HTC StarTrek: The Codename Behind HTC's First Clamshell Smartphone

Before a phone reaches store shelves under a marketing name, it usually exists for months under an internal codename known mainly to manufacturers, carriers, and the reviewers who get early access to preproduction hardware. In March 2006, Mobility Today published one of these early looks: a hands-on preview of a clamshell Windows Mobile device HTC was referring to internally as \"StarTrek.\" The article has long since disappeared from the live web, but an archived copy survives, and it lines up closely with an HTC clamshell design that went on to be sold under a genuinely unusual number of different retail names.

What Was HTC StarTrek?

HTC StarTrek was an internal codename, not a retail product name. It referred to a clamshell (flip-style) smartphone HTC was developing to run Windows Mobile 5.0 for Smartphone edition — notable at the time because it was the first clamshell-form-factor device HTC had produced. Mobility Today's original article makes this distinction explicit in its own text, describing the review unit as \"not a branded phone\" and noting that \"specs can definitely change depending on the OEM,\" since the same underlying hardware was expected to be sold by multiple carriers and resellers under their own names.

The Original Mobility Today Article

The article in question, titled \"HTC StarTrek\" on the live site, was recovered from the Wayback Machine's archived copies of mobilitytoday.com, since the original URL no longer resolves on the live domain. It was written by site contributor David Ciccone and published as the first of a two-page hands-on preview, with a follow-up page focused specifically on comparison photography against other devices Ciccone had on hand. This retrospective is built directly from what those two archived pages actually say — where the archive doesn't confirm a detail, that gap is stated plainly here rather than filled in with a plausible-sounding guess.

When Was It Published?

The archived page itself carries a byline reading \"posted Tuesday, Mar. 21st, 2006,\" and the earliest Wayback Machine snapshot of the article was captured on April 11, 2006 — consistent with a piece that had already been live for a few weeks by the time it was first crawled. Reader comments attached to the article are dated between March 21 and March 29, 2006, which further supports a late-March 2006 publication date rather than an earlier or later one.

CeBIT and the First Glimpse

Ciccone's opening line places the device in context: \"A few weeks back at CeBit we saw a first glimpse of the soon to be released I-Mate Smart Flip.\" CeBIT 2006, a major European technology trade show, ran in Hannover, Germany in mid-March 2006, and it lines up as the likely venue where Mobility Today first encountered the hardware before receiving a unit to review directly. Notably, the original article already uses the name \"I-Mate Smart Flip\" for the device it otherwise refers to throughout as \"HTC StarTrek\" — an early sign that the codename and at least one retail name were already circulating side by side within weeks of each other.

Hands-On Preview, Not a Leak

This was a genuine hands-on preview, not a leak pieced together from rumors or blurry photos. Mobility Today had physical possession of a unit, took its own photographs (hosted at the time on Flickr and embedded directly in the article), and described specific things the reviewer observed by using the device personally — screen brightness, button placement, and a day of casual use. That distinction matters: the piece reads as firsthand impressions of real hardware, with the honest caveats of an early, non-final unit, rather than secondhand speculation about a device the outlet hadn't actually touched.

Why It Was Called a Preproduction Unit

Ciccone is upfront about the limits of the review: \"The unit I have is a preproduction unit so I will not be going over the out of the box experience.\" That's a meaningful qualifier for a 2006 hands-on. Preproduction units can ship with unfinished software builds, placeholder packaging, or hardware quirks that get resolved before retail launch, and reviewers of the era were generally careful to flag that status so readers wouldn't mistake early impressions for a final verdict. The article treats this as a first-impressions piece specifically because of that preproduction status, not a full review.

Design and Build Impressions

The recurring comparison throughout both pages of the article is to the Motorola RAZR, then one of the most recognizable thin clamshell phones on the market. Ciccone writes that \"How can one not notice the RAZOR look and feel that draws you towards this phone,\" and the second page reiterates that \"they weren't kidding when they said this phone was as sleek as a RAZOR.\" The article frames thinness and a RAZR-like profile as the device's standout first impression — notable because clamshell Windows Mobile Smartphones were uncommon at the time, and HTC had not previously shipped one.

The Display and External Screen

The article singles out the main display as \"bright\" with \"vibrant\" colors, and separately praises the front-facing external screen as \"very helpful\" — a feature that let users check basics like caller ID or the time without opening the clamshell. Beyond those descriptive impressions, the archived text does not give exact screen dimensions or resolution figures, so this retrospective isn't asserting specific numbers as something Mobility Today's original piece confirmed.

Buttons, Touchpad, and Camera

Physical layout details described in the original hands-on include a sync slot and a camera shutter button on the right side of the unit, and a volume rocker plus a user-mappable button on the left side — on Ciccone's review unit, that mappable button was set to launch Comm Manager, Windows Mobile's connectivity settings panel. The second page also calls out a \"flat touch pad to dial,\" described as having a distinctive grippable surface for the thumb, which the reviewer treats as a genuinely novel input detail rather than a routine keypad.

Windows Mobile 5 and AKU2

The article confirms the review unit ran \"Windows Mobile 5 for Smartphone edition,\" and the second page adds a specific software detail: \"AKU2 is solid.\" AKU, short for Adaptation Kit Update, was Microsoft's periodic update mechanism for Windows Mobile 5 devices during this era, and referencing AKU2 specifically indicates the preproduction unit was running a fairly current build of the platform's software stack at the time of the review, rather than an early, unpatched one.

The Missing MicroSD Slot Question

One notable gap the reviewer flags directly: \"I did notice one thing that was a bit weird.. No mini SD slot on this phone?\" This became a point of discussion in the article's comments as well, with one reader asking whether a slot might be hidden under the battery and another responding that they believed it was. The archived article itself never resolves this question conclusively — Ciccone notes he'd only had the unit for 24 hours and didn't have time to investigate further — so this piece isn't claiming a definitive answer on the reviewed unit's storage expansion beyond what the original coverage actually settled.

Compared to the Mio A701, JasJar, and Treo 700w

These comparisons are presented as photographic size references rather than detailed feature-by-feature evaluations — the article's focus throughout both pages is how compact and thin the StarTrek unit felt next to other devices Ciccone had on hand, not a broader spec or performance comparison against them.

HTC's Codename Practice

Using internal codenames during development is a routine industry practice, and HTC in particular became known during the mid-to-late 2000s for codenames that didn't always match eventual retail names — a natural consequence of HTC's business model at the time, which involved designing hardware that carriers and resellers like i-mate, Qtek, Dopod, Orange, T-Mobile, and Vodafone would then rebrand and sell under their own names in different regions. A single piece of HTC-designed hardware could reasonably end up on shelves under half a dozen different product names depending on the market, which is part of why a codename like \"StarTrek\" is worth documenting on its own — it's frequently the one consistent thread tying otherwise differently branded phones back to the same underlying design.

What Device Did HTC StarTrek Become?

Based on cross-referencing the Mobility Today archive against later device documentation, the HTC StarTrek codename corresponds to HTC's first clamshell Windows Mobile Smartphone, which reached retail in 2006 under a genuinely wide spread of regional names, including the i-mate SmartFlip, Qtek 8500, Orange SPV F600, Dopod S300, Cingular 3100 and 3125 (in the US), and the HTC S411 in Brazil. Some later retail and reference listings also used \"HTC Star Trek\" directly as a product name, rather than purely as an internal codename, which is part of why the two labels are sometimes used almost interchangeably in coverage from this period. This retrospective treats that identification as well supported by the available evidence — the clamshell form factor, the Windows Mobile 5 Smartphone software, the first-clamshell-for-HTC framing, and even the specific \"soon to be released I-Mate Smart Flip\" phrase in Mobility Today's own original text all line up — while still noting that Mobility Today's archived article itself never uses a single definitive retail model number.

Specifications, as Later Documented

These figures come from later documentation of retail models, not from Mobility Today's original preproduction hands-on, which didn't publish a formal spec sheet. They're included here for reference on what the eventual retail hardware looked like on paper — including confirmation of a MicroSD slot, which resolves the ambiguity Mobility Today's reviewer ran into with his early unit, though final retail memory configurations varied somewhat between the different regional and carrier versions.

Reader Reactions at the Time

The archived comment section attached to the article captures genuine March 2006 anticipation. One commenter, posting from Australia, mentioned having followed the phone since it was \"leaked\" earlier and having a supplier lined up for a regional i-mate version. Another asked specifically whether US carriers had the device \"on their radar,\" a fair question months before Cingular's branded 3100 and 3125 versions actually arrived. Others focused on more practical questions — the T9 dialing pad, the disputed MicroSD slot location, and simply whether a price point existed yet. None of those questions were fully answered within the article itself, underscoring how early-stage this coverage really was.

The Legacy of This Codename

HTC StarTrek is a useful small case study in how mid-2000s smartphone hardware actually reached the public. A single design, developed and reviewed under one internal name, ultimately fanned out across a handful of carriers and resellers under entirely different retail identities — a pattern that was common for HTC specifically during this period, before the company began selling more devices directly under its own brand. Mobility Today's March 2006 preview sits right at the seam of that process: hands-on with real, working preproduction hardware, written before any of those retail names had fully settled into place.

FAQ

What was HTC StarTrek?

HTC StarTrek was an internal codename for a clamshell (flip-style) smartphone HTC developed to run Windows Mobile 5.0 for Smartphone edition — notable at the time as HTC's first clamshell-form-factor device.

Was HTC StarTrek a codename or a retail product?

Primarily a codename. Mobility Today's original article explicitly describes the reviewed unit as \"not a branded phone,\" though some later retail and reference listings did also use \"HTC Star Trek\" directly as a product name.

What device did HTC StarTrek become?

The hardware reached retail in 2006 under several regional names, including the i-mate SmartFlip, Qtek 8500, Orange SPV F600, Dopod S300, Cingular 3100/3125, and the HTC S411 in Brazil — all built on the same underlying clamshell design.

When was HTC StarTrek covered by Mobility Today?

The archived article carries a byline dated Tuesday, March 21, 2006, with the earliest Wayback Machine snapshot captured on April 11, 2006.

Was the Mobility Today article a hands-on or a leak?

A genuine hands-on. The reviewer had physical possession of a preproduction unit, took his own photographs, and described firsthand impressions rather than secondhand rumors.

Did the reviewed unit have a MicroSD slot?

The reviewer couldn't find one on his preproduction unit and said so directly in the article; later retail versions of the hardware are documented as including MicroSD expansion.

What software did it run?

Windows Mobile 5.0 for Smartphone edition, with the article separately noting the unit was running the AKU2 update build.

Why was it compared to the Motorola RAZR?

Because of its thinness and clamshell profile, which the reviewer repeatedly described as reminiscent of the RAZR's sleek look and feel — a notable comparison since HTC hadn't previously released a clamshell device.

Is the original Mobility Today article still online?

No — the original URL no longer resolves on the live site. This retrospective is based on archived Wayback Machine snapshots of the original two-page article.

Read together, the archived Mobility Today pages and the later retail history of this hardware tell a fairly complete story: a preproduction HTC clamshell, previewed hands-on in March 2006 under the internal name StarTrek, that went on to reach real customers within the year under a scattering of different carrier and reseller names. It's a small but well-documented snapshot of how mid-2000s smartphone hardware actually made its way from a trade-show glimpse to a store shelf.