Cisco Systems has bumped up its buyout offer to $3.41 billion for video conferencing company Tandberg. The network giant’s initial bid received a thumbs down from most of Tandberg’s shareholders, who felt the initial $3 billion offer undervalued the company. So far, more than 40 percent of Tandberg’s stockholders, which includes investment firm OppenheimerFunds and …

According to figures released by research firm Gartner last week, Apple’s iPhone, RIM’s BlackBerry and Google’s Android OS have been sharing a feast. The main course? Windows Mobile. Gartner claims Microsoft’s mobile platform lost 28 per cent of its global smart phone market share between Q3 2008 and Q3 2009, dropping from accounting for 11 per cent of the world’s …

Arriva — the bus company that brought you the number 23 Erskine to Glasgow, among other favourites — is going to start accepting e-tickets flashed from the screen of your mobile phone. Arriva is calling it the m-ticket, and you have to install an app on your mobile phone to get started. Go to arrivabus.co.uk/m-ticket or text ‘mbus’ to 82500 …

“The Xperia X10 could be the beginning of a beautiful friendship for Sony Ericsson and the little green robot,” said our main — and, to be fair, only — girl, Flora, when she checked out Sony Ericsson’s Android-powered Xperia X10 phone earlier this month. And now, it seems we have a release schedule. According to Sony Ericsson’s official online store …

LG Shine II LG LG and AT&T announced Monday a successor to its LG Shine slider handset, the LG Shine II. It’s just as glossy and reflective as its predecessor, complete with a 2.2-inch mirror LCD. Features include a music player with a customizable equalizer, stereo Bluetooth, the typical messaging features, GPS, and a 2.0-megapixel camera. The Shine II will …

Today, the BBC has announced a full timetable for its BBC HD channel becoming available on the new Freeview HD service. London and Manchester will be the first places getting access to the HD service, which we expected. We also knew Freeview HD would use the more efficient DVB-T2 system the BBC has played a huge part in developing over …

If it escaped your attention that Channel 4 is broadcasting a series of programmes in 3D throughout this week, feel free to catch up. For the rest of you, we thought you might enjoy a three-dimensional excursion down memory lane. Terrestrial broadcasts of 3D television have been taking place for years, usually as special episodes of popular programmes. As most …

At its annual European press launch in Amsterdam, Panasonic yesterday announced that it would launch a series of new Blu-ray players, including a portable machine, the DMP-B15, and a freesat-recording model, the DMR-BS850. There were also jokes about windmills. To our surprise, the company has decided that in the middle of a recession, what people really need is the ability …

We’ve seen the Motorola Droid and the HTC Droid Eris from Verizon Wireless so far, but apparently there is a third Verizon Android handset waiting in the wings, if rumors are to be believed. Rumors are that it will be the HTC Passion, which is supposedly powered by a 1GHz Snapdragon chipset (the Passion might also be called the Dragon). …

Dell said Friday that it’s ready to enter the smartphone business with the Android-based Mini 3. Long rumored to have a smartphone in the works, Dell said that the first two carriers to sell the Mini 3 will be China Mobile and Brazil’s Claro. In China, the Mini 3 will use OPhone, China Mobile’s customized version of Google’s Android operating …

Hive for the iPhone: brilliant fun Scott Stein/CNET Back when I used to work at Sony Online Entertainment many, many years ago, I became a board game geek. The game designers and producers gathered once a week to share their sizable collections and obscure finds up in Mira Mesa, Calif., and I got hooked. The fact that the Game Keeper …

Recently, I removed my iPhone e-mail accounts so I could troubleshoot a problem with the Mail app. But when I reinstalled the accounts, I found that I wasn’t able to delete messages from one account’s in-box. The account in question was a POP3 account used to retrieve messages from my spam e-mail filtering service. It was sending and receiving e-mail …

TomTom, the golden child of the iPhone 3GS launch, has whipped more features out of the bag for everyone who shelled out £60 for it. The free update will add lane guidance, which helps you figure out where you should be going on complicated junctions, and text-to-speech, so it can read out street names and points of interest as part …

AT&T wants to set the record straight about its 3G wireless coverage. The company has placed a statement on its Web site defending itself against critical advertisements Verizon Wireless has been running that highlight areas of the country where AT&T lacks 3G coverage. “We typically don’t respond to competitors’ advertising,” AT&T said in its statement. “However, some recent ads from …

Now playing: Watch this: Samsung Behold II (T-Mobile) 3:54 On Thursday, Samsung and T-Mobile announced that the Samsung Behold II will be available starting November 18 for $229.99 with a two-year contract. First announced at CTIA Fall 2009, the Behold II is Samsung’s second Android device. It uses Samsung’s TouchWiz interface and includes a 3D cube navigation menu for the …