You have no shortage of handsets at your disposal for au. No less than 7 have been announced today. 6 of the phones are in the "W41" series, and o­ne of the phone's is au's 5th in the "au design project." The new phones are:

• neon
• W41SA
• W41K
• W41T
• W41S
• W41CA
• W41H

Coverage of each inside.

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-neon

The "neon" is a CDMA 1X WIN clamshell handset, and the fifth unit from the "au design project." It is a collaboration model with Mr. Naoto Fukazawa, who assisted in the design of the "INFOBAR" and "W11K." Release is scheduled for late February.

On the outside, the phone has a roundness about its edges yet still has a squarish silhouette, giving it a refreshed design. Its shape has been described by Mr. Fukazawa as "being chipped away until there was nothing left," but since it is a clamshell phone, there are depressions in the number key areas between the display side of the phone and key side of the phone such that it can easily be opened.

The phone has a "face" o­n the back side of the display for the phone's digital audio player, FM radio, and clock functions. An 8 character x 2 row, 16 segment red LED arrangement will display information. When the phone is closed, it will not o­nly display the time, but a message or animation. o­n the phone's site, "CLUB neon," original wallpapers will be available for download.

The display is a 2.4" QVGA (320 x 240 dot) TFT LCD capable of displaying as many as 260,000 colors. It has a 1.3MP camera. The data folder has a capacity of 50MB. miniSD is used as a removable memory. Included in the package is a recharging standard, and a desktop holder so that the neon can be used as a desktop clock or audio player.

"Flat Key" means that the gaps between the keys have been eliminated. The key parts were constructed such that the panels are supported o­n the reverse with a round fulcrum, so you can actually mess around with the keys and push the sides of the panels, causing the keys to slant a bit. (Translator's note: This is similar to the construction of keys o­n a notebook PC's keyboard.) Because of this, when compared to the buttons used o­n a regular handset, it is very easy to tell when the buttons have been pushed.

The product code is "W42T," but the maker has been thorough about soliciting it to users as the "neon." As shown in the product code, the maker is Toshiba. It supports BREW 3.1 (KCP) and thus Flash 1.1, and the software is similar to that of the W41T. This handset however uses a Flash menu, which the design meantioned that the preset idle images have a motif that "are like ordinary scenery you've seen somewhere."

The handset measures 50 x 89 x 23mm, and weighs 125g. It has an idle time of 260 hours, and continuous talk time of 180 minutes. "shiro," "mizuiro," and "kuro" body colors will be available. Though the handset is focused o­n design, it supports most new functionality such as LISMO, Chaku Uta Full, EZ Navi Walker (Input with Voice), EZ Books, Safety Navi, Hello Messenger, infrared communications, and e-mail background reception. It also has a miniSD card slot.

Inspired by:
http://k-tai.impress.co.jp/cda/article/news_toppage/27396.html