Verizon Alias2 with Changed Button Layout

[Shikhar]

Consider our interest piqued, Verizon. Fresh from leaksville comes the first solid details and mock ups of the upcoming Samsung U740, or Alias2, headed to Verizon Wireless in the near future. Those of you familiar with the Alias will immediately recognize the same dual-hinge design that allows the phone to be opened portrait-wise like a standard clam shell, or landscape-wise for some QWERTY action.

Verizon Alias 2 cell phone pictures show its extraordinary features of having both a QWERTY keypad and a standard clamshell number pad in a single device. The dual-hinge clamshell is the successor to the venerable U740 Alias first released in 2007. This handset is equipped with a dynamic keypad, its an interesting idea, that will show numbers if the phone is flipped open in portrait mode, or QWERTY letters if opened in landscape mode. The phone will also feature other standard options such as a microSDHC slot, external media player controls, Bluetooth with stereo audio support, camera, and speakerphone.

The exact nature of the dynamic keys hasn’t been explained. One suggestion is that they could use e-ink, which would only require power when the legends were changed, not to maintain them. Whatever the technology, the end result is a keyboard that, when held horizontally, shows a QWERTY layout for messaging, and when held vertically shows a numeric keypad and shortcut keys.

Verizon's original Alias U740 dual-hinge phone may not have rocked any worlds, but it was a clever attempt to provide the best of both a QWERTY keypad and a standard clamshell number pad in a single device -- and it sounds like the Alias 2 we're seeing leaked here improves on that concept by using dynamically-changing button labels to hammer home the mode switches. It's not clear what tech is being used to switch layouts -- there are some whispers that it's an E-Ink display, since the labels apparently remain even without power -- but given this phone's expected price point, we'll say we're expecting more along the lines of one of those segmented LCDs found in cheap universal remotes. In other words, garbage. Hopefully we'll be proven wrong at CTIA, we'll let you know. Slightly bigger pic after the break.

[Flux]

Apparently the Alias2 is equipped with a dynamic keypad that displays 0-9, a d-pad, etc when the phone is opened in portrait mode, and a full QWERTY keypad when the phone is opened in landscape mode. Think of it as a slightly dumbed down version of the Mozilla concept we saw back in February — a poor man’s Optimus Maximus for mobile handsets. Very, very cool. We’re not sure exactly how the dynamic keypad works for the time being, though the HoFo member who supplied the images believes it to be an electronic ink (or similar) technology. Whatever it is, it sounds pretty sweet and we’ll definitely be checking it out first-hand if Verizon decides to show it off at CTIA. Hit the jump for the full images and details.

The handset itself is a feature-phone rather than a smartphone, and has a predicted budget price. There’s a possibility that the Verizon Alias2 will be demonstrated at CTIA in the next couple of weeks, so we’ll be bringing you any new details when we’re there.

[labman]

Wow. That looks terrible. The first one looks better than that! It looks like a free phone on the outside to me, and a cheap japanese knockoff on the inside.

[Fullorton]

Its an interesting idea, but it still suffers from the same problem as the original Alias: the keys are designed for landscape use and not portrait, Its good as a texting device in landscape mode, but its completely unusable as a regular phone in portrait mode.