iOS 5 Beta 1 Will Expire On August 4, 2011 [Warning]

We have some serious news for those of you using iOS 5 beta 1 : it expires on August 4, 2011. iOS 5 beta 1 was released at WWDC 2011, and we gave you the download links too. If you activated your UDID and installed the firmware, just keep in mind that the beta has a timebomb attached to it. On August 4, iOS 5 b1 will stop working (meaning that the build will lock you out of your iDevice). Remember to sync and maintain regular backups of all your stuff. Read on for more info.
Read on for all your problems and doubts on this...

Q : Can the timebomb be deactivated ?
A : No. That involves modifying lockdownd, which would cause it to return an invalid signature on boot and therefore brick your iDevice. Unfortunately, we don’t have an iBoot-level exploit for iOS 5 beta 1, so we can’t break the boot chain.

Q : Can I backup my iDevice after the build deactivates itself ?
A : We are not completely sure, most probably it doesn’t.

Q : Will it make a difference if I have a Wi-Fi only iDevice and just change the date and time ?
A : That won’t work.

Q : Will iTunes let me restore iOS 4.3.3 back to my iDevice, and will everything still be there ?
A : Yes! Just plug in your iDevice and click Restore. All of your data will be restored back the way you had it.

Q : Why did Apple timebombed iOS 5 ?
A : Because you’re not supposed to be using them for your personal uses. They are meant to help developers in porting their apps to iOS 5.

Sony Ericsson Xperia Ray and Active Announced: Videos

Sony Ericsson is expanding their Xperia range of devices with the addition of two more Xperia handsets, and has officially announced the Sony Ericsson Xperia Ray and Sony Ericsson Xperia Active, and we have a couple of videos below for your viewing pleasure.
The videos of the Xperia Ray and Xperia Active come our way courtesy of the guys over at Phone Arena and by way of the Sony Ericsson YouTube page, and the Phone Arena guys have come up with the specs for each handset.
So The Sony Ericsson Xperia Ray is like the Xperia Arc in as much as its light at 3.53 ounces and is 9.4mm thick, sports a 1GHz Qualcomm processor and an 8 megapixel Exmor R auto-focus camera with flash and 720p video, with a 3.30-inhc capacitive touch screen, Android 2.3 Gingerbread, A-GPS, WiFi, Bluetooth, turn-by-turn and voice navigation, 300MB built-in memory and microSD expansion up to 32GB.
The Sony Ericsson Xperia Active sports a 3-inch scratch resistant display and is a waterproof handset up to 3 feet for 30 minutes and boasts being able to accurately track the users finger even when wet, and is also dust proof, Android 2.3 Gingerbread OS, 1GHz Cortex-A8 processor, 5 megapixel auto-focus camera with flash and 720p video, GPS and Bluetooth.
No word on a release date for both Xperia devices but apparently they are scheduled for release in Q3 of 2011, and obviously not word on pricing. So there you go, all you need do now is hit those play buttons to check out the two new Android handsets…enjoy.

Symbian Anna coming this July, update for existing Symbian^3 devices in August

Nokia announced Symbian Anna this April along with the Nokia E6 and X7. Today at Nokia Connection in Singapore they have announced that Symbian Anna would ship with new Symbian^3 devices this July and the update for existing Symbian^3 devices like N8, C7 and C6-01 would be available at the end of August.

Symbian Anna would bring some of the new features like split screen and portrait QWERTY keyboard, faster browser, new photo gallery and updates for OVI maps that includes new public transportation routes and Facebook, Twitter and Foursquare sharing. The updated social client would let you view the tweets of your followers in the phone’s contacts.

Some of the features have also been included for business users like Microsoft Communicator Mobile, E-mail enhancements with full meeting request support, hardware accelerated encryption for better security and intranet access.

Nokia N9 Launch Countries – India , USA missing

The Nokia N9 was announced in Nokia Connection 2011 event in Singapore. Nokia also released a check availability page which indicates the countries in which the Nokia N9 is available. Sadly India is missing from that list and even USA. We might wonder that Nokia is working on carrier deals for USA but for India looks like it might be same story like the N900.

The list of countries Nokia N9 will be available are

• Austria
• Bulgaria
• China
• Croatia
• Finland
• Greece
• Hong Kong
• Hungary
• Malaysia
• New Zealand
• Portugal
• Poland
• Romania
• Russia
• Saudi Arabia
• Serbia
• Singapore
• Slovenia
• Sweden
• Switzerland
• UAE
• Vietnam

You can signup to a email notification in Check Availability page if you live in any one of the above listed countries. Anyone from India who interested to buy the N9 ?

The Nokia N9 uses a microSIM Card Slot !

While we are still summing up details about the Nokia N9, one thing we wanted to share ASAP. The N9 uses a microSIM card slot similar to the iPad 3G and iPhone 4. Here is what we found on the official specs page of the N9. It mentions Micro SIM card. No wonder the device is so thin at 12.1mm at the maximum and 7.6 mm at the edges.

Looks like the rumours about more manufacturers jumping on the microSIM ship turned out to be true. Now can we expect Apple to reduce this even further and come up with a nano SIM card in the iPhone 5 ?

Nokia N9: A savior or delusion

So, Nokia finally announced its MeeGo-powered N9 and all of a sudden we're getting all the more excited about the phone, the OS and the company's future as a whole. After today's announcement, we don't doubt that many have already gotten their hopes high for the Nokia N9. While this might be justified indeed, we wouldn't rush it just yet. There are still too many questions that need to be answered, before we know if the Nokia N9 will be ready to serve its purpose as a contemporary feature-packed high-end smartphone (that's what we want, right?), or simply turns out to be a sweet delusion with its attractive unibody construction and competitive spec sheet, but sub-par user experience.
All-touchscreen concept

It goes without saying that what has helped build most of the interest in the handset is its concept of having absolutely no keys to clutter the front. It's just you and that 3.9” AMOLED touchscreen. This, of course, makes the handset look somewhat innovative and intriguing, and we're totally in for it. Whether navigation will be comfortable though is another story. It depends on how it'll be implemented with the interface of the MeeGo OS. From the available demos so far (not much info), we can only say that it looks mostly straightforward. Whether this will be the case with the finalized product still remains to be seen.

The screen plays a vital role when it comes to the positioning of the device on the market. In that aspect, the Nokia N9 seems well-prepared to us with its 3.9” display, which is pretty close to what some of you recently quoted as their most desirable screen size. We also find 3.9 inches to be a good balance between size and comfort. Nokia has been opting for AMOLED tech in its high-end smartphones ever since the N8, and we wouldn't blame it for the most part. AMOLED screens are indeed pretty impressive with their popping colors and high contrast levels, so the Nokia N9 is surely being competitive by counting on this particular screen technology.

One thing we should all be thankful to MeeGo for is that it finally brought Nokia out of the 360x640 world. The N9 will sport a contemporary resolution of 480x854 pixels, but it should be noted that for this screen res to stay relevant (at least in the high-end world), the handset should be released right about... now. Or at least very soon, because qHD phones are already popping up here and there.

We wouldn't waste time discussing the device's build and execution. Nokia has showed us many times that it is capable of crafting beautiful and unique-looking handsets, and as it seems it won't disappoint us with the N9. It's not the hardware that we're uneasy about though, it's the software.

Nokia N9 Meego Phone codenamed Lankku coming tomorrow ?

Looks like Nokia Vietnam has spilled the beans about the upcoming Nokia Meego Phone -- the N9 which is codenamed Lannku. The banner above translates roughly to ” a masterpiece from Nokia
will be introduced on 21 june 2011. Don’t miss it”. The source code on the page confirms the existence of Nokia N9 aka Lannku   We expected the first Nokia Meego phone to be announced MeegoConf last month but it never happened. Nokia is expected to announce a market disrupting device tomorrow June 21st on the sidelines of CommunicAsia. Will it be the N9/N9-01 Meego Phone or the silly 1GHz S40 phone ?

Rumours suggest a QWERTY keyboard or a Touchscreen only device along with a 12 MP Camera.You can also see some nice Meego icons with a touch of Symbian Anna in the video below.

I have also heard that only the developer version of the device will have a QWERTY keyboard and the consumer version will be a touch only device.

Nokia N9 Teaser Video

HTC Sensation Launched in India at Rs.32700

HTC India today launched the much awaited Sensation Android phone in the country. This is the first HTC Dual Core phone to hit the market and it was announced at London few days ago.India launched the Sensation in the Indian market today. The price of the phone is Rs.32700.

Here are the interesting specs of the Sensation.

• 4.3 inch qHD display
• 1.2 GHz Dual Core Qualcomm Processor
• Aluminum unibody design
• HTC Sense 3.0
• HTC Watch Service
• 1GB ROM
• 768 MB RAM
• WiFi (n)
• 8 MP Camera capable of 1080p video recording

It weighs 148 grams and is capable of 3G speeds of 14.4 Mbps, It is powered by a 1520 mAh battery which promises. An Asynchronous Dual Core CPU from Qualcomm means that the two cores of the CPU can run at different speeds which can translate to better performance and battery life. 400 hours of Standby Time and about 7 hours of talktime over 3G and about 8.25 hours over GSM

Motorola Xoom Coming to India this Month

Motorola just informed us that they are  bringing the Motorola XOOM Honeycomb Android Tablet to India later this month. The Xoom was the first Android Honeycomb tablet to be launched and is powered by a 1 GHz Dual Core CPU and features a 10.1 inch display.

Pricing or information regarding the models has not been revealed , but we guess the WiFi only models should arrive first. 

Sony Ericsson XPERIA Duo Leaked

Sony Ericsson is pretty late to the Dual Core phone party but looks like the company might be working on a Dual Core phone which is expected to be called the Xperia Duo according to a rumour. The device looks pretty similar to the ARC with a slightly bigger display.

It has 3 keys for back, home and menu similar to the Arc. Are you looking forward to a Dual Core SE phone ?

I'm not sure whether it’s legit , so do take this news with a grain of salt.

Nokia announces Symbian^3 phones T7-00 and 702T for China

Nokia has announced two Symbian^3 phones Nokia T7-00 and 702T for china. These are TD-SCDMA (Chinese version of W-CDMA) devices. The Nokia T7-00 looks similar to Nokia N8 but the hardware differs from it. The Nokia 702T is the Chinese variant of Nokia E6-00. The Nokia T7-00 leaked this march via OVI publishing tool.Unlike N8′s AMOLED display, the Nokia T7-00 comes with 3.5 inch (640 x 360 pixels) clear black display CBD and comes with 8MP EDoF camera with 720p video recording, Handwriting, QWERTY and ITU (12-key) text input. The outer body is made of aluminium and has an non removable battery, similar to N8.

The Nokia 702T is similar to that of E6 but it is a TD-SCDMA device. It has 2.46 inch (640 x 480 pixels) touch screen, QWERTY keypad with larger Ctrl and function buttons that allow easy switching between Chinese and English during text input. This phone also comes with 8MP EDoF camera with 720p video recording and made of stainless steel and hardened glass similar to E6.

The Nokia T7-00 comes in two colors, black champagne and metal, and Nokia 702T  comes in, white and urban gray. These phone would be available in Q3 of 2011 and would ship with the Symbian Anna.

Nokia N8 Getting 30FPS Video And Continuous Auto-Focus

The Nokia N8 smartphone is very well known for its exceptional camera quality allowing the device to take fabulous pictures almost on par with professional cameras thanks to its Carl Zeiss optics.

Nokia's mobile camera guru Damien Dinning was talking unofficially about the N8's camera and mentioned that the smartphone will be getting an update. The refresh will further improve the already great camera but this time in terms of video capturing as 30FPS would be added for smoother playback as well as continuous auto-focus. "There wil be an N8 specific update coming which will. You need the code from Anna though" says Damien and we can't wait for it to get out there on the phones. 


Source: Twitter
Via: MyNokiaBlog

iOS 5 (iPhone 4) Unlock with Gevey SIM Pro: illegal

A new SIM called the Gevey Pro will unlock the iPhone 4 on iOS 5, the SIM is only $28 but a warning is issued here.
The Gevey SIM has been said to be illegal, and we here at PhonesReview recommend not using this SIM to unlock the iPhone 4 on iOS 5, your choice and your risk of course, in a nutshell please do not kill the messenger.
If you visit Redmond Pie, a reader sent in some screenshots of his own Apple iPhone 4 being unlocked using the Gevey SIM. This SIM also works without the need of a jailbreak, please visitApplenBerry for more information.

The Gevey Pro Features: More Stable, Compatible with more Sim, Minor bug Fix, and the package content includes Custom GEVEY Sim Tray, Instructional Booklet and a GEVEY Pro Sim.
Please let us know what you think of the above, will use the new Gevey Pro SIM to unlock your iPhone 4 on iOS 5?

How to: Jailbreak iPhone 3GS, 4 iPad, iPod Touch Running on iOS 5 with Redsn0w 0.9.8b1

iPhone-Dev Team has just released a new version of Redsn0w (Redsn0w 0.9.8b1) to jailbreak iOS 5. This version is only available for Mac so far.  Please note that, this is a tethered jailbreak, and for people who rely on carrier unlock, stay away from Redsn0w.

The following devices are supported according to iPhone Dev Team:

• iPod touch 3G
• iPod touch 4G
• iPad 1
• iPhone3GS
• iPhone4 (GSM)
• iPhone4 (CDMA)

First you need to have the following things with you:

1. iTunes 10.5 Beta [Download from Here]
2. Redsn0w  for Windows [Download from Here]
3. iOS 5 for iPhone, iPod & iPad, Download from Here (Apple Developer Account Required)

Now follow the steps mentioned below:

1. Connect and Restore/Update your iPhone to iOS 5.

2. Once iTunes has completed the restoring/updating process, open Redsn0w.

3. Click the ‘Browse‘ button and select the iOS 5 you downloaded.

4. You will see the screen below when the firmware has been verified.

5. Now check ‘Install Cydia‘ and click Next.

6. Switch off  your device and plug it into the computer, Click Next.

7. Now Redsn0w will guide you through series of process to get into DFU mode. All you have to do is to follow the on-screen instructions as shown below.

8. Once you have followed the on-screen instructions, your device will reboot. Redsn0w will start uploading the new RAM Disk and Kernel. Just wait till you see the below screen.

Now your iOS 5 device has been successfully jailbroken (tethered). If you face any problem while performing the jailbreak process just write us in the comment section below, we will help you out.

Apple iMessage Rival Coming For Android?

As most will know Apple unveiled their new iMessage in iOS 5 at WWDC 2011, and well as Apple practically stole Android notifications, it’s only fair that Android steal iMessage, right? Apparently the rumour doing the rounds is Google is also working on their own BlackBerry Messenger, iMessage type rival.
According to the guys over at Slash Gear, sources have informed the Wall Street Journal that sources of the unnamed variety have said that the Android platform maker Google “has also recently worked on a messaging application.”
Other than that though there are no further details on what the new messaging application would look like or when Android users would be likely to see it.
As far as I see it, if Android comes up with a messaging service that cuts out the need to SMS or MMS it’s obviously good for the user as long as they keep it free like Apple’s iMessage. However on the down side, carriers are not going to be too happy if every user switches from SMS and MMS to free messaging as this will undoubtedly cost the carrier lost messaging revenue.
Still as they say, all’s fair in the mobile world, and as Apple nicked Android notifications, Apple can’t say much about Android doing the same with messaging can they, although as Android users have access to Gmail and Gtalk I’m not too sure what another messenger could offer. More on this as and when we hear.