For everyone out there who wants an iPhone 3G-type phone but doesn't want an iPhone, InformationWeek has an article talking up what it calls "8 killer iPhone 3G alternatives."

If you don't want to get roped into a two-year contract with AT&T, need a physical keypad or have a thing against the App Store, the magazine suggests you check out one of the following:

BlackBerry Bold for its "snazzy redesign, integrated Wi-Fi, 3G network capabilities and assisted GPS."

HTC Touch Pro because it has both a touch-screen interface and a physical keyboard, plus Wi-Fi, 3G and GPS.

LG Voyager for its physical keyboard and touch-screen. This option has some drawbacks, though - it's not a true smartphone.

LG Dare because, although its target is the casual user, it has "features and a design that may make mobile professionals look twice."

Nokia N 96 because, well, it's the latest addition to Nokia's N series.

Samsung Omnia for its 3.2-inch touch-screen, five-megapixel camera, built-in GPS and Wi-Fi and handwriting recognition.

Samsung Instinct, which InformationWeek describes as "a legitimate alternative" to the iPhone for Sprint customers.

Garmin Nuvifone, which is due out later this year, and boasts a touch-screen, Wi-Fi, e-mail capabilities and, because it's a Garmin, killer GPS features.

There was promise, but now it's gone. As PC Magazine reports, Advanced Micro Devices (AMD) said Thursday that it had discontinued its digital television and handheld businesses. "Not surprisingly, AMD reported a hefty loss for the second quarter of 2008."

This comes as no surprise; back in April, then CEO Hector Ruiz said that the company would soon exit non-core businesses. (He also exited yesterday, incidentally; apparently he is also a non-core business.)

In early 2007 at CTIA, AMD introduced a promising series of updates to its mobile graphics accelerator chipsets (called Imageon), which this author had covered in Orlando for PC Magazine at the time. They provided high resolution, full-screen video playback and impressive 3D graphics acceleration—no surprise since AMD owns ATI. Oh well.

For the first time in two years, the number of mobile subscribers in the UK declined in Q1. The figure dropped by a mere 119,000 to 70.67 million, according to a Cellular-news report. Sure, any decline is bad, but considering that the mobile subscriber penetration rate in the UK is around 116%, the growth potential has to slow down some time.

The number of folks in the UK with 3G phones topped 10 million in the quarter. As of the end of March, there were 10.83 million 3G subscribers, up from 7.1 million in the year-ago quarter, to account for more than 15% of all mobile phones.

We can't wait to see what kind of 3G numbers the UK reports for Q2, which will include about three weeks’ worth of iPhone 3G sales. The second quarter should also be quite a boon for O2, which is responsible for all those iPhone 3G activations.

The sluggish economy has begun to slow cell phone sales: top handset research house Gartner has lowered its market growth forecast, and top phone-charger maker Salcomp has already warned on profits, Reuters is reporting.

"In the last month however, the economic environment started to negatively impact emerging markets as well as mature," Carolina Milanesi, head of mobile device research at Gartner, said in the article.

Last year, cellphone sales grew 16%. This year, analysts are forecasting that sales will again grow, but only 10% to 11% on average. There's also a bit of saturation at work here, since over 80% of the U.S. population already has a cell phone subscription and, presumably, at least one cell phone to use with it.

(Image credit: Clipart.com)

Palm is trying to regain some dominance in the smartphone market with a new Treo model designed to take on RIM's market-leading BlackBerry line and, of course, the new iPhone 3G, the AP reports.

Offered by Sprint, the Treo 800w is the first major release from Palm this year and features Wi-Fi, GPS and the latest version of the Windows Mobile OS.

Even though the Treo 800w is launching only three days after the iPhone 3G, Palm already has some serious catching up to do, say a million units' worth. The PDA maker has been faltering for years, but its real undoing came from Apple, which managed to take the number-two smartphone spot from Palm within months of the iPhone hitting the market last year.

Will this new Treo do the trick to get Palm back on track? Use our comments feature to share your opinion.

Believe it or not, the iPhone 3G isn't the only new phone making its debut. For some reason, Verizon Wireless and LG Electronics chose to unveil the new flip-style LG Chocolate 3 today as well, but it's not going on sale until Sunday.

The third-generation of Chocolate music phones, the Chocolate 3 is the "marquee" music phone for the new V CAST Music with Rhapsody subscription service. Designed to be a top-notch music machine, the new Chocolate has a built-in FM transmitter so you can listen to its music through a car or other stereo system. It also boasts dual speakers, a Bluetooth headset for wireless stereo sound and multitasking abilities so you can listen to music while using other phone functions.

It might not have much internal memory, but it can support an 8GB microSD memory card. And it has something you won't be seeing on the iPhone anytime soon - Flash. The Chocolate 3 is the first Verizon Wireless phone to feature the Dashboard a graphically rich portal powered by Adobe Flash Cast technology that delivers personalized multimedia and entertainment services directly to the phone. Dashboard supports 13 different channels, including four fixed - Mobile Web, VZW Showcase, Get Channels and Search - plus the choice of nine additional channels you can choose to have appear on your phone.

The new Chocolate will retail for $129.99 after a $50 rebate and with a new two-year commitment.

Sony Ericsson and mobile application distributor Handango have hooked up to make it easier for folks with a Sony Ericsson convergence phone to access content and applications.

The deal calls for Handango's content partners to offer "a vast and easy-to-navigate array of best-in-class smartphone applications" that have been optimized for Sony Ericsson's XPERIA and UIQ advanced handsets. Handango is also the content provider for the handset maker's mobile Web store for UIQ phones and will offer its InHand mobile client on all UIQ devices.

Sony Ericsson's XPERIA X1 will come embedded with a Handango-branded Windows Mobile 6.1 InHand client to give users direct access to applications for enhanced device usage.

Folks who already have a UIQ device will have access to Handango's mobile store from their phone's browser as of July 25. New UIQ phones will come from the factory with an over-the-air link to the store.

Nokia just released some surprising results of a global survey on recycling mobile phones, FierceWireless reports.

The survey, which was based on interviews with 6,500 people in 13 countries, found that a "very low number of consumers recycle their phones and most are unaware that they can do so. Only three percent of people recycle their mobile phones and three out of four people are not aware they can recycle their mobile phone."

Some other numbers quoted from the report:

- People on average have owned around five phones.

- While 3 percent of those surveyed said they recycled their phones, only 4 percent said they throw them away.

- The majority (44 percent) said that the phones are at home and simply not being used.

- Others (16 percent) said that they give their old phones to other family members or friends, while another 16 percent said they sell them.

Open mobile computing platform developer Openmoko has unveiled a new mobile device that it claims will "help to enable ubiquitous computing for the 21st century."

The $399 Openmoko Neo FreeRunner phone features a 2.8-inch touch-screen, Wi-Fi, motion sensors and Bluetooth. It comes with core software for dialing, SMS and recording contacts.

Openmoko intends to periodically add features, starting next month with a software suite that takes advantage of the phone's hardware platform to provide new location-based applications. Two versions of the phone will be available, 850 MHz or 900 MHz Tri-band GSM, to match frequencies in different countries.

What makes this more than just another new phone announcement is the Openmoko platform, which lets developers in the Free and Open Source Software (FOSS) community create unique versions of the FreeRunner phone, modifying not only the way the phone works, but also how it looks. CAD files are publicly available for designers wanting to tailor the FreeRunner's look and feel.

The phone will be available in the EU, North America and India.

RCR Wireless News is reporting that UTStarcom will sell its personal communications division to private equity investors for at least $240 million:

"The PCD business primarily distributes handsets and accessories in North America for its parent corporation, UTStarcom. The company, based in Alameda, Calif., also recently divested its mobile solutions business."

So who exactly is UTStarcom, you may ask? They, along with Audiovox, have distributed the odd high-end and bargain-basement cell phones in the U.S. over the past several years. The company never became a major player in the lucrative mid-range cell phone market here. UTStarcom also made a stab at the mobile VoIP market, which hasn't really gone anywhere in the past several years either.

The report said that both moves were designed to help UTStarcom focus on its core products, which include IPTV, next-generation networks, and broadband data.