Smartphone Season: 25 Hot Handhelds For Fall
As if there was any doubt that smartphones rule the mobile device world, this fall's list of scheduled smartphone releases seems to redefine the term "crowded marketplace."
The following slides provide a look at new challengers to the supremacy of Apple's iPhone and RIM's BlackBerries. All together -- with a few new low-end devices thrown in for good measure that try to stretch the definition of "smart" -- they represent new avenues for carriers like Verizon, AT&T, T-Mobile and Sprint and challenger operating systems like Windows Mobile 6.5 and Google Android. Which will we still be talking about a year or two from now?
Carrier: T-Mobile
Motorola's Cliq goes for $200 and will be available to existing T-Mobile subscribers on Oct. 19, with everyone else getting a shot on Nov. 2. Motorola Cliq is 3G and includes a full slide-out QWERTY keyboard, a 3.1-inch touch screen, a 5-megapixel camera with autofocus and 24-frame-per-second playback video capture, a music player preconfigured for Amazon's mp3 store, Wi-Fi, a 3.5mm headset jack and 2 GB of memory, expandable up to 32 GB. Among its most notable features is MotoBlur, a custom interface that aggregates a user's social networking and other communications tools into a single interface.
Carrier: T-Mobile
While its pricing and launch date haven't been confirmed, the Behold II will be Samsung's first Android-based phone to hit the U.S. It includes Bluetooth 2.1, GPS, a 5-megapixel camera with video capture, Wi-Fi capability and as much as 16 GB of expandable memory through a microSD slot. It also has a 3.2-inch AMOLED touch display and Samsung's TouchWiz UI and 3-D cube menu, plus built-in Google services like Gmail, Google Talk and YouTube.
Carrier: Sprint
Samsung's' new slider (that is, sliding QWERTY keyboard phone) will have an 800MHz processor, 3.2-inch AMOLED screen, optional trackpad and a 3.2-megapixel camera. Another Android phone for Samsung, it also includes built-in Google search, Google Maps, Gmail and YouTube. It'll run $179 after a $50 savings and $100 rebate with a two-year lock-in, and is set to launch Nov. 1.
Carrier: AT&T
While not quite considered a "smartphone," the Mythic is one of two Samsung phones on AT&T to be announced at CTIA Fall 2009. Samsung's Mythic offers a 3.3-inch touch screen, speakerphone, 3G, Samsung's TouchWiz interface, a memory card slot, personal organizer, messaging, e-mail, a music player, and support for AT&T's Mobile TV and AT&T Navigator. It'll be available in November for $200 and offers AT&T's new Mobile Browser, which AT&T says offers an HTML experience on par with using the Web on a computer.
Carrier: AT&T
The Mythic's complement, Samsung Flight, also offers AT&T's Mobile Browser but instead of a touch screen is a slider handset with a QWERTY keyboard. The Flight offers AT&T Navigator, a music player, streaming video, a memory card slot, a personal organizer, speakerphone, 3G, messaging and e-mail. It's also coming in November and will set you back $99 with a service plan.
Carrier: Sprint
Sprint and Samsung in early October unveiled the Intrepid, a QWERTY keyboard phone and also Sprint's first Windows Mobile 6.5 phone. It features Internet Explorer Mobile 6, a 2.5-inch touch-screen interface with 320 x 240 pixel resolution, a 3.2-megapixel camera, stereo Bluetooth, microSD supporting slot for up to 32 GB, Wi-Fi connectivity, threaded text messaging, instant messaging, a Smart Reader for scanning business cards and both Microsoft ActiveSync and Microsoft Office Mobile. It's also the first smartphone to offer Microsoft Tellme, a voice-activated program allowing users to voice dial and also text and search the Web using voice commands. It's available as of Oct. 11 for $250 with a two-year lock-in and a $100 rebate.
Carrier: Unannounced
Yikes! At about $1,030 (700 Euros), a new phone branded by, yes, fashion titan Giorgio Armani is a new Samsung phone powered by Windows Mobile 6.5. Debuting in Milan over the weekend, it sports a 3.5-inch AMOLED touch screen, 5-megapixel camera, and a video player, plus 8 GB internal memory and HSDPA Internet support. According to an Armani press release, the phone "coordinates perfectly with Giorgio Armani suits." To each his own, gentle smartphone shoppers.
Carrier: Verizon
A new Verizon phone, the Razzle, is made by Personal Communications Devices (PCD), a one-and-half-year-old company formed out of the former Personal Communications division of UTStarcom. An odd one, for sure: It's not a 3G phone but is unique in that users can twist the bottom half of the phone around -- it's a QWERTY keyboard on one side and has speakers and a music player on the other. It also has a 1.3-megapxel camera, a 2.2-inch display, GPS and VZ Navigator for turn-by-turn directions. According to Verizon, the Razzle will be available for $70 with a contract agreement, but hasn't yet announced on-sale dates.
Carrier: Verizon
HTC's Imagio is the first smartphone to support Verizon's V Cast Mobile TV services, and it's also the first Verizon mobile device powered by Windows Mobile 6.5. It also works with Verizon's V Cast Video On Demand an V Cast Music Services. The Imagio has a 3.6-inch WVGA touch screen, measures 4.6 by 2.4 by 0.5 inches, weighs 5.25 ounces, has a 528MHz Qualcomm MSM7600 processor with a 1,500 lithium ion battery, a 5-megapixel camera, 3.5mm headphone jack, a microSD expansion slot and uses HTC's TouchFlo 3-D interface. It's available as of Oct. 6 through Verizon online and comes to Verizon stores next week for $200 (with a two-year lock-in and $100 rebate).
Carrier: Sprint
The HTC Hero proves Sprint isn't banking all of its hopes on just the Palm Pre. Hero is a Google Android device with a 3.2-inch HVGA touch- screen display (including pinch to zoom capabilities), and also includes GPS, a digital compass, gravity sensor, 3.5mm headphone jack, a 5-megapixel camera with autofocus and expandable memory through a microSD slot. It's the first U.S. smartphone to use HTC Sense which, according to HTC, lets users customize their smartphone features by creating home-screen panels and other widgets. It's available as of Oct. 11 for $180 (after a $50 instant savings, $100 mail-in rebate and two-year lock-in).
Carriers: Verizon, T-Mobile, Sprint
HTC's original TouchPro arrived to strong reviews in fall 2008, and apparently the telcos liked what they saw: Verizon in September became the third major U.S. operator to launch its successor, the HTC TouchPro 2. Unlike Sprint and T-Mobile -- both pushing the Touch Pro 2 for $350 -- Verizon is offering the phone for $200 after a $100 rebate and two-year lock-in. The Touch Pro 2 has a 3.6-inch WVGA TouchFLO 3-D display, full keyboard, 3.2-megapixel camera, tilt screen, and runs on Windows Mobile 6.1 with upgrades to Mobile 6.5 promised.
Carrier: AT&T
HTC Pure is a rebranded version of HTC's Touch Diamond2 pumped up for use with Microsoft's Windows Mobile 6.5. A touch-screen unit, it doesn't have a physical keyboard, but does sport a 3.2-inch WVGA touch screen with 800 x 480 resolution. Like other HTC smartphones, it offers TouchFlo 3-D interface, plus 144 MB of data storage, expandable to 16 GB thanks to a microSD slot, and a 5-megapixel camera that can autofocus and take video. The Pure also comes with Motion G-Sensor, an ambient light sensor and FM radio, plus Bluetooth 2.0 with EDR.
Carrier: AT&T
Another new Windows Mobile 6.5 phone through AT&T, HTC's Tilt 2 is a QWERTY keyboard slider phone with a 3.6-inch WVGA touch screen, dual speakers and noise-canceling microphones and a 3.2-megapixel camera. If that sounds familiar, it is: the Tilt 2 is the AT&T version of HTC's TouchPro 2. Like many of its new HTC smartphone brethren, it also offers TouchFlo 3-D. According to AT&T, it's available for $300 (following a $50 rebate and two-year lock-in).
Carrier: Verizon
HTC Ozone is Verizon's version of the HTC Snap, minus some features but also at a cheaper price than its HTC Snap counterparts. It arrived in July and had a recession-friendly launch price of $50, giving users Windows Mobile 6.1, long battery life, basic Web browsing and application options. It also comes with VZ Navigator, mobile e-mail, mp3 trimmer, visual voice mail, mobile IM and 3G and Wi-Fi connectivity. The display is 2.4-inch with 320 x 240 QVGA resolution, and it comes with a 2-megapixel camera, QWERTY keyboard and microSD memory card slot.
Carrier: Unannounced
Formerly known as the HTC Click, HTC's Tattoo is yet another Google Android phone that made its debut in Europe in early October and is expected to hit U.S. shores in the coming months. HTC has not announced official pricing but at the time of the Tattoo's early September announcement, expectations were that it would be offered for free in European markets with a two-year carrier service contract. It's similar to the HTC Hero in that it includes the customizable HTC Sense interface. Tattoo also has a 2.8-inch touch- screen display, a 3.2-megapixel autofocus camera, 3.5mm stereo headset jack, expandable microSD memory slot, support for Wi-Fi, GPS and Bluetooth, an accelerometer and a digital compass.
Carrier: T-Mobile
The Dash 3G, T-Mobile's version of the Snap, was the last of HTC's summer phone releases, sporting Windows Mobile 6.1, Microsoft Outlook sync as part of the full Office Mobile suite, Wi-Fi, GPS, a full QWERTY keyboard, 3G connectivity and a 2-megapixel camera, plus messaging options and IM clients. It also offers 528MHz Qualcomm CPU, 256 MB of RAM and flash storage and HTC's YouTube player. It went on sale in mid-July for $169 with a two-year contract.
Carrier: Unannounced
LG Electronics muscled into the Android-based smartphone game in September with the LG-GW620, a QWERTY slider with 3-inch full touch screen and, yes, Google's Android front and center. It's only available in Europe this year, but according to LG will kick off a flood of new smartphones based on not only Android but also Windows Mobile 6.5, for which LG has promised 13 new phones in the next 16 months.
Carrier: Unannounced
File the Pop under the list of LG phones slated only for Europe in 2009, but promised to help ignite LG's smartphone firestorm over the next year and a half. Similar to LG's Cookie KP500 phone, the Pop, formally known as the LG GD510, includes a 3-megapixel camera with video capture, a 3-inch WGVGA touch screen, and a narrow 4.8mm bezel -- "giving the illusion of an uninterrupted sheet of glass," LG writes in its launch release.
Carrier: Sprint
Palm in early September revealed the Pixi, a slimmer, lighter version of its Palm Pre and expected to be available in time for the holidays. The Pixi sports a 2.63-inch multi-touch screen with 320 x 400 resolution, an exposed QWERTY keyboard, GPS, a 2-megapixel fixed camera with LED flash, 8 GB of storage, Bluetooth 2.1+ EDR, removable battery, support for MMS and many of the social networking capabilities -- woven-in Facebook, Google and Exchange ActiveSync, plus Yahoo, LinkedIn and Palm Synergy -- seen on the Pre.
Carrier: AT&T
AT&T's Samsung Mythic and Samsung Flight releases also saw the launch of two new not-quite-smartphones from Pantech. The Reveal is a 3G, feature-rich phone with a slide-out QWERTY keyboard and a music player, plus AT&T Navigator. Like the Mythic and Flight, it also offers an embedded full HTML Opera Mini mobile browser, called att.net.
Carrier: AT&T
Pantech's impact is the complement to Pantech Reveal, and both are lower-end AT&T phones that combine mobile browsing and plenty of other basic features without quite being in the smartphone class. The main difference between the Impact and the Reveal is that the Impact has a touch screen on the outside. Like the Reveal, it offers a slide-out QWERTY keyboard, 3G connectivity and a music player.
Carrier: Verizon
It's not exactly high end -- does that mean it's not "smart?" -- but Nokia's new Shade seems targeted at users who want some basic features without a lot of bells and whistles. It offers a 1.3-megapixel camera and GPS navigation through Verizon's VZ Navigator, and also offers changeable cover plates, sold separately through Nokia. It's a cheap little number, too; $30 with a contract agreement.
Carrier: Verizon
Now here's an odd one: a dual-band CDMA swivel phone with QWERTY keyboard, 262k color display, Bluetooth, microSDHC card slot, music player and organizer functions. That may sound pretty standard until you get a look at the design:The phone's a chubby-looking square-shaped thing (2.71 inches x 2.71 inches by 0.59 inches) with a slide-out keyboard, geared toward those with a yen for stylish messaging devices, but it does include 3-megapixel camera with video capture, flash and autofocus, Verizon features like VZ Navigator and V CastMusic with Rhapsody, a "habitat mode" for organizing calls, messaging and other custom content, Bluetooth and support for mobile e-mail, with an HTML browser. It runs $99 after a $50 rebate and two-year lock-in through Verizon.
Carrier: Verizon
The clamshell Barrage is specifically designed for rugged environments, protected with a chrome, glass, mesh and rubber casing. According to Motorola, it can handle being submerged underwater up to 1 meter deep for as long as 30 seconds, and is protected against heat, cold, shock, vibration and salt fog. It also has Push-to-Talk capabilities through Verizon Wireless' network and sports a 2-megapixel camera. The Barrage became available at the beginning of October for $130 after a $50 mail-in rebate and a contract lock-in.
Carrier: AT&T?
Dell's alleged Android phone is as yet unconfirmed by Dell; a Wall Street Journal report from last Wednesday was the first to make mention of it, citing "people briefed on the plans" as saying Dell would launch an Android-powered smartphone in early 2010, that AT&T is the carrier, and that the phone will be a touch screen. While we wait for confirmation from Round Rock, rest assured, Dell, you have our attention.