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Add 8GB of Storage to Your Cell Phone

Posted by ScuttleMonkey on Wed Feb 22, 2006 01:19 PM
from the sticky-storage dept.
Handhelds Hardware
gd writes "MobileTechNews is reporting that a company called US modular has put out a device that taps into your existing mobile phones microSD or Tflash slot to add up to 8GB of storage. The Stik&Stor adds a memory chip to the back side of the battery pack and only costs $199 to add 8GB to your music phone."
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  • I see trouble ahead (Score:5, Insightful)

    by mustafap (452510) on Wednesday February 22 2006, @01:24PM (#14778089)
    Tied up in DRM, all this memory kicking around is going to cause problems.

    "Where did I put that Elton John Album? On my IPod? No... On my mobile? No... On my works mobile? No... On my PC? No... On my IPAQ? No... oh bugger it, I'll just buy another electronic copy."

    Glad I stuck with LP's

    • Re:I see trouble ahead (Score:5, Funny)

      by 88NoSoup4U88 (721233) on Wednesday February 22 2006, @01:39PM (#14778223) Homepage
      I can't refrain from a chuckle imagining you in the morning commute, dragging along your recordplayer and soundsystem, and listening to some good morning tunes.

      I don't see your problem though: Most mobile phones use flashcards for their storage, and until now I have not yet encountered one which was protected against using any of my images/sounds/music/videos.

  • Lame (Score:2, Insightful)

    by grub (11606)

    Most people get their cell phones cheap (or free) on various plans because people are CHEAP. they won't want to spend a couple of hundred bucks for extra memory when they likely already have an MP3 player, PDA, etc.

    This thing will fail miserably.

    • You're full of it. (Score:5, Insightful)

      by brunes69 (86786) <[slashdot] [at] [keirstead.org]> on Wednesday February 22 2006, @01:31PM (#14778149) Homepage
      I also already have a toaster and an oven. That doesn't mean there's not a market for toaster ovens.

      People don't want to carry 15 different devices when one can do the job of all good enough. Why is it some /.'ers can't understand that?

      My V635 is a perfectly capable MP3 player and also a very decent phone. Why should I have to carry around a whole other device to listen to a bit of music one in awhile. Simmilarly, the 1.3 MP camera is "good enough" for what I use it for, quick snapshots.

      • My V635 is a perfectly capable MP3 player and also a very decent phone.

        My a950 is a perfectly capable camera (for snapshots) and a decent phone, but I'll be damned if I can figure out why I'd want to pay even more just to be able to use the MP3 player capabilities. No, they don't bundle the cable, no I'm not paying airtime + >$1 per song to download them. It's stupid enough that the phone doesn't include any normal human being type ringtones.

        • I can guarentee you if you bought it stock or from a 3rd party you'd have the cable and software to transfer whatever the hell you want.

          And my phone (and all the ones this thing is for) has a removeable transflash card I can just plug in my PC. Also my phone came with the cable - and I can set it so that when I plug it into the PC it shows up as a USB flash drive.

          • I can set it so that when I plug it into the PC it shows up as a USB flash drive.

            Yeah. That's how I transferred the MP3's from the lifedrive into the transflash card. I would have used my PC except my PC doesn't currently have an SD slot. As for the software, yeah, I have a copy of Media Player 10 too. Hello? The MP3's weren't recognized by the phone, and I don't think Verizon was sitting there saying "nope, we didn't authorize these".

    • What kind of LOSER would want to watch porn on an inch-and-a-half screen? Other than, of course, those majestic shitheads who proclaim loudly and consistently that they love porn and then expect me to be impressed because they're rebelling against societal acceptability.
    • Or in this case, microporn. It seems like viewing porn on a 1" screen would take away most of the fun, since all the naughty bits would only be a few pixels wide. However the sounds might be useful, especially on crowded buses (don't sit next to me with your screaming kids!) or in boring meetings (I am so bored, fire me right now!).

  • Microdrives for 4/8GB (Score:3, Interesting)

    by SlashdotOgre (739181) on Wednesday February 22 2006, @01:28PM (#14778124) Journal
    I'd be a bit hesitant to add a microdrive to my cell phone. I'm a fairly careful person, but I tend to keep phones for roughly 2 years (for Verizon's New Every 2 Program), and my phone tends to have fallen at least a handful of times over that period. I've already heard stories of people with Palm LifeDrives which failed from less.

  • How big ? (Score:2, Interesting)

    by karvind (833059)
    From the article I couldn't guess the size of the 8GB microdrive. Anyone has any idea ? One from Lacie [lacie.com] is rather big to be tagged along with a cellphone.

  • Nice! (Score:4, Funny)

    by xero9 (810991) * on Wednesday February 22 2006, @01:31PM (#14778151)
    Nice! Now I can have 8GB of storage for all my phone numbers! Oh wait, that already fits on my 32k SIM. Nevermind.
    • Since my phone can contain 1GB, I really enjoy not having to bring along my MP3 player anymore: It's one of the few extras I -really- use on my phone (and one, imo that makes sense).

  • But it adds an ugly 'wart' on your phone (Score:3, Insightful)

    by TeeJS (618313) on Wednesday February 22 2006, @01:32PM (#14778162) Homepage
    I think it's a great idea in concept, but the bump it adds to your phone would be seriously annoying. I'm very happy with a Treo 650 w/ 4GB SD card. If you're a serious user of data on your phone, why wouldn't you buy one with real expandability built in?

    The picture in the article does not truly represent how big the patch is - a better example is on the mfr's page here [usmodular.com]

    • If that blue ribbon on the side is the connector cable... you're going to tear it or pinch it or somehow cut that connection.

      Just looking at that picture makes me think that they would have been better off designing a new battery cover & building their memory card into the cover*.

      It would solve a lot of the aesthetic issues and would give you a more durable design. It may or may not still be a bit ugly, but IMHO it would be a much more elegant solution.

      *with the memory card being removable of course
  • 8 Gig - Now I can run ....

    [wait for it...]

    ...

    Windows Vista !!

    Bill Gates will be so pleased.

  • hrm (Score:3, Funny)

    by flyingsquid (813711) on Wednesday February 22 2006, @01:35PM (#14778195)
    Well a byte will store two digits or one letter. So if we need a 10 digit number that's five bytes, then we'll be generous and leave 35 characters for first and last name. That would give us 40 bytes for each phone # and name... allowing you to store two hundred million phone numbers. Wow, I've gotta run out and get me one of these!

    Sigh. Now if only I had someone to call.

    • To disprove your assumption that 1 byte == 2 digits, I only need to point to 0xFF which is 255, clearly 3 decimal digits.

      However, you are right, a 10 digit phone number would use 5 bytes.. beginner's luck, I suppose.

  • WHY? (Score:4, Insightful)

    by TheSkepticalOptimist (898384) on Wednesday February 22 2006, @01:40PM (#14778234)
    I think that the cell phone market has it all wrong if they are aiming to add massive amounts of storage to a cell phone.

    If I was a supposed industry leader in the cell phone market, I would announce that my phones would NEVER have more then a few megs of storage in them. Here is why!

    Cell phones are ALL ABOUT SUBSCRIPTION and PAY PER USE services. The only reason why you have a camera on your cell phone is so you either pay a monthly service charge to allow x number of pictures/kilobytes to be transmitted for free, OR you pay $.10 - $.20 for each picture sent. Same with text messaging, same with video on a cell phone, same with music on a cell phone. These features are not added to benefit mankind, but to drive up your cell phone bills and make the phone companies more money.

    I.e. the cellphone is a money making device. It makes money from its very existence, you can't use or even have a cell phone without spending money.

    This is unlike mp3 players, PDA's, computers, etc, where you buy the device, it comes with X amount of storage, and you fill the device with hopefully legal content that you can listen or watch at your convenience without paying a dime extra.

    So, when someone decides to turn a cellphone into a ubiquitous multimedia player with ample storage, why should ANY cell phone maker rush to implement these feature? Why should a cellphone company allow the user to store gigabytes of high resolution pictures so they can return home to their PC and download the pictures FOR FREE to their computer. Why should a cellphone company allow people to listen to hours of music or watch hours of video FOR FREE. Why should a cellphone company allow ANY feature to be used for free on a cellphone.

    Instead, the future of cellphone multimedia lies squarely in subscription services. You can stream music from the cellphone network, FOR A PRICE. Stream pictures taken to an online storage facility, FOR A PRICE. Stream video and data services FOR A PRICE. Even for those people that want to buy a song online with a cellphone, buying the music only puts the song into some online storage container that is streamed to your cellphone, for a price of course.

    I can't see cellphone companies embracing technology that effectively ruins their subscription based market. Allowing users to store gigabytes of pictures, music, video, or text might get people to buy the cell phone, but cellular service providers won't want to carry a phone that doesn't force the end user to buy into some subscription or pay-per-use service.

    Unlike digital multimedia players, cell phones are tied to a network. Given sufficient bandwidth, constant "always-on" music and video and data streaming should be possible, if for a price. I think cell companies are going to want to implement these subscription based features rather then slapping 8gb of hard drive into a cellphone so the end user doesn't spend a dime on ring tones, games, music, video, and other subscription services because they can find content on bit torrent or eDonkey.

    In the end, perhaps only PDA based cellphones will get the boost in storage, but I can't see the average cell phone coming with gigabytes of storage, it just doesn't make sense.

    • So, when someone decides to turn a cellphone into a ubiquitous multimedia player with ample storage, why should ANY cell phone maker rush to implement these feature? Why should a cellphone company allow the user to store gigabytes of high resolution pictures so they can return home to their PC and download the pictures FOR FREE to their computer. Why should a cellphone company allow people to listen to hours of music or watch hours of video FOR FREE. Why should a cellphone company allow ANY feature to be u

    • Re:WHY? (Score:4, Insightful)

      by vertinox (846076) on Wednesday February 22 2006, @02:02PM (#14778437)
      I can't see cellphone companies embracing technology that effectively ruins their subscription based market. Allowing users to store gigabytes of pictures, music, video, or text might get people to buy the cell phone, but cellular service providers won't want to carry a phone that doesn't force the end user to buy into some subscription or pay-per-use service.

      Last I checked, my manufacture of my cell phone is not the same as my cell phone service provider. Sure, it says SprintPCS on the phone, but it's just painted on by Toshiba.

      Does Toshiba cell phone service? Not to my knowledge. Do they make money me directly when I download ring tones? Not directly. The only money they made is when I paid $50 for the phone and Sprint gave them a rebte cut of about $150 when I signed a two year contract.

      Even T-Mobile and Verizon do not make their phones. You've got Erikson, Nokia, Samsung, Keyocera, and various other companies who make the phones. They make the hard ware and in theory you can get a branded phone to work on another service provider if you get the correct ID car put it in. (not that they are going to give you hell about it and the first 3 sales reps you talk to know nothing about this but they can do it)

      So... Sure the cell phone makers make money by selling cheap ass phones to the providers who in turn give money directly to the manufactures, but the cell phone makers are competing with each other and in order to remain competative they are having to put more features on their phones.

      The providers may not like and ask if they can make it so you have to go through them to get content out of the box, but there are ways of transfering content to and from your cell phone through 3rd party sources.

      In fact, with the introduction of VoIP wifi phones, I'd say we'll stop seeing content lock in as hard core as it is now.

    • Cell phones are ALL ABOUT SUBSCRIPTION and PAY PER USE services. The only reason why you have a camera on your cell phone is so you either pay a monthly service charge to allow x number of pictures/kilobytes to be transmitted for free, OR you pay $.10 - $.20 for each picture sent. Same with text messaging, same with video on a cell phone, same with music on a cell phone. These features are not added to benefit mankind, but to drive up your cell phone bills and make the phone companies more money.

      You're c

    • If I was a supposed industry leader in the cell phone market, I would announce that my phones would NEVER have more then a few megs of storage in them. Here is why! Cell phones are ALL ABOUT SUBSCRIPTION and PAY PER USE services.

      And as a customer in the cell phone market (no hypotheticals required), I get sick of paying bills, and will buy a cellphone with some storage space so I can just copy over my music once and for all.

      I have they money, you (as a hypothetical player in the cell phone market) wan

  • Backwards (Score:5, Insightful)

    by Chairboy (88841) on Wednesday February 22 2006, @01:50PM (#14778326) Homepage
    The utility of having this much space on your phone isn't just storing MP3s, videos, and whatnot. The real potential is in what this means you can create.

    I'd like to have my phone be a constant or voice activated recorder. I have my phone on me at all times, it has a microphone, why not have it provide me a 'cockpit voice recorder' of sorts for life? No more guessing exactly what my wife told me to do, or having to write down phone numbers.

    Generation 1, your phone just records MP3s of life as it happens to you. If anything interesting happens during the day, you save the file on your computer.

    Generation 2, it meta overlays GPS data and is automatically stored as part of your 'diary'. You store it in an encrypted location so it can't be used against you unless you choose to release it, and you have a perfect alibi showing what you said and where you were.

    Generation 3, combine voice processing to index everything spoken around you into a searchable form, recognize phone numbers, voices, etc, and create a full digital assistant. At some point around here, it can also store a digital video feed from any cameras you or your personal equipment might have that's synchronized with everything.

    Generation 4, it hunts down Sarah Conner.

    Everytime someone puts a bunch of storage into something, someone else says "what's the use?" And human nature being what it is, some other asshole decides to invent something cool to use that storage/capabillity for just so they can give the finger to the first person.
    • No more guessing exactly what my wife told me to do...

      Oh man I so badly want one of these now. Now I will have PROOF that she didn't ask me to take out the trash two hours ago.

      Sadly she will now have proof of all the stupid crap that I have blurted out , and can now nag me about it without even saying anything by playing it over and over.

    • Or just backup IMDB to your phone and OWN the Kevin Bacon arguments

    • I'd like to have my phone be a constant or voice activated recorder.

      Not constant (it doesn't have the memory for that), probably not voice activated (unless you meant 'activated via a voice command'), but my cell already does voice recording.

      My mp3 player does voice-activated recording though.

    • At 96kbit/sec, 8gb (67,108,864 kbits) would net you about 699,051 seconds of recording.

      That's eight days of recorded audio.

      Relatedly: 86,400 seconds in a day * 96kbit/sec = 8,294,400 kbits per day, or 0.988769531 gigabytes per day.

      Definitely within the realm of feasibility.

  • Vaporware Indicator: Falsified images (Score:5, Interesting)

    by Garridan (597129) on Wednesday February 22 2006, @01:51PM (#14778340)
    Look at the shadows & bright spots on the "memory chip" and the cell phone. They don't line up.

    If this thing is real, why'd they have to photoshop an image of it?
    • My suspicions are aroused by the fact that they're starting off on 8GB. To demonstrate that it is an effective storage technique, I'd expect them to come out with a more profitable-per-byte lower capacity model, such as a $120 4GB one, possibly even less.

  • Looks Fragile (Score:3, Insightful)

    by youngerpants (255314) on Wednesday February 22 2006, @01:52PM (#14778346)
    OK, I actually quite like this idea. I've had my P900 for a few years now as I cant really see the point of giving up a phone that does everything for me (phone, browser, email, ssh ferchristsakes). A boost in storage for MP3's sounds like a great idea.


    However, just look at the flimsy ribbon connecting it, imagine the poor quality adhesive that will rip the bugger off when my phone is in the same pocket as my keys. Nah, I'll wait until they get it out of prototype phase.

  • Radical! (Score:4, Funny)

    by fm6 (162816) on Wednesday February 22 2006, @01:59PM (#14778415) Homepage Journal
    A memory card in a memory slot!

  • how much usable, how reliable (Score:3, Interesting)

    by fermion (181285) on Wednesday February 22 2006, @02:23PM (#14778630) Homepage Journal
    This reminds of the old MS DOS 3.1 days, when we could use all sorts of tricks to upgrade to more memory, but wheather wwe could use it at a particular time was dependent upon the phase of the moon, the distribution of the electrons, or whatever. One would have all the formats, all the drivers, and hope for the best.

    It seems that this might be the same case. First, the connection seems a bit fragile. Second, the current specificatins for some motoralo phone already include a memeory slot, but the maximum memory is listed at 256MB even though the current maximum memory module is 512K. This indicates that phones may have a less than GB limit, perhpas they do not include 32 bit addressing.

    • Oh man, FLASHBACK, I clearly remember the dark days of DOS memory managers. I was working support at the time, and I remember one of the first questions to ask was what memory manager they were using and how many drivers were loaded into low mem. What a f-ing nightmare. I was so happy when NT came out because that BS was finally going to go away forever. Now, I can just imagine mem mgrs coming full circle and coming back for a visit ... on cell phones. I guess the form factor will always limit the expandabi
    • I have one of the listed phones (V635) that takes transflash, and I can play any MP3 in the player, use any MP3 as a ringtone, re-encode any video I want to .3gp format in mplayer and upload it - including full movies. I have re-encoded whole DVDs into 20 MB .3gp files and watched them on my phone while on the bus.

      There is no DRM issue whatsoever. You can plug a transflash card into any SD reader to download or upload whatever the hell you want on it. It's no different than CF or SD or XD or any other memory card, there is no DRM involved.

      The parent poster is pretty ignorant to this technology. Personally I can't wait to get one of these - the highest storage transflash card right now (I am aware of) is only 512 MB. 8GB would rock.

      • Re:WTF? Do you own one of these phones? Obviously (Score:4, Interesting)

        by elmegil (12001) * on Wednesday February 22 2006, @01:35PM (#14778193) Homepage Journal
        So I have a question about this whole mess, having recently gotten a TF capable phone. I put a new TF card into my phone, then took it out, put it in the SD adapter, put it in my lifedrive, copied two MP3's to the "music" folder that my phone had created, and put it back into my phone.

        Those were the "any" MP3's you refer to above.

        They aren't seen by my phone. So clearly, your claims of technical ignorance and that "any" phone can play "any" MP3 are far overblown.

        Obviously, there probably needs to be some other additional update to the phone for MP3's, but since Samsung doesn't see fit to include a USB cable with their phone, and Verizon does see fit to neuter the Bluetooth capabilities of all their phones, I'm not in a position to do it "the right way" to find out how to do it "my way".

        Am I bitching about Verizon? Not really. This is a CELLPHONE for me, not an MP3 player, not anything else. And from that perspective, Verizon is the best of my options where I am at. But I was curious, and find it somewhat ironic that they market all the amazing capabilities of these phones when in fact they *aren't* as simple as you want to claim, much less how they market them. Unless of course you *like* paying three times for your music.

    • Next you want a game console just to play games? Or a TV Set jut for watching TV? Or a stereo just for listening to music? Or a computer just for ... erh, bad example.

      The world's moving towards "multi functional", baby! How else could you sell those NEW and IMPROVED goodies on various items.

      Buy the new cell, it now has a camera! No, buy this, it has an MP3 player! Buy this console, you can watch videos on it, not only play!

      If you made a cell that just, well, makes calls, how do you want to market that? You
      • Next PSP generation will be able to make phone calls, I'm sure!

        I think you mispelled Nokia N-Gage.
      • Next PSP generation will be able to make phone calls, I'm sure!

        Yes, and the PSP phone will have:

        1. a cost that's twice as much as the other cell phones
        2. Downloadable games, at $29.95 each.
        3. A proprietary memory card slot that won't have readers/writers available for it
        4. A compilcated sync system where you have to give funny names to upload video files, ringtones
        5. firmware upgrades every 2 months to prevent homebrewing
        6. Dial a wrong number? You just bricked your psp-phone.
    • Dumb terminals? Given that you can stick more and more powerful chips in smaller and smaller devices - with less electrical consumption, it would seem the opposite. Right now, a very good many computing devices are so small that the largest impediment is the *input* - trying to type into the things.

      steve

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