It appears Chinese ODM TechFaith's Q knockoff, spotted under glass at CITA last spring even before Motorola and Verizon shipped the highly anticipated smartphone, has found a vendor to deliver it to the masses. The UBiQUiO 501 Pocket PC Phone, as it's been branded, is now available for pre-order through importer eXpansys for $515, and it may be more widely available soon in some markets.

TechFaith is reportedly the same company that built Samsung's ultra-slim i320 communicator, another BlackBerry/Q/Treo one-handed QWERTY thumb-keyboard communicator competitor like the UBiQUiO 501.

As with the Q, the UBiQUiO 501 is very slim at 13.5 millimeters. Its full measurements are 4.8 x 2.6 x 0.5 inches (122 x 65 x 13.5 millimeters), and the smartphone weighs only 4.8 ounces (135 grams).

Unlike the Q, a Windows Smartphone, the UBiQUiO 501 is a Windows Mobile 5.0 Pocket PC Edition Phone, which means its 2.5-inch 240 x 320 pixel resolution QVGA, 65,000 color display is touch and you can edit as well as view Microsoft Office files.

There's also built in 802.11b/g Wi-Fi and Bluetooth with support A2DP stereo headsets.

The tri-band (900/1800/1900 MHz) GSM/GPRS smartphone lacks support for any type of high speed cellular networking, even 2.5G EDGE. Not a devastating loss when Wi-Fi is involved, but t could be missed when a hotspot isn’t around.

Additional features include 200 MHz TI OMAP 750 Processor, 64 MB of RAM, 128 MB of ROM, miniSD slot, 2 megapixel camera, mini USB port and a 1250 mAh Li-Ion battery.

A device like the UBiQUiO 501 could prove attractive to customers of carriers like Cingular and T-Mobile who want an ultra slim smartphone with a keyboard like the Q, but can’t get one because Motorola only offers it though Verizon, a CDMA/EV-DO carrier. The world’s number two cell phone vendor does intend, to release a version of the Q with GSM/UMTS wireless before the end of the year, however.

BlackBerrys are much larger and, besides, they don’t offer the same type of multimedia capabilities yet. Palm’s Treos are larger too and the newest models are only available through CDMA operators as well.