New Panasonic Mobile TV Phone: VIERA 920P

Japan brings another Mobile TV phone, this time from Panasonic, the giant electronics manufacturer. Following Sharp's idea to integrate TV technology into mobile phones, Panasonic created a new handset and named it after the company's line of LCDs and plasma displays, VIERA.

The new device, Panasonic VIERA 920P, comes in a clamshell form and can be opened in two ways, one for using its phone-related capabilities and one for using it as a mobile TV, thanks to its Digital Multimedia Broadcasting (DMB) feature. The handset works on GSM and W-CDMA networks, measures 106 x 49 x 18 millimeters (when closed, of course) and weighs 135 grams. It has the same design that most of the "TV phones" made in Japan have: a simple, rectangle shape, to easily integrate the biggest screen possible.

Panasonic VIERA 920P offers an internal 3.0 inch, 16:9 display with a 480 x 854 pixel resolution, perfect for videos and TV, plus an external 0.77 inch, 96 x 25 pixels display for viewing information like incoming or missed calls without opening the phone. The 920P packs a nice 5.1 Megapixel CMOS camera (with Auto focus and video recording) that will allow users to take good quality pictures, and a secondary camera for video calls. Other known features include Bluetooth 2.0 with EDR (Enhanced Data Rate), e-mail, Internet browsing, about 200 minutes of talk-time, up to 340 hours of stand-by on GSM networks and up to 580 hours of stand-by on W-CDMA networks.

The new Panasonic TV phone is available in Japan via SoftBank, one of the leading mobile carriers in the country, under the name of SoftBank 920P. There are no details about the handset's retail price, nor about its availability for other markets. However, as most of the Mobile TV phones, it will probably remain in Japan.




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