The Danger Hiptop, also re-branded as the T-Mobile Sidekick, is a GPRS/EDGE smartphone manufactured by Danger Incorporated. The Hiptop is sold by T-Mobile in the United States, United Kingdom, Germany and Austria. SunCom used to sell the device in some parts of the U.S., and Fido was the exclusive Hiptop carrier in Canada until sales were discontinued after Fido was bought by Rogers Communications, at the end of the Hiptop 2's life. The discontinuation was mainly because the Hiptop is a competitor to Rogers' BlackBerry business. In Germany, the Hiptop service is also offered by E-Plus including a flat rate tariff. In Australia, the Hiptop device and service are sold by Telstra. The Hiptop was also sold in Singapore by Starhub in 2004 , but is no longer available.

Overview

The Hiptop software is designed by the company Danger, Inc., now owned by Microsoft, located in Palo Alto, California. The original Sidekick hardware was designed by Danger and manufactured by Flextronics. The Sidekick 2, 3, iD, 2008, and LX (2009) are all manufactured by Sharp Corporation in Japan and designed, respectively, by Danger and then Danger in partnership with Sharp. All versions of the Sidekick were developed in close partnership with T-Mobile. Danger provides the Hiptop OS software and back-end services for the device. These include a catalog of downloadable software applications, email hosting, instant messaging and web proxies.

Hardware

The screen on the Hiptop 1, 2, 3, iD, 2008, LX, and 2009 flips 180 degrees to reveal the qwerty keyboard. The screen in the Hiptop Slide simply slides up to reveal the keyboard. There are two buttons on the left side of the device ("menu" and "jump") and also two on the right ("back" and "cancel"). On all Hiptops except the original the left side houses a directional pad and on the right, a scroll wheel (Hiptop 2) or track ball (Hiptop 3, LX, 2008, 2009 and Slide). The Hiptop 2 and Slide's directional pad contains internal multicolored LEDs used in ringers and notifications, while the 3, 2008, LX, and 2009 track ball contains internal multicolored LEDs that provide the same function. The right side also has two phone buttons: send call (also page-down) and end call (also page-up). The top of the unit has two shoulder buttons (application-specific). The bottom has volume controls and a power button. The Hiptop line is designed to be held horizontally with both hands, allowing typing with two thumbs, similar to that of a Game Boy Advance or a console video game controller. This design contrasts with the vast majority of other cell phones which have a vertical design.

Hiptop (Danger/Flextronics)

Hiptop 2 (Danger/Sharp)