A whole range of Dell Mini 3 smartphones now official, sort of

After giving up their PocketPC business several years ago Dell are ready for a come back but this time they will try to conquer a much wider field. Now it's as official as it gets: Dell have just confirmed their plans to produce a range of smartphones under the brand name Dell Mini 3. Judging on Dell's netbooks naming convention, which takes after the screen size, it's a good guess that the new Dell smartphones will all have their sreens around 3 inches.

And when it comes to Dell future smartphones, we have to resort to guessing, as the company did not announce any hardware specs whatsoever. Those will be announced "...when devices are available in stores." Dell marketing obviously can't get over their computer marketing strategies (much like Acer and their newbie attempts, as well).

Anyway, rumors on Dell smartphones have been circulating for the past 2 years or so and a few months back the Dell Mini 3i was even sighted during an event organized by China Mobile. Back then Dell called it only "a proof of concept" but today it just can't get any more real than that.

The first company across the globe to get the Dell Mini 3 is world's largest mobile operator, namely China Mobile. Their version of Dell Mini 3 will run the OPhone OS (basically that's the well-known Android OS with some minor customizations) and is expected to become available sometime this month.

Meet the Dell Mini 3

The Chinese version however won't have 3G and Wi-Fi. The first 3G-enabled Dell Mini 3 will be offered in the Claro network in Brazil. If you don't live on the American continent, chances are you might have never heard of Claro, but they are actually part of America Móvil, the largest mobile phone network in America. The Dell Mini 3 will be available in Claro by the end of the year.

So as it turns out, Dell Mini 3 is actually a name for full range of devices sold in different configurations and OS options. Unfortunately, Dell refused to unveil more information on the exact specifications. All we know is that they will all feature touchscreens and will be designed around the Android OS. The rest of the technical details will be announced by the time of the official market launch of the Dell Mini 3 smartphones. Pricing remains unknown as well.

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