consumer devices

Adobe's Flash technology, omnipresent in virtually every computer and rapidly moving throughout mobile devices, is now rolling into digital home devices, including televisions and set-top boxes.

Android, Google's open-source operating system for mobile devices, is beginning to spread to other devices. According to a report in Sunday's New York Times, T-Mobile is planning to take the lead in that migration, rolling out Android on a variety of new consumer devices.

Microsoft may not be giving its mobile users what they want -- at least not according to CEO Steve Ballmer -- but it plans to in the near future.

Ballmer talked up Microsoft's upcoming Windows Mobile 6.5 release Wednesday at the U.S. Public Sector CIO Summit held at the company's headquarters in Washington. Ballmer told the audience that although everything users want is not included in the 6.5 release, it will be in Windows Mobile 7.

From what Verizon has said this week about its plans to build out a new wireless network based on Long-Term Evolution (LTE) technology, its 4G technology appears to be on a collision course with the WiMAX technology pushed by Clearwire and Sprint.

Skype is offering its Voice over Internet Protocol service to Android and Java-enabled mobile phones, and to Intel-based Mobile Internet Devices (MIDs). This is the first time the software has been released for mobile users in the U.S.

At the Consumer Electronics Show, Skype announced Thursday the release of a light beta version of Skype for Android and Java-based phones. Java-enabled phones include those from LG, Motorola, Nokia, Samsung and Sony Ericsson.

Call Anywhere

Today's LCD monitors and plasma displays are a substantial evolution from the monochrome CRT relics of PC antiquity. High brightness, support for more than 1 billion colors and sharp resolution are just a few of the latest improvements.

Color-Critical LCD

AT&T and Nokia on Thursday brought the Nokia 6650 to market to compete against other devices launching in time for the holiday shopping season. The small folding device runs on the Symbian-based S60 platform, which lets users personalize their mobile experience with third-party application downloads, themes and profile settings.

AT&T has a board seat on the Symbian Foundation that oversees development of the open-source mobile-phone platform.

SanDisk has rejected an unsolicited $5.85 billion acquisition offer from Samsung as "an opportunistic attempt to take advantage of SanDisk's current stock price, which is significantly depressed given industry cyclicality," the company's board of directors said.

"Honey, let's see what's on the Widget Channel." That dialog is what Intel and Yahoo are hoping for with their announcement Wednesday of an application framework for TVs and other consumer devices called The Widget Channel.

The companies said the framework is optimized for consumer equipment with Intel architecture. The channel is designed to allow users to access and use rich Internet applications, even while watching TV programs.

Yahoo's Widget Engine

Dell officials told the Wall Street Journal this week that the company has been testing a new MP3 player that could become available to consumers as early as this September.

Like Microsoft and Sony, Dell has traveled down this road before without success. And given the current lack of consumer confidence due to the U.S. subprime mortgage crisis, the market outlook for consumer devices has also diminished considerably of late, according to industry observers.