Motorola E895

Cancelled
27th June 2005

The Motorola E895 is a conventional looking phone, but a rather clever one. Underneath the somewhat unassuming exterior is a nifty Linux based Smartphone with a high resolution 240x320 pixel TFT display in 262,000 colours, a 1.3 megapixel digital camera, Bluetooth and expandable memory using TransFlash/microSD cards (up to a maximum of 512Mb).

It does pretty much everything you'd expect from a handset of this type - you can play back MP3s and other media (the E895 supports stereo Bluetooth headsets as well as plug-in ones), video capture, an email client and web browser, instant messaging support and of course the Linux operating system gives users the opportunity to add more applications. On top of this, the Motorola E895 has a built-in speakerphone, tri-band GSM, GPRS and EDGE support and gives around 4 hours talktime and up to 10 days standby time.

As an alternative to a Window or Symbian based Smartphone, then the Motorola E895 looks pretty capable. In fact, the closest rival we can think of is Motorola's MPx220, a Windows-based clamshell with broadly similar capabilities.

There's a problem though - and it's not really anything wrong with the E895 device in itself, it's a problem with the manufacturer. This isn't Motorola's first attempt at a Linux-based smartphone - it's their sixth. And what happened to the other five? Well, the E680 sank without trace to be replaced with the extremely rare E680i, the A780 and A760 made no impact on the market either, and the A768 only ships to China. So, for all Motorola's efforts, their existing Linux handsets have slipped in and out of the market without causing a ripple.

It's not just with Linux phones that Motorola has a problem - out of their Windows-based lineup they cancelled the MPx and MPx100 devices, and high-end 3G handsets such as the E1120 didn't even have prototypes available for their launch. Motorola's current track record of actually getting handsets to market at all, never mind on time is very poor. And when they do, their smartphones have proved to be a flop. Even the much-hyped MPx220 was very poorly received when it actually shipped.

So, with the Motorola E895 we have a promising looking phone, where the biggest problem seems to be that it's made by Motorola. Given their track record on this type of device, we suspect that the E895 will also sink without trace.. whenever it eventually ships.

Motorola claim that the E895 will start shipping to Asia Pacific regions during Q4 2005. At the moment no release date has been confirmed for Europe or the US.

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