Thursday, October 26, 2006
ASUSTeK Preparing The Mars II For O2
Posted by Nurhisham Hussein in "HARDWARE" @ 10:00 PM
"Yesterday we voiced our opinion that ASUSTeK may soon be one of the main players in the Smartphone market … but it seems they will be one of the leaders in all Windows Mobile-powered phones’ market, as the FCC also revealed information on the Asus Mars II Pocket PC Phone, which will be available as the O2 XDA Zinc."
While I don't subscribe to the notion that HTC is faltering in designing and releasing new Windows Mobile devices (they do get many things right, and you can't fault their record of updating their devices - OEM or ODM), ASUSTeK has certainly come up with a worthy competitor. Apart from a few minor shortcomings that has turned off certain segments of the market (I want VGA! SDHC would be nice, too) the HTC Hermes design is certainly the current reference standard. The Asus Mars II comes close, but falls short with only tri-band GSM and single-band UMTS (no HSDPA), but trumps the Hermes with a 2.0MP autofocus camera - the Hermes' 400MHz Samsung is arguably as fast as the 520MHz Intel sported by the Mars II. The Mars II will be released as the O2 Xda Zinc, though no information is yet forthcoming on availability. We'd guess based on previous experience you should see it within the next 3 months in Asia and Europe.
While I don't subscribe to the notion that HTC is faltering in designing and releasing new Windows Mobile devices (they do get many things right, and you can't fault their record of updating their devices - OEM or ODM), ASUSTeK has certainly come up with a worthy competitor. Apart from a few minor shortcomings that has turned off certain segments of the market (I want VGA! SDHC would be nice, too) the HTC Hermes design is certainly the current reference standard. The Asus Mars II comes close, but falls short with only tri-band GSM and single-band UMTS (no HSDPA), but trumps the Hermes with a 2.0MP autofocus camera - the Hermes' 400MHz Samsung is arguably as fast as the 520MHz Intel sported by the Mars II. The Mars II will be released as the O2 Xda Zinc, though no information is yet forthcoming on availability. We'd guess based on previous experience you should see it within the next 3 months in Asia and Europe.
