The global turmoil made many smartphone fans get their hands off the expensive handsets. But here’s a news that may excite the Verizon customers – a $99 smartphone. The scheme’s speculated to be valid for the existing smartphones carried by the telecom co. The HTC’s trendy mobile phones – Pro 2 and Diamond 2 are supposed to be covered under the new scheme. The 2-yr contract price of $ 99 also prevails for Samsung Omnia and some Blackberrys;and seems very reasonable when seen with the contemporary 1 yr and other such contracts that tend to touch more than $120. Getting a hefty competition from iPhone 3G, the move by Verizon Wireless seems a good move. Let’s see how much delighted are the customer’s by the move. [...]

HTC Smartphones don’t get short of carriers. The next are Verizon and Sprint who are rumored to launch HTC Pro 2 and Diamond 2. The news spread from the Supply Chain Management people of HTC which have coded the Diamond 2 and Pro 2 as the XV6975 and the XV6875. With much rumors about Verizon relating to these handsets, Pro 2’s almost confirmed as to be on Verizon’s list when its pics were leaked recently. There were sneak peeks to Sprint’s Touch Pro 2 as well making the device’s release quite exciting. Let’s see which carrier excites the customers. Read the Touch Diamond 2 review! [...]

Web Camera is an interesting app that lets you use your Windows Mobile device as a webcam as-well-as FTP camera. Here is the list of its features:

• Transforms your PDA or Smartphone to high-resolution web-camera.
• Use your PDA/Smartphone as microphone! Even through Wi-Fi!
• FTP-Camera feature. Transmit pictures directly from device on your FTP server.
• In any time and in any place you and your friends can see in browser what pictures transmit FTP-camera.
• You and your friend can see in any browser what picture transmit FTP-camera in real time from any place.
• Can work through any connection: USB ActiveSync, Wi-Fi, Bluetooth, GPRS, 3G, LAN, WiMAX.
• Compatible with almost all modern Smartphones and PDAs (Windows Mobile 6.5 included).
• Can be used as web-camera in many programs: Skype, MSN Messager, Yahoo Messager, ICQ, Virtual Dub and many others.
• Can capture device screen and transmit video to Desktop PC.
• WebCamera Plus support English, Russian, German, Turkish, Norwegian, Romanian, Italian, French, Czech, Greek, Chinese (Taiwan), Japanese, Hungarian, Dutch, Finnish, Spanish, Portuguese, Polish languages.

Although the application is bit pricey at $24.90, but if you need those features, there is no harm in giving its trial version a go before buying it. [...]

US engineers are using Windows Mobile devices as medical imaging devices. They say that this technology makes commercial USB ultrasound probes compatible with Microsoft Windows mobile-based smartphones. This lets them to use the Windows Mobile smartphone for scanning kidneys, liver, bladder, eyes, prostate and uterine screenings and biopsies. According to Richard, who is the Associate Professor at Washington University says, "Imagine having these smart phones in ambulances and emergency rooms. On a larger scale, this kind of cell phone is a complete computer that runs Windows." [via upi] [...]

Whether you like it or not, ASUS made the linux immensely popular with their netbooks. Now, after netbooks, ASUS is now planning to use linux in one of their two upcoming smartphones. This is TOTALLY contrary to what we have been thinking! We all thought the ASUS has been committed to windows mobile. Asustek’s Chief Operating Officer H. C. Hung told Reuters that both Windows and Linux will be used in the phones being co-developed with Garmin, a leading specialist in global positioning devices. Right now, it is not known when the company will unveil its first linux based Smartphone, but rumor has it that would be released in early summer. ASUS has proved that it is not a company that [...]