Yesterday we reported that Windows Phone 7 devices like the Samsung Focus could not have their storage easily upgraded, as you will need special “Certified for Windows Phone 7″ microSDHC cards.
Owners who attempt to update with a “regular” microSD card run the risk of messing up their phones, with AT&T even going as far as to put a sticker on the microSD card holding bracket with the capital letters “STOP!”
Today, however, SanDisk has confirmed the first “certified” card, with Samsung’s support pages saying the following:
Compatible micro SD cards will be branded as “Windows Phone 7 Compatible” on the packaging. Approved cards can be obtained from the manufacturer or carrier. (The SanDisk 8GB class 2 micro SD card has been certified.)
The company also warns that once you use the card in your WP7 device, it will become unusable for other devices.
Says Samsung (via EWM):
Once inserted and properly formatted, the memory card becomes an inseparable part of the phone. A micro SD card inserted into a Windows Phone 7 device, and integrated into the device’s file system, is intended to be a permanent modification to the device. Once a micro SD card has been integrated into a Windows Phone 7 device’s file system, it will no longer be readable or writable on any other devices such as computers, cameras, printers, and so on. This includes an inability to format the micro SD card for use in these devices
Result for: printers
During the Fortune Brainstorm Tech conference this week, Palm CEO Jon Rubinstein has confirmed that the company, under the new management of HP, will also be creating WebOS netbooks, alongside tablets, smartphones and printers.
Says Rubinstein: “We’re working a wide variety, as Todd said, smartphones definitely, slates, netbooks, working with the guys in the printer group. webOS [...] will have a unified user interface across all of these, will have a unified developer environment, and it’s all based on the foundation that we build in webOS from day one.
When we developed webOS, we thought about making this scalable across a variety of mobile devices; that’s what we’ll be delivering going forward.”
While tablets, printers and smartphones had been confirmed in the past by either HP or Palm, netbooks had only vaguely been mentioned.
In April, HP purchased Palm for $1.2 billion, after outbidding RIM, Apple and Lenovo.
With the acquisition, the company also acquired all of Palm’s patents and its WebOS mobile operating system.
Result for: printers
HP has filed for a trademark application for the term PalmPad, which has led many observers to suggest that the company will name their upcoming WebOS tablet by the name.
Even on the simplest level, the name implies use of WebOS, which was created by Palm on a tablet, although everything is speculation at this point.
Hewlett-Packard Development Company, L.P applied for the trademark.
In April, HP purchased Palm for $1.2 billion, after outbidding RIM, Apple and Lenovo.
With the acquisition, the company also acquired all of Palm’s patents and its WebOS mobile operating system.
HP has promised to use the operating system on tablets, printers and other non-computing devices, as well.
