I can’t wait until more and more of these things come out and all of a sudden you go to a baseball game and see everyone sitting in their seats half-sideways with one leg all the way outstretched so they don’t damage the huge phone in their pockets. Ha!
Anyway, that dream is coming to Japan in June thanks to Sharp and mobile carrier Willcom. The Intel Atom-based cell phone/pocket computer is called the D4 and is “the first of its kind.” It’s got a 1.33GHz processor, a 40GB hard drive, 1GB of memory, and it runs Windows Vista (slowly). Other features include a QWERTY keyboard, 5-inch 1024×600 slide-up display, Wi-Fi, Bluetooth, MicroSD slot, two-megapixel camera, USB port, and TV tuner.
The device itself will cost 128,600 Yen (about $1275) and will require a two-year service contract at 1,600 Yen per month, according to the Register. That’s about $16 per month for service. Can that be right? Is mobile service in Japan that inexpensive?
Here are some more photos from Akihabara…
Great find! I used to own a Sharp Wizard OZ-770 - truly great PDA with unbelievable battery life (100 hours). This unit isn’t much larger. The only issue I have with this is… why Vista?
XP would be a much better choice for this lower-powered chip (MS has already made allowance to continue to support XP on other small devices, such as the Asus EeePC). Certainly a modified Linux distro (or any of the lightweight versions out there) would do well on this thing.
What does it really matter, I guess. Another cool tech item available only in Japan…