RSSApple, Motorola Launch ROKR Phone
By Ed Oswald | Published September 7, 2005, 1:59 PM
As expected, Apple and Motorola on Wednesday unveiled the long-awaited iTunes phone at an exclusive event at the Moscone Center in San Francisco. The phone, dubbed the "ROKR E1," will launch exclusively today with Cingular in the United States and with various operators worldwide throughout the rest of the month.
The ROKR can only hold about 100 songs, Jobs told attendees, which would be transferred via USB to the phone.
"The way we think of this phone is, it's really an iPod shuffle on your phone," Jobs said. The key difference between the Shuffle and the ROKR, however, is the fact that the phone has a display that will function much in the same way the current iPods do.
The phone will also include a camera and video recording capabilities, as well as stereo speakers and a headset jack to listen to music. One button access will be available to launch iTunes, and the user will be able to shuffle songs much like the iPod Shuffle.
Music will automatically pause for incoming calls, Jobs explained.
Motorola will at least initially produce the ROKR as a quad-band GSM phone, a move most likely aimed at making it available to the widest possible audience. No announcement was made as to whether a CDMA version on the phone would be introduced.
The two companies will also launch large advertising campaigns to support the phone's launch. Madonna as well as other musicians will be featured in upcoming commercials set in a phone booth in the desert. Cingular will launch three commercials of its own and a billboard campaign featuring the ROKR.
"There have been a lot of rumors about this product, but today, the talk ends and the music begins," said Ralph de la Vega, Cingular's Chief Operating Officer. "You're going to get your songs on your phone, anywhere you want them, any time you want them, with the world's best music service, brought to you by Motorola and Cingular."
The ROKR E1 will retail for $249.99 with a 2-year contract.
lol. only 100 songs!? how can they call it an iPod phone then? My Audiovox SMT5600 can hold a lot more than that via its MiniSD memory card slot.
**EDIT**
...and it has Windows Media Player (not the best, but it plays all the formats I need).
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Listening to songs I would expect would parallel 'talk time'....so you have 9 hours to actually talk/listen to music, I would assume. I love my Razr, I WISHED they'd stuck a sd card slot in it, I mean, I can't see why they didn't....anyway, this phone needs refinement. And since most of us have at this point, ipods, zens, shuffles and nanos, the phone is moot, that is until they can slap sense and sensibility together, ie: a phone which can actually parallel as an MP3 player without much 'visible' lines. If a phone came the size, style and features of my razr and the capability to hold gigs of data like my Zen, I would gladly consider shelling out 250 for it. But as it is, there's no way in hell I'm paying 250 for an ugly clonky looking phone (which I'll have to lock or buy a belt clip so it doesnt dial by itself in my pocket) which will only play 100 songs, on ...ugh Itunes. And thats assuming your songs are 128kb and about 4 mins long. I listen to alot of dance and club, 8-10 mins meaning I could fit maybe 50 songs on there....$250? Nuh uh.
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Listening to music does not use nearly as much battery life as talking on the phone. Listen time != Talk time.
With talking on the phone, most of the power goes into wirelessly transmitting data, not making sound.
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Talktime² : up to 260-560 minutes
Standby Time² : up to 160-230 hours
Music Time²: : up to 15 hours using wired headset, up to 6 hours using Surround Sound feature
iTunes® Transfer Time²: : approximately 30 seconds for 4MB music file
Now lets do a little math - talktime is 260-560 minutes, that's 4-9 hrs. We all talk on our cellphones an avg. of about 2 hrs a day and lord knows how many at night, meaning technically you're going to one way or another get the crappy end of the stick because if you DO use the phone to play music while you're not chatting for say an hour or 2, your talktime is significantly decreased. Ofcourse, if you carry your charger around or are in a situation where u can constantly charge the phone, you're safe. 30 seconds per 4mb music file? Yikes! 100songsx4mb=about 400mb of storage; @ roughly 13 secs per meg. At any way you look at it, it's going to take you about 86 minutes to fill up the phone.
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As if I didn't have enough problems with battery life on my phone to begin with.
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You notice how there is nothing about battery life in this article. I wonder if Jobs even touched on that.
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Talk Time: Up to 9 hours/560 min
Standby Time: Up to 9 days/230 hrs
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.. that assumes you don't listen to songs.
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