Motorola i9 for Sprint-Nextel gets FCC approval

The FCC strikes again. Sprint customers who still get their iDEN on should be happy to learn the upcoming Motorola i9, first seen back in May with the name Motorola i890, has just made its way through the FCC approval process and it’s ready to go. Actually, the i9 is something a little new from Moto – no, Motorola isn’t dropping the RAZR form factor anytime soon but this time they’ve thrown some ModeShift into the mix. Yep, the cool backlit buttons found on the ROKR E8 and other models can also be seen on the i9. If you’ve yet to play with a ModeShift-enabled Moto, it’s actually pretty cool. Button labels are displayed via the keypad backlight and the labels and function of certain buttons changes according to the area of the UI you’re in. Toss some haptic feedback into the mix and you’ve got ModeShift. Other i9 spec highlights include a 3.1 megapixel camera, integrated GPS and stereo Bluetooth. No word yet on when the i9 might drop or where pricing will be but smart money is on a pre-holiday release.