However, this morning, after I landed in Chicago from Washington DC, first I received voicemail notification and then I had an incoming call. I was completely perplexed as I saw my signal strength indicator had an X through it. I thought maybe even if I answered the call, it would not go through, but the phone call went on as normal.

The way I believe cell towers works is that in order to have received that phone call today, my phone had to have registered on the cell tower first with an outgoing ping in order to receive the phone call. In this case, the "flight mode" on the phone might not be cutting off the radio but maybe just reducing the transmitting power? Either that or flight mode is a complete farce to keep stewardesses happy.

However, there are a few drawbacks to my in-vehicle unit. The first and major issue is that the device is permanently installed in my car. Therefore, when I am on vacation or in someone elses car or even walking I am without navigation. Next, the system is CD based, this means that data is spread out across several discs split by region and the data gets old.

Now that I have a smartphone with a fairly strong processor, a good amount of storage and bluetooth, I've decided to try and find a replacement.

Since the US government is always broadcasting these signals, there is no fee to use GPS. What you'll need is a GPS receiver, maps, and optionally map overlays.

In its most basic form, a gps receiver can tell you your coordinates, but to most people, that doesnt do them very much good. So a gps program translates these coordinates and places them on maps. Maps vary widely in quality. With maps you have map age, accuracy and depth of detail. You don't want to be forced to drive down an old road that doesn't exist or to be accidentally routed down the wrong way of a one way street.

Another very important feature is map overlays. This is additional information that is added to the maps beyond street information. These can include points of interest and current road conditions. Points of interest typically include restaurants, businesses, atm's, etc. Current road conditions typically show traffic conditions and road closures. Typically points of interest are included as part of the map data, but traffic conditions usually require a monthly or annual subscription.

As you can imagine, all of this information takes a lot of space. In the first car GPS units, they typically used CD's. They would take the United states and divide it up into as many as 12 regions. Given that each disc capacity is 650MB, this meant your maps could hold up to about 7.6 gigabytes of information. This is plenty to provide most of the roads in United States and for millions of points of interest. Recently, gps manufacturers have been switching to DVD. The convenience of DVD is that they can include more information on one disc, but since most manufacturers release only one disc to a user, this ends up being less complete data for the end user.

However, now with the progression of portable devices, we are now seeing a transition to other types of storage include flash media and hard disks. In recent magellan units, they have had 20GB hard drives containing maps for the entire united states as well as europe.

Now with EVDO and other high speed networks along with portable devices like the Q smartphone, we can now stream map information from a server.

This brings me to my introduction of Wayfinder. Wayfinder is a GPS program for PocketPc and Smartphones that instead of using local copies of maps, uses the device's high speed connection to pull in the most current map data. This includes street information, points of interest as well as current traffic conditions.

You would normally thing that this sort of sophistication would be far more expensive than the current system of buying a set of maps and data that can get old and outdated, but at $99USD for a lifetime subscription, it is far cheaper than most other solutions I have seen or tested.

The wayfinder has an easy to use interface that browse maps, search for addresses and businesses all fairly easily. It calculates routes using current traffic information and provides turn by turn voice instruction. My only quip about the voice prompts is that there are too many prompts when you approach a turn. All I need to know is that a turn is coming in about 300 yards and when to turn. I think I've counted 4-5 prompts for a single turn using the wayfinder.

I have also noticed that the points of interest are not as in depth as I expected from an online service. In fact, they fall behind my cd's considerably and probably compare most closely to TomTom's selection of points of interest. Relying on points of interest is probably not a good idea to find somethign specifically, but it is useful to see on the map where the nearest gas station, parking or wifi hotspot is.

The software connected to my nokia GPS receiver quite easily and finding a signal and getting the current location was quite quick. The EVDO connection worked quite well and I saw no performance difference between using the network and using local data.

One thing that the software is missing that seems to be a trend in other devices and software is 3D birds eye navigation. While this looks nice, I am still not convinced on the usefulness of this feature. If the lack of 3D makes the software cheaper, faster and more battery efficient, I'm all for it.

Overall, I'd probably recommend the Wayfinder to most new GPS users in a metro area. The biggest selling point is that you get a feature rich system at a bargain price. Because I am not sure how the software performs in non-EVDO areas, I cannot recommend this for anyone who will be spending any considerable amount of time in rural areas.

After playing around with Wayfinder, I'm guessing in 2 years or less, we'll probably seeing most of the gps devices moving towards streaming maps rather than distributing them on media.

In comparison, the Palm Treo 700w was at first $499 and then reduced to $399. However, I was quite startled to read that the cost estimate of the components for the Q is at about $158.

This makes me wonder how much is Verizon actually "subsidizing" with your two year contract and how much is Microsoft taking in for licensing?

Another question is that the memory only cost $25, does this mean that by adding 25 dollars to the price of the phone, they cuold have effectively doubled the memory in the Q?

Component/Subsystem
TFT-LCD display module $25
Memory (Intel and M Systems MCPs) $22
Applications processor (Intel Xscale) $19
Digital Baseband (Qualcomm MSM6500) $14
Camera module $7
Subtotal of main cost drivers $87
Total Materials Costs $150
Total Materials with Manufacturing $158

However after snooping around the web for a while, I was able to find a way to get a version of Skype, originally made for PocketPC able to run on the Q. As usual, do the following at your own risk.

Original Link : Skype on Motorola Q Uploaded by: bryantchoung

First you will need to get the CAB Version of the Skype Software:

The executable version of the installer will not let you install Skype to your smartphone. We will get around this by extracting the files you need from the CAB file and manually installing them on your phone.

Once you download the cab file, use a program like winrar or winzip to open up the cab file. Copy the following files to a temporary folder: 000Boing.002 000Skype.001 SKYPED~1.003.

Then rename the files:
• 000Boing.002 -> Boing.wav
• 000Skype.001 -> Skype.exe
• SKYPED~1.003 -> SkypeDialer.dll
Then copy these file to your smartphone. I decided to copy the files to my storage card in a folder called skype.

Then, using file manager on your phone, you can locate and start Skype manually.

Before you try and run skype on your phone, you’re going to need some help from your PC. Part of the login process in Skype requires you to click on a login button. While this is no problem for pocketpc users, Q users have no touchscreen. Therefore use a mouse emulation program like Pocket Controller. The Free trial version will do everything you need.

After the program starts, enter in your login information and remember to leave the box checked for Skype to remember you and to automatically log you on.

Next, I have not figured out how to dial phone numbers in Skype on the Q. I’m pretty sure I’m missing some buttons. Additionally, the “softkeys” at the bottom of the screen are useless in this program.

The only way I have found to dial calls is to log into Skype using your PC and then adding contacts. Once you have added contacts, you can then select them on the Pocket version of Skype and dial.

You can view the video to see the entire process of signing on and making a call. You can also get an idea of the phone quality. So far, I’m just impressed that I have skype running on my Q. The call quality seems to be a bit spotty, but when the audio does go through, the sound seems clear. There also seems to be a bit of an annoying lag. Hopefully either Skype or some other adventurous user will be able to make some progress in making this better. Other factors might include programs installed on my Q, network use, and my EVDO reception.

Link to Video

One great app that was originally designed for Pocket PC was PocketNester. This has been skillfully ported to Windows Mobile for Smartphone, and you should be able to get it to run on your Q.

An emulator is a piece of software which lets your Q emulate another device. PocketNesterPlus is an NES emulator for your Smartphone. By downloading "Rom Files", which are essentially the files right off of NES cartridges, you will be able to play almost any game made for NES on your Q.

If you plan on storing any significant number of Rom Files, I would recommend you using a mini-SD card. This tutorial is targeted for installing the application and files on your mini SD Card.

You should be able to download PocketNesterPlus from here:
http://www.modaco.com/index.php?act=Attach&type=post&id=18405

NOTE: This is a RAR file and you will need a program like Winrar to uncompress the file on your PC first.

You should be able to find ROMS online fairly easily. It seems as though Nintendo isn't as concerned with protecting NES Rom's now that the platform is decades old. I would recommend sites like ISOhunt and mininova. These sites often offer packs of 300 - 2000 NES rom images.

You can use either a SD card reader or you can use windows Explorer connected to your Q using activesync.
In your SD Card, make a Folder called NES. Copy the Rom files and the application to this directory. If you have a lot of Rom files, I would recommend dividing them into folders. File Explorer on the Q seems to be very slow in handling directories with lots of files.

Next, start up PocketNesterPlus.exe on your phone. Find it using the File Explorer and click on it to run it.

Before you get started, we need to tweak some settings.

First, go to Options->Preferences. Select the Check Mark next to ASsociate .NES files. This will let you start PocketNester by using File Explorer to find the rom and by click on the rom. This is very useful, because I have not been able to get the "Open Rom" feature in PocketNesterPlus to work.

Next go to Options->Display. Ensure that Landscape Left is selected. As a Note, to change the radio button selection, use left and right on the Directional Pad.

Next go to Options->Controllers. you can assign keys to the controller buttons by clicking on th grey boxes with the ... and then pressing the keys you would like to assign:
I used
P for A
O for B
K for Select
L for Start
Right for Up
Left for Down
Up for Left
Down for Right
M for Menu.

You may be confused about the Direction Mappings, but remember, the display is rotated from its original orientation.

The Menu button will allow you to pop out of the emulator at any moment and adjust settings or exit the emulator.

To play NES Games, use File explorer to find the rom you want, then you can click on the file and PocketNester should start automatically.

I have tried installing SmartNES, and while it works fine, I found it has poor performance and the display only takes up a quarter of the screen.

So I'm please to announce my first PHP WML page:
smartphonesmarts.com/dial.wml

Let me know what you think!

When you are looking for your adapter for the Q, look for the following features:
1. a mic - With this you will be able to take calls on the Q seemlessly. If your Q is playing windows media player, media player will pause and you will hear your ringtone through your headset. Because you have a mic on your cord, you will be able to talk immediately. Look for this little bump on the cord in a picture or in the item description.

2. a talk button - With a talk button on the cord, you will be able to start voice dial and also end conversations. This might be handy if your Q is in your bag or pocket.

3. stereo - Make sure your adapter supports stereo audio out.

4. 3 black bands on the 2.5 mm plug. Any more or any less will not work properly with the Q

5. A 3.5 headphone jack receiver. This lets you plug in your high quality headphones or even an adapter to plug into your home stereo. It was quite an experience hearing a phone call through my surround sound system.

5. Unfortunately, I have not found the combination of all of these qualities in any store and could only find it on ebay. And because it was hipped from China, it took about a week to ship and when I opened the envelope I hoped for only a headset and no bird flu.

Examine the picture included with this blog entry to see what the adapter should look like.

Sound quality: The Sound Quality of the Q is very good. Personally I did not care for any of the "sound enhancements" that the Q can do through software, and instead turned all of them down. While windows media player did offer a decent interface, You might also want to try tcpmp for Windows Mobile smartphone because this also comes with a graphic equalizer and support for an unbelievable number of audio formats

Sound Sources: One great thing about the Q is its connectivity options. You can get yourself a 2 gig mini-sd card, internet radio stations, Sirius, as well as streaming from your homepc using Orb.

Bluetooth: Some people have opted for bluetooth wireless headphones. While these headphones are cool, I have several issues with them.

1. I do not need another thing to keep charged
2. I already have high quality headphones
3. Listening with your bluetooth connection drains the connection faster.
4. You can't use it as a phone headset
5. PRICE!

The advantage of the bluetooth is the lack of wires and some headphones come with buttons for media player control.

This adapter will transfer your Q from a plain pda and phone to a multimedia marvel. This is a definite necessity for anyone who will have the Q with them on the train, bus or even at work.

Virtual Earth Mobile is a program for Windows Mobile that grabs Maps, Directions, and Satellite imagery from Microsoft's Virtual Earth Website. This will let you Zoom to any part of America, update using a GPS receiver, Find businesses and addresses, and get driving directions.

From there you can install VE Mobile to your Q or to the mini-sd card. The next thing I would do is to go to Menu-

Second, I would only try using this application if you have unlimited EVDO. This application will take up a good amount of bandwidth.

Now that you're all set up lets start the review:

Functionality
The software is Fully Loaded. Almost everything you can do on the virtual earth web site, you can do from this application. When you press menu you will be presented with the following options:

Zoom in:
Self explanatory

Map Type:
You can go to any place in America in either map mode, satellite mode or hybrid mode.

Locate Me:
You can have yourself be located by GPS coordinates. If you have a GPS antenna connected to your Q, i'm assuming the application will grab the coordinates and reposition itself. If you're connected to a WiFi Base station, it will use the IP address of the Wifi Connection

Find:
You can find any address in the US. You can also find places by using the Business search feature by category or name in a particular city. One cool additional feature is that you can also choose a contact from your contact list to load in. One annoying part is that unlike the website, it does not place a flag on the part of the map where your address is located.

Driving Directions:
You can get driving directions, but its a little clumsy. After you find a place, you set it as your start. After you find a second place you set it as the destination. Then when you select get destination, it takes you to the MSN website in IE to get text directions. It probably would be easier to get directions from a website.

More:
You're also able to set map cache options and go to a place by Latitude and longitude.

Usability:
Using the directional pad is easy enough to use to move around the map. Clicking the center button zooms in. the left menu button zooms you out. All of the other features are listed under the right menu button. While the entire application works and is fairly easy to use, because of the amount of data and the lack of a decent cache makes using this application a bit slow.

When you're on the PC web browser version, normaly a good amount of the map to the left right top and bottom of your current view is automatically downloaded and pre-cached so that scrolling around is faster. This is not done Virtual Earth Mobile. So after you view an area, it is cached, but not before. Although EVDO is quite fast, it is not quite fast enough to make scrolling around a pleasent experience.

Bottom Line:
While this is a cool application showing what is possible using the Q and its evdo connection it is probably only best used in a pinch. It is far too slow to be used to find anything in any kind of hurry. Perhaps if they fix the pre-caching issue on this sometime soon, it will change my impression. But because its free you have nothing to lose, so download and try it at the very least it is a fun toy.

What is a SIM Card?
A sim card is a card about the size of your thumbnail that goes into GSM phones. SIM stands for Subscriber Identity Module. This chip holds your account number as well as phone book entries. Because of this, you are free to use any compatible GSM phone just by taking out the SIM Card and putting it into another phone.

What do you mean compatible gsm phone?
GSM uses 5 different frequency bands. Not all networks use all of the bands and not all phone support all of the bands. GSM-850 and GSM-1900 are used in the United States and GSM-900 and GSM-1800 are used in most parts of the world.

What does Verizon use?
Verizon uses CDMA or Code Division Multiple Access. The Difference between GSM and CDMA is that GSM uses TDMA to encode their digital signals.

How does Verizon identify its users?
You have a ESN or electronic Serial number attached to your phone. The benefit of this is that if someone steals your phone, if they try and register it, your ESN will be registered as stolen. The only hassle is that there is no quick way to swap your account from one phone to the other. This requires either a Customer Service Website or phone call.

What is TDMA?
TDMA is Time division Multiple access. Cell phones operate on shared frequencies with the towers. In order to share this frequency without hearing other people on your line, you can use two methods. One is to a lot a certain amount of time in each second that your phone is allowed to communicate with the tower. CDMA uses codes to allow the phone to only use up shared time slots when it needs to. Because of this better sharing, CDMA can handle faster speeds. CDMA also offers greater signal strength and better switching between towers, but you don’t need to worry about why.

So Can I use my Verizon phone on a GSM network?
Yes and No. There are a couple phones that work on a GSM network as well as a CDMA network. This is accomplished by basically sticking two phones into one.

When I get a phone call, how does Verizon know where I am?
Even when you are not on your phone, your phone is in constant communication with the towers around it. As it enters new cells, it registers and talks to towers. When Verizon gets a call on their network, it will know what tower you are registered with and it can send out the ring signal to your phone. Also because of this they Phone companies are able to get a general idea of where you are any time your phone is on. Sometimes Cell phones also have aGPS installed that can help locate you.

What is aGPS?
aGPS or Assisted Global Positioning System is like regular GPS, except it uses cell phone towers to help the cell phone know where you are. It uses information it knows about the cell phone tower as well as any signal processing help from the GPS tower to let 911 and any other applications know exactly where you are.

Why is my battery life not as good in Wisconsin as it is in Chicago?
The digital cell phone has the ability to adjust power it broadcasts at. When signal strength is low, it will increase power to talk to the tower, When the towers are closer and the signal strength is stronger, it will use less power to talk to the tower.

Why is reception so much better in Europe and Korea than in America?
Population density and government regulation. The United States is a big country and setting up towers all over the country is a huge task. Think about Montana, Oregon, etc. It’s not the same as covering only Switzerland. In addition to this, the US government did not regulate the industry like some other countries. Because of this, we have CDMA and GSM coverage in many areas in essence creating many areas with triplicate or more coverage. If we settled on a single standard, it would be easier for companies to share the burden of setting up towers.

How does the internet work on the cell phones?
There is a new generation of cell phone technologies that are for data only. This includes EV-DO and HSDPA. Both are variations of CDMA, but it seems like CDMA carriers like Sprint and Verizon are going with EV-DO and GSM carriers are going with HSDPA. EV-DO stands for Evolution Data Only. HSDPA stands for High Speed Downlink Packet Access. Technically EV-DO and HSDPA are incredibly fast with HSDPA being faster than EV-DO, but ultimately real world numbers are affected by environmental factors and limits placed by the companies. In the end, you can think of it as speeds similar to your cable modem.

What is Bluetooth?
Bluetooth is another wireless technology designed to allow communications between devices at a short distance where you previously needed wires. In Cell phones, this includes headsets and data connections. This lets you connect wirelessly to your car, a Bluetooth headset, and your PDA or computer.

Ok.

So you’ve got the latest and coolest smartphone, you’ve paid for your data plan but now you’re stumped as to how to get your email automatically sent to the stupid thing. Hopefully this guide will set you on your way.

Exchange
If you have an exchange account you will want to set up an activesync relationship with your exchange server. You can do this by going to tools->Configure Server Source in your active sync manager. You need to get exchange email settings from your exchange administrator. On your smartphone, go to the Activesync application and select menu->schedule. To enable AUTD which stands for Always up to date, set up your schedule for “As Item Arrive”. Since the Q does not have AUTD 2.0 yet, it will do AUTD through text messaging.

If you have Verizon you will have to enter in XXXXXXXXXX@vtext.com where the x’s are your phone number. Also you should be able to get a free 2000 text messaging credit to your account if you call customer service.

If you’re not connecting to an exchange server and you’re not connecting through the web, you’re probably going to have to connect through POP3 or IMAP. Most likely you will have POP only, but if you do have IMAP, you will want to use IMAP instead of POP.

The major difference between POP and IMAP is that POP was designed for a one client in mind and IMAP was designed for checking from multiple clients.

With POP, the traditional idea was to connect to the server once, download all the messages to your computer, and then delete messages on the server. Therefore, if you downloaded your email on your computer at home, when your smartphone went to go check your mail, it would have missed a bunch of email your Home computer already downloaded. Alternatively, you can also set up pop to leave messages on the server, but problems arise in managing email status, like read, unread, deleted. Just because it is read on your home pc, doesn’t me that it will be marked as read on your smartphone. Also because of this, sometimes you will end up with errors where you will receive duplicates of messages.

With IMAP, the idea was to have more transactions on the server and to have message status kept on the server. In this way, your home computer and your smartphone will sync up with the server at selected intervals and upload any message changes as well as downloading any new changes. In this way, your inbox should look the same on your smartphone and your pc.

Gmail, hotmail, etc are webmail services. These email accounts are only accessible through a web browser because your email stays on their servers all the time. However, a services have started offering POP or IMAP services in conjunction with their web mail offerings. Gmail offers POP mail, but its implementation is almost unusable with the smartphone. Hotmail does not offer any POP or IMAP, but you can connect through PocketMSN installed on your smartphone.
If you do have one of these services, your best bet may be to forward all of your email to a different server. You can either do this through settings, or if there isn’t a forward setting, look into setting up email rules to forward your mail to another address.

Email Providers
If your email isn’t currently supported by your smartphone, you might look into forwarding all of your mail to another email provider. You should be able to find IMAP email available for as cheap as 99 cents a month and exchange email being a few dollars more. I personally use 1and1 email services and have had no problems. I have also just started using mail2web with no problems yet. They offer free exchange hosting.

Multiple email addresses
I have set up catchall’s for emails on my domain to forward to my gmail account. Then my gmail account will forward email to my imap account.
By forwarding your email through gmail, you get the advantage of having on online archive of all your email as well as gmail’s spam filtering.

Setting up Email on your smartphone
First, get all of your email server’s connection information from your email provider.

Things you will need:
-email address
-username
-password
-mail server type
-mail server address
-smtp server. Find out if your smtp server requires authentication.

Note that you should also ask if your smtp server is available while you’re not on your providers network. In that case, you will have to set up your smtp server with your wireless carrier. If you’re on verizon: http://dts.vzw.com/faqs/VZAccess/faq_natlbrdbandaccess.html go to number 6.

Once you have all of your information, proceed to the messaging application on your smartphone.
Go To Outlook Email. Press Menu. Go to Options.
Go to New Account, and type in your information.
Hit Next
Hopefully you will be able to have the smartphone select all of your information automatically. If not, continue to the next step.
Enter in your username and password. Select that you would like to save your password. This will allow your phone to check your email for you automatically at periodic intervals
Hit Next
On this screen select your server type and specify an account name. Note that you will NOT be able to change your account name later.
Hit Next
Type in the address for your incoming POP or IMAP server that you received from your provider and then the outgoing SMTP information from your provider, If you are using a different provider for your smtp, go to the screen to change additional outgoing server settings.
Hit Next
The next screen will determine how much of your mail will be downloaded. Select the number of days worth of email in the first box. In the second box, you will be able to select how much of the message you will download. Header only, will get the subject only, Entire message will get the entire mssage without any attachments, first 500 bytes will cut off the message after 500 bytes.
Hit Next
The next screen will specify how often the phone will check online for new messages. Ideally you would probably want to check as often as possible, but you can set for longer periods of time to conserve battery. Regardless of what setting you pick, you will always be able to manually send and receive at any time.
Hit Next
Hit Finish

You should be all set up now. Your smartphone will support several email accounts.

Terms:
SMTP – Simple Mail Transport Protocol. Commonly used with SMTP Server. This is the server your phone or email client uses to connect to send email.
POP – Post Office Protocol. This is a type of incoming mail server
IMAP – Internet Message Application Protocol . This is a more advanced type of incoming mail server.
Exchange – The mail server created by Microsoft.
AUTD - Always Up to Date. Push email technology using Exchange Server

So far I've covered as much as I can think of that I've learned or still had questions about.

Let me know if you have any answers or any new questions for it.

Link to the Q FAQ

Q as a Phone :.
Let's start off with the most important part of any cell phone: How does it work as a phone? In comparison to other PDA Phones such as teh 700w and the 6700, the Q is by far a better phone. I say this because of the following reasons:
Better Sound Quality
Better Speakerphone
Better Form Factor
Easier to use
GUI is not as pretty, but more simple.

The sound Quality on the Q is better than the Motorola e815 and RAZR and by far much better than the Treo 700w. I attribute this to its dual speakers which were designed for multimedia.

The form factor is really important to me because a cell phone is something I may need to carry around close to 24/7. The biggest difference is, a PDA or something in a PDA form factor is something that I would rather not. Ease of use is also very important in a phone. At no point do I want to have to struggle to try and make a call. There were several times while using Windows Mobile Pocket PC edition where it was difficult to get to make a phone call. The Q makes it incredibly easy to get to the home screen or dial pad from anywhere. One big feature that I hated on the 700w was how the red end button would merely turn off the device whereever you were. On the Q, this conveniently minimizes any open applications and takes you to the home screen. From the home screen you can just start typing in a number or name to start dialing.

The biggest shock to me was how different the GUI is between Windows Mobile Smartphone and Windows Mobile PocketPC. At first glance, they seem like they are the same, but upon further use you begin to realize that they are developed from two completely different perspectives. A good way to think of it is the 700w can be thought of as a PDA where they added in the ability to make phone calls. In fact, you could probably use the 700w as a PDA 100% of the time as a PDA and be completely happy that you have a full function PDA. The Q on the otherhand has been designed and tailered from top to bottom to be used as a phone.

A good example of the difference between the two are the menuing systems. Each gui in the Q has been optimized to use the jog dial. Instead of entering values, most items are set by being presented by a blank page with a list of scrollable and clickable options. Things like entering in time intervals for checking email has been changed from a specified interval (ie. 1-infinity) to a list of options (never, 15 minutes, 30 minutes, an hour).

It is this menuing system that lets you quickly make changes to your settings without having to think, read, or navigate much. While you do lose some control, i would say this is worth it.

Performance:
The Q is powered by a very able Intel processor and an adequate amount of ram. While the menuing system can seem a little late sometimes, it is able to handle mutli-tasking and intensive operations with ease. I was able to check email, browse the internet, and have my calendar open all at once without any noticable slowdowns. Applications like Orb, which require Internet explorer, Windows Media, and EVDO Streaming handled full screen video very well.

Stability:
In my experience with the 700w, i would have to reset it at least 3 times a day. The Q has been rock solid and I don't anticipate having to reset it any time soon.

Overall, this phone does everything I need/want it to and would definitely recommend it to anyone who is looking for a smartphone. I might recommend the 700w or 700p to anyone who is looking for a PDA, but even then i might convince them that they don't.

It's late now. I need to sleep. I'll probably edit/add to this review over the next few days.

For those of you who are interested, you can order the Motorola Q through Verizon Wireless online right now. They should start popping up in stores between now and June 5th. By June 5th, all stores should have the phones available for a nationwide launch.

The phone is running a 312 MHz processor with 128 MB of ram and an MiniSD slot that is expandable up to 2gig.

The phone will be running EVDO and CDMA on Verizon Wireless exclusively for at least 6 months. Then it could possibly show up on Sprint.

The phone does not feature a touchscreen, but does offer a landscape screen with a 320 x 240 pixel resolution. The phone also offers a QWERTY thumboard for text input.

The phone also offers bluetooth and Infra-red for connection options. In theory you could add a WiFi card into the mini-sd slot as well.

The phone will also come equipped with a 1.3 megapixel camera and light as well as stereo speakers.

After writing this I'm realizing I should start writing articles explaining what these specs mean in english terms. Look for those soon.