This article is more than 1 year old

Samsung shows 'world's first' hard drive phone

1.5GB handset for the price of two 8GB iPods

Samsung has shown what it claims is the world's first mobile phone that incorporates a hard drive.

The SPH-V5400, unveiled today in Japan, includes 1.5GB of hard disk storage. That's barely more than you can get from a SD or CompactFlash card, but it's a start, presaging the day when handsets are as much iPods as phones.

The Apple product is not only more capacious than the Samsung handset, but cheaper too. When the SPH-V5400 goes on sale in South Korea later this month, it will retail for around $800, IDG reports.

The idea of adding a hard drive to a handset isn't new, but so far disk sizes and reliability issues have weighed against their incorporation into mobiles. The arrival of 1in drives makes equipping a handset with hard disk storage a possibility, but production isn't easy or cheap - one of the chief reasons why Apple's iPod Mini is proving too hard to get hold of.

The Samsung handset also features an FM radio, 64-voice polyphonic ringtone support, a 240 x 320 display and TV output - again, preparing the way for the day when mobiles incorporate Microsoft Portable Media Center-style functionality.

Ditto the phone's radio, which like the Neuros II 'digital audio computer' and the Griffin iTrip can broadcast audio content to nearby FM receivers. ®

Related stories

Review: Neuros II 'digital audio computer' Cornice countersues Seagate
Western Digital sues Cornice
Seagate unveils 'tiny to terabyte' hard drives
Hitachi to boost 1in HDD output
Toshiba takes micro HDDs to 60GB
Rio pitches Carbon player at iPod Mini

More about

More about

More about

TIP US OFF

Send us news


Other stories you might like