Windows Phone Thoughts: Checking Out This Fall's Gadgets: Pepcom's Holiday Spectacular Press Event

Figure 71: Motorola's latest lineup

Motorola had all of their interesting devices on display. Here, you can see the Motorola A630, their next-gen StarTAC (currently only a Korea model), the MPx220 Windows Mobile Smartphone, the RAZR v3, and of course the MPx. Yummy, we want them all. :) Suhit finds the MPx to be an awesome device but it is a bit too big to be held up as a phone. The hinge also seemed like it was a bit flaky; we're sure it's been through tradeshow abuse, but it remains to be seen how well it'll hold up in actual use.


Figure 72: Motorola's latest lineup, flipped open

All of them have bright, beautiful screens. The new StarTAC is intriguing, but Motorola has no plans to sell it in the US at this time. The RAZR phone was also extremely interesting due to its incredibly thin, light design.


Figure 73: Motorola's latest lineup, MPx flipped open in landscape

The MPx is dual-hinged, and can be opened up in landscape. This unit matches what we've seen in previous development units: only 22MB of memory is available on the unit. Hopefully this'll be boosted, and with the unique program memory architecture on the MPx will serve to be a useful setup.


Figure 74: IBM's micro projector

IBM didn't have too much new, although this small projector is always photogenic. We could use one of those in our office. ;)


Figure 75: Samsung MM-A700

Samsung was showing off several new phones, most of which we liked. The one that stuck out is the Samsung MM-A700 which is a phone that is currently being offered through Sprint. This seemingly generic camera phone actually surprised us when we found out that it has camcorder capabilities. It is able to record up to 15 seconds of fairly high frame-rate videos and then play them back.


Figure 76: Samsung MM-A700

It is also capable of streaming videos down from a remote site and view them on a really nice, high resolution screen (the only limitation here is battery life). Yet another surprise on the phone was the built in LED flash that you see in this picture.


Figure 77: Kodak Printer Dock Plus

Kodak's booth was among our last stops. They had several of their Kodak Printer Dock Plus printers on display. Each one was connected to a different camera to show off the versatility of their printer. We have noticed that several readers on Digital Media Thoughts have this printer and really like it.


Figure 78: Kodak Printer Dock Plus

Here is another shot of the printer.

RIM

Last but not least was RIM and their new Blackberry 7100t. This was at the end of the show, so we didn't have time to take pictures, but we walked away very impressed with the unit. SureType works extremely well -- adding new words to the dictionary is quite straightforward -- and the unit is very comfortable to hold up to the ear. The screen is extremely bright and clear -- amongst the highest-DPI screens on smartphones today. Apart from the keyboard and the phone ergonomics, the unit works a lot like existing Blackberries: there's a thumb wheel and an escape button. The unit will be integrable with Blackberry Enterprise Server, Blackberry Desktop Redirector, and a web client will be offered through T-Mobile.

The $199 price with a T-Mobile contract is also very compelling -- enough that Suhit practically begged the rep to give him one. In fact he claims that his search for a "perfect" always-on email phone which had supposedly ended with the Sidekick II has actually been changed to the Blackberry 7100t (even though it doesn't have a camera phone or Wi-Fi). The 7100t does have Bluetooth, but it appears that one cannot transfer data from the 7100t to a computer via BT. She couldn't do that, but she suggested the unit would be out in about two weeks, which pegs the release date in early October. Janak, on the other hand, is still thinking of getting the Sidekick II to complement his Pocket PCs. He still hasn't figured out, though, how he's going to fit the entire mess in his pockets. ;)

Conclusions

The Holiday Spectacular Press Event was chock-full of fantastic digital media and handheld technology. We would have taken more time setting up the shots, but we barely managed to fit everything in the three-hour window as it was. The booths were packing up as we left around 9:10pm. Hopefully, you found our preview drool-worthy -- we're looking forward to see more of these products hit the market. :D There were only a few prerelease things shown, and the manufacturers asked us not to post on it. Stay tuned when the most interesting of the bunch hits the market next week. :D