Smartphone unit sales are soaring, with sales almost tripling between 2004 and 2005, and increasing a further 50% in the first half of 2006 compared to the previous year.
Figures revealed by the high-tech market research firm In-Stat reveal that the Windows Mobile operating system has now managed to grab an equal slice of the US market share with smartphone big boys, BlackBerry and Palm.
Bill Hughes, an analyst at the research firm says that much of 2005’s soaring smartphone shipment growth was down to a run on Linux-based handset shipments in Asia at the end of the year.
However, he’s a bit sniffy about calling these phones – mainly from Motorola, NEC, and Panasonic – proper smartphones because they don’t possess the same high end functionality seen in Windows Mobile, Blackberry, and Palm OS devices.
Although the Linux-based handsets are capable of running Java-powered applications added by users, Hughes reckons they should really be called ‘feature phones’ rather than smartphones.
Despite the spectacular sales, Hughes advised caution, pointing out that many smartphone users continue to lug around the very devices that smartphones are supposed to replace.
“Also, users have been slow to add new applications to their devices. Most users have only downloaded a few applications,” he added.
Other research by In-Stat found that business users given work phones were three times more likely to carry a second phone for their personal calls than other users.
Google Maps for Mobile now officially supports GPS location information when used with mobile phones … well at least one of them at the moment, the Helio Drift.
Palm has introduced a new range of quad-band Palm Treo 680 smartphones, running the tried and trusted Palm OS.
The Treo comes with a large and bright 320×320 screen and the well regarded full QWERTY keyboard, with a raft of multimedia functions including an integrated digital camera, Bluetooth 1.2 , MP3 player, video recorder and player.
Along with the usual bundled applications for e-mail, Web browsing, messaging, multimedia, calendar and contacts, there’s a special version of Google Map for the Treo.
Palm has also announced that it will be partnering with several media companies, including Yahoo, Google and blogging firm Six Apart, to make their products available on the new device – these will join the enormous back catalogue of commercial and free software that’s already available for the OS.
Although PDAs may be a dying breed, they clearly ain’t dead yet, with the lesser known Spanish electrics company releasing no less than two spanking new GPS-enabled PDAs.
A SD/MMC card slot takes care of expansion options, with connectivity coming in the form of a MiniUSB socket , Bluetooth 2.0 and Wi-Fi 802.11 b/g (T620 only)
ViaMichelin is the part of the Michelin group that designs, develops and markets digital travel assistance products. They already have a successful Website that uses information from the Michelin Guide allowing visitors to plan their travel and routes utilising the Guide info.
Why get a X-980T?
There’s also a speed camera database for the UK (which isn’t actually available yet, but will be in late October) and other countries. Again it’s included in the price (as are updates).
Overall Verdict
Although we’re not alone in thinking that the Palm Treo is the best smartphone around, the device suffers from one tragic omission; Wi-Fi.
This design has obvious advantages and disadvantages; the advantage is that the sled offers its own power supply, giving users a considerably enhanced battery life compared to handheld-powered Wi-Fi cards; the disadvantage is that the thing adds bulk to the phone.
The unit must be charged for two hours before use, with a small amber LED blinking while charging. This turns to solid green when the Treo is connected to a Wi-Fi network.
The first few times we tried this, it took so much effort to pull the phone in and out of the sled we began to fear we’d end up breaking the thing.
Most GPS enabled watches we’ve seen so far have been so ridiculously chunky that you’d need the muscles of Mick McManus to stop your arm dragging to the floor under the weight.
Despite its GPS abilities, the watch can’t display maps or offer latitude or longitude information on its tiny 49×72 full dot LCD screen, so there’s no chance of the bleeping t’ing guiding us home after a heavy session in the pub.
For a self confessed, gimme-gimme-shiny-new gadgets nutcase like me to be using a phone several years old speaks volumes of the strengths of the Treo 650.
If I’d have taken my Windows Mobile phone I dare say I would have been very well acquainted with stylus (and the reset button) by this time, but the Treo’s fabulous one-handed operation and rock solid performance made it a practical laptop replacement.
Palm has remained tight-lipped about their European product roadmap, with the web rife with rumours of both Windows and Palm new models going under ggroovy codenames like Hollywood, Lowrider, Nitro and Lennon.
Following on from 
Keyboards. Soft vs hard (ooo-er)
Volume controls are where they should be – on the side of the phone – and muting the phone entirely is simply a case of sliding a switch in the top of the phone, a feature that is inexcusably absent in almost every other phone.
If you want to switch to the speakerphone during a call, just press the ruddy great onscreen ‘speakerphone’ icon. No holding down keys, no shuffling about in sub-menus or fiddling about with switches like a Windows phone.
Looking someone up in the address book is just as simple – just type in their initials and you’ll go straight to their entry.
Palm has said that its next Treo smartphone will be targeted at European markets, although it appears that it won’t be a GSM/UTMS version of the 700p.
Ofcom has just issued guidance that GPS repeaters are probably illegal in the UK, both in their use and their sale.
GPS devices need to be able to receive the positional information from satellites. Initially this involved having line-of-sight to the ‘birds’, but as chip-sets have improved, they’ve become more sensitive, so requiring less direct sight. If GPS units work within buildings, they do so at the sacrifice of accuracy. Even with the chip improvements, GPS will not work within buildings, and certainly not underground.