We’ve heard various rumors over the past year or so that T-Mobile USA parent Deutsche Telekom was looking for someone to look over its fledgling American wireless provider, either in the form of a partnership or an outright buyout. Now, many moons later, the company has felt compelled to set those rumors to rest — possibly because it couldn’t find any interested parties. Rene Obermann, Chairman of the Management Board at Deutsche Telekom, believes there’s room for four major wireless players in the US (T-Mo is number four, currently) and asks the question: “Why can’t you have penetration rates of 500 percent or 1,000 percent?” The idea here is that, as more and more devices go wireless, people are going to need more and more wireless plans to cover them. But 10 separate wireless plans per person? That sounds ’spensive.

T-Mobile USA staying single for now originally appeared on Engadget on Sat, 27 Mar 2010 23:07:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

Popularity: 9% [?]

Over the next few years we’re looking at major LTE build-outs in the US from at least two players — Verizon and AT&T — but we’ve rather unexpectedly gotten a third player coming into the fold this day led by hedge fund Harbinger Capital Partners. Basically, these guys just got regulatory approval last week to buy satellite operator SkyTerra, combining about 23MHz of spectrum through slivers of ownership in the 1.4GHz and 1.6GHz terrestrial bands with 10MHz of L-band satellite space. This isn’t the kind of network you’ll just be able to waltz into a store and sign up for, though; instead, Harbinger is looking to offer it as an end-to-end wholesale service to other providers, of which AT&T and Verizon could be a part if they need the extra capacity or they’re looking for a stopgap prior to completing their own build-outs. Interestingly, the terms of the SkyTerra deal specify that the huge guys can only account for up to 25 percent of the new network’s traffic, so there’ll still be plenty of room for other players to get in when the initial commercial launch goes live (or is scheduled to go live, anyway) some time before the third quarter of 2011 covering 9 million potential subscribers. A full-scale launch in all “major” markets is lined up by the second quarter of 2013 — and thanks to Harbinger’s holdings in TerreStar, we could see even more than 23MHz worth of LTE airspace by the time everything’s said and done. By comparison, Verizon holds 22MHz of 700MHz spectrum in many markets, so these guys are working with a decent-sized slice of the pie here.

New US LTE network borne of satellite operators, launching next year originally appeared on Engadget on Mon, 29 Mar 2010 13:35:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

Popularity: 9% [?]

Ready for a surreal way to start your day? Salt Lake City’s KSL News has a report out this morning detailing the baffling experience of AT&T subscribers trying to access emergency services in the city. Instead of being routed through to their local dispatcher, the urgent calls somehow found their way to Seattle’s 911 response center. Brought to the news team’s attention by one Tony Sams, this issue was originally thought to originate in his iPhone’s GPS system, as he was being identified as being located in the Seattle area, but then his local police also tried dialing their own number only to find themselves chatting it up with their Emerald City colleagues. Until they figure this out, we’d suggest using your landlines — if you still have one of those antiques — or just yelling at passersby for help. Hit the source for the full video report and the 10-digit direct number for Salt Lake City general dispatch.

Update: AT&T has been very nippy in getting this routing problem sorted out, and proper service has been restored. The company is now investigating the cause of this problemo.

[Thanks, Ryan]

AT&T redirecting 911 calls from Salt Lake City to Seattle, working on a fix (update: fix is in) originally appeared on Engadget on Fri, 26 Mar 2010 05:23:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

Popularity: 9% [?]

Wind Mobile lights up towers in Ottawa, Canada originally appeared on Engadget Mobile on Fri, 26 Mar 2010 17:28:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

Popularity: 2% [?]

Ready for a surreal way to begin your day? Salt Lake City’s KSL News has a report out this morning detailing the baffling experience of AT&T subscribers trying to access emergency services in the city. Instead of being routed through to their local dispatcher, the important calls somehow found their way to Seattle’s 911 response center. Brought to the news team’s attention by one Tony Sams, this issue was originally thought to originate in his iPhone’s GPS system, as he was being identified as being located in the Seattle area, but then his local police also tried dialing their own number only to find themselves chatting it up with their Emerald City colleagues. Until they figure this out, we’d suggest using your landlines — if you still have one of those antiques — or just yelling at passersby for help. Hit the source for the full video report and the 10-digit direct number for Salt Lake City general dispatch.

Update: AT&T has been very nippy in getting this routing problem sorted out, and proper service has been restored. The company is now investigating the cause of this problemo.

[Thanks, Ryan]

AT&T redirecting 911 calls from Salt Lake City to Seattle, working on a fix (update: fix is in) originally appeared on Engadget on Fri, 26 Mar 2010 05:23:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

Popularity: 2% [?]

We got a glimpse at Spracht’s new Aura EQ Bluetooth headset back at CES this year, but in reality, we sort of didn’t — what was being shown back then didn’t constitute final ID, turns out. The company’s back at it here at CTIA showing something closer to what you’ll be seeing on store shelves later this half — though they only had one, and it wasn’t in final retail packaging — so we took a minute to check it out. It’s using the same tricky earbud that we saw before, but the front of the unit has changed significantly — gone are the matte ridges, replaced with a glossy black surface broken up by a few bumps that represent the range of the capacitive volume slider. If “understated” is the look you’re going for, the Aura EQ is generally going to do the trick — and even if you like something a little more edgy, it’s got those funky points on the front and rear. Quite the crowd pleaser, eh?

Spracht Aura EQ (the really real version) hands-on originally appeared on Engadget on Thu, 25 Mar 2010 19:21:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

Popularity: 2% [?]

Look out folks, we’re about to go LTE, and it’s not from where you were expecting: MetroPCS is building out an LTE network in “various metropolitan markets,” with Las Vegas due to go online first in the second half of 2010. Samsung will be doing the infrastructure work, and is running the presser here at CTIA, with a pretty impressive display of room-based LTE show of force. Samsung, as previously announced, will also be building the first 4G handset for the network, dubbed the SCH-r900, though they aren’t sharing any other details about the device at this point. Samsung ran a quick demo of 4G performance using some laptops and a couple of racks of LTE parts (we’ll have video up momentarily), and was also running some sort of LTE prototype (pictured above), though we don’t know squat about it. PR is after the break.

Update: There’s video after the break! Witness those blazing 4G speeds for yourself, you’ll be amazed and astonished. Or at least mildly entertained.

Continue reading MetroPCS bringing LTE to Las Vegas this year, Samsung doing infrastructure and first LTE handset: the SCH-r900

MetroPCS bringing LTE to Las Vegas this year, Samsung doing infrastructure and first LTE handset: the SCH-r900 originally appeared on Engadget on Wed, 24 Mar 2010 11:53:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

Popularity: 1% [?]

AT&T’s teaser site for the Dell Aero has gone live and we have the ability to now fill in a few more gaps in our knowledge about this forthcoming handset. It’s looking every bit the renamed Mini 3 we thought it was, so click here and here to get a closer look at the body of the device. The official web mouthpiece confirms a 3.5-inch screen with nHD resolution — which may or may not signify the same 640 x 360 as on the Brazilian and Chinese versions — and one definite point of departure, a 5 (rather than 3) megapixel camera on the back. Claimed to be the lightest Android smartphone yet, the Aero will also come with WiFi and GPS built in, though its biggest attraction will undoubtedly be the thoroughly tricked out Android UI, which promises Picasa, Flickr, Facebook, YouTube, and Twitpic integration right out of the box. Check out the gallery below for some hints of what that will look like.

[Thanks, Chilko]

Dell Aero is ‘the lightest’ Android phone yet, poses for photos originally appeared on Engadget on Tue, 23 Mar 2010 08:27:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

Popularity: 1% [?]

No, we can’t give you a clear reason why this particular chap did this particular thing, but good gravy, look at the pretty pictures! We’ve encounter an iPhone-inspired font that looks to have been created by collating and color coding a vast collection of apps in order to properly represent the English alphabet. There’s not much info given beyond the app count and the fact it required an architect with “too much free time” on his hands, but we’re not going to begrudge a visual attraction when we can get one. You might be able to get the typography for yourself by contacting the author at the source link, or you can skip past the break to see it on video — if you’re careful enough you should be able to spot the world’s greatest mobile app making a guest appearance.

Continue reading iPhone font created out of 540 apps and a love for the arcane (video)

iPhone font created out of 540 apps and a love for the arcane (video) originally appeared on Engadget on Sun, 21 Mar 2010 21:35:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

Popularity: 1% [?]

Here you go, folks, an official statement from Redmond itself on the perennial Windows Phone 7 Series / copy-and-paste discussion. First and foremost, from the onset, there will be no copy and paste in the traditional sense; Microsoft is hoping to bypass the issue by integrating into the OS contextual, single-tap instances for viewing an address on a map (let’s hope it has some good recognition algorithms here), doing Bing searches based on highlighted terms, dial a phone number, and so on. But the book isn’t entirely closed here, apparently, as the statement goes on to say the company “will continue to improve our feature set over time based on what we hear.” We’ve also got a statement regarding the hacked emulator, to which a representative told us, “we have been very clear that [it] is based on early code and is not reflective of the final user experience,” which is a nice way of saying don’t get your hopes up on those fun tiny surprises (task manager, anyone?). Full statements after the break.

Continue reading Microsoft: Windows Phone 7 series ‘will not initially offer copy and paste,’ case-specific actions integrated into OS

Microsoft: Windows Phone 7 series ‘will not initially offer copy and paste,’ case-specific actions integrated into OS originally appeared on Engadget on Fri, 19 Mar 2010 18:41:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

Popularity: 1% [?]