What a great way to start off the week, free stuff! Via RetailMeNot we have a collection of coupon codes that you can use when ordering a new wireless service or plan. RetailMeNot has a great collection of coupons for all sorts of wireless products, like AT&T, Verizon, and many more.

This is interesting. Apparently there is a problem in some places with iPhones and dropped calls. So much so that the people at the Apple store are telling people that the dropped call rate is 30%. This seems incredibly high and that most people would find this unacceptable.

Also, the fact that The Apple store seems to shrug this off as problem that AT&T needs to address is astounding. It may very well be true that it is an AT&T problem, but the Apple folks should spearhead the effort to resolve this for their customers. Especially if, as it appears to be the case, the iPhone is more prone to dropped calls then other phones.

The article doesn't mention other phone, but the comments section does include some anecdotal evidence indicating that other phones don't experience similar drop ratios. Whatever the case may be, AT&T and Apple should get together and find a solution to lower the rate.

(Source: Poll Technica: iPhone dropped calls—is 30% normal? Defensible?)

The researchers at Stanford come through again. This time with research that will help keep people attentive to their driving if they should be talking on their cell phones. The researchers found that people will become more attentive if the direction of the sound changes. Specifically, people would pay more attention to a sound at the same level as their ears, if that sound moved down, the people learned that there was something needing their attention. Of course, this means the car has to be able to sense that traffic conditions require the attention of the driver!

Found a Wonderful collection of Cell Phone themes, Wallpapers, and Ringtones at www.mobile9.com. I particularly liked this Ying Yang Moon image and I am uploading it to my phone now.

This will certainly bring another zen aspect to my phone, I've already got a zen ring tone that was provided with the HTC Pure.

On an unrelated publishing note:

I am working on the problem of text bleeding into the third column, This appears on some browsers, but not on others. I am working on installing updates for Joomla, and for my template. I am sorry for this annoyance and hope to have it cleared up soon.

Thanks for Visiting! I apperciate your support.

Tim.

We are about to see mobility going to a whole new level as new multi-core processors will bring more speed and memory to mobile phones. The ARM® Cortex™-A5 MPCore™ processor was announced by the company that makes just about all the CPUs for the mobile devices that we have come to rely upon.

You can read all the juicy details here. And if you are able to understand the whole NEON 128-bit SIMD and Mali-VE6 video engines, I congratulate you. I will remain happy with the fact that my phone. Meanwhile, I will marvel in the fact that they are able to dramatically increase the performance of the processor while decreasing power consumption, which is very important in mobile devices.

Another awesome feature of this new chipset, is that it will be compatible with applications developed for previous chips in the Cortex line. This will allow for rapid inclusion of the chip into new devices because there will be minimal software development.

Okay, I think I've satiated my need for geekiness for today!

The Garmin Blog for the Nuvifone will provide some great information about this sweet phone.

You can check out the latest commercials, and find other great information on this one-of-a-kind phone.

The Nuvifone(TM) G60 is only available from AT&T. You will be able to get the latest traffic and weather updates. Plus, you can even look up fuel prices for your location.

This phone has all the features of a regular mobile and the world-class navigation from the experts at Garmin.

Visit http://www.wireless.att.com/ For availablilty information and other details.

Now comes www.trapster.com. A smartphone app to report and discover police traffic check points.

They appear to have most smart phones covered: iPhone, Windows Mobile, Android, and Blackberry. They can even download information to most GPS systems.

I was wonering how the police would react to such a service. One quote on the trapster site addresses this:

"If someone slows down because of it, it's accomplishing the same goal of trying to get people to obey the speed limit"
Bill Johnson - Executive director of the National Association of Police Organizations

But, of course, the danger is people not slowing down when they don't see a trap marked. The police could flood this system with false information. Thereby negating the ability to rely on the information presented by this service. In any case, when driving, I revert to these four words of wisdom for safe travelling:

 "Honk less, Yield More!"

(Thanks to Blue Ridge Wireless for bringing this to my attention!)

Here is a panorama shot from my new HTC Pure. Quite a nice little feature.

I just received the HTC Pure, today. So far, it is pleasing to me. I am sure that a few adjustments are necessary for me to be totally comfortable, but there are several wow factors that I can already share.

Panaroma view

I hope to share some images taken with the 5 Megapixel camera in panorama mode soon, today was kind of a drippy rainy day, and I didn't think people wanted to see a panorama of my desk! We'll be deep into the fall colors soon, so I'll have plenty of opportunity for nice pictures soon.

Teeter

Okay, this is kind of a silly thing, but the Teeter game is simply awesome. My kids are going to go crazy over it! I'm sure that the motion detection can be implemented in much more productive ways. For now, I'll enjoy maneuvering the ball around it's little obstacle course!

Touch Screen 

The screen is very nice and quite an improvement over my last phone (Samsung Blackjack) The touch feature seems to be suitable, although the keyboard is small and seems to create typing errors. This is no worse than any other touch phone I've tried though.

The only problem so far that I've experienced is with the web browser - it has faulted twice. However, the phone was nice enough to send a note off to Microsoft describing the problem. Maybe they'll be able to fix it! So yes, this is Windows Mobile 6.5! I'm assuming there will be the usually little tweaks to the OS in the next couple of months.

Yet to be determined is the battery life and other useability factors (screen in sunlight, GPS, etc) I'll keep posting as I go!

The ultra rugged Sonim RPS series of phones will take whatever you can dish!

Plus, enjoy this slick video!

You've got to love the shout out to Noah!

Today brings a press release promising an Android based phone for all you verizon customers out there!

Although no specifics were included about he phone, several rumors persist that the Motorola sholes phone will be available by Christmas.

Apple iPhone 3GS - 16 GB - Black

Now, you can get an iPhone online with two-year activation for $199.00!

You don't have to mess with the folks at the Apple store, and there are no AT&T agents fend off!

Buy straight from your computer, now, and get a great deal.

Using your cell phones camera to transcribe whiteboard information: Two internet services that will take your picture and give you a searchable document.

http://www.evernote.com/

http://www.qipit.com/

Many thanks to the guys at Blue Ridge Wireless for some excellent points about cell phones that have been immersed in water:

'Wet phones are ecomonically beyond repair. All electrical circuits are suspect, need to be traced for shorts. Capacitors, internal batts store current & short boards, traces can delaminate, there can be a lack of circuit continuity...Our white paper is coming soon'

In short, you should no longer rely on a cell phone that has been soaked. The phone may fail at any given point without notice. You don't want to be stuck in an emergency situation with an unreliable cell phone!

Be sure to visit http://www.blueridgewireless.com/ for more information.

A very good article on how to block spam from getting to your cell phone. (via The New York Times)

How to save a wet cell phone (from Wikihow.) The first step is always the most important: Get the water out as soon as possible!

But, this article does point out a few things that you might not think of in your panic to save the phone. Most importantly: Remove the battery! 

Next we have the water resistent Fugitsu F730i Cell Phone. A phone that practically begs to take a shower with the pretty ladies!

Of course, there are other rugged cell phones out there, but none seem to have the style that the F730i has. I guess we will have to wait and see if it comes to the States!

Various websites that have caught my eye over the past couple of days:

5 best ways to get free ringtones (via zeropaid)

 Most Expensive IPhone Apps (Courtesy Annafra)

Intuit GoPayment - Allows you to accept credit card payments from your cell phone.

This is an impressive number. Actually, lots of impressive numbers: "It took Apple 74 days to rack up these half billion downloads, and 82 days to get the previous half billion."

The number of downloads is accelerating. Here is the press release from Apple.

Also, note that Apple has sold 17 million iPhones and 13 million iPod touch. That's 30 Million devices that can run apps from the App Store. That's roughly 60 apps per device!

(Thank you, Joy of Tech!)