The M9R

Soon the m9r will hit the market. This is not just a regular internal product update, which is quite common in the IT industry and usually invisible to the user, the letter “r” suggests that it is more than that.

First of all, the letter probably stands for “range”. The m9 handset uses a new chip set which has an improved antenna performance. That means the range will be improved. Though the majority of customers will not really need this, it addresses those who are on the edge.

The other thing is that it will support the “repeater”. Even with the improved range, you can still double the distance by using a repeater in large offices and warehouses. Though I honestly think that the good old m9 also supports the router. Maybe the m9r is because the router is so close, we can already smell it.

Then there is more memory (which also has the “r” in it). More memory is always good to have, though the software does not need it at this point. But you never know what future software updates bring, and it never hurts to have more memory. Especially the handset has more memory; we were always very tight with memory there. Try to program something with a color display if all you have is 64 KB RAM. I believe now it is 128, still not the same of what you have on your smart phone, but at least twice as much as before. And also the base has now 32 MB RAM, so that we can probably take it easier with adding memory hungry features.

The other reason for the letting is the improved speaker (the letter at the end). This results in a better handsfree mode and a better playback for the ring tone.

Another thing that was changed is that the combo now has only one handset. This is sad because most people won’t realize they can register more than one handset per station. I guess the overall marketing rationale behind it was to get the overall price down. People can be very short-sighted when comparing prices.

The m9r continues exactly from where the m9 was. Regarding the maturity of the product this time it means there will be no big surprises. So the bottom line is that the m9r is a hardware upgrade, not a software upgrade.