Link to NY Times Article

Here's the complete article, with the kyocera stuff bolded:

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Cellphones, and Then Some: The Latest High-Tech Mergers
By DAVID POGUE

As aliens observe us through their intergalactic telescopes, they must laugh their little green heads off at certain illogical aspects of human behavior. We wash down a super-size pizza with a low-cal beverage; we pursue a love interest more intently the more we're rejected; and we buy high, sell low.

Gadget freaks often exhibit their own bursts of bizarre behavior, like carrying around one electronic gizmo to look up phone numbers and another to dial them. That problem, at least, is approaching a solution with the arrival of the combination palmtop-cellphones known as communicators.

It's quite an engineering challenge: you want the biggest possible screen and keyboard but the smallest overall dimensions. This season, you can choose from four new attempts to take on the task. Each comes from a corporate consortium of hardware, software and cellular companies, but the crucial players are Microsoft, Kyocera, Handspring and a start-up company called Danger.

Each communicator combines the functions of telephone, e-mail terminal, instant-messaging pad and Web browser. Better yet, all the new models capitalize on the new, faster Internet "pipes" that the cellphone carriers have just installed. Generally for an extra fee, these new networks (called 1x, GPRS or 3G, along with a variety of carrier-specific marketing names) bring Web sites to your little screen with roughly the same speed as a PC's dial-up modem. Previous Internet cellphones, by contrast, made smoke signals look speedy.

Most people are mercifully spared any awareness of the operating system inside their phones, but Microsoft wants to change all that. Its new phone software, called PocketPC Phone Edition, makes its debut in a new palmtop-cellphone ($550) from T-Mobile.

The software is just what you'd expect from Microsoft in 2002: color-coordinated, clean-looking, blessed with a few nice features - a Notes page associated with each call in the Call Log, for example - but overflowing with nested and sometimes confusing dialogue boxes that only Microsoft engineers could love. (On the Web bookmarks list, for instance, when you tap Add, the screen says, "Select an item to delete." Nice to know Microsoft has a sense of humor.)

The handset itself is a big, broad slab with an unprotected screen. To dial, you're supposed to tap small "keys" displayed on the glass.

Virtual keypads like this invite grease and smudges from your fingers, make touch-dialing impossible, and don't let you control how long each "key" is pressed when, for example, you're trying to operate your home answering machine using touch tones. And then, as though to rule out any chance that one square millimeter of glass is not smudged, the screen is designed to rest against your cheek as you talk.

T-Mobile might have avoided these problems by studying the failure of earlier, similarly designed gadgets (the Handspring VisorPhone, for example). Those who forget the flops are condemned to repeat them.

On paper, T-Mobile's second new offering, the Sidekick, might not seem a much better bet. Who, in 2002, would have the gall to release a gadget with a no stylus or touch screen, no color, no way to synchronize data with a PC, and a brand-new operating system that can't run any existing add-on programs?

Yet incredibly, the Sidekick is a fantastic success, thanks to the most thoughtfully conceived hardware and software since the original Palm Pilot. (You may have heard this one called the Danger Hiptop. That was before T-Mobile picked it up, in readiness for its official release this week.)

Instead of squeezing a tiny thumb keyboard onto the width of the device, as the RIM BlackBerry and Handspring Treo do, the designers laid it out the long way, with the gadget held in landscape orientation. As a result, the keyboard is much more spacious and complete. Praise be, it even has a dedicated @ key. Which leaves only one problem: Where does the screen go? In Danger's ingenious solution, the screen conceals the keyboard. When you need to type, the screen pivots at a corner with a spring-loaded pop, producing what could be a laptop for hamsters: screen above, keyboard below.

The software is equally clever. Every feature seems to be where you want it, when you need it. You don't even miss the stylus and touch screen: the pushable scroll wheel is quick and simple.

The programming makes all the difference. Just a few examples: on the Web, the built-in browser fills in the "www" and ".com" for you. You can set up the device to silence its musical rings and chords after a certain hour of the night (or during class hours at school). And if there were any doubt that the Sidekick was designed to appeal to a younger crowd, you can conduct 10 AOL Instant Messenger chats simultaneously; a simple keystroke switches among them.

The Sidekick has its blemishes. It's biggish, about the size of a stuffed bifold wallet. You can upload your phone numbers and calendar events to a Web site that is continuously synched with the Sidekick, but the Sidekick doesn't communicate with your computer. Dialing the phone by using the keypad (as opposed to using the speed-dial list or address book) is on the awkward side, too, because you have to open the screen to get at the keys, and then close it to talk. And although type and graphics on the grayscale screen are razor-sharp, the microscopic type is not designed with middle-aged eyes in mind.

But you can forgive quite a bit when you discover the price: after a $50 rebate, it's $200 - less than half the price of its rivals. The service price is right, too: $40 a month buys 1,000 text messages, 1,000 weekend minutes, 200 whenever minutes, and - get this - unlimited Internet time. Well-heeled teenagers, unite!


If the Sidekick is a cheap, fun and funky Volkswagen Beetle, then the new Kyocera 7135 ($500 to $600) is a Mercedes: handsome, luxurious, and loaded with features. Because it is based on the Palm operating system, it runs any of the thousands of Palm-compatible programs (games, tip calculators, Web browsers and so on).

Yet this device, which Kyocera says will be available "in plenty of time for the holidays," is much more phonelike than its closest competitor, the Treo. Only the Kyocera has a true number-dialing pad, for example. It also offers 30 dial-by-voice numbers, 99 speed-dial numbers, and a serious battery (3.5 hours of talk time). Another huge perk: the Kyocera's battery is removable so that you can keep a second battery charged and ready. (The synching cradle for your Mac or PC can charge the spare.)

The Kyocera even stomps all over some of the Treo's organizer features. It offers a much more colorful screen (65,000 colors versus 4,096), an expansion slot for extra memory, and even a built-in MP3 music player.

Nothing's perfect, though, especially not in the communicator category. For example, the 7135's main phone screen is, inexplicably, not touch-sensitive. If you try to use the stylus, an error message tells you to use the menu keys instead.

Note, too, that instead of a miniature alphabet keyboard like the Treo's for composing e-mail, the Kyocera has a conventional Palm-type writing area tucked just below the hinge. Depending on your enthusiasm for Palm's Graffiti handwriting-recognition alphabet, this arrangement could make the Kyocera a weaker candidate for e-mail.

The Kyocera is about half an inch thicker than a Treo, too - which, in a shirt pocket, might as well be a mile. On one hand, with great thickness comes great durability. On the other hand, I couldn't find a single male who could contemplate carrying it in a pants pocket; its bulge would look like a second knee on your leg. Purse-carrying women raved about it, though. And a number of gents volunteered that wearing it on the included belt clip, with the top-mounted caller-ID display visible, wasn't such a bad solution.


Besides, if it's small you want, you'd be better off shopping for the Handspring Treo 300, available from Sprint for $500. It's the only communicator that not only fits into a shirt pocket, but even disappears completely inside it. Of course, tininess has its drawbacks, too, like a slightly shrunken screen, a cramped alphabet keyboard and a less-than-optimal battery.

But like the nearly identical Treo 270, which works on the Cingular or T-Mobile networks, this model offers sparkling software that makes one-handed dialing a quick, convenient and stylus-free process.

For the moment, you can't have it all. The leading candidates offer economy and delicious software (the T-Mobile Sidekick); beauty and luxury (the Kyocera 7135); or shirt pocketability (the Handspring Treo). To find all of these virtues in a single device, you'll have to wait another year or two. At that point, the aliens will no longer be amused - they'll be jealous.

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This part HAS to be bogus. Whatever are they talking about?

Does anyone else see something wrong ith this statement? If the screen isn't touch sensitive, then how do you get a message back saying to use the menu keys??

For those that know - is the screen touch sensitive?? If it is what was the reviewer talking about?

Lack of touchscreen might just kill me buying this and replacing my T68 (BTW - T68s do NOT like going through the washing machine, perhaps my wife should have washed it on a gentle cycle instead) with a new T68i plus Palm Tungsten/T.

(Long time lurker - first time poster )

Of course there's a touch screen for the PDA. Reviewer is talking about the Dialer app, the equivalent of the flip closed mode on the 6035. That's when the phone hardware, not the Palm hardware, is running. For that you have to use the hard keys, you can't tap on the on-screen menu choices like Messages, Answer Call, etc. This is a fundamental limitation of a design that lashes phone chips to Palm chips. There's nothing the 6035 could do that the 7135 can't (other than jog wheel).

I would say that was a mostly positive review.

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I will admit that I am new to these models (though I have programmed in BREW for the 3035, and PalmOS for the VII/VIIx), but that still strikes me as odd.

Hasn't anyone written a third party app that does this? Looking into the SmartPhone API set from Kyocera, the pdqTelephone API set appears complete enough to handle this functionality from within software (independant of the phone dialing side of the hardware). The pdqSigxxx API looks good for SMS, and the pdqPhone API handles mute, hold, volume etc. Everything is there ... have I missed something?

This might actually be a compelling reason for me to buy the 7135 ... an untapped market for software utilities for the kyo smartphones (then again, I might be talking out my ... nevermind ... flame away or correct me if I am wrong).

Welcome to the board, Token! And right you are, everything is in the API to do a Palm based dialer if the one on the phone does not suit. In fact, there are some threads here somewhere discussing just such animals that I would assume will work just fine in the 7135 if in fact the dialer app that comes with it is "sub-optimal"

Note also the accompanying graphic, which shows Verizon or Sprint, with the Sprint asterisked as "to be announced within the next few weeks".
What do the testers on this forum think of the "wearability" statements in the article: that a shirtpocket is hopeless, that a pants pocket presents problems ("Is that a 7135 in your pocket, or...") and that the holster ain't bad? (But how nerdy is the holster?)
Also, nifty as the 7135 itself seems to be, isn't it going to be a captive of the cell phone companies' plans? With the Vision plans at present only allowing 2MB per month, and $20 for each overuse MB or $20 for 8MB additional AND a 1.5MB AvantGo/Vindigo download every morning, I'm still gonna be syncing with PC's/laptops. And I think I will be waiting on getting the 7135 until Sprint brings their prices down. Does anybody see any fallacy in this paragraph, or something I'm missing?

lol... how nerdy is having a phone in a shirt pocket? Will people start buying 2 pocket shirts so they can still use their pocket protector? :icon28xx

I think the Times guy didn't talk to enough people about putting it in a pants pocket. I don't think it will be that bad. Unless he was at a "hair band" concert and everyone was wearing spandex and leather.

And it's pretty common these days to see guys carrying their phones in either a holster or pouch (I think I'll get both). :drink1

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Very good article! Come on Kyocera release the phone already!

--terry

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--terry
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Enjoy the journey, it should be just as much fun as the destination.

Yeah, come on ya bastages! :boing

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> e-mail terminal

email client

> combination palmtop-cellphones known as communicators.

combination PDA-mobile phones known as smartphones

>crucial players are Microsoft, Kyocera, Handspring and a
> start-up company called Danger.

don't forget samsung, sony-ericsson, palm, nokia

> It's biggish, about the size of a stuffed bifold wallet

but a wallet fits in your pocket so?

> an expansion slot for extra memory

MMC/SD slot for a more than just memory.

> Nothing's perfect, though, especially not in the
> communicator category. For example, the 7135's main
> phone screen is, inexplicably, not touch-sensitive. If you
> try to use the stylus, an error message tells you to
> use the menu keys instead.

And what's difficult about using the menu keys?

> fits into a shirt pocket

an unwise benchmark. You're on the toilet, reading avantgo, finishing up, where to put the pda? pants are down, ok, shirt pocket. pull up pants, turn around to flush the toilet and PLINK, the pda goes down the toilet.

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David

Just a note, Pogue is a good reviewer and worth reading (he covers Mac and Palm issues very well, imho). I thought the 7135 review was fair (clearly he preferred the 7135 and the Sidekick to the Treo and PocketPC phone).
The only thing I wonder is if he's in the loop as to a 7135 release date.

Depends which side of the fence you sit. Having come from a PDA with wireless capability background, "Communicator" is quite acceptable.
From the "SmartPhone" direction, you could also include LG, Panasonic, and a plethora of Asian cellphone manufacturers that are producing phones for 3G networks (specifically Qualcomm's BREW standard). You might also include Motorola and other integrating Java into the cellphone.
After buying many of these devies, how many of us have stuffed bifold wallets (unless they are stuffed with credit card receipts )

Sounds like someone speaking from experience . If my previous cellphone (T68 - purchased in Italy last year, used on cingular network in SoCal) was a little bigger, my wife might have noticed tucked into the pocket of my shorts before she did the washing

I am looking forward to the 7135. With the holster, it will be more than functional (and my wife tells me I have deep pockets, so it should fit there too).

Pogue is normally right on the money from a PDA perspective, but SmartPhones and Communicators are new ground for all the "industry commentators". Indeed, at the BREW developers forum in San Diego back in June he raved about his Treo 270 (he had a prerelease version). I think he'll be carrying around the 7135 by the time the next BREW forum comes around

Token

Let me say i was planning on wearing the belt clip. BUT, in reality having a phone small enough to stick in your breast pocket when you wear a suit is VERY convienent. You always feel the vibration, its really quick to grab and see who is callling. For someone like me who wears a suit and has my i300 in my inside pocket or pants pocket, its much harder to get out quickly. The shirt pocket is, in and out. Only problem is if you bend over it falls out

Just a thought.

:guitarist

Nerdy?! Nerdy?! Did you think John Wayne looked nerdy with his holster? Did Clint Eastwood with his holster? Did Marty McFly with his holster?!



Okay, I give you the last one.

Well, if you're wearing a suit I think putting the 7135 in your shirt pocket will be fine. I think the shape is more of a problem than the weight... it's kinda thick, but with a jacket on it probably won't matter.

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