Vodafone took a few minutes out of their busy schedule yesterday to announce two new handsets. The "903T" and "803T" are both by Toshiba. The 903T, the successor to the popular 902T, supports the provider's "Vodafone Live! Navi" service we'll tell you about later today. The 803T offers a myriad of music player functions. More details about each inside.

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-903T

The "Vodafone 903T" is a Toshiba handset that features a GPS function, and is compatible with the company's new "Vodafone live! NAVI" navigation service that can even be used overseas. It will be released in early October.

The 903T is a W-CDMA and GSM (900/1800/1900Mhz) 3G handset made by Toshiba. It supports "Vodafone live! NAVI" and comes preloaded with the "Zenrin Itsumo Navi" navigation application. This application not only allows for confirmation of your current position and your surroundings, but offers routes to destinations, VICS information, and can also provide location information when overseas.

The phone's main display is a 2.4" TFT LCD that has a resolution of 240 x 320 dots, and can display a maximum of 260,000 colors; the subdisplay is a 1.1" TFCC LCD with a 112 x 112 dot resolution and capacity to display 65,536 colors. The LCD itself can turn 180 degrees similar to that of the 902T, in a feature called "View Style."

The cameras in the phone are a 1.92MP MOS camera with autofocus on the reverse, and a 0.31MP CMOS image sensor immediately below the main display. These support recording of QVGA sized video at 15 frames per second, and video output to TVs is also support. An internal 10MB of memory for saving pictures is provided, as is an SD card slot; a 64MB SD card is included in the package.

Other functions include support for Mega Appli, Bluetooth, and infrared communications. Most other functions remain largely the same as the 902T, but the user interface has seen a few changes intended for Japanese users. Furthermore, Chaku Uta Full are supported this time around.

The continuous talk time when using W-CDMA is about 180 minutes, and the idle time 400 hours. The phone has a size of 50 x 111 x 25mm, and it weighs roughly 149g. Blaze Orange, Deep Sea Blue, and Haze White color variations will be offered.

The 903T is a Japan-only phone, and will not be sold overseas. Vodafone has said that they are still looking into handsets that contain a GPS function, and stated that a plan of theirs is to increase the proportion of phones that support GPS.

Inspired by:
http://k-tai.impress.co.jp/cda/article/news_toppage/25556.html

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-803T

The "Vodafone 803T" is a Toshiba handset that contains a music player and supports W-CDMA and GSM (900/1800/1900Mhz). It will be released in mid-October.

The 803T is a Toshiba handset that offers a music playback function that can play audio data transferred from PCs and Chaku Uta Full tracks. It has a feature called "Music Console" that enables the audio player function to be used even when the handset is closed. Since the subdisplay will dislay song name, artist name, track length, and other information, the handset can also be used a portable audio player.

Playable audio formats include AAC, AAC+, and the unit's own format. To load audio data onto the phone from a PC, users take audio data that they have already recorded (from software such as iTunes or other audio CD ripping software) and transfer it to the phone using the included "Beat Engine" software using a USB cable. Data that passes through Beat Engine will be converted to the 903T's own format, dubbed "TBD" (Translator's note: Guess they don't know "TBD" means "to be determined"), and saved on the miniSD card.

This data format, which varies from Secure MP3, is laced with the user's phone number, and can thus not be played on other handsets. In the package users will find a stereo earphone mic that has a remote for use with the audio player and a 64MB miniSD card. miniSD cards as large as 512MB are supported. Stereo twin speakers can also be used for audio playback.

A step towards implementation of this audio player was the inclusion of a 1,000mAh battery on the handset. When not using the phone's phone features at all, the player supports audio playback for about 7 hours.

For a camera, the unit has a 2.2MP CCD camera that can record images as large as 1728 x 1298. The main display is a 2.2" TFT LCD that with a resolution of 240 x 320 dots that can display 260,000 colors, and the subdisplay is a 1.3" STN LCD 4-level monochrome that has a res of 160 x 96 dots. Other features include Chaku Uta Full, Mega Appli, Bluetooth, and infrared support. A dictionary function is also provided; the included miniSD card features a Japanese/English->Japanese dictionary with about 40,000 words, and a Japanese->English dictionary with about 36,000 words.

The continuous talk time on W-CDMA is 180 minutes, and the continuous idle time about 400 hours. The unit measures 47 x 100 x 26mm, and has a weight of about 134g. Three body colors will be available: Piano White, Sax Blue, and Swing Red. This handset is also planned to be released overseas.

Inspired by:
http://k-tai.impress.co.jp/cda/article/news_toppage/25559.html

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Press Release:
http://www.vodafone.jp/japanese/release/2005/050907.pdf