I want to SHIFT

HTC spit out new mobile devices faster that you can say B-L-O-G. It was only a week ago that I was raving about the upcoming Avantage. Well, at CTIA Wireless 2007 the Taiwanese company will showcase yet another hot little number, this time dubbed the HTC SHIFT. This sexy supermodel features 7-inch touchscreen, 30GB hard drive, Tri-Band UMTS/HSDPA, Quad-Band GSM/GPRS/EDGE, Bluetooth 2.0, Wi-Fi, and runs Windows Vista. Ka-Boom! Is it a mobile phone? Is it an UMPC? I don't know. But I know one thing. The laptop as we know it is heading for dinosaur status. The brand new X60 I am typing this very text on already seems like a heavy stone age machine. Leading gadget blogs reports that the SHIFT will be out in Q3 2007, so we can expect quite a showdown between Paul Allen's FlipStart, the OQO2 and HTC's Avantage and SHIFT small wonders. Note that all of the above are Windows powered. I wonder what is going on at the Apple and Google labs? The iPhone specs originally offered are no longer attractive for anyone expecting a PC in their hand. It is going to be a very exciting year for handhelds. HTC looks more and more like a serious contender for the throne. And what about a SONY Vaio Walkman CyberShot PlayStation UMPC with an Ericsson mobile phone inside? And what about the Korean powerhouses Samsung and LG? (Also watch out for SK Telekom's Helio Ocean project). Not to mention Motorola - no more RAZR's, please! - and market leader Nokia, whose Communicator model was a relatively successful first mover.

Oh, are you reading this on a BlackBerry?

Take a ride on the web:

http://www.htc.com
http://www.flipstart.com
http://www.oqo.com
http://www.apple.com/iphone
http://www.helio.com/#devices_ocean
http://www.nokiausa.com/phones/E61i
http://www.nokiausa.com/phones/9290
http://www.ctia.org
http://umpc.com
http://www.discoverblackberry.com

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