HP has been rather quiet on the smartphone front, and we do know that they still have a couple more handsets that are ready and waiting to be unleashed upon the masses – the Veer and Pre 3, not to mention the TouchPad tablet, of course. Well, judging by the Pre 3 arriving at the FCC, one can say that it is closer than the rest to a launch date. The Pre 3 goes by the model number HSTNH-F30CN, where it has just picked up FCC approval today. It seems as though the device’s label location pics do appear to be too large to be the Veer, and too tiny to be the TouchPad, hence the Pre 3 conclusion.
Test reports have shown that the Pre 3 has already won approval for its dual-band wireless-N Wi-Fi capabilities, and while there was nary a beep concerning the handset’s cellular or Bluetooth capabilities, more on that should surface in due time. Test reports also do point towards support for GSM 850 and 1900 bands, in addition to WCDMA bands II and V. For those who are well versed, they would know that these are frequencies that correspond to AT&T’s network in the US, further confirming speculation that the Pre 3 will arrive via AT&T. Ah well, since they no longer have an iPhone monopoly, why not spread their eggs across multiple baskets?
The Pre 3’s software version has been listed as WebOS 2.3, which has yet to be announced since the current version of webOS is 2.2, while webOS 3.0 has been designated for HP’s TouchPad tablet. Seems similar to Android territory, with Android 3.0 Honeycomb meant for tablets, while Android 2.3 Gingerbread being rather rare at the moment amongst handsets.