Wireless carrier Verizon is branching out from offering just mobile phones. Last week, Reuters (and other news sites) had reported Verizon would start selling netbooks this year. Those reports were confirmed by a Verizon spokesperson who was quoted on several other web sites such as InternetNews and InformationWeek. There were no details on which netbooks or the prices of wireless data plans that would be available. But many speculate the move would be similar to AT&T's foray with RadioShack—an Acer Aspire One for $99 (instead of $300) with a two-year data plan.
The takeaway: While we haven't rated its wireless data service, Verizon has long been among the better carriers in our Ratings of cellphone service (available to subscribers). On the other hand, while the netbook to be offered by Verizon isn’t confirmed, Gizmodo has it as an HP Mini, and the only HP Mini we've tested scored low in our netbook Ratings; a successor is now in our labs and will appear soon on ConsumerReports.org. Also, many candidates for a supposedly subsidized netbook likely already own a smartphone with a data contract; will they, in tight times, want to take on yet another data bill every month? Would you?

Mobile phones continue to boast better cameras, as demonstrated by our Ratings of both cell phones and (especially) smart phones (both available to subscribers). These three new arrivals to our labs have cameras that fared impressively in preliminary tests in our labs.

Here are details on those test results, along with other information on the phones, which we continue to test. Prices are from the indicated wireless service carrier, with a two-year contract.

Samsung Memoir, $250, T-Mobile. (Click on the image at right for a closer look.) The best camera we've seen on a phone, whether a regular cell phone—as the Memoir is—or a smart phone. The Memoir's full-featured 8.0-megapixel camera, among the highest resolutions we've seen on a cell phone, produced excellent 8×10 prints, and very good 13×19 prints, in our tests. The camera was also less sluggish in taking shots than other 3- and 5-megapixel camera phones we’ve tested. It also has manual ISO settings up to 1600, allowing you to capture images in low-light conditions (though not without noise). Other camera features include a flash, autofocus, anti-shake control, face, smile and blink detection, and video recording.

The Memoir has an impressive array of other features, too. For example, it can view Office documents such as Word, Excel, and PowerPoint. That ability is usually the purview of the smart phone, which further confirms the blurring line between cell phone and smart phone.

Samsung Omnia, $100, Verizon.
(Click at image right for a closer look.) A feature-packed smart phone
that boasts a fine, full-featured 4.9-megapixel camera. The camera
produced very good 8×10 photos in our tests.

One of the thinner phones we've tested lately, the Omnia has a relatively large 3.2-inch touch-screen
display with widget bar navigation, and its interface is similar to
Windows, which makes navigation intuitive to PC users. It synchronizes
easily with Microsoft Outlook on a PC. It's also easy to switch between
applications and run multiple programs, and you can create and edit
Office documents.

The Omnia has built-in Wi-Fi for fast Web surfing, though it can't be used to swap data with other devices.

LG Incite, $100, AT&T. LG's first smart phone for the U.S. market, while small, manages to squeeze in a more-than-decent camera—albeit one that's not quite as good as the cameras on the new Samsungs. At 3.1-megapixels, it has fairly-high resolution for a phone and produced good-quality 8×10 prints in our tests.

The Incite has a relatively large 3.0-inch touch-screen display and its interface is similar to Windows, which makes navigation intuitive to PC users.

All three phones are now in testing, and will post soon to our Ratings. — Mike Gikas

The Conficker worm—as in an online worm,  a type of virus that lives unnoticed in your PC while spreading itself to others over the Internet—has been one of the hottest online-security stories over the past few months. The worm started infecting systems big-time last fall. But the biggest chapter in this story might be yet to come.

Up to now, Conficker, which affects only Windows computers, has clogged networks and infected an estimated 12 million computers. It's also been able to shut down antivirus and other security software. "But it hasn't implemented a nasty functionality, yet," says Ed Skoudis, co-founder of IntelGuardians.

However, experts fear it may, come April 1. There's plenty of speculation about what exactly could happen on April Fool’s Day, the day Conficker is programmed to connect to other PCs forming a “botnet”, but no one knows for sure. So you'll want to take whatever steps you can to protect yourself.

That means ensuring your security-software subscription is current and checking that updates are being implemented. You should also run Windows Update—look for that or Microsoft Update on your Programs menu—to get the latest critical patches and the malicious software removal tool which will kill Conficker. Finally, this is a great time to make sure your data is fully backed up, using one of the several available options.

For more on staying safe online, take a look at our Online Security Guide for more tips. — Donna Tapellini

For years, I've wondered which type of product will win the "hybrid" or "convergence" war: An HD camcorder with all the quality and flexibility of a good digital camera? Or a camera offering the quality of HD video found on a good camcorder? I've got my motives: I'd love to be able to use just one device to shoot photos and video of my kids, family and friends.

To date, no one product meets both of my requirements. But Canon's new 15-megapixel EOS Rebel T1i SLR seems to be giving cameras a slight edge over camcorders. (Although all consumer-grade camcorders can take digital still photos, nearly all do a mediocre job, producing middling quality and low-resolution images.)

Meanwhile there are three SLRs and many point-and-shoots that claim to capture HD video. Plus, Panasonic's second micro four-thirds, SLR-like camera, the Lumix GH-1, also takes HD video.

The Rebel T1i is Canon's response to the Nikon D90, the first SLR on the market to offer HD video. (The third SLR is Canon's first with HD video, the EOS 5D, Mark II. But priced around $2800, body only, it's more than what most average consumers will pay for an SLR.)

At $800 for a body-only model, or $900 with the 18-55mm image-stabilized zoom, the Rebel T1i is cheaper than the Nikon D90, which is $1000 body-only or $1300 with a longer 18-105mm image-stabilized zoom. That makes the T1i the least expensive SLR that has HD-video capability.

The Rebel T1i differs from the D90 in another potentially significant way: Canon claims it can shoot at 720p (at 30 frames per second or fps) or 1080p (at 20fps). The Nikon D90 can only shoot 720 video at the slightly slower 24 fps. The T1i also lets you autofocus when shooting video, which you can't do with the D90.

Of course, we won't know just how good the video quality is until we get the Rebel T1i in our labs. And our experience with the Nikon D90's HD video wasn't promising: Its video quality didn't match that of even lower-ranked HD camcorders in our Ratings.

In some ways, the Rebel T1i combines features and specs from two of its siblings, the Rebel XSi, $650, and the pricier EOS 50D, $1400, body only. It's exterior is similar to the XSi. Plus, it includes 9-autofocus points, ships with an image-stabilized kit lens, and has the same 1.6x magnification factor for lenses. Also, Canon rates the T1i's burst mode nearly the same as the XSi: 3.4 fps vs. 3.5. But its sensor and processor are similar to the EOS 50D, since it's a 15-megapixel camera and its 3-inch LCD has more than 900,000 dots, which should make for far more detailed images on the display.

For more on SLRs, go to our SLR Ratings (available to subscribers).

The Rebel T1i will be available in May.

—Terry Sullivan