Click to View

Tomorrow, AT&T will launch its first Motorola Q model, the Q9h, which will also be the first Q smartphone available from a GSM carrier in the U.S. Previously, only operators that used CDMA technology, like Verizon Wireless and Sprint Nextel, carried this device.

The Q9h is very similar to the Q9m, Verizon's upgrade to the original Q model. And, as with all previous Qs, the Q9h sports a BlackBerry-like tablet shape with a 240 x 320 pixel (QVGA) resolution display on top and a QWERTY thumb-keyboard on the bottom.

Unlike Verizon's latest Q model, however, you can use AT&T's in many countries outside the U.S. for both voice and data calls. It also supports AT&T's UTMS/HSDPA 3G network for data transfers up to 3.6Mbps, but only slower 2.5G EDGE technology outside this country.

Additional features include integrated GPS to support location-based services (i.e. turn-by-turn voice and on-screen driving directions, 3-D moving maps and traffic alerts from TeleNav, a subscription service), 2.0-megapixel camera for picture and video, and a microSD slot to greatly expand upon the Q9h's internal memory.

As a Windows Mobile 6 Standard-run smartphone, the Q9h's screen isn't touch. It offers more advanced mobile office features than Microsoft delivers through the bundling of DataViz's Documents to Go.

Windows Mobile 6 delivers the ability to view e-mail messages in their original rich HTML format with live links to Web and Microsoft Office SharePoint sites, which means that text and images are displayed as they would be on a Windows PC.

There's also support for Good Mobile Messaging 5 and Microsoft's Direct Push Technology for BlackBerry-like push e-mail delivery and automatic synchronization of Outlook calendars, tasks and contacts in an Exchange environment, in addition to Redmond's new System Center Mobile Device Manager, which will arrive around the time the mobile management security and access server product ships during the second quarter of next year.

Additional messaging options include AT&T's Xpress Mail push e-mail service and support for POP3/IMAP4 mob-e-mail clients, SMS and MMS, and AOL, MSN and Yahoo! instant messaging.

The Q Q9h also comes preloaded with AT&T Mobile Music, AT&T's CV video, and MobiTV services, all through AT&T's MEdia Net platform.

AT&T will sell the Q9h for $200. Unlimited monthly data plans, which include corporate e-mail, are $44.99 a month with a voice contract. Personal data plans, which include personal e-mail, begin at $29.99 a month for 20MB of data. AT&T also offers an international data plan for those who travel outside the country a lot.

The new Q compliments AT&T's Samsung BlackJack, a very similar smartphone. It is rumored AT&T will soon introduce a follow up to that device, the aptly named BlackJack II, before the end of the year.