The 9500 just got some serious competition: the MDA IV

Google translation of the page (as Vignette servers apparently use invalid URLs 😞 )

Impressive indeed!
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Bonn, 2 February 2005 * world novelty: T-mobile quits new, multi-functional communication terminal on * to "MDA IV" integrated as the first Windows mobile-based portable radio equipment w-lan, Gprs and UMTS technology * further highlights: E-Mail Push service, Bluetooth, editing keyboard, two cameras, Videotelefonie and Windows mobile platform * VGA screen with high resolution for optimal representation of InterNet sides and graphic data the mobile office of the future fits into a palm: On approximately 100 square centimeters the new "MDA IV" offers all conditions for comfortable working now with Microsoft Windows software of t-mobile on the way. As world-wide the first portable radio equipment the "mini laptop" integrates the portable radio technologies GPRS, UMTS and w-lan and practically always and everywhere fast, wide-band data links - approximately makes the t-mobile possible customer thereby for the E-Mail dispatch, the Download of large files or for InterNet searches and access on the company-owned Intranet. T-mobile customers know the MDA IV world-wide in laws, since it supports the nets GSM 900.1800 and 1900 megahertz as tri volume equipment. The editing keyboard supports the input of SMS, MMS or enamel and VGA screen provides for an optimal representation from texts, pictures and InterNet sides. With this format the ' InterNet in your pocket ' achieves a new quality. Further equipment highlights are two integrated cameras, loudspeakers and the Windows mobile operating system. In the hand turning the opened unfold VGA screen can be turned around the own axle, then within seconds a PDA with Touchscreen becomes from the mini laptop. The MDA IV is presumably available starting from summer. "the MDA IV is a milestone, if it concerns, explains to ' Office into your pocket ' reality become to let" Martin Knauer, managing director marketing of t-mobile Germany. "on smallest area the equipment unites innovative portable radio technology, functionality and efficient software. Inserted use our Multimedia nets, the mini laptop is nearly as efficient as the PC on the job. Thus we come to meet the needs of our customers, who wish themselves on the way just as reliable media as in the office." Enamels received and immediately answer, important documents fast dispatch, information from the firm net download or on the way at a presentation work - the MDA IV is not inferior to a PC in punkto efficiency. Thus the proven advantages of the Windows mobile platform can use t-mobile customer, for example Word, Excel, Outlook and the InterNet Explorer. But among other things the 520 megahertz Intel processor, the integrated portable radio technologies GPRS, UMTS ensure and w-lan as well as the operating system of Windows mobile. The a choice into available in each case the fastest t-mobile net at the location takes place automatically. "the MDA IV is as mini laptop a consistent advancement and a high performance addition of our past MDA family. With 40 per cent market share is the marketing of the MDA family of t-mobile a success history, which gains a further highlight with the MDA IV ", so Martin Knauer further. Like the other MDA models the MDA IV offers comprehensive Office equipment. For the automatic receipt of enamels the equipment supports the E-Mail Push service. Word and Excel files, which received the users for example as E-Mail of appendices, can be represented and worked on on the new large VGA display optimized; also PowerPoint and pdf files are indicated. Pocket Outlook makes the administration possible of dates, contacts and tasks. For the synchronisation of the data with a PC the equipment possesses beside the USB also an Bluetooth interface. With the two inserted cameras photos and video sequences can Videotelefonie be taken up and played in addition, are natural with the MDA IV. The optimized VGA screen makes the Videostreaming particularly comfortable. Integrated video and Musicplayer provide for high picture and clay/tone quality when playing Videostreams and music files. Due to its compact measures the MDA IV fits comfortably into nearly each vest pocket - and as tri volume mini laptop it is suitable also as a travel companion for the foreign country.

More pics here:
http://www.pocketland.de/shownews.php?news_id=664

That doesn't look like it will fit in a pocket, in fact they call it a mini-laptop on the site. Put's me in mind of a Psion Netbook with a phone bolted on and a smaller screen size, and the prices on those are astronomical.

It could be just as "pocketable" as a 9500, which isn't exactly small either. We'll have to wait for some more detailed specs...

Oh, and I do hope they fit it with a VERY large battery, because a VGA screen and (especially) WIFI and UMTS eat a lot of battery

T-mobile's own translation:
http://www.t-mobile.net/CDA/t-mobile_deutschland_newsdetails,1705,0,newsid-3665-yearid-3577-monthid-3669,en.html?w=742&h=565

Edit: more pics 😃

Delta737 wrote:T-mobile's
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It's larger than 9500 and even than a PDA and you don't have the outside phone...

But I guess you're right to say that it's the first real competition to 9500's market.

It is... I think, Nokia have to hurry up with 9600 if they don't want to lose market share. It would be interesting to know some more specs about battery life, dimensions and price. Windows Mobile 2005 will be launched in S. I am for Symbian but I admit, the MDA IV is really tempting...

My my math given it's the same length of the 9500 its 1.6 cm wider. In which case the screen would be a fair sight smaller for those dimensions and therefore a tad more squinty. Main thing that would be a put off would be battery life, we all know the 9500 goes for days even with quite heavy use would be hopeful for similar battery life. I can also see people taking bets as to how quickly that screen would snap off with that pivot.

Price wise, one would expect it to weigh in at more than a 9500 sim free, if it will be sold as such, but being an Operator's "own" device it'll probably recieve huge subsidies. As with a lot of these devices the downfall is being limited to a single network provider and I'm afraid everyone I've known who has used One2One/Tmobile never went back.

SwitchBlade wrote:My my math given it's the same length of the 9500 its 1.6 cm wider. In which case the screen would be a fair sight smaller for those dimensions and therefore a tad more squinty. Main thing that would be a put off would be battery life, we all know the 9500 goes for days even with quite heavy use would be hopeful for similar battery life. I can also see people taking bets as to how quickly that screen would snap off with that pivot.

Price wise, one would expect it to weigh in at more than a 9500 sim free, if it will be sold as such, but being an Operator's "own" device it'll probably recieve huge subsidies. As with a lot of these devices the downfall is being limited to a single network provider and I'm afraid everyone I've known who has used One2One/Tmobile never went back.

I think everything is quite correct what you wrote. The MDA IV is, however, not a one provider device, although T-Mobile gets HTC's devices well before other providers, but it also comes under HTC's own brand Qtek, as I-Mate, Vodafone's VPA (the VPA III has just appeared in Germany, T-Mobile has had the MDA III since September...), Orange's SPV, O2's XDA, Siemens SX... and so on; furthermore, as they run Windows Mobile OS, the device belongs to a far larger community not only in hardware, but also in firmware/software than Nokia 9500/9300 does, I'm afraid (I wish the opposite were true, though...) Maybe the new version of Symbian OS (9.x) will offer even more advantages in order to win the war with WM.

Looks nice...but as long as it is a windows mobile OS I wouldn't buy it.... 😉

BB333 wrote:Maybe the new version of Symbian OS (9.x) will offer even more advantages in order to win the war with WM.

Ehrm, Symbian already won that battle a long time ago and has something like 90% of that market. One of the reasons the Win Mobile software library is so much greater, is that the OS has been around a lot longer than Symbian (not counting EPOC). And I fear it might be easier to code for that platform.

The huge amount of third party software is the only thing attractive with the Win platform IMO, but it will be a snowy day in hell before I buy another thing with the ugly Windows logo on ever again.

Raven wrote:Ehrm, Symbian already won that battle a long time ago and has something like 90% of that market. One of the reasons the Win Mobile software library is so much greater, is that the OS has been around a lot longer than Symbian (not counting EPOC). And I fear it might be easier to code for that platform.

The huge amount of third party software is the only thing attractive with the Win platform IMO, but it will be a snowy day in hell before I buy another thing with the ugly Windows logo on ever again.

Why?

Huib

Bad experiences like instability, loss of data etc. It's also a preference thing, I suppose. I dislike all the basic things like the Microsoft corporation itself, the way their OS looks and works and so on.

Looks to me like a Blue Angel type device with a different keyboard arrangement. Looks like an interesting device. I'm assuming the 3g support is something thats coming in Magneto and I do wonder the impact it will have on battery life and power requirements.

I think ultimately they are different devices though. The MDA remains a pda first... and at the end of the day the most recently announced device is often the best (and we know how long these things take to come out), I think we'll see something similar at 3GSM where we get our first look at the next generation of smartphones.

Raven wrote:Bad experiences like instability, loss of data etc. It's also a preference thing, I suppose. I dislike all the basic things like the Microsoft corporation itself, the way their OS looks and works and so on.

I'm a little bit disappointed with relatively frequent crashing of my Nokia 9300 in my two week long torture tests. My Windows XP happens to be very stable during these recent months... until further notice

msiivola wrote:I'm a little bit disappointed with relatively frequent crashing of my Nokia 9300 in my two week long torture tests.

Really? Care to elaborate on that? My 9300 has been nothing but rock stable during three weeks of heavy usage.

My Windows XP happens to be very stable during these recent months... until further notice

My overpriced, piece of absolute garbage Dell laptop running XP has been nothing but a pain in the neck, with daily crashes and hangups, and I even had to replace the hard-drive a few weeks ago and reinstall everything from scratch.

msiivola wrote:I'm a little bit disappointed with relatively frequent crashing of my Nokia 9300 in my two week long torture tests. My Windows XP happens to be very stable during these recent months... until further notice

I am also quite concerned that breakdowns which happen on my 9210 will continue on 9500; reading through threads of this forum has made me to consider further whether to buy it or waiting for the MDA IV. I must tell you, the UI and functions of WM (2003 SE, not to mention the coming of WM 2005 which will bring support for 3G and much more) are more user friendly and sophisticated than the UI of 9500; the MDAs just work smoothly (and it has been said of the MDA IV that it will use a safe memory preventing data loss).

However, I have so far remained faithful to Nokia and committed to open source Symbian, because I don't like the image and the policy of MS, either. But I must stress, Nokia and the Communicator series have caused - at least for me - much more headache than MS Windows (XP) ever has, unfortunately. I'm sure that we'll only be able to compare the two devices once the specs for the MDA IV have appeared; in the meantime Nokia will have the opportunity (and also the obligation, as well as a reasonable interest) to improve the firmware and to come up with some news about the future devices of the Communicator series, maybe at the CeBit in March.

BB333 wrote:I must tell you, the UI and functions of WM (2003 SE, not to mention the coming of WM 2005 which will bring support for 3G and much more) are more user friendly and sophisticated than the UI of 9500; the MDAs just work smoothly (and it has been said of the MDA IV that it will use a safe memory preventing data loss).

The S80 v.2.0 UI may not be the prettiest one around, but it sure is much more intuitive than any Win Mobile version, IMO. Same goes for the S90 UI (7710) which adds a few features and is more graphically pleasing to the eye. Both of which are based on previous EPOC (Psion) versions. I guess it is a personal preference thing though.

I don't know about WM 2005, but the other versions aren't very optimised for keyboard use/navigation, unlike the communicator line.

Odd I've not suffered any problems with stability on my 9500 in the past, well nearly 2 months now I guess. Before that I never saw stability problems with the 9210 either. I've not tried a Windoze mobile platform, but did try a Compaq Ipaq against my 9210 some years back and the 9210 was far more intuitive and wiped the floor with usability, functionality and battery life. That said the main reason it was a better device was repeatedly because of the keyboard. When you consider that this device is little larger than the 9500 (dunno about depth but if we assume the same), and the processer is yay times faster, more RAM etc etc etc then I wouldn't expect anywhere near the battery life. And in a device to be used as a mobile phone thats an important consideration. Palm and Symbian are both far better than windoze devices on battery life.

if you think that is the competition i think you are wrong

This is the competion!!!!!!

really really loving it

hope they give it a good processor

That's not a competitor to the Communicator, more like a "Treo killer".

Indeed. Besides, some sources say it doesn't have wifi. And I hate the 240x240 screen. Compared to the latest PPCs and Communicators it is a very low resolution. Besides, no 3rd party app would decently work (because this is the first PPC to use the square screen).

Also I'm confused why they put both an SD card slot AND a Mini-SD card slot in it :con?

well it has all the features of the 9500 and one more which is a built in gps system so yes i do see it as a competeir

and lets not start the "symbian is better than the windows"fight again and compare them hardware wise

yes both of them are better in every way to the 9500

In every way??

9500 compared to new iPAQ:
9500 has a higer screen resolution
9500 has a full QWERTY keyboard (no thumbpad)
9500 has Wifi (some reports say the ipaq doesn't, some says it does)

Offcourse, the Ipaq has some advantages, but definately not "better in every way"

ok so far 2 things better for the 9500

lets not forget about the biult in gps and hopefully fast proccesossr

dont get me wrong im not selling my 9500 for those two windows but there still very good competion

Ismail wrote:ok so far 2 things better for the 9500

Ehm, that's the two most important things, and the very reason why people buy Communicators. 😉

Ismail comparing them on hardware is stupid, as the Ipaq will win on proc power, memory etc, but when you add an OS you see that windows *needs* that much power to run, Symbian doesn't.

all im saying is they are good competeros

IMO, the 9500 is the overall winner from both the PDAs that r posted here. its got the functionality and the reliability of symbian. and best of all, its Nokia! no i dont have one of them but i've used it and loved every bit of it (the 9500)