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While the news of a delay is usually a bad thing, it will be nice to hear that this delay is just two days. That’s right, instead of being released on today July 15 as expected it has been pushed back to July 17.

“As you can imagine, we encountered a few bugs last week that we needed to fix before we launch. Our engineering team worked through the weekend to fix the bugs. Even though our release is a beta, we’d rather spend the extra time to fix them, thus giving you a better experience. The fixes are almost complete now, but we need two more days to run the build through our quality assurance testing. The new launch date is now set for the 17th.”

Of course, even when released on July 17, this is still just a beta release and not a final version. While a delay is not always the best news, on the flip side its nice to see a company making sure its going to work as expected, instead of just dumping something out for the sake of making the deadline.

So here’s to waiting two additional delays before we are able to play around with Opera Mobile 9.5. Hopefully we will not see any further delays.

Via [Opera Mobile Blog]

The team behind Opera Mobile has announced that they will have Opera Mobile 9.5 available as a “first beta” on July 15. The beta edition will be available for public download and will be based on the same engine as the desktop version of 9.5. The new version of the browser will offer support for Opera widgets, Javascript, AJAX and Flash (Lite 3.0).

Although Opera Mobile is available for both Windows Mobile and Symbian-based phones, this release announcement only mentions a Windows Mobile release. You can also already find a version of Opera Mobile 9.5 on currently shipping phones such as the HTC Touch Diamond.

Read [Opera Mobile Blog] Via [MobileCrunch]

The Nokia N96, is now expected to ship in July of this year.  Announced earlier this year, the N96 once again pushes the upper limit of the Finnish phone manufacturer’s N Series.  The quad band N96 has Wi-Fi, GPS, and support for DVB-H mobile tv—all built in.  The phone sports a stellar 5-megapixel camera with dual-LED flash and auto-focus.  A neat hardware feature of the N96 is a little kickstand for the device, enabling you to prop it up to watch videos.

Play.com has listed the phone for 599.99 GBP, which converts around $1,200 USD.  However, the Nokia MSRP is currently listed at a slightly more reasonable $800.  Either way, Play.com says the N96 will be shipping on July 31st.

Keep your wallets padded Nokia fanatics, because come July, they’ll be taking a heavy hit.

Via [Symbian Guru]

Did you know Samsung makes refrigerators?  True, really tech-looking ones you can find in Lowes.  Another surprise for you, this Samsung has a Safari browser.  Yes, that Safari.

Samsung has been working with Apple to get the browser and it looks like this is going to happen.  While the basic S60 browser was pretty good, bringing Apple branded software is an interesting move I suspect we’ll see lots more of.  Way to go Samsung.

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Looking to keep its promise of delivering newer versions of its SlingPlayer Mobile software, Sling Media has made updates available for download on their web site today. And not only did they update three currently existing versions of their software client, but they also added support for a few new devices, namely the Nokia N95 8GB, the Treo 500v, and the Samsung i760. Streaming has also been optimized on select handsets, and one such is the Sprint Mogul. Interestingly enough, though, the SlingPlayer Mobile software client on the Palm OS has not been upgraded yet like the other clients.

To download the latest version of SlingPlayer Mobile, all you have to do is log on to Sling Media’s web site and click on the appropriate links. You won’t be needing to fork out any money because the download for the upgrades are free, unless of course if you’re not already an existing customer, at which case you’d have to pay $30 per handset. And don’t forget you also need a Slingbox set up in your home (or any place you stay) for all this to work. So unless you do and you’re willing to pay for the hardware (and software, for new customers), don’t be dreaming up about this right now, thinking that things will magically appear out of nowhere. More info available at the following links.

Download [Sling Media] Via [Crave]

Heads up to all Sony Ericsson smartphone fans. The upcoming Sony Ericsson G700 smartphone just went through the clutches of the FCC, and guess what? It was given a go signal. No surprise there. So now SE only needs for the G700’s brother, the G900 to pass through the FCC as well, and they can simultaneously roll out two formidable new smartphones for enterprise users or the few people who are all business, all the time.

The Sony Ericsson G700 was first announced at MWC 2008 back in Barcelona, Spain, and the highlights of its features include a 240x320 pixel, 262k color touchscreen display, 160MB of internal memory with Memory Stick Micro support, 3.2-megapixel camera with dual-LED flash and it runs on the Symbian UIQ OS. This could be great news for those looking for a new kind of smartphone, only one has to consider, SE has a knack for having most of its devices approved by the FCC even though most of these will never see the light of day in the US market. And there aren’t any details on availability and pricing yet anyway, so I guess SE fanboys will just have to wait.

Via [IntoMobile]

It seems that Sling Media is planning to have a very busy year, with support coming to more and more devices. Dave Zatz has confirmed that they (Sling Media) have an iPhone SDK, but where they decide to go with be another story and an actual player has not been confirmed to be in the works yet. According to Dave “we know it’s [iPhone] a hot platform and we’ll see what our options are.” Sounds like it would be a smart move.

In addition Sling Media, just yesterday confirmed the upcoming SlingPlayer support for the Symbian UIQ, Nokia N95 8GB and also confirmed they still have the previously announced Blackberry player in the works. Assuming it all goes according to plan, it look like we geeks could have our choice of mobile phone and not have to worry about Sling Player support.

Via [CrunchGear]

Sling has announced their upcoming release of SlingPlayer Mobile for Symbian UIQ. With no specific date for launch, the SlingPlayer Mobile is expected to be available this summer and will support the Sony Ericsson P1i, P990i, W960i, W950i, M600i and the Motorola MOTORIZR Z8.

In addition Sling also has some good news for Nokia N95 owners, the current version of the SlingPlayer Mobile for Symbian S60 also has an update in the works, look for that sometime in the Spring of 2008.

A specific release date has not yet been announced, however we will be looking for more information to come during CTIA next week.

Read [Sling Media]

Sling has announced that they’ll be rolling out an updated version of SlingPlayer this spring. The updated SlingPlayer will be optimized for devices running on Windows Mobile (both touchscreen and non-touchscreen versions) and they’re working on a similarly optimized Nokia N95 8GB client as well. Support for Symbian UIQ is also in the works and at the same time, their mulling over Apple’s recently released iPhone SDK for a possible future release of a stand-alone iPhone SlingPlayer client. Well, if that doesn’t get you excited, I don’t know what will. Think of it as a substitute for until YouTube begins live video streaming. Online video sites have yet to kill the couch potato’s holy grail, anyway.

Via [IntoMobile]

It looks like we don’t have to wait long before Nokia’s next flagship phone hits the shelves, at least in the UK that is. According to Carphone Warehouse, the Nokia N96 is scheduled to be released in August, barely six months after we first got the whiff of such a device and five months after the dual slider was officially announced at the MWC 2008. On the list accompanying the N96 are also the Sony Ericsson G900 and the Samsung G810 with release dates of April and July 2008 respectively.

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