Music Cell Phones
By Nicolas Fogelholm, Sat Dec 10th
You sometimes see cell phone manufacturers talk about musicphones. What is it then? A music phone is a phone optimized forplaying music. The idea with music phones, smartphones andcamera phones is that one would have only one device instead ofmany. A music phone combines a cell phone and a portable musicplayer. Every major cell phone manufacturer has them.
Sony Ericsson introduced the Walkman phones, Motorola launchedthe ROKR iTunes and Nokia delivers music phones under theXpressMusic phone brand.
More than 100 million music phones were sold in 2005 and that ismore than double the number of portable MP3 players and some 12percent of cell phones sold in 2005 were music phones.
Music Phone Characteristics
Here is some typical characteristics of a music phone. Whencomparing music phones look at these key features.
- Large memory (hard disk)
- Support for poular audio formats (MP3, AAC...)
- Good sound quality
- Support for the standard headphones 3.5mm jack
- Dedicated music keys
- Good music software (for PC and Phone)
- Easy to upload music to phone (via bluetooth or USB)
- Easy access to OTA (over-the-air) downloads
- Extended battery time
- FM radio
Music Phones 2005
Here is a couple of examples of music phones released in 2005.
Nokia 3250
This phone has dedicated music keys and can store up to 1 GB(Gigabyte) of music and offers 10 hours of music play. You cantransfer music with the Nokia Audio Manager. The music playersupports standard audio file formats such as MP3, WMA, M4A andAAC. It has a FM radio. Retail price of 350 EUR before subsidiesor taxes.
Sony Ericsson W900i
Sony Ericsson W900i is a 3G phone and you can download,transfer, manage and play music from over-the-air (OTA) musicdownload services. Transferring audio files from a PC to thephone is done with the
