Toshiba's TG01 running Snapdragon launched as T-01A in Japan
By Thomas Ricker 
posted Jun 22nd 2009 4:11AM
posted Jun 22nd 2009 4:11AM
One of the hottest pieces of gear this year just made its way to retail in Japan. Less than a centimeter thick, the NTT DoCoMo T-01A is the same TG01 device revealed by Toshiba back in February running Qualcomm's ultra-fast 1GHz Snapdragon chipset. As such, our far east brethren can lay claim to that 4.1-inch WVGA (800 x 480 pixel) resistive touchscreen display; HSDPA, GPS, and WiFi radios; and Toshiba's custom-built UI meant to mask its Windows Mobile 6.1 core with a bit of Rothko misdirection. And now that Toshiba's home country of Japan is all set, we hope to see the TG01 make its launch debute in Europe and beyond.
This thing is more powerful than the actual computer I'm writing this on! :D
Your iPhone?
I believe he said computer NOT phone
/exasperated sarcasm
if you were implying that (your) iPhone is a computer you could have found a different post to sustain that... I wasn't talking about the iPhone here and yes Snapdragon will snap! iPhone's internals in a performance test. Even running crappy Windows Mobile.
I'd like to know how they're getting long battery life when using a 1GHz processor. They have some sort of new battery tech over in Japan? I'm amazed that the Snapdragon chipset could be that much energy efficient than the ARM chipset. If it is, then that's a really amazing chipset. Must run relatively cool at full power or you'd have one hot potato in your hand.
@iphone
The stated specifications is that it uses 30% less power.
And they have a netbook powered by Snapdragon with no fan at all. So that shows you how little heat the chipset produces.
The initial Snapdragon is a 1.0Ghz single-core cpu that uses a custom-designed ARMv7 instruction set compatible core that is more powerful (double the SIMD width) than the standard ARM Cortex-A8 core in the Palm Pre or iPhone and can run up to 1.3Ghz when made in 45nm. The future Snapdragon akin to the T.I. OMAP4 is a 45nm, dual-core running @ 1.5Ghz, and the cores are just faster than the Cortex-A9.
While the hardware, with a powerful graphics and video engine is no doubt great, Windows mobile is a big drag on performance. WinMo is still compiled to ARMv4, can't take advantage of any of the recent ARM optimizations or NEON SIMD unit, doesn't intrinsically support a floating point unit or the Snapdragon's DSP, has no graphics acceleration using the 8+ year old code of GDI+, etc.
winmo=turn-off
device=hot
damn, didnt think that one through:
device=hot
winmo=not
How original, someone hates windows mobile. Thanks for letting everyone know though!
That's OK. It was a stupid comment any way that you put it.
Whats wrong with the man/woman not liking WinMo. Damn...back off
I had the same thought as glensky upon first reading this post. Android donut is expected to support higher screen resolutions and that will be a killer.
To all those Microsoft defenders in here, WinMo can't even come close to performance efficiency of Android and that's the reason some people don't like WinMo. With the same hardware, you can do sooo much more using software with better design and implementation that is Android.
@Madddy
Exactly.. I have nothing against Microsoft (am actually a .NET developer) or the idea of Windows mobile. In fact, I wish they had a killer Windows mobile platform with full .NET framework support and a modern hardware-accelerated GUI.
The reason I can't stand windows mobile is because it is the most archaic, inefficient smartphone platform out there due to the reasons I listed directly above in my other comment. Because the WinCE core has compatibility with ARM platforms going back to the late 90's, it is very slow and inefficient being unable to use any of the modern ARM instruction sets, optimizations, FP units, SIMD engines, etc.
Take a look at the iPhone 3G. It has a 400Mhz ARM11 and PowerVR MBX lite --- some of slowest hardware of a modern smartphone besides RIM's devices. And yet it brought a whole new level of performance and interface fluidity, all because iPhone OS was built to support all of the modern features of ARM SoCs. The new 3GS only continues to show this with the great speedup in graphics and processing.
I really hope Windows Mobile 7 turns out to be decent in a way that all prior versions are not.
Hum, pricing?
Hmm, my first comment seems to have disappeared... Well, then I'll try to repeat what I said...
I would guess that one will be paying 700+ bucks (well, if converted to USD) for this phone.
Reason is that there is that given that this is in Japan, there is a 99% chance that you won't get any subsidies as neither the Japanese carriers nor consumers care for them.
I went to a docomo shop with the intention of getting this phone. However, after using a demonstration model for a few minutes, I quickly changed my mind. First of all, the response of the touch screen was ridiculously bad, to the point where is was just frustrating. Typing on the software keyboard (when I could get it to launch) was near impossible. Another strange thing is that there is no option to change the operating language to English. It may have just been a bad demonstration model, but it was enough to put me off from this phone. Incidentally, sales of this phone have been temporarily suspended in Japan until the 28th due to some problems when dialing certain area codes...
Yeah resistive touch screens are terrible now. Capacitive all the way.
not if resistive is done correctly it could be better than capacitive...
Capacitive screens have lower resolutions. I'd rather have a higher res screen.
It's a Windows Mobile phone. Within about 30 seconds you could tweak the screen sensitivity in the registry and end up with one of the most sensitive resistive screens you've ever used (which coincidently is far easier to type with than a capacitive screen). And again, being windows mobile you can quite easily change the language in a few seconds too.
@KaRmAChAnG
Resistive touchscreens are leauges better than capacitive in my opinion... Much more accurate. You can use anything you like to poke the screen and it will work... I have a capacitive screen on my MP3 player and it's just really annoying being able to only use my finger... and not even the top tip of it will work! When it's cold I have to take my gloves off to use it... I laughed at all the people with iPhones at the station this winter getting frostbite just to check their mail while I browsed in warmth :)
All WinMo phones in Japan are localized. You need to flash the device to change the language and since most Japanese WinMo phones are never exported there are no English ROMs.
Some people have successfully flashed Japanese HTC devices with English ROMs but that will surely invalidate your warranty.
I tried out another demo model today. Still crappy... I didn't expect WiMo to have English. However, I did expect that Toshiba's interface menus, etc. could be switched to English. The worker at the docomo shop called headquarters and they said it cannot be set to English. Pretty dumb considering the phone is going to be used in English speaking markets. As for the sensitivity settings, I'll try them out next time. The problem is that the docomo workers know basically nothing about the phone and don't know how to use it.
@ MacD... see above. There's NO English on the phone because it's for the Japanese market. Sheesh. I don't expect to find Japanese on my phone when I buy it here in Toronto either.
@kylehaze
some Japanese career like docomo tend to think devices they sell to be their property Instead of user's, so I doubt they even leave those devices re-fashable. It's a career willingly add new weird "docomo connection manager" software to disable ALL 3 OF WiFi, BT, and USB while using 3G data just to prevent tethering.
I have a question,
does anyone think that snapdragon will make winmo usable? the criticism of of most winmo phones with a custom GUI on top is that it slows the phone down.
could snapdragon remedy this and make winmo a viable option for the masses
I look forward to finding out peoples opinions
Winmo is great, it's nowhere near as slow as everyone makes out, on my xperia apps launch in 2-4 seconds dependent on the app.
It's all the iPhone fanboys which make out it's slow. The iPhone is faster but it's optimised for one set of hardware which is alot easier than doing it for the huge range of WM devices.
In my case the issue with winmo isn't so much that it's slow (with a decent phone it's not) but that many of the apps are fairly buggy compared to the IPhone/Android/Pre and the UI is terrible. Even with 6.5's more finger friendly menu the widgets for all of the programs remain the same and horribly outdated
@billobob
I agree the UI does need a lot of work. 6.5 is just a stepping stone for the real revamp of winmo 7 though.
With HTC's Touchflo 3D 2 interface i find winmo really easy to use. I guess it's all personal preference though, but as with windows users those who say it crashes all the time and it's slow they have made it that way, because I guarantee the computer worked when they bought it.
I wouldn't say any of the built in WinMo apps are buggy by any means, these are proggrams which have gone under hard testing for used designed for use in a buisness environment. Most the the built in Apps are designed to be very small and lightweight, so that's what they are, barebones stylings but extremely functional.
Even without a custom GUI, Windows Mobile is by no means unusable, in fact it is very usable in the case of 6.5, it just mightn't look as nice as everything else. Granted, 6.1 wasn't optimised for fingers so it has slightly more arduous to use, but still not unusable. Windows Mobile wouldn't have the marketshare it does if it were "unusable"
Plus, you only need to use a Touch Diamond 2 to realise that a custom GUI (Touch Flo3D in this case) can work spectacularly without slowing down the phone, in a far more visually appealing manner that matches the smoothness of the iPhone.
What's Snapdrgaon?
just leave
WTF is wrong with you? I ask a simple question and you have to bring out your upbringing? If you don't have an answer no one will call you stupid, fanboi.
"bring out your upbringing?"
"fanboi"
I wat'd on both of these.
Also couldn't you just search it yourself?
http://www.bing.com/search?q=qualcomm+snapdragon
Stop being so lazy.
that's what a forum is for, to ask questions and get answers.
And what's wrong with my language?
this is not a forum. it's a blog with a comment system. also, under the post there are links to the subject in the post, including snapdragon.
in the time it took your to write that you could of googled snap dragon and found the answer http://www.google.com/search?q=snapdragon&ie=utf-8&oe=utf-8&aq=t&rls=org.mozilla:en-US:official&client=firefox-a there happy?
Darkmax, the question you asked wasn't simple, it was stupid. It says right in the article 'ultrafast 1GHz Snapdragon chipset', which should be self-explanatory. For those who DON'T know, Engadget even went through the trouble of making the word Snapdragon clickable.
So you really shouldn't be surprised, but then again you confused the Engadget comments with a forum, so there's that...
oh okay... must have missed that part of the article.
But aren't you guys just plain nasty? Get a life.
That's The pot calling the kettle black. Darkmax you have replied and insulted us to. You called me a fan boy because of my name. Oh and another thing people are not always nice especially when you make a fool of your self.
no I called you a fanboi because of the comment below.
i could just not like win mo. Also you completely ignored my other points
1. forum is a place where people comment
2. the question is simple. Stupid only because you think it is.
3. with your name, and the fact that you have no love for win-mo, you are a fanboi.
4. with your reply from the start proved that you have no tolerance nor any sort of courtesy
5. in which of my comments am i being rude?
God i wish i liked winmo
According to this page it's available in Spain (check 'where to buy'):
https://www.toshiba-europe.com/mobilerevolution/default.aspx
Love those dimensions. Not sure if Im a fan of the GUI though.... how can it be better than spb mobile shell 3..which made even my wonky old htc touch dual (relative) delight to use
A7
Well.. I'll debate that Titanium in 6.5 is the better UI, or even TF3D but luckily, none of that matters. The WinMo guys all have a choice of UI. That's the one thing about WinMo that keeps me coming back is that I can tweak my device however I want. Custom UI, custom ROMs, registry edits for custom functionality or looks, and thanks to XDA, all the apps I could ever want. No, not as many or as easy as those with app stores, but XDA and PPCG forums put us directly in touch with the authors of apps and ROMs and themes or whatever.. I do have to say I love the WinMo these days.
^^ Couldn't agree more!!!
^^^
Double agreed!