It’s been a bumper week for mobile phone announcements, this week, with not one, not two, but three manufacturers announcing brand new mobile phones. Samsung have unleashed the i8510 INNOV8, Sony Ericsson have launched three new Walkman phones, and Three (hmmmm, lots of significance of three, this week, maybe it’s some kind of portent) have announced a brand new version of the Skypephone, the S2.
All in all, it’s been a rather exciting week!
Samsung i8510 INNOV8
First up is a brand new mobile phone from the Korean giant, Samsung, and I’m going to be honest here… I’m a well-known Sony junkie, but this beastie’s actually turned my head. Now, you may ask why, but check out the specs of it: 8 megapixel camera, S60 operating system (so it’s a proper, full-on smart phone), HSDPA, 8Gb of memory and GPS. So, no prizes for guessing which mobile phones it’s aiming to take on (hint: one of them’s the N96, the other’s fruit-based…)
The reason I’m excited is because, frankly, as well as the specs looking scarily good, the Samsung i8510 INNOV8 itself also looks scarily good. As in ‘want one, right now, give me it, now, now, NOW’ good. It’s definitely one to watch, and personally, I can’t wait to get my hands on one when it’s released!
Sony Ericsson W902
Next up is a brand new Walkman mobile phone from Sony Ericsson, the W902. And it looks rather tasty, it does. Sharing the same basic body plan as the Sony Ericsson C902, it also keeps the same 5 megapixel camera, and even sneaks some of the Cyber-Shot bits in while no-one’s looking. We’ll never see Sony Ericsson merge the two ranges to make ‘CyberWalkShotMan’ mobile phones, but this is as near as it gets.
Oh, and it’s all gorgeous and shiny, as one of my colleagues put it. And, let’s not forget it has HSDPA internet access, and the Walkman 3.0 music player, and THAT brings with it things like shake control and SensMe (where the phone picks songs for you, based on your mood). All in all, the Sony Ericsson W902 is a worthy flagship for the Walkman line (at least until they get their finger out and make the 16Gb, touch-based, iPhone-killing replacement for the W960i, that everyone is sure they’ll make).
Three Skypephone S2
The first Three Skypephone was unique. It was the first mobile phone to fully embrace Skype, right out of the box… well, actually, let’s be honest, the whole thing was built around Skype access. Skype was the be all and end all of its existence.
The new version, the Three Skypephone S2, takes that VoIP-type stuff, and builds loads of extra features on top of it, piling in a 3.2 megapixel camera, 50Mb of internal memory (plus a microSD card slot), and full fat HSDPA, running at up to 3.6 Mbps. The most crucial new thing, though (and this really is properly good news), is that you can use the Three Skypephone S2 as a USB modem, as well as a mobile phone. So, essentially, what Three are giving you is a mobile phone and a mobile broadband modem all in one.
That.
Rocks.
Also announced this week were the Sony Ericsson W595 (a replacement for the W580) and the W302 (a cheap Walkman phone for anyone who just wants a value music mobile phone). Both rather tasty phones, too, I have to say!
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