HTC today revealed the HTC TITAN II, an LTE variant of its big screen Windows Phone device. The device will be available shortly on the AT&T network in the US. The standout feature is, of course, LTE connectivity, which brings support for faster cellular data connections. Other key specifications include a 16 megapixel camera, 4.7" SUPER LCD screen, 16GB of memory, a 1.5GHz processor and 512MB of RAM.
The roll out for a minor update for Windows Phone, version 7.10.8107.79, commenced last week. Microsoft has delivered the 8107 update to all manufacturers and operators, but it is optional, which means it may not be made available for all devices. The update fixes a number of bugs including the one that occasionally caused the keyboard to disappear when entering text. In addition Microsoft has made some changes to the way it will be communicating about the delivery of future minor updates.
The Windows Phone Marketplace has now passed the 50,000 app and games submission mark. Content is being added at the rate of 265 items per day. At the time of writing, 50,126 items have been published. Of these, 17,276 were added in the last 90 days and 8,010 were added in the last 30 days. These items come from 13,002 different publishers.
The 50,000 mark, which has been reached sooner than we estimated, is a key milestone, but more important is the accelerating growth of the Marketplace. It took just over a year to get to 40,000 apps, but just 40 days to add the next 10,000 apps. That bodes well for Windows Phone in 2012.
We're going to see a lot of "Windows Phone smartphone market share will be X% in 2012" stories in the next week or two as writers move through the retrospectives and opinions, and Digitimes pitches in with their prediction today (they're going with 6.2%, if you're keeping track). The one thing to keep in mind on all of these is this... nobody can tell the future, or what is going to happen to any platform. "Events, dear boy" will drive the percentages as much as smoothing out curves and following the mathematical trends. But we can have fun making our own guesses.
The Nokia Lumia 710 will be available on T-Mobile USA, from January 11th 2012, at a cost of $49.99 (after a $50 mail-in-rebate card). It will be Nokia's first Windows Phone product in the US and is an important milestone for the company as it looks to rebuild its smartphone market share in the competitive US market.
Nokia's second Windows Phone handset, the Nokia Lumia 710, has now started shipping. Initially it is going on sale in Taiwan, with Singapore, Hong Kong, India and Russia following in the next seven days. A global roll-out will follow in the weeks and months ahead. The Nokia 710, with an estimated retail price (before taxes and subsidies) of €270 / £230 / $360, offers a more affordable option for those looking to buy a Windows Phone device.
After a happy online jumble of "it's coming, it should be here today, it's here for me, is it in the Marketplace?" from various sites, tweets and Facebook status updates, you can finally pick up the Xbox Companion App for your Windows Phone... and iOS devices. Using your Windows Phone as an alternative controller (think of it like a TV remote rather than gaming controller), the app will allow you to search Bing, browse content from the Marketplace, and control media playback on the Xbox.
Everyone's favourite flight simulator for Windows Phone, Infinite Flight, just got itself a big update, v2.1 (changelog below), adding in two major new planes as well as a number of enhancements and fixes. You can grab the update yourself by going into 'Marketplace' on your Windows Phone and looking for 'Updates' at the bottom of the home screen.
We all knew that Windows Phone Mango included 'Internet sharing', i.e. Wi-fi tethering, but the functionality hasn't so far been available to handsets which 'updated' to Mango (rather than shipping with it) - and Internet sharing is also dependent on the chipset in your phone. However, there's an update rolling out around the world from HTC for the editorial HD7 and 7 Mozart, I applied it yesterday, screenshot proof below (from the HD7). It seems that tethering is a 'go'.
After celebrating its first anniversary by passing the 35,000 app mark in mid October, the Windows Phone Marketplace has now passed the 40,000 app and games submission mark. Content is being added at the rate of 165 items per day. In the last 30 days, 85% of submissions were apps and 15% were games; 68% were free, 23% were paid and 9% were paid with free trial.
