Thomas Ricker and Chris Ziegler came away from their N97s with very different opinions of Nokia's premier superphone -- and they weren't afraid to let those opinions be known in a series of vicious verbal volleys. Head on over to Engadget for all the drama!

As we know from its WWDC unveiling, the iPhone 3G S is basically a 3G with some faster bits, more memory, and a better camera -- but is it worth the price of admission? Head on over to our full review for the answers you seek (and maybe some you don't)!

We've been following Novatel's MiFi with bated breath since its December announcement, and the totally pocketable 3G / WiFi router has finally graced a US carrier. Though it'll ultimately come in a variety of physical designs, bands, and radio technologies for different carriers and parts of the world, the MiFi 2200 for Verizon naturally packs CDMA with EV-DO Rev. A, which means uplink speeds should be reasonably speedy to go along with your 1Mbps-plus downloads. Obviously, the concept of a credit card-shaped object connecting up to five WiFi-enabled devices to high-speed internet from wherever the road takes you is an incredibly intoxicating one -- but does the MiFi 2200 deliver? Let's have a look.

Gallery: Verizon MiFi 2200 review

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T-Mobile's Sidekicks have been cult favorites stretching all the way back to the original grayscale model -- a device with a design only a mother could love, may we add -- when it launched nearly seven years ago. Though the unusual form factor with the addictive spring-loaded pivoting swivel has largely prevented it from attracting a mainstream audience, the countless teens and twenty-somethings who've latched on to the Hiptop ecosystem have cited many of the same reasons for loving it since day one: an easy, foolproof UI, push email, high-quality customizability, decent web browsing capabilities, and a stellar messaging-optimized layout (remember that QWERTY was little more than a twinkle in most manufacturers' eyes back in 2002).

At its launch, the first-generation Sidekick LX represented a new high end for the franchise -- big shoes to fill for the 2009 model of the same name. Does it live up to the hype? More importantly, could this be the first Sidekick complete enough and robust enough to reach new audiences? Read on.

It's not the company's first touchscreen device, but the 5800 XpressMusic is the first touchscreen device that Nokia has designed to appeal to the masses, and as such, there are certain expectations. By even the most forgiving of standards, Nokia is now officially late to this game -- all of the remaining top-five manufacturers have been offering mass-market touchscreen phones for some time now -- so there's plenty of ground to be made up. What's more, the 5800 marks the retail introduction of S60 5th Edition, the latest incarnation of the world's most ubiquitous smartphone platform; future iterations of this very code will lay the groundwork for the Symbian Foundation's next-gen offensive, so the stakes have never been higher. You might say the weight of the world -- or Finland, at the very least -- is on the 5800's shoulders, but is this unassuming little slate up to the task? Let's have a look.

Twitter clients for the iPhone are pretty much a dime a dozen, but unfortunately, the same can't be said for the BlackBerry platform. Things are looking up for the Waterloo faithful, though, with a number of clients on the horizon -- and one of the best we've seen thus far is SocialScope from the guys at Ubiquitous Systems. The app has been around in the form of an invite-only alpha for a few months now, and with more recent releases the guns are coming out and it's really starting to develop into a fairly advanced app. Read on for more impressions and an exclusive hands-on with the latest build -- and oh, yeah, we've got loads of invites for you certifiable addicts as well!

The Meizu M8 has been caught on camera plenty of times before, but we can't recall seeing an English-language version until now. One tester at MP4 Nation has managed to get some hands-on time with the unabashed iPhone doppelganger, and calls the audio and video playback quality a disappointment, especially given the powerful Samsung ARM CPU inside. As he eloquently puts it, "cheap MP4 players can do a better job." Ouch. Video resizing also seems to be poorly implemented, cutting off the edges when it doesn't match the 3:2 aspect ratio. It's not all bad, though, as the photo viewer and phone book has been aptly copied from Apple's flagship mobile, including multi-touch zoom, and the Windows CE-masking GUI is fluid. More videos of the M8 are promised, but in the meantime, check out volume one after the break.

The original Helio Ocean burst onto the scene nearly two years ago, impressing with its dual slide design, Bluetooth, 3G, GPS and well-integrated messaging app challenging phones on both sides of the feature / smart phone line. 2009 finds the Ocean 2 once again topping the Helio line, but now facing even stronger competition. Luckily, it's offering a lot more than an exclusive MySpace app to lure in users this time, with 2GB of internal storage, touch controls and a slew of software tweaks. Now that we've spent a few days comparing it to its predecessor, check after the break for some of the the highs and lows of this new handset.

Can you believe it? It's been over two years since we first got wind of what would become Meizu's high-end iPhone clone, the M8. Okay, we admit to being somewhat dubious at first, and won't be entirely won over until we get one to play with, but just a few days away from its Chinese release the handset seems to live up to its promises according to IT168's full review. Other than a few faults, including an "ear-piercing" integrated speaker and issues running third-party Windows CE applications, things sound surprisingly good. The 480 x 720 3.4-inch screen received high marks, performance was rated as very speedy, and the integrated 3 megapixel camera looks to be able to take great looking pics -- assuming you turn a few lights on. It does sound like a solid device, but is it a proper iPhone competitor? In China, where the iPhone still isn't officially available, we wonder if it isn't the iPhone that's the underdog now (cue raised eyebrow).

Sony Ericsson has produced some exceptional handsets over the years, with certain gems like the W950, W300i and W580i (just to name a few) catching the eyes and hearts of casual and hardcore mobile fanatics alike. Even so, it's hard to argue that any single phone in the outfit's history has caused more of a stir than the XPERIA X1. Sure, half of that is because we here in America have been waiting on the thing since February, but the other is due to pure, unadulterated sex appeal. 2008 has been a banner year for smart- / touchscreen-based handsets, and even though this one is lagging behind most of the other guys in terms of time to market, the X1 is still a formidable rival. We had a chance to spend a few quality days with the North America-bound X1a ($799.99; ships November 28th) -- which is different than the X1i that has already landed in certain parts of the globe -- and if you've come here looking for opinions, you haven't come in vain. Follow us past the break for a look at the pros, the cons and the middling minutiae of SE's slickest smartphone yet.

The Treo Pro is the first of what is clearly a new design direction for Palm -- a shiny, black mutation of the popular Centro coupled with a few lines from the Treo 500 and a dash of the original Xbox thrown in for good measure. Under the hood is the staid and familiar Windows Mobile 6.1, with few changes save for the typical Palm shortcuts and the inclusion of an HTC-licensed task manager. Is this combo powerful enough to lift the smartphone-maker out of the doldrums of its current lineup, or is it just another half-step along the uneven pavement the company has been treading? Read on to find out.

No longer does Windows Mobile alone a capable smartphone make. The platform's core is as relevant, powerful, and well-supported as ever, but that's not the problem -- the real issue is that it's just plain hard to look at. The days of WinMo looking even remotely modern in its stock form are long gone, and top-tier manufacturers clearly recognize that; everyone from ASUS to HTC has taken matters into their own hands to craft custom skins that kill off as many of the ancient visuals as possible while still holding onto everything that makes Windows Mobile great.

Enter the Samsung i900 Omnia, a phone that submits to design direction forced upon the industry largely by the iPhone -- full touchscreen, no keyboard, you know the drill by now -- and does pretty much everything in its power to overcome WinMo's limitations to make it competitive in the year 2008. Did Sammy succeed? Read on.

Thanks to the good folks at Wireless Imports for the hookup!

Well this was bound to happen. Ahead of schedule, Walt Mossberg has turned his official review of the new iPhone 3G, and we've got the recap. On the whole, Walt stays mostly positive about the device; he likes the form factor (which he wants to stress really hasn't changed much), says the 3G speeds are a big improvement over EDGE (no kidding?), and informs us that the audio quality and phone reception are -- thankfully -- improved all around. Downsides? There are plenty. Mossberg takes issue with AT&T's new pricing policy, which he finds steep, says he barely squeezed 4 hours and 27 minutes of talk time out of the battery, and gripes that you can only sync Exchange or personal calendars and contacts -- not both. If you're like us, you'll probably want to just read the whole thing. Too lazy? Check the video after the break.

Update: David Pogue of the New York Times has also turned in a kinda-sorta review of the iPhone 3G, though it reads more like an overview of its features than a honest-to-goodness critique. He also makes passing reference to the GPS antenna being "too small" to function as a proper GPS, which makes roughly zero sense to us. Feel free to figure it out on your own.

Update 2: Can't forget Ed Baig of USA Today, who says the new model is "worth the wait" (not to say we have any option at this point anyway, seeing how hard it is to find an original anywhere). He seemed to have trouble picking up 3G service in some locations, though it's not clear whether that can be chalked up to technical issues with the handset or a lack of coverage where he was testing. Like the others, Baig discovered a noticeable improvement in audio quality and a noticeable hit in battery life when hooked up to the 3G network. Gotta pay to play, we guess.

We had a chance to play with Research In Motion's upcoming BlackBerry Bold handset tonight, and we came away happily impressed. To start things off, the keyboard felt easy enough to use, at least easier than the 8830 we're often forced to use for work email. Gone are the sharp protrusions, replaced with a nice flat surface upon which to click.

Of note was the Bold's user interface. Menus are clean and easy to read (despite some strange icon choices, see below), and response time is about as quick as one could hope, especially compared to other phones out there that seem to struggle with their operating systems.

While Nokia makes a habit of practically defining "featurephone" for the industry, traditionally it's handsets like the N95 that hog all the spotlight, leaving Nokia's few QWERTY phones in the shadows. Not that they've been trying too hard -- while the E62 and E61i have both shipped over here, neither has featured 3G data in US bands, and the E62 even had the distinct pleasure of having WiFi stripped out. Enter E71, the successor to those phones, and Nokia's very first QWERTY device to feature US-friendly 3G.

Nokia is also (finally) taking form factor much more seriously: at 10mm thick, the E71 is one of the slimmest Nokia phones to date, and Nokia claims it's the thinnest QWERTY smartphone on the market. The E71 also attacks the drab, plastic looks of its predecessors with chrome accents and a glossy screen. The phone is incredibly pocketable, and comfortable to hold and use. Of course, with the smaller size Nokia had to cut down on screen real estate and keyboard spacing, but at a QVGA resolution there's little suffering on that front. The keyboard had a much more rigid, clicky feel to it compared to the spongy keys of the E62, and we were virtually typo-free on it within minutes.