Check out these new Curves

We may get a wide variety of mobile phones fast in Asia, but when it comes to BlackBerry handhelds, users in our region always have to wait a while for the US and Europe to get their "CrackBerry" fix first. Anyway, Research In Motion (RIM) today announced the availability of the BlackBerry Curve 8310 and 8320 devices in Singapore.

The Curve series of push-email handhelds, starting with the 8300 model, are meant to be more consumer-friendly but still feature a full QWERTY keypad unlike the other mass-market model, the BlackBerry Pearl. Features like a built-in camera and a 3.5mm audio jack for plugging in wired headsets set the Curve series apart from the regular BlackBerry devices meant for business users.

The 8310 comes with built-in GPS while the 8320 offers built-in Wi-Fi. And no, you can't have both options together as that's not available on any Curve device. Because of the consumer slant, these new BlackBerrys are less stoic looking and come in colors like silver and gold rather than just basic black.

Both devices will be available from the three operators in Singapore within the next two months though StarHub customers will only be getting the 8320 and not the 8310. We are still awaiting information about pricing and its wider Asian availability from RIM.

HTC Juno is officially the T-Mobile Shadow

We've talked about the HTC Juno before when it was spotted in China, and then again in some poorly taken shots together with a BlackBerry Pearl. Well, it's now official from T-Mobile, and will be called the Shadow.

The US operator plays down the technical features of the Shadow and instead focuses on this new handheld's user interface. Even though it runs Windows Mobile 6 Professional, the Shadow's default screen looks nothing like it. Instead of the regular (and boring) Today screen, this PDA-phone has the myFaves home screen from T-Mobile which uses graphical icons to give access to common features. To further reinforce its not-for-boring-businessmen image, T-Mobile even gave it the tagline "The official phone of fun".

For those interested in the specs, the Shadow is a quadband phone with Wi-Fi and Bluetooth. It has a slide-out keypad with a QWERTY layout similar to the BlackBerry Pearl and HTC Touch Dual--two letters to one key. A QVGA display is found on the front, while a 2-megapixel camera is positioned on its back. HTC has not launched this device separately from T-Mobile in the US, so we won't be seeing it in Asia at the moment. But given that the HTC Touch Dual has almost all of its features and more, that may not be a bad thing.

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Nokia gets into the Asian music scene

Homegrown music talents in the Asia-Pacific region now have a new platform to showcase their latest song creations. The Independent Artists Club (IAC) Web site launched recently by Nokia aims to promote local artists in the region by allowing them to upload their songs on the Web for music fans around the world to enjoy.

The IAC program will launched in Singapore and Thailand first, before being rolled out over the next six months to selected Asia-Pacific countries including Malaysia, the Philippines, Indonesia, Bangladesh, Vietnam, Australia and New Zealand.

With each IAC country launch, selected local artists will initially be invited to upload their tracks. After which the Web site will be open to all artists for song uploading. The Singapore IAC site is expected to open up for the public to upload their songs in Mid-December.
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What the iPhone keypad should have been

Touchscreen handheld devices without keyboards, whether numeric or QWERTY, always seem to be perceived as less convenient than those with. In Windows Mobile devices, you either use a stylus to peck at a tiny onscreen keyboard or some form of handwriting recognition to enter text. Some manufacturers add in special versions using T9 (a predictive text input method found in most mobile phones) to make their handhelds easier to use. Let's face it, none of these input methods come close to the usefulness of a real keyboard, until now. I've just found out about TouchPal, an alternative soft keyboard from Cootek that blows everything else out of the water.
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Official E-Ten M800 specs--a few downers

The QWERTY-enabled E-Ten M800 slider now has an official image and specifications. Everything said about it previously was true. This includes a VGA display, HSDPA connectivity, a SiRFstar III GPS chip and a 500MHz Samsung processor.

What wasn't confirmed then was the amount of RAM. We do know now that it's 64MB, just like the X800. Given its otherwise performance-focused features, it would have been great if there was more RAM for running applications. Another interesting point we can see from the image is that it has touch-sensitive buttons under the display. Though this may be aesthetically pleasant, we've always been suspicious of the usefulness of such buttons. Without tactile feedback, pressing them is sometimes like stroking a cat--you can touch it all you want, but it doesn't give you any love back.

Those are not death sentences, of course, and we'll wait to see how well it works after we handle one in the flesh. Go to the M800's product page to see its full list of specifications.

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