Leaked info on Dell Mini 5, may be renamed ‘Streak’

On March 13, 2010, in Dell Mini 5, by rohit
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Some leaks are being flooded on internet about the Mini 5 phone of Dell. The internal document of the company says the phone will also be carrying some feature integrations with a host of services from Amazon.
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The leak mentions that the phone may be available in several “premium finishes.” It also says that the Android-powered tablet will be available in few attractive colors and designs.

Apart from the personalization options of Dell’s Mini 5, the leaked document didn’t mentioned anything else about the upcoming tablet. It reflected information on the features of the phone like the front-facing video camera, capacitive touch-screen and dock connector. Well, the leak did inform more interesting tidbits than the earlier leak.

From the leak it is also learned that Dell may be having content partnership with Amazon. May be Amazon’s Kindle, Video services, MP3 and Kindle reader app will be integrated in the phone.

It seems as if the partnership of Dell with Amazon for Mini 5 is to compete with the upcoming iPad. The tablet of Apple has the iBooks and iTunes Stores. Hence, the Amazon integrated services will help Mini 5 to give some similar features as of the tablet.

The leaked document of Dell also refers to this Snapdragon-powered device as the ‘Streak’. This is the same name that first surfaced late in 2009. However, it is still known whether this is only an internal codename or an official change.

The documents even don’t tell anything about the launching date of the device.

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Boom in smartphones. Is their room for new players such as Dell?

On March 11, 2010, in Uncategorized, by rohit
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Smartphones are growing at a rapid speed in the mobile handset market. There are few evidences to back this statement.

The report of IDC says that the converged mobile device market has seen a growth of about 30 percent in 2009. The report also mentions that this growth momentum will continue even this year.
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Paul Jacobs, the CEO of Qualcomm, believes that the market for smartphones will split into high-end segment and low-end segment. He says that this is a trend that is speedly eroding the feature phones market.
The Yankee Group’s survey of 2009 had found about 43 percent of consumers of US plans to take smartphones their next mobile device.

Well, one question arises. Is is that all these reports is a gesture to smartphone market for new vendors?

If you look at the recent news of Palm and Garmin, it indicates that the market of smartphones is in fact not profit panacea that one would expect. According to Palm, the manufacturers is now expecting a full-year revenue going below what it had estimated earlier of $1.6 billion to $1.8 billion. The reports of Garmin is also similar. The company is till date “disappointed” with its nuvifone products sale. These can also give a jerk to new players in the market such as Dell, LG, Acer and other.

Ramon Llamas, analyst of IDC’s smartphone, said: “Instead of, ‘If you build it, they will come,’ it’s turned into, ‘If you build it, will they come?”

Lamas further mentioned that the two, Garmin and Palm, faced unique challenges. So far the marketing effort of Palm targeted the “Valentine’s Day” potential customers and not the traditional smartphone early adopters. He explained that Garmin suffered promotional scarcity and its ecosystem too much relied on interest in mapping and directions.

John Jackson, the CCS Insight analyst, said: “We knew that Palm would launch the Pre into the teeth of new flagship products (or revs of products in Apple’s case) from Apple, RIM, HTC and others.”

Jackson added further, “The same is true for Garmin, compounded by the issue of Google (and now Nokia) basically undermining the navigation proposition with freeware. Without a portfolio, a limited number of stock-keeping units (one in Garmin’s case and basically two in Palm’s case) are that much more likely to get lost in the mix. Apple is the exception, but that success story is well known at this point.”

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Sony may soon release gadgets to rival Apple

On March 6, 2010, in Uncategorized, by rohit
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Sony is busy developing a technology that will have neck-to-neck competition with the iPhone and iPad. Recently the Wall Street Journal wrote an article on it saying that this new technology that is being developed at Sony will include a smartphone which will be capable of downloading and playing video games.
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Apple is trying to dominate the mobile handset market and on the other hand Sony is growing its strength in the market day by day. The smartphones that are due to be released in the market has also some type of threat to these companies as it will take consumers away from the laptops and netbooks.

In the latest try of Sony, the Japanese electronics giant, a very portable device will have the best elements of the netbooks, the e-book readers and also the gaming consoles. It may be called “PlayStation Portable”, a rumour name.

The concept of portable playstation have swirled for years. Sony made use of the Sony Ericsson handset division for developing mobile phones that are capable of downloading video games and playing the PlayStation games on their handsets.

Rumours are also there that Sony may release the device in the open market by this year. Still the specifications and price of the device is unknown or may be it has not yet been finalised by the company.

Sony is also going one step further in the industry. It is preparing itself for its own version of Apple’s iTunes store. This platform, still in the tentative form, is named as Sony Online Service. Here, the mobile users can download movies, music and television programmes. Consumers can also download older games that has been earlier released for the original PlayStation console.

The Wall Street Journal also quotes analyst Noobuo Kurahashi: “That’s the vision, but it’s still not quite clear what specific steps Sony will take to achieve that, especially when iPad and other highly capable mobile devices are crowding the market.”

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Number of connections per person will increase in 3G tablets says Dell head

On March 4, 2010, in Uncategorized, by rohit
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AT&T is preferring the tablets using 3G as it can sell more than one connections to a single customer says Neeraj Choubey, head of Dell’s Mini program.
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Randall Stephenson, CEO of AT&T commented something interesting at the investor conference in regard to the Apple’s products. According to him, the iPhone of Apple is an important part in their lineup. He says that the iPad of Apple will mainly be a “WiFi driven product”. The carrier is currently offering 3G service contract in the United States for the 3G-enabled WiFi.

In the investor conference replying to a question about the Apple iPad, Randall Stephenson said that he did not think too many new 3G subscriptions can be achieved with it because end consumers would prefer using it with WiFi. Moreover, it will be a month-by-month subscription for iPad from the AT&T, which is rare from the carrier as it usually prefer looking customers with two-year service agreements offering them subsidized and locked phones.

With the earlier idea of selling two-three connections to same customer, Neeraj Choubey said that Dell was in negotiation with AT&T to get bundled 3G on the new and first table from Dell, the Mini 5, and also on all other tablet phones being made in the Dell house.

There has been exclusivity contract by AT&T in the United States for the iPhones. However, Randall Stephenon did not disclosed as of now the length of this exclusivity deal with the Apple’s. Though he did not answer directly but he said that according to him the iPhone as “an important part” of the carrier’s phone offerings “for quite some period of time”.

Stephension, when asked about bandwidth demands, replied that in the iPhone-heavy areas such as New York City and San Francisco the network is improving to accommodate high smartphone data usage.

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AT&T may offer data-only service on Mini 5

On March 2, 2010, in Dell Mini 5, by rohit
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Is it that the Mini 5 of Dell will be only a data replacement for your smartphone?

General Manager of Dell’s tablets division Neeraj Choubey confirmed recently to Laptop Mag that the company is in negotiation with carrier AT&T to make the Mini 5 device reach to the end consumers.
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Choubey said to the magazine that one can hold this Android-based handset on their head or even attach Bluetooth headsets to make or receive calls. He adds further that the device will have a front-facing camera in it so that it eases the video calls.

Till now AT&T has not officially announced a partnership with Dell so it is tough to evaluate whether the carrier will require a voice plan also with the data service. Usually it is seen that AT&T has gone for both with all its smartphones.

Right now it seems that AT&T will go with a data-only tablet plan because many people may find this 5-inch Mini 5 tablet computer too bulky for a phone. Moreover, let us also refer the case of Apple’s iPod which is going to be offered only data service.

Speaking truth, the Dell’s Mini 5 is actually having an awkward size. It will never accommodate the pants pocket and this is creating some sort of skepticism.

Analyst Van Baker gives the right comment while talking to the media. He said the Mini Five will be sitting uncomfortably between large-screen tablets like iPad and smartphones.

This does not mean that Mini 5 will not be having its own market. It has some really positive features and one of the main features is one can make VoIP calls from this device. Choubey adds that the device may appeal to “this quintessential soccer mom” by consolidating the functions of a navigation device, a Flip camera and a cell phone into one product.

More to this, Dell will be benefiting from the Android Market and also with its smooth operation. Whatever it is, if Dell could shrink the device little more, many more users would be very interested.

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Last quarter income down, but Dell well tuned for Mini 5

On February 28, 2010, in Dell Mini 5, by rohit
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Dell faces a drop of six per cent in its income even though there is a good level of demand by consumers for netbooks and laptops which have brought up shipments.
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Dell announced this drop recently and contrary to it there has been signs of more spending in the critical business sectors.

In the recent quarter the earnings of Dell fell to $334 million, which is 17 cents per share.

However, the revenue of the company was increased by 11 percent to $14.9 billion and the gross profit margin was 17.4 percent.

In the holiday season it was noted that consumers bought low cost netbooks and laptops. This has made the shipments to be higher by 29 percent. It is said that these low cost notebooks and laptops gives less profit to the company.

The recent dismal results of Dell are sharply in contrast to Apple. It has been seen recently that Apple has taken the high road if we talk of personal computers and other products.

Though Dell has a hold on much higher market than the Apple overall, but the company has been fighting in lower margin end of those business that it has pioneered.

Well, the forthcoming tablet products of Dell may do some magic in the graph of income. The Mini 5, which is the first of the tablet series, is going to be launched very soon and it will be competing Apple’s new iPad neck-to-neck.

Mini 5 is also a mobile apart from being a table computer where as the new iPad of Apple is a web-enabled tablet device. Mini Five has only 5″ screen, much smaller than the iPad. Mini 5 will be using Google’s Android operating system.

One more pinch of information to share here. Recently the competitor HP had also announced a strong PC and business server sales, which is a trend that has been also reported by Intel just last month.

Let us know what you think whether Dell’s income will have a magical rise with the launch of Mini 5.

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Mini 5 vs. iPad of Apple

On February 28, 2010, in Dell Mini 5, by rohit
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Let us have some comparison between the Dell Mini 5 and the Apple iPad, both are much talked about these days. First let me convey what I found in Mini Five.
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The Dell Mini 5

Mini Five loads Google apps and it is easily scaled in 3.5” screen to a 5” screen. Dell Mini 5 is easily put into belt pouch, though of big size. The life of battery in this Tablet Computer seems same to what we have seen in a screen phone, but it is better than an iPhone for browsing, gaming, watching videos, and also the typing part.

The screen of Mini 5, at 5″ the screen, looks about 90% larger and this in fact makes a lot of things better. For the purpose of multi-tasking the device has two cameras. One of it is of 5 mega pixel accompanied with twin LED lights and also digital zoom. The other camera is made for video conferencing.

The Apple iPad

Few things which comes to my mind first while writing about Apple iPad is that it lacks of multi-tasking and have heard of flash complaints many a times. Moreover, the iPad does not have any camera. The main problem that can be evaluated here is that the iPad even does not replace anything, and in fact not even a Kindle.

The battery life of kindle lasts for almost two weeks, but this is not the case of iPad. The battery of it discharges the same day, better to say, it can carry-on only in single digit hours.

The Wi-Fi version of it better works at home or and the WAN version needs another data service. So, you will still be carrying your smartphone for making calls and your laptop for the work purpose. If you are carrying you laptop then there is no need of carrying iPad for browsing.

Wrapping Up

According to me Apple should have come up with a 5” iPhone and not a 10” iPod, initially at least. Mini 5 seems to be attracting folks more who wanted something bigger than 3.5” Smartphone.

The type of screen version that iPad has is going to struggle as a reader. In it the browser is crippled vs. a Netbook or Notebook (no flash). It is too big for your portable media player.

Put your thoughts too here whether you would prefer 5″ or go for 10″ iPod.

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Mini 5 price still undisclosed, but may oscillate around iPad

On February 28, 2010, in Dell Mini 5, by rohit
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When someone speaks of tablet computer, the first thing that comes to our mind is Apple’s iPad. Well, this does not mean other companies are not busy bringing up their own version of portable computing goodness.
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The first effort of Dell in the world of tablet computers named (beta) Mini 5 is a 5-inch capacitive touchscreen of a slice of glass and plastic, which Michael Dell says it will hit the market in a couple of months. Not only this, this device is just a first in a series. According to Neeraj Choubey, general manager of tablets in Dell’s Communications Solutions Group, the company is going to have a family of such tablets. He also says that this 5-inch screen is just an example and they are going to bring to market variety of screen sizes. If this is going to happen then the other versions of Mini 5 may have larger screens in future. It may also be closer to the iPad. Let’s wait for the varieties.

Dell ventured into the mobile market some three years ago. Today the smartphones of Dell are available in Brazil and China market. The company had also given hopes to bring in North America a version of it.

Not to mention again that the device will have quick access to websites such as YouTube, MP3 music store of Amazon and also the e-mails. Presentation maker, spreadsheet and documents are also there.

Analyst Baker says, “If the Dell Mini 5 is this small and it is pocketable, then why isn’t it a phone?.. If I am going to carry a second device, it better have something that’s a significant advantage over what I can do with my phone. With the iPad, the value proposition is a much larger display.”

He adds further, “That type of model — the way iPad was able to do with AT& T — will become more prevalent with these tablet devices… It allows the carrier to increase number of devices per user.”

The price of Mini 5 is still undisclosed. Well, it may be oscillating around apple’s iPad price, may be. The iPad is introduced at a $15 for 250 MB. For $30 a month one is offered unlimited usage with no-contract data plan for use with the iPad.

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