Hmm, I might be described as obsessive, but all the things that are possible in the mobile device world are fodder for my intensely overpowering mental illness. Why is it so? Why am I driven to distraction. by all of this possible shiny new, not really existent yet, newness? 

As an Eee and long time Axim user, the latter two devices, fascinate me, and the iPhone Nano, makes more and more sense every day, not a media player replacement, a dedicated phone, PDA, that takes all the best from the iPhone, and makes it really pocketable. You can all berate me now, but I think the iPhone Nano would be a good thing, fit in my pocket better.

So little mister reads more RSS feeds than anyone else in the world, has a rumour fest for you today, Why, “if they post it I’ll read it”, is that a warped quote from a movie?

Google and Android seem to have bypassed CES this year, and lot’s of people have  commented on it, but that doesn’t mean that manufacturers are not going with the OS. most of us Windows mobile, Symbian, iPhone users can’t really appreciate the power of Android. That doesn’t refer to the OS as such, or the HTC G1, it refers to the fact that any device manufacturer can port the OS to their device, for an outlay of…No Coin What So Ever. Hoopey Doopey, does that idea not tend to lend itself to a budget device, 0r a high powered reasonably priced device, that could be a market winner?

Let’s face it, the least outlay, the more profit, the better liked and marketed a device will be, by any manufacturer or distributor. We’re talking dollars now!

So where does my beloved Axim come into this? Giga Om founder Om Malik recently interviewed Michael Dell, with some astounding responses, in terms of a Dell converged device, and as we know, the Dell standalone PDA is not dead, but buried.

Om: Any plans for mobile phones or smartphones?

Dell: We are certainly looking at the whole smartphone category, but I wouldn’t expect anything anytime soon.

Om: With the emergence of Google’s Android, and with Symbian OS and Microsoft Mobile already on the market, do you think that makes it easier for Dell to get into the phone business?

Dell: What you’ve got [are] industry-standard platforms upon which applications are being built and ecosystems are being created, and that kind of building-block architecture gives us all sorts of opportunities.

Om: You can be a big game-changer in this market, right? You can decide to work with Android or Symbian. Is there a desire on your part to work with one over the other?

Dell: We’re not ready to publicly disclose our plans there…we’re kind of working on that.

That’s pretty vague, but others are reading things into it, this seems like pure rumour baiting to me, but what would I know? Although, this has generated all sorts of info about an axim phone.

Another rumour that I actually think might pan out, is the idea of a budget Asus phone, based on the Eee philosophy. If you can produce umpteen million different models of a PC that are reasonably priced, and fulfil almost all of the demands of most of the online community, that doesn’t want to do graphic editing, you might think the company could continue their mobile range, with their low priced ethos intact.

Asus head Jonney Shih told the Times’ Saul Hansell that the forthcoming Eee Phone will be integral for controlling a home full of innovative Asus gear–from Eee Top touchscreen PCs to the company’s crazy new PC-in-a-keyboard home theatre machine that wowed us at CES. It doesn’t look like Saul pressed him on Android, but that has been the flavour of the rumours so far, and if you’re going to do a modern smartphone on the cheap these days, Android’s zero licensing fees probably make it the way to go. Look for it in the first half of this year, sayeth the rumours. [NYTimes]

The iPhone Nano, doesn’t make much sense if you think about the device as a media player, lets think outside the box for a moment, it’s a PDA! If you are going to use an iPhone as a PDA/phone/organiser you don’t need the screensize, the iPhone is targeted at mobile entertainment. Somehow I think an iPhone Nano would deliver for the “PDA” crowd. You might have to be in China to get it though!

There’s a theory that the real iPhone Nano is merely the knock-off versions sold in markets in China and other places in Asia, which has proven so popular that demand has grown for cases. But Brian Marshal of Broadpoint AmTech expects Apple to launch such a device at some point this year, and thinks Asia might be the first place it arrives

In any case, there’s lot’s out there that inspires speculation!

iPhone/Cnet

Asus Eee Phone

Dell