Sharon Vaknin/CNET Remember when it was taboo to write in books? Well, a college career of in-book highlighting and two e-readers later, I’m ready to admit that I have absolutely no guilt about writing in books. Or tearing them apart, for that matter. So when I was looking for inspiration for a DIY charging dock …

For consumers who have an iPhone, but yearn for the feel and touch of a physical, BlackBerry-esque QWERTY keyboard, SoloMatrix may have the solution. Its product, Spike, is a protective case that has a hinged physical keyboard, which can be overlaid on an iPhone’s display. This lets users type away on a tactile keyboard, without the need for wires, docking, …

Now playing: Watch this: Phone News: iPhone 5 to get nano-SIM 4:03 It’s Tuesday which can only mean one thing: it’s Phone News day! Except of course on days when we put the show out on Thursdays — but hey, here at CNET UK Towers we’re as flexible as an unskinned Android. So what regurgitated titbits of phone and tablet …

Now playing: Watch this: Get quenched with the Kyocera Hydro 0:54 After unveiling it during CTIA 2012, Kyocera finally announced that its newest waterproof Android 4.0 handset, the Kyocera Hydro, will be available on Boost Mobile’s network starting August 3. Though it isn’t considered a “rugged” device per se, the Hydro is waterproof and can withstand a good dunk or …

If you think your phone bill is shocking, get a load of the iPhone that delivers a 650,000-volt electric shock. A charged-up robbery victim is calling for money to help develop the Yellow Jacket, an iPhone case with a Taser-style stun gun built-in. The Yellow Jacket iPhone case contains an electroshock zapper, and when applied to an attacker the resulting …

Motorola Mobility said it isn’t worried about a looming import ban on many of its products that takes effect tomorrow. “Motorola has taken proactive measures to ensure that our industry leading smartphones remain available to consumers in the U.S.,” the company said in an e-mailed statement. The ban, which takes effect tomorrow, comes from a U.S. International Trade Commission ruling …

When the time is right to propose to your significant other, and you decide the way to do it is create a custom boot animation for their Android phone (and you think they’ll say yes and not, “What the hell is wrong with my phone?”), who you gonna call? XDA Developers, that’s who. Android fan robo4130, from Scottsdale, Arizona, took …

Amazon’s Kindle Fire may be cooling down. That’s according to Cowen analyst Kevin Kopelman, who today cut his forecast on the company’s revenue, as well as sales of its Kindle e-reader and Kindle Fire tablet. The forecast comes ahead of an expected refresh of Amazon’s tablet, which made a splash late last year with its $200 price point. Since then, …

Half of all adult cell phone users surveyed by Pew Research use their cell phones while watching TV, a revelation that could drive more interactive advertising for TV viewers. Josh Miller/CNET According to the Pew study, which surveyed 2,254 people in March and April of this year, 52 percent of all cell phone owners said they had used their mobile …

After Google recently shook up the 7-inch tablet space with its well-received Nexus 7, much of the speculation has focused on rumors that Amazon and Apple would soon introduce new “mini” tablets. Now we’re getting word from a credible source that Barnes & Noble, a 7-inch pioneer with its Nook Color and Nook Tablet, is set to bring out out …

Samsung plans to acquire CSR’s handset connectivity and location development operations and technology, the companies announced today. Under the terms of the deal, Samsung will hand over $310 million to the semiconductor company to take control over its “Handset Operations.” In addition, Samsung will take on all 310 CSR employees operating in those divisions. CSR says that Samsung will also …

Taking screenshots on your new device is a great way to show off your home screen, or even show a friend what settings they need to have in a particular app. It wasn’t long ago that root access, a third-party app, or even the Android SDK was required to take a simple screenshot. Thankfully, taking a screenshot on the Nexus …

While the Samsung Galaxy S III (S3) looks identical across all four major U.S. carriers, data speeds are anything but equal. I’ve been testing GS3 phones on one carrier or another for over a month now, and was curious which one gave me the fastest and which the most consistent speeds — and if the two were the same. “Fast” …

MartinLogan is known for making high-end speakers, so it came as a little bit of a surprise when I saw that the company’s just-announced Mikros 70 reference in-ear headphones were priced at a fairly modest $149.95. I haven’t tried the earphones out but MartinLogan describes them as, “Inspired by the sonic clarity and detail of our legendary electrostatic speakers and …

If you own an HTC Evo 3D or Evo Design 4G, here’s a bit of good news. An update to Google’s modern Android 4.0 Ice Cream Sandwich operating system is just around the corner. Android ICS certainly isn’t Google’s freshest mobile software flavor, Android 4.1 Jelly Bean. Frankly I’d rather have the nimbler handling and trove of new abilities JB …