E-Ten's G500 GPS PocketPC phone drops by the FCC

No word as to a date or even the possibility of a US release for E-Ten's G500, but at least the FCC thinks everything is looking good with the unit, so we've got that going for us. Announced in Europe this January, the quad-band GSM phone features Windows Mobile 5.0 Pocket PC, GPS, Bluetooth, and a QVGA display. Its lack of WiFi makes us think the unit would be a good fit for those WiFi haters over at Cingular, but your guess is as good as ours.

[(Unverified) Posted Apr 12th 2006 8:33PM]

I have a E-Ten M600 w/ a US Cingular Sim in it and I love this phone. Coming from a SX66 to this beaut is like night and day. And E-Ten is quick to jump on any complaints with a quick fix rom update.

I was going to wait for the (mini sd) G500 but I have multiple (almost 4 gigs worth) standard sd cards and mini sd tops out at 2 gig I think. Plus the mini is double the price.

[(Unverified) Posted Apr 12th 2006 11:46PM]

Cingular Wifi hater? HTC Cingular 8125 has Wifi built in...

[(Unverified) Posted Apr 13th 2006 2:22AM]

the Cingular 2125 doesn't have WiFi but T-Mobile's SDA does

and btw the 8125 does have WiFi but its crippled to 802.11b when it has the potential of 802.11g (there's always registry tweaks though :])

[(Unverified) Posted Apr 13th 2006 3:36PM]

There's a lot of ways to expand any device with WiFi.
Maybe this is a -- cough, puke -- ATT/Cingular product. If so, it's junk, just like their service, coverage and bandwidth. Maybe that should be "brandwidth" ... did I just invent a tech-age word? Surely someone has already thought of brandwidth.
In any case, I think this is the future of "consolidation" to make cell-phones become really thin and small and let PDA's become cellular and network "connected" ... now I know for a fact that Palm made a mint out of the concept of the connected device ... surely Palm (or Apple?) is readying itself for a cellular PDA?
And when will these penny-pinchers get over the idea of low-res displays? Are they trying to create a product road-map by holding back already available technology? Hello, it's for you, it's the 80's ... they want their flat-headed product management people back.

[(Unverified) Posted Apr 13th 2006 4:58PM]

We reviewed this device at pocketnow (http://pocketnow.com/index.php?a=portal_detail&t=reviews&id=803) last week, so I thought it already was available in the U.S. I guess that explains why the reviewer couldn't find one to buy easily.

[(Unverified) Posted Apr 13th 2006 5:02PM]

Adam (#6) said: "surely Palm [...] is readying itself for a cellular PDA?"

Say what? Haven't you heard about the Treo?

Steve