Low on money for lunch? Find out how much is in your bank account quick!

Ever been out to lunch or wanting to get the latest DVD, but you weren’t sure if you had enough money in your bank account? Well, Ahli United Bank may have eliminated that problem by the use of your cell phone and SMS. All you have to do is send a text message to your bank and they will text you back. After selecting from a menu of options, you’ll be able to see your account balance in no time. The system can automatically notify you of credits and payments from your account, as well as view your balance, and conduct different transactions. The service will be available in English and Arabic, and is including free in all of their banking packages.

[Read more from AME Info]

MMS your pic to your online dating profile! EasyDate

The UK’s largest online dating service, EasyDate, boasting almost a million singles across its network of online dating sites, last month introduced a new facility to help their customer’s upload images of themselves direct from their mobile phones, via MMS, to their online dating profiles.

The idea has first been implemented on - youcangetme.com. Sean Wood, EasyDate’s Marketing Manager explains:

We realised by the number of photos we received in the post that not all our members had access to a scanner or a digital camera, so we looked at options that would give them the easiest possible method of completing their profile and increasing their chances of finding a date online. It occured to us that most mobile phones had integrated cameras so this was definitely the way to go.

Our initial trials have proven very successful so we are now implementing this technology across our network of sites.

Youcangetme.com also provides “SMS Text flirting” between it’s registered members, making further use of mobile technologies in the implementation of its matchmaking services.

I think this a great idea. Nearly all handsets have a built-in camera these days, and sending a pic by MMS is a snap. Camera’s in mobile phones are improving in quality every month. Mind you, it could work to your advantage having an older handset with a lower quality camera. A bit of low-light noise introduced into your dating profile pic maybe helps disguise some of the blemishes…!

If you are single and in need of a date - check out their services.

[Full details of EasyDate’s press release at PRWeb]

Cingular offers BlackBerry Connect for Palm Treo 650

This week saw the joint announcement by Cingular Wireless and RIM of the introduction of BlackBerry Connect for users of the Palm Treo 650. Push email services are critically important for many mobile professionals and this new service will be welcome news for all Treo 650 fans.

Among other things, BlackBerry Connect provides:

• Push Corporate Email Services
• Wireless Calendar Synchronization
• Attachment Viewing
• Remote Address Lookup

Tim Roper US Region Vice President of Palm said during the announcement:

“Treo 650 already is one of the most compelling mobile-computing devices available today for business users, and the BlackBerry Connect functionality gives Cingular customers another great reason to adopt Treo as a vital business-productivity tool.”

Cingular has unlimited BlackBerry Connect services starting at $44.99 per month. The Palm Treo 650 with Cingular can be bought on Amazon starting at $44.99 on a new plan. More information on the services are available from PalmOne and Cingular.

[Source Cingular Press Release]

Frucall adds new services…

Further to our earlier posting, Frucall today announced the introduction of several additional new features to their mobile, voice-based price comparison shopping services.

Frucall Text - allows users to receive price comparison info, (previously only available in audio) via text message delivered to their handset. This convenient features removes the need to have a pen and paper handy to jot down the pricing info or having to commit anything to memory, instead providing a handy text-message version for ease of reference throughout your shopping experience.

Also announced was new buddy list and messaging functionality:

Frucall Buddy List Messaging lets users send voice and text messages to friends, families and groups they define. Users can record voice or text messages that are sent instantly to everyone within their selected Buddy List groups. Buddy List Messaging works on all phones and is not limited to phone numbers on the same carrier network. Normal carrier charges apply to receiving text messages.

Thanks to Michael @ Frucall for the heads up, and good luck with the new services.

Further details can be found here.

TV Guide by SMS - 4INFO

Mobile search provider 4INFO have added another great feature to their growing list of mobile search and information services - TV Guide info by SMS.

By texting a simple message to 4INFO (44636) comprised of the command ‘tv’ + ‘the name of the show’ + ‘user’s zip code’, 4INFO will respond within a few seconds with the a list of providers servicing that zipcode area. The user is then prompted to select a provider from the menu of choices. On replying the user then receives an SMS detailing the airtimes for the requested show for the next few days.
More…

Samsung ‘Super music phone’ SCH-B570 - released in Korea

Korean electronics manufacturer, Samsung today announced the launch of it’s feature packed ‘Super Music Phone’ the SCH-B570. Complete with advanced audio, picture in picture video and multimedia support the B570 also sports *ahem* Golf Manager (?) a tool for managing golf scores and driving distances on Korean golf courses (using its built-in GPS).

With a whopping 8Gb of memory, this has to be the largest built-in storage facility on any cell phone to date. Samsung claims the massive drive can hold:

• 1,600 mp3 files (at 4Mb per song) or
• 16 Personal Media Player (at 400Mb per movie)
• or more than 20,000 x 300kb digital photos

Specifications:

• 1xEV-DO Mobile broadband
• 2 Megapixel Camera
• 1.98“ Display 240×320 resolution, 262K Color
• Size: 112 x 48 x 19.9 mm
• Weight: 130 g

The phone sports a myriad of other features including:

8GB Hard drive disk, Satellite DMB / Picture In Picture / Personal Media Player, Motion Recognition Technology, GPS, VOD/MOD, MP3, Document Viewer, Mobile printing and TV out.

And if Golf Manager wasn’t enough, Samsung’s also revealed another curious feature:

Samsung also presented the ‘motion recognition capability’ by introducing the new ‘morning call motion detector snooze alarm’. When the alarm clock rings, users can turn it off simply by shaking the phone, then alarm will automatically alert again a few minutes later.

Other features aside, it’s hard to believe that this device doesn’t have Apple’s rumored iPod/Phone in its sights, and maybe THIS will be just the device to rattle Apple’s cage and make them announce something. Just how much storage will the new iPhone have?

The SCH-B570 will be released in Korea for around USD800 in the next few days.

Sprint’s Palm Treo 700wx with GPS - Vodafone/Cingular Treo 750 on the way?

Sprint are expected to release the new Palm Treo 700wx next week with a host of great new features included double the RAM from the 700w and built-in GPS. sprintusers.com has what looks to be an official specs sheet. This new PDA will operate on the Sprint EV-DO Mobile Broadband network and have access to Sprints Power Vision network services.

The 700wx is expected to be released to business customers from 27 August with an offering at retail sales outlets from 3 September.

Treo 750…

In other Treo news, the Treo 750 is expected to be released in just two weeks time 12 September for the European market on Vodafone’s 3G network. As expected, the 750 will run Windows Mobile 5.0. While no official details have been released, it is hoped that the 750 will be an antenna-less design and have built-in wifi - something that has been lacking from all Treo handsets to date.

Reuters reports:

Palm is to launch the new handset to Vodafone customers in a number of European countries including the U.K., Germany, Spain, Italy and Netherlands as it attempts to win back the confidence of a market it once dominated with its Palm Pilot device.

PDAStreet is speculating that shortly after it’s release, Cingular users should expect a US version…

Digg2Phone - get your Digg fix on your fone

Digg2Phone is a new service allowing registered members to receive SMS alerts on stories currently doing the rounds on Digg.com. Use it to track your own stories, see when stories hit the home page, track new comments or see when a story gets buried etc.

As Digg2Phone say:

Digg2Phone is for the digg addicts who can’t watch the digg spy all day.

With Digg2Phone, you can choose which stories you want us to follow for you, and we’ll text message you when something happens.

The service is not yet available to the public, but they are looking for beta testers. No details yet on a public release. Another fun non-telephony way to use your handset…

[More from Digg2Phone]

Phone Friday! News & reviews on some phones

HTC release the Excalibur, better than the Q?

The Excalibur is HTC’s version of the Q, but appears to blow the Q out of the water. This thin smart phone comes with Windows Mobile and a full QWERTY keybaord. It also will have Mi-FI and Bluetooth, and like the Q it will have a method for one handed navigation. The Excalibur will have a touch sensitive scroll pad including home and back keys as well.
The Excalibur is rumored to launch with Sprint in the US by the end of the year, but no word on an exact date or price.

[Thanks for Geek.com for the pictures, and check out HTC’s website for more of their sleek phones.]

LG releases some white chocolate

Although this may not be the Chocolate, the LF1300 certianly has some flavor. The LF1300 comes with a 2-inch QVGA display, 1.3 megapixel camer, SD expansion, Bluetooth, and of course, an MP3 Player.

This slider measures 98 x 48 x 16.9mm and will be available through CYON. The LF1300 is said to be released only in Korea, and no word on pricing as of now.

[Picture and story from I4U.com]

Milk chocolate from Sony Ericsson?

Well this also isn’t the Chocolate, but Sony Ericsson has released a milk chocolate colored phone, calling it the K800i. It comes with a brilliant 3.2 megapixel camera, UMTS high-speed data, and and MP3/MPEG4 player.

The K800i will be released in Hong Kong and Taiwan.

[Picture from Gizmodo.com]

Blackberry’s Precious Pearl - 8100, no longer just a number

Employees at RIM have let details slip of the soon to be released Blackberry 8100 a.k.a Blackberry Pearl. The Pearl has a number of features that people have been longing to have included in their Blackberry’s - a camera, external storage and other multimedia goodies - the perfect mix of business and pleasure.

Features include:

• EDGE mobile broadband data services
• Bluetooth
• microSD card support
• Camera with built-in flash

Engadget has scooped the leaked RIM internal release (officially under embargo until 18 September) and has the full details. Here’s a snippet describing the new unit:

The BlackBerry Pearl is a very cool, incredibly small, easy-to-use smartphone. It comes complete with digital camera, multimedia capabilities and expandable memory. And it, of course, offers the full BlackBerry experience – including email, phone, web browser, text messaging, organizer applications and much more. This year, give your loved one the gift of freedom – with the BlackBerry Pearl they can do all the things they “have to do” and more of the things they “want to do.”

This adds just a few more reasons that will prevent “crackberries” from kicking the habit!

Due for release next month through T-Mobile first and then presumably Cingular some time later, the Pearl will have a retail tag of US$199.

[More from Engadget]

Sprint to announce building of a WiMax network

Sprint is scheduled to announce later today that it is choosing the WiMax technology to build a brand new wireless internet network. Although this will not be available until 2008, this is definitely something to look forward to. Sprint will be working with Motorola and Samsung using Intel chips to make headsets that are compatible. The service is said to be available nationwide (in the United States), and could even replace cable and DSL.

[To read more, check out dailywireless.org]

New system to deliver cell phone photos to 911 operators

There are over 370 million camera phones in use worldwide, and increasingly they are being used to communicate news as it breaks.

In July 06, the London bombings saw images of the devastation being uploaded from cell phones to blogs and sites like Flickr as the event unfolded, and many cell phone recorded video clips made the mainstream broadcast news.

PowerPhone who specialise in software and training for 911 operators, have developed a new system named Cell Phone Delivery (CPD) allowing callers to send photos from a camera equipped cell phone handset via email direct to the console of the 911 operator, providing the operator with far more accurate information from the scene of a crime or emergency than a mere verbal description might allow.

“Citizens are now the eyes and ears for our 9-1-1 operators — and camera phone photos are going to be an important part of improving safety and security.” Chris Salafia, PowerPhone’s president and CEO

[More from PRWeb]

Franklin helps fill the gap with new CDU-550 USB EV-DO Modem

Wireless broadband manufacturer, Franklin Wireless, anounced on Friday the launch of their new USB 1x EV-DO modem, the CDU-550, a first for the industry.

This new modem released under a partnership with Sprint, who now have the largest mobile network in the US (Sprint Power Vision Network), offers high speed wireless internet access to laptops that do not have PCMCIA card slots, offering instead a USB interface. The card will have immediate benefit for those with new MacBook Pro laptops where a PCMCIA slot was dropped in favour of the incoming ExpressCard/34 format interface.

The Sprint Power Vision Network now covers 153 million people and services customers in 220 major metropolitan areas as well as 470 airports across the nation, the most of any carrier.

[Press release from Franklin-Wireless]

Welsh shop worker fired by SMS

21 yr old Kate Tanner, a shop worker at Blue Banana (a clothing store) in Cardiff, Wales was recently fired from her job by SMS.

The company defended the decision by saying that they had tried to call Ms Tanner several times before texting to say that since her performance hadn’t been up to scratch they had to let her go. Although not their general policy the company explained that it was an appropriate last resort method of communicating their decision given the circumstances and because SMS messaging is considered such a large part of “youth culture”.

The terminating text:

“Hi katy its alex from the shop. Sorry 2 do this by text but ive been trying to call u + ur phones been switched off. Ive had a meeting with jon + ian and weve reviewed your sales figures and they’re not really up to the level we need. As a result we will not require your services any more. You will receive your last pay packet on friday 28th july. Thank you for your time with us”

What next? Your boss putting comments on your Blog or your MySpace profile? How about a slightly more personal message from your boss on YouTube?

[Full story from icWales]

Yet more iPhone speculation - could THIS be the one?

The web is abuzz once again with yet more dubious, ‘top-secret’ images of the much anticipated Apple cell phone. Just take a look at Flickr. More pictures of a new supposed, handset dubbed ‘iChat Mobile’ have surfaced along with a scratchy video on YouTube of someone supposedly wielding one.

These new images feature a phone sporting iPod shuffle like controls along with a keypad that would presumably have a similar feel to the click controls of a traditional iPod.

The thing that seems to have most people puzzled is the appearance of what looks to be an iSight camera on the rear in combination with the name iChat. The camera could either be a traditional camera, as we’ve come to expect in most handsets, OR maybe this is for a Wifi/VoIP/Skype like application (akin to iChat proper) offering video conferencing facilities and not a cell phone at all….but, then shouldn’t the camera be on the front so you can see the other caller while they see you?

While, I like really like the look of this thing, to me the corners look far too sharp to be slipped in and out of a pocket and the handset looks to be the size of a very large remote control. Apple’s specialty is designing functional, stylish and practical technology and this to me doesn’t fit the mould and the whole package just doesn’t add up.

As convincing as this unit looks, I’m gonna go out on a limb and say that this is not THE cell phone we have all been expecting. We’re itching to see what Apple really has in store for us though. Roll on WWDC…