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Music Cell Phones
You sometimes see cell phone manufacturers talk about music phones. What
is it then?
A music phone is a phone optimized for playing music.
The idea with music phones, smartphones and camera phones is that
one
would have only one device instead of many. A music
phone combines a cell phone and a portable music player. Every major
cell phone manufacturer has them. Sony Ericsson introduced the Walkman
phones, Motorola launched the ROKR iTunes and Nokia delivers music phones under the
XpressMusic phone brand.
More than 100 million music phones were sold in
2005 and that is more than double the number of portable MP3
players and some 12 percent of cell phones sold in
2005 were music phones. Music Phone Characteristics Here is some typical characteristics of
a music phone.
When comparing music phones look at
these key features.
- Large
memory (hard disk)
- Support for poular audio
formats (MP3, AAC...)
-
Good sound quality
- Support for the standard
headphones 3.5mm jack
-
Dedicated music keys
- Good music software (for
PC and Phone)
- Easy to upload music to phone (via
bluetooth or USB)
- Easy access to
OTA (over-the-air) downloads
-
Extended battery time
- FM radio
Music Phones 2005
Here is a couple of examples of music phones released in 2005.
Nokia 3250
This phone has dedicated music keys and can store up to 1 GB
(Gigabyte) of music and offers 10 hours of music play. You can
transfer music with the Nokia Audio Manager. The music player
supports standard audio file formats such as MP3, WMA, M4A and
AAC. It has a FM radio. Retail price of 350 EUR before subsidies
or taxes.
Sony Ericsson W900i
Sony Ericsson W900i is a 3G phone and you can download,
transfer, manage and play music from over-the-air (OTA) music
download services. Transferring audio files from a PC to the
phone is done with the Disc2Phone PC software supplied with the
phone.
The W900i's internal 470 MB memory provides space for between
120 and 240 songs. You can increase the storage capacity with a
bigger memory stick (available up to 2GB). This phone supports
music files like MP3, AAC, AAC+, MIDI, WAV and XMF. It has a
3.5mm headphone jack.
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