HTC Shift(s) sights to UMPCs

Darius Chang | Oct 02, 2007

Well known for its range of PDA-phones, the Taiwanese maker may be seeking to make a dent in the UMPC market with the HTC Shift.

Announced together with a trio of new PDA-phone models, the Shift actually looks a lot like the older Dopod U1000 with a thicker keyboard. However, unlike the latter which runs on Windows Mobile, the Shift gets its kicks by hopping onto the Windows Vista platform. Why? Well, try watching someone trying to get work done in a hurry while running Vista on a 800MHz Intel processor and 1GB of RAM. Just make sure that fellow is not armed or he may try to shoot you, then himself out of sheer fustration.

What separates the Shift from the competition are:

It has a built-in HSDPA radio.

It has dual processors: The Intel 800MHz for applications and a 400MHz Qualcomm MSM 700 for the PDA features.

Despite rumors and videos that the Shift has dual OS (Windows Mobile and Vista), the official Web site states that it actually has the new SnapVUE feature that should behave like the Windows SideShow concept.

So how attractive is it? Considering it goes for over 1,000 euros in Europe, don't expect to get this baby for anything less than S$2,500 (US$1,673.02) when it hits our shores come Q4 2007.

Filed under: Notebooks
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