Motorola E398 and E680

Two very different phones from the Motorola stable, but this time both belonging to the "E" series of "Entertainment" phones. The E398 is similar to many other high-end phones on the market with some interesting enhancements. The E680 however, is a much more interesting and complex beast.

Motorola E680

Discontinued
9th March 2004

The Motorola E680 is an innovative handset that borrows in some ways from Motorola's advanced range of 3G units, such as the A925, but this brings highly advanced features to GSM networks with several important innovations.

Firstly, the E680 runs an embedded version of the Linux operating system, providing a meaningful rival to Windows and Symbian based smartphones - although it's interesting to note that Motorola are also major developers on these other platforms too.

There's a large 240x320 pixel colour touch-sensitive display, borrowing from the A-series, a built-in VGA camera with 8X digital zoom, all wrapped up in a very stylish and compact handset that will appeal to the iPod generation.

The E680 is a powerful handset indeed - perhaps it's better to look at it as a small handheld computer that can also make phone calls. The embedded Linux operating system is an extremely powerful platform, offering MP3 and RealPlayer support, MPEG-4 video capture and playback, downloadable 3D Java games using the advanced graphics accelerator plus highly sophisticated audio features. And the E680 seems to be able to do all of this without compromising its design, making it a much more powerful and practical games platform than the Nokia N-Gage.

There's a standard shared memory of just 32Mb though, which is only enough for recording a few MP3 tracks. It can be upgraded to a massive 1Gb using SD cards though, giving the E680 a huge storage capacity. Local connectivity is via Bluetooth or USB cable. And if you actually want to use it as a phone, then it's a GPRS capable tri-band device that can use the touchscreen as an active dialling pad. It's quite possible that Motorola are going to have a truly massive hit on their hands with the E680 - and it certainly shows that Motorola can innovate as well as chase after the pack.

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Motorola E398

Discontinued
9th March 2004

The E398 is certainly an entertaining phone, even though it's maybe not the most innovate thing you'll ever see.

The E398 is a straight replacement for the E390 which never actually seemed to make it into the retail channel. It features a built-in VGA resolution camera with a flash, 176x220 65,000 colour display, Bluetooth, and Java support.

The key feature of the E398 is audio support though, and it features an advanced speaker system for optimum MP3 playback, through dual 16mm 22Khz speakers plus a built-in vibrating function that works along with your games. It supports MPEG-4 video playback too,

Apart from the audio capabilities and the distinctive ridged design, there's something familiar about the E398.. it's very similar in overall terms to the Sony Ericsson T630 which spawned a small army of lookalikes. The E398 is certainly a more interesting phone in technical terms than the T630.. and indeed, it's a lot more interesting that most of the Nokia range, but despite all of Motorola's attempts, they haven't managed to make the E398 as sexy as the T630 in design terms. Still, it's not a bad handset at all and makes a useful addition to the Motorola range.

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