Samsung follows crowd, preps M4650 Windows Mobile touchphone

Don't be fooled: Samsung officially calls this the M4650 Multi-Touch, but get this, it doesn't support multi-touch. It does support single touches of its 2.8 inch screen, though, which'll have to do seeing how it lacks either numeric or QWERTY keypads. The Korean company is prepping the Windows Mobile 6-based touchphone for its domestic market, matching a recent trend toward keyless, finger-friendly input that LG, HTC, Apple, and others have adopted in recent months. A customized build of Windows Mobile isn't the only trick up the handset's sleeve, either: haptics give users a little bit of positive feedback when they make contact with the display, and when Office Mobile finally ceases to be entertaining, the terrestrial DMB tuner should come in handy. Ironically, the M4650 will be offered through LG Telecom -- of all carriers -- for something in the range of 500,000 won (about $550) before rebates.

[Via textually.org]

[Barry @ Nov 4th 2007 6:31PM]

It's hilarious watching companies try to dress up Windows Mobile in response to the iPhone. Fail. Every time.

Microsoft is about five years behind on this one.

[michael @ Nov 4th 2007 6:52PM]

5 years behind what?

Last I remembered, multi-touch in phones didn't come until around this year. And Microsoft has had touchscreen support for a long time (phones, laptops, etc.) So I don't get what your aiming at here.

I like my WinMo phone, thank you. It does a ton of functions, ALLOWS 3rd-party apps. without worrying an update will kill you, and it does the job. A lot of users buy and like WinMo phones so it's not a failure either.

Your comment makes little sense.

[Jon @ Nov 4th 2007 6:52PM]

Let's see. Phones using icon based UI. Used by phones since ten years ago. Not a creation of Apple.

Tab bar on the bottom? Used by Palm on Treo 680 released before Iphone was announced. Not a creation of Apple.

[Barry @ Nov 4th 2007 7:01PM]

The iPhone isn't even really a phone as much as it's an incredibly compact and very usable tablet pc that can also make phone calls. The difference in usability (and I say this with plenty of experience using Window Mobile on a daily basis) is night and day. The touchscreen usability on WM devices is pathetic.

[Jon @ Nov 4th 2007 7:03PM]

A tablet PC that does not allow you to install applications? Sounds like your phone is the one five years behind!

[Barry @ Nov 4th 2007 7:07PM]

Sigh.

Keep you pants on and wait until february. Or just jailbreak. Or use the massive number of totally great webapps. Or be like me and not really care about installing a fish tank or other such nonsense.

[paul34 @ Nov 4th 2007 8:12PM]

Barry, your fanboy-ism is both admirable and detestable.

I own an iPhone after owning several Series 60 devices. While the iPhone is awesome and very "cool," it is HARDLY a smartphone - the even more extreme analogy of a "tablet PC" is ludicrous at best.

It's nothing more than a well-design *regular* phone (a.k.a. dumb phone). Similar to high-end Sony Ericssons. They are very good dumbphones, but do not proceed to the level of a true smartphone like my past Series 60 devices or these types of WinMo devices.

[Reader @ Nov 4th 2007 11:06PM]

Out of all smartphones on the market I can't believe you chose the iPhone to compare to a full on computer. Minus the touch screen it's probably the least like a computer out of any smartphone on the market (for now at least).

[reticulate @ Nov 5th 2007 12:13AM]

Anyone else sick to death of the iPhone fanboy brigade trolling ever WinMo article out there?

[silverblackvoid @ Nov 5th 2007 6:15AM]

troll.

[dave95 @ Nov 5th 2007 8:37AM]

@ Jon

Lets not let facts get in our way, eh? - The Apple Newton was released well before the first Palm device. It pioneered the PDA concept with Touch Screen input, handwriting recognition and hey look even tab bar on the bottom. The guys who brought us Palm were the ones that worked on the Newton first.

http://images.google.com/imgres?imgurl=http://content.answers.com/main/content/img/CDE/_NEWTON.GIF&imgrefurl=http://www.answers.com/topic/pda&h=488&w=304&sz=48&hl=en&start=1&um=1&tbnid=6ZY5S9i7T0tGLM:&tbnh=130&tbnw=81&prev=/images%3Fq%3DApple%2BNewton%26svnum%3D10%26um%3D1%26hl%3Den%26client%3Dfirefox-a%26rls%3Dorg.mozilla:en-US:official%26sa%3DG
Newton

It's sad that Samsung is using 'multi-touch' in the name when this device is really not multi-touch.

[derek @ Nov 4th 2007 6:41PM]

How can they call it Multi-Touch if it doesn't support Multi-Touch? Isn't that false advertising?

[shaun @ Nov 4th 2007 6:48PM]

yes

[nate @ Nov 4th 2007 6:55PM]

no, you can touch it on the back to hold it, and touch the screen at the same time.

[Mile @ Nov 4th 2007 7:01PM]

Touch the screen multi times.

[Dave @ Nov 4th 2007 7:51PM]

You can touch yourself while you Live Search Steve Ballmer covered in man sweat.
http://search.live.com/images/results.aspx?q=steve+ballmer+sweat&go=Search+Images

[ChrisG @ Nov 4th 2007 6:52PM]

This looks more like Samsung going after HTC on this one. Don't forget Samsung's only good smart phone right now is the black jack and I think the smart phone market associates the success of the iPhone to the use of touchscreen technology. Because of that Samsung probably put a touchscreen so that they could get a good stake at this whole "touchscreen smart phone" market. I don't think Samsung meant to go after the HTC touch but the user interface sure is reminiscent of the HTC touch but you have to blame that on their build of Windows Mobile. If Samsung really wanted to make their own version of the HTC Touch they would have featured something similar to HTC's Touch flow user interface.

[Jon @ Nov 4th 2007 6:58PM]

This is not the first Samsung phone with touchscreen so they aren't putting a touchscreen now because of the Iphone. The i700 for example came out in 2004 and does not have a keypad similar to the M4650. The Palm OS i500 came out 2003.

[ChrisG @ Nov 4th 2007 7:06PM]

excuse me but have you been on the samsung site or look at any carriers, there currently aren't any touchscreen samsung smart phones on the market except this one. I'm not saying Samsung didn't use to have touch screen phones, it's just now that touchscreens are popular Samsung is reintroducing the technology to their phones.

[shuyin198x @ Nov 4th 2007 7:23PM]

Damn Chris! Reading your post hurts the ol'brain. What's up with the because at the start of the sentence and the two buts?
"Because of that Samsung probably put a touchscreen so that they could get a good stake at this whole "touchscreen smart phone" market. I don't think Samsung meant to go after the HTC touch but the user interface sure is reminiscent of the HTC touch but you have to blame that on their build of Windows Mobile."

As for sammy's touchscreen, the more the better.It means more choice for consumers.

[ChrisG @ Nov 4th 2007 7:38PM]

Sorry about that i was kinda multitasking and rushing.

[Jon @ Nov 5th 2007 6:54AM]

No again. This is an update to the i718 which was announced last year.

[Barry @ Nov 4th 2007 7:16PM]

Christ, wait until february.

Or jailbreak, which will always be an option.

Or use the hundreds of webapps. I'm pretty sure the iPhone is beating the crap out of WM in applications if you count the webapps.

I'm just happy I can use a mobile browser without wanting to stab my eyes out. That alone is worth the full purchase price, everything else is icing on the cake.

[Barry @ Nov 4th 2007 7:19PM]

Damn you, engadget comment system!

[shuyin198x @ Nov 4th 2007 7:27PM]

Christ replied, he's not listening to you :P
Only teasing, I know you meant to press the ''reply button'' for chrisg.

[Barry @ Nov 4th 2007 7:40PM]

No, I replied to the thread in my earlier comment, but it didn't show up for five minutes and I assumed the comment system dropped it on the floor (after multiple page refreshes, prayers, and chanting). My second reply ended up in the wrong place, and the comment system has this cool feature which allows you to be unable to delete your own misplaced comment.

[Argot @ Nov 4th 2007 8:55PM]

Break into your own phone. Step into the time machine and travel back to 2001 with Apple.

[ark_v2 @ Nov 4th 2007 7:17PM]

iPhone rippoff is 3-2...

[derek @ Nov 4th 2007 8:06PM]

What is the 3-2?

[John @ Nov 4th 2007 10:44PM]

=1

[Tired_ @ Nov 4th 2007 7:49PM]

And the Creative Zen Stone doesn't get me high, either. It's just a name.

[HAHAHA @ Nov 4th 2007 8:24PM]

Hey! Are you OK, Engadget?? I'm very surprised you aren't tired of this foolish 'touch' news!! The touch phones have existed in this planet for a long time before the born of apple's iPhone! And it's quite ridiculous for us to compare THE 'touch' with THE 'multi-touch'! Well, every body knows only the APPLE has his 'multi-touch' for himself, and it is obviously different from THE 'touch' within other else such as HTC, LG, SAMSUNG or even NOKIA. So there's no need to compare them, they're from two different planet in the distance!

[dave95 @ Nov 5th 2007 8:45AM]

Then why put "multi-touch" in it's name?????

[Surur @ Nov 4th 2007 8:35PM]

You know, this is just an updated version of this Samsung Anycall sgh i718 phone from December 2006.

http://cn.engadget.com/2006/12/11/06itu-samsung-sgh-i718/

Contrary to popular engadget opinion, Apple did not invent sliced bread.

[Cesar Cardoso @ Nov 4th 2007 8:53PM]

And touchscreen phones have been popular in Asia for a LOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOONG time.

[LordFarkward @ Nov 4th 2007 9:19PM]

me love you LOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOONG time

[Josh @ Nov 4th 2007 11:45PM]

not as long as fergie...

[rushabhjs @ Nov 6th 2007 9:45PM]

A lot of crap written up here by WM6 users, plain simple the OS just sucks. I have struggled with it for two years on an iPaq 6515 in need of a smartphone and find that my new iPhone is simply just way better.

It is multi-touch, stable, productive, stylish and fun.

Suck it up Microsoft fanboys (if any, sounds like most are working for MS or trying to)

[UnnDunn @ Nov 4th 2007 9:26PM]

I hate keyboards on mobile devices. Doesn't matter whether they are physical or virtual, mobile keyboards suck.

Which is why I like Windows Mobile Professional; it has handwriting recognition that actually works (after a bit of training.)

[Drew @ Nov 4th 2007 10:51PM]

@ Paul34:

Funny... My iPhone can remote control other computers using VNC, SSH and Telnet, run an Apache webserver and host a website, track finances, chat on IRC, AIM, ICQ, and MSN, play Doom, NES games, and even Zork, view PDF, Word, and Excel documents, keep track of a to-do list, calendar, and contacts, listen to music and watch movies, stream media to other computers, oh, and even make phone calls. If that's a "dumb" phone, "smart" phones must be REALLY impressive.

[dj-kenpo @ Nov 4th 2007 11:22PM]

it plays doom, but you can't. there's no controls yet.

if you want to nitpick.
it's a cool device, but it's in it's infancy, I wouldn't classfy i as a smartphone today, but after february the game will be very different I think. I'm sure they'll be more than enough apps to satisfy everyone except the iphone haters.

[Jon @ Nov 5th 2007 2:27AM]

Congrats. We have been doing those things you have listed since 2001. Next!

[Drew @ Nov 5th 2007 6:48AM]

@ Jon:

I've been a Windows CE user since 1996, so yes, "we" have been able to do those things for quite a while. But the iPhone has been in consumer hands for just over 4 months and even without an SDK or any support from the manufacturer, the third-party software development world for it is thriving.

[Paul @ Nov 4th 2007 11:06PM]

What can the iPhone do that higher end regular phones can't? web, email, IM, pictures, chat, none of these are things my Sanyo Katan can't do.

WM smart phones can do pretty much anything as long as someone makes a program for it. Wake me when an iPhone can run SSH and SNMP clients.

[dj-kenpo @ Nov 4th 2007 11:25PM]

it does run ssh... where have you been?

and ya, the windows mobile can do internet (I have a dell pda and an itouch)

I wouldn't say it's the same thing. the iphone runs the web (minus flash) ALOT better than windows mobile. browsing on wm is like getting a root canal.

[Natedog @ Nov 5th 2007 12:45AM]

Blah blah, iPhone, blah blah, does internet better, blah blah...
...
...
EDGE, bitches! What now?

[js @ Nov 5th 2007 1:05AM]

Will it blend like the iPhone?

[Drew @ Nov 5th 2007 1:30AM]

As dj-kenpo said, the iPhone *does* run SSH.

"WM smart phones can do pretty much anything as long as someone makes a program for it."

You can replace "WM smart phones" with "iPhones" and it is still true.

I've got a Windows Mobile HP iPaq that I keep around for using with international SIMs (haven't unlocked my iPhone yet and prefer to have my US number available all the time), and even though I've long been a supporter of and a developer for Windows Mobile/CE, the iPhone is just so much better, in almost every way.

[dave @ Nov 5th 2007 10:31PM]

fanboys from both sides of the WinMo vs. iPhone battle should honestly can it. iPhone has a better UI, and is probably a lot more stable, but WinMo is infinitely more useful as fas as 3rd-party app support goes, and leaves a fair bit to be desired in built-in features too. i was trying to get a friend to jailbreak her iPhone, and she said it's rediculously hard to do, and she doesn't want to worry about bricking it, while my uncle's shiny new HTC mogul has none of those problems, and 3rd-party apps run without a hitch. the only thing that WinMo is 5 years behind in is its user interface, which i'll admit is completely trash-worthy compared to iPhone.




doesn't TouchFLO run a nice UI over WinMo's core? and samsung's new adobe UI, for that matter? we should all just get that, haha.