New Mobile Phones Showcased 143
An anonymous reader writes: "This is a report at VR-Zone
showing many new and upcoming models of mobile phones with features like color
LCDs, GPRS and digital cameras built-in from major Telco companies like NTT
DoCoMo, Panasonic, Kyocera, Samsung and Sony Ericsson. 3D Graphics animation
software design houses for example discreet, NewTek and Alias|Wavefront and
video editing card manufacturers like Pinnacle and Canopus have their booths
there too." There are too many links to list here separately, but I especially liked the pictures of products from NTT DoCoMo and Sony Ericsson.
WOW! (Score:3, Funny)
At last my life has meaning again. No I can get a phone that plays MP3s, video clips and warns me if my fly is down.
Sorry, I just drank five too many Jolts.
ech (Score:1)
Only hands-free porn viewing allowed in Santa Fe.
Re:ech (Score:1)
Re:ech (Score:1)
Re:ech (Score:1)
Not where I live (Alberta) they aren't. Our idiot MLA's voted that it was ok to when a bill was tabled to make it illegal.
doh. (Score:1)
So many features (Score:1)
Re:So many features (Score:1)
the problem is (Score:1)
Re:the problem is (Score:1)
Since when were Panasonic, Samsung, Sony Ericsson, etc telcos? These are the companies that make the handsets. They are not the companies that run the networks the phones are programmed to use. That'd be Verizon, Sprint, Cingular, etc. In short, Midwest Wireless doesn't fit in here, because they provide service and resell these phones. They don't make the phones. The AC that submitted the story is an idiot.
Re:the problem is (Score:1)
So actually making hardware and software essential to telecom doesn't make them telecom companies?
So the companies that make TV programs aren't in the TV buisness, neither is the companies that make the actual tv sets? Only the cable company is?
Re:the problem is (Score:1)
The word "Telco" is generally meant to be a shortening of the phrase "Telephone company", and traditionally refers to the companies that provide the service for telephones. The companies that make the phones would most precisely be called "Telephone manufacturing companies". While I can see your case for calling them "Telcos" as well, that's not the common use for the term.
Re:the problem is (Score:1)
My mistake, I thought telco was just a shorter form of the (already shortned) word telecom, for telecommunications
And Thanks for not beeing an ass about it, but correcting me politely
I really want a cell phone (Score:2, Funny)
Re:I really want a cell phone (Score:1)
Teach me to flame liek you flame
Re:I really want a cell phone (Score:1)
In my experience cellphones can only aid and have never crippled my life in any way, well, short term at least, who knows if it will cause some new type of cancer or not...
Wow..... (Score:1)
amazing (Score:1)
Phone sex just got an upgrade! (Score:1)
Imagine how much they'll charge for it if they provide a video feed, too!
This is going to give good old-fashioned Internet porn a run for its money. ;)
Re:Phone sex just got an upgrade! (Score:1)
It's the same old thing (Score:3, Funny)
Re:It's the same old thing (Score:2)
I want a small, subtle flip phone that looks elegant and classy, has good reception, and doesn't cost $700. Why can't that happen? Le sigh.
--Dan
I can just picture it.... (Score:1)
Same old stuff (Score:4, Insightful)
Huge freakin' phones that do way more than I want a phone to do. Video/pictures/color...etc.
Give me a phone that calls someone with great sound/voice quality, and can fit in my pocket without me knowing it's there. That's all I want.
Re:Same old stuff (Score:2)
Re:Same old stuff (Score:1)
if its gonna be that kinda party, im gonna stick my dick in the mash potatoes.
It slices, it dices... (Score:1)
But I phone that lets you talk to someone.
Finally! (Score:1)
Try European stuff! (Score:1)
Re:Try European stuff! (Score:2, Interesting)
Re:Try European stuff! (Score:1)
Re:Finally! (Score:1, Offtopic)
Re:Finally! (Score:1)
GURPS (Score:1)
Re:GURPS (Score:1)
but have you read the recent (Score:2)
Yes, it's a joke.
tcd004
Something wrong with vr zone? (Score:1)
Re:Something wrong with vr zone? (Score:1)
featuritis (Score:2, Funny)
Re:featuritis (Score:1)
Speak for yourself (Score:2)
* _small_
* calendar with alarms, synchs with my desktop
* camera that takes at least 640x480
* good contacts section, inc notes with each contact
* voice memo
* on-set answerphone ala Sony Z5 [1]
Phillip.
[1] This is something you don't appreciate until you go abroad, where retrieving voicemail is £2.50/min with T-Mobile but £0.20/min paying to receive the call that gets recorded instead.
Just a suggestion (Score:1)
Hey guys, how bout we get the 3g network deployed a little more before bombarding us with useless reasons to buy a new cell phone? You'll get more business out of me with a nice 3g network than you will with color LCD's.
Re:Just a suggestion (Score:1)
No, I'm pretty sure I don't like you because you keep whining. I certainly don't care about your karma or lack thereof.
Re:Just a suggestion (Score:1)
Why is this cool? (Score:5, Informative)
Well, as a wireless developer, I'll tell you:
2.5/3G -- almost all of the phone designes showcased support some sort of high speed wireless connection (high speed as a releative term to what came before). I-mode, M-Mode, GPRS, whatever, it all translates into "get data to the the phone faster than before".
Displays -- lot of them also offer colour displays, and those that don't are at least super-size STN screens. While you're right in assuming that colour screens are overkill, having a screen that can display at least 8+ lines is always good.
bluetooth -- even though bluetooth is a bit of a "lame duck", it's still more convenient then directional IR or tethering the phone to the laptop with a cable.
GPS -- while the "big brother" factor is pretty big here, as well as location-dependent SMS advertising, it's also useful for your average user -- like, say, telling your phone to use BLuetooth to sync only when you're a certain computer at XY coords, or a yellow-pages/direction system that can tell "you are here".
Polyphonic Sound -- I lied, this is not one of the reasons they're cool. This is one of the reasons why I will get pissed at people who have a CD quality Britney Spears sample as their ring tone while in a theatre while I'm trying to watch Matrix 2 and Matrix 0.
plus: MMS with audio/amr email attachments (Score:1)
MMS: Multimedia Messaging System [mobilemms.com] -- this allows you to send email with audio/amr [ietf.org] attachments, so you can play them with open source code [3gpp.org] from public 3GPP technical standards [3gpp.org] TS 26.071, TS 26.073, TS 26.101 and TS 26.074.
AMR is a truly great vocodec technology, which stands for "Adaptive Multi Rate." Accordingly, it takes less bandwidth and battery time because when the microphone isn't picking up sound (from, e.g., your speech) your phone isn't sending as much information. Just the way it ought to be. Why spend 4 kbps to send comfort noise when 20 bps can do just as well? Execellent code!
You are here (Score:1)
I just rented a mobile phone while in the UK, and it knew where I was plenty well enough to tell me local weather and where to find the closest ATM. Towers aren't that far apart.....you don't need the phone to report your position down to a resolution of a few inches to get that kind of information.
Anything else is just too big brother for me.
Re:Why is this cool? (Score:1)
Oh... (Score:3, Funny)
The site was a bit on the slashdotted side... but i insisted. And guess what. The guys actually took pictures of the phones! of the silly phones! Now who on earth goes all the way to Asia to get pictures of phones? Boy, I sure liked E3 better than this fair...
</kidding>
Re:Oh... (Score:2, Informative)
bottom three photos...
breathless
I had to do it... (Score:1)
Seeing new phones always depresses me... (Score:1)
slashed already... (Score:2)
Please please, give me a smaller phone. (Score:3, Interesting)
Give me a wireless phone that will fit on my ear with a small 1/2 sized boom mic. that will allow me to plug it into my pda/computer to upload phone lists and you have a big time sale. "Dial, 555-5555 connect" would be wonderful for voice dialing. Something that will be light enough to leave on while I sit at my computer, drive, pull hotswap drives, would be wonderful. I have seen these for short distances that you plug into your phone on your desk. Why not go ahead and shrink the portable phone down enough that you wear it like your would a hat, or a watch. It seems the most logical step.
Re:Please please, give me a smaller phone. (Score:2)
Re:Please please, give me a smaller phone. (Score:2)
No I would not. Excuse the missed space.It is even a pet peeve of mine. Funny how something you despise in others comes back to bite you...
Re:Please please, give me a smaller phone. (Score:1)
Re:Please please, give me a smaller phone. (Score:2)
Re:Please please, give me a smaller phone. (Score:2)
very nice! I have yet to see that watch phone, and it dose not look way out tacky. If they could combine this with the bluetooth headset that is posted below it would be pretty slick.
Re:Please please, give me a smaller phone. (Score:2)
Re:Please please, give me a smaller phone. (Score:1)
The T68 is a usability nightmare. You even turn it on with the NO-button! That makes less sense than shutting down Windows with a Start-button. It has abot 3 different sets of menus accessible from 3 different buttons.
I could go on for quite some time, but besides the form-factor and the feature-est there is nothing great about the T68.
Re:Please please, give me a smaller phone. (Score:1)
Speaker embedded in the tip of your thumb.
Microphone in the tip of your finger.
Keyboard embedded in to palm of back of hand as comfort dictates.
It's so obvious really
Just what we needed! (Score:1, Insightful)
I guess that all those idiots driving around with a phone glued to their ear are not obnoxious enough. We are now have to put up with more idiots looking into ridiculous, teeny-weeny screens instead of watching the way they go.
More freakin' distractions (Score:4, Insightful)
Adding more features simply adds to the problem.
And for all you too cool users that say "Oh, *I* can drive just as good with my SuperZoomie hands free thing"...try it with a driving simulator sometime. Crank up a NASCAR game, and try to have a meaningful phone conversation while winning the race. Which happens first? Either you give up the phone conversation, or you crash.
Problem is, on the road, there is no reset. You merely die.
Eh? (Score:1)
Re:Eh? (Score:1)
See how fast you die while talking on the phone vs not talking.
Re:Eh? (Score:2)
Re:More freakin' distractions (Score:1)
drive at all well. And trying to talk on the phone
makes things go from bad to worse.
I drive just fine tho, I find that I lose track of
the phone conversation if anything, not have trouble driving.
Re:More freakin' distractions (Score:1)
Then why bother with the phone call/video feed/SMS/email at all?
Re:More freakin' distractions (Score:1)
Re:More freakin' distractions (Score:1)
Sometimes, I get the feeling that Japanese people are getting out of hand with all the car-based electronics. My brother's Japanese Game Boy Advance actually has an illustration to explain "Do not use while driving or walking."
They're not aimed at drivers... (Score:2)
All these cool features are aimed right at the young, hip, high school and college aged kids. I have a dozen female high school aged cousins, and they all had the latest and greatest phone that had every feature you could imagine.
The parents, on the other hand, being much more conservative, had the standard plain vanilla phones... which means they had eight times more features than my US Sprint phone and weighted 50% less.
The greatest feature I've seen with their phones is the lightweight battery chargers- size of a matchbox. The one thing I really hate when I travel is having to carry around 20 pounds of bricks to charge all my appliances. Oh, and the LCD clock, the screen turned into a nice, analog clock when the phone was on standby. That was nice touch.
Re:They're not aimed at drivers... (Score:1)
You think HS and college kids don't drive? Those are the little puppies with the phone glued in their ear while driving.
Re:They're not aimed at drivers... (Score:1)
Re:More freakin' distractions (Score:1)
No, actually, you -- the bicyclist and/or pedestrian -- usually die. The driver of the car walks away with scratches and a bruised ego.
Re:More freakin' distractions (Score:1)
Seriously, how is having a conversation on a phone different from having one with the passenger beside you? Once you have hands-free handsets, you should be able to use the phone. I do it all the time.
Re:More freakin' distractions (Score:1)
Delete NASCAR, and substitute any task intensive game while talking on the phone. It is different from a passenger in the car with you, because your focus is outside the vehicle. A passenger with you is awre of the situation from moment to moment, and can act accordingly. On the phone, it may be your boss asking "Where the f$ck is the spreadsheet for the Finster account?" And you're supposed to help him find it while driving.
Just try it sometime. see which way you have a better score, with or without the phone call.
You'd be surprised how good these are (Score:4, Interesting)
Speaking of which, took delivery of a new convergence device, the XDA, about to come on the market in the UK (and Germany to follow), from British phone company O2. Looks great ( see it here [o2.co.uk]) and works very smoothly, a GPRS phone combined with a Pocket PC... that's the downside, Microsoft. Otherwise it does all the things you'd want something like this to do: always on email, web surfing, MP3 player, phone, the whole caboodle.
Re:You'd be surprised how good these are (Score:1)
(1) The phone cuts out for no apparent reason and periodically reboots itself. 2 mates who had the same model of phone had the exact same problem, ergo it's a design fault.
(2) With all the bugs in the 9110, I wasn't going to pay almost GB£400 on a 9210 when the 9210 isn't even Triband. So for £130 (after a £50 trade-in for my old phone) I went for the T68i and haven't had a single problem since. Sure I miss the alphanumeric keyboard, but if you really can't do without one, you can always buy a chatboard that plugs into the bottom of the phone.
Re:You'd be surprised how good these are (Score:1)
Re:You'd be surprised how good these are (Score:1)
periodically reboots itself. 2 mates who had the
same model of phone had the exact same problem,
ergo it's a design fault.
Quite astounding, except for the fact that my FonyEricsson 68 does the exact same things -- and is painfully slooow to use with the small buttons and unmatched menu latency.
Better yet: sometimes the t68 seemingly comes up with a fit of the blue screens (screen shuts down, phone doesn't respond to any buttons including ON/OFF) and is only revivable by way of removing the battery.
Seen Nokias (5 yrs in use), seen Ericssons (1yr). Now what? Motorola? Samsung? Please.
great (Score:1)
More references from EurAsia (Score:1)
New toys - hey, isn't there a /. category for that?
Different phones for different things... (Score:2)
I have two phones, and between them they are everything I need. When I'm working, I carry a Nokia 9210 [nokia.com], and when I'm out chilling with friends or clubbing, I carry a Sony Ericsson T66 [sonyericsson.com].
The 9210 is a real powerhouse of a phone, with a word processor, spreadsheet, internet access, excellent messaging facilities, massive contact database, etc - but it's a bit much to carry around. The T66 is tiny, and yet fully functional as a phone - it weighs in at around 60g (2oz).
I have all but given up on finding the perfect phone for all occasions, I listed what I thought might be my perfect PDA [slashdot.org] on slashdot a while back, but I can't see it happening any time soon. The only solution to me is to vary my device depending on the circumstances - each device does what it's designed for very well indeed, but one device trying to do everything invariably fails completely.
-- Pete.
Re:Different phones for different things... (Score:2)
Jeeezus. Do you have purses for every occasion, too?
Re:Different phones for different things... (Score:1)
Phone (Score:1)
- work anywhere on earth
- good sound
- have at least 8 hours active battery life (and more standby)
- is small, light and durable
- and cost 20$ a month unlimited connection.
If you give me that I'll drop my regular phone line and you have me as a customer for the rest of my life...
If I want to see moving pictures in color I'll turn my TV on... you wanna bet that those features are there to bombard you with shiny colorful advertisement!!!
Re:Phone (Score:2)
$15 Line Charge
$1 Touch Tone (I believe)
$4 taxes
$5/mo Caller ID
$3/mo call waiting
etc, etc. If you want free long distance, it's gonna be $20 more on top of that, and then only to ATT customers.
For $35/mo, I get 450 anytime, 1000n/w (start at 8PM), call waiting, 3 way calling, caller ID, free LD to the US from my home calling area. You're not going to get unlimited, even from a land line for $20.
Different cultures (Score:2)
Most posts are along the lines of criticising "useless" features, however most slashdotters are American and therefore this does not surprise me.
In other areas of the world, a mobile phone is much more than a simple communications tool. In places like Europe, Asia and Australia, EVERYONE has one as mobile phones are deeply embedded now in the cultures of these countries. In the US however, many of these new features will never work, because the US networks are far behind the rest of the world.
I'm not trying to flame, I just am trying to explain that the situation is different in other countries, and therefore although some of you might think video/text messaging/mobile internet is a waste of time others really do appreciate these innovations.
I agree there are a few useless features I find on mobile phones, though, although they may be useful to someone else.
Re:Different cultures (Score:2)
Here in San Francisco I can go grab nearly any phone on the planet, bring it here and use nearly every single feature available (exceptions being some older single-band GSM and all two 3G phones) using Cingular or AT&T. That includes WAP, GPRS, SMS (though I'm unsure about MMS), GSM, silly ringtones, even sillier games, and even i-mode (called m-mode.)
Not only that but Sprint and Verizon are both rolling out 3G 1x this year (Sprint's rollout is nearly complete, though phones for 3G are scarce.)
Cell phone penetration nation-wide is around 53% which is far shy of Europe's 74%, but out here in California the picture looks a whole lot more like Europe.
There are many reasons why people don't go buying cell phones every 6 months here, but features not working isn't one of them. A cheap wired phone system (compared to Europe), phones that are a little more substantial than Japanese counterparts (DoCoMo phones cost, look and feel like plastic toys and one doesn't feel bad about tossing one), an immense computer/laptop penetration rate (compared to Japan for instance) and just plain culture differences are probably the biggest reasons.
The idea of tossing out two hundred dollar (or in the case of Nokia 8910, near thousand dollar) devices every six months just seems wrong.
Mobile users turned off by 3G services (Score:2)
Read the whole article on ft.com [tm0.com]
So who needs it? (Score:1)
Honestly, do you *need* a color-screen on your phone? It's harder to read, and drinks more battery juice.
Do you need an MP3 player in there? A radio? A camera? I know I don't. For the simple reason that I already have these things, and they work much better than an all-in-one solution.
Me, I want three things:
* Small size
* Long battery life
* Good voice quality
Got all that in a tiny Nokia - I use it via a headset (voice dialling), never notice it's in my pocket, and it has an uptime of about two weeks before I have to recharge it.
Good enough. I don't like bloat in my code, and don't like it in my phone, either.
Ciao,
Klaus