Sharp V602SH & Sharp V402SH
Discontinued 11th
May 2004
Vodafone Japan (Vodafone K.K.) recently
announced a new range of handsets for Summer 2004, featuring
models from the likes of Sharp, Toshiba, Mitsubishi and
Sanyo. Frustatingly, all of these handsets are far more
advanced than anything announced for the rest of the
world and are exclusive to Japan only (although some
may find their way out of Japan through specialist exporters).
Of these, possibly the two most interesting handsets
are made by Sharp.
Sharp V602SH
On
the inside, the Sharp V602SH looks a little like the
popular Sharp GX20 and Sharp GX30 models, with a slightly
bland silver design. However, one of the first things
you notice is that the large QVGA (320x240) pixel display
swivels 180 degrees. OK, we've seen this sort of thing
before, notably in the LG 7100 but this is Sharp's excellect
65,000 display as used on the GX30. The display works
in this way partly to help with taking digital photos,
but probably also because it's quite a cool thing to
do.
However, the clever bit with the Sharp
V602SH is not the display, but the camera. It features
a 2 megapixel autofocus camera and crucially it is the
first mobile phone to come with a camera with a 2X optical
zoom, which actually gives a better resolution than
the standard digital zoom, which merely makes the pictures
larger and more grainy. This is certainly a first as
far as we know, and is a significant step towards a
high-quality all-on-one mobile/PDA/camera device.
This is a 2.5G device offering Vodafone
PDC plus dual-band GSM support in a handset measuring
99x55x25 mm and weighing 132 grams - about the standard
for a 3G handset. Memory can be expanded using SD memory
card. and the V602SH comes with music playback, video
support, 3G graphics acceleration for games, karaoke
support, a dog bark translator and weather indicator.
No, this isn't our April
1st story.
Certainly, not all the features in this
phone will appeal to the western market, but you can
expect to see the 2 megapixel optical zoom camera in
worldwide handsets sometime in 2005 at our best guess.
Sharp V402SH
A
close relative of the Sharp V602SH, the V402SH isn't
quite so technically accomplished except for one crucial
feature, but is a much prettier handset. By western
standards, it's still pretty advanced, being a 3G phone
with a 1.3 megapixel camera bundled with the excellent
320x240 65,000 colour display common to most new Sharp
handsets.
Again,
the display rotates by 180 degrees, and again theh V402SH
takes SD cards for memory expansion. There's no dog
bark translator, but it does indicate the weather which
we assume saves you looking outside. Or possibly you're
staying in a capsule hotel. All very nice..
..but the main trick with the V402SH
is the in-built analogue TV tuner - meaning that you
can watch TV on the high-resolution display. Unfortunately
this tuner is designed for Japanese NTSC standards,
so support elsewhere in the world is limited, but we
can't imaging that building PAL support for Europe in
a future handset would be too difficult. There's a built-in
FM tuner for radio reception too.
At 98x50x27 mm and 129 grams, both these
Sharp handsets are about the same size and weight as
the NEC E616
- but these aren't strictly 3G phones, instead running
on Vodafone K.K.'s enhanced 2.5G PDC network.
The V402SH and V602SH represent peculiarly
Japanese products in many respects, and although some
are bound to end up in Europe, these handsets are not
really to European tastes. However, technologies like
the TV tuner and optical zoom camera certainly are and
should be available worldwide sometime next year.
Sharp
V402SH Provisional Specifications
|
Available:
|
Q3
2004
|
Network:
|
PDC/GSM
|
Data:
|
PDC/GPRS
(up to 384kbps)
|
Screen:
|
320x240
pixels, 262K colours
|
Camera:
|
1.3
megapixel
|
Size:
|
Large
clamshell 98x50x27
mm / 129 grams
|
Bluetooth:
|
Not
specified
|
Infra-red:
|
Not
specified
|
Polyphonic:
|
Yes
|
Java:
|
Not
specified
|
Battery
life:
|
2 hours talk / 16 days standby
|
|
Sharp
V602SH Provisional Specifications
|
Available:
|
Q3
2004
|
Network:
|
PDC/GSM
|
Data:
|
PDC/GPRS
(up to 384kbps)
|
Screen:
|
320x240
pixels, 262K colours
|
Camera:
|
2.0
megapixel with 2X optical
zoom
|
Size:
|
Large
clamshell 99x55x25
mm / 132 grams
|
Bluetooth:
|
Not
specified
|
Infra-red:
|
Not
specified
|
Polyphonic:
|
No
|
Java:
|
No
|
Battery
life:
|
2 hours talk / 16 days standby
|
|
|