Digital Rover

Here in the 21st century, it is still an irony that many smartphones still ship with the QVGA (320×240) screen. Though the trend is slowly changing with the likes of HTC Touch Diamond, Toshiba G series and Apple iPhone, it is a pity that almost all S60 phones shipping today still sport QVGA. Of particular note is the upcoming N96 from Nokia. Apart from the E90 no other S60 phone in Nokia’s current portfolio has a screen larger than QVGA. Ha, the good old N80 days!

You may ask- do we really need anything more than QVGA, especially with the kind of mobile browsers available today. When compared to QVGA, VGA at 640×480 provides four times more pixel count. This means less scrolling while browsing. Your pictures and videos will also appear with better clarity and details because of the higher pixel density. Excel mobile becomes usable with QVGA. Look at this comparison picture from Jason Langridge’s blog which shows how better the browsing experience is on a VGA screen, even with the same screen size.

By the way, VGA is not the only option available. The iPhone sports a lower resolution than VGA at 480×320 which is still way ahead of QVGA in terms of usability. I think Apple found this resolution as the sweet spot as some people consider that VGA screens display tiny fonts which could strain your eyes. Some Windows Mobile phones like Toshiba G900 also sport screens with a whopping 800×480 WVGA resolution.

If you want a better mobile experience VGA (or higher) is the way to go. This could be one reason the N96 may not see the kind of success its predecessor, the N95 boasts of.

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Google keeps expanding its portfolio of mobile phone applications for various platforms. For Windows Mobile and S60 platforms, Google provides plenty of standalone applications which enhance your mobile phone’s usability in many ways. For example, the Google Maps and GMAIL clients are excellent little applications that give a great user experience for these services on a mobile device.

It was really becoming difficult to track these applications on a platform basis, considering the so many varied  operating systems these devices come with. Google has put up a small portal from where you can choose the mobile applications that are designed for the specific handset that you use. There are nice video demonstrations for each individual application. The portal can be accessed from here. Except for the iPhone, most other platforms have native applications. But then, that may change soon.

[via WMExperts]

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Here is a tiny little Pocket PC phone with a 2.6″ QVGA screen from ASUS. At INR 12900 (US$ 300), the ASUS P320 is a steal. Sporting the archaic TI OMAP 850 processor, the P320 also has a SiRF star III GPS chip.  (how many billions did Texas Instruments make with this tortoise inspired OMAP 850 processor?). Software is a standard fare with Windows Mobile 6.1 goodies. ASUS also provides its own now-customary shell.

Now available at a mobile store near you.

More from ASUS website here.

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Revisiting my 3G iPhone wishlist reveals that only a few of my most wanted items will find their place in iPhone 2.0 firmware. Here is a rundown:

What I will get

• GPS Chip
• General Software Improvements: Contact Search
• Better battery life. We have to wait for the reviews to come in to see how much of Apple’s claims are true in this regard.

What I won’t

• A2DP. Hmmm, Will I ever get this?
• Access to file system.
• iChat.
• Better BT stack. From the specs it appears that it is going to remain the same.
• Video Recording. For some reasons, Apple still believes this is not required.
• General Software Improvements: Todo list, Notes Sync.
• Standalone apps for viewing docs: Nopes, but they did add few more document formats.

Now it is time to wait for the 3.0 iPhone firmware!!

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This is probably the first time Apple is offering a product at a significantly lower cost than its rivals. The new iPhone, which will compete with the likes of Nokia N96 and several other 3G Windows Mobile phones which sport equally good features, applications and hardware capabilities. Compare Apple’s $199 iPhone 3G to an unlocked N95 8GB, which sells for $600 upwards. Some people may point out to the contract involved, but even if you go with another device, an unlimited data plan will still cost you almost as much as an iPhone data plan.

This will definitely make the iPhone a mass market device. As more carriers are picking it up, it will likely to become as ubiquitous as the iPod. Apple surely is on its way to achieve the target of 10 million phones this year. My guess is that they will handsomely overshoot this target.

Now, what does this mean for other mobile phone makers? Surely, just imitating iPhone is not sufficient anymore. They need to reduce prices and that too in a big way. This will definitely put pressure on the already wafer thin margins that many mobile phone vendors are operating on. The AppStore is likely to be an instant hit with tons of games and applications, which is another nice distribution model that will be difficult to emulate by others. Mobile vendors will now be banking on volumes to derive profits from Smartphone sales too. This is going to be interesting as smartphones will be available at attractive prices for the masses who had to be content with feature phones earlier.

I feel that there will be a new class of phones which could be called ‘Smarter Phones’ which will feature cutting edge technologies, staying ahead in the race. Expect such phones to come from Nokia and the Windows Mobile stable in the next few quarters.

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Rarely get to see this happening with a major website. But as of this hour, the Microsoft site seems to be down. Any webpage request fo the domain microsoft.com is returning a 404. Other domains belonging to Microsoft seem to be fine.

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Hmmm… Everyone has their whishlist for the most rumoured product in the world today. Here is mine.

• A GPS chip please. A smart phone without GPS in 2008 is almost passe. For those poor souls who carry the first version of iPhone, please modify the bluetooth stack to support external GPS receivers. You know, these things have become so tiny these days that you can carry them in your keychain.
• A2DP. Need this badly for a music phone.
• Access to file system. Any power user will need this. Accidental deletion of System files can be avoided by making such files protected. Exposing the file system is not a risk - we have seen this working for Win Mo and Symbian for several years now.
• Stand alone application(s) for viewing/editing office documents and pdf. Today, I have to carry all my documents as email attachments. I would prefer to have a OS X’s Preview like application on my handset to conveniently view documents. Editing capability will be a bonus, but not a necessity for most people.
• Better bluetooth stack. Today, there is no way I can transfer a file (photo, video clips etc.,) from my iPhone to my friends who carry lowly phones from Nokia and Sony Ericsson. Can Apple fix that useless BT stack which does not do anything other than connecting to a headset? We need internet tethering support too, considering the 3G speeds we are going to get (hopefully it will have HSDPA and not just the basic 3G support).
• iChat. Yah, a sorely missing feature on the iPhone. And please please, add that front facing camera too.
• Video Recording. Its a shame that we don’t have this on the first revision. And a better camera will be a welcome change.
• General Software Improvements. Todo List, Notes Sync, Contacts search.
• Better battery life. iPhone probably has the best battery life among all other PDA phones I have ever used. But the 3G could seriously hamper the battery life on the phone. Hopefully, Apple has a solution for this.

These are what I think will improve the iPhone as a great digital companion. How does your list look like?

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Recently, I got a chance to play with LG’s hot new Windows Mobile phone, the LG KS20. KS20 is a remarkably thin and lightweight phone with a QVGA screen. I was surprised by the connectivity options available on this phone. It has Triband GSM with UMTS. It is also HSDPA and Wi-Fi enabled for high speed internet browsing. Other standard connectivity options like bluetooth are available.

Though it felt plasticky when I held it in my hand, it is very lightweight - in fact, it is the lightest Windows Mobile phone I have ever come across. The screen is flush and the shiny plastic is prone to getting finger prints. LG also supplies a carrying case in the original box.

There aren’t many custom applications available. Even the today screen customizations done by LG are almost unnoticeable. This is surprising since the competitors like Samsung and HTC provide very heavily customized today screens on their new models. All you get in the KS 20 is a bunch of application launch icons on the bottom of the screen. Everything else is standard windows mobile fare. The absence of GPS based applications are noticeable. You can use an external GPS receiver though.

On the negative side, I felt that the touch screen is not very sensitive. In fact, you have to press the stylus hard to invoke any actions. This made it very uncomfortable to use. I feel that the digitzer’s life may be reduced because of the extra pressure one has to apply. Then again, this may be a problem specific to the piece that I had.

Otherwise, it is a stylish and feature packed tiny little windows mobile phone.

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The improved Sony Mylo 2, which we have compared with N810 and iPod Touch earlier, is now available on Amazon.  Available for about $288, it is a nice device for making VoIP calls and browsing the internet. Some of the highlights of the device include:

• QWERTY Keyboard
• 1.3 meg camera
• 1GB on board memory expandable through memory slot
• Integrated wireless LAN
• MP3/AAC/WMA/ATRAC
• Linux based
• Skype
• Netfront browser

Amazon Page.

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I think it is now becoming a habit for HTC to call for a press meet one month before the launch of iPhone and its revisions. It is a pity that they are still relying on Windows Mobile to deliver their goods. While what we saw with the diamond is no doubt impressive, under the hood HTC still has the grand old Windows Mobile running in all its glory. HTC did a clever thing this time around by making the TouchFlO UI feature rich instead of dropping back the user to Windows Mobile UI for doing even basic things. The new Opera browser is a welcome change from the Pocket Internet Explorer we are used to.

But the whole reason why people use Windows Mobile is because of its powerful PIM capabilities and wide variety of third party application availability. Unfortunately, all these applications will still be using the classic Windows Mobile interface which is generations behind that of current favorites like the iPhone or the upcoming Android. This is where the user will be spending most of the time (rather than the weather applet or the today screen).

Unless the new Windows Mobile version (7 or whatever) starts shipping, there is little to rejoice from these kind of shell enhancements which desperate mobile device vendors are making on top of Windows Mobile. Sony Ericsson’s Xperia is another one that is on the pipeline.

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