Surfing with the Motorola A3100

The Moto Surf A3100 is a Windows Mobile smartphone with a touch screen.

Kent German Former senior managing editor / features

Kent was a senior managing editor at CNET News. A veteran of CNET since 2003, he reviewed the first iPhone and worked in both the London and San Francisco offices. When not working, he's planning his next vacation, walking his dog or watching planes land at the airport (yes, really).

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Kent German

Jan. 23, 2009 1:01 p.m. PT

The Motorola Surf is a tablet device with a phone. Motorola

Motorola got a jump start on CES when it announced its new crop of phones two days before the show opens. The most high-end of the bunch is the new Surf A3100 smartphone, which offers an expansive touch screen and support for Windows Mobile 6.1. Starting Thursday in Las Vegas, it will join the Earth-friendly Renew W233 and the rugged Tundra VA76r at Moto's booth on the show floor.

Sporting a sleek, attractive design with rounded edges and chrome detailing, the Surf offers three ways for users to interact with it. They can use a stylus, a trackball, or their finger. Features on the quad-band GSM device include 3G support, integrated Wi-Fi, a 3-megapixel camera with a secondary VGA shooter, Google Maps, Bluetooth, messaging and e-mail, a media player, and video conferencing. A customizable user interface sits on top of the Windows mobile OS that will allow users to customize the UI with widgets.

The Surf will arrive first in China during the first quarter of this year. At present, Moto has no plans to bring the A3100 to a U.S. carrier.