Samsung already knows how to draw a crowd to the Samsung Galaxy Note, an unusually large smartphone for AT&T with a 5.3-inch screen and a stylus for writing and sketching. At shopping malls, conferences, and popular plazas around the world, hired caricature artists in red berets sketch the likeness of passersby and then offer to …

At long last, Verizon is giving us a taste of the Ice Cream Sandwich update plan we’ve been hungering for ever since Google made the operating system available to developers. HTC HTC ThunderBolt HTC Droid Incredible 2 HTC Rhyme HTC Rezound LG LG Spectrum Motorola Motorola Droid Bionic Motorola Droid Razr Motorola Droid Razr Maxx Motorola Droid 4 Motorola Xoom …

Now playing: Watch this: Skype for Windows Phone Beta 1:07 BARCELONA, Spain–Skype has at long last come to Windows Phone, and here at Mobile World Congress, I got a closer look at the beta version (the “gold” version releases in April.) The app fits closely with the look and feel I’d envision for the mobile platform, with larger icons, swipe-through …

BARCELONA, Spain–Typically, attending the last day of a conference puts you face to face with the frantic stragglers trying to grab one last meeting, or the dazed wanderers biding time before a welcome flight home. Not so at Google’s MWC booth, which remained a fairground for Android lovers. It’s pointless trying to narrow down a favorite attraction: was it the …

Now playing: Watch this: Huawei Ascend D Quad 1:12 BARCELONA, Spain–Huawei is gunning for quad-core Android market share just as much as the next manufacturer. Curious about the Ascend D Quad smartphone that Huawei is claiming to be the world’s fastest, or the MediaPad 10, a quad-core 10.1-inch tablet? So were we. That’s why we stopped by Huawei’s booth at …

BARCELONA, Spain–Today at Mobile World Congress, Ericsson CEO Hans Vestbeg, saunters over to a bicycle on the far edge of his keynote stage and touched a spoke. Instead of hopping on the bike, like many in the audience undoubtedly hoped he would, the leader of the Swedish network equipment giant announced that this particular bike is a connected device. The …

BARCELONA, Spain–T-Mobile has a plan. The smallest and weakest of the four top U.S. wireless providers may be bruised after a breakup with would-be spouse AT&T, but it isn’t beaten. So goes the company line. It all starts with investing $4 billion to upgrade its network and roll out 4G LTE, which it expects to launch in 2013, behind Verizon, …

BARCELONA, Spain–These days you’ll be hard-pressed to find people who remember when personal computers were luxury items that few could afford. Now smartphones are increasingly headed in the same direction, continuing to become cheaper and more ubiquitous for everyone, not just for the global elite. The mass market in question goes well beyond the budget-conscious living in developed markets, and …

Now playing: Watch this: HTC One V 1:13 BARCELONA, Spain–When HTC announced its HTC One family of phones, it saved the HTC One V, the runt of the litter, for last. It may be less high-powered than its cohort, comprised of the HTC One X and One S, but it promises to be a good choice in its own right …

BARCELONA, Spain–I don’t tend to take much stock in promises of zero shutter lag; I’ve seen too many examples of hold-ups where there shouldn’t be were all claims true. So when I got the HTC One phones in my hand for some short and sweet camera tinkering, I was pretty surprised to see the camera capture and store the shot …