Gadgetell | Tech News, Reviews, and Interesting Things

Anyone looking to become a new T-Mobile customer may just be in luck. Wal-Mart of all places currently has a sweet deal in place on a variety of models. Some of the items include the Wing, which comes with a free Kingston 1GB memory card and USB card reader and will (after rebate) give you $50.

The titanium BlackBerry Curve, Pearl and Dash are all in the same category, giving you $50 cash back, however these last three do not offer the free memory card and USB card reader. Still a nice deal though.

The Samsung Blast, Katalyst and the SGH-T639 will all get you $75 back after rebates. They also have some good deals on the Nokia 5310 XpressMusic phone, MOTORIZR as well as some MOTORAZR models.

Of course most of these deals require a mail-in-rebate so be sure to fill out all your paperwork. Click the product link below to check out the full list of deals.

Product [Wal-Mart] Via [Gizmodo]

For many people just getting into digital photography, the world of photo editing can seem a tad overwhelming. Hewlett Packard offers some help in the foray through the forest of editing your precious snapshots and helping you turn them into all they can be, even if it didn’t happen exactly the way you wanted right from the camera.

The Adobe Photoshop program, a perennial favorite among many photographers is rather tried and true. It’s used by everyone from magazine layout staff and professionals to the Joe Schmoe who captured his son playing flag football at the weekend game. However, if you are first wading into the waters of photo editing...granted, the program may seem a little daunting, especially for those not familiar with any kind of editing or publishing software. 

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Sony has recently begun shipping the mylo com2 with a free charging cradle. While its certainly not a must have item, and I am not sure it would push me over the edge and make me run out to purchase a mylo, its always a nice deal when you are getting a $29.99 item for free.

A dock or charging cradle is one accessory that I consider a must have for most gadgets. It looks much nicer sitting on the desk, it helps to keep your device from getting bumped and knocked to the floor and is much easier to stick your device in the dock or cradle as opposed to fiddling with a loose wire.

Sony has not made any mention of whether this is a permanent or just a limited time offer, but if you were already considering a mylo purchase, this sounds like as good a time as ever to make that purchase.

Product [Sony Style] Via [pocketables]

It was way back in February when we first learned that AT&T was beginning the process of taking over the Wi-Fi offering at Starbucks. With that announcement came the word that as long as you have a Starbucks gift card that you are actively using you will be able to receive two free consecutive hours of Wi-Fi a day. Well since then we have seen lots of Wi-Fi coming and going, sometimes with stories about the offers and sometimes it was related to the access being live. Well it turns out that two free hour offering is just about ready to go live.

According to Dave Zatz:

“the system was configured a few days ago and they’ve confirmed it works. I saw the back of the store memo and the manager says they’ve got signage behind the counter ready to go in conjunction with the June 3rd launch.”

And, just in case you have something against using the Starbucks card, those two hours of Wi-Fi will set you back just $3.99. In addition to this offer, those Laptop Connect customers are also able to get free Wi-Fi at Starbucks locations as well. Sadly this offer has no mention of whether that free iPhone Wi-Fi offer will be returning, but with the launch rumored to take effect tomorrow, we will not have to wait long to find out. Hopefully this roll-out will be for all Starbucks locations, however its possible that it may be a limited roll-out on an area by area basis.

Read [Zatz Not Funny] Via [jkOnTheRun]

Once again we are back on the AT&T free Wi-Fi offer, however in a refreshing twist (except for this mention) it has nothing to do with an iPhone. In fact this latest offer is giving all Laptop Connect customers, who are on a service plan of $60 or higher free access to Wi-Fi hotspots at any of AT&T’s 17,000 plus hotspots. The best news is that it is effective beginning today, May 20, 2008.

Effective tomorrow, May 20th, the long-awaited FREE WiFi Access to over 17,000 WiFi locations throughout the U.S. launches for Laptop Connect Customers with plans $60 or higher. This exciting new feature will allow customers unlimited access to over 17,000 WiFi locations at no extra charge including locations in Starbucks and McDonalds. Customers will need three things for this free access:

* A laptop card. FREE WiFi for Smartphones is not available yet, but will be later in 2008.
* The latest version of Communication Manager (version 6.8). Once loaded this version will automatically log onto AT&T hotspots.
* A Laptop Connect plan of $60 or greater.

Also, in addition to the Laptop Connect customers, all smartphone users will also be able to get free the same free Wi-Fi offer, however this will not be available till later in the year. Lets hope the free offer for smartphone users comes sooner than later, and also that this offer stays around.

Via [Boy Genius Report]

Apple’s iTunes Store better watch it’s back, because here comes Napster with not just another online music service, but one that now offers a whooping 6 million DRM-free music tracks. With this number of available tracks Napster has now become the world’s largest major label MP3 catalog and the largest library of independent music worldwide.

Beginning today, all digital music that is downloaded from Napster will be a DRM-free MP3 that is compatible with any MP3 player or music phone, including yes you guessed it right, the iPod and the iPhone. Downloaded music will remain at 99 cents for a single track and $9.95 for most full albums. Most of Napster’s digital music is encoded at a 256kbps bitrate and shall include album art. In addition, users can freely browse Napster’s catalog without any obligation or commitment to purchase. Napster is also offering a web-based on-demand streaming service which users can access from anywhere using computer with Internet connection.

Read [Business Wire]

The on again and off again free Wi-Fi offer that AT&T will begin rolling out for iPhone customers will still be coming, at least sometime in the future. With some recent teasing, the roll out had been planned to go live on May 15, but was again delayed. At this point the reasons why it has gone on and off is just a mystery, maybe they messed up and maybe they were trying to test out the service on a stealth level and did not count on the blogosphere making it quite so public. Anyway, from a recently leaked AT&T internal memo, it seems they are not really worried because they have not yet officially announced anything.

“The iPhone Wi-Fi offer that was scheduled to launch today has been canceled. Nothing has been announced by the company to our customers and will not impact existing customers. Additional communication will be provided if the status the project changes.”

Via [Boy Genius Report]

Following up on the earlier rumors, HP has begun to officially offer the Mini-Note 2133 with Windows XP. Although HP has commented that Windows XP will be pre-installed they are doing it by way of the free Vista downgrade option, so when the notebook arrives it should include an install disk for both XP and Vista Business.

In addition to the Windows XP offering, HP has also added a few new configurations to the Mini-Note line-up. Instead of the original four configurations to choose from there are now eight. This should sound like welcome news with more to choose from, however it makes the XP downgrade offering seem just a little on the shady side. 

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It turns out that AT&T is making an attempt at keeping their free Wi-Fi offering a secret. Even though its long past the secret part, thanks to the appearance and disappearance act that is has been putting on recently. According to a statement from AT&T they offered up an official “no comment” about the situation, but they also stated that the issues that have come up were nothing more than “human error.” Which based on that it would be pretty safe to say that its just a matter of time before it goes live for real, until then we can only hope the same human that has been making those errors will continue, we love our free Wi-Fi.

Read [New York Times] Via [Gizmodo]

First we see see the 2G Surf being given away for opening an account with RBC Bank up in Canada, and now those over in the UK are given an option to receive a free Eee PC of their own.

PowerUp Mobile is currently offering a free Eee PC 2GB Surf when you sign up for T-Mobile’s Web n Walk mobile broadband package. New users must sign up for a two-year agreement which will set you back £35 per month, in addition to the Eee PC, users will also get a free USB modem. With just a limited time to sign up, you better not wait too long, because the offer ends on June 15, 2008.

With two recent free Eee PC offers, it would make you wonder when the next will show up, possibly and hopefully we can get a similar offer over here in the US.

Read [PR Web] Via [Engadget]