The surprise of the day was stumbling upon the UBiQUiO (Seriously, that's how they want you to do the capitalized and non-capitalized letters) devices. They're full Pocket-PC smartphone (touchscreen and all) available in unlocked GSM versions from Mobile Planet and originally made by a unnamed Taiwanese manufacturer. But if all those sketchy details don't bother you, the price for the upcoming Ubiquio 503 might: $650 for the unlocked version, available in June.
The 503 has some great specs, though: WM6, a 520mhz Intel processor, 256 megs of ROM, 64mb of RAM, quad-band HSDPA/GSM radio, WiFi, and two cameras. Dang. They just had a dummy model of the 503 at the booth, but they did have a live 501 there for me to play with. More details on that one (currently available) after the jump, along with some other random CTIA newsbits.
Ubiquio 501
| The Ubiquio 501 is a quad-band GSM PocketPC Windows Mobile 5 device. The thumbboard on it is actually pretty nice, it reminds me of the thumbboard on the MotoQ9 (which is perhaps not a coincidence - "keepin' it real fake" as Engadget would say). It sports a very nice 320x240 touchscreen and otherwise pretty standard specs for a GSM/EDGE PocketPC device: Triband GSM, Bluetooth 1.2, WiFi, and a 2 megapixel camera. | Overall I was pretty impressed with the form factor. Ubiquio decided to make it thin (.53 inches) and wide - which results in a somewhat slab-like device that is nevertheless very pocketable. |
In any case, if none of the currently available offerings the the US float your boat, one of these guys might be a worthy import.
JB5 Browser
Jataayu had a small booth at CTIA where they showed me a little of the JB5 browser - the one I wasn't able to get working on my Dash. They were using it on a MotoQ9 and overall it was pretty neat. I was especially font of their zooming feature. I'll be giving it another go and a full review soon.
More Moto Q9
Jataayu weren't the only folks using a Q9, I saw a lot of booth-drones using them. It's like Moto is giving them out like candy. I want some candy, too. Heck - Motorola even embedded them in the floor of their booth (right). I'm thinking Motorola is pinning a lot of their hopes on the Q9 being a success - they really need a success right now.
Yahoo Go!
I did my part for the Windows Mobile community and gave Yahoo guff for not having their excellent Yahoo Go software available on enough WM devices. Right now it only works on tall-screen Smartphones. Seriously, I want to use this, especially now that they're going to be offering unlimited storage for their email. At least their oneSEARCH service works on everything.
