Analysis of the Upcoming Toshiba TG01

As Chuong posted earlier, Toshiba plans on unveiling the TG01 at Mobile World Congress in about two weeks. The TG01 is just about the first mainstream device to be built off of Qualcomm's Snapdragon platform, which, as we learned at CES last year, promises higher CPU clock speeds (1GHz to start) with multiple cores, plus great battery life and excellent multimedia capability (according to Qualcomm, the graphic controller used for Snapdragon is better than that used in the Sony PSP).

Beyond the compelling features that we already know about - a width of 9.9mm (the Touch HD is 12mm thick), a huge 4.1" screen (the Touch HD packs 3.8"), shake gesture support, and a very speedy 1GHz processor, it is the interface that may be most intriguing.

Perhaps more than any other interface that we've seen for Windows Mobile (TouchFLO 3D, Panels on the XPERIA X1, Spb Mobile Shell), the interface on the TG01 (complete with smooth animations) keeps the user away from digging into the typical Windows Mobile interface by making many functions available from the home screen area. This trend will continue with this and other new devices until we get a dramatic revamp of Windows Mobile, probably coming in version 7. Also, the bottom bar has been changed in all screens to leave the call start/end keys available all the time (and thus cutting down on hardware buttons).

The images we see thus far shows the TG01 running on Windows Mobile 6.1.4, meaning the version that has the new version of PIE. That said, it's likely that Toshiba will be launching with WinMo 6.5, considering the release is targeted for Summer 2009 in Europe. See more images over at pocket-lint.