Ah, finally. Mintpass has been teasing us with its delightfully adorable Mintpad for nearly a year now , and after sending a few out to a smattering of media outlets, it fell into a holding pattern for the rest of the summer. Now, at long last, the touchscreen-based PMP is on sale over in the UK, paving the way for consumers ’round the globe to call themselves an owner. Final specifications include a 2.9-inch LCD, 4GB of internal storage, a microSD expansion slot, WiFi, 1.3 megapixel camera, support for a gaggle of file formats and a battery good for 30 hours of audio or 5 hours of video. Too bad that

Well, there’s not exactly a whole lot to go on with this one, but Mintpass looks to have just recently launched an English version of its Mintpad website, which could well be yet another a sign that the MID / PMP is finally nearing a release outside of South Korea. Of course, that’s still not quite a sure thing, especially since the previously rumored April / May release date has now come and gone, and there’s unfortunately not so much as a price on the website to further back things up. There are plenty of specs, however, including the same 400MHz ARM processor, 128MB of RAM, 4GB of storage, and built-in WiFi as before, plus no shortage of pics in case you’ve yet to get an up close look at the device. [Via PMP Today ] Filed under: Handhelds , Portable Audio , Portable Video Mintpass launches English Mintpad website, sign of things to come? originally appeared on Engadget on Mon, 15 Jun 2009 15:09:00 EST

I was excited to learn that the Mintpad —a Wi-Fi enabled, 2.9-inch touchscreen web-surfing pad and media player with 1.3-megapixel cam, microphone and built-in speaker—is coming to the US. The 4GB device—which goes for $143 in Korea—has many functions included, like a calendar, a notes app, blogging application, book store, chatting music, video playback and recording, photos, and web browsing “with Flash support.” So yes, I was excited, but then I remembered that—except for the Flash support, the video recording, and the fact that is a WinCE 5.0 Pro device—it’s like the description of a $229 iPod touch in a thicker box and with half the storage (and the iPod gets you one zillion more apps in a much sleeker package with real touchscreen with higher resolution—not a pressure-based one.) Still, it’s a cute device, but probably not enough unless they price it here really cheap. [ Poketables ]