And you thought this day would never come. The official release of Opera Mobile 10 is now available for Windows Mobile, marking the end of several long beta periods. If you still need to see what you're getting into, check out our video review of the Opera Mobile 10 beta. Then head on over to Opera and get your download on. [Opera Mobile]
Opera Mobile 10 (see our video hands-on and full review) has hit the beta 2 stage of its life. Here's what's improved, via the Opera Moble Blog:
That enough for a beta 2 release? We're definitely happy to see better memory management -- that was our chief complaint of the early beta. And for what its worth, we're now getting 99 out of 100 on the Acid3 test, down a point from the first release. But as this is still a beta release, there are bugs. Peep a list of them after the break. Now, what about you guys? This latest release of Opera Mobile 10 working for you? Grab it here.
You've seen the announcement and the video tour of Opera Mobile 10 Beta. Now we'll sit down with the mobile browser on Windows Mobile see what we like, what we don't and what we feel is missing.
Let's skip to the chase on this one so follow the break to see some screen shots along with our observations on Opera Mobile 10 Beta.
OK, folks, here it is: The Opera Mobile 10 beta. For a beta release, however, it's pretty darn complete and could well serve as your daily mobile browser. Not convinced? Peep the video after the break as we put it through its paces, and put it up against the iPhone 3G's Safari browser.
First there was Opera Mobile 9.5 beta, which gave way to Opera Mobile 9.7 beta. Now, enter Opera Mobile 10 beta for Symbian. And it looks like a likely progression and brings much-improved password management, among a host of other features. Question is, will we see Opera Mobile 10 on Windows Mobile? Wmpoweruser says yes, unofficially, even though there's zero mention of WinMo in the Symbian release. So, we'll just have to see. [Opera Mobile 10 beta]
Some registry diving in one of the leaked HTC HD2 ROMs floating around out there and found a couple of interesting entries.
There are a couple of other nerdcore entries in there. Check 'em out.
Via wmpoweruser
OK, this isn't exactly a fair fight, but forget about that for a minute. To the average user it probably doesn't matter whether your browser is being rendered through a proxy, security and privacy implications be damned.
So casting that difference aside, our own resident Nokia Expert and regular ZDNet contributor Matt Miller set forth to test the beta version of Opera 9.7 against a number of other phones, including the T-Mobile G1, iPhone 3G, Nokia N97, Nokia 5800, Nokia N85 (hey, we told you he's a Nokia Expert) and iPhone 3GS. For the WinMo side, Matt was rocking Opera Mobile 9.7 on a Pharos Traveler 137.
And what did he find? In straight page-loading tests, Opera Mobile 9.7 won. Read his full findings here. Matt's also keen on the rendering.
Opera gets it right with Opera Mobile and is much smarter about optimizing your display size and resolution. The custom HTC builds of Opera Mobile even allow several custom zoom levels where the text always fits on the display just right. There is still work for Apple to do in the browser, but they definitely have the loading speed down pat.
Browser wars are a favorite pastime of smartphone nerds (Exhibit A, Exhibit B) and there are a ton of variables to take into account (not to mention one's own patience level). But if it's good enough for Matt, it's good enough for us. If you've got a touchscreen device, head on over to Opera and try out the 9.7 beta for yourself.
A few people had been asking, "If Opera Mobile 9.7 is coming, why's 9.5 still in beta?" The Opera Mobile blog explains:
Our core department has released a new version of Opera Presto which contained support for Opera Turbo, more advanced web standards, Gears and several other improvements. We wanted to make this available to our users as soon as possible, and chose to upgrade the core version in Opera Mobile. Updating the browser core is a big step forward for us, and it felt natural to change the version number.
We have to upgrade to a new browser core as often as possible. Several products using a wide range of browser core versions introduces a lot of overhead (several version of core has to be maintained and worked on at the same time), so we try to use the most current stable core version at all times.
Makes sense to us. Now, can we get a copy of 9.7 already? :)
Our love-hate relationship with Internet Explorer may again become a bit of a moot point as Opera Mobile has announced some details of the next version of its browser.
CNet reports that Opera Mobile 9.7 will support Flash and Ajax. CNet also says Opera Turbo, which squeezes data through slower connections, will make its mobile debut, and that 9.7 scores a perfect 100 on the Acid 3 rendering test. Google Gears and Open GL ES for graphics also will be on board, as will widgets.
Drool.
Opera Mobile 9.7 is intended for release by carriers and phone manufacturers, CNet says, but a consumer release is hinted at.
Alls we know is this: Between IE6, Skyfire, Firefox and now Opera 9.7, it's starting to look like the browser wars are back with a vengence.
Update: Opera's posted a video of 9.7 in action. Peep it after the break.
If you didn't realize that the 2009 Mobile World Congress was just a few days away, you'd swear there was something in the air. Between new phones to updated software, news from the Windows Mobile industry isn't letting up. It's also turning out to be the week of the browser, with Mozilla and Skyfire already coming to the table.
Not to be left out in all this excitement, Opera Mobile has announced it is going Turbo. Opera Turbo (pdf link) is boasting an 80 perecent traffic compression by using the trick of rendering Web sites on their servers then sending the compressed version to the mobile browser. What's that mean to you? Faster load times. Opera Turbo is reported to support Flash and AJAX. This is all in the same vein of what Skyfire's been doing for a while now, but it's good to see other browsers throw their hat into that ring.
Opera plans to show off Turbo in Barcelona next week, and we'll add this to Dieter's "To Do" list.
Via IntoMobile.com
|
New in the Forums
|
|
 |
|||
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
|
