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Helio's Pantech PN-810 QWERTY device pops up in FCC
And here it is, Helio's coup de grâce. The QWERTY handset we'd heard Helio was cookin' up with Korea's Pantech actually hit the FCC some time ago, but the shots we were able to glean from the test apparatus documentation were teasers at best. Thanks to the wonders of expired confientiality agreements, that same FCC documentation now yields a bounty of goodness, including a user's manual and a full array of pictures. The so-called PN-810 gives the illusion of a dual slider, but actually employs two distinct layers to provide two completely different keypads depending on the slide direction: QWERTY in one, numeric in the other. Key features (other than the unusual form factor, of course) include a 2.1 megapixel cam, Bluetooth, and the full array of goodies that comes with Helio membership. A release date remains uncertain, but the PN-810's been chilling with the feds for some time now, so we wouldn't be terribly surprised to see it hit in the near term.%Gallery-1733%
The next Kickflip? Helio-branded Pantech in the wild
So, we covered the Pantech PN-810 in passing a couple weeks back as part of our regular FCC Fridays series, and at the time, we had absolutely no idea what significance the device had. Those familiar with the FCC's online document repository know that the "External Photos" and "User's Manual" PDFs are usually the most exciting bits. The test reports, on the other hand, typically cause one's eyes to glaze over by page two or three, and attempting to digest the entire thing is akin to torture. Anyhoo, eagle-eyed (and brave) HowardForums members have picked out a couple telling pictures buried deep within one of those test reports; besides revealing the form factor and design of the handset, they also leak a carrier -- Helio. Since VK Mobile's implosion earlier this year, it only makes sense that Helio would be looking to replace the VK-sourced Kickflip with another swivel phone (although this could be a slider, too) from a manufacturer more likely to stick around for a while, and that's where Pantech comes into the equation. All this being said, we don't know much of anything about the phone besides what we see here, and we don't think this is the rumored QWERTY phone Helio's been said to have up its sleeve. With an FCC approval under its belt, though, we hope this'll all sort itself out sooner rather than later.[Via HowardForums, thanks Simon]Update: Our original tipster, Simon, has pointed out something very important: there appears to be another "layer" hiding on the bottom of the phone that would presumably slide out to reveal a full keyboard. Combined with the centering of the screen and the soft buttons up top, it lends credibility to the theory that this really is the mythical Danger-designed QWERTY superphone after all. Shouldn't be long now, folks. (We hope.)
