Sprint annouced Kyocera Echo, the first Android smartphone with two capacitive touchscreens.
Sprint’s February 7th event has no iPhone 4, but it featured a brand new phone that will use Android as operating system, the Echo manufactured by Japanese company Kyocera. The name is perfect because the smartphone has two capacitive touchscreens, and can be combined to form one screen.
Kyocera Echo (Sprint) is the "first ever dual-touchscreen smartphone." Kyocera Echo will use Android FroYo as operating system.
Each touchscreen is measured 3.5 inches, so if combined, the Kyocera Echo’s touchscreen size will be qualified to work like tablets. According to the product’s official page, it will be released with Android FroYo version as the pre-installed operating system, internal storage of 8 GB expandable using MicroSD up to 32 GB, 1 GHz Snapdragon processor, and a 5 megapixel rear-facing camera. It was not announced if the Echo will be getting a Gingerbread update.
According to CBS, the dual-screen Android smartphone is scheduled to arrive in Spring 0f this year, and will be sporting a tag price of $199 with a 2-year Sprint contract. Sprint is branding the Kyocera Echo as a smartphone that will feature 4 screen modes, the Single-Screen mode, the Simul-Task mode, the optimized mode and the tablet mode.
Simul-Task mode is described as the Echo’s screen mode allowing a user to “choose 2 of the 7 core apps and run one on each display simultaneously,” while the optimized mode allows the user to “let the dual displays complement each other, like email on one and a full virtual keypad on the other.”
So, is this an iPhone 4 or an iPad 2 “killer”?
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