AR MOBILE CORNER

The i-mate JAQ is the first device from i-mate that is not a rebranded OEM product from HTC. Moving away from the successful partnership that has worked so well in the past was a bold move. The i-mate JAQ was designed and is built by Inventec, and it is obvious upon first inspection that it was not made with beauty in mind. Great looks is not what the JAQ is all about though. CEO of i-mate Jim Morrison even tells a story of the birth of the JAQ that involved an exec from a large company asking for an "ugly" QWERTY device that his employees wouldn't be likely to take with them outside of business hours, and as such would be less likely to lose the device. With that story in mind, you can see that i-mate targeting the device at business users exclusively, and it is with that in mind that we undertake this review.

The i-mate JAQ is a PDA phone, not a smartphone, and as such runs Windows Mobile 5.0 Pocket PC Edition (with AKU 2.5) and has a touchscreen. Do not expect to use the touchscreen as an input method though, as the focus is clearly on the QWERTY keypad. Thankfully, most of the device is usable without reaching for the stylus.