The first transparent phone, the LG-GD900 Crystal, has been launched by LG Electronics. The handset features LG’s next generation touch technology, Gesture Command, which recognises handwriting and responds to multi-touch commands. The phone includes an 8 megapixel Auto Focus camera and MP3 player.

LG-GD900 Crystal’s slide-down Crystal Touchpad first appears to just be an alphanumeric keypad, but it actually doubles as a touchpad like the trackpad on a laptop computer. The most interesting thing is that the transparent slider is developed by glass and not plastic or fibre.

To launch an application on the LG-GD900 Crystal, press the phone’s multitasking button and draw one of 12 easy symbols on the keypad. Users can assign these symbols to any of the phone’s nine multitasking-enabled features.

For instance, if the symbol resembling a capital M is assigned to the MP3 player, launching this feature is as easy as writing M on the Crystal Touchpad. This is especially handy to start some background music in the middle of another task like writing an e-mail. This same M symbol could be assigned to a different feature like the Memo Pad instead, based on individual preferences.

LG-GD900 Crystal also features a dedicated graphics chipset so that transitions between features are smooth and video plays perfectly. The phone supports 7.2 Mbps HSDPA, WiFi and Bluetooth 2.0 with A2DP for connectivity and runs Windows Mobile 6.1 Professional Edition