Sprint announced the upcoming availability of Kyocera DuraMax, which is their first device to sing along the brand-new CDMA-based Direct Connect service. The clamshell-shaped phone will be available October 2nd for $69.99. It’s a rugged feature phone, made to meet Military Standard 810G Spec compliance for dust, shock, vibration, temperature extremes, blowing rain, low pressure, solar radiation, salt, fog, humidity and water immersion. The DuraMax also rocks a 3.2-megapixel camera, two screens, 2.5mm headset jack, GPS (compatible with Family Locator service), stereo Bluetooth support, media player, web browser and a memory card slot.
We are, however, more interested about Sprint’s new Direct Connect, which offers push-to-talk communication nationwide, as well as other services like Call Alert with Text, Group Connect, TeamDC (for communicating with up to 200 Sprint Direct Connect subscribers at the same time) and NextMail (which allows users to send a recorded message to any email worldwide or mobile handset via text message)…