3GSM special

BEST of BARCELONA: Our pick of the new phones at 3gsmThe 3GSM World Congress isn’t really a handset show. As the name implies, there’s a lot of talking – both formally, in the seminar theatres, and informal networking.
It’s also proof that there’s more to mobile than handsets: very few of the exhibitors have anything to do with the box that fill our retail shelves. That doesn’t mean the handset makers ignore 3GSM -- far from it. They often have the biggest, brashest, fullest stands; and most use 3GSM to launch the phones that will define their strategy for the year.And of course we just love getting our hands on new phones ...HTC: more of the same, only (a bit) betterIt looks rather like a mini laptop, but the HTC Advantage X7500 really is a phone – 3G and HSDPA plus quadband GSM as well as WiFi. There’s also a good-quality 3 megapixel camera with high-power LED flash and an additional video-call camera. But inside there’s a pokey 624MHz Intel PXA270 processor with 128MB ROM, 8GB of hard drive, and Windows Mobile Pocket PC Phone Edition (though only version 5.0). So it does emails and can create and edit Microsoft Office documents. HTC has clearly done something clever with the battery, since it claims eight hours of active life; no laptop will give you that. Other innovations include a 5in touchscreen display with a very clever tilt-to-navigate technology HTC is calling VueFLO, VGA and TV Out for use with monitors, and on-board GPS with a copy of TomTom Navigator 6 inside as well. We also liked the built-in business card scanner – and especially the very clever magnetically attached QWERTY keyboard. No word on cost, but it won’t be cheap. Still, it will be less than the price of a lightweight laptop plus a heavyweight smartphone.• HTC S710 The other really interesting HTC phone will appear first as the Orange SPV E650, though HTC will also flog SIM-free versions. At first glance it looks like a slightly tubby candybar smartphone, and the spec fits that – Windows Mobile 6, 64MB of RAM, a 2.4in 240x320 screen, quadband GSM plus WiFi and Bluetooth 2.0 and a 2mp camera. Then you might notice the really cool slide-out QWERTY thumbboard that slips out from the underside. Given that, the phone is really slim; in keying mode it’s an excellent emailer and text device, especially as it claims up to seven hours’ talk time and 175 hours’ standby.Orange is very keen on this phone. It will bring the SPV E650 to market “before the summer”, we were told, though it should be available under the HTC brand next month in the UK and some other European territories.• HTC P3350 This is the GPS-less version of the P3300 that HTC launched last autumn, emphasising multimedia rather than navigation. So it comes with FM radio, 256MB of internal memory, and lots of reference to HTC’s ‘Media Hub’ for managing music and Windows Media Player 10 for playing it (Windows Mobile 5 is inside). There’s no WiFi but you do get quad band GSM. Funny how the much more attractive GPS version was launched first …

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