Add 8GB of Storage to Your Cell Phone

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."

Comments

I see trouble ahead

[mustafap]

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

Lame

[grub]

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.

[brunes69]

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.

But it adds an ugly 'wart' on your phone

[TeeJS]

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

WHY?

[TheSkepticalOptimist]

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.

Re:WHY?

[vertinox]

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.

Backwards

[Chairboy]

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.

Looks Fragile

[youngerpants]

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.

Actually a great idea! - The global phone book.

[Anonymous Coward]

Well, I think you've hit on a great idea, a global - built in - phone book.

Forget calling information, when you could store all the white pages of all major US cities,
and even add in the yellow page ads to display on the little color screen...

Great Idea!