BARCELONA, Spain - Toshiba announced one single phone at the Mobile World Congress. The TG01 represents a different strategy than the previous one, which seemed to focus mostly on business users.

The new device is based on a full-touchscreen design, with few buttons on the bottom of the display. It runs on Microsoft Windows Mobile 6.1 Professional, with support for 6.5. The user interface is customized by Toshiba, and there is no indication whether Toshiba will use its own Toshiba Touch UI interface when Windows Mobile 6.5 arrives, but it is likely to do so.

The phone's highlight, besides its enormous display, is the new Qualcomm Snapdragon QSD2850 processor, which runs at an impressive 1GHz, that makes the TG01 the fastest phone in the market. The new processor platform is tweaked for mobile phones in such a way, that Toshiba is confident that its 1000mAh battery will support it for up to five hours of talk time. The processor will be an attraction for multimedia power users and business users.

The Toshiba TG01 has a 4.1" resistive touchscreen display with 480x800 pixels of resolution. Resistive displays aren't as responsive to finger operation, but Windows Mobile does not support capacitive ones. The display is based on the Toshiba LCD TV Regza, ensuring a high quality image, even though the screen is not based on vivid AMOLED displays, such as the Samsung Omnia HD, for example.

The phone has 512MB of ROM, 256MB of RAM, and a microSD memory card slot for memory expansion.

Usual connectivity solutions such as HSDPA, HSUPA, Wi-Fi, Bluetooth, A-GPS, and USB 2.0, are also present.

The device possesses a 3.2 megapixel camera with autofocus, but no flash, or additional technologies such as geo-tagging. The camera is certainly not one of the main points of the TG01.

In order to cater to both business and multimedia users, the TG01 brings Pocket Office and Internet Explorer 6 Mobile pre-installed, as well as MP3 support, and Facebook and YouTube applications.

The Toshiba TG01 is and feels enormous in the hand. It measures 129 x 70 x 9.9mm, against the Sony Ericsson Idou, which measures 111 x 54 x 15mm. The main reason for this out-of-the-ordinary size is undoubtedly the large 4.1" display. The fact that the TG01 is 9.9" thin doesn't actually change things, and the size factor will surely make consumers think twice about buying the phone or not.

In terms of weight, the 129g of the phone are well distributed, and do not deteriorate the build quality and experience. The build quality is supposed to be excellent, as the TG01 is sitting on a magnesium alloy casing.

Below the display, the home key, and back key are located. In the middle of the two, there is a zoom bar, a new feature that the HTC Touch Diamond2, and the Nokia 6710 also include. Above the display there is a secondary camera for video calls, and an ear speaker.

The left side of the phone contains a thin power button, and a volume rocker. Toshiba's strategy - to be different from everyone else - might not be very attractive, considering that we rarely see a volume button on the bottom half of the phone's lateral section.

The keys, on the left and right side of the phone, are sitting on a silver metal plate which surrounds the phone, contrasting with the phone's black colour. The phone also comes in a white colour, but there was no unit available for us to photograph.

The right side of the phone has a camera shutter button, a memory card slot, and possibly the microUSB port. We were not able to test the structure of the memory card slot.

The bottom and top parts of the phone were left untouched by Toshiba.

The back part of the phone contains the loud speaker, an embossed brand name, and the small camera sensor.

The user interface of the TG01 is made by Toshiba, although only on the surface, as menus are still somewhat based on Windows Mobile's actual user interface. This could be because the phone is at an early stage.

The interface is based on three customizable stripes. The user can add icons and widgets to it. Once the user enters the menu, the Windows Mobile interface is back.

A tap sensor and an accelerometer (motion sensor) are built-in. A shake invokes the dialler by default, but in can be customized to any other function. The motion sensor is also used to enable auto-rotation on the system, and to control navigation on a web page.

A full screen keyboard is available for typing, instead of a small portrait one. As the display is quite large, the finger cannot reach everywhere, therefore a virtual touchpad and a virtual d-pad appear on the screen when necessary.

The Toshiba TG01 is to release in Asia, Europe, and US by Summer 2009. More unspecified colours are scheduled to release for Asia.

As said previously, the size constraint will be an issue for consumers looking for a stylish device. Power users and business ones will be attracted towards phones with the best user interface, even though the 1GHz processor is quite tempting to have. If Toshiba makes sure its user interface is predominant throughout the software, it does stand a chance in the market.