Sidekick 3 D-Wade Edition

Only in Miami does a sports-themed limited edition phone look good enough to take down the runway. But that's exactly what the T-Mobile Sidekick 3, D-Wade Edition-designed by NBA All-Star Dwyane Wade-achieves. Unlike some of the edgier, tattoo-covered limited edition Sidekicks of yore, this one is subtle and elegant with white and tan accents and a back made of the same tough material as a basketball.

According to T-Mobile, the impetus behind getting Wade to collaborate on this limited edition communicator phone was his No. 3 Miami Heat shirt number (just like the Sidekick 3!). But it turns out the Sports Illustrated Sportsman of the Year and recent GQ cover boy is also an avid Sidekick 3 user-you know, text messaging his agent and PR folks and all that. The phone also has a bunch of gold 3s splattered around the screen bezel.

Someone says beige and gold phone to me and I usually think, no thanks. But this limited edition doodad is a nice piece of understated unisex bling suitable for any Paris or Romeo (don't forget it's V-Day on Wednesday), whether they're basketball fans or not.

it’s pretty much exactly your standard Sidekick 3 handset. It has a 1.3-megapixel camera, a full QWERTY keyboard, trackball, and runs on a Danger-based operating system. AOL, Yahoo, and MSN instant messengers are all supported; and it allows multiple e-mail accounts to be accessed in the same place. There’s a music player for MP3’s, which you can load in through the included USB cable, and listen to with the included Bluetooth 1.2 headphones. Unfortunately, you have to remove the battery to reach it, but there’s also a mini-SD card slot to maximize the amount of music you can carry.

Internet surfing is still a little bit dicey, for instance logging on to MySpace isn’t going to happen, but generally the Sidekick 3 D-Wade Edition should do what it claims to do. The phone is available now in limited supply at select T-Mobile retail locations and online.