Today, on an all-expenses paid trip to South Korea visiting Samsung's HQ and facilities, I saw the coolest phone I have ever seen. I should say first that I consider myself a skeptical and jaded phone analyst. Got a fashion phone with a touch screen? Too expensive. Touch screen phone with mobile TV? That's nice, what else? A phone thinner than a matchbook? Still too wide for my tastes. I try to keep an eye on what real customers will like, and not just what technology journalists crave. But the SCH-B710 for SK Telecom blew me way.
Eye-popping graphics
The phone is 3D. The home screen and the main menu are both rendered using some sort of magical holography, and they have real depth when you look at them. The effect is astounding. The 1.3-megapixel camera around back? Also 3D. Two separate lenses create a 3D image on the holographic display.
But that's not all. The phone also has two TV tuners, one for DMB-T, which is basically three state-run free channels, and one for DMB-S, which is a paid satellite TV service. Want to watch both? No problem, the phone will display two streams side-by-side on the swiveling display.
Oh, and it has a joystick for navigation, it's thin and cute and painted glossy white, and a computer-guided self-examination quiz at the AnyCall studio in Seoul told me that this is my ideal phone. The computer was right.
AnyCall? Who's AnyCall?
AnyCall is Samsung's brand name for their phones in Korea, China and Russia. Because Samsung is so large and diverse in this region (in fact, the company accounts for a whopping 20% of the GDP of South Korea, according to company reps), the telecom division decided to come up with a special name for their phones. AnyCall also runs some studio stores, similar to the Samsung Experience store in the U.S., except that you can actually buy things there.
But back to the magic phone. You may wonder when this prototype will finally come to market? It already has, on a 3G EV-DO network . . . in Korea. The phone is available on SK Telecom, and though I'm not exactly sure of the price, it should be something just above $600, depending on exchange.
Why not here?
It isn't just the network. Well, okay, the phone will need some tweaking before it works on Sprint or The Network. It isn't just the TV tuner, though it would be a shame to buy a picture-in-picture TV phone that didn't get any picture. In my opinion, it's everything. This is a complicated phone, not meant for novices, and that's not the sort of phone that our U.S. carriers usually sell to non-smartphone users. Feature phones are supposed to be super-easy, maybe dumbed down, and should follow a paradigm set by the carrier, according to their walled garden approach.
So, you won't see the SCH-B710 in the states any time soon because it's too cool for us. We wouldn't understand it. Not all of us, anyway, and if you can't sell a phone to everyone, you might as well not sell a phone, right? Yeah, we don't agree either.
Let us unlock these phones, ye CDMA carriers. Let us import, and buy, and mess with to our hearts content. Personally, I won't do much, and I promise I won't hurt anyone (except indirectly, through jealousy). Please, I'm never this enthusiastic about a phone. Can I have one? Please?
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