Sprint to Turn iPod Touch Into 3G Mobile Hotspot?
Phone Scoop yesterday
discovered new
regulatory filings posted by the U.S. Federal Communications Commission showing a new Sprint-branded 3G mobile hotspot device manufactured by ZTE that appears to be in the form of a designed case to wrap around Apple's iPod touch.
The Peel, as FCC photos suggest it will be called, seems to be a carriage sled for a tablet style device like the iPod touch. The Peel does not seem to connect to its host device, and it seems to be a specially designed Wi-Fi hotspot device that could offer EV-DO networking to an iPod touch in a package that could be clamped to Apple's Wi-Fi-only iPod.
In addition to apparently allowing an iPod touch to connect via Wi-Fi to access the case's 3G data capabilities, the user manual suggests that the Peel would serve much like a traditional 3G mobile hotspot, allowing up to five devices to connect to it to share the Internet connection.
The Peel would not be the first time Sprint has tried to tap into the Apple iOS ecosystem to promote its mobile hotspot devices. Earlier this year, the carrier released a
television commercial touting its Overdrive 3G/4G mobile hotspot device by claiming that Apple's iPhone could achieve a ten-fold increase in data speeds by connecting through the Overdrive on 4G as opposed to the iPhone's built-in 3G connectivity through AT&T.
Soon after the launch of the Wi-Fi iPad in the U.S., Sprint also rolled out a free "4G case" to hold both the iPad and the carrier's Overdrive hotspot device, promoting the package as a way to achieve high-speed mobile connectivity with the iPad and other mobile devices.
Popular Stories
iOS 18 is expected to be the "biggest" update in the iPhone's history. Below, we recap rumored features and changes for the iPhone. iOS 18 is rumored to include new generative AI features for Siri and many apps, and Apple plans to add RCS support to the Messages app for an improved texting experience between iPhones and Android devices. The update is also expected to introduce a more...
The first approved Nintendo Entertainment System (NES) emulator for the iPhone and iPad was made available on the App Store today following Apple's rule change. The emulator is called Bimmy, and it was developed by Tom Salvo. On the App Store, Bimmy is described as a tool for testing and playing public domain/"homebrew" games created for the NES, but the app allows you to load ROMs for any...
Apple today said it removed Game Boy emulator iGBA from the App Store for violating the company's App Review Guidelines related to spam (section 4.3) and copyright (section 5.2), but it did not provide any specific details. iGBA was a copycat version of developer Riley Testut's open-source GBA4iOS app. The emulator rose to the top of the App Store charts following its release this weekend,...
Game emulator apps have come and gone since Apple announced App Store support for them on April 5, but now popular game emulator Delta from developer Riley Testut is available for download. Testut is known as the developer behind GBA4iOS, an open-source emulator that was available for a brief time more than a decade ago. GBA4iOS led to Delta, an emulator that has been available outside of...
A week after Apple updated its App Review Guidelines to permit retro game console emulators, a Game Boy emulator for the iPhone called iGBA has appeared in the App Store worldwide. The emulator is already one of the top free apps on the App Store charts. It was not entirely clear if Apple would allow emulators to work with all and any games, but iGBA is able to load any Game Boy ROMs that...
Last September, Apple's iPhone 15 Pro models debuted with a new customizable Action button, offering faster access to a handful of functions, as well as the ability to assign Shortcuts. Apple is poised to include the feature on all upcoming iPhone 16 models, so we asked iPhone 15 Pro users what their experience has been with the additional button so far. The Action button replaces the switch ...