Thought you might be interested in either reading and / or posting the news of the latest review....................
The O2 Xda Stellar
O2 have been renowned for innovation over the years with the creation and development of the Xda series of machines. The last twelve months or so however have seen few machines being released which look to be current compared to machines being offered by other carriers. However this is now being addressed with O2 bringing to the marketplace the O2 Xda Stellar which is based on the design of the HTC TyTN II - one of the latest machines created by HTC.
The Stellar serves to bring to the user a high level of features; QWERTY keyboard, 3Mpixel camera, fast processor, large RAM / ROM, GPS, Quad band, phone, etc.
Once again O2 are back in tune with what the user wants. We'll look at these features as we move through the review and see if the Stellar does deliver the features demanded by today's user and whether it serves to extend the proud line of Xda branded products.
Needless to say that once again we extend our thanks to O2 for allowing us to review the Xda Stellar.
http://www.4winmobile.com/forums/4wm-reviews-hardware/13075-xda-stellar-review.html
Related
Just starting our own personal forum thread so we can discuss all the stuff going on there.. new phones, mobile technology, os's, etc..
- The Windows Mobile 6 enhancements and previews of 6.1 and 7
- Gphone prototype debut
- GPS entertainment apps.. haha
- HTC debuts
- Linux powered phones
- Apple announcing 3.5G for "Iphone"(Iphone2?) and special praisal of Iphone..rather sad!!
etc
I have a lot of thoughts on what I've seen and read so far.. but too busy..will post later.. have fun!
I asked an "insider" from O2 if we can expect a newer device than the Herald in their roadmap..
and he told me that in the middle of the year "there will be a fantastic device and all HTC Kaiser user will yell that they ever bought a Kaiser...." we´ll see....
cheers
Microsoft and HTC both agree on XDA-Developers "We can't live with 'em and we can't live without 'em
According to tweakers.net (dutch), a very popular and more important, trustworthy Dutch IT website.http://forum.xda-developers.com/
XDA-Developers breaches intellectual property laws regarding ROM Cooking.
However Microsoft and HTC both agree "We can't live with 'em and we can't live without 'em."
Microsoft will not send take down orders to sites such as XDA-Developers, who offer customized ROMs for windows-mobile telephone.
Some sites offering ROMs based on Windows Mobile 6.5 got take down orders last week. They, However, appeared to be hoax.
“Taking action against sites such as XDA-Developers isn’t a matter of concern for Microsoft” says Maarten Sonneveld of Microsoft Netherlands against tweakers.net. “What happens there, the modifying of ROMs, is illegal. The intellectual property however is not with us. The ROMs are intellectual property of the producers of the phone or the mobile phone providers if it concerns branded telephones. We simple only deliver the OS.”
The biggest producer of Windows Mobile-phones, HTC, also says they don’t have any plans to take action against ROM sites. “What happens there isn’t allowed” says HTC Benelux-CEO Mark Moons,
“But XDA-Developers is the biggest and most active community of Windows Mobile-developers. We can’t live with ‘em and we can’t live without ‘em.”
Last week it seemed there were to come an end to tolerating Windows Mobile-communities.
A certain ‘James Young’ sent emails on behalf of Microsoft to site managers in which he stated that they were sharing illegal content, and summoned them to stop their practices; some site managers, in fact, did this.
It mostly concerned ROMs with betas of Windows Mobile 6.5, the update of Microsoft’s Mobile OS that should appear this summer
Haha nice one
Nice, but doesn't come much as a surprise. This community is the only reason Windows Mobile is still competitive. And Microsoft knows it. Besides that, why should they bother? Other than on the desktop PC, the phone hardware is quite limited without proper drivers WM won't run on phones which weren't supposed to run it in the first place. So Microsoft sold their license, HTC (or any other manufacturer) bought it and end of story. They have absolutly no disadvantage when ppl start cooking ROMs - in the contrary. I can't even begin to image using my X1 or any other WM-phone without the customization options presented here. Without them, I wouldn't have bought another WM-phone and become a WM-fan ... ;-)
Read this on tweakers.net yesterday, don't know if we should be happy about this statement.
But it seems xda-developers is going to be watched carefully by MS and HTC, probably has been already.
Until the take serious actions against this community I'm going to flash my X1 with Touch-IT ROMs as many as possible
I would say Microsoft and HTC is the winners here. The ROM cooking means more people is attracted to the platform and for me the reason I bough the X1 was this community.
Rather than moaning, HTC and Microsoft should make donations to XDADevs because this community is one of the main reasons why both of them rose to unforeseen heights.
skycamefalling said:
Rather than moaning, HTC and Microsoft should make donations to XDADevs because this community is one of the main reasons why both of them rose to unforeseen heights.
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Totally agree with u lolz
E90 Commie said:
I would say Microsoft and HTC is the winners here. The ROM cooking means more people is attracted to the platform and for me the reason I bough the X1 was this community.
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+1
i bought my htc wizard and SE x1 because of xda-developers.if they shut rom sites down i ll never buy windows mobile device that's for sure.my phone is my home so i ll decide how will i decorate my home not microsoft.cheers
Yeah i've read that also (im dutch and visit that site 3 times a day or so )
I think that htc says "MAKE NICE ROMS XDA, or else we will.....)
I'll add my 2 pennies worth...
I'm not a cook, though I sorely wish I were! However, thanks to XDA developers, I've had WM phones for the past 5 years, up until Blue Angel I *only* would have Nokia phones, but I was given the Blue Angel as a present and hated it. I then accidentally found XDA when I was going to sell the Blue Angel and was looking for a way to unlock the sim. Figuring I had nothing to lose as I hated the phone anyway, I put a new rom on and fell in love! Since then, I've had every HTC phone and just recently went to the Xperia *ONLY* because of this website. If XDA wasn't here, I would have gotten the N96 or a Blackberry.
So, for what it is worth MS and HTC if you're reading... Leave XDA alone, support it where you can, and be happy for the generosity of this community for making the product you produce better and more usable!
the only reason I got rid of my Omina and went back to a HTC made pda was because of the support and options that I can find here, good move from microsoft however I suspect microsoft as always turned a blind eye to a degree (remember the fpt problems?)
Cool. This is a pretty big community of developers.
James Joung lives here in my neighbourhood
Now I understand why he has spent the whole week laughing
Well,
if it wern't for XDA developers, when I got my Orange c500 (Back in the day) that would have been the last WM phone I bought.
Since then ive had:
Orange c550
Orance c600
MDA Vario
HTC TYTN
HTC Touch Diamond
Sony Xperia X1
goes to show the value of XDA... if anything, I think Microsoft, HTC etc should jump on the band wagon and help chefs get the best out of WM, or at least, some kind of formal agreement should be attained to help protect the community
can't live without them(xda),hehe.. htc and microsoft should donate to support xda !
gtrab said:
James Joung lives here in my neighbourhood
Now I understand why he has spent the whole week laughing
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Maybe he was laughing because his CEO, told him that if he will try to touch this site, he will have to fill up for unemployment... This site have 41,159 members (ONLY ) and allmost all of us, we own between 2-4 HTC pda phones. If HTC will loose us, I guess that they will show the middle finger to Microsoft and they will stick with Android from the time on...
To be honest in that perverse way MS has BENEFITTED from 'Piracy' etc. throughout their history. Take Office for example - way back in the day Lotus and Wordperfect were the dominant market forces. MS were trying to force their way into the market wth their Office products. In the end they blew away the competition - how? Because their media had no copy protection - thus Office Workers ended up getting copies from work to put on their home PCs to carry on extra work at home. The others had copy protection.
MS turned a blind eye to this because they knew that the more people had Office, the more they would want it in their workplace - so much so that in the end how many companies use those products anymore? Now that they are the dominant force, Piracy is an issue.
It is the same with sites like XDA-Devs. The mobile phone market is huge and will get bigger even in these times. WinMo is still a small part of that market - Nokia and Symbian undoubtably have an edge here. However people are becoming more savvy about mobiles and want more from them which is where MS, RIM, and Apple come in (with an improving Symbian).
However if all the consumers had to rely on was 'Stock' ROMs and buggy WinMo (esp. when consumers will compare it to the iPhone etc.) then WinMo would have nowehere near the amount of consumers, and would die a slow death. However thanks to XDA-Devs (and sites like these) we can buy these phones confident that some super talented Cook will provide us with a ROM that will get us the full experience of these devices. Hence we will then buy the next generation, then the next etc.
MS and HTC know this - hence why they can't 'live without 'em'. No point cutting off your nose to spite your face eh?....
@itje
after reading the good news.. please bring back your Touch-IT WM 6.5 project rom.. hehe =)
damskie said:
@itje
after reading the good news.. please bring back your Touch-IT WM 6.5 project rom.. hehe =)
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He just did, and posted the new ROM for download.
[/offtopic]
I'm probably going to get it for asking this, but why not add support for other devices (at lest popular ones). I realize this site was founded around HTC devices (I've owned at least four myself), but couldn't there at least be a couple forums for other vendors (Motorola, Sony, Samsung, to name a few).
Personally, I've been extremely anxious to get my hands on a Touch Pro II when they come to the US, but I must say the more I read about the Samsung Omnia Pro, with its AMOLED screen, 3.5 mm headphone jack, dual flash, 5 megapixel camera, 30 fps video, 1GB ROM, 800MHz processor, and so on (check out http://wmpoweruser.com/?p=5024 for a comparison), the more I start to wonder if I should wait for that device.
While I don't agree with everything in the comparison, WMPowerUser makes a point that the Omnia Pro won't have XDA-Dev support. I've gotten so much help from XDA over the years that not having that support could be a deciding factor.
I guess my question is... Why can't we have support for devices from other manufacturers on XDA-Developers (other than in Off-topic/General Discussion areas)?
I believe the idea behind keeping the site all HTC is for a few reasons. The first would probably be because the site is huge already, and running at maximum capacity. And once you added the Samsung Omnia for example, then other people want a forum for their Axim or QTEK or I-mate or whatever phone (or even an iPhone section, gasp!), and this site simply does not have the resources to have forums for every single device ever made. And in my opinion, the second major reason is summed up by JimmyMcGee here:
This is not and official Administration Response, but My view of expanding is summed up in the following quote.
"Jack of all Trades, Master of None."
That quote essentially states if you do to much, you can be the best at anything. We are who we are because we focused our drive and effort on mastering HTC phones.
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I hope that helps,
Dave
Here's a simular thread with a lot of info, pro's, con's, etc.
http://forum.xda-developers.com/showthread.php?t=502205
Always exist somewhere everybody's belong
This is the site for HTC manufactured Devices, maybe there is a Omnia forum for you all...
BTW check my siggy there is one more Win Mo Non HTC devices forum
WINMODEVELOPERS... its growing...
winmodevelopers.co.cc
It probably happened a month ago and I am just noticing it today (Nov 23, 2009), but it's very welcome news. For past 4 years I've been using Windows Mobile, but really thrilled to now have my HTC Hero running Android. I'm just curious when the Development & Hacking forum structure was revamped to give Android completely equal footing to the formerly "mostly just Windows Mobile HTC site"?
I hope someone will answer this question before it gets plucked away and banished to "General Discussions"
Yea, it happened probably a month ago... XDA has never intended to be locked down to just one device manufacture. at the time of XDA's creation the leader in smart phones was HTC and thus we worked with only the best (htc phones). However, now that time has passed we are seeing other smartphones begin to rival even HTC's prior superiority.
While we don't know yet the future of XDA, we hope in the future we can find a way to still provided the best Mod, hack, dev support for your favourite cutting edge phone.
Since the android platform is pretty generic for most phones that run it, meaning they have alot of base principles that tie them together, this has been created, and other sub forums, to try and reach out to the Android side and offer a place to put their mods hack and ideas that may benefit the community.
Stericson
Stericson, thanks very much -- very helpful. It fits with the understanding I'd always had --- that the forum began for modding the device actually called the XDA, which was an HTC phone. And the dominant platform was Windows Mobile.
I have been happy to see how users, all over the site, have been adapting to and including Android phones (those put out by HTC) and Android OS... and how a larger and larger group of users have asked for what you've now given: An equal-weight approach to the Android platform as well as WindowsMobile.
XDA has never intended to be locked down to just one device manufacture. at the time of XDA's creation the leader in smart phones was HTC and thus we worked with only the best (htc phones). However, now that time has passed we are seeing other smartphones begin to rival even HTC's prior superiority.
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This is interesting to read because I have never seen it expressed here before now that XDA-Developers might (... might) begin to more officially support devices made other than by HTC. 9 out of 10 times when a new registrant comes to XDA and asks "where's the forum for the Droid?", and before that, "where are the forums for the Omnia?" and "SonyEricsson?", the answer given by users is "This site is about HTC phones only" usually followed by "read the frikkin' FAQ!"...
Pushing the inclusion-boundaries of XDA-Devs, to me, is a great thing.. and an almost necessary adaptation... as the game has changed dramatically post-iphone. Given that most people in WindowsMobile land equate XDA-Devs as the ultimate go-to source for any mods and hacks on that platform, several large and separate communities have emerged to fill in new concentration-areas with Android that have appeared to be "unsupported by" or "outside the scope of" XDA-Devs. But also gven that Android rooting & modding began happening here almost immediately since HTC produced the first phones, an Android expertise exists here.
To me, now is the time to decide: does XDA officially expand to embrace the other phone makers now releasing Android phones?
Thanks for answering my question. And if you want to move this thread to a more appropriate forum, please do.
In in this New year Your Question should be answered.
There will be New Non HTC devices added to the Forums, though not in Large Scale. We won't be supported all new Smartphones coming out.
And which, well that's still a discussion being had in the General Forum
Hey all, I'm Nirave. I've been a member of the forums since the late 2000s during my Windows Mobile days. I still remember how many times XDA helped me fix my Xperia X1 and the early days of my foray into Android.
Since 2009, I've been writing about technology. I used to run a UK site, and prior to joining the leadership team at XDA almost a year ago, I worked for Mobile Nations, Future, and Android Authority. I help direct all the content that's published across our family of websites, as well as the boring wider company stuff!
I've used pretty much every flagship launched over the last 8 years and always carry at least two phones. One is an iPhone, one is an Android phone. Oh, and I love foldables – my arsenal includes the Z Fold 2, Mate Xs, and ThinkPad X1 Fold!
Glad to meet you Nirave! I also had some Window Mobile device's which were a blast from the past!
nirave said:
Hey all, I'm Nirave. I've been a member of the forums since the late 2000s during my Windows Mobile days. I still remember how many times XDA helped me fix my Xperia X1 and the early days of my foray into Android.
Since 2009, I've been writing about technology. I used to run a UK site, and prior to joining the leadership team at XDA almost a year ago, I worked for Mobile Nations, Future, and Android Authority. I help direct all the content that's published across our family of websites, as well as the boring wider company stuff!
I've used pretty much every flagship launched over the last 8 years and always carry at least two phones. One is an iPhone, one is an Android phone. Oh, and I love foldables – my arsenal includes the Z Fold 2, Mate Xs, and ThinkPad X1 Fold!
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Other things to know about Nirave: he doesn't sleep, he is a great cook (if you like a killer curry), and he likes to buy more phones than he actually needs or will ever use (ahem, I think he learned that from me...).
I know many other secrets about Nirave that I'll undoubtedly reveal over time. xD
i once was knew good cook ..
it was fun .. xD