14 DAY TRIAL // The highly-anticipated Kyocera Echo is now available for purchase online and in all Sprint retail channels. The smartphone is price tagged at $199.99 with a new two-year agreement and after a $100 mail in rebate.
Sprint has added the Echo to its Android portfolio in late March when it put the device up for pre-order.
Furthermore, the phone was available for purchase two days earlier than the expected release date, but only for Sprint's loyal customers.
The rest of the customers interested in buying Kyocera Echo had to wait until April 17, when the phone was slated for its official release.
The 'intriguing' trait of the Kyocera Echo is represented by the two high-resolution 3.5-inch WVGA touchscreen displays connected by a patent-pending “pivot hinge” that enables the two displays to operate independently, side-by-side or combined to form an oversized 4.7-inch integrated display.
Thanks to the manufacturer's innovation, Echo owners will be able to use the touchscreens in four possible ways: Single-Screen Mode, Simul-Task Mode, Optimized Mode and Tablet Mode.
While in Single Mode users can take advantage of all the functionality of a single-display, touch-screen smartphone, but using the Simul-Task Mode will allow them to check out any two of the phone’s seven core apps (messaging, e-mail, Web browsing, phone, gallery, contacts and VueQue) while they're running independently on the dual displays.
With the Optimized Mode users will be able to compose an e-mail on one screen with a touchscreen keyboard on the other, or watch a YouTube video on one display while browsing and queuing additional YouTube videos on the other.
The last from the four modes, the Tablet Mode allows users to stretch a single application across both displays for a full 4.7-inch viewing area. This mode is mostly useful for viewing maps, videos, websites, detailed documents and long lists.
Kyocera Echo runs Android 2.2 Froyo and is powered by a single 1GHz QSD 8650 Snapdragon processor. The Echo packs 1 GB of on-board memory and comes with an 8GB microSD card for the external memory card slot supporting cards up to 32GB.