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CTIA: Samsung revamps TouchWiz interface and Instinct line
Published: 1 April, 2009
Tags >> Samsung
As its rivals cut back on the number of new phones they launch, Samsung is keeping up the pace with a pile of new models for CTIA, including its WiMAX tablet, Mondi, and a reworking of the popular Instinct. Perhaps more importantly at a show that will be heavily software oriented this year, it has also updated its TouchWiz user interface for smartphones.
TouchWiz is going further down the route of supporting widgets and preloaded applications, optimized for the device and for mobile usage. This type of interface is very much the heart of smartphone design trends in 2008-9, and while these overlays may threaten to fragment the mobile web, they do patch over many of the cracks that remain in the smartphone operating systems, and the whole mobile internet user experience.
The new generation of the UI will support internet as well as native apps. Samsung has been working with Yahoo, Google, Accuweather and others to bring mobile connected applications to TouchWiz, and these companies' programs will now be accessible with one touch from the homescreen of supporting handsets, which will include the new Mondi.
The Korean giant will also release a software developers' kit next month, to allow professional developers to submit their own apps to the new store that is being created for TouchWiz, the Samsung Rich Connected Application storefront. Samsung is also promising a web-based tool for casual users and hobbyists to create widgets, and facilities for carriers to add their own specific services to the TouchWiz widget tray. This could eventually bring the Instinct into the TouchWiz fold - the flagship handset is a co-development with Sprint, so currently has its own UI, though Samsung is promising that the new version will be more open to developers, who can access the core Java API.
Currently, TouchWiz runs on top of Windows Mobile 6.x, on phones like the Omnia, but it is expected that Samsung will steal a march on many stores by enabling the UI and apps to span multiple operating systems, including forthcoming Android models.
On the hardware side, the Instinct has been given an upgrade and is now called the Instinct S30. Contrary to rumors, it is not a miniature version of the original but is the same size, but with 32Gb of expandable memory and EV-DO Rev 0 support. It has a 3.2-inch touchscreen with virtual keyboard, 2-megapixel camera, HTML browser, music player, 600-contract phonebook, and GPS with Sprint Navigation. It comes preloaded with calendar, sync and instant messaging apps and will cost $129.99 with two-year 'Simply Everything' contract ($99 a month) from Sprint, from April 19.
Samsung also announced several phones for AT&T, but not the much anticipated Android devices. So the most innovative device on show at its high profile party on Tuesday was the Mondi, which as reported in Rethink Wireless fills the gap left by the Nokia N810 WiMAX Internet Tablet. The Mondi runs Windows Mobile and the TouchWiz interface and comes with a large 4.3-inch display and slide-out Qwerty keyboard. It supports WiMAX, Wi-Fi, GPS, Microsoft Outlook and Mobile Office, 4Gb of internal memory, 3-megapixel camera, video player and instant messaging, and is targeted at the crossover space between netbooks and phones. It will be available from Clearwire.
