future of cell phone technology?

[her34]

is 3g going to be it? in two years, carriers will have 3g rolled out in most places. aside from video calls, will there be anything else that cell phones will do?

how will cell phones in 5 years be different than current cell phones?

 

[Matthias99]

Not really Highly Technical.

I suspect that once decent high-speed data service is avaiable in most areas, you'll start to see PDA-phones/smartphones that don't suck, and can actually browse the internet decently.

They've already started some streaming media services; I suspect we'll see more of that. Once you have an internet connection, there's nothing stopping you getting webcasts (audio or video) on the phone, or things like live TV broadcasts.

how will cell phones in 5 years be different than current cell phones?

Probably they'll figure out something even more useless than a camera to stick on it. They'll be thinner and lighter and work longer, thanks to better batteries and second- or third-generation OLED screens. Beyond that it's just speculation.

 

[wpshooter]

Her34:

One thing for sure is that if they still exit (and it would not hurt my feelings a bit, if they didn't), that people will still be using them to talk about things that don't amount to "A HILL OF BEANS" - actually that is probably an insult to a hill of beans, in that eventually, it will make some more beans to feed someone that is hungry.

 

[Falloutboy]

your prolly going to see the merger of cell networks and wifi/wimax networks for the next generation of phones.

 

[Unkno]

mini-computers...lol

 

[bobsmith1492]

Hopefully they'll be outlawed except in cases of emergency.

$0.02

 

[mchammer]

What would be the smallest possible size a phone could be made right now, just a basic phone, no camera or fancy screen.

 

[bobsmith1492]

Ever watched Zoolander?

 

[powerup]

Cell phones are not going to change too much in the next 5 years until they find a new battery source. All these new features are battery killers. You can only use the phone for a short time then you have to charge it up again.

 

[Matthias99]

Originally posted by: mchammer
What would be the smallest possible size a phone could be made right now, just a basic phone, no camera or fancy screen.

The limiting factors would tend to be the size of the battery, keypad, antenna, etc. The actual electronics that make up the transceiver and 'phone' (if you don't need embedded Java, a web browser, fancy graphics, Bluetooth, etc.) are pretty damn small.

Look at, e.g. the Motorola RAZR; without the fancy screen you could probably just cut the top half off. If you didn't need a keypad (use voice dialing with some logic to let it recognize spoken numbers, and/or upload a phone book from a PC), you might be able to shrink it a bit more, but the battery, antenna, and mic/speaker will still limit you. You could ditch the mic/speaker, I guess, and only have it work with a headset.

That would probably give you something about 2"x3"x.3". That's around the size of a few credit cards stacked on top of each other (and is pushing the limits of how small you can reasonably make something like a phone). As was said, without a significant breakthrough in batteries (or other portable energy sources, like micro fuel cells), you can't really make any portable device requiring significant power a lot smaller.

 

[0roo0roo]

meh they will charge too much for it to matter to most people. who cares if theres video. people will only jump when the price is right. otherwise its only for the early adopters and business type folks charging the outrageous fees as work expenses.