[3GSM] - New UIQ 3 smartphone - the MOTORIZR Z8

[slitchfield]

Motorola are back in the Symbian/UIQ fold after a short absence, launching the MOTORIZR Z8, based on UIQ 3 on Symbian OS and developed by the Sendo design team inherited a couple of years ago. A sliding design, the Z8 also comes with a 2mp camera and tie-ins with mobile data-based TV. The press release follows.

Read on in the full article.

[stuclark]

Sendo Smartphones now has even more pictures, plus an official summary of the phone's features.

First UIQ phone wihtout touchscreen...now i´m sure SE will also make some

In other hand, this is great news for UIQ3 users has a whole

[krisse]

Wow, this is great, now people who like Moto styling can get into Symbian too (I know they did some UIQs before but they didn't look cool).

It also shows the advantage of Symbian being about more than just Nokia as not everyone likes Nokia designs (I do but some don't, and no one should have to change their tastes).

This kind of release definitely needs to be encouraged, Symbian needs as many different manufacturers supporting it as possible so that everyone can find a Symbian they're proud to carry round with them.

As an ex-Sendo Smartphone designer who left just before the Motorola takeover I was keen to see the new phone.

To be frank it seems roughly like where Sendo could have been if they hadn't gone pop.

It's essentially a Sendo X a few years on: more memory, more devices, better video.

[stuclark]

Yes, this phone is essentially the Sendo X3, just with a different UI.

Further to my post, two back, upon consideration I reckon I was being a bit unfair!

The Sendo/Motorola design team have had to start from scratch in order to migrate to the new Symbian system.

The transition to a HSDPA radio stack must have been a bit of a nightmare too!

It's under 2 years since Sendo finally went down the tubes. Allowing for some time spent in "handover confusion" the Sendo/Motorola team probably had just over a year to produce this totally new handset .. with a new OS/GUI and also a new radio module.

This is an impressive achievement in itself!

However I definitely WILL be expecting more "bells & whistles" on the NEXT model, now that they have got the groundwork in place!

The next one is pretty soon after and has some better bells and whistles.
I was shown it in a private meeting.
After that the bells and whistles come even thicker and faster.