More details are coming out about the eagerly anticipated Windows Mobile 7 platform. All phones are not created equal and it is something end users pick up on quickly. Carriers and manufacturers want to minimize cost and maximize profit while I am sure Microsoft and consumers would prefer their device perform like a Porsche 911 GT3 on steroids. Microsoft is now taking a more active roll in ensuring that even if the phone that bears their operating system doesn't perform like a Porsche, it won't mimic that of a Chevette either.Even when the manufacturer releases a device with beefy specs, the carrier may nix some of the features to save money. For example, the HTC Touch Pro comes standard with 288MB of RAM, but when Verizon purchased the device last year for its network, it promptly had the RAM reduced to 192MB. You won't notice it if you only run one or two apps, but if you load up several over the course of a few hours, or heaven forbid you launch Opera 9 on it, the device becomes sluggish and other apps start getting closed by the system. This reflects badly on Microsoft because they get the blame for the device feeling bloated or sluggish as you use it.

In order to maintain a base performance level and the Windows Mobile 7 platform, Microsoft has created their Chassis specification. Right now there is only one, but I am sure others will follow. For example, multi-touch is a requirement, but that makes no sense on a non-touch screen phone, so it is likely a second specification will come out for those types of devices. So, here are the specs as provided by the fine folks at wmpoweruser.com.

Core requirements:

• Processor: ARM v6+, L2 Cache, VFP, Open GL ES 2.0 graphics HW (QCOM 8k, Nvidia "Tegra" AP15/16* and TI 3430 all meet spec)
• Memory: 256MB+ DRAM, 1G+ Flash (at least 512MB fast flash - 5MB/s unbuffered read @4K block size)
• Display: WVGA (800×480) or FWVGA (854×480) 3.5" or greater diagonal - it appears QVGA is dead
• Touch: Multi-touch required
• Battery: Sufficient to meet Days of Use LTK requirements.
• Controls: Start, Back, Send and End are required (soft controls allowed as long as they are always present).

Those are the base requirements for the device. Chassis 1 is clearly aimed at consumers - here are the requirements for bolt on features:

• Camera: 3MP+, flash optional, 2nd camera optional (VGA resolution sufficient)
• GPS: aGPS required
• Sensors required: Light Sensor, Compass (3 axis, 5 degrees, 100 Hz sample rate), Accelerometer (3 axis, 2mg resolution, 100 Hz sample rate)/li>
• USB: High speed required, 20 MB/s transfer rate.
• BlueTooth: BT2.1 required, must run MSFT BT stack, CSR BlueCore6 or later recommended.
• Wi-Fi: 802.11B/G required, must run MSFT Native Wi-Fi stack, Atheros 6002 or Broadcomm 4325 recommended.
• Connectors: Micro USB and 3.5mm Audio required - no more of these absurd USB or proprietary connectors that invariably require you to get an adapter so you can use your favorite headset.

The following items are optional but will be supported by the OS:

• FM tuner: If tuner HW is present it will be detected and supported by the Media application.
• Haptics
• SD Card (Micro SD recommended)
• DPAD, qwerty or 12/20 key keyboards all optional

These specs are a double edged sword. The devices loaded with all of these features will be good performers, but there are no WinMo devices today with all of this. There are none with multi-touch. Since WinMo 6.5 doesn't support multi-touch, it is unlikely that there will be a device with that feature on it, and that means no WinMo 6.5 device will be upgradable to WinMo 7. As I wrote Monday, the update story for WinMo 7 is looking good. I hope Microsoft has looked at least one version out after WinMo 7 in these specs so users can not only get minor updates on their device but at least one fresh new OS before having to buy a new phone from their carrier.