Technology continues to become more miniaturized day-by-day, with thinner, sleeker gadgets constantly rolling out from the design headquarters of the world’s electronics and computer manufacturers, but it’s dog-gone rare when a company beats its own record and renders its latest merchandise obsolete before it goes on sale.

The suits at Samsung SDI are currently gloating over their compatriots over at Samsung Electronics for coming up with a thinner LCD, creating a display that’s only 0.74 millimeters thick. That’s .08 mm thinner than the 0.82 mm units the Electronics boys …

A recent and interesting study by the Pew Internet & American Life Project has shown that 34% of people that surf the internet in the US have logged in using a wireless connection at one point or another. This percentage includes people using WiFi or cell phone networks at home or at work along with anywhere else, through a PC, laptop or any handheld device.

Of these wireless users, 27% of them have connected wirelessly from somewhere other than home or work, possibly implying that there …

As people that put on frequent air mileage know, making and taking international calls on your cell phone can be a chore at the best of times and impossible at the worst of times. The people at National Geographic certainly have first-hand experience with this frustration, with their video teams traveling to the furthest regions of the globe, so who better to try and solve this dilemma than them?

National Geograhic and Playa del Rey-based Cellular Abroad have come up with a solution with the National Georgraphic Talk Abroad Travel Phone, a …

A Helio branded phone has recently been discovered seeking approval on the FCC website, featuring a new multi-layer design.

The Pantech PN-810 made for Helio appears to be a new smartphone design solution with a unique triad of interfaces. On the face of the phone there is a relatively large 260k TFT LCD display with a handful of navigation buttons, but no keypad. Slide the phone length-wise and it exposes a number pad for dialing, and slide it sideways to expose a full qwerty keyboard. I’d be willing to bet that the …

Since the first flip phone came out in the early 90′s mobile phones just haven’t been the same, and it just wouldn’t be right if the Brick passed up reporting on this retro style 1980′s cell phone. A brick can mean a number of different things; solid and reliable, some gadget rendered useless by time or technology and of course a great big heavy cell phone that makes you taste pennies and forget your name after more than 15 minutes of continuous use.

The 80′s Brick Cell Phone model FY8850 is an actually working mobile …

Three climbers stranded on Oregon’s Mt. Hood after falling from a snowy ledge on Sunday are equipped with Cellular Phones and Mountain Locator Units to aid rescuers.

The three climbers – two women, a man, and a Labrador – are able to maintain contact with rescue officials with a cell phone. The climbers also have at least one mountain locator unit with them to assist rescuers.

Mountain locator units or Personal Locator Beacons (PLB) are lightweight devices that attach to clothing and emit a signal which can help rescuers pinpoint the …

Motorola has announced the new MOTORIZR Z8 from Motorola featuring a sleek design that’s becoming commonplace with Motorola phones, but this one has a slight twist, or more of an angle really.

The Z8 has a “kick slider” design, which slides out to expose the keypad while creating a slight angle to match the contour of the face. The intention here is to make the use of the mobile phone more a little more comfortable, and we’re always happy to see new designs for cell phones, even if it is just a slight change.

The …

The BlackBerry 8800 is the thinnest BlackBerry handset yet and aims to satisfy everyone by combining important features from the successful BlackBerry 8100 and the business-oriented 8700.

The quad-band GSM/GPRS and EDGE-enabled 8800 provides integrated support for voice and data applications, including phone, email, text messaging, web browser, organizer, multimedia, GPS, and more.

Navigation on the 8800 is accomplished through the full QWERTY keyboard and RIM’s trackball navigation system. The landscape display makes it easy to view emails, attachments, pictures, videos, web pages, business applications, and games. A sensor automatically adjusts the brightness …

Ericsson introduced its new Femto Cell Solution on Friday. The new access point will give consumers using GSM and WCDMA phones the ability to make VoIP calls using their mobile phones at home to take advantage of cheaper rates.

The Femto Cell Solution is a personal-sized home access point with WiFi and ADSL compatibility. Ericsson claims that the solution will give operators the opportunity to offer home-zone packages and strengthen its relationship with subscribers and also provide incentives for all users in a household to have the same mobile operator.

Ulf Ewaldsson, Vice …

Market Watch has recently identified a filing to the FCC by Microsoft which adds more fuel to the rumor mill about a potential Zune Phone. What makes this filing even more curious is the fact that Google Inc., Hewlett-Packard Co. and Intel Corp are also listed as taking part in submitting this device to the FCC.

Many speculators have written about a possible phone from Microsoft ever since the release of the iPhone from Apple. The thought is that Microsoft might try to take the same route …

New York State Senator Carl Kruger is looking at banning the use of electronic devices such as mobile phones and digital audio players like the iPod, when crossing streets in New York.

Citing that a number of fatalities in the city have been attributed to people not paying attention to crossing traffic due to personal phones or audio players, the Senator hopes to ban the use of these types of gadgets in city crosswalks in an effort to “look out for the people”.

“While people are …

In a twist on the Comic Book Guy’s famous catch phrase, we are giving praise to some of the best, if not the best, earplug style headphones that we have seen lately. The M-Audio IE-20 XB Reference Earphones are professional grade in-ear style earphones, but they are more than that. They have a large bass driver that makes these earphones really stand out.

Usually earphones lack the low end oomph that larger head phones have. This is not the case with the IE-20 XB, …

Crunchgear got a tip yesterday that a Zune Phone from Microsoft is in the works, and as far as tips go they seem to think this is a pretty solid one. According to the tip, executives from Microsoft are currently working out details of the product and its release.

The gadget site states a number of “known” details about the rumored Zune Phone and it’s launch. First, the new mobile phone would be a smart device that interfaces with the existing Zune product but will not run Windows Mobile, …

Do cell phones cause cancer? That is what the British government wants to know. Some recent studies have raised questions about the safety of cell phones after ten years of use. Specifically, does using a cell phone for ten or more years lead to an increased chance of brain cancer?

Many studies have been conducted over the years, some with conflicting results but the latest consensus is that cell phones are generally safe for use in the short term. The effects of long term usage have yet …

US Auto manufacturers like Ford and GM are hoping hi-tech innovations will put sales into high gear. Ford recently announced a partnership with Microsoft to create Sync, a technology built into Ford vehicles that will allow the interface of devices like mobile phones and iPods to the automobiles sound system.

GM unveiled an all electric car that draws power from an onboard lithium-ion battery (just like an iPod!). GM calls this concept car “Volt.” GM tried and failed once before with its EV1 hybrid car. GM has improved on the …