Sales of Japan's First Pocket PC Phone an Astounding Success

If sales are anything to go by then Japan's first Pocket PC Phone - the W-ZERO3 from Sharp - can only be described as an absolutely astounding success.

Stores started taking orders on December 9th for delivery on 14th, but unless you had an order in by midday on the 9th you were out of luck. The complete inventory nationwide sold out in literally a couple of hours.

At BIC Camera's flagship store there was a line of more than 200 people by the time doors opened!

Both the Willcom (carrier) site and the Sharp site sold out in hours. A few days later Willcom started taking requests but was forced to move to a lottery system to decide which lucky punter would get the right to buy one of the much sought after devices. At the current time Tokyo is completely out of stock with no cofirmed next delivery date and it seems there's many people just waiting in line to get there hands on what is for Japan, a revolutionary phone.

A big vote of confidence for Microsoft and Pocket PC phones. We want to see more! And when will we see the first Windows Mobile Smartphone ???

Opera 8.5 for Pocket PC to Appear on W-ZERO3 First

Opera have announced and blogged that their much awaited Pocket PC browser will appear first on Sharp's W-ZERO3 Pocket PC Phone in Japan. The date in the article says mid Jan. although the Willcom site says that the W-ZERO3 with W-SIMwill be available from 14th December. I wonder if the first devices will ship without it?

Windows Mobile Developer Resources

I don't usually post general Pocket PC news, but as I'd love to see more Japan and Japanese related apps for Pocket PCs I think this one is worth posting. If anyone has any other good Windows Developer Resources, please post as comments.

Windows Mobile Developers Wiki

Windows Mobile 5.0 Pocket PC Phone from Willcom

Nov 30 '05 Update: The release date has been announced at the 14th Dec. Prices start from 39,800 yen ($US360) if you take out a one year contract at the same time. Standalone without the W-SIM will be 45,000 yen (US$400).

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Amazing news for the Pocket PC market in Japan. Willcom have announced the W-ZERO3 from Sharp, a Pocket PC Phone Edition device using the Windows Mobile 5.0 OS which will use Willcom's W-SIM module for voice and data (to 64 kbps) communications and has a built in QWERTY keyboard and WLAN.

This will really electrify the so-called smartphone market in Japan. Although Windows Mobile 5.0 may have some way to go to catch up with the usability of phones on the Japanese market, the operating system is way, way ahead of the rest in terms of PDA functionality. The range of applications for Windows Mobile is almost unlimited. For example Skype produce a version of their VOIP software for the Pocket PC.

On the downside at 220g it will certainly weigh on the Pocket. Also in terms of memory expansion it only supports miniSD which is no good for those who have invested heavily in regular size SD memory cards.

Scheduled to go on sale at the end of December it will be interesting to see what the top 3 carriers do to try to catch up.

Some related links (JA = Japanese only):
Wireless Watch Japan
Pocket PC Thoughts
Digital World Tokyo
Willcom Product Page (JA)
Sharp Product Page (JA)
WinCE Fan Announcement (JA)
WinCE Review (JA)

SD Radio Tuner

PDA Kobo , a PDA specialist shop in Japan, have announced the upcoming sale of an SD card radio tuner for PDAs. Looks like the headphones go into the card itself but the tuning is done from the Pocket PC. Just 3,675 yen (about US$30).

Japanese Handwriting Recognition for English OS Pocket PCs: Rumored Hack

Some semi-good news for users of English OS Pocket PCs looking to add Japanese handwriting recognition to their device. A hack has been hacked. Having said that, it comes with the warning that this is a "serious bit of At Your Own Risk modding and I would strongly encourage users who are not comfortable or experienced with altering system settings to stay away". Thanks to a regular reader for the report.

P.S. I know that MS is interested in an Global IME type solution for Pocket PCs ... just not sure how long it will take.

GPS All-In-On-Unit and Navigation Soft

Looks like this is the week for PDA & GPS annoucements. PDA Kobo has announced:

1) An all-in-one GPS unit (that works as a cradle rather than using Bluetooth/SD/CF). They also sell navigation software (GrandMap Navi) and mappig software (SuperMapple Digital).

2) Some packaged sets of the Mitac Mio168RS with GPS to meet different customer needs.

Japan PDA Market Quiet, but HP Continues to Push

Well things have been very quiet in the Pocket PC world in Japan this year. In fact the whole PDA section in one of Tokyo's biggest electronic stores had slimmed down to just a few devices which included 1 Clie, 2 Zaurus and 1 Toshiba Pocket PC. Still Dell and HP are plugging away at the Japanese market. HP still have a good line up of 6 models here and have just announced a package that includes a Hagiwara Bluetooth GPS receiver and navigation package from b-walker. You can see a flash video (in Japanese) about HP's PDA strategy in Japan here.

Hopefully the arrival of Windows Mobile 5 devices to Japan late this year or early next will bring back a bit of excitement. I heard that HP will provide an upgrade for the hx4700 - great news! More and more of the development effort for Windows Mobile is going into SmartPhones and Pocket PC phones so I'm sure Windows Mobile users overseas are having much more fun. There is no sign of these appearing in Japan anytime soon, although it wouldn't surprise me to see a SmartPhone here at some point in the future. Perhaps one of the two new mobile carriers starting up over the next year will take the bait ??? Given the super advanced nature of phones here - in terms of both function and usability - Windows Mobile will face stiff competition but it would be good to see SmartPhones on the market here.

Mio 168 RS with MioMap Mapping Software

Finally some Pocket PC Japan news worth posting about. Mitac Japan has announced a Windows 2003 version of their Mio 168 (now Mio 168RS) Pocket PC with Built in GPS. What looks really exciting though is their new mapping application MioMap that includes audio navigation guidance with settings for pedestrians and cyclists as well as cars. For 73,290 yen you get the PDA, the MioMap software, Super Mapple Digital Ver.4 for Mio and a 1GB SD card - not a bad bundle. Unfortunately for powers users the hardware specs are not too great and there is no CF slot. The MioMap software cannot be used on other Pocket PCs which is a great shame. (Super Mapple Digital sold separately does come with a Pocket PC component).

If you already have a Mio 168RS you can get an OS upgrade and the MioMap software for just 22,000 yen a PDA Kobo. The are a lot of good pictures on this page as well as more on the page on the PDA Kobo site introducing the 168RS.

New Pocket PC 2003 SE Devices from Dell

Dell today announced the availability of the Axim X50 and X50v in Japan.

Here is the press release with links to the product pages. (Japanese only)

Here the x50v page on the Dell US site.

InPad and Claviature Input - Support Japanese

Microth offers two interesting input methods that support katakana and hiragana (as well as lots of other character sets). Worth a look.

"Our products include InPad - a handwriting input method based on innovative, patent pending technology and Claviature - a multilanguage, compact on-screen keyboard with large, comfortable keys."