ie8 fix

Windows Phone

Acer to launch Win 8 tablets with smaller screens this year

Acer plans to launch Windows 8 tablets with smaller screen sizes in the second half of the year, an executive said Friday.

Such devices will feature touch screens smaller than 10 inches, Emmanuel Fromont, Acer president for the Pan America region, and Sumit Agnihotry, Acer vice president of product marketing, told CNET in an interview following an Acer product launch event in New York.

They likely will cost below $400 -- the typical entry point for Windows tablets today -- and will be pushed as productivity devices that link to the traditional PC world more easily than Android devices, the … Read more

Smartphones banned? Not in this primary-school class

It's not unusual for schools to ban mobile devices during class, but it's a different story at Nan Chiau Primary School in Singapore. Here, 350 third-graders gaze and poke at Windows phones while their science teacher elaborates on their assignments for the day. The students are free to shoot photos and videos using their Nokia Lumia 710 smartphones to help them remember what they've learned.

Using an app called myDesk -- developed by undergraduates at the University of Michigan -- the students make diagrams and concept maps, as well as append text and photos to their assignments. Teachers are also able to use the app to review the work submitted and leave feedback. … Read more

Nokia schedules London Lumia event for May 14

Nokia's Lumia 920 may not be its top flagship smartphone for long. The Windows Phone handset maker announced on Thursday that it will hold a May 14 event to show off the next device in its growing Lumia line.

Nokia introduced a pair of budget Lumia phones in February at Mobile World Congress -- the Lumia 720 and Lumia 520. This time, the Finnish company stays closer to home by planning its big reveal for London.

We don't know much more about the event or the smartphone that Nokia plans to trot out, but the most popular (and … Read more

Nokia hints at U.S. flagship phone even as sales lag

Nokia is still struggling in the U.S., but there's hope that another flagship phone is on its way.

CEO Stephen Elop said on a conference call Thursday that this current quarter will mark a season of new product introductions. Most importantly, he hinted at a phone carrying "hero," or flagship, status with a leading U.S. carrier.

The product is likely to be the rumored variant of the Lumia 920 for Verizon Wireless. The phone is important because it gets Nokia into the nation's largest wireless carrier in a much bigger way, carrying with it … Read more

Nokia shipped 5.6M Lumias during first quarter

Nokia reported its latest first-quarter earnings on Thursday, sending a clear signal to partner Microsoft that it continues to struggle to get back on the track.

This comes only a few days after Microsoft -- Nokia's partner in the smartphones -- said that it believes the Finnish phone maker is a "great" company and partner and that Microsoft has no plans to launch a Surface-branded smartphone of its own.

Lumia shipments were up by more than 25 percent to 5.6 million shipments during the first quarter, up from 4.4 million during the fourth quarter.

By … Read more

Nokia's next flagship to have 41-megapixel camera, quad-core?

Nokia could at long last migrate the gigantic lens from its 808 PureView Symbian smartphone over to a more modern smartphone design.

According to the latest Nokia smartphone rumor, obtained from a source by My Nokia Blog, the company's forthcoming "Eos" is intended to feature a 41-megapixel camera sensor. On the 808 PureView, this lens captures incredible detail and provides lossless cropping.

The Eos could also possess a quad-core Snapdragon 800 processor, though after testing, My Nokia Blog posits that Nokia could release it as a dual-core device after all.

Other rumored features include a 1,280x768-pixel … Read more

Nokia Lumia 520 review: One of the best budget phones around

When Nokia first unveiled its Nokia Lumia 520 this past February, the Windows Phone proved that Nokia could achieve new lows.

That's only when it comes to price, though, not features. As CNET UK discovered while fully reviewing the Lumia 520, Nokia has managed to create a very inexpensive handset that will sell in the U.K. for about 100 pounds at full retail price.

In U.S. currency, that translates to just under $200 without a contract. Luckily for us Yankees, a variant of this 520 is coming to T-Mobile in May, off-contract, as the Nokia Lumia 521.… Read more

Nokia Lumia 720 review: Sleek, but not the best value in town

With all the Nokia Lumia phones out and about right now, it's hard to keep track of what's what. Luckily, CNET UK's Andrew Hoyle puts the Nokia Lumia 720 into perspective in his full review of the midrange smartphone.

The Windows 8 phone looks sleek and familiar, more akin to Nokia's high-end Lumia 920 than the upper-midrange 820 series. It offers more than the forthcoming 520 and budget 620, but not so much over these latter two that wallet-watchers should lose focus.

In other words, the decent camera, user-friendly interface, and bevy of Nokia-only apps do … Read more

Microsoft's tweener plans for Surface and Windows Phone

With Windows Blue and a coming Windows Phone 8 update, Microsoft will give legs to its plan to enable OEMs -- including Microsoft itself -- to support a burgeoning category of tweener devices, including mini tablets and big-screen smartphones.

Just a year ago, Microsoft execs were pooh-poohing the advantage of smaller screen sizes for Windows devices, claiming smaller screens wouldn't allow users to handle adequately both creation and consumption tasks. But in the face of robust demand for mini tablets from its competitors, Microsoft execs changed their tune. Now the message is that Windows 8 was designed from the outset to run on smaller and bigger screens at different resolutions, … Read more

T-Mobile will sell budget Nokia Lumia 521 in May

T-Mobile announced this morning that it will soon carry the Nokia Lumia 521, a variant of the Nokia Lumia 520 that the company announced in February at Mobile World Congress.

That T-Mobile would carry a version of the phone is nothing new, but now we know that the phone will be available sometime in May at Walmart and Microsoft stores in addition to T-Mobile's Web site and stores.

T-Mobile isn't answering questions about pricing details just yet, but Nokia said it will sell the 520 unlocked for just 139 euros without a contract. That works out to about $… Read more