Toshiba G450
Discontinued 12th February 2008
Without doubt one of the strangest mobile
phones we have ever seen, the Toshiba G450 is a surprisingly
well specified and very lightweight 3G device that
just does things rather differently.
This Toshiba G450 weighs just 57 grams,
about half the weight of a conventional 3G phone. Measurements
are 98 x 36 x 16mm, so it's slightly shorter and
about two thirds of the width of a conventional monoblock
handset. Instead of a keyboard, the Toshiba G450 has
two circular multifunction pads.
The biggest compromise is the display
- the 0.8" 96 x 39 pixel panel is certainly never
going to be any use for web browsing, but it should
work just fine for basic handset operations and the
multimedia player. The Toshiba G450 includes stereo
wired headphones, but it does not support Bluetooth.
One of the primary design goals for
the Toshiba G450 was to act as a modem - it comes with
HSDPA support allowing download speeds of up to 3.6
Mbps, and it also supports UMTS, EDGE and GPRS data.
Voice calls can be made at the same time as data calls.
Because the G450 doesn't support Bluetooth, the handset
has to be connected to a laptop with a USB cable, but
as the USB cable also keeps the G450 charged then this
is probably a good thing.
When
connected to a PC, the Toshiba G450 appears as a standard
USB memory key. MP3s and other data can be transferred
to the handset. Internal memory is a maximum of 160
MB, but this is not expandable. Music playback automatically
pauses when a call is made.
As well as having an MP3 player, the
Toshiba G450 has an alarm clock. This may seem silly,
but as a mobile phone alarm clock is probably its most
used PIM function, then it's reassuring that it is there.
And it's worth mentioning because really, apart
from MP3s and the alarm clock, the Toshiba G450 doesn't
really do anything else. OK, you can make calls, send
texts and manage your contacts list too.. but really
you wouldn't want to try doing anything else on the
G450's tiny screen.
Toshiba say that the maximum talktime
on 3G is just 70 minutes, with up to 140 minutes talktime
on GSM. Standby time is 7-8 days. The short talktime
is due in part to the small 600 mAH battery. You can
tell by this that the natural environment for the G450
is to be plugged into a laptop with a USB cable.
This is a very odd device. But we give
credit to Toshiba for trying something different with
the G450's design. Think of it as an alternative to
a standalone USB cellular modem, and you might be close
to figuring out the G450's target market.
Toshiba say that the G450 should be
available from the first quarter of 2008 across Europe,
in Black, Red and Silver colour combinations.
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Toshiba
G450 at a glance
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Available:
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Q1
2008
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Network:
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GSM
900 / 1800 / 1900 + UMTS
2100
|
Data:
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GPRS
+ EDGE + UMTS (3G) + HSDPA
|
Screen:
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96
x 39
pixels
|
Camera:
|
No
|
Size:
|
Narrow
monoblock 98
x 36 x 16mm / 57 grams
|
Bluetooth:
|
No
|
Memory
card:
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No
|
Infra-red:
|
No
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Polyphonic:
|
No
|
Java:
|
No
|
GPS:
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No
|
Battery
life:
|
70-140
minutes talk / 7-8 days standby
|
|
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