Dell Smoke deals & review

Run on the so-called Android Froyo 2.1 OS, the Dell Smoke is due for release in Q2 2011. But in the meantime, Dell is keen to tempt you with its fantastic looks and, in the company’s own words – “non-conforming style”.

Tall and sleek, the Dell Smoke resembles a BlackBerry as it is a hybrid of a touchscreen smartphone and a full QWERTY smartphone. It is like a longer, more powerful Pixi handset with a good-sized screen (2.8 inch).

Launched together with four other handsets – Flash, Thunder, Lightning, Aero – the Dell Smoke is pitched somewhere in the middle with the Flash phone, which also runs on Android Froyo. However, as far as we can tell this is no ordinary smartphone – aimed at the business user (hence the BlackBerry QWERTY design) the Smoke comes with a host of apps, features and functionality.

To aid you with work stuff, the Dell Smoke comes with Bluetooth; active noise cancellation with a dedicated microphone for seamless calls; Google Maps and a digital compass to help you get to meetings on time; and a document viewer. To please your sociable side, there is social networking integration which likely includes streaming all your communication into the one easy-to-view-and-reply place, as well as apps for Google Talk, Picasa and YouTube.

Limited internal details have been confirmed but there is a 5-megapixel camera onboard and capacity for up to 32GB memory via a microSD card.

The Dell Smoke looks impressive and on paper looks like a strong addition to the business smartphone market. Once we know more, we’ll let you know so be sure to check back soon.