Bad camera, poor battery life, a dodgy d-pad, ugly color -- is there anything good to say about the most well-spec'd glofiish in E-TEN's range? Well, yes: with support for not one, not two, but four mobile TV standards under its belt, you'll have a hard time finding a WinMo set out there that's friendlier to telly on the go. Plus, the V900 rocks a flush VGA display and tri-band HSDPA, which are "good things" last time we checked; you're just going to have to put up with flimsy build quality and a host of software and hardware niggles to get 'em. At $700, it's hard to swallow the thought of buying a device this heavily panned in a review, but if you absolutely must be able to switch between DAB and DVB-T with aplomb... well, your crappy phone has arrived.

Granted, Norway isn't actually a member of the European Union, which makes it slightly less dramatic that they've rejected the Nokia-tested, EU-approved DVB-H standard in favor of DMB -- but it's still Europe, and this just adds to the ugly, fragmented picture that mobile TV is becoming around there. Germany has all but abandoned DVB-H to go with its free, designed-for-TV counterpart, DVB-T, and the UK has recently hooked up Qualcomm with spectrum for a MediaFLO network, so ubiquitous DVB-H is anything but a guarantee across the continent at this point. The current Norwegian plan calls for nine DMB channels to launch by winter, which may be viewed as a superior technology there because it's better able to cover rural areas in a cost-effective way than DVB-H is. Bottom line: if you'd dreamed of some day carrying a single device from country to country to catch all the spellbinding local TV programming, you might be out of luck for a while.

The problem with selling licenses for spectrum -- any kind of spectrum -- is that there's an implicit assumption that the investment a company's going to make into buying the airwaves and building out the infrastructure necessary to take advantage of it is eventually going to pay off. For the winners of Germany's DVB-H license, though, the economics simply don't make sense; the country's carriers stone-cold gave up on the concept once they lost the license bid, instead turning to bundling DVB-T receivers to steal free signals designed for plain ol' TV reception. The winning bidder, Mobile 3.0, had intended to sell users on packages costing a handful of euros a month -- but "free" is a pretty powerful word, so even if there's a marginal battery performance disadvantage with the DVB-T setup, it's going to be virtually impossible for any pay service to fight it, especially when carriers are putting zero effort into making sure DVB-H tuners are on board their handsets. As best as we can tell, T-Systems' DVB-H trial wrapped up in December, so yeah, that pretty much spells the death of the so-called standard in Bavaria. What say you, EU?

[Via mocoNews]

In a case of oh shiznit, LG and Samsung are combining forces to protect their mobile TV interests in the US. With Qualcomm's proprietary MediaFLO digital broadcast technology rapidly gaining a mobile TV foothold in the US (thanks to AT&T and Verizon) and Europe standardizing on DVB-H, it seems that LG and Samsung (the once proud and gloating parents of the DMB standard) have little choice but to support the ATSC's attempt to create the ATSC-M/H standard in the US... about three years too late. Of course, the ultimate victor will have very little to do with what's best for the consumer and everything to do with who is most successful at lobbying the government. Oh, did that sound bitter? Good.

While Samsung is a perennial innovator when it comes to hardware, software has never been the company's strong suit. Lucky for us, the new TouchWiz UI Samsung is building for its touchscreen phones is a significant step in the right direction, and the new AnyCall Haptic SCH-W420 looks to be the perfect way to show it off. Centered around a 16:9, 3.2-inch screen, the phone includes DMB, a 2 megapixel camera and Bluetooth 2.0. Haptic feedback in the form of vibrations help out with the UI, and home screen is customizable with widgets. The feature set seems to be squarely targeted at the consumer, but the price sure ain't -- the phone is launching in Korea starting at 700,000 KRW and ramping up to 800,000 KRW ($700 to $800 US). Video is after the break.

[Via Engadget Spanish]

Want the Internet in your pocket? Good, because that's what LG is offering to South Koreans with its new LG-LH2300 Touch Web phone. This ain't your father's baby Internet mind you, the LH2300 features a new "Hello UI" riding atop 800 x 480 pixels spread across a 3-inch touchscreen LCD. LG didn't stop with the web though as the LH2300 also packs T-DMB mobile TV, Bluetooth 2.0, microSD memory, and a jog wheel for easy page scrolling. Its 3 megapixel camera sports face recognition and anti-shake tech. No specifics on the included "high speed" data service. Nevertheless, that front facing camera's a pretty good clue that this pup won't be riding EDGE when it launches in Korea next month for a mere $600 US equivalent.

[Via AVING]

As expected, the European Commission just did the obvious and made the EU's de facto DVB-H standard, standard. The move is expected to accelerate the deployment of mobile television services across Europe in the same way that GSM standardization in the early 90s gave Europe a head-start on backwater cellular locations like North America. So get outta Dodge Qualcomm and South Korea with your MediaFLO and DMB mobile television technologies, you aren't welcome around Brussels anymore.

We're still trying to get everyone on board with 3.6Mbps HSDPA around here, but as usual, LG and its merry band of engineers from the future are looking to embarrass the remainder of the world with its 7.2Mbps SH150. For the record, not even in Korea are there any live HSDPA 7.2 networks just yet, but the SH150 is fixin' to get involved with test market trials ahead of a full-scale launch down the road. Features include 2 megapixel primary and VGA secondary cams, DMB reception, and a QVGA display in a rather portly (by 2007 standards, anyway) 15.6mm slider package. Check it for about 500,000 won ($538).

We've known this gem was looming, but word on the street has the LG-KC1 finally hitting the hands of eager South Koreans. Amongst the niceties are a potent 806MHz Marvell Monahans CPU, 512MB of NAND Flash ROM, 128MB of SDRAM, WiBro connectivity, T-DMB mobile TV, integrated Bluetooth, a two-megapixel camera, and a 2.8-inch QVGA screen to boot. Unfortunately, it looks like this otherwise fantastically spec'd device is still running Windows Mobile 5 from yesteryear, and of course, the chances of it ever making it to US soil in the near future are essentially nil. Regardless, feel free to click on through for another picture if you enjoy the tease.

A visit to the "mixed signals" department reveals this little gem: just weeks after locking up DVB-H as the mobile TV standard of choice in Europe, the European Union has hooked up with China to push -- wait for it -- DMB. The two standards are, of course, heated rivals in the push for global domination so it's clear as mud why this partnership makes sense -- but sure enough, the newly-formed MOBIDEC project is riding on two years' worth of EU funding to push mobile TV cooperation between Chinese and European firms, and WorldDMB (DMB's marketing machine) is deeply involved. Of course, neither DVB-H nor MediaFLO have been approved for use in China, so maybe the EU's thinking here is that a multinational standard is better than a proprietary format. Still, though, it's a little weird.

[Via mocoNews]

In the dog-eat-dog world of cellphone manufacturing, a millimeter of thickness can make all the difference -- the difference between producing some generic, brand X handset that no one gives two flips about, and crafting "the world's thinnest slider" to a deluge of fanfare. The "world's thinnest" titles tend to get passed around pretty frequently -- particularly among the Korean manufacturers as they work overtime to rapidly one-up each other -- though we're not too sure how much longer this can carry on. Pantech's new IM-S230 clocks in at an astonishing 9.9 millimeters thick, a far cry from the world's thinnest phone, but extraordinarily impressive when you learn that the S230 is a slider (sorry, Samsung!). Features include a 1.3 megapixel camera, media player, document viewer, and DMB TV reception on a 2.2 inch display. Look for it for around $535 in white or black when it launches.

[Via Unwired View]

Samsung's SPH-W2400, which we spotted a month or so ago thanks to the FCC, finally has a face and a few more details to boot. The snazzy Anycall-built slider sports a unique rotating screen, DMB TV tuner, a two-megapixel camera, MP3 player, Bluetooth, microSD slot, TV out, language translation software, and HSDPA connectivity. Best of all, it appears that this phone will basically work in every corner of the modern world, but sadly, we've no idea where you'll actually find one for sale nor how much you'll be asked to cough up for it once you do.

It looks like a bit of a beast, but at least it rocks a spec sheet to match its intimidating layout. The SCH-B750 (for Samsung's domestic Korean market, naturally) is being billed as a "camcorder phone" with a swiveling display and 3 megapixel shooter that combine to mimic the way you'd hold a small digital video camera (ring any bells?). Features include QVGA internal and OLED external displays, DMB, TV out, comprehensive media support, and microSD expansion. It's not as big as it looks, either, coming in at a reasonable 99 x 51 x 16 millimeters. No word on when exactly Koreans will be able to grab this puppy, but one thing's for certain: it'll be a lot sooner than we can.

"Remain calm, earthling, I do not wish to harm you -- at least, not yet. I merely wish to demonstrate LG's newest mobile TV phone, the KB2700. With a sliding keypad and a landscape screen, lazy humanoids such as you do not need to turn the handset sideways to enjoy the mind-numbing form of entertainment you call 'television.' Unfortunately, only those in the Earth territory of South Korea will be able to obtain it. Now, please lie still while I beam you back to the cornfield from which we obtained you."

Picture-in-picture functionality on a phone is certainly not without precedent -- on Korean handsets, anyway -- but that doesn't mean we have to understand it. Watching even a single show on screen the size of a thumb remains a tough sell in many parts of the world, let alone two shows side by side. Alas, this game plan must be working out alright for LG and Samsung since they keep pumping out handsets that rock the feature. Latest is the SCH-B710 from Samsung, a rather portly-looking pivot phone with a pair of DMB tuners and the aforementioned picture-in-picture functionality for individuals afflicted with particularly brutal forms of ADD. Thanks to Anycall branding, we know this one'll stay well within Korean borders, but we wouldn't be surprised to see the form factor head elsewhere by a different model number.