A closer look at Japan's latest handsets
by Chris Ziegler 
posted Dec 1st 2008 at 9:00AM
NTT DoCoMo's fall / winter 2008 lineup
KDDI au's fall / winter 2008 lineup
Softbank Mobile's winter 2008 collection
NTT DoCoMo's fall / winter 2008 lineup
KDDI au's fall / winter 2008 lineup
Softbank Mobile's winter 2008 collection
Reader Comments (Page 1 of 1)
cool_nerd @ Dec 1st 2008 9:51AM
i think i speak for a lot of people when i say that it is insane how many incredible handsets one cellular provider can come out with. all of these are wonderful looking devices, many much more innovative than the g1 or iphone. GET WITH IT ATT/VZW!
carcomptoy @ Dec 1st 2008 12:26PM
It's a bit naive to think that these models would even be marketable here in the U.S. at the current time or even in the near future. Regardless of the economy, Americans have always been behind not only the Japanese but also the other Asians and Europeans. Sure, we could have these phones, but no one's going to buy them cause everyone just wants whatever's free.
getitright @ Dec 1st 2008 8:31PM
Everyone here in America wants "free" or cheap phones. That's why they don't sell phones like that here.
The displays are all QVGA if not WQVGA which put every phones in America into shame.
Most phones come with 3.2MP cameras, some are 5MP cameras, even a few are 8MP cameras!
They have One Seg Mobile TV fuction on most phones. What do we have?
All phones come with at least 5 color to choose from.
America IS a third world country when it comes down to phones compare to Japan and Asia.
Jamar @ Dec 3rd 2008 10:41AM
"Sure, we could have these phones, but no one's going to buy them cause everyone just wants whatever's free."
And in Japan, it's the phones like this that are "free" (well, not that Tiffany one, and not the full touch-screen dealies, but most of the rest).
Tyler @ Dec 1st 2008 10:48AM
They are mostly all the same, and very long. and most of them look like they could have been made shorter. I just dont like the style
Montusama @ Dec 1st 2008 2:17PM
I believe I read somewhere that Japanese phone market lacks what the American phone market has, remember when the iphone came out in the states? it was "revolutionary" to some degree? Well many phones in Japan don't have that "revolutionary" thing to them, of course having just about any of one of those phone's come here would be "revolutionary", and for people who want one (including me) getting them to work in the US, is nearly impossible (especially the KDDI by AU ones)
dnaL0R @ Dec 1st 2008 3:13PM
i just love how they come in so many different colors... i've always wanted a white phone because it looks so clean !!
Bert @ Dec 1st 2008 3:12PM
The Japanese value R&D to a fault, which is why Sony Ericsson uses its CDMA division in Japan as a test bed for future designs and feature sets. It would be impossible for a Japanese cellphone to sell here without a carrier subsidy in the 70-95% range simply due to the cost of engineering. As an example the retail cost of a W44S before contract was ~$750.
It's also important to emphasize that the Japanese manufacturers intentionally sabotage a particular feature for each carrier in order to maintain increasingly shorter and more expensive production cycles that only reinforce the constant R&D spending cycle that leads to a false appearance of innovation.
I'll leave the DRM discussion for another time as that is a discussion unto itself.
Jamar @ Dec 3rd 2008 10:45AM
"It's also important to emphasize that the Japanese manufacturers intentionally sabotage a particular feature for each carrier in order to maintain increasingly shorter and more expensive production cycles that only reinforce the constant R&D spending cycle that leads to a false appearance of innovation."
Interesting that you mentioned SE, because apparently this tactic backfired on them and now they have no dedicated R&D for Japan anymore. From now on, all SE's Japanese models should be the same as their world-market models. Hope this means better stuff for us elsewhere rather than a prelude to a Nokia-style pullout from Japan.
Meta @ Dec 2nd 2008 1:28AM
I think Japanese phones are over-rated. The peak of their technology is not higher than ours in the U.S. it is just that the median is higher. The smart phones represent the highest level of phone tech and the ones shown here are available and have been available in the U.S. and Europe.
Their "average" phones are quite a bit better than ours but any tech junkie here who wants one can easily get something as good or better, you just have to look and pay for it.
As for the "3.2MP cameras, some are 5MP cameras, even a few are 8MP cameras!", that's a complete waste of (limited) phone storage at this point. In order to take a decent picture that can take advantage of 5 or 8 MP, you need some decent optics and these phones definitely lack them. It's the old "bigger is better" fallacy again.
Jamar @ Dec 3rd 2008 10:48AM
I think that's the point- that in Japan high-tech is far more easily accessible to the average person. A "free" phone in Japan will beat the pants off a "free" phone in the US (can't find any free phones on any US carrier with a VGA screen, e-book reader, 3.2MP camera with AF, optical zoom, and anti-shake, multi-RFID, streaming video all in one package).
getitright @ Dec 4th 2008 1:18AM
@Meta
Seems like you've never used a Japanese phone before. Some phones run with CCD sensors which are the same type as your typical normal digital cameras. A 3-4 years old model 903SH can take better pictures than any phones you can now buy in America. That's 3-4 years ago. Let's not talk about what they have now.
I still have my 904SH in my storage which was bought from Japan 2 years ago. It's Sim Unlocked now. I compared the pictures that I took with my N82 and it just put N82 into shame.
Bert @ Dec 3rd 2008 11:59AM
@Jamar: Are you sure about SE Japan ending dedicated Japanese R&D? I've got some friends that work in the Japanese branch that haven't said anything about SE consolidating R&D operations.
One of the major reasons SE ended American CDMA R&D was because of the idea that Japan would serve as the incubator for their ideas, and they saw no profit potential in the US (thanks in part to CDMA carriers rejecting the T608). They didn't want to overshadow their high-end GSM models with much higher spec CDMA models that had 3G, high resolution displays, and multiple megapixel cameras years before the GSM side did.
Sara @ Dec 31st 2008 6:30AM
Cute!I like the first 2 pink ones(they're the same though duh) and that last white 1 and those numerials(not sure if it is called so).I don't really read discriptions on Engadget.