Gizmodo: flipphone

Apple iPhone 2.0 Patent Shows Dual-Touchscreen Flipphone

Jason Chen — Mon, 17 Mar 2008 12:45:50 EDT

It's rare that Apple's patents actually show the exact form factors of devices they have in development, but this "dual sided trackpad" patent for a phone seems to definitely show that they've got some flipphone version coming up. The patent itself outlines a phone that has two multitouch sensors, both on the "bottom" part of the phone. When it's closed, the phone acts like your current model iPhone. When it's open, only the bottom part of the phone is touch-sensitive, whereas the top part is just a display.

The top/bottom touchscreen difference has the interesting effect of bringing some new features such as actually drawing out a number on the touchpad, rotating and old school dial (?), simulating a T9 dialpad, or even having both sides of the touchscreen active at once for some crazy control.

What's the point of this? Besides new features, apparently many people HATE the candybar form factor and won't even consider a phone a real phone unless it's a clamshell. Like Jack Bauer, for instance. [Unwired View]

Lightning Round: T-Mobile's Samsung Beat Music Phone

Jason Chen — Mon, 01 Oct 2007 13:11:22 EDT

The Gadget: T-Mobile's Samsung Beat, a music flip-phone with 2GB microSD support, 1.3-megapixel camera, Stereo Bluetooth streaming, Quad-Band GSM, myFaves, IM support, and a round green speaker on the front for impromptu dance-athons.

The Price: $99 with two-year contract.

The Verdict: For $99, this is a pretty decent music phone. The green circular speaker on the front is plenty loud for music on your own—we don't recommend it on the bus or anything just out of general principle—and the external music control buttons next to it are plenty convenient. The internal music UI isn't atrocious, which is a step up for music phones not from Sony Ericsson or Apple.

It's relatively small, which is good, and has good incoming and outgoing sound quality (someone said it made my voice sound deeper. Unconfirmed!). The keypad also has a nice graphite-esque texture, which adds to the overall appeal of this low- to mid-range phone. Overall, we'd give it a thumbs-up for regular folks who aren't interested in smartphone functions.

T-Mobile

GE's Universal Flip Phone Remote Dials Up Star Trek Reruns

Jason Chen — Thu, 19 Jul 2007 18:20:14 EDT

We're not sure why you'd want a universal remote that actually has to flip open to use, but we're not going to tell you people how to live your lives. In the chance that you do, GE's $18.99 Flip Unviersal Remote has the standard power, channel and volume buttons on top, with the numbers, video modes and DVD playback buttons inside. Cool, yes, but not all that practical. Your kids will have fun using it as a Star Trek communicator though. [Jasco via Sci Fi via Coolest Gadgets]

LG Shine's Cousins Flip, Get Dipped in Gold

Jason Chen — Mon, 12 Mar 2007 18:45:11 EDT

LG's popular Korean phone, the Shine, has not only been updated already, there's now two new versions planned for an eventual release. The first, a gold-dipped hedonistic version, should ship for Korea's CDMA networks first before (possibly) heading everywhere else with a GSM version.

The second, a flip-phone version of the Shine, looks to be in production sometime soon as well. Too bad for us, there's still no word on when any of these Shine editions—Au or not—will make its way to the states.

Update: The flip version seems to be headed to Verizon in July. Thanks MacVicta!

– Jason Chen

Sogi [via Electronista via Crunchgear]

LG VX8600 Chocolate Flip Phone Headed For Verizon

Jason Chen — Wed, 01 Nov 2006 16:00:56 EST

Now that Halloween's over and the multi-colored Chocolate phones are on sale, we can focus towards Chocolate: The Next Generation. We first saw pictures of the XV8600 flip-chocolate back in August, but we've got specs now. Real, big boy specs!

The XV8600 will have a 1.3-megapixel camera, a microSD/TransFlash slot, EV-DO for data, Bluetooth A2DP, a talk time of 3.66 hours and a 176x220 pixel screen. The phone will be launched on November 15 and start with a price of $229 with one-year contract and $179 with two-year contract. – Jason Chen

Another piece of Chocolate for Verizon - LG VX8600 [Phone Arena]