Wednesday, February 21, 2007
Dell Axim R.I.P...For Real This Time?
Posted by Jason Dunn in "THOUGHT" @ 06:15 PM
There have been quite a few rumours circulating about the fate of the Dell Axim over the past 12 months, but none have even been confirmed by Dell. Chris Leckness over at Mobility Site has posted an update that seems credible:
"I just got off the phone with an internal Dell PR employee. I asked the questions we all wanted to know and got the answers we didn't want to here. To answer the Dell Phone rumor I just posted on, Dell has no immediate plans to launch a Dell Branded Phone. They do carry unlocked phones, PDAs, and other consumer electronics from hand picked top of the line companies though. The hiring of the Motorola Exec was announced officially last week...The rumors circulating about the a Dell Portable Gaming system had already been squashed, so that leaves only two questions unanswered...1. Is Dell working on Tablet PC? I didn't ask this, I forgot, but I still think this is going to happen personally. 2. What about the Dell Axim? Bad news here. The rumor I posted about last week is the verdict. Once the current Dell Axim offerings are gone, they are gone. This is the 1st time in the last year that I was able to get an official response related to the Dell Axim line of handhelds."
The entire industry is moving toward phone-based devices, which we all knew, and Dell doesn't seem to want to step into that space. I can't blame them - they know what a nightmare dealing with the big carriers can be, and if they can't make money selling non-phone Axim devices, they'll just jettison the whole thing. That's what they did with their line of MP3 players, so it's not surprising to see history repeat itself. I'll mourn the loss though - the Axim line was always reasonably priced, and offered great hardware. The X51v is still one of the nicest pure-PDA style devices ever made. You can guess what this means for Windows Mobile 6 upgrades though...not going to happen (in my opinion at least).
"I just got off the phone with an internal Dell PR employee. I asked the questions we all wanted to know and got the answers we didn't want to here. To answer the Dell Phone rumor I just posted on, Dell has no immediate plans to launch a Dell Branded Phone. They do carry unlocked phones, PDAs, and other consumer electronics from hand picked top of the line companies though. The hiring of the Motorola Exec was announced officially last week...The rumors circulating about the a Dell Portable Gaming system had already been squashed, so that leaves only two questions unanswered...1. Is Dell working on Tablet PC? I didn't ask this, I forgot, but I still think this is going to happen personally. 2. What about the Dell Axim? Bad news here. The rumor I posted about last week is the verdict. Once the current Dell Axim offerings are gone, they are gone. This is the 1st time in the last year that I was able to get an official response related to the Dell Axim line of handhelds."
The entire industry is moving toward phone-based devices, which we all knew, and Dell doesn't seem to want to step into that space. I can't blame them - they know what a nightmare dealing with the big carriers can be, and if they can't make money selling non-phone Axim devices, they'll just jettison the whole thing. That's what they did with their line of MP3 players, so it's not surprising to see history repeat itself. I'll mourn the loss though - the Axim line was always reasonably priced, and offered great hardware. The X51v is still one of the nicest pure-PDA style devices ever made. You can guess what this means for Windows Mobile 6 upgrades though...not going to happen (in my opinion at least).
