As you might expect, Japanese carrier
SoftBank's summer 2009 lineup contains the usual science-fiction array of ridiculously well-equipped handsets -- plus 3G photo frames and a
Lenovo IdeaPad S10 with embedded WWAN -- but the real news here might be a pair of lovelies from Sharp. The mirumo 934SH (pictured left) features a 3-inch external display that can display time, date, weather, news, and other information without consuming any power between changes; sounds like E-Ink, though Sharp describes it simply as a "memory LCD." You've also got an 8 megapixel camera, a waterproof shell, and a UV sensor that can help you determine just how quickly you need to slather on the SPF 30. Next up is the Solar Hybrid 936SH, a phone suspiciously similar in concept to
the device Sharp is working on for SoftBank competitor KDDI au. Clearly the big draw here is the big solar array up front that'll give you one minute of call time or two hours of standby per 10 minutes of charging, but you've still got IPX7 water resistance, an 8 megapixel camera, and a full wide VGA display at your disposal. Look for the 934SH in June and the 936SH in August -- if you happen to be in Japan, anyhow.
posted May 19th 2009 2:03AM
I want a Sharp smartphone.
Well, I e-mailed this in, but just to get the info out there quickly, the memory LCD is actually an OLED, which Softbank CEO Masayoshi Son claims uses only five per cent of the power used by previous external displays. Seeing as most of these were STN, that's no surprise, but anyway.
And the 'memory' part comes from the fact the external display can only show one of 38 different screens at one time, and the hardware remembers which of those 38 you use most.
Also not mentioned was the fact that both use CCD sensors in their cameras, which makes the awesome, and for some reason Chris chose to ignore the 10mp CCD camera equipped Aquos Shot, which also has a 3-inch VGA capacitive screen and 'Chase Shutter', which allows the autofocus to follow an object selected on the screen as it moves across it. Nice, huh.
Calling OLEDs LCDs? That's a little confusing. But then again I suppose LCD has become synonymous with thin screens.
Oops. Meant 'makes them awesome'. Anyone else think of Brawndo when they use that word?
This is a very nice phone for people that don't smartphone just good look and easy function.
I assure you that even the cheapest of Japanese cell fones could beat the best smart fone you've seen any day. I should know, I lived there the last six years, and watched as the cell fones they had years back, became our cell fones of today('our' being the people here in the US).
Japanese phones have nice hardware, primary displays and cameras, but just like most of their US brethren they have always had shitty software and the "check-the-box" feature cramming. The iPhone and now Palm Pre have a far better user experience than most Japanese cellphones I have ever seen.
Not every bistable display is eInk! In fact that's just a brand of electrophoretic display.
Electronic paper is the real generic term.
This "memory LCD" could be any type of electronic paper. Though the name might suggest a relation to cholesteric LCD technology.
NM on the last part....
Yeah...we won't be getting this technology for another 2-3 years...
damn lucky ass japanese bastards XD
Oops. Major boo boo on my part. The 'Memory LCD' is actually an LCD. They didn't make that clear at the press conference, which I was watching, but checking the site, it appears it actually uses one five hundredth of the power of previous OLED (!) external displays, so what the hell it's made of is anyone's guess.
The 'memory' part of my comment is accurate, though.
What great phones why can't they make a gsm quadband model and let us in the usa buy them? They are very stylish , i would buy one?
Exact same reason why Nokia won't bring some of their high end phones to US. 90% of the cellphone users are perfectly happy with their crappy phone which came free with a 2 year plan.
99% of the people in US, wouldn't even consider paying 6-700 dollars for a phone, and no carrier would ever bother subsidizing it.
Just a completely different culture. You in US get a crappy phone for dirt cheap and pay ridiculous fees each month, and in Japan we can buy a (relatively expensive) great phone and pay dirt cheap for the monthly fees.
Im in Osaka!! my softbank fee is not so cheap... 26$. And I regret buying my 5mp sharp cellphone 2 years ago... the system is hard to navigate and the cellphone is soooo thick!
That one look slick though... next year it will be cheap.
Generally the phones like this you get with a 2 year contract in Japan are either free or less than $100. Competition between Docomo, au, and softbank keeps prices down I guess.
@ Boards of Canada,
Exactly, lol. For 26 in US you won't get shit.
Take the iPhone for example, in US the very minimum you can pay for it is 80 dollars per month...
@Boards of Canada
One thing I noticed living there, most Japanese like the larger fones. Not exactly sure why, but I suppose they're afraid to break the smaller ones or they need a better battery life with how much they are used.
@Michael Flux
Exactly. When I lived in Iwakuni(about an hour south of Hiroshima by train) I had a nice SaMsung slider fone that I bought for bout $90 and my monthly bill was $10. When my dad retired and we came back to the US I almost died when I saw the 'deals' here. I mean seriously, for my entire family it cost less than $60 a month, and here it's over $300!! The fones we had in Japan were a lot better there too!
America is so behind. I wish we could even come close to having what the Japanese have had for quite awhile now. Their phones are amazing, many useful features one may need in such a compact device plus an array of other features that just don't really have a good reason for being there other than just why the hell not (UV sensor, really?).
It looks like Softbank has quite an assortment of flip phones but they're all W-CDMA phones. The 933SH looks quite decent and so does the 5.1mp Omnia POP 931SC. Other than the Omnia does anyone know if Softbank is running LIMO Linux based OS on their phones?
this is one sexy phone!
How much is the price for this sweet little thing?
These are some sweet phones.....
that's awesome...Engadget should give one of these away
Hmm... no wonder why the Japanese consider the iPhone backwards technology.
Waterproof? Awesome!
And I like the large exterior screen.
Very slick, but I wonder how much they would smudge with fingerprints...