Motorola has been on an obscure design rampage since the Backflip, continuing that tradition with the Flipout, and now with the Motorola iDEN i886 Android phone. The Motorola iDEN i886 is quite toned down from the previous iterations, but sports two keyboards. Nothing crazy, but this is what seems to be a first for an Android device.
The iDEN i886 is a mid-ranged Android phone that comes with Push-to-talk, GPS, accelerometer, web browser, Bluetooth, a 2 megapixel camera, and a MicroSD card slot. It looks similar to the Pantech Matrix, only with its alphanumeric keyboard on the front of the phone. The phone has just hit up the FCC, but since it’s yet to be announced, we’re not sure when we’ll actually be seeing this thing hit the shelves. The i886 could hit Sprint/Boost Mobile, or possibly some other regional carrier when it launches.
As far as user experience goes, we’re not sure if the i886 will deliver a good one. Sure, we know it’s no Motorola Droid or X, but the very small screen will likely hinder the web browsing experience at best, but not everyone is looking for incredible web browsing, we suppose. We also are unsure of the version of Android that the phone will be using. The device looks like a feature phone, with some of the innards from a smartphone, but we think it’ll stay at a low price range. We’d find it hard to believe if this particular handset cost upwards toward $200, but anything is possible.
So if you’re looking for a smarter feature phone, or you’d love to revel in the dual keyboard possibilities, whatever they may be, you may want to wait it out for this device to hit the streets. Also, if you weren’t in love with the i1, and crave the Push-To-Talk functionality of Nextel, the iDEN i886 may be right up your alley.
We’ll be keeping a close eye on this one, even if it won’t be replacing any of our current devices anytime soon.
[Via: Unwiredview]