CES 2006

LG

There was a surprise waiting for us at the LG's booth. If some of you remember, during CTIA 2004 Siemens showcased the PenPhone – a concept tri-band GSM phone with small LCD display, Bluetooth and joystick navigation. LG STYLE-I (HBM-700) looks stunningly similar to the Siemens PenPhone and our first reaction was – it is not a concept anymore! Moreover, the STYLE-I features a numeric keypad and Verizon's logo. Of course the good people at LG unveiled the mystery for us – it is a Bluetooth talking device. It allows you to place a call using the keypad and displays called-ID information on the OLED display. So if your phone is always buried somewhere in your backpack or it is too large to be shown in public, just get one of these babies. It has up to 8h of talk time and 200h of stand-by. Other supported features are voice-activated dialing, last number redial, 3way calling, call waiting plus a headset jack. The price was not announced but it will be available from Verizon Wireless.

Siemens PenPhone	LG Style-I

Parrot

Parrot announced three new Bluetooth car kits at this year's Consumer Electronics Show – the  Rhythm N' Blue, the 3400 LS-GPS and the 3200 LS-COLOR.

The Rhythm N' Blue is an in-dash radio-CD/MP3 player with built-in Bluetooth. When an incoming call is received, the caller's name is displayed. Numbers may be dialed manually via the keypad or hands-free using the voice recognition feature. The Rhythm N' Blue allows full duplex conversations with echo cancellation. The main features include voice recognition for up to 150 names, 4x45 watts power, 1 RCA pre-out if you have existing amplifier and bass/treble equalizer. Its current retail price in the US is $349 or 279 euros in Europe.

Parrot Rhythm N' Blue

Parrot 3200 LS-Color is a Bluetooth car kit, combining hands-free phone function with a 262k color TFT display measuring 160x128 pixels. It is dash mounted and offers full duplex conversation with echo cancellation, Photo ID and Hi-Fi polyphonic ringtones. Its current price is $299 or 219 Euros.

Parrot LS-Color

Parrot 3400 LS-GPS has the same design (apart from the small antenna) as the 3200 model but also adds GPS functionality. It does not display maps, but rather sends your position via Bluetooth to your PDA, phone or laptop which runs the GPS mapping software. The MSRP price is set to $399 or 319E.

Parrot LS-GPS