. When the battery runs low, the LED indicator provides an alert. There are also simple keys that are illuminated for taking and ending calls. The HF-300 weighs 80g. It's equipped with a sunvisor clip for easy positioning of the device in your car and has rubberized pegs at the bottom so it can easily stay firm on your desk. The speakerphone will automatically turn off after five minutes after the connection to the mobile device has been severed.

The HF-300 is compatible with a wide range of Nokia mobile devices supporting Bluetooth Specification 1.1 and higher and Handfree Profile 1.0 and higher. It is expected to be available globally in the third quarter of 2007 and will cost an estimated Rs. 4960, excluding taxes.

As such, owners of LG handsets will now be able to view videos and easily upload them directly onto YouTube.com.

The YouTube-enabled LG handsets will be available worldwide beginning end 2007, the companies said. LG also announced that it would apply a new user interface (UI) to its upcoming YouTube-enabled handsets. Dr Skott Ahn, president and chief executive officer of LG Electronics, said, "This new service will connect people like never before. For the first time, LG customers will be able to film, upload, and view videos on YouTube using their mobile phone, just as they would be able to from their home computer."

Adding to it, Steve Chen, co-founder and chief technology officer for YouTube, said, "People want to be able to capture interesting moments with their cell phones wherever they are, and whenever they want. We're excited to be partnering with LG to give people the opportunity to enjoy YouTube for watching and sharing those moments." Meanwhile, LG already has a non-exclusive agreement with Google, YouTube's parent company, to pre-install Google services on its handsets.

As part of this deal, recently, LG launched (first in Italy) its LG-KS10 that features Google search, Gmail for mobile, and Google Maps for mobile.

Speaking on this occasion Mr. H. C. Ryu, Managing Director, Samsung Telecommunications India said, "India is a very critical market for Samsung and the launch of the world’s slimmest slider Metal phone is a testimony to our commitment to meet the growing aspirations of consumers for sleek, aesthetically designed phones that accentuate their personality without compromising on premium multimedia capabilities."

According to the company, the design inspiration of the Metal series is drawn from the core attributes of metal itself i.e. power and prestige, and is designed for power players.

The SGH E840 is equipped with full mirror LCD, hidden touch keypad and 2.22-inch wide TFT LCD screen. For build, the phone uses premium materials such as tempered glass and metal. It also features a 2 mega pixel camera, FM Radio, MP3 player, mobile printing, document viewer and 70 MB internal memory with expandable microSD flash external memory (upto 2GB).

The SGH D900i is a 12.9mm slim slider that comes with artistically designed metal lining body offering loads of high-end multimedia features like 3 mega pixel camera with dynamic user interfaces, vivid 262K color screen, Bluetooth stereo headset, FM Radio, New camera UI, enhanced battery life and speedy shutter.

The SGH D840 comes packed with a 2 Megapixel Camera, MP3 player with integrated dual speaker, multi-format music player for listening to music on your Bluetooth stereo headsets wirelessly along with 80 MB of internal memory and external microSD memory.

All the Metal Series phones are secured with mobile tracker, emergency SMS alert and privacy lock.

Form Factor
Like I said before, the design of the E490 is quite elegant with a smooth metallic color finish and the cool style is only accentuated with the silver linings. It's also rather slim and lightweight for a flip with dimensions like - 94 x 49 x 15.5 mm and it weighs 83g. On the front you'll see a monochrome screen (128 x 32 pixel resolution) that’s just 32 x 8 mm wide, but has a choice of 7 colors in case you'd like to go with one that matches the replaceable panels you may have chosen. Yes the panels are changeable too. Just above the screen is the 1.3 megapixel camera.

On the right hand side is the Hot-Swap microSD slot for external memory and the dedicated camera key is just underneath that. On the other side are the propriety USB/Charger/Earphone socket. Why oh why couldn't they just have another socket for the earphones? Anyways, moving along, underneath that are the volume keys that also double as the zoom keys. Flip her open and you have the clear 176 x 220 pixel, TFT screen with 65K colors. Just beneath the screen are 2 speakers that aren't great but they aren't so bad in speaker-phone mode.

I have to admit, I thought the keypad would pose a bit of a problem but thanks to the large keys and the 5 way nav-pad I had absolutely no issues. There are also 3 dedicated keys for the MP3 player, messaging and the browser.

SD cards, to date, have been largely used for data storage in digital still cameras and increasingly in televisions. MicroSD cards, which are a quarter the size of an SD card, are backward compatible with SD cards using an extender, to allow multimedia files downloaded by mobile phones to be easily displayed on other media.

With a read speed of 16 Megabytes (MBs) per second and a write speed of 6MB/s, Samsung's 8GB microSD card exceeds the Speed Class 4 SDHC (Secure Digital High Capacity) standard which requires a data write speed of 4MB/s. This is also much faster than the SD Speed Class 2 designation carried by most competing microSD cards currently on the market.

The market research firm Dataquest predicts that the memory card market as a whole will average 10 percent annual growth between 2006 and 2010, while demand for high density 8GB cards will grow an average of 2.6 times per year over the same period. By 2010, the 8GB memory card will be the market mainstream in terms of units sold.

"From the moment you use a Bluetooth watch you wonder how you ever managed without it," says José Barreiro-López Head of Sales & Marketing Support of Sony Ericsson.

The three watches include — the Music Edition that's finished in black with orange details; the Executive Edition that features a professional-looking stainless steel bracelet and the Classic Edition that sports a premium leather strap and black dial.

"Using your watch as a wire-free interface with your phone is about as convenient and non-obtrusive as you can get. Now whether you’re out socializing, working, or just at home with your family, there’s a Bluetooth watch to go with you."

Surprisingly, what we have here this time — the Sagem Bleu my214x — swept me off my feet. I have to admit, after a series of bad products we were kind of expecting something similar. But like I mentioned we were pleasantly surprised. Advertised as 'Hamara FM', it is aimed at people with an intense taste for FM. Also this phone bears a Made in EU tag. How often does one get to see that??

Design
The phone takes from the usual candy bar design, and I have to admit it bears an uncanny resemblance to the Motorola W209. What I mean to say is that if look at the my214x closely, the overall design picks up quite like that of the W209 from the top and departs from it half way. In any case, I like the compact look. Although a tad too small for my hand, it looks pretty smart. At 103 x 44.5 x 15.4mm and 69g, it’s not only compact but also weighs hardly anything.

The phone comes in black plastic finish, which to me, doesn’t look like it will be prone to smudges or scratches. One thing I will mention is that I did manage to get some ugly scuffing marks on the battery cover, which came off with a slight rub. The top front portion of the phone has a glossy finish. And on prolonged pondering may seem like it’s the result of some cheap finish. My suggestion to you is… stop pondering.

The buttons on the phone are quite responsive and uniformly placed, and despite it's tiny design I didn't find it messy to use. You will realize this when you get down to messaging on this phone. The functions of the buttons have been kept quite basic; by this I mean menu access, navigation and call/cut. The D-pad as well as the left/right programmable keys are customizable, so you can attach a shortcut of your own choice.

At the bottom, you will find the mini USB/ Charging slot and the 2.5mm earphone jack. That’s it, no more fuss!!

The company has launched its SMS (Short Messaging and Search) version 2.0 that includes scheduled SMS, color SMS, and emoticons, among others.

SMS 2.0 promises a seamless integration of messaging, content, and advertising on mobile phones, and integrates with usual user interaction as default SMS application.

And as of now, SMS 2.0 is compatible only with Nokia smart phones, but Affle intends making it available on other handsets as well.

From the connectivity angle the my411x is equipped with Bluetooth and GPRS for sharing files and net connectivity. The media options the my411x offers are MP3 and video playback. The phone is also equipped with VGA camera with 4x digital zoom. Since the my411x is Java enabled it's easy to download and install games, applications, tools etc. to personalize the phone.

The India distributors for Sagem, Pratham Telcom have launched the Blue my411x and it retails at Rs. 5100.

The slider also sports a 2-megapixel camera with a Schneider-Kreuznach lens, an FM tuner and MP3 playback with the help of a microSD card.

Unfortunately, there's not much available on pricing and availability, but look out for this phone when it hits the market shelves sometime later this year.