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Following the mishap of my Nokia N81 (broken screen) I needed to obtain a new phone. As I had another phone that was out of contract I was able to get the new HTC Touch Diamond. This is an awesome touch screen phone. The apple iPhone is basically a poor copy of the HTC touch phones only running substandard software including the Music crippling DRM iTunes software. In reality there is no comparison. The iPhone is an iPod with a phone application attached. It does the internet badly (no java or flash support) has no Bluetooth (OK it has bluetooth but you cannot use it to transfer files or data – isn’t that he point of bluetooth?), cannot MMS pictures, has a very bad battery life and you have to install and run iTunes before you can even use the phone application. The HTC Touch Diamond by contrast is first and foremost a Smartphone. That is, it is a PDA phone  running the Windows Mobile 6.1 software. Not only does it have the full phone functionality that every mobile phone should have, it combines this with the PDA capability of Mobile Office, Word, Excel and PowerPoint, integration with Outlook and Exchange, SMS and MMS, photos and video (using a 3.2Mega Pixel camera) has a touch screen interface including some cool scrolling applications just like the iPhone has. Data connectivity includes Bluetooth, Wifi, multi-band Phone (3G, GSM and HSDPA). GPS can be integrated easily (using an external device which is good because it doesn’t then rely on cell coverage). Possibly the only poor comparison to the iPhone is the internal storage is fixed at 4GB. The battery life is also poor, but it can be replaced unlike the iPhone!

There is a new exciting HTC Touch Dual phone just out. It combines an intuitive touch screen and keypad within a cool design. With the flick of your thumb, the touch screen slides to reveal a handy smart-sized keyboard. If you prefer to touch, the interface allows you to quickly go through your emails, messages, music and images. When you touch the screen you activate the home page to give you an instant view of your email, calendar, messages, missed calls and dynamic weather updates. Get onto HTC's website for more specs.

Microsoft Windows Mobile is now really taking off in Smart Phones and PDAs.

There are a range of devices in each of these categories on the Microsoft Windows Mobile Website.

SmartPhones
Take your Microsoft Office Outlook
e-mail, contacts, and calendar with you. With Windows Mobile, you can browse the Web, view Microsoft Office files,* listen to music, and more—all from your mobile phone.

PDAs
Need everything except the phone? With a Windows Mobile powered PDA, you get the mobile version of Microsoft Office, which includes Outlook Mobile, Word Mobile, Excel Mobile, and PowerPoint Mobile. Plus, if your PDA has Wi-Fi, you can surf the Web and check Web-based e-mail on Wi-Fi networks.