Sprint phone boosts data capacity

Sprint will begin selling next month the Vision Smart Device PPC-6601, a combination cell phone and Pocket PC device with a slide-out keyboard, Microsoft Windows Mobile 2003 software and embedded Bluetooth technology, the company announced at the CTIA Wireless IT & Entertainment show.

The device, which will be marketed by Audiovox, costs $529 with a one-year contract, or $479 with a two-year contract. It does not have a camera. A version with a camera will be available later this year, a Sprint representative said. The PPC-6601 uses an Intel XScale 400 MHz processor, offers 128 MB of memory and has the most capacity of any Sprint wireless device, according to the company.