The popular rumor floating around at the moment is that Microsoft intends to announce self-branded handsets powered by NVIDIA's beefy Tegra architecture for next-gen phones and MIDs at the GSMA's Mobile World Congress in February of next year. Let's put aside for a moment the fact that Redmond continues to vehemently deny having any interest in getting into the hardware end of its Windows Mobile racket -- concealing the truth is a part of doing competitive business, after all -- and turn our attention to the practical matter of whether this makes any sense whatsoever. First off, Windows Mobile's strength lies in its incredibly deep and wide partner base, a base that includes visionary teams at HTC, Samsung, LG, Motorola, and countless others. With Android and Symbian finally becoming viable opportunities for third-party manufacturers, Microsoft doesn't want to do anything that's going to hasten the revolt before it's able to wrap up version 7 (or at the very least, 6.5) -- and competing with your own licensees would be a bang-up way to do that. Granted, Microsoft did exactly that by introducing Zune following the PlaysForSure initiative, but let's be honest: Windows Mobile and Zune don't play in the same league. Zune's a hobby, a side gig; WinMo's a monster, a long-term cash cow that's got to be treated with the same franchise tag as Windows itself.

We peeked at the updated HTC Advantage X7510 at Mobile World Congress, there aren't wholesale changes here, HTC has chosen to simply revamp the keyboard and tidy up the face. The result is a somewhat tidier looking -- though still rather large -- device, with more memory -- now 16 GB of flash -- that still gets all of its previous jobs done. HTC has chosen to eschew traditional keys for a smooth touch-sensitive keyboard, and while we weren't huge fans of the first, we're afraid this isn't a whole pile better -- sure, it looks lovely, but feedback from the keys is about nil. Follow the pics below to get at the gallery.

Aside from the N96, Nokia also rolled out the 6220 classic and 6210 Navigator sets this week at Mobile World Congress. Both of these sets while fairly vanilla in design pack huge piles of features under the hood, from a 5 megapixel camera on the 6220 to GPS and Nokia Maps 2.0 on the 6210. Both retail in the high $400 range, but if you're looking for a new set to fiddle with, either could fit the bill quite nicely.

The Samsung F480 is a pretty slick device, featuring the new TouchWiz UI -- which to be honest, is a little weak looking -- a 5 megapixel shooter, widgets that can be added and dragged about on the home screen, and input feedback via vibration. It is without a doubt a well put together piece of hardware, has outstanding connectivity -- ahem! North American HSDPA, Samsung? -- and will undoubtedly be a hit once it lands in April or May this year.

Move along, nothing too new and thrilling here. We hunted down Nokia's touch demo and were completely un-thrilled by the whole package. Sure, it's still early days for the interface, but it's a case of same old same old as it's sporting the same UI, same OS, but now instead of using the d-pad, you're able to poke about with your finger. The demo was running on a small tablet in software only, no hardware yet, though, as we've already mentioned, devices should start arriving in the second half of the year. Hopefully Nokia will see the error -- in our opinion -- of its ways and drop some glitz -- feel free to pop on over and visit NVIDIA for some inspiration, Nokia -- down on this fairly glitz-free bit of wizardry. Follow the juicy teaser below to see the gallery.

As expected (sort of), Gigabyte's GSmart division came packing at MWC this year with a small army of WinMo handsets ready to battle -- and this time, they're taking the war to Europe. The headliner is the MS808, featuring HSDPA and GPS alongside support for a healthy majority of the world's digital TV standards: DVB-T, DVB-H, T-DMB, and ISDB-T. Unfortunately, it doesn't actually feature the cool skeleton view currently showing up on GSmart's website, but you get the idea. Also being shown are the MS800, MS820, and MS804 -- the last of which looks suspiciously like the O2 Xda Denim -- all with the same integrated HSDPA and GPS as the MS808, but lacking the television tunerfest. Separately, Gigabyte announced that its phalanx of new handsets will feature Garmin's Mobile XT software and are all cocked and loaded to be unleashed on an unsuspecting (or at this point, suspecting, we suppose) European market in the near future, leaving the glut of Windows Mobile Professional hardware packed with more choice, more confusion, and arguably less differentiation than ever. There are worse problems to have, we suppose.

Read - GSmart Unveils 3.5G Mobile TV and GPS PDA Phones at Mobile World Congress 2008
Read - GSmart introduces 3.5G GPS PDA phones with GARMIN Mobile XT to European market

It feels like Nokia and Yahoo! have been all buddy buddy for a while now, and indeed, Yahoo!'s been really good about deploying its wares to Nokia's S60 devices in a timely fashion; in the mobile search game, though, it seems a bit of a faux pas to be without Google on board, doesn't it? The world's number ones in their respective industries have announced that Google search capability will be integrated into Nokia's bundled Nokia Search app on all the upcoming models announced at MWC this week and into other handsets in the future. Nokia's playing it nice and straight by saying that the move is all about "providing choices" to its consumers, but let's be honest, if you were going to have one search provider on your phone, it'd probably have to be Google. Speaking of, is it just a coincidence that "Mountain View" rhymes with "Espoo"?

It looks like Android will have more than just its openness and pretty face to show to the world soon. According to a report from Reuters, LG has officially set a time-table for bringing a Google-powered handset to market (and obviously not the phone above). "We will bring it out late in 2008 or early 2009," said Chang Ma, the company's vice president for marketing strategy. The plan sounds shockingly close to competitor Samsung's scheme for a rollout of the Linux phone in early 2009. Clearly, companies are doing more than just putting pen to paper on the platform -- let's just hope those minor kinks get straightened out before the new year.

[Via Phone Scoop]

Okay, we suppose cellphone companies trumpeting some sort of fuel cell technology isn't that weird, but nevertheless, Moto sure seems proud of its most recent advancements. Showcased at this year's Mobile World Congress are a number of "alternative power solutions including fuel cell and reflow batteries," which can be deployed in most every wireless / mobile environment out there. More specifically, the outfit is demonstrating a fuel cell-powered WiMAX base station, and it's also suggesting that said technology could "further guarantee [the] availability of uninterrupted power" in TETRA radio networks that are used in public safety environments. Fascinating, no?