Introduction / Preview Xplores new m98 model is a PalmOS smartphone thats the size of a regular clamshell style handset. The Xplore m98 is an excellent attempt at miniaturising a full PalmOS device into a tiny clamshell design apart from the 1.3in 260,000-colour screen, the triband GSM phone has WAP 2.0, GPRS Class 10 and support for MP3 ringtones. The Xplore m98 also has an integrated 1.3-megapixel digital camera. However, there is no Bluetooth or EDGE (Enhanced Data Rates for GSM Evolution) support. On the PDA (personal digital assistant) side of things, the phone comes with PalmOS version 5.4, running on a 168MHz ARM processor with 64MB Flash memory and 32MB SDRAM. The phones memory is also expandable underneath the battery theres a card slot that supports TransFlash media. Interestingly, the phone has two different graphical user interfaces one that works much like a phone with simplified icons, and the other is the full PalmOS interface. The logic is that the regular phone interface is meant to keep things simple and allow you to quickly access phone functions without having to scroll through an intimidating number of icons. However, if you want to access the full PDA functions, all you have to do is press a button and the familiar PalmOS graphical user interface will appear. On the PalmOS side, the phone comes with all the usual applications, including a version of the QuickOffice suite, which allows you to view and edit Word and Excel documents, as well as access e-mail and view attachments. Of course, some concessions had to be made to keep the size of the phone down. While the touchscreen display has a good resolution of 176 x 220pixels, the small size of the screen might make text entry a little challenging. However, the phone makes up for it by allowing you enter text anywhere on the screen instead of just in a small, delineated area. This is in addition to the regular keypad input method. The phone supports both English and Chinese language character input and even comes with a 70,000-word English-Chinese/Chinese-English dictionary. Buy it Now at Superufo.com! |