MWC:new devices:Samsung SGH-i780,HP iPAQ 21x,MDA Compact IV,Toshi G910,HTC Shift etc. - General Topics
After my thorough and, for example, PPCT frontpaged elaboration on the current i-mate lineup, let me speak about my experiences with the new, highly anticipated models either announced or showcased at MWC (or just recently released): the Samsung SGH-i780, the HP iPAQ 21x, the new Toshiba models, the E-Ten V900, The Gigabyte MS808 etc. (And, I’ll quickly mention the T-Mobile-only (!), high-end, VGA MDA Compact IV too.)
Samsung SGH-i780
First, I REALLY recommend Mobile-Review’s two-part review of this VERY nice device. In here, I generally don’t repeat what has already been explained there (except for a quick summary); I only elaborate on what I don’t agree with in the review and deem it necessary to add.
This is a pretty promising and high-spec’ed, still, very light (120g – somewhat more than the 112g, original [and, capability-wise, much-much inferior] HTC Touch, the same as the Nokia N95 and the T-Mobile MDA Touch Plus (HTC Nike 200); somewhat less than the HTC Touch Cruise P3650 (HTC Polaris 100) and MUCH less than the Kaiser) Pocket PC with a BlackBerry-alike thumbboard, a square 320*320 (yes, you've read it right: NOT those awful, incompatible-with-most-titles 240*240 screens!) screen, the latest-and-(almost the) greatest Marvel Xscale PXA310 CPU (as opposed to the old Intel Xscale PXA270 series still used in most current and forthcoming, Xscale-based devices – see for example the i-mate 6150 / 8150) and an optical touchpad (as opposed to traditional D-pads).
(From top left to right: the HTC Universal (i-mate JasJar), HTC s310 / Oxygen (SPV C100), the SGH-i780 (from bottom left to right): T-Mobile Shadow (HTC Kii 100), Samsung SGH-i640, BlackBerry 8800 and Nokia N95)
(From left to right: the HTC Universal (i-mate JasJar) with an extended battery, HTC s310 / Oxygen (SPV C100), T-Mobile Shadow, Samsung SGH-i640, BlackBerry 8800, Nokia N95 and the the SGH-i780)
(The same as before at the bottom; on the top, the new Benq, the HP iPAQ 610 (more on it later) and the HTC s730)
I've played a lot with the latter (the touchpad) at Barcelona and, frankly, didn’t quite like it. Of course, I need to admit I’ve already been spoiled by the touchpad of the HP iPAQ hx4700, which I hated. Frankly, I’ve found the “optical touchpad” of the Samsung a bit worse:
it’s definitely smaller than that of the iPAQ. It should have been made much bigger, even on the expense of the neighboring, huge buttons.
I’ve found it harder to operate. With the hx4700, you can both just touch the touchpad and press it hard: both will work. With the Samsung, only light touching works.
The fact that, unlike with the iPAQ, it can be pressed down (“Action”), is a plus, however, when compared to the hx4700.
All in all, if I REALLY need to use something being able to position quicker, I would still prefer to see something like the trackball in recent BlackBerry models (everything newer than the 8700). It has its own problems (for example, it needs to be cleaned now and then – fortunately, it’s comparatively easy on the BlackBerry), but is a FAR faster, FAR more precise and FAR more gaming / e-book reading-friendly pointing method than such a small touchpad. I know this as I’m also a BlackBerry 8800 user (as has also been mentioned HERE). Windows Mobile manufacturers, are you listening? It’s better to forget this touchpad thing altogether (again, remember the hx4700’s fate!) and use trackballs instead.
I didn’t have the chance to run third-party, non-320*320-aware native (NON-Java MIDlet) games on the handset. The Mobile-Review state most third-party games have major flaws, which is what I expected, based on the WVGA Toshiba G900 game compatibility reports in the dedicated XDA-Devs thread (see for example THIS, THIS and, most importantly, THIS). I think, on the other hand, Java MIDlet-based games capable of auto-resizing themselves (there’re several of them; see my MIDlet Bible) will run without problems. Of course, controlling them will be another issue – as long as the numeric buttons don’t work on the keyboard (haven’t tested this myself), don’t expect miracles as the optical joystick is just not suited for gaming. Just like on the hx4700, of course.
Note that, as is also reported in THIS XDA-Devs thread, there may be other issues as well – not only with games or full-screen apps.
Other, related threads of interest:
HoFo
MoDaCo
PPCT – in this thread, I mostly elaborate on my opinions on the touchpad.
GPS
Unfortunately, being situated in a hotel, I couldn’t test the GPS performance. It’s based on the Qualcomm MSM6260 gpsOne chipset, which is, according to for example THIS article, is somewhat newer than the MSM6275 gpsOne chipset used in, for example, the HTC Trinity / P3600. Still, I’m not entirely sure it has comparable sensitivity to the (newer) Qualcomm MSM7200/7500 gpsOne GPS used in, say, the HTC Kaiser / AT&T Tilt, which, in turn, is still a bit weaker than the currently best consumer chipset, the SiRFstar III. The Mobile-Review article states they haven’t really been able to make it work and/or had very long wake-up times – which is pretty much similar to the not very good GPS real-world performance of the Trinity. Other folks, on the other hand, have reported success with Google Maps / iGo / TomTom 6.030 in different user forums.
Battery life
The device, as with most other Samsung models, comes with a spare battery; based on this, the specs, Samsungs’ past battery life and the 1000 (that is, very-very weak – yes, you have to pay for the device’s only weighing 120 grams, while still having excellent specs) mAh battery, you will most probably have pretty bad battery life – I haven’t managed to test this myself either. Also see for example THIS for more info on this.
There’re some additional videos HERE.
Toshiba
(the G910 compared to a HTC Universal)
(a close-up of the hinge – as can be seen, there’s no way of rotating the screen)
(from the left)
(the top with the monochrome screen and the controls outside)
Frankly, I expected FAR more from Toshiba, the manufacturer that, back in Autumn 2003, brought us the e800, which was practically unrivalled for almost one year: the first VGA device out there. After the e800’s pioneering into the VGA world a year before its competition, Toshiba seems to have lost its momentum: now, they just seem to be unable to come up with something really cool, really revolutionary.
The phone that most geeks have been waiting for was the G910/ G920 – the successor to the pretty much lackluster Toshi G900. Let’s see how it fares!
The first thing you notice with the device when you open the screen is that it only occupies little of the available estate – the rest of the upper plate (also housing the screen) is simply not used, unlike on, say, the predecessor (G900) or Sony-Ericsson’s X1 – two “simple” sliders (not clamshell models). This is pretty easy to explain: after all, this device is solely a clamshell device and you can in no way rotate the screen in the same way as on a HTC Universal or the VGA clamshell Sharp Zaurus models. This is why they didn’t put any buttons / the D-pad on the upper plate.
The results aren’t so bad as with the pretty much ridiculous-looking (see THIS for more user opinions on this question) Asus M930(W) (a.k.a. P930):
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but is still FAR from being perfect.
Microsoft and/or OEM’s / ODM’s should forget sticking to the (W)VGA (or, as far as the Asus M930W is concerned, WQVGA; that is, 400*240) resolution in their strictly clamshell devices – again, on devices where you can’t put additional controls like the D-pad next to the screen. Do what Nokia did with the E90: with VGA devices, decrease the vertical resolution and, at the same time, make the screen much wider. You can even consider bringing back the “old” 640*240 screen used in Handheld PC’s – it wasn’t particularly bad at all. Of course, while we’re at it, you could make it, say, 800*320 (so that the device becomes compatible with ALL QVGA Portrait-only programs; that is, mostly games) or, as with Nokia’s E90, 800 x 352. The slight loss on the vertical resolution would certainly pay off with the much increased screen estate.
A different approach would be just not using the 1:1 pixel aspect ratio any more in clamshell-only, not rotateable models. That is, use wider pixels in your screens so that the resolution remains the same W(Q)VGA, but, with wider pixels, you'll be able to fill in the entire plate estate. Few users will be upset if you do so.
As THIS excellent MoDaCo podcast put it: if Windows Mobile clamshell device manufacturers aren’t able to fix these problems, the Average Joe’s will simply go for another model: either a slider (where the entire available surface is used up by additional UI components like buttons and D-pads) or the Nokia E90, which, thanks to the uneven, not strictly WVGA screen resolution (800 x 352), uses almost the entire upper plate:
Note that the Toshiba folks have also showcased two of their other models, the G710 (a very simple [no Wi-Fi, 128M ROM and TI OMAP 1030 clocked at 260 MHz only etc.] touchscreen-less Smartphone with a front thumbboard; nothing to write home about) and the G810 (a QVGA Pocket PC with pretty decent specs – for example, it has 128M RAM and, as opposed to all currently available (!) Qualcomm models, its Qualcomm chipset runs at 520 MHz). In the following shot, you can see both of them – along with the iPAQ 614 with a unique wheel design (and the outdated Intel Xscale PXA270 & unavailability in the U.S.)
HP
Still speaking of the HP iPAQ 61x (see the previous section), let me present you two close-ups:
As can clearly be seen, the MIDlet manager running on these devices has been written by Sun Microsystems. NOT Esmertec, NOT Aplix, not (the no more existing) TAO, no NSIcom (see CrEme) – but Sun themselves. While I didn’t get any definite answer on whether Sun plans to (re)enter the Windows Mobile platform, this is certainly a good sign. As long as it has been indeed developed my Sun, and not just a “let it have a Sun logo and Copyright and that’s all” step.
Of HP’s new devices, it’s, of course, their latest high-end model, the iPAQ 210 (a.k.a. 211, 212, 213 and 214, depending on your location; otherwise, the devices are identical, except for some localization, if at all) that interested me the most. After all, its predecessor, the HP iPAQ hx4700, despite its problems (flash writing issues even with the latest, unofficial, “cooked” ROM’s; lack of SDHC support [even with the latest, “cooked” Kozhura ROM’s]; the, at least for gaming / book reading, awful touchpad, the weak speaker etc) still a very decent device.
(HP’s booth)
(on HP’s booth, probably the F1 simulator was the most popular – people lined up to play it)
Firs, make sure you check out Brighthand’s review HERE. You might also want to look around in the dedicated forums HERE (BH), HERE (PPCT) and HERE (Mobility/AximSite).
I had the chance to play a bit with the new HP 214 and, to tell the truth, was a bit disappointed. It seems to be worse than its predecessor in the following ways:
it doesn't have the same screen than the hx4700 (this has also been confirmed by the HP rep there). I didn’t have the chance to directly compare its color reproduction to that of the hx4700. (You might remember that the hx4700, along with similar models that had screens manufactured with the same technology but at slightly different sizes – that is, the Fujitsu-Siemens Pocket Loox VGA devices [for example, the 718/720] and the HTC Universal) However, it has definitely worse viewing angle – when not viewed exactly from 90%, the colors become much paler than with the hx4700. I’d also say the colors themselves are less vibrant than on the hx4700, but this is still not confirmed – unless some people post some comparative pictures to THIS thread.
HP 210 users / reviews also report that operating the touchscreen requires a bit more strength than with other touchscreen devices. If you do apply a screen protector, the situation may become even worse.
Fortunately, at least it seems not to have problems with the landscape polarization (unlike with the x50v / x51v). In this regard, it’s way better than the Dell. (Too bad it doesn’t have the 2700G or, for that matter, any kind of a 3D hardware acceleration.)
it feels really cheap (pasticy) in the hand - FAR worse than the magnesium-cased, really-really nice hx4700.
it's considerably thicker 2.5 mm’s (0.1 inch) (77 x 131 x 14.9 millimetres vs. 75.4 x 133.8 x 17.4 millimetres) and, despite the plastic housing (as opposed to the magnesium housing of the hx4700), heavier (186.7 vs. 192).
there’s no infrared support
it doesn’t have the Credent security software suite, unlike its predecessor (should you ever need it)
its speaker isn’t loud at all (which has both been mentioned in the BrightHand review and HERE) – actually, it’s even weaker than that of the hx4700.
All in all, it was a bit of a disappointment for me. I hoped for something that is considerably better than the hx4700 not only internally, but also externally (and have a screen of at least the same quality & contrast & color reproduction). I think I’ll stick with the hx4700 and wait for something better than the 210. Sorry guys.
Some other, related threads:
You can use the hx4700 battery with the 210
PDAdb.net’s one-by-one spec chart with the hx4700.
Other direct comparison threads:
AximSite
BH
Yes, you must surely have noticed I couldn’t like 100% any of the above-introduced devices. Yes, I know, I’m very hard to please and pretty much critical – but, if one speaks about his or her hard-earned dollars, criticism is OK. I really hope the Sony-Ericsson XPERIA X1 indeed turns out to be better than any of them – or, one of the following high-end, VGA devices also recently announced (with the MDA Compact IV, right at MWC): the MDA Compact IV, the E-Ten V900, MSM808:
MDA Compact IV
The MDA Compact IV, which is a custom device for T-Mobile sporting a 2.8” VGA (!) screen. Currently, almost nothing is known of it. There are some threads on it; for example, THIS, THIS and THIS.
It wasn’t showcased at all. As it was only very (!) briefly shown in the T-Mobile press conference, I don’t know any high-res, non-blurred close-ups of the device – or, for that matter, any video recording of the event.
E-Ten V900
I’ve already mentioned this high-spec’ed (Samsung S3C6400, 128M RAM, digital TV receiver) device.
Interestingly, their homepage doesn’t contain any information on the V900 (direct link to their Products page HERE; their MWC-related press release doesn’t contain anything either; it’s only the CeBIT one that mentions the device. Note that, here, they speak of a H2 2008 release date. In there, no specs are given; the flyer available at MWC, however, has some kind of a specs. My shot follows (as with genuine MWC flyer shots, to my knowledge, I’m the first to publish this in the WinMo world – as with the Samsung S3C6410 and the cracked Skype flyers):
As you can see, it’s indeed a very powerful device.
If you compare the technical data in the flyer to that of PDAdb, you’ll realize that the flyer only lists the S3C 6400 running at 533 MHz, while PDAdb.net states it’ll run at 666 MHz. Hope the “slow” 533 MHz is just a misprint in the flyer (as is, for example, the correct spelling of SiRFstar III, which is written as Sirf Start III in here.)
BTW, here’s the full flyer, should be interested in the entire stuff:
According to the MoDaCo folks, the specs are in no way finalized; I, therefore, really hope they DO put the latest S3C6410 (instead of the already-outdated S3C6400) in the commercial version of the device. Yes, I know even the S3C6400 is great compared to the heavily outdated and, in general, crappy S3C 2442 (still) used in all their (even the latest!) devices, but still - the S3C6410 would result in additional speed increase, power consumption decrease, 3D hardware acceleration, additional multimedia hardware acceleration etc.
Some other V900 photos can be found HERE.
Other sources of info:
Eten Club
A thread with some pics
Unfortunately, the MoDaCo folks weren’t allowed to take photos of the device either, it being so early in the production phase. On the Microsoft booth, as can be seen in the following shot (the V900 at the right end; I’ve also included the three new Toshi models on the shot), it was also separated from the users’ hands – that is, it wasn’t possible to give it a more thorough ride:
Gigabyte
Of the new Gigabyte announcements (see for example THIS for more info on them), it’s definitely the MS808 that seems to be the most interesting and is definitely the most feature-packed.
Unfortunately, the demo device at MWC wasn’t in working order, which can also be seen in The Unwired’s “hands on” video. The official Gigabyte homepage doesn’t have any info either.
Hope I’ll able to report more on this handset in the near future – for example on how it actually works. It’s slated for release in Q3, which may mean we still need to wait some months before we can get some working (!), public prototypes.
HTC
There wasn’t any new and/or really interesting device at the HTC booth.
I’ve quickly played with the upgraded (better(?) keyboard, 16G flash instead of the 8G Microdrive etc) HTC Advantage / Athena x7500/ x7501 and wasn’t particularly pleased. They didn’t showcase any new and REALLY interesting device either: the Touch series (Touch, Dual, Cruise):
And the P3470 (yes, another TI OMAP 850-based device…), TyTN II, s730 (Smartphone) and the Shift:
The only model I found cool was the HTC Shift (specs HERE – as you can see, it could have a much higher-resolution screen than the current 800 X 480, taken the 7” size into account), but it has just a barebone Windows Mobile operating system only usable to establish connections for Vista running on the x86 CPU (at least this is what I’ve been told by the MS folks at the MS booth).
(the size of the Shift vs. the Universal)
I also took some pictures of the Fujitsu Lifebook U-series U1010 UMPC, which is, while much narrower (albeit a BIT longer and thicker) and lighter than the Shift (171mm (W) x 133mm (D) x 26.5-32.0mm (H), 0.63kg vs. 207/129/25 mm, 800 grams; figures of the U1010 and the Shift, respectively) , still sports a higher-resolution, rotateable (!) 1024 x 600 screen. (Note that the linked U1010 page is from Singapore; I couldn’t find any mention of the model or even the U-series on the U.S. pages of Fujitsu):
(size compared to the HTC Universal – again, the latter with an extended battery)
(the Shift and the Fujitsu U1010 next to each other)
Windows Mobile devices at the MS booth
Still speaking of the MS booth, let me present you a more thorough list of all the showcased Windows Mobile devices in there:
And a shot of an ongoing Live Search presentation:
Verdict
Unfortunately, the devices I like /wait for the most (S-E XPERIA X1, E-Ten V900, Gigabyte MS808) will only be released in the second half of the year and none of the current Windows Mobile devices are particularly appealing.
Of course, this, as was the case with i-mate’s devices (see my price-related remark in there), is hugely price-dependant. That is, I can put up with, say, an i-mate 9502 or a Toshi G910 if and only if it's sold at, say, $200...$300. However, I barely think I'd ditch my Universal then - the latter has still much better keyboard and much larger screen, which pretty much negates its being slightly outdated and heavy.
That is, as a high-end geek ONLY interested in 640*480 VGA (or Wide VGA – 800*480) devices, I’m pretty sure I’ll wait with retiring my at least the Windows Mobile models from my current HTC Universal + Nokia N95 + BlackBerry 8800 + HTC s310 setup and switch to the new one. For example, if the i-mate 9502 will be sold here in Europe (which is, currently, pretty much unlikely) and its price will be sufficiently low (say, 300 bucks at most), I may go for it. The same stands for the iPAQ 210, which is, for me, a little bit of a disappointment: I wouldn’t have thought it would be considerably worse than its 3.5-year-old predecessor in several respects. I don’t think I’d purchase it at its (not THAT high) price – the hx4700 just feels better in the hand and looks far more professional. The new Toshi G910 (G920) is just a joke with its clamshell-only, small screen estate design. As almost nothing is known of the T-Mo Compact IV, I can’t say anything for sure. As I have a post-paid T-Mo (BlackBerry) subscription, I may go for it without having to fear of being locked to them, so if and only if it has a decent spec and design (MUCH better than that of the Toshi G910/G920 or the i-mate 9502), I may go for it.
This, however, doesn’t mean YOU should be waiting any more. If you don’t necessarily want a VGA device (that is, a QVGA will suffice) and/or don’t have problems with the incompatibilities with a lot of games (not that you would want to play ANY action games on its touchpad) and other graphical apps, take a look at the Samsung SGH-i780. It looks really sexy and is very powerful – it’d be my personal pick if and only if it wasn’t “just” a 320*320 device. Some of HTC's later devices are also worth checking out (unless you're afraid of the graphics driver problem, which, at last, may be officially fixed - at least to a certain degree); also the iPAQ 110 (used together with an external phone if you need Internet access, that is).
What next?
Depending on my free time, I’ll try to publish a write-up on digital TV issues and how the Nokia N96, the various Gigabyte models and the E-Ten V900 (the most important digital TV receivers announced) are able to receive them. I’ll explain the differences between different digital TV standards; I also explain what you lose with, say, the lacking DVB-T compatibility (as opposed to DVB-H) of the N96 and so on.
Related Articles
Misc news: MWC, GREAT rebates, new devices, new games/emulators/CorePlayer version – some (additional) reports on, for example, the O2 XDA Flame
MWC: Chipset Vendors & New Chipsets - Part II – more info on the chipsets I’ve been referring to
MWC: i-mate’s new devices – my thorough report on i-mate’s new models
And, generally, all the other, MWC-related articles on my blog.
are there anyone have Firmware for M930?
or WM6.1 for this smartphone?
Related
REVIEW: Great top-down shooter Burning Armor Code-E Finally Released!
It was a few months ago that I reviewed the non-EDGE-based, old version of the vertical shoot’m up Burning Armor. Now, the EDGE-based version has been released. Availability, compatibility It’s available here and compatible with WM2003+ platforms. Note that it’s not compatible with previous operating systems, despite what the information page of the game states (I’ve tested it on my PPC2k2 iPAQ h3660: a no-go). The game costs $19.95 and there is a demo version available. I’ve tested it on my several Pocket PC’s (Pocket Loox 720, Dell Axim x51v, WM5 HP iPAQ hx4700, HTC Wizard); I haven’t encountered any problems. It’s only on the non-overclocked HTC Wizard that controlling the ship with the stylus (and constantly keeping the touchscreen depressed) resulted in a decidedly lower speed (as with many other titles); this, however, wasn’t that big a problem. (Note that you must enable stylus control in Options – the game defaults to D-pad based controls, which, in my opinion, isn’t the best with the game genre.) Gameplay It’s really better than the previous version. It’s perfectly playable even on high-resolution (VGA) devices, while the previous version had serious speed problems on them, making most models useless for playing the title on. Music, sound effects The quality of the music is also definitely better than in the previous version: the sampling frequency seems to have been increased. Overall Give this version a try if you are into the genre. While it’s certainly overpriced (now that the, technically, still superior and more enjoyable Skyforce Reloaded only costs $5 at ClickGamer, $20 is, in my opinion, a bit on the expensive side), you may find it worth paying for if you, for example, have already played through Skyforce Reloaded. If you, on the other hand, have never played the latter, give it a try first.
which PDA you suggest? [phone edition]
my minimum requirement: -attractive in look -vga [so that i can read pdf files in good quality] -wifi & bluetooth -good multimedia [atleast better then nokia n 70 ] -atleast 2MP camara and unlimited video recording capacity -no ram problems or memory full problems like sucking nokia s60 phones -basic applications should be available [compatible] for that pda - Pocket Office(Word, Excel, Outlook, PDF viewer) - Java MIDP 2.0 -good speed [atleast better then nokia s60] -price around 14-18000INR [350-450USD] -4gb memory card should be available Click to expand... Click to collapse actually i wanna buy iphone but it's not launched in india yet and not sure when it will be launched..so cant wait more then 1-2months for it now what do you say about htcs710? any other phone better then this in my price according to my requirement? Thanks to all to take your time to guide me..
HTC does not have many VGA offerings. but its not the end of the world with qvga. I started a thread recently for my self that could answer some of your questions. http://forum.xda-developers.com/showthread.php?p=1970736
maybe flame maybe sonyE's upcomming x1
I've been looking hard to find a device to upgrade my Trinity to a VGA device and the sad thing is there really isn't anything decent out there right now and hardly anything worthwile coming out, at least from what's been announced. HTC, forget it they don't have anything in a small form factor that's VGA. Too bad, the Touch Cruise would have been absolutely perfect if it had a VGA. The only thing that could have made that better was if it had a Capacitive VGA touch screen. E-Ten has some VGA devices but they only have 64 Megs of ram and it's poorly used, you end up with an average of about 12 Megs running which can make it painful to use. Not to mention its quirks like not being able to power off the device like HTC devices by holding the Power Button down, lots of little things like that. Imate Ultimate Series, all except the 8502 are VGA but most are lacking in GPS if that's a feature you are looking for and they are bigger than most devices if size matters. Not to mention Imate seems to be in trouble, their current rom is very buggy, support seems limited and the battery life is terrible. O2 Flame as mentioned by Rudegar is a posibility but I believe it's TriBand, that's a problem for me as I'm in North America but if you don't need the extra band, it's worth considering. The Xperia also mentioned by Rudegar pretty much has everything and goes behind VGA with an 800x400 resolution but it's not available yet. Personally I'm not a big fan of slide out querty keyboards, I find them to big and combersome to use with two thumbs but given the deminsions are about the same as the O2 Flame, I'd choose this over the Flame if I couldn't find anything smaller. The Gigabyte GSmart MS808 has potential, don't know the diminsions but the current specs seems to indicate it has everything you are looking for. Haven't had any experience with Gigabyte but people seem to like them so it's worth taking a look at. Again, it's not available until later this year though. Bottom line, nothing out there that's really worth it right now in the VGA market. If you can wait I'd hold off until later this year, I think we'll be seeing a lot of new devices coming out with VGA, even HTC should be moving towards VGA as their leaked new Touch Flow (Manilla) seems to indicate. Personally I've been seriously considering jumping Windows Mobile and moving over to an Iphone for a while. Now that they are building in ActiveSync support with push email into the next firmware. I'd have to get used to a lot of limitations, no camera, gps, basic functionality ect. that I don't have know but the capactive touch screen!!! I really wish there was a Windows Mobile device out there that used this technology. Once you use it, it makes it really hard to go back to a resitive touch device almost unbearable! I'd really wish there was a VGA Windows Mobile device that had it all for me the absolute minimum of any device should be Small Slim Form Factor Good Battery Life TriBand HSDPA/HSUPA Quadband GSM 400 Mhz Proc. VGA Display 256 Megs Rom 128 Megs Ram GPS 3Mp Camera/VGA Camera (Video Calls) Bluetooth Make that screen Capacitive and it would be the best device out there!
" Personally I'm not a big fan of slide out querty keyboards, I find them to big and combersome to use with two thumbs but given the deminsions are about the same as the " nor am i a fan of keyboards but other then that which one could just not use the x1 looks pretty sweet so far
a non VGA device thats interesting is the new MWg Atom V. http://www.expansys.ca/d.aspx?i=164854 its an all-in-one with an attractive design. draw backs are: qvga 64 ram minimalistic 6 buttons- 2 for calling and maybe price. -- Aside recent rumors that SE Xperia will be on At&T so that will give us in NA the option of plenty unlocked X1's in early 2009. ASUS is also bringing exciting new devices that that are the size of an IPhone with a 2.8" screen
Touch Pro performance
Let's talk about the Touch Pro performance. I will post some quotes. branko.savic said: Ok, so just to be fair I did some more testings on all three of my devices to find the optimal settings, here is the results: Test performed on same video, with coreplayer 1.2.5, and optimal settings for each device: Omnia: Raw framebuffer: 442.74% Universal: Direct Draw: 165.28% Touch Pro: QTv display: 152.44% Smooth Zoom and Dither turned off on each device! So in conclusion, again Omnia wins by a huge 277.46% over the next best device that is the Universal. And even then the Universal is 12.84% better then the Touch Pro! Please bare in mind that the Universal is a three years old device with only 64MB ram, while Touch pro is brand new and 288MB ram! They have same clock speed but Touch pro is supposed to have a better/newer chipset then the Universal! There is no doubt in my mind anymore, Touch pro is missing the video drivers, or could it just be that qualcomm chipset just sucks? Click to expand... Click to collapse DSF said: poor directdraw, framebuffer/video performance. Just to make an idea: an old device from 2005 with omap 850 200mhz CPU performs better in this area than the touch pro @ qualcomm 528mhz. what a shame. The test were done in this topic (in romanian, sorry). CorePlayer was used for benchmark. I will summarize. - HTC Tornado overclocked (262Mhz) max performance: 174.22% - Touch Pro max performance: 172,67% Both in Raw framebuffer mode. When used QTV it gains only 162,64%. How come? It's pitty, 262Mhz from OMAP performs better than 528!!!Mhz from Qualcomm?! The video used for tests is this one. (320x240 @ 25FPS) Click to expand... Click to collapse So what do you think? Are the qualcomm chipsets just junk or we got poor drivers? Personally, I was hoping that HTC did learn something after the HTC TyTN II issues.. Another prove of sh*ty graphics on touch pro: Touch Pro landscape redraw issue (videos included) Furthermore I would like to make some recommendations to see the true performance of touch pro: - Rats!! http://clickgamer.com/download.htm?pvid=15358 - Ubulis TSE http://www.ionfx.com/product_windows_mobile_obulisTSE.htm (note the req: "200Mhz CPU or higher" - Spore - Prince of Persia HD - Assasin Creed HD - etc. Wonderfull, the graphics are so fluid... NOT.
How about GL benchmarks between the iPhone, Kaiser, Raphael, and Toshiba G810 Portege? http://www.glbenchmark.com/compare....ser)&D3=HTC Touch Pro&D4=Toshiba G810 Portege A lot of it is the quality of HTC's drivers since the Portege does better, but the rest is Qualcomm's fault because even the Protege is inferior compared to an iPhone, N95, etc etc. However, I cannot find a better phone that has a decent 3D chip on it, has at&t 3G, touch screen, and isn't NDA locked.
If Qualcomm is such crap, then why oh why is HTC using it on all new devices? Keep me wondering!
NuShrike, Touch Pro has a newer CPU that the one found on Toshiba G810 Portege, however, the benchmarks are still unsatisfying. Here's some interesting information Q: HTC, Qualcomm and the missing drivers—where do we send the angry mob with torches? A: Qualcomm has a tiered pricing policy with their chipsets—so although you bought the chip, you have not bought all the features. So you have to pay additional fees per phone to get things like aGPS, graphic acceleration, etc. In the past, HTC had no problems when using the older MSM-6500 chips (ARM9 processors) without drivers hence their reluctance to pay for any or additional support with the new MSM-7500 chips (ARM11 processors), especially since the newer processors were advertised to match or outperform the older generation. Unfortunately, Qualcomm’s ARM11 performance does not match their previous ARM9 processor and is therefore, not quite as advertised. To get the proper performance out of the ARM11, one has to have knowledge of the processor’s implementation and design, but since that processor is not publicly available; the solution requires cooperation and assistance. HTC in this instance does not have this knowledge and is therefore unable to directly fix the problem, so they are put in a tough situation as they already have millions of these devices sold but they don’t want to pay Qualcomm more than they have to. Click to expand... Click to collapse Full article: http://wmexperts.com/articles/editorials/qualcomm_htc_chipsets_and_feat.html And here we've got a comparison between touch pro and dell axim v51v (a VGA PocketPC from year 2005). http://www.glbenchmark.com/compare....whide=true&D1=HTC Touch Pro&D2=Dell Axim X51v (I've bold the VGA because there are some users that are trying to find excuses of poor performance because of VGA resolution)
branko.savic said: If Qualcomm is such crap, then why oh why is HTC using it on all new devices? Keep me wondering! Click to expand... Click to collapse Because Qualcomm owns wcdma! Anyone developing chipsets will have to pay them royalties which in the end increases cost of the chips and handsets.
branko.savic said: If Qualcomm is such crap, then why oh why is HTC using it on all new devices? Click to expand... Click to collapse They probably make their hardware really cheap compared to other solutions. There aren't many others (or at all) that package 3G WCDMA, asymmetric dual-core ARM11/ARM9, GPS, (WiFi?), BT?, and 3D GPU all into one at a pretty good power envelope. The problem sounds like it's $$$ to access any of Q's advanced features, and they're not even that good. Funny part is the CPU design was licensed from ARM in 2002 and is only hitting mainstream last year with the Kaiser/N95. However, it seems Qualcomm never licensed FPU capable ARM11 design, versus TI (N95 cpu) and Samsung (iPhone cpu) whom did.
If the video issue was the only problem... Sometime it really annoys me how poor can perform... When I was thinking to switch from my HTC Tornado (TI OMAP 850 CPU (180Mhz)) I was saying the performance difference must be enormous , but I find that those qualcomm CPUs are crap or the drivers sucks.. (but I tend to think it's the first variant). I really want that my device to perform well while listening to music, not to wait 1-2 sec for Start Menu to appear (atention, Start Menu, not Programs list, while scrolling in that list the things are so laggy, but that's a WM issue, so I pass. I've got a lot of apps installed) I'm really dissapointed of crappy performance. My first and last qualcomm cpu-enabled device. If I know that before buying... but no one complains of this, all worship it (for eg, see gsmarena review). An advice for interested people in buying Touch Pro: if you want a good device PASS touch pro. It simply doesn't deserve it's price. It has a lot of super nice features (5 row qwerty, plenty of RAM, good amount of ROM, accelerometer, multiple sensors, good shape, superb VGA resolution, HSPDA, etc etc) but has soo many issues (low volume, crap speakerphone/earpiece, music gap, slider play, gps lag, poor directdraw performance, landscape redraw issue, poor overall system performance..) I really expected way much more from a 2008 year device and especially from HTC! BTW, I'm using a custom ROM (T.I.R V8), so no I'm not using the factory ROM What I'm wondering is that just a few owners joined the topic.. so, I guess, that the performance of your touch pro doesn't bother you.. then, we shouldn't be surprised if HTC isn't interested. They think that we are happy with the performance of the device. Edit: http://brew.qualcomm.com/bnry_brew/pdf/brew_2007/Tech-303_Ligon.pdf - see page 13. And that's MSM72000. We got MSM7201A chipset on Touch Pro (better). So in final may be HTC fault? I'm so confused
Yep, have to agree the performance is abysmal. I heard HTC didn't want to pay some company for a proper graphics driver.... but thats just hearsay. And have you seen the HTC HD? From the youtube videos I've watched ot goes like s**t off a shovel, seems they managed to get that thing working properly, if they'd only do an update for other devices.
Guys.. we need to do something, I'm really dissapointed about touch pro performance. Look here how smooth does run quake 3 on nokia n82 (CPU: TI OMAP 2420 @ 330 MHz*): http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=k1i4fOCrCv0 "Quake 3 Arena Running on nokia n82 in perfect speed,with all graphics settings set to high and Anti-Aliasing ON!!!!" If you want, I will record a video showing quake 3 in action on touch pro, low fps, choppy sound, etc. * Embedded 220MHz TI TMS320C55x DSP (GSM/GPRS/EDGE/UMTS baseband), 640KB shared SRAM, 2D/3D graphics acceleration, dual display support, analog/digital TV video output, TI TWL92230 companion chip http://pdadb.net/index.php?m=cpu&id=a2420 Is that fair..? I just don't know what to say. The time is passing and nothing's done in this direction.. @Gav_ haven't seen touch hd running other stuff than internet browsing (opera with the full quares when dragging, etc..), youtube, general menu browsing..
DSF said: Guys.. we need to do something, I'm really dissapointed about touch pro performance. Look here how smooth does run quake 3 on nokia n82 (CPU: TI OMAP 2420 @ 330 MHz*): http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=k1i4fOCrCv0 "Quake 3 Arena Running on nokia n82 in perfect speed,with all graphics settings set to high and Anti-Aliasing ON!!!!" If you want, I will record a video showing quake 3 in action on touch pro, low fps, choppy sound, etc. * Embedded 220MHz TI TMS320C55x DSP (GSM/GPRS/EDGE/UMTS baseband), 640KB shared SRAM, 2D/3D graphics acceleration, dual display support, analog/digital TV video output, TI TWL92230 companion chip http://pdadb.net/index.php?m=cpu&id=a2420 Is that fair..? I just don't know what to say. The time is passing and nothing's done in this direction.. @Gav_ haven't seen touch hd running other stuff than internet browsing (opera with the full quares when dragging, etc..), youtube, general menu browsing.. Click to expand... Click to collapse I totally TOTALLY agree. I mean how can we fix this? How much time is going to go by until the chipset can finally do what it should be able to do?
The only take I have on these devices, is that they are pretty much marketed as "business class" devices. Yeah, they will play video, but you know that if they market it as a "business" device, they probably won't do much. If they marketed it as a gaming device, or video music player, it might be a different story. They made a Swiss army knife, but it doesn't do any of them well. I'm happy with my TP, but I don't listen to music or watch videos, other than once in a while a youtube. I have mine for receiving email, text messages & phone calls, which, if you could get an honest answer from HTC, is where they think the market is for these devices.
@djcaston only HTC & Qualcomm knows.. No idea how we can fix this, but we should do something (make this public, e-mail htc, publish on mobile news site, etc). The solution/answer SHOULD come from the companies mentioned above. @p51d007 but the DIAMOND is marked as a "business class" device too? I don't think so. Even as a business device is not working too good. Just try some powerpoint presentations, open a doc file and see how much time it takes to load. So.. I've made more comparisons. Quake III Arema Nokia N82 - Symbian S60 QVGA TI OMAP 2420 @ 330 MHz, chipset launched in 2005 Graphic: PowerVR MBX In action: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=k1i4fOCrCv0 Dell Axim x51v - WM VGA Intel XScale PXA270 @ 624 MHz, chipset launched in 2004 Graphic: Intel 2700G5 Multimedia Accelerator In action: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KEuEGqYZNek Touch Pro/Diamond Qualcomm MSM7201A @ 528 MHz, chipset launched in 2008 Graphic: Not sure.. maybe embeded ATI Imageon? In action: http://uk.youtube.com/watch?v=x8_wfWaYa_w (the device in video is a touch pro) SEGA Sonic 3 (Picodrive emulator) Same emulator on both devices. The hardware acceleration does not count as the last test includes Picodrive emulator that doesn't use HW acceleration at all. However, you can see that on SPV C600 the gameplay is smooth, something that we cannot say about the one on touch pro. HTC Tornado (SPV C600) TI OMAP 850 @ 200 MHz, overclocked at 252Mhz, chipset launched in 2005 Graphic: no Hardware Acceleration In action: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QFmUxwGBmMc Touch Pro/Diamond Qualcomm MSM7201A @ 528 MHz, chipset launched in 2008 Graphic: Not sure.. maybe embeded ATI Imageon? In action: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QrLD8OGFk8w (the device in video is a touch pro) As you see, touch pro is below EVERYTHING. A tehnology from year 2008 is so way behind a tehnology from 3-4 years ago. It's looks so anormally to me.. @p51d007 I'm asking you now, Dell Axim x51v was marketed as a "business" or a multimedia device?
Point taken....the only response I could say would be HTC & graphics DON'T go together LOL... DSF said: @p51d007 I'm asking you now, Dell Axim x51v was marketed as a "business" or a multimedia device? Click to expand... Click to collapse
I saw some xperia drivers posted once that people were saying made the touch pro run better. Anyone ever look into this?
i'm from Diamond forum, but totally get what you're all saying here
I had a great game on my Elf called Chain Reaction. It was brilliant for killing a short amount of time while waiting for something/someone.... One of my problems with the Elf was that it wasn't powerful enough to multi-task at anything, like listen to music whilst playing a couple of rounds of Chain Reaction. I can't tell you how p****d I was when I fired up my Touch Pro for the first time and it realised it couldn't even play that game with anything like a smooth frame rate, let alone do it whilst listening to music. Never before have I spent so much money on a product that promised so much but delivered such a weird mix of 'that's really cool' and 'that's so poor/unreliable'. I've been emailing HTC for a month now asking them for a replacement unit or a refund (over the GPS issue), and I still haven't had a single reply. LOL....
Ouzo said: I had a great game on my Elf called Chain Reaction. It was brilliant for killing a short amount of time while waiting for something/someone.... One of my problems with the Elf was that it wasn't powerful enough to multi-task at anything, like listen to music whilst playing a couple of rounds of Chain Reaction. I can't tell you how p****d I was when I fired up my Touch Pro for the first time and it realised it couldn't even play that game with anything like a smooth frame rate, let alone do it whilst listening to music. Never before have I spent so much money on a product that promised so much but delivered such a weird mix of 'that's really cool' and 'that's so poor/unreliable'. I've been emailing HTC for a month now asking them for a replacement unit or a refund (over the GPS issue), and I still haven't had a single reply. LOL.... Click to expand... Click to collapse Just sent them an email myself. Hopefully enough people email them so that we may get a proper update! Its ridiculous when I can barely run Quake 3 on this thing while my Viewsonic PPC runs it just fine! And its not just about playing games either. The whole phone feels laggy.. Sorry to complain so much, but I paid good money for this thing.. And I like the design so much, I dont wanna return it just yet....
Coming from a Kaiser, and putting Elite RC1 on my Raphael, I was reasonably satisfied - until I got a G1. Side by side is like pentium vs 486. My point being, they are running similar hardware, so I'm not sure the Qualcomm chipset is so crap after all. I haven't seen any 3d accelerated stuff yet, but I know these devices are capable of great 3d gaming.
Indeed, as an Axim X50v owner I am dismayed at how immensely better it is in the graphics department, for a device so much older. HTC, Qualcomm or perhaps even a carrier needs to get off their hands and take care of the customers. Publicity may be one of the few tools we have, but I guess we might as well use it. Posting your displeasure here is as good an action as any, but take the time to comment or reply in any venue that you see these issues being discussed. C'mon manufacturers/suppliers ... get those damn drivers out!
i do agree. i began to get frustrated with my TP that i started thinking of selling it, there are alot of things that arent going well at all in its preformance, and since the thread is about preformance in general i have a bad experience with my TP laginess. and GPS for example my wife bought a diamond a couple of days ago, and some how her Diamond gets a fix in less than 30 seconds, my TP takes considerably longer. the device is really really laggy, i sometimes wonder it recieved my click or not when i touch the screen. and its video preformance is extreemly poor. i mean i have an XDA flame and a toshiba g900, i thought the G900 is a crappy phone but it has GoForce 5500 chipset with some driver update its video is becomming amazingly fast and smooth. what makes me angry lets say is that im a WM fanatic and the company where i work distributed iphones on all of us to use in our business tasks, it was a surprise to be honest that the Iphone took over this market really wiered, but after testing it for a while its much faster than the TP and it scores much higher in all tests with a massive diffrence, the only WM phone that came near the Iphone is the Samsung omnia, i think i already know why. both are samsung CPUs i tested the samsung omina of my friend and i think the Omnia is the WM version of the Iphone. THough HTC is the bigger sister in the smart phone world but she is letting her clients badly down with crappy drivers and sometimes crappy PDs. best regards Kevin
Breaking news: real-life, comparative HTC Diamond 2 shots!
While at Microsoft’s stand at MWC the just-announced Diamond 2 was behind glass and couldn’t be used, at HTC’s booth anyone could give them a test ride. In the following, I post my first thoughts of the device. First and foremost, I just don’t like it. It’s just too thick and has an outdated hardware. In the era of 1 GHz CPUs (where the faster clock also means FAR better performance – see my real-world benchmarks of the 1GHz Toshi TG01 HERE), I find it just lame to announce a device with a 528 MHz, oldish, not very capable CPU. As I’ve mentioned several times, the lack of competition has definitely made HTC lazy and refusing to invent revolutionary stuff. If HTC was just one manufacturer of the many, this wouldn’t be a problem. But, given that HTC is the leading one and Windows Mobile’s future largely depends on the generic acceptance of HTC’s models, not inventing any more is a serious mistake. In addition, they don’t seem to even fix bugs and errors plaguing a lot (if not all) their devices; see for example the infamous touchscreen CPU usage bug causing major problems on all non-Xscale platforms. I consider their latest-and-greatest model, the Diamond 2, equally uninteresting and unimaginative. I, who have an iPhone 3G, may get the Nokia N97 (which turned out to be much better in real life – I’ve played with it quite a bit at MWC – than I previously thought) and will surely get the Toshi TG01 if it’s not as bug-ridden as Toshi’s earlier QWERTY sliders, the G900/G910, the Diamond 2 is a huge, thick and slow device that simply doesn’t have anything I would happily pay for. Let’s see some (also comparative – with the BlackBerry 8800 and the iPhone 3G) pictures I’ve taken at MWC. As you can see, the Diamond 2 is pretty large and is much thicker than the iPhone. If it was a power device with the latest and greatest technology, I could easily forget this. But for a phone with a pretty mediocre CPU, there is just no excuse.
The device reported on low memory after a while…: Interestingly, the list of running programs didn’t have any seemingly offending entry (and the total program memory was still over 35 Mbytes – of the 288 free):
MWC: The Toshiba TG01 size compared to that of the iPhone 3G
After publishing my first report (don’t forget to check out my recently-posted high-res Prince of Persia videos either) on the Toshiba TG01, probably the most appealing and, because of the very powerful hardware, revolutionary phone announced recently, I’ve received several requests for size comparison. For this, of course, I’ve selected the iPhone 3G, currently, the most popular smartphone with a touchscreen. As usual, click the images for a much larger version.
Hey Menneisyys, do you think it would be possible to port over windows 6.5 and/or touch flo 3d to the tobisha tg01? Just curious, thanks.