At the CTIA show in New Orleans, Texas Instruments introduced a second generation Pocket PC Phone Edition design, code named WANDA (Wireless Any Network Digital Assistant).
WANDA is a "reference design," which is like the prototypes often made by chip manufacturers for other companies to copy so that it will be easier to bring to market products that use those chips. In this case, TI is hoping to get one or more companies to use its OMAP processor in new Pocket PC Phones. The OMAP processor is a member of the ARM family similar to Intel's StrongARM and XScale processors.
WANDA was designed in partnership with Accelent Systems, Inc. TI claims that the design reduces the number of electronic parts by 25% compared to current Phone Edition designs. But what makes the WANDA most interesting to potential customers is that it incorporates Wi-Fi, Bluetooth, and a GSM/GPRS phone into a single Pocket PC that is significantly smaller than the current Phone Edition devices.
Lack of local wireless capability is one of the few complaints about the current Phone Edition models. Wi-Fi and Bluetooth are not built into the devices, and since they don't include CompactFlash or SDIO-compatible card slots, users can't add that capability. A phone based on the WANDA design would be a great improvement. For example, you could connect a Bluetooth-enabled laptop PC to a WANDA Phone Edition device and, through WANDA's GPRS capability, to the Internet.
WANDA is a modular design, which means that a manufacturer that decides to build a WANDA device can choose to include any combination of the three wireless technologies. TI indicated to me that it would also be possible to provide a CDMA/1xRTT radio in place of the GSM/GPRS module.
The device has a small speaker mounted on the front of the device that is used as the phone's standard earpiece, and a slightly larger speaker on the back that's used for higher volume speakerphone output. This helps reduce the probability of blasting your eardrum if you accidentally switch to speakerphone mode while holding WANDA to your ear!
The WANDA design specifies 64 MB of RAM, a portion of which is reserved for system use, which is typical of current Pocket PCs. The device can include either 32 or 64 MB of flash ROM memory, which should provide ample space for user data. And of course, data stored in flash ROM isn't lost if the battery runs down.
Along with the wireless options, WANDA devices will have a USB interface for data synchronization, IrDA (115kbs) communications, and a MMC/SD slot. The slot is not SDIO compatible, but with all the wireless features built-in, this is probably not a major disadvantage. WANDA devices will also include a standard stereo headphone jack, a earphone/microphone jack, and a vibration alert for alarms, messages, or incoming calls.
Another surprise TI has for us is that the WANDA design includes a digital camera with a very reasonable 800x600 pixel (0.5 megapixel) resolution. While not high enough for printed photos, this is more than adequate for images intended for the Web.
The built-in, rechargeable battery is spec'd at 1900 mAh, and based on TI estimates, battery life will be impressive. TI claims that WANDA devices will have 450 hours GSM standby, 12 hours constant PDA usage, 8 hours GSM talk time, and 6 hours GPRS browsing. TI did not say how Wi-Fi or Bluetooth usage would affect battery life.
TI claims that by using the WANDA reference design a manufacturer can bring a Pocket PC Phone to market in as little as 100 days. It will be very interesting to see if any manufacturers jump on this product, which became available to OEM/ODMs
starting in April. I hope that a major manufacturer takes them up on the offer.
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