OpenMoko FreeRunner gets reviewed early

by Chris Ziegler posted Jun 11th 2008 at 1:10PM

The FreeRunner is FreeRunning a little late on its way into devs' hands, but that's not stopping OpenMoko from shipping out a few units early to VIPs, apparently. Monochrome Mentality was the lucky recipient recently of one of the very first FreeRunners served piping hot off the assembly line, and the impressions are generally positive. Buyers will notice the spit and polish the second they lay eyes on the box the FreeRunner comes in, a sign that OpenMoko's trying to move their open-source model away (well, not necessarily away) from the hardcore geeks and toward a broader consumer market. WiFi and motion sensors are the hallmark features the FreeRunner boasts over its Neo1973 predecessor, but visually, the new model takes a more subdued approach with black rings replacing the silver ones. Minor modifications include programmable LEDs embedded in the buttons, host mode support for the USB port (pretty cool!), and a whole pile of accessories in the box -- a good thing, considering the $399 price tag.

Filed under: Handsets, Others, Linux, GSM

Tags: freerunner, linux, neo1973, openmoko

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Charles Han @ Jun 11th 2008 9:42PM

Wow i just can't see this phone hitting it big, android is going to open source too and be available in variety of phones and carriers. I also don't see Moko getting picked up by a carrier either. Oi, gluck to them, but they seriously should've launched last year to be way ahead of the competition.

Neutral

Flerchjj @ Jun 18th 2008 4:06PM

It doesn't look like android will be entirely open. This phone should be able to run android apps if android is recompiled for arm4. Much of the initial work to get android onto other hardware was pioneered on this device.

There may be issues with US carriers picking up this device, but I could see it being popular in Europe. Plus you won't see feature & software restrictions like on so many other phones.

Neutral

.tunys. @ Jun 19th 2008 12:36AM

Whether they get to reach the mass market or not, the project will still be a success. They successfully put out a fully open source phone.

The challenge here is selling Open Source, and I think that you are right that Android will probably make more sales. Personally, I don't like the Android project. It's just too... corporate for me. There is too much involvement from the big boys.

Neutral