Mobile World Congress gets ready to roll

We are off to Barcelona for one of the biggest events this year - Valentine's Day. Oh, we got word of some Mobile World Congress (MWC) going on for the next week or so, so we might as well drop in. Sunny Barcelona has got us in a fun mood but so much for fooling around, we're in for a busy couple of days and we'll keep you posted.

Barcelona's preparations for the Mobile World Congress in pictures

Monday will mark the beginning of a strenuous week of scouring the latest and the greatest of what mobile phone manufacturers will offer us in 2008.

As usual, we will bring you all the last-minute news from the Mobile World Congress (previously known as 3GSM Congress). We are here in Barcelona one more time for your pleasure (and ours).

Most manufacturers are keeping their announcements for the first day of the event, so the only thing we got right now is high hopes and small teasers.

Since Samsung and LG are the only ones to advertise on the cityscape, we are pretty sure about what they will be highlighting. Yesterday Samsung announced their latest Ultra mobile - the 5-megapixel Samsung U900 Soul. It's an all-metal slider with a touch-sensitive navigation pad similar to what we saw in the Samsung E950 (but hopefully spiced up with some new features).

Samsung U900 Soul ads are all over Barcelona

LG are not lagging behind with the LG KF600 (we already told you about) and the LG KF700. Both are sliders, but while the KF600 has its touch-sensitive InteractPad, the KF700 has a large 3-inch touchscreen display. Both have full-fledged hardware keypads.

LG KF700 and LG KF600

Samsung will also be having a go at Nokia N95 with their latest Samsung G810 - a 5-megapixel Symbian smartphone with 3x optical zoom and Wi-Fi.

Speaking of Nokia, they are supposed to officially present the Nokia N96 (we already told you about that too). It's got a 5 megapixel camera and 16GB of onboard storage. We are also hoping for a glimpse of the Nokia Touch UI.

Sony Ericsson are expected to announce their next UIQ high-end smartphone - the Sony Ericsson P5. Motorola are also planning to present a new multimedia device - the Motorola Z12, despite all the talks of commotion at their mobile division.

Some of these devices are entirely speculations based on leaks, so we will be updating you as soon as the info hits us.

Well, that's it, we are eagerly looking forward to Monday but we'll try to make the most of our stay meanwhile with some Spanish sangria.