Your Ideal Mobile Phone...

BLACKBERRY TUTORIAL AND TIPS

2009-03-21T05:02:00.000-07:00

So if you’ve been looking for an application that will simplify your Blackberry experience, look no further. QuickLaunch by NikkiSoft allows you to launch applications, websites and compose messages along with other things from as little as 2 clicks. Configuring QuickLaunch is a breeze and is an application that every Blackberry owner shouldn’t go without. QuickLaunch supports 83XX, 8900, 9000 and 95XX devices with 4.5 OS or above.

Install was fast and simple and configuring was a fast and straight forward process. After installing I setup my left convenience key (through the Blackberry Screen/Keyboard options) to launch the app and when pressed it brought up the sidebar which defaults to the right side of the screen (but can be changed to the left). The QL Settings menu is simple and only has four configurable items; menu locations, font size, right-side convenience key action and left side convenience key. (The convenience keys will have priority over other mapped applications while the QuickLaunch menu is opened.) QuickLaunch allows you to set the convenience keys (left, right or both) to close QuickLaunch if an app is not launched using the application.
Click through to keep reading about QuickLaunch for BlackBerry

Best Buy offers iPhone on the cheap

2009-02-27T12:15:00.001-08:00

Listen up, you Best Buy Rewards Zone and Silver Premier members, if you have a hankering for the iPhone 3G, mosey over to the nearest Best Buy store, flash your card and get $50 if you are Rewards Zone member or $100 if you a Silver Premier member. Of course there are catches to this: First, you have to be enrolled in the membership programs before Feb 21st. Second, you still have to sign up for 2-year contract with AT&T to get the iPhone for as low as $99 bucks.

Nokia 5800 XpressMusic phone releases in USA

2009-02-27T12:13:00.000-08:00

Nokia has readied the 5800 XpressMusic, aka, the Tube, touchscreen phone for the US market and is set to release it as early as today. Nokia’s website still shows XpressMusic as coming soon and allows you to pre-order. However, according to Engadget Mobile, the company is set to release the phones to its flagship stores in New York and Chicago this week, possibly today. Nokia has priced this phone attractively at $399 unlocked and it has both GSM and WCDMA support so it should work on any network. So, if you were looking for an iPhone competitor with 3.2Mpxl camera and up to 16GB microSD support for tons of music, mosey over to the Nokia store or online and order it.

Samsung Memoir gets panned

2009-02-27T12:10:00.000-08:00

T-Mobile is gearing up to find out what is America’s appetite for 8Mpxl camera phone in this economy. They are set to release the Samsung Memoir starting today. It is the first 8Mpxl camera phone launched by a US carrier. So, there are some expectations from that perspective.

The specs for this phone include T-Mobile 3G support, touch screen with Samsung’s TouchWiz interface, Xenon flash, HTML web browser, A-GPS and photo functions such as smile and face detection along with geo-tagging capabilities and ability to upload your pictures to Flickr and T-Mobile MyAlbum service. However, the TouchWiz UI is not all that great and does not have the pizzazz say the HTC TouchFLO does, according to Boy Genius Report. Also, considering the underlying OS is old Symbian S40, this phone will have limited appeal, maybe for the fans of Samsung Behold who might be ready for some 8Mpxl fun.

Another issue is the price point. At $249.99 with 2 year contract, it is hard for many to justify this phone especially when T-Mobile has some attractive pricing on the Blackberry Curve.

NOKIA N86 FIRST 8Mpx Cameraphone

2009-02-17T09:56:00.001-08:00

After the escapes and the fiasco of yesterday, Nokia obtained its line of act today and officially launched N86 to the mobile congress of the world to Barcelona. This telephone has the similar factor of the shape of duel-slide block while its N97 soon-to-Be-launched bretheren. Other Spec. for this telephone are as follows:

The quadruple joins together the connectivity of GSM/EDGE (850/900/1800/1900 megahertz)

Tri connectivity of band HSDPA (850/1900/2100 megahertz or 900/1900/2100 megahertz)

2.6 tactile not-screen of inch AMOLED, stripe-resistant posting with 240 X 320 Pixel and 16 million colors

Edition of Symbian S60 3rd, package 2 of device

GPS, A-GPS

Integrated compass

Wi-Fi

Navigator of HTML

Total integration of Ovi

The music consacrte/N-Gage keys

jack of helmet of 3.5 millimetres

Bluetooth 2.0 with A2DP

FM radio with the RDS

FM transmitter

Stereo loudspeakers

TV outside

Full synchro with PC

8GB of built-in memory

Support of chart of MicroSD, until 16GB

Maintenance time: up to 6.3 hours

Latency time: up to 312 hours

Playback of music: up to 25 hours

Play: up to 7 a.m.

103.4 X 51.4 X 16.5 millimetres

149 grams

Nokia announced that N86 will be available in the second quarters in Europe and the detail for €375. With launching so close to N97 and Spec. similar, I wonder how N86 cannabilize the N97 sales.

Samsung and LG both announce solar powered phones

2009-02-14T06:35:00.001-08:00

Both Samsung and LG have announced plans to launch solar powered phones this year. Both phones have solar panels on the battery cover of the phones. However, that is where the similarities end. Samsung’s phone is beautiful looking phone with rounded edges and 3 inches touchscreen. The phone, called Blue Earth, is made out of recycled material and avoids harmful materials. It comes with its own customized UI that promotes eco-friendliness.

LG’s solar powered phone is smaller and square compared to Samsung’s. However, it too is eco-friendly with recycled packaging, and user manuals printed with soy ink on recycled paper.

Both phones will be unveiled in Barcelona later this week at the Mobile World Congress.

[Via UnwiredView]

March 2009 : LG Arena’s launch in European

2009-02-10T10:06:00.001-08:00

According to a press release put out by LG Korea, the LG Arena KM900 will launch in Europe sometime in March of this year. The press release also touted the new 3D S Class UI and the dedicated multimedia chip in the phone. According to LG it took them 100 person-years to develop this UI. Some of the key features of this UI are:

Multi-touch to easily expand and collapse Web pages and pictures

Dedicated multimedia chip for fast Flash UI operation

Rotational on-screen dials with haptics feedback for various settings (radio, clock, etc;)

The sides of 3D cube are for the following panels: multimedia, shortcuts, widgets, phone functions

Horizontal quick menu access on the bottom

[Via UnwiredView]

Nokia 5630 the new XpressMusic Phone

2009-02-10T10:04:00.001-08:00

Nokia today announced a new XpressMusic phone, the 5630. It is a candybar phone with dedicated music keys. It runs the new Symbian S60 OS but does not have touchscreen. The phone is very slim at 12 millimeters and comes with 3.2Mpxl camera, N-Gage experience. It also has a shortcut bar for music, radio, photos and web. Other features include:

GSM/EDGE and HSDPA/HSUPA connectivity

A QVGA display

Nokia’s “Say and Play” feature – for voice control over the music player

A 3.5mm headset jack

4GB MicroSD card included in the package (the phone supports up to 16GB)

The phone will be released in Europe in second half of this year and will retail for €199 ($256) before taxes and subsidies.

[Via UnwiredView]

Samsung launches UltraTouch S8300

2009-02-09T18:26:00.001-08:00

Samsung today announced a new slider, the UltraTOUCH S8300. As the name suggests, the phone has a touchscreen and because it is a slider, it also has numerical keypad. The phone runs Symbian S60 OS with Samsung’s customized UI which got updated for launch at Mobile World Congress next week in Barcelona. Here are the specs for this phone:

3G (HSDPA, UMTS, EDGE/GPRS)
2.8” WQVGA AMOLED screen touch screen
8Mpix camera module with LED flash with AF, face detection, smile detection and GeoTagging, with support for DviX, XviD, H.263, H.264, WMV9 and MPEG4 video plus 30fps VGA video recording mode
FM radio with RDS
Audio player compatible with MP3, AAC, AAC+, WMA files
Bluetooth A2DP
A-GPS module
80MB of internal memory with upgrade of microSDHC slots up to 16GB

The phone will be unveiled at the MWC at which time the pricing and launch details will become clear.

[Via AkihabaraNews]

Nokia E75 specs

2009-02-09T18:18:00.001-08:00

Courtesy of Expansys, the UK-based e-tailer, the specs, pricing and release date were leaked for Nokia’s upcoming E75 smartphone. This QWERTY keyboard bedecked phone is expected to be released on March 13, 2009 in UK for a princely sum of £389.99 or free with 18-months contract with T-Mobile UK.

The specs for this phone are:

GSM: 850/900/1800/1900 (Quad-Band), WCDMA: 900/2100 (Dual-Band), HSDPA (3.6Mbps) connectivity

240×320 px QVGA display

3.2 mpx camera with auto-focus, digital zoom, LED flash, Hi-Res VGA Video Recording, and 30 fps QVGA recording

FM Radio

Wi-Fi

A-GPS

microSDHC memory card slot

3.5 mm AV connector, Bluetooth 2.0, microUSB

Dual Home Screens (Work/Personal)

DualKeypad Design

Nokia Maps

PDF Document Viewer

ZIP File Manager

1500 mAh battery, 630 mins talk, 408 hrs stand-by time

Let’s see what Nokia has to say about this phone.

[Via UnwiredView]

Sony Ericsson Xperia X1 : Best office phone

2009-01-14T08:23:00.001-08:00

Sony Ericsson Xperia X1 is amazing design mobile phone. This Xperia X1 is also supported by more superior processors than Nokia E71 is 528 Mhz, RAM and 256MB. The Xperia X1 display with resolution 800 x 480 pixel with TFT touch screen tehnology also equipped with a touchpad with a 3 inch wide that can be changed immediately when horizontal QWERTY keypad of the phone Xperia X1 this side moving.

Sony Ericsson Xperia X1 can edit, display, and create a new file phone because the windows as a mobile operating system. Because Xperia X1 is compatible with HSDPA and WiFi connection you can also access the Internet at high speeds of 3.2 MPx and supported by camera equipped with flash LED AUTOFOKUS.

LG KM900 review

2009-01-14T08:19:00.001-08:00

LG has launched a mobile-phone as a sophisticated series KM KM500 and KM 710 but not the High End and not supported by Wifi, 3G and other capabilities. This Korea Vendors has prepared a high end mobile phones in the new series, namely LG KM900.
Planned music-oriented phone and supported by the Wi-Fi and 3G network. In addition, the LG KM900 has a 240×400 pixel display and a touch screen. For connectivity, LG KM900 on Wi-Fi and Bluetooth. As a music phone, there is a 3.5-mm headset jack for KM500 and KM710 also have them.

Samsung C6620 with TIM Italy

2008-11-02T07:03:00.001-08:00

The Italian operator TIM has just returned to its catalog what should be the natural successor of the Samsung SGH-i600. Indeed, TIM Samsung unveils smartphone C6620 which foreshadows a new line of smartphones running Windows Mobile 6.1 design radically different. We were accustomed to dark colors of i600, i780 and i320 for a business man, while the C6620 has a twin-hull colors that should attract a wider audience and younger. The style is reminiscent of the Asus M530w.

In terms of technical features, the Samsung C6620 supports GSM / GPRS / EDGE / UMTS and HSDPA. It has a QVGA (320x240), Bluetooth, 20MB of internal memory, a microSD slot, a 2M pixel camera.

Its dimensions are 113.3 x 63 x 11.9 mm 108.8 grams. It is available in three color combinations: Navy Blue, Apple Green and Wine Red. It is not known at this time if the device will be marketed in France.

LG, Tim and Microsoft in the new LG Tribe

2008-11-02T07:00:00.000-08:00

LG Electronics LG officially presented Tribe (which we have known as LG KS360), the new slide sold exclusively by Tim at a price of 149 euros.

LG Tribe responds to the needs of all those young people who seek an extension in technological products of its own style and personality. The phone is, therefore, in several variations of color, all young and trendy to not ever go unnoticed: the sober Aqua Blue, the flaming Blaze Red, Pink, the tender and the most classic Black.

LG Tribe boasts a 2.4-inch display with QVGA touchscreen interface for calls and contacts, integrated MP3 player and FM radio with 12 stations stored, a retractable QWERTY keyboard and a 2.0 megapixel camera.

LG Electronics, in collaboration with TIM and Microsoft Online Services Group, has developed an integrated offer that will be able to exploit the potential of mobile network: just press a button and LG Tribe will allow access to Windows Live Messenger.

The exchange real-time information that will be guaranteed by the TIM active for two months from the date of purchase, with free access to Windows Live Messenger (the monthly ceiling for the promotion of 3,000 messages and instant messaging 100MB of traffic per month WAP), which would exchange conversations, photos and documents with the more than 13.7 million registered users in Italy to Windows Live Messenger. Once the promotion, you can renew the option to use Windows Live Messenger with the "I'M & WEB CARD" to 3 euros a week (with a ceiling of 1,000 messages and instant messaging traffic 100MB WAP ) Or the "I'M CARD 30" to 6 euros per month (with a ceiling of 3,000 instant messaging messages to Windows Live Messenger).

"The new LG TRIBE is aimed at a younger target, close to the technology you use every day advanced methods of interaction, research mobile phones with innovative features and easy to use and immediate. LG TRIBE is a concentration of technologically advanced solutions, until now available only on high-end phones exclusive business users. The colors designed specifically for young people, the QWERTY keyboard and touch-screen display, will certainly be appreciated by all those who want a mobile phone performance and the unique style, "says Michelangelo Tursi, Director of the Group of LG Telecom.

Nokia and Kodak: Mutual Exchange of Patents

2008-11-02T05:37:00.000-08:00

For the moment the details are still few, but the news certainly can not go unnoticed: Kodak and Nokia have reached an agreement for the mutual exchange of patents.

It is not know what will this agreement, which does not mean that in future some Nokia phones will incorporate Kodak sensors. In this regard we recall that Kodak is no stranger to mobile telephony, for example, the Motorola MOTOZINE recent ZN5 of 5.0 megapel.

The next series N have signed a Kodak camera? The answer can found in the coming months.

Sony Ericsson W908c

2008-10-09T21:01:00.001-07:00

Sony Ericsson W908 is a 3G phone supporting HSDPA. This is a slider representing the Walkman musical series. The device got TFT screen with the resolution of 240x320 pixels which shows 262144 colours, a 2MP camera with x2.5 digital zoom, and expansion connector for Memory Stick Micro (M2) up to 1 GB.

Class: 3G, musical
Position in the line: above Sony Ericsson W900i Sakura
Rivals: Nokia 3250
Description based on official information

General features
- Announced in 2007, official announcement on the 15 June 2007
- UMTS/HSDPA 850/1900/2100, GSM/GPRS 900/1800/1900
- Screen TFT (QVGA) shows 262144 colours, has the resolution of 240x320 pixels
- Weight: 86
- Dimensions: 99.5 x 50 x 12.5 mm
- Colours: Hearty Red, Noble Black

Memory
- 40 MB internal memory
- Expansion connector for Memory Stick Micro (M2) up to 1 GB

Call management, ringing tones
- Vibracall
- Polyphony
- Speakerphone
- MP3, AAC as a call melody

SMS
- Predictive text input Т9
- SMS, MMS, EMS, E-mail(POP3, SMTP)

Camera
- Integrated 2 MP camera with 2.5-digital zoom

Multimedia
- Audio formats: MP4 (AAC, AAC+, E-AAC+), MP3, M4A, 3GPP™, AMR-NB, AMR-WB, WAV, G-MIDI 1, SP-MIDI, RealAudio® 8, iMelody, XMF, WMA
- Supports 3GPP (H.263, H.264), MP4, RealVideo 8, WMV
- Image formats: GIF, JPEG, BMP, WBMP, PNG, SVG Tiny 1.1
- Supports animations SVG Tiny 1.1, GIF, Flash Lite® 2.0
- Java MIDP 2.0
- 3D games
- Walkman® player 3.0

Connectivity
- GPRS
- HSDPA
- WAP 2.0/XHTML
- USB 2.0
- Bluetooth 2.0 (A2DP)
- FM-radio shows RDS
- Modem
- Synchronization with PC

Organizer and extras
- NetFront™ 3.3
- PhotoDJ™
- VideoDJ™
- MusicDJ™
- TrackID™
- SensMe™
- PlayNow™ 4.0
- Alarm clock
- Calculator
- Calendar
- Diary
- Timer
- Tasks
- Stopwatch

Sony Ericsson W902

2008-10-09T21:00:00.001-07:00

Sony Ericsson W902 is positioned as the best music phone with high sound quality. This is a slim candy bar model with a 5-megapixel camera. The device supports an 8GB Memory Stick Micro (M2), which can store over 800 tracks. Its stereo speakers allow enjoying music not only via headphones, but also without them. Sony Ericsson W902 Walkman works in UMTS/HSDPA and GSM/GPRS/EDGE networks. The handset hits several markets in 4Q 08 available in Volcanic Black, Wine Red, Earth Green colors.

Class: fashion, 3G
Position in the lineup: above Sony Ericsson W890
Rival models: i-mobile 902
Description based on the official info
- Model - 2008, July
- GSM 850/900/1800/1900, UMTS 2100
- Display - 2.2" TFT, 240x320 pixels, up to 262K colors
- Talk time - up to 4 hours in 3G, up to 9 hours in 2G, standby time - up to 360 hours in 3G, up to 380 hours in 2G, video call time - up to 2.5 hours, music time - up to 25 hours
- Dimensions - 110 x 49 x 11.7 mm
- Weight - 100 g
- Colors: Volcanic Black, Wine Red, Earth Green

Memory
- 24 MB of internal memory
- Slot for Memory Stick Micro (M2) cards

Call management
- Vibrating alert
- Polyphonic ringtones
- Loud speaker
- MP3 for incoming calls
- Video calls

SMS
- Т9 predictive text input
- EMS, SMS, MMS, Email

Camera
- Built-in 5.0-megapixel camera with 16x digital zoom
- Auto focus, Image stabilizer
- Video capture
- Flash
- Frontal camera for video calls

Multimedia
- Java MIDP 2.1, CLDC 1.1
- 3D-games
- Flash Lite version 2.0
- Audio formats - MP3, AAC+, RealAudio 8, SP-MIDI, WMA, EMF, eAAC+, iMelody, DLS
- Video formats - H.263, MPEG-4, 3GPP, MP4, Real8 Video, WMV
- Walkman ver. 2.0 player
- FM-radio with RDS
- TrackID
- PlayNow
- OMA v1.0, OMA v2.0

Connectivity
- EDGE class 10
- GPRS class 10
- HSDPA 3.6 Mbps
- WAP 2.0
- USB 2.0
- Bluetooth 2.0 + EDR
- PC sync

Organizer and extras

NetFront v 3.4
BestPic
Timer
Tasks
Stopwatch
Notes
Flight mode
Calendar
Calculator
Alarm clock

Sony Ericsson W900i Sakura

2008-10-09T20:59:00.002-07:00

Continues the Walkman line, the same form-factor as in the S700, however is equipped with automatic finish for opening. Also it is equipped with a 2 MP camera with autofocus and is capable of working in 3G networks.

Class: fashion
Position in the line: above Sonyericsson W800
Rivals: no data for the moment
Test based description

General features
- Announced in 2005
- GSM900/1800/1900, UMTS
- Battery type 900 mAh Li-Pol
- Battery life:
- Graphical display, shows up to 262000 colours and has the resolution of 320x240 pixels (TFT). The display can hold up to 8 text lines, 2 service lines and 1 line with icons.
- 2.0 MP camera, autofocus, a capability to record video
- Java (MIDP 2.0), Mascot Capsule 3D Micro Engine
- Сolours - white, black
- Dimensions: 109 x 24 x 49 mm
- Weight: 148 gramms
Memory
- Phonebook memory for 1000 contacts with completely filled fields + memory SIM card. For a name in the phone memory you can keep up to 6 phone numbers, e-mail address and other extra data. To a name in a phonebook you can have a picture(a photo), which will be shown at incoming calls.
- Users' groups
- Organizer - calendar(up to 300 events), to-do list (up to 80 events)
- Call log of last 30 calls of all types , you can view separate lists
- Free memory available for Java applications, photos and other applications is about 470 MB
- Slot for memory cards MS Duo/Duo Pro (up to 4 GB)
Call management, ringing tones
- Vibracall
- 64-tones polyphony
- You can assign own melody to each user (not more than 10 users users)
- Voice dialing for 41 number, voice control of profiles and a dictaphone in the standby mode.
- Magic Word, works only with a headset or a card speakerphone set
- mp3/AAC file as a call melodies
- Fast dialing for 9 numbers
- Automatic redial
- Speakerphone

SMS

EMS
MMS
SMS Chat
Sending and receiving call melodies and animated images
Sending SMS to various addressees at the same time
Predictive text input Т9
Message templates
Wap Push
Push to e-mail

Connectivity
- WAP 2.0, WAP Push
- GPRS(4+2)
- IrDA
- Bluetooth 1.2
- Mail client(SMTP/POP3)
- Synchronization with PC
- SyncML
- Wirelles Village Instant Messaging
- Access NetFront HTML browser
- OMA DRM phase 1

Organizer and extras

FM-radio, memory for 20 stations, automatic search for stations, stereo playback
Integrated file manager
МР3 player
User's profiles
МР3/MP4/AAC player
MegaBass
Stereo Widening
User's profiles
Headbands at phone on and off synchronized with sound and editing possibility
Search for entries in a to-do list, organizer
Melody editor, MusicDJ
VideoDJ, PhotoDJ
Themes for changing the interface, several are preset - include not only wall-papers, but sounds as well, аnd also graphical elements of the interface
Dictaphone (limited only by free memory).
Date, time
Alarm clock usual and with daily repeated
Photo album(My Pictures) - you can set extra images, receive images from PC or with a camera
timer, stop watch with intermediate results and usual calculator.
Games - 3D games. Worms(TM) Forts: Under Siege 3D, Extreme Air Snowboarding, Gauntlet

Sony Ericsson W890c

2008-10-09T20:59:00.001-07:00

Sony Ericsson W890i - Middle West and Africa, Pacific Asia, Europe, South America

Sony Ericsson W890c - China

This musical device inherits much from Sony Ericsson W880. The W890 is equipped with a 2" display with QVGA reslution, a 3.2 MP camera and a frontal one for videocalls (the last concerns the W890i), wireless Bluetooth module with A2DP profile, FM-radio with RDS. Besides the phone works with Memory Stick Micro (M2) expansion cards.

Class: musical
Position in the line: above Sony Ericsson W880
Rivals: Nokia 5310 XpressMusic
Description based on official information

General features
- Announced in 2007, November
- W890i UMTS/HSDPA 2100, GSM/GPRS 850/900/1800/1900
- W898c GSM/GPRS 850/900/1800/1900
- 2" display, TFT, has the resolution of 240x320 pixels and shows up to 262000 colours
- Battery type Li-Ion 950 mAh
- Dimensions: 104 x 46.5 x 9.9 mm
- Weight: 78
- Colours: brown, silvery, black

Memory
- 28 MB internal memory
- Expansion connector for Memory Stick Micro (M2) up to 4 GB

Call management, ringing tones
- Vibracall
- Polyphonic call melodies
- Speakerphone
- Videotelephony (for W890i)

SMS
- Predictive text input Т9
- EMS, SMS, MMS, Email (POP3, IMAP4)

Camera
- Integrated 3.2 MP camera with 3.2x digital zoom

Multimedia
- Java MIDP 2.1, CLDC 1.1
- Java 3D 1.1
- 3D games
- Macromedia Flash Lite
- Supported audio formats: MP4 (AAC, AAC+, E-AAC+), MP3, M4A, 3GPP™ (AAC, AMR), AMR-NB, AMR-WB, WAV, G-MIDI 1, SP-MIDI, RealAudio 8, iMelody, XMF, WMA, Extension WMA
- Supported video formats: 3GPP (H.263, H.264), MP4, RealVideo 8, WMV
- Supported graphical formats: GIF, JPEG, BMP, WBMP, PNG, SVG Tiny 1.2
- Supported animation formats: SVG Tiny 1.2, GIF, Adobe® Flash Lite™ 2.0
- Walkman player 3.0
- FM radio with RDS

Connectivity
- Bluetooth 2.0 with A2DP
- EDGE
- GPRS
- HSDPA (for W890i)
- USB 2.0
- WAP 2.0\XHTML
- Modem
- Synchronization with PC

Organizer and extras

Access NetFront 3.4
PhotoDJ
VideoDJ
PictBridge
MusicDJ
TrackID
PlayNow
Alarm clock
Calculator
Calendar
Notepad
Stopwatch
Timer
Tasks

Sony Ericsson S700

2008-10-09T20:57:00.000-07:00

This is the first company model in this form-factor. It is equipped with a large qualitative TFT-screen, a slot for Memory Stick Duo, and a camera with the resolution of 1.3 MP.

Class: fashion
Position in the line: above Sonyericsson K700
Rivals: Sharp GX30
Test based description

General features
- Announced in March 2004, shipments started in June 2004 , official anouncement on the 9 March 2004
- GSM900/1800/1900
- Battery type Li-Ion 780 mAh (BST-27)
- Battery life:
- Graphical display, shows up to 262000 colours and has the resolution of 240x320 pixels (TFT). The display can hold up to 8 text lines, 2 service lines and 1 line with icons.
- Integrated camera 1.3 MP, allows taking pictures with the resolution of (1280x960, 640x480, 320x240, 160x120), effects are present, night mode - backlighting as a "flash". The phone records 3GP video, records sound. Digital zoom 8x
- Сolours - Optic Silver
- Java (MIDP 2.0), Mascot Capsule 3D Micro Engine
- Dimensions: 107.5 x 49 x 24.5 mm
- Weight: 137 gramms
Memory
- Phonebook memory for 510 numbers + memory SIM card. For a name in the phone memory you can save up to 6 phone numbers, e-mail address and other extra information. For a name in a phonebook you can have a picture (a photo), which will be shown at incoming call.
- Users' groups
- Organizer - calendar (up to 300 events), to-do list (up to 80 events)
- Call log of last 30 calls of all types , you can view separate lists
- Free memory available for Java applications, photos and other applications is about 30 MB, total memory bank forms 32 MB
- Slot for memory cards MS Duo
Call management, ringing tones
- Vibracall
- 40-tones polyphony (MP3 files as a call melody)
- You can assign own melody to each user
- Voice dialing for 41 number, voice control of profiles and a dictaphone in the standby mode.
- Magic Word, works only with a headset or a card speakerphone set
- Fast dialing for 9 numbers
- Minute minder
- Automatic redial
- Speakerphone

SMS

EMS
MMS
SMS Chat
Sending and receiving call melodies and animated images
Sending SMS to various addressees at the same time
Predictive text input Т9
Message templates
Wap Push

Connectivity
- WAP 2.0, WAP Push
- GPRS (4+2)
- IrDA
- Bluetooth
- Mail client (SMTP/POP3)
- Synchronization with PC
- SyncML
- Wirelles Village Instant Messaging

Organizer and extras

FM-radio, memory for 20 stations, automatic search for stations, stereo playback
Integrated file manager
МР3 player
User's profiles
Headbands at phone on and off synchronized with sound and editing possibility
Search for entries in a to-do list, organizer
Melody editor, MusicDJ
Themes for changing the interface, several are preset - include not only wall-papers, but sounds as well, аnd also graphical elements of the interface
Dictaphone (limited only by free memory).
Date, time
Alarm clock usual and with daily repeated
Photo album (My Pictures) - you can set extra images, received images from PC or with a camera
timer, stop watch with intermediate results and usual calculator.
Games - 3D games

Sony Ericsson S500 represents a 2.5G slider with 14 mm width

2008-10-09T20:56:00.002-07:00

Sony Ericsson S500 represents a 2.5G slider with 14 mm width. Its features include a 2 MP camera with x4 digital zoom.

Class: 3G, fashion
Position in the line: is specified
Rivals: no copies for the announcement
Description based on official information

General features
- Announced in 2007 , May
- EDGE 850/900/1800/1900
- TFT display (QVGA) supports 262144 colours, has the resolution of 320x240 pixels
- Weight: 94
- Dimensions: 99 x 47 x 14 mm
- Colours: Growing Green, Midnight Blue

Memory
- 12 MB of internal memory
- Expansion connector for Memory Stick Micro (M2) up to 1 GB

Call management, ringing tones
- Vibracall
- Polyphonic call melodies
- Videotelephony
- Speakerphone

SMS
- Predictive text input Т9
- SMS, EMS, MMS, E-mail (POP3 and IMAP4)

Camera
- Integrated 2 MP camera with 4x digital zoom

Multimedia
- Supported audio formats: AAC, AAC+, E-AAC+, MP3, MP4, M4A, 3GP, AMR, WAV, SP-MIDI, G-MIDI
- Supported video formats: 3GPP (H263, H264), MP4, Real Video
- Supported image formats: GIF, JPEG, BMP, WBMP, PNG, SVG Tiny 1.2
- Supported animation: SVG Tiny 1.2, GIF
- Java
- 3D games
- Media player

Connectivity
- Bluetooth 2.0 (A2DP profile)
- USB 2.0
- Synchronization with PC
- Modem
- WAP 2.0/ XHTML

Organizer and extras
- VideoDJ™
- PlayNow™
- PictureDJ™
- PictBridge™
- MusicDJ™
- Disc2Phone®
- Alarm clock
- Calculator
- Calendar
- Notepad
- Timer
- Stopwatch

Sony Ericsson S302

2008-10-09T20:56:00.001-07:00

Sony Ericsson S302 - for Mid West and Africa, Asia Pacific, Europe, America

Sony Ericsson S302c - for Asia Pacific

Sony Ericsson S302 –the first handset of the Snapshot series. This is a slim and stylish 2-megapixel cameraphone. To store your pictures use Memory Stick Micro cards or 20 MB of internal memory. There is Photo fix function, which improves photo quality, and the opportunity to share pictures via a USB cable, Bluetooth or directly in blogs.

Class: low-end
Position in the lineup: under consideration
Rival models: Sony Ericsson W610
Description based on the official information

General features
- Model - 2008, June
- GSM 850/900/1800/1900
- Display - 2.0" TFT, 176x220 pixels, up to 262 144 colors
- Talk time - up to 7 hours, standby time - up to 300 hours
- Weight - 79.0 g
- Dimensions - 101.0 x 46.0 x 11.0 mm
- Colors - Silver, Blue

Memory
- 20 MB internal memory
- Slot for Memory Stick Micro (M2) (up to 2 GB cards)

Call management
- Vibrating alert
- Polyphonic ringtones
- MP3 for incoming calls
- Loud speaker

SMS
- Т9 predictive text input
- SMS, MMS, EMS, Email (POP3, IMAP4)

Camera
- Built-in 2.0-megapixel camera with 2.5x digital zoom
- Video capture

Multimedia
- Java MIDP 2.0, CLDC 1.1
- Audio formats - AAC, MP3, MP4, M4A, 3GP, AMR-NB, WAV
- Video formats - 3GP (H.263), MP4
- Image formats - GIF, JPEG, BMP, WBMP, PNG, SWF, SVG Tiny 1.1
- Animation formats - SVG Tiny 1.1, GIF
- FM-radio with RDS
- OMA DRM v1.0

Connectivity
- GPRS
- EDGE
- Bluetooth 2.0 with A2DP
- USB 2.0
- WAP 2.0/XHTML/HTML
- PC sync

Organizer and extras
- TrackID
- PlayNow
- Photo fix
- PictBridge
- Flight mode
- Alarm clock
- Calendar
- Calculator
- Notes
- Tasks
- Timer

Sony Ericsson K850i

2008-10-09T20:54:00.000-07:00

Sony Ericsson K850i is a 3G phone with a 240x320 screen showing 262K colours. Besides it is equipped with expansion connector for Memory Stick Micro ™ and a 5MP camera with autofocus and x16 digital zoom.

Class: 3G, fashion
Position in the line: above Sony Ericsson K810
Rivals: no for the announcement moment
Description based on official information

General features
- Announced in 2007, official announcement on the 15 June 2007
- GSM 850/900/1800/1900, UMTS 850/1900/2100
- Screen TFT (QVGA) shows 262144 colours, has the resolution of 240x320 pixels
- Weight: 118
- Dimensions: 102 x 48 x 17 mm
- Colours: Luminous Green, Velvet Blue
- Sold in: Middle West and Africa, the USA, Pacific Asia and Europe

Memory
- 40 MB internal memory
- Supports microSD™/Transflash™
- Expansion connector for Memory Stick Micro (M2) up to 1 GB

Call management, ringing tones
- Vibracall
- Polyphony
- Speakerphone
- Videotelephony

SMS
- Predictive text input Т9
- SMS, EMS, MMS, E-mail (POP3 and IMAP4)

Camera
- Integrated 5 MP camera with 16-digital zoom
- Autofocus
- Xenone flash
- Anti-red-eye effect

Multimedia
- Audio formats: MP4 (AAC, AAC+, E-AAC+), MP3, M4A, 3GPP™ (AAC, AMR), AMR-NB, AMR-WB, WAV, G-MIDI 1, SP-MIDI, RealAudio 8, iMelody, XMF, WMA
- Supports 3GPP (H.263, H.264), MP4, RealVideo 8, WMV
- Image formats: GIF, JPEG, BMP, WBMP, PNG, SVG Tiny 1.1
- Supports animations SVG Tiny 1.1, GIF, Flash Lite™ 2.0
- Java MIDP 2.0
- Java 3D 1.1
- 3D games
- Media player

Connectivity
- EDGE
- HSDPA
- WAP 2.0/XHTML
- USB 2.0
- Bluetooth 2.0 (A2DP)
- FM radio with RDS

Organizer and extras
- BestPic™ (program for work with the camera)
- Access NetFront™ 3.3
- PhotoDJ™
- VideoDJ™
- PictBridge™
- MusicDJ™
- TrackID™
- PlayNow™
- Microsoft Exchange ActiveSync
- Alarm clock
- Calculator
- Calendar
- Notepad
- Timer
- Stopwatch
- Tasks

Sony Ericsson K858c

2008-10-09T20:53:00.002-07:00

Sony Ericsson K850c provides a 240x320 screen showing 262K colours. Besides it is equipped with expansion connector for Memory Stick Micro ™ and a 5MP camera with autofocus and x16 digital zoom.

Class: fashion
Position in the line: above Sony Ericsson K810
Rivals: no for the announcement moment
Description based on official information

General features
- Announced in 2007, official announcement on the 15 June 2007
- GSM 850/900/1800/1900
- Screen TFT (QVGA) shows 262144 colours, has the resolution of 240x320 pixels
- Weight: 118
- Dimensions: 102 x 48 x 17 mm
- Colours: Luminous Green, Velvet Blue
- Sold in: Pacific Asia

Memory
- 40 MB internal memory
- Supports microSD™/Transflash™
- Expansion connector for Memory Stick Micro (M2) up to 1 GB

Call management, ringing tones
- Vibracall
- Polyphony
- Speakerphone

SMS
- Predictive text input Т9
- SMS, EMS, MMS, E-mail (POP3 and IMAP4)

Camera
- Integrated 5 MP camera with 16-digital zoom
- Autofocus
- Xenone flash
- Anti-red-eye effect

Multimedia
- Audio formats: MP4 (AAC, AAC+, E-AAC+), MP3, M4A, 3GPP™ (AAC, AMR), AMR-NB, AMR-WB, WAV, G-MIDI 1, SP-MIDI, RealAudio 8, iMelody, XMF, WMA
- Supports 3GPP (H.263, H.264), MP4, RealVideo 8, WMV
- Image formats: GIF, JPEG, BMP, WBMP, PNG, SVG Tiny 1.1
- Supports animations SVG Tiny 1.1, GIF, Flash Lite™ 2.0
- Java MIDP 2.0
- Java 3D 1.1
- 3D games
- Media player

Connectivity
- EDGE
- WAP 2.0/XHTML
- USB 2.0
- Bluetooth 2.0 (A2DP)
- FM radio with RDS

Organizer and extras
- BestPic™ (program for work with the camera)
- Access NetFront™ 3.3
- PhotoDJ™
- VideoDJ™
- PictBridge™
- MusicDJ™
- TrackID™
- PlayNow™
- Microsoft Exchange ActiveSync
- Alarm clock
- Calculator
- Calendar
- Notepad
- Timer
- Stopwatch
- Tasks

Sony Ericsson K610im

2008-10-09T20:53:00.001-07:00

This is the first company phone with support for i-mode service. Technologically, it represents a modified version of the K610i.

Class: 3G, fashion
Position in the line: starts
Rivals: no for the announcement
Description based on official information

General features
- Announced in 2006, officially announced on the 19 of June 2006
- GSM 900/1800/1900 UMTS 2100
- Battery type Li-Pol
- Graphical display shows up to 262000 colours and has the resolution of 176x220 pixels (TFT). Up to 7 text lines, 2 service lines and 1 line with icons.
- 2 MP, various effects, 2x digital zoom
- Frontal VGA camera for videocalls
- Java (MIDP 2.0), Mascot Capsule 3D Micro Engine, as well as Java 3D
- Dimensions: 102x45,2x16,9 mm
- Weight: 92 gramms
Memory
- Phonebook memory for 1000 contacts + SIM memory. Up to 6 numbers, e-mail address and extra data for a name. A picture (photo) can be assigned to a name, it will be shown at an incoming call.
- User groups
- Organizer - calendar (up to 300 events), to-do list (up to 80 events)
- Call log of 30 last calls of all types
- Memory bank for Java applications, photos and other data forms 20 MB
- Memory card slot Memory Stik Micro (M2), hot change, up to 1 GB cards
Call management, ringing tones
- Vibracall
- 72-tones polyphony, mp3 as a call melody
- Each user can have a personal melody assigned (not more than 10 users)
- Voice dial
- Magic Word, works with a headset or a car speakerphone kit
- Fast dial for 9 numbers
- Minute minder
- Automatic redial
- Speakerphone

SMS

EMS
MMS
SMS Chat
Send and receive ringing tones and animated images
Group messaging capablity
Predictive text input Т9
Message templates
Wap Push

Connectivity
- i-mode
- Bluetooth (A2DP profile)
- Mail client (SMTP/POP3)
- Synchronization with PC
- SyncML
- Wirelles Village Instant Messaging
- USB connection to a PC, serves as an external drive

Organizer and extras

Integrated file manager
Media player - MP3, AAC, E-AAC+, MPEG4, 3GPP
User profiles
Screen headbands synchronized with sound, editable
Search in to-do list and organizer
Melody composer, MusicDJ
VideoDJ
Themes to alter the interface, several are preset - not only wall-paper, but sound and graphical elements of the interface are included
Dictaphone (limited only in free memory).
Date, time
Alarm clock once and recurrent
Photoalbum (My Pictures) - you can install extra presets, receive them from a PC or a camera
timer, stopwatch with intermediate values and a plain calculator.
Games - 3D games

Sony Ericsson K550im

2008-10-09T20:52:00.001-07:00

I-mode version of the K550, differs from a usual device support for i-mode, a capability to use iMMS and iMail.

Class: multimedia, middle
Position in the line: above Sony Ericsson K510
Rivals: Nokia 6233
Description based on official information

General features
- Announced in 2007, official announcement on the 06 February 2007
- eGSM 850/900/1800/1900
- Battery type Li-Ion
- Battery life:
- 1,9" TFD display the resolution of 176x220 pixels and support for up to 262000 colours
- Сolours: deep black, pearly white
- Weight: 85 gramms
- Dimensions: 102 x 46 x 14 mm

Memory
- Phonebook may contain up to 1000 names with completely and partly filled fields. Totally about 2500 numbers. Personal call signal for a name, assign a picture.
- General call list contains up to 30 entries with date and time specified
- Organizer - calendar (up to 300 events), to-do list
- User memory forms about 64 MB, shared dynamically among all applications
- Expansion slot for Memory Stick Micro M2™

Call management, ringing tones
- Vibracall
- Polyphonic call melodies, 40-tonal polyphony
- Fast dial for 9 number
- Automatic redial (up to 10 attempts maximum)
- Automatic or manual network selection
- Voice dial
- mp3/aac files as a call melody

SMS
- Predictive text input Т9
- Smiles
- Concatenated messages
- Message templates
- Sending and receiving graphical messages

Camera
- 2.0 MP camera, (the maximum resolution of 1632x1224 pixels)
- Automatic focus
- Backlighting at shooting
- Макро режим, night mode, multishooting, timer
- Recording video as 3GP , the resolution of - 176x144 pixels
- Digital zoom

Multimedia
- Java (DoJa)
- Integrated image editor
- Musical composer, MusicDJ
- VideoDJ
- Play Now
- TrackID
- Themes, several are preset - include not only wall papers, but sounds and graphical elements
- FM-radio, memory for 20 stations, automatic search for stations, stereo playback, RDS
- Integrated video and audio player (MPEG4, H.263, AMR, MP3, AAC, AAC+, eAAC+, m4a)
- Photoalbum (My Pictures) - allows installing extra pictures, receive them from a PC or a camera
- 3D игры

Connectivity
- Integrated mail client (iMAIL)
- Instant Messaging
- GPRS/EDGE class 10
- RSS-reader
- IrDA
- Browser, xHTML
- Bluetooth 2.0 (A2DP profile)
- iMMS
- Synchronization with PC (USB 2.0)

Organizer and extras
- Integrated file manager
- User profiles, "aboard" plain (turning off radio component)
- Screen headbands at phone on and off synchronized with sound and editing capability
- Organizer, recurrent events
- To-do list
- Notes
- Search for entries in to-do list, organizer
- Dictaphone (the only limit is free memory).
- Date, time
- Alarm clock plain and daily recurrent (total number of 5 alarm clocks)
- Timer, stopwatch with intermediate values and plain calculator

Sony Ericsson G900

2008-10-09T20:51:00.003-07:00

The company has launched a device with a simple set of functions - Sony Ericsson G900. It looks very like Sony Ericsson W960i and has minor changes. The product will be available on the market in May at about 320 Euro. It differs from the previous model Sony Ericsson G700 in Wi-Fi, finger-friendly interface, 5-megapixel camera with auto focus.

Class: smartphone, 3G
Position in the lineup: above Sony Ericsson G700
Rival models: no direct rivals
Description is based on the official info

General features
- Model - 2008, February
- GSM 900/1800/1900, UMTS 2100
- OS - Symbian OS v9.1, UIQ 3.0
- Display - 2.4" touchscreen TFT, 240x320 pixels, up to 262K colors
- Talk time - up to 12 hours in GSM, up to 4 hours in UMTS, standby time - up to 380 hours, video call time - up to 2.5 hours
- Weight - 99 g
- Dimensions - 106 x 49 x 13 mm

Memory
- 256 MB of internal memory
- 128 MB RAM
- Slot for Memory Stick Micro (M2) cards (up to 8 GB)

Call management
- Vibrating alert
- Polyphonic ringtones
- Loud speaker
- MP3 for incoming calls
- Video calls

SMS
- Т9 predictive text input
- SMS, MMS, EMS, Email (POP3, IMAP4, SMTP, MIME), IM, Push e-mail

Camera
- Built-in 5.0-megapixel camera with 3x digital zoom
- Auto focus

Multimedia
- Open GL ES support
- Java MIDP 2.0, CLDC 1.1
- Audio formats - MP3, AAC-LC, eAAC+, AAC+, HE AAC, AMR-NB, AU, iMelody, MIDI, SP-MIDI, RMF, WAV, WMA, XMF, DLS, Real Audio 9
- Video formats - MPEG-4 (H.263, H.264), 3GPP, RealMedia, WMV
- Image formats - BMP, GIF, JPEG, MBM, PNG, WBMP, SVG Tiny 1.1
- GIF animation
- 3D games
- FM-radio with RDS

Connectivity
- GPRS Class 10
- Bluetooth 2.0
- Wi-Fi 802.11b/g
- USB 2.0
- WAP 2.0
- Opera 8/XHTML/HTML
- PC sync

Organizer and extras
- MusicDJ™
- PlayNow™
- TrackID™
- Flight mode
- Alarm clock
- Calendar
- Calculator
- Stopwatch
- Timer
- Phonebook

Sony Ericsson G700 Business Edition

2008-10-09T20:51:00.001-07:00

Sony Ericsson G700 Business Edition differs from the original Sony Ericsson G700 in the absence of the camera. Note that the device is meant for the Asia Pacific region, not Europe.

Class: smartphone, 3G, business
Position in the lineup: under Sony Ericsson G700
Rival models: no direct rivals
Description is based on the official info

General features
- Model - 2008, February
- G700 - GSM 900/1800/1900, UMTS 2100
- G700c - SM 900/1800/1900
- OS - Symbian OS v9.1, UIQ 3.0
- Display - 2.4" touchscreen TFT, 240x320 pixels, up to 262K colors
- Talk time - up to 12 hours in GSM, up to 4 hours in UMTS, standby time - up to 380 hours, video call time - up to 2.5 hours
- Weight - 99 g
- Dimensions - 106 x 49 x 13 mm

Memory
- 256 MB of internal memory
- 128 MB RAM
- Slot for Memory Stick Micro (M2) cards (up to 8 GB)

Call management
- Vibrating alert
- Polyphonic ringtones
- Loud speaker
- MP3 for incoming calls
- Video calls

SMS
- Т9 predictive text input
- SMS, MMS, EMS, Email (POP3, IMAP4, SMTP, MIME), IM, Push e-mai

Multimedia
- Open GL ES support
- Java MIDP 2.0, CLDC 1.1
- Audio formats - MP3, AAC-LC, eAAC+, AAC+, HE AAC, AMR-NB, AU, iMelody, MIDI, SP-MIDI, RMF, WAV, WMA, XMF, DLS, Real Audio 9
- Video formats - MPEG-4 (H.263, H.264), 3GPP, RealMedia, WMV
- Image formats - BMP, GIF, JPEG, MBM, PNG, WBMP, SVG Tiny 1.1
- GIF animation
- 3D games
- FM-radio with RDS

Connectivity
- GPRS Class 10
- Bluetooth 2.0
- USB 2.0
- WAP 2.0
- Opera 8/XHTML/HTML
- PC sync

Organizer and extras
- MusicDJ™
- PlayNow™
- TrackID™
- Flight mode
- Alarm clock
- Calendar
- Calculator
- Stopwatch
- Timer
- Phonebook

Motorola MOTOROKR EM30

2008-10-09T20:49:00.001-07:00

Motorola EM30 is equipped with a ModeShift keyboard, which backlights buttons in red in music mode, in blue in phone and SMS modes. There is a 3.5-mm audio jack, so you can use any headphones you like.

Class: music
Position in the lineup: above Motorola ROKR EM28
Rival models: not yet specified
Description based on the official info

General features
- Model - 2008, August
- GSM 850/900/1800/1900
- Main display - 1.8" TFT, 128x160 pixels, up to 65K colors
- Battery type - Li-Ion 970 mAh
- Talk time - up to 6 hours, standby time - up to 300 hours
- Dimensions - 115 x 53 x 10.6 mm
- Weight - 90 g

Memory
- Phonebook for 1000 contacts
- Slot for microSD cards (up to 8 GB)

Call management
- Vibrating alert
- 32-channel polyphony
- Loud speaker
- MP3 for incoming calls
- CrystalTalk technology

SMS
- Т9 predictive text input
- EMS, MMS, SMS

Camera
- Built-in 2.0-megapixel camera with 8x digital zoom
- Video capture

Multimedia
- Java MIDP 2.0
- Games
- MP3-player
- FM-radio with RDS
- Audio formats - MIDI, MP3, AAC, AAC+, Enhanced AAC+, WMA, WAV, AMR-NB, Real Audio (RA) v10

Connectivity
- GPRS Class 12
- EDGE Class 12
- Bluetooth 2.0 (A2DP)
- WAP 2.0
- USB 2.0
- 3.5-mm audio jack
- PC sync

Organizer and extras
- Calculator
- Calendar
- Alarm clock
- World clock
- Notes

Motorola ROKR EM28

2008-10-09T20:48:00.002-07:00

Motorola EM28 features sensor buttons on the flip cover, which can be revealed on purpose. The external screen displays artist and track name during the playback. The USB 2.0 jack enables high-speed date transfer without additional software installed.

Class: budget
Position in the lineup: above Motorola ROKR EM25
Rival models: Sony Ericsson W380
Description based on the official info

General features
- Model - 2008, August
- GSM 850/1800/1900 or 900/1800/1900
- Display - 1.8" TFT, 128x160 pixels, up to 65K colors
- Secondary display - 1.2" CLI, 96x80 pixels
- Battery type - Li-Ion 940 mAh
- Talk time - up to 7.5 hours, standby time - up to 250 hours, music time - up to 11 hours
- Dimensions - 94.35 x 49.5 x 17.38 mm
- Weight - 90 g

Memory
- Phonebook for 1000 contacts
- Slot for microSD cards (up to 2 GB)

Call management
- Vibrating alert
- 32-channel polyphony
- Loud speaker
- MP3 for incoming calls

SMS
- Т9 predictive text input
- EMS, MMS, SMS

Camera
- Built-in 1.3-megapixel camera with 4x digital zoom
- Video capture

Multimedia
- Java MIDP 2.0
- Games
- MP3-player
- FM-radio with RDS
- FMShare
- Audio formats - AAC, AAC+, eAAC+, AMR NB, MP3, WAV, RA6

Connectivity
- GPRS Class 10
- EDGE Class 10
- Bluetooth 2.0 (A2DP)
- WAP 2.0
- USB 2.0
- 3.5-mm audio jack
- PC sync

Organizer and extras
- Calculator
- Calendar
- Alarm clock
- World clock
- Notes

Motorola ROKR EM25

2008-10-09T20:48:00.001-07:00

Motorola EM25 offers a quick access to music libraries and comes with an integrated FM-radio. Dedicated media buttons let the user control playback, pause, fast forward and rewind. FMShare lets you share your favorite FM station with friends, while SONGID identifies the song, then downloads and plays it on the phone.

Class: budget
Position in the lineup: starting
Rival models: Samsung SGH-J700
Description based on the official info

General features
- Model - 2008, August
- GSM 850/1900 and 900/1800
- Display - 1.8" TFT, 128x160 pixels, up to 65K colors
- Battery type - Li-Ion 780 mAh
- Talk time - up to 8 hours, standby time - up to 330 hours
- Dimensions - 101 x 46 x 13.9 mm
- Weight - 90 g

Memory
- 128 MB of internal memory
- Phonebook for 1000 contacts
- Slot for microSD cards (up to 2 GB)

Call management
- Vibrating alert
- 64-channel polyphony
- Loud speaker
- MP3 for incoming calls
- CrystalTalk technology

SMS
- Т9 predictive text input
- SMS, MMS

Camera
- Built-in 1.3-megapixel camera with 4x digital zoom
- Video capture

Multimedia
- Java MIDP 2.0
- Games
- MP3-player
- FM-radio with RDS
- FMShare
- Audio formats - AAC, AMR NB, MIDI, MP3, WAV

Connectivity
- GPRS Class 10
- Bluetooth 2.0 (A2DP)
- 3.5-mm audio jack
- PC sync

Organizer and extras
- V CAST Music
- V CAST Video
- Calculator
- Calendar
- Alarm clock
- World clock
- Notes

Nokia 6500 classic

2008-10-09T20:46:00.002-07:00

3G phone Nokia 6500 classic comes equipped with a 2 MP camera with Carl Zeiss optics, flash and x8 digital zoom. The device comes with 1GB of flash-memory onboard. Besides it is equipped with Bluetooth 2.0, stereo FM-radio, and Micro USB.

Class: middle, 3G
Position in the line: above Nokia 6300
Rivals: Sony Ericsson T650
Description based on official information

General features
- Announced in 2007, official announcement on the 31 May 2007
- GSM/EGSM 850/900/1800/1900, WCDMA 850\2100
- Series 40 5th Edition
- Screen with the resolution of 240 x 320 pixels shows up to 16.7 million colours
- Battery life:
- Battery type Li-Ion 830 mAh
- Weight: 94 gramms
- Dimensions: 109.8 x 45 x 9.5 mm
- Colours: black, bronze

Memory
- 920 MB flash-memory

Call management, ringing tones
- Vibracall
- Polyphony, 64 tones
- MP3 melodies as a call signal
- Videotelephony

SMS
- Predictive text input Т9
- SMS, MMS+SMIL, IM, E-mail (MAP4, POP3, SMTP)

Camera
- Integrated 2-MP camera with 8-digital zoom
- Photos with the resolution of 1600 x 1200 pixels as JPEG
- Video recorded with the resolution of 176 x 144 pixels as MP4
- Flash

Multimedia
- Flash Lite 2.1 player
- Java MIDP 2.1
- Headbands
- Wall-papers
- Themes
- Games
- Video player
- Musical player
- Supports 3GPP, (H.263), H.264/AVC, MPEG-4
- Audio formats: AAC, AAC+, eAAC+, MP3, MP4, WMA, Mobile XMF, SP-MIDI, AMR (NB-AMR), True tones (WB-AMR)
- Graphical formats: BMP, GIF87a, GIF89a, JPEG, PNG, WBMP

Connectivity
- EGPRS class 31, up to 296 kb/s
- GPRS class 31, up to 53.6 kb/s
- WCDMA incoming speed 384 kb/s, outgoing 128 kb/s
- HSCSD
- CSD
- Bluetooth 2.0 (profiles: A2DP, AVRCP, DUN, FTP, GAP, GAVDP, GOEP, HFP, HSP, OPP, SAP, SDAP, SDP, SPP)
- Micro USB
- Nokia Audio Visual Plug 2.5 mm
- Bluetooth Stereo Audio
- Video cable
- Stereo FM-radio with RDS
- WAP 2.0/HTML/XHTML
- Handsfree

Organizer and extras
- Dictaphone
- Calendar
- Alarm clock
- Calculator
- Notepad

Nokia 6500 slide

2008-10-09T20:46:00.001-07:00

3G phone Nokia 6500 slide comes equipped with a 3.2 MP camera with Carl Zeiss optics, autofocus, flash and x8 digital zoom. The device comes equipped with expansion connector for MicroSD, supports memory cards up to 4 GB, and USB 2.0.

Class: middle, 3G
Position in the line: above Nokia 6300
Rivals: Sony Ericsson T650
Description based on official information

General features
- Announced in 2007, official announcement on the 31 May 2007
- GSM/EGSM 850/900/1800/1900, WCDMA 850\2100
- Series 40 5th Edition
- 2.2" screen with the resolution of 240 x 320 pixels shows up to 16.7 million colours
- Battery life:
- Battery type Li-Ion 3.7v 900 mAh
- Weight: 125 gramms
- Dimensions: 96.5 x 46.5 x 16.4 mm
- Colours: silvery

Memory
- 20 MB flash-memory
- Expansion connector for microSD (TransFlash) up to 4 GB

Call management, ringing tones
- Vibracall
- Polyphony, 64 tones
- MP3 melodies as a call signal
- Videotelephony

SMS
- Predictive text input Т9
- SMS, MMS+SMIL, IM, E-mail (MAP4, POP3, SMTP)

Camera
- Integrated 3.2-MP camera with 8-digital zoom and autofocus
- Photos with the resolution of 2048 x 1536 pixels as JPEG
- Video recorded with the resolution of 640 x 480 pixels as H.264/AVC, MPEG-4 15 fps
- Main camera with 4-x digital zoom for video
- Flash
- Second camera records with the resolution of 176 x 144 pixels as H.263 15 fps

Multimedia
- Flash Lite 2.1 player
- Java MIDP 2.1
- Headbands
- Wall-papers
- Themes
- Games
- Video player
- Musical player
- Supports 3GPP, (H.263), H.264/AVC, MPEG-4
- Audio formats: AAC, AAC+, eAAC+, MP3, MP4, WMA, Mobile XMF, SP-MIDI, AMR (NB-AMR), True tones (WB-AMR)
- Graphical formats: BMP, GIF87a, GIF89a, JPEG, PNG, WBMP

Connectivity
- EGPRS class 31, up to 296 kb/s
- GPRS class 31, up to 53.6 kb/s
- WCDMA incoming speed 384 kb/s, outgoing 128 kb/s
- HSCSD
- CSD
- Bluetooth 2.0 (profiles: A2DP, AVRCP, DUN, FTP, GAP, GAVDP, GOEP, HFP, HSP, OPP, SAP, SDAP, SDP, SPP)
- Micro USB
- Nokia Audio Visual Plug 2.5 mm
- Bluetooth Stereo Audio
- Video cable
- Stereo FM-radio with RDS
- WAP 2.0/HTML/XHTML
- Handsfree
- TV out

Organizer and extras
- Dictaphone
- Calendar
- Alarm clock
- Calculator
- Notepad

Nokia 5500 Music Edition

2008-10-09T20:43:00.000-07:00

This is a musical edition of a sport smartphone 5500 Sport. The hardware component of the phone changed in no way. However the package changed - now it includes a 512 MB microSD card, a special wrist and waist fastening while going in for sports, aslso a bicycle fastening and a sports headset. And after all, the Nokia 5500 Sport Music Edition provides Nokia Music Manager software, which makes exchanging musical compositions with PCs easier.

Class: smartphone, sports, multimedia
Position in the line: above Nokia 5500
Rivals: no in its segment
Price for the release moment forms about 330-350 Euros
Description based on official information

General features
- Announced in 2006, official announcement in October 2006
- eGSM 900/1800/1900
- Battery type 860 mAh Li-ion (BL-5B)
- Battery life:
- - talk mode from 2 up to 4 hours
  - standby mode from 150 up to 270 hours
- Graphical screen high-contrast, 262000 colours (TFT), the resolution of 208x208 pixels (31x31 mm)
- 5 dimensional navigation button
- Run by Symbian OS version 9.1 (S60 3 edition interface)
- Weight: 103 gramms
- Dimensions: 107x45x18 mm

Memory
- Memory for applications forms about 32 MB, about 10 MB of internal memory are available to a user. Use memory cards for storing data.
- microSD memory slot
- Photos can be assigned to numbers in the phonebook
- For each name you can store Name and Surname (two lines), Company name, Position, Phone number, Mobile phone, Fax and E-mail address — totally 8 fields. You can add any number of fields.
- No limit on the number of user groups, a capability to assign a name to several groups at the same time
- SIM entries are stored separately, you can't view them with phone entries at once
- Call lists, no limits on the number of entries; date, duration and time of a call are kept. You can set a storage period for list entries (a month by default)

Call management, ringing tones
- Vibracall
- Polyphony, True Tones, supported formats include AAC, eAAC+, MP3, RealAudio, WAV
- 64-tones call melody, mp3, AAC, WAV, NB-AMR, WB-AMR
- Voice dial doesn't depend on the pronounciation, no need in recording tags preliminarily
- Speakerphone
- Call duration is displayed during a conversation
- Melody composer,assign melodies to names in the phonebook

SMS
- Predictive text input Т9
- Message templates (10 preset and you can change them or add own ones)
- Graphical messages
- Concatenated messages (up to 459 characters)

Camera
- Integrated 2-MP camera (CMOS)
- The maximum resolution of 1600x1200 pixels
- Anti-red eye effect, scene setting, lighting tune up
- Digital zoom x20
- Video can be recorded with sound - QCIF (176x144) or subQCIF (128x96), 15 fps

Multimedia
- Stereo FM-radio, Visual Radio
- 3GPP Video Streaming
- RealOne Player: playback of RealMedia and 3GPP-compatible files
- Special player with support for formats: eAAC+, AAC+, M4A, MPEG-4 ACC LC, LTP, MP3, AMR-NB, AMR-WB, MIDI, WMA
- Remote controller compatible with stereo-earphones
- Musical profile - the smartphone as an mp3 player
- Java (MIDP 2.0), 3D API (JSR-184)
- Themes

Connectivity
- WAP 2.0
- Bluetooth 2.0 with support for EDR
- GPRS class 10
- EGPRS (Class B, Multislot class 11)
- E-mail protocols: SMTP, POP3, IMAP4 - attachments
- MMS
- Synchronization with PC via Bluetooth or cable
- SyncML
- SMIL
- USB 2.0 via Pop-Port
- PoC or PTT
- Instant Messaging

Organizer and extras
- Sport mode using an integrated 3D-sensor (preset applications are Quick start, Training diary, and Tests). Also the sensor is used to manage some of the applications.
- Text to Speech
- User profiles, temporary profile
- Time, date
- Calculator, currency converter
- Stopwatch (up to 20 intermediate values), countdown timer
- Organizer with support for events of various kinds, reminders
- To-do list
- Dictaphone
- Photoalbum - advanced gallery
- Viewer - application to view MS Word and MS PowerPoint files
- Games

Nokia 5610 XpressMusic

2008-10-09T20:39:00.000-07:00

Nokia 5610 XpressMusic is a multimedia slider for 3G networks. It is the first device in the XpressMusic line with support for videotelephony. There is a plenty features which will gladden music lovers.

Class: 3G, multimedia
Position in the line: above Nokia 5300
Rivals: no direct rivals
Description based on official information

General features
- Announced in 2007, official announcement on the 29 August 2007
- GSM 850/900/1800/1900, WCDMA 850/2100
- Platform Series 40 5th Edition, Feature Pack 1
- Display with the resolution of 240 x 320 pixels shows up to 16 million colours
- Battery type BP-5M 3.7V 900 mAh
- Battery life:
- Weight: 111
- Dimensions: 98.5 x 48.5 x 17 mm

Memory
- 20 MB internal memory
- 128 MB RAM (about 90 MB available to a user)
- Expansion connector for Micro SD (up to 4 GB)

Call management, ringing tones
- Vibracall
- Polyphonic call melodies, 64 tones polyphony
- MP3 and video files as a call melody
- Videotelephony

SMS
- Predictive text input Т9
- SMS, MMS+SMIL, fast messaging, Email (IMAP4, POP3, SMTP)

Camera
- Main camera
- Frontal camera

Multimedia
- Games
- Screen headbands, wall-papers, themes
- Java MIDP 2.1 CLDC 1.1
- Flash Lite 2.1
- Video player
- Audio player
- Dictaphone
- Supported audio formats: AAC, AAC+, eAAC+, MP3, MP4, WMA, AMR-NB, AMR-WB, Mobile XMF, SP-MIDI, MIDI Tones (poly 64), True tones
- Supported video formats: 3GPP (H.263), H.264/AVC, MPEG-4
- Supported graphical formats: BMP, GIF87a, GIF89a, JPEG, PNG, WBMP
- FM stereo radio
- Stereo sound

Connectivity
- GPRS
- HSCSD
- CSD
- Bluetooth 2.0 +EDR (profiles: A2DP, AVRCP, DUN, FTP, GAP, GAVDP, GOEP, HFP, HSP, OPP, SAP, SDAP, SPP)
- Bluetooth Stereo Audio
- Micro USB
- USB 2.0
- WAP 2.0/XHTML/HTML
- Handsfree
- PoC (Push-to-talk over Cellular)
- Synchronization with PC

Organizer and extras
- Organizer

LG KP500: cheapest touchscreen handset yet

2008-10-09T20:37:00.000-07:00

Another touchscreen handset has appeared from LG - the KP500. This handset is the cheapest handset, to sport a touchscreen available on the market. Naturally, to achieve this, the handset, spec-wise, isn't top of the range, as can be seen below. Once again, LG has not officially announced the confirmed specs for the handset - but, expect them to soon, as the handset should be released in Europe, next month.

Connectivity: Quad-band GSM, EDGE, and GPRS
Display: 3" touchscreen, 320 x 400 pixels, supports up to 262 thousand colours
Camera: 3 MP
Memory: 46 MB internal, Micro SD card slot
Extras: Stylus, on-screen keyboard, FM Radio, built-in motion sensor, Bluetooth, and USB connectivity
Battery: 900 mAh
Dimensions: 106.5×55.4×11.9 mm
Weight: 89 grams

Nokia rolls out S60 5th Edition for touchscreen devices

2008-10-09T20:36:00.000-07:00

As Nokia’s touchscreen-enabled line-up was picking up pace with the latest release of the Nokia 5800 XpressMusic phone (read more about it in our exclusive preview here), it was about time hey introduced some new members to their software portfolio. The other day they rolled out S60 5th edition platform that can be installed on touchscreen handsets. As Nokia claims, the new edition of this OS sports a number of unique characteristics and allows the developers to create multimedia-ready devices with a wide array of features enabled in them. Naturally, the first phone to come preinstalled with S60 5th Edition is the Nokia 5800 XpressMusic.

The most newsworthy specs of the new OS include:

Bundled browser supporting Adobe Flash Lite 3
Finger- and stylus-based navigation
Bundled motion sensor
Support for widgets (mini-applications like the ones found in the Samsung M8800)
Updated video and image editors
Support for Open C++

Samsung i7110's specs leak

2008-10-09T20:35:00.001-07:00

We already have some articles on the upcoming Samsung i7110 smartphone in our news feed. In a word, it’s a Symbian S60-based device housed in a candybar-style casing, whose major trump is a so-called “virtual mouse pointer” – it allows the user to control a mouse pointer on the phone’s screen with the help of the navigation pad (much like the setup found in the Samsung i780 Windows Mobile smartphone). However it’s the first time we could get our hands on a detailed spec sheet of the phone. Reportedly, the i7110 will be launched at Symbian Smartphone Show that will take place on October 21-22 in London.

Spec sheet of the Samsung i7110:

3G (HSDPA), GSM/EDGE connectivity
OS: Symbian 9.3 S60 (Feature Pack 2?)
QVGA OLED-display capable of up to 262K colors
5 Mpix camera with autofocus and LED flash
FM-radio with RDS functionality
GPS-receiver
80 Mb of internal memory
microSDHC memory card slot
Dimensions – 118x52x

LG-KC780 WITH 8 MP SHOOTER CAMERA

2008-10-09T20:34:00.001-07:00

LG have finally unleashed the much-rumored KC780 slider phone. Its major attraction is the 8 Mpix camera module with Schneider-Kreuznach lenses housed in a relatively compact casing, whose thickness doesn't exceed 13.9 mm. On top of that it comes bundled with a 2.4-inch display. As LG claims, the KC780 is tweaked mainly for shooting portraits, rather than anything else, hence its advanced feats on this front, such as smile dection and face recognition. The phone is set to go on sale in Europe some time in November, and then it'll go on to spread across the globe.

Spec sheet of the LG-KC780:

Connectivity: GSM/GPRS/EDGE 900/1800/1900 MHz
2.4-inch display capable of 262K colors and 240x320 pixel resoulution
140 Mb of built-in memory
microSD memory card slot
8 Mpix camera with Schneider-Kreuznach lens and autofocus
Bluetooth 2.1+EDR, USB 2.0 connectivity options
900 mAh Li-Ion battery
Talk time - up to 6 hours
Standby time - up to 450 hours
Dimensions - 107x52x13,9 mm
Weight - 119 g

Rating:

NOKIA 5310 LETS YOUR MUSIC MOBILE

2008-10-09T20:29:00.000-07:00

Nokia 5310 XpressMusic

Nokia 5310 XpressMusic is a musical candybar with special player buttons. It works in GSM networks and has 30 MB of internal memory onboard, also they may be expanded with microSD memory cards up to 4 GB in capacity. Besides the device is provided with a 2.0MP camera, Bluetooth 2.0 module and FM stereo radio.

Class: musical
Position in the line: above Nokia 5300
Rivals: no direct rivals
Description based on official information

General features
- Announced in 2007, official announcement on the 29 August 2007
- GSM 900/1800/1900 or 850/1800/1900 depending on the sales region
- Platform Series 40 5th Edition, Feature Pack 1
- Display with the resolution of 240 x 320 pixels shows up to 16 million colours
- Battery type Li-Ion BL-4C 3.7V 860 mAh
- Battery life:
- Weight: 70.2
- Dimensions: 103.8 x 44.7 x 9.9 mm

Memory
- 30 MB internal memory
- Expansion connector for microSD (up to 4 GB)

Call management, ringing tones
- Vibracall
- Polyphonic call melodies, 64 tones polyphony
- MP3 and video files as a call melody

SMS
- Predictive text input Т9
- SMS, MMS+SMIL, fast messaging, Email (IMAP4, POP3, SMTP)

Camera
- Integrated 2.0 MP camera with 4x digital zoom
- Pictures with the maximum resolution of 1600 x 1200 pixels and saved as JPEG
- Records video as H.263, H.264/AVC with the resolution of QCIF 176 x 144 pixels, 7 fps
- Timer

Multimedia
- Games
- Screen headbands, wall-papers, themes
- Java MIDP 2.1 CLDC 1.1
- Flash Lite 2.1
- Video player
- Audio player
- Dictaphone
- Supported audio formats: AAC, eAAC+, MP3, MP4, WMA, AMR-NB, AMR-WB, Mobile XMF, SP-MIDI, MIDI, True tones
- Supported video formats: 3GPP (H.263), H.264/AVC, MPEG-4
- Supported graphical formats: BMP, GIF87a, GIF89a, JPEG, PNG, WBMP
- FM stereo radio

Connectivity
- GPRS
- EDGE
- HSCSD
- CSD
- Bluetooth 2.0 +EDR (profiles: A2DP, AVRCP, DUN, FTP, GAP, GAVDP, GOEP, HFP, HSP, OPP, PAN, SAP, SDAP, SPP)
- Micro USB
- USB 2.0
- WAP 2.0/XHTML/HTML
- Handsfree
- Synchronization with PC

Organizer and extras
- Alarm clock
- Notebook
- Timer
- Calendar

Samsung D900 / D900i Review

2008-10-09T02:05:00.001-07:00

Phone rating:

In a nutshell: The superslim D900 is a supersexy sliding phone, complete with a high quality 3 megapixel camera with flash and autofocus, and a fully-featured music player with expandable memory to replace your MP3 player. The D900 has been one of Samsung's most successful phones and was the best selling phone of Winter 2006 / Spring 2007. The D900i is virtually the same but with an FM radio.
Best buy: *Free* with half-price line rental for 16 months from mobiles.co.uk (D900).

The Samsung D900 puts the WOW! in WOW! FACTOR. Seriously, a phone this exceptional doesn't come along very often, perhaps not since the Samsung D500 in 2004.

You can tell we love the phone, so let's get on with the reasons why. Firstly, this is the world's slimmest slider phone (now beaten by the Samsung U600!). Samsung have really perfected the slide design, and the D900 is silky smooth. The physical appearance of the phone is unbeatable, with a lovely magnesium surface coating and a small but functional keypad making the phone very tactile and easy to use. The LG Chocolate and the Samsung E900 may look cool with their touch-sensitive keypads, but you can't beat the ease-of-use of a conventional keypad. At just 13mm thickness, the D900 even beats the Motorola RAZR in the thinness charts.

Looks aren't everything however, so let's move on to the next reason for choosing the D900 - its 3 megapixel camera with autofocus. This is simply the best camera currently available in any phone after the Sony Ericsson K800i. It gives results of amazing clarity, and what is really astounding is that Samsung have fitted their best ever camera in their thinnest slider phone! We are in awe. The video camera is also of high quality and records in MPEG4 format. The display on the D900 is very finely detailed with outstanding clarity and does full justice to the camera. Some reviewers are mistaken in believing that videos cannot be viewed in full screen, but they can - just press 1 to switch to full screen mode.

Next the music player. This handles a good range of formats - MP3, ACC, ACC+ and e-AAC+ - and has very good sound reproduction with 3D virtual surround sound and a digital power amplifier. The player is easy to use with playlists of up to 30 tracks. You can use the stereo headset supplied by Samsung or a wireless Bluetooth headset. The built-in memory is 70 Mbytes, which is enough to get started, but if you're serious about using the phone as an MP3 player you can buy a Micro SD card - a 512 Mbyte card costs around £15. The only real downside on the music front is that there's no radio included.

The phone has all the usual features that you'd expect - messaging, email, MP3 ringtones, speakerphone, Java games, etc, etc. The full spec is listed below. There are a few bonus features - a document viewer for viewing MS Office files, offline mode for use when listening to music on a plane, a TV-Out connection for viewing images directly on a TV screen, and EDGE for fast internet access. Connectivity is via Bluetooth or fast USB. The user interface is very nice and friendly, with a new menu design featuring a black background - very smart. Battery life is good. One gripe is that you can't use an MP3 for the SMS alert sound (same with all Samsungs), but good news - you can select vibrate and ring simultaneously.

2006 has been an exciting year for phones, but the Samsung D900 has got to be a serious contender for phone of the year. The D900i is virtually the same as the D900 but it also has an FM radio (but is missing the document viewer). The new Samsung U600 is even slimmer. The G600 isn't quite as slim, but features a 5 megapixel camera and is an outstanding phone.

The D900 has been the best selling phone for the first half of 2007 and there are now some incredible deals available. Use our links at the top right of this page to shop around for a bargain.

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Features of the Samsung D900 include:

3 megapixel camera with autofocus, flash and 4x digital zoom
Video camera (MPEG4 format)
Display: TFT, 262,144 colours, 240 x 320 pixels
Music player (MP3, ACC, ACC+, e-AAC+ formats) with 3D sound and digital power amp
FM radio (D900i only)
64-voice polyphonic ringtones / MP3 ringtones
Voice memo recorder
Integrated handsfree speakerphone
Messaging: SMS, MMS, email (POP3, SMTP, IMAP4, SSL, TLS)
T9 predictive text
Document viewer for MS Office, PDF and HTML files
Mobile printing via Bluetooth (PicBridge�)
Java games (Forgotten Warrior, Freekick, Arch angel, Cannon ball) plus downloadable games
Flight mode
Personal organiser functions
Memory: 70 Mbytes plus MicroSD memory card slot
Connectivity: Bluetooth 2.0, USB 2.0, TV-Out
WAP 2.0, GPRS Class 10, EDGE
Quad band
Size: 104 x 51 x 13 mm
Weight: 93g
Talktime: 3.3 hours
Battery standby: 260 hours

Samsung Armani Review

2008-10-09T02:04:00.001-07:00

Phone rating:

In a nutshell: The Samsung Giorgio Armani phone is a truly compact touchscreen phone. It doesn't have the ease-of-use of Apple's iPhone nor the high-end features of the LG Viewty touchphone, but it looks amazing. If you can get used to the touchscreen interface, you'll find that it's a beautiful phone that can also take photos, record video clips and play music.
Best buy: *Free* with half-price line rental from Dialaphone.

We loved last year's LG Prada, so we were really looking forward to reviewing the Samsung Giorgio Armani. Samsung plus Armani is such a fantastic combination, that success is guaranteed, right? Well not necessarily, because a lot has changed since the Prada phone of 2007 - the Armani now has to complete with the iPhone and the LG Viewty. Let's put the phone through its paces and see how it shapes up to the competition.

The first thing to say is that if you love Armani, then stop reading now and just go and buy the phone. It's a beautiful phone, and you can call and text with it, OK? Seriously though, it's a stunning phone to look at. It's really tiny and weighs hardly anything, at just 85g (the iPhone weighs 135g!). It's the smallest and thinnest of all the touchscreen-driven phones currently on the market. The finish is much nicer than our photo here conveys - it's finished in a combination of aluminium and stainless steel. It also comes with a specially-designed leather pouch to protect it from scratches. Apart from the send and end keys located beneath the screen, the Armani is entirely touchscreen controlled, and this is the secret to its good looks and also the cause of most problems.

The device is smaller than other touchscreen phones available, and that means that the screen is smaller too (2.6" compared with the iPhone's 3.5"). It also has a lower resolution. Inevitably this makes the touchscreen interface harder to use, although Samsung have done their best with the award-winning Croix user interface which uses touch and audio feedback and specially-designed graphics and icons. The bottom line is that it isn't as easy to use as an iPhone or a Viewty, especially for texting.

Just like the iPhone and the Prada phone, the Armani phone isn't at the cutting edge feature-wise, but it does everything that most people will want. It takes reasonably good photos with a 3 megapixel camera (with zoom & flash), records video clips and plays music. The internal memory of 60 Mbytes is enough for around 15 music tracks, but you can easily expand this with a memory card. Battery life isn't great, but it's acceptable at around 2-3 days of normal use. The phone supports Bluetooth, including Bluetooth wireless headphones. You can also browse the web and send emails, if you really must.

Technically, the Armani can't compete with the daddy of touchscreen phones - the 3G LG Viewty - nor does it have the ease of use of the Apple iPhone. What it does have is the Armani brand, to-die-for looks, a truly compact body, and enough features to satisfy 90% of users. It's about expectations - don't buy this thinking it's the best phone ever, or has the most impressive spec available, because it hasn't. Buy it because you like the style and are willing to compromise on ease-of-use and high-end features.

LG Chocolate Review

2008-10-09T02:03:00.001-07:00

Phone rating:

In a nutshell: The LG Chocolate KG800 is a beautiful phone with touch-sensitive keys that definitely scores 10 out of 10 when it comes to looks! It's available in a choice of black, pink or lilac. It has a built-in camera, music player and Bluetooth wireless connectivity. The camera isn't the best and memory is limited, with enough space to store around 30 songs. Other complaints include poor battery life and overly-sensitive buttons. But despite these problems the Chocolate has been near the top of the best-selling list for the past year. It's now available incredibly cheaply and continues to sell rapidly, but stocks will run out soon, so get yours now if you want one!
Best buy: *Free* LG Chocolate with free line rental for 12 months from mobiles.co.uk; or £34.95 on Pay as you Go from the Carphone Warehouse (available in lilac & black).

From time to time a phenomenonally original phone is released. The LG KG800 (nicknamed the LG Chocolate) is one such phone. In an age when pink seems to be the "in" colour, the LG is brown (very dark - almost black) with a beautiful gloss finish and sliver detailing. The idea that it looks like a bar of chocolate is tenuous, but it's definitely an eye-catcher, and the more that you see the cooler it gets.

A sliding phone, when closed the Chocolate just looks mysterious. It's dark, with a dark LCD screen, and just an LG logo and a silver OK button to give any clue about what to do with it. The hidden keypad is touch sensitive and glows red when in use. When opened, the full keypad is available. There are also buttons around the edge for volume control and multimedia - MP3, camera and video. The design works well and looks fantastic, although the touch-sensitive keys are quite sensitive and take a little getting used to.

Feature-wise, the Chocolate comes with a 1.3 megapixel camera (with flash) and a video camera. The display is high quality. The Chocolate has an MP3 player that can handle a wide range of formats. Music can be controlled from the touch pad or with the inline remote control supplied with the handset. A headset is included and this plugs into the charging port. MP3 ringtones are supported, and there's 128 Mbytes of memory which is pretty good, although a memory card option would have been nice to have. Both wireless Bluetooth connectivity and USB are supported. Interestingly the Chocolate can function as a mass storage device with software to enable photos, videos and music tracks to be dragged and dropped between phone and PC.

The Chocolate is quite slim and compact and weighs just 83g, making it an ideal handbag companion. Equally it will easily fit into a jeans pocket. The keypad is sensitive to touch and heat, so it won't be activated when in a bag. Battery life is below average and the phone will need charging every few days.

The Chocolate is definitely a cool phone to be seen with but it does have its problems. The touch sensitive buttons look fantastic, but have been known to drive people insane! The Chocolate is also not the most reliable phone ever, and suffers from poor battery life. Before buying, also consider the Samsung E900 and the newer LG Shine. If you decide to buy the Chocolate you'll find some incredible deals online- on Pay as you Go you can buy it online from the Carphone Warehouse for an incrediby cheap £34.95 in a choice of lilac or black.

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Features of the LG Chocolate KG800 include:

1.3 megapixel camera with 4x digital zoom and flash
Video camera
Display: TFT, 256,000 colours, 176 x 220 pixels
Music player (supports MP3, AAC, AAC+, AAC++ and WMA file formats)
MP3 ringtones (64 voice polyphonic)
Messaging: SMS, EMS, MMS, Email
Java games
Memory: 128 Mbytes
Connectivity: Bluetooth 1.2, USB
WAP 2.0
Triband
Size: 95 x 48 x 15 mm
Weight: 83g
Battery standby: 200 hours

Motorola RAZR2 V9 Review

2008-10-09T01:59:00.000-07:00

Phone rating:

In a nutshell: The RAZR 2 V9 is a superslim 3G clamshell phone that uses premium materials in its construction to give a quality look and feel. A poor camera lets the phone down in imaging terms, but the music player is fantastic, with touchscreen controls, plenty of memory and support for Bluetooth stereo headsets. The only problem with the phone is its below-average battery life.
Best buy: *Free* from Vodafone (use voucher code VODABLUE1 to get a free Bluetooth headset when you buy a V9 from Vodafone by following this link); or £159.99 on PAYG from Three.

The Motorola RAZR2 V9 is almost exactly the same as the RAZR2 V8, except that it's a 3G version, with a high-speed HSDPA implementation of 3G, enabling fast downloads at up to 3.6 Mbps. It also allows you to make video calls on a 3G network and can accept a microSD memory card.

The RAZR2 V9 is about the same size as the original RAZR V3, and looks very much like the original. It's built from premium materials - stainless steel & chemically hardened glass - with a two-tone soft-touch housing, and looks and feels like a quality product. The RAZR2 is a much higher-spec phone than the original RAZR though. There have been some design improvements too - the flat keypad is nice and responsive - and the external screen is the largest of its kind and is touch-sensitive. The external touchscreen can be used to control the music player, and also to read and reply to text messages. When not in use as a touchscreen, the external display shows information such as the date and time, or incoming calls. It's a multi-tasking phone, so you can use the music player whilst accessing the other phone functions.

The V9's camera isn't that brilliant. At 2 megapixels and no flash, it's well below average for this class of phone. It supports low-resolution video recording plus 3G video calling. The music player on the other hand is great. The touchscreen controls enable the music player to be operated without having to open the phone, and there's full support for managing playlists on the go. The media player is Windows Media Player® 11, which supports virtually all music formats and enables easy synchronisation with a PC. The internal memory is limited to 45 Mbytes, which isn't very much for storing music, but the V9 can take microSD memory cards up to 2 Gbytes, which is enough to store around 500 tracks. There's full support for wireless Bluetooth headsets, and also microUSB 2.0 connectivity, for fast data transfers from a PC.

Another nice feature in the V9 that first appeared in the RAZR2 V8 is CrystalTalk™. This is a new technology that improves call quality by automatically adjusting the audio to take into account of background noise.

The only thing that we don't like about the V9 is the battery life. The V9 is a slimline phone with two large screens to power, and 3G too, so it isn't surprising to find that the battery runs down pretty quickly. If you're a heavy user, we'd have to say that this isn't the right phone for you. But if you can live with the battery, you'll find the RAZR2 V9 to be a very stylish and feature-rich mobile.

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Features of the Motorola RAZR2 V9 include:

2.0 megapixel camera with 8x digital zoom
Video camera (176x144 pixels, 15 frames/second, MPEG4 format) plus 3G video calling
Internal display: 262,000 colours, 320 x 240 pixels (2.2 inches)
External display: 262,000 colours, 320 x 240 pixels (2 inches)
Music player (MP3, WMA, AAC, AAC+, AAC Enhanced, WAV, AMR NB, XMF, MIDI formats)
Hands-free speaker
CrystalTalk™
Automatic answer (headset or car kit needed)
Speaker independent voice recognition
Conference calling
Voice recorder
Messaging: SMS, EMS, MMS, email (POP3/IMAP4/SMTP)
Pre-loaded games
Caller id with image
WAP, GPRS Class 12, EDGE Class 12
Opera web browser
Calculator, Alarm Clock, Wallpaper, Screensaver
Memory: 45 Mbytes plus microSD memory card slot (up to 2 Gbytes)
Connectivity: Bluetooth 2.0, USB 2.0
Quadband (GSM 850 / 900 / 1800 / 1900) plus 3G HSDPA 2100
Weight: 125g
Size: 103 x 53 x 13.3 mm
Talktime: 3.5 hours
Battery standby: 260 hours

Motorola KRZR K1 Review

2008-10-09T01:29:00.000-07:00

Phone rating:

Warning: although this phone looks great, and initially we liked it, it has become clear that the KRZR has many reliability and durability issues. Of all the phones currently on the market, this one seems to be the most likely to fail in some way. We have to say that you'd be KRZY to buy it after reading the reviews on this page. Instead, consider the RIZR Z3, which is almost the same as the KRZR but in a slide design (and more reliable), or the 3G Motorola MAXX or V3XX.

Now that superslim phones are everywhere, Motorola's offerings in this department were starting to look a bit old-fashioned, even though it was Motorola's RAZR phone that started the whole superslim trend. Motorola strikes back with the KRZR K1 (or MOTOKRZR as the company likes to call it). The KRZR is a clamshell phone, like the RAZR, and shares a lot of the RAZR's technology, but whereas the RAZR was a man-sized phone, being quite wide despite its thinness, the KRZR is a much narrower phone that fits better in the hand and is more ergonomic all round.

The styling of the KRZR has been updated, with a reflective glass-coated surface that makes the KRZR stand out from the crowd (and acts as a magnet for fingerprints, by the way!) Although it's a fashion phone, it has a well thought-out design, with a functional (if small) keypad, and good ergonomics. However, the glass used is fragile and can scratch, crack or shatter, even when treated carefully. We have never before encountered a phone where so many users have reported a broken screen. This is obviously a design fault or manufacturing defect.

In addition to it's pretty looks, the KRZR has high spec features too. The main internal display is a high quality TFT screen with 262,000 colours and the same resolution as the RAZR: 176 x 220 pixels. The external display is rather poor, though, being of inferior CSTN technology which fades in bright sunlight. The integrated camera is 2 megapixels with an 8x digital zoom and a built-in picture editor, but no flash. There's also a video recording capability at CIF resolution, with a maximum duration of 25 minutes per clip. The absence of a flash is a disappointment, and limits the use of the camera. Next up is the music player. This supports MP3, AAC and AAC+ formats with stereo output to headphones via mini-USB or wireless Bluetooth. The KRZR isn't the best music player phone, as there is no support for drag and drop file transfer and only mono output from the built-in loudspeaker. Still, it does the job. MP3 tracks can also be used as ringtones.

There isn't a lot of internal memory in the KRZR - just 20 Mbytes - but the good news is that this can be expanded using a TransFlash memory card up to 2 Gbytes. As already mentioned, connectivity options are Bluetooth and USB (no infrared). Fast internet access is available via EDGE. Usefully the phone is quadband, so will operate globally. Battery life is average. The KRZR does suffer from having the unintuitive menus that non-Motorola users find so hard to use, so Nokia and Sony Ericsson users watch out! Texting is particularly tricky. There are also various software issues with the KRZR. These seem to depend on which batch of the phone you try, but you can get a flavour of the kinds of problems people have experienced by reading the user reviews below.

In summary, the MOTOKRZR is a cool fashion phone and being Motorola's first new superslim phone for about a year it would be a natural choice for RAZR users looking to upgrade. The KRZR doesn't excel in the photographic or music departments, but it's certainly an all-round performer that is more unisex in form and more ergonomic to use than the RAZR. However, the problems with the glass breaking and the software errors that users have experienced mean that we have to recommend that you avoid this phone.

Sony Ericsson C902 Review

2008-10-09T01:00:00.000-07:00

Phone rating:

In a nutshell: Sony Ericsson's new flagship Cyber-Shot phone lives up our high expectations. This is an outstandingly good camera phone with a 5 megapixel camera with face-detection autofocus, LED flash, and easy to use camera controls. It also packs in a music player, FM radio, 3G HSDPA, Bluetooth and loads of memory. In addition it's a superslim stylish handset available in Black or Red. We have deducted one star because of occasional freezing and crashing in early releases of this model.
Best buy: *Free* with half-price line rental from Dialaphone (Black) or Dialaphone (Red).

The C902 is the first in a brand new range of Sony Ericsson phones: "C" for Cyber-Shot™. Previously all Cyber-Shot phones were part of the "K" series, and the C902 is the replacement for the Sony Ericsson K850i. The Cyber-Shot phones have been enormously successful over the past few years, but we felt that SE had made a few mistakes in recent models with dodgy keypads and unreliable firmware. It looked like SE had hit a rough patch, so let's hope that with the C series they can leave all that behind and move on to greater things. The C902 is the flagship Cyber-Shot model, and so our expectations are high.

Physically, the C902 seems to be back to the old Sony Ericsson style at its best. It's a classic-style handset, but ultra-slim at just 10.5mm. The keypad is a good old-fashioned one that has good-size square keys giving tactile feedback and enabling fast texting. Hooray! We're also delighted to find a 5-way navigation pad that just works. Looks like SE have learned some hard lessons about keypads and have gone back to a design that works. It feels like a quality handset too, with a combination of metal and plastic, and an elegant finish. It's available in a choice of Black or Red, and both colour schemes look very nice indeed.

The screen is slightly smaller than the K850i's. This is because of the touch-sensitive shortcuts added to both sides of the screen. These are used to activate the camera and switch between still and video. They can also change the autofocus mode, flash and other camera settings. We have to say that these work really well in our view. As camera phones become more and more sophisticated, accessing the functionality from a phone becomes more of a challenge for the user (it's not a dedicated digital camera after all.) The C902 shortcuts are an excellent solution to this problem and give the user a lot more control over the camera settings than most other camera phones. It's a shame that the display size has been reduced to make way for the shortcuts, but at least the screen has the same high resolution as previous Cyber-Shots (240 x 320 pixels). It's a bright and sharp display that works well in most lighting conditions.

Let's take a peek at the camera next. The camera is actually concealed beneath a mini sliding cover. When you slide the cover open, the phone switches to camera mode. The camera is a 5 megapixel beast with autofocus, image stabiliser and flash. The camera quality is very similar to that of the K850i. The autofocus uses face-detection software, so it will automatically focus on a face in a picture. The image stabiliser software we're less convinced about, but it may help to avoid camera blur in low lighting. The camera also has the BestPic™ feature which can automatically take nine photos in a second, so that you can then choose which one to keep. An Accelerometer feature senses which way up the phone is being held, and will automatically rotate your pictures into portrait or landscape mode. The main difference between the camera in the K850i and the C902 is that there is no Xenon flash in the C902. A Xenon flash is more powerful than a regular LED flash, however SE had a lot of problems with the Xenon flash on the K850i, so at least we can be confident that they have chosen a safe option for the new C902. The LED flash used for the C902 is more powerful than a standard one, and should give good results. Video recording is also comparable with the best of the K series phones, and video calling is available too, on a 3G network. A new "Storyteller" application lets you create presentations from pictures and show them on Facebook and other social networking sites.

Although its a Cyber-Shot phone, the C902 has great music capabilities too. The media player is fully featured, with support for album art. Sony's MegaBass™ ensures that you get rich sounds out of the small speaker. The PlayNow™ feature lets you personalise your phone by downloading an MP3 ringtone (you have to pay for downloads, however.) MP3 and AC ringtones are supported. TrackID™ can identify a song from a few seconds recording. An FM radio with RDS is also included. You can plug in a stereo headphone, or use an optional Bluetooth stereo headset. One thing that we really like is the large amount of built-in memory available - at 160 Mbytes this is big increase on what's available in the K850i, and makes it much easier to manage files. The phone supports Memory Stick Micro™ (M2™) cards up to 4 GB, which is enough to store 1,000 music tracks. For some reason though, there's no support for microSD cards.

Connectivity is very good, with support for Bluetooth and USB. The USB connection enables the phone to act as a USB mass storage device, so moving music and images between phone and PC is drag-and-drop simplicity itself. As already mentioned, this is a 3G phone, with HSDPA support enabling an "always-on" internet connection with download speeds of up to 3.6 Mbps - comparable with a home broadband connection. As well as being 3G, it's a quadband GSM phone, so should be usable anywhere in the world.

Battery life is adequate, but ultraslim phones tend to have shorter battery lives than conventional phones, which isn't surprising. The smaller screen size does help to reduce power consumption, and we don't think that the battery life will be an issue for most users.

We had hoped that the C902 would be free of bugs, but a number of users have reported problems with the phone freezing or crashing occasionally. It seems that Sony Ericsson still need to improve the reliability of their firmware. We hope that firmware updates will sort out these problems soon. Despite this, we really like the C902. Although it lacks a Xenon flash, we feel that its a much better all-rounder than the K850i, and is probably Sony Ericsson's best camera phone so far. It can probably match the Nokia N95 too, especially in good lighting conditions.

Sony Ericsson C702 Review

2008-10-09T00:59:00.000-07:00

Sony Ericsson C702 Review

Phone rating:

In a nutshell: The Sony Ericsson C702 is a mid-range 3G phone that offers a lot for your money. Its star feature is GPS satellite positioning, combined with Google Maps. It's built for the outdoors, being splashproof and dust resistant. In addition it's equipped with an excellent 3.2 megapixel camera, a music player, an FM radio and high-speed 3G internet (HSDPA). Battery life is excellent too, but the keypad and joystick are slightly fiddly. But this phone is so feature-packed, we're willing to overlook this one flaw. Available in Cool Cyan or Speed Black.
Best buy: *Free* with half-price line rental from Dialaphone (Black) or free from Vodafone.

The C702 is the second release in Sony Ericsson's new "C" for Cyber-Shot™ range (the first was the flagship C902.) The C702 is not as expensive as the C902, but it isn't simply a budget version of the C902. Instead, the C702 is a new kind of phone from Sony Ericsson - it's a rugged outdoor kind of phone, designed to be splashproof and dust-resistant, and equipped with Assisted GPS satellite positioning.

The phone feels rugged enough. We didn't test it by dropping it in the bath or burying it in the sand, so we can't vouch for how rugged it really is, but Sony Ericsson say that it complies with the IP54 (Ingress Protection) standard, and it's clearly been designed to be tougher than normal phones. The phone is a good size and weight (not too big or too small), and has a good-sized screen. However, we don't like the joystick / navigation key, and the buttons are quite small too.

This is a Cyber-Shot phone, so we're expecting a good camera. At 3.2 megapixels, it isn't up there with the 5 megapixels of the C902, but it compares well with previous camera phones such as the K800i. The camera is equipped with face-detection autofocus, a digital zoom and an LED flash. It's as good as anything currently available in the mid-range of phones.

The star feature of the C702 is the Assisted GPS. This will find your location and show you where you are on Google Maps™. This isn't a system that will replace the satnav in your car, but is ideal for personal use. This is definitely a great feature for any outdoor activity, and will be useful for anyone wanting to find their way around the city too. Previously GPS has only been available in top-of-the-range phones such as the Nokia N95, so it's great to see this technology starting to filter down into mid-priced phones. The GPS includes a geo-tagging feature, so it records the location of where each photo was taken. Personally, I have no trouble remembering where I took a photo ("This is me at the beach", etc) , but this feature may be helpful for some.

The phone is fully equipped with all of life's essentials for the 21st century. Music-wise it may not be a Walkman phone, but it has a fully-featured music player and FM radio (with RDS). You can listen to music with conventional headphones or an optional Bluetooth wireless stereo headset. We're delighted to see a full 150 Mbytes of internal memory, which is very generous, and is enough to store around 40 songs. You can add a Memory Stick Micro or Memory Stick PRO to increase storage to 4 GB. Fast "always-on" internet access is available via 3G HSDPA. Battery life seems to be good too.

The C702 is an impressive phone. Of course it doesn't have all the features of the high-end phones, but when you consider the price of the phone, it compares very favourably with other mid-range phones. We considered deducting one star because of the keypad/joystick, but have decided on balance to award the full 5 stars, as it excels in every other respect.

Nokia N95 Review

2008-10-09T00:52:00.001-07:00

Phone rating:

In a nutshell: The most technically advanced smartphone ever! Complete with GPS satellite navigation, a 5 megapixel camera with autofocus, 3G video calling, and every other gadget you can think of! On the downside it's large, and like most smartphones does not have 100% robust firmware. If you've used another Nseries phone or Symbian phone before, then you'll love it! Available in 4GB and 8GB versions; in silver, black or red.
Best buy (Nokia N95 4GB): *Free* with half-price line rental from Dialaphone (Silver) or Dialaphone (Red Sport).
Best buy (Nokia N95 8GB): *Free* with half-price line rental from Dialaphone or direct from Three (the 8 Gbyte version comes preloaded with a full length copy of the feature film Spiderman 3).

Another Nokia Nseries smartphone! And this one is the most technically advanced ever! Can it really live up to the hype, or will it prove to be as unreliable and bug-ridden as some of Nokia's other Nseries phones?

The headline features of the eagerly-awaited Nokia N95 are mouth-wateringly amazing:

Built-in GPS navigation
5 megapixel camera with Carl Zeiss & Tessar optics
Wi-Fi wireless internet connection
2.6 inch display with 16 million colours
Ultra-fast HSDPA data transfer

Let's start with the basics. The Nokia N95 is a 3G smartphone built on the Series 60 Symbian interface (version 3.1). Let's be clear from the start that these types of phone are slow, have a tendency to freeze or shut down, and have unstable firmware. They are also large and heavy. At 120g the N95 is of average weight for a smartphone, but is pretty bulky, despite its slide design. At least you won't forget which pocket it's in! When closed, you can access menu functions using the 5-way navigation key and the associated control keys. The N95 also has several other dedicated media keys that can be used as shortcuts to media functions. This is a good feature if you like to have lots of buttons to push, but sometimes they just end up getting in the way. When you slide the phone open you have access to a full keypad, but like the Nokia N73, the buttons are too small to be really comfortable. The user interface will be familiar to anyone who has used a Series 60 phone before: it's not as simple to use as the Nokias of olden days, but you wouldn't expect such a high powered device to be, would you? So, without getting into the functionality of the phone yet, we'd give it 2 stars for usability.

Now, the kind of person likely to buy this phone isn't going to be put off by wimpy considerations like size and ergonomics. Perhaps not even by warnings of bugs and a sluggish user interface. It's what the phone does that matters most. And this is where the N95 really delivers! The first multimedia feature that you encounter is the screen, and it's a massive one: 2.6 inches across, 240 x 320 pixels, and an incredible 16 million colours. An ambient light detector is used to control the brightness of the screen, making it usable under most lighting conditions. It's one of the best screens ever, and does full justice to the camera and navigation systems.

The camera is a first in the UK: the first phone camera to hit the 5 megapixel mark. At this number of pixels, you can (theoretically) match anything that a dedicated digital camera is capable of - provided that you have the optics to back up the megapixel grunt. Nokia have been developing their camera capabilities quite impressively recently using Carl-Zeiss optics and Tessar lenses - the Nokia N93 being the best camera phone before the release of the N95. The N95 lacks the optical zoom of the N93, but retains the autofocus, flash and lens. Does the 5 megapixel sensor make up for the lack of an optical zoom? The answer is no, so in our opinion the N93 is still king of the camera phones, but for practical purposes the N95 is a better option. It can certainly match or beat the Sony Ericsson K800i. The video camera is also outstanding, recording in VGA resolution (640 x 480 pixels) at up to 30 frames per second with stereo audio. There's a second front-facing camera for making video calls too.

The other most interesting feature of the N95 is the built-in GPS navigation system. The N95 actually has a GPS system built into the phone, that communicates directly with the satellite. This enables you to use the phone to track your position either on foot or in-car. You'll need to buy a license to use the Nokia mapping system though. Now, whilst this is a nice feature to have in a phone, we've got to say that it doesn't match the quality of a dedicated satnav system like the TomTom One. The sensitivity and reliability of the GPS receiver is not as good, and neither is the user-friendliness of the system.

These are the most groundbreaking features, but the N95 has almost everything else you could think of including in a phone too: a music player with support for all common music formats, a stereo FM radio, integrated handsfree speaker, speaker independent voice dialling, talking ringtones, HSDPA (the fast data transfer technology dubbed "3.5G") and lots more! When it comes to connectivity, the N95 is the best-connected device in town, with support for Bluetooth 2.0, USB 2.0, Infrared, Wireless LAN, TV-Out and a 3.5 mm headphone jack. Its memory is also more than adequate with up to 160 Mbytes of onboard memory and support for microSD memory cards (up to 8 Gbytes). Battery life is OK - when you consider how much work has to be done to power this beast, you can't really set your expectations too high.

In conclusion, The Nokia N95 is bound to be a smash hit, but equally there are bound to be unsatisfied users returning their N95 to the shop. Early adopters will love the wealth of features that this phone offers (literally the best you can get at the time of launch), but the N95 does suffer from practical disadvantages, and you'll need to decide whether the benefits outweigh the problems.

The new Nokia N96 is a slightly improved version of the N95 8GB. The new Samsung i8510 is very similar to the Nokia N95, using the same Series 60 user interface, but offers an improved 8 megapixel camera and some other refinements.

Nokia N82 Review

2008-10-09T00:51:00.002-07:00

Phone rating:

In a nutshell: A good alternative to the N95, the N81 offers very nearly the same features, but at a significantly lower price. It's a classic-style smartphone with GPS navigation, an outstanding 5 megapixel camera, media player, wireless LAN, a 2 Gbyte memory card and HSDPA for accelerated 3G connectivity.
Best buy: *Free* with half-price line rental from Dialaphone or mobiles.co.uk.

The Nokia N95 has been Nokia's best-selling smartphone of 2007, and with sales remaining strong and with no clear competitor from the other manufacturers, the N95 will probably continue to sell well into 2008. The role of the N82 then, is not to push the boundaries of technology any further, rather it's to offer essentially the same features as the N95, but in a different package that will broaden its appeal.

Although they look quite different, the specifications of the N82 and N95 are so nearly identical, that we'll refer you to our in-depth review of the Nokia N95 to learn more. The detailed specification is listed below. Suffice to say that you can't really get more from a phone than you can from the N82: possibly the best camera in a mobile phone (5 megapixels with autofocus and xenon flash), GPS navigation, a superb screen, high-speed 3G, WLAN, a huge memory, etc, etc.

Instead of repeating all of the things that we talked about in our N95 review, let's focus on the differences between the N82 and N95. Probably the most significant difference is the price: the N82 should retail for around £150 less than the N95. That's a big difference and presumably reflects the fact that this is repackaged technology. For this reason, we are hoping that the N82 will be less buggy than initial versions of the N95, although we've yet to see a Series 60 phone that didn't have some bugs. The screen on the N82 is slightly smaller, but the phone itself is slightly narrower and slimmer too. The weight is slightly less, but not enough to make any real difference. We prefer the keypad of the N95 - the N82 has fiddly little buttons - but with fewer "extra" buttons, the N82 arguably has a simpler user interface. One further difference is that the N82 ships with a 2 Gbyte memory card, whereas the N95 comes with a 4 or 8 Gbyte card.

Nokia N81 Review

2008-10-09T00:51:00.001-07:00

Phone rating:

In a nutshell: A possible alternative to the N95, the N81 comes with a fantastic 8 Gbytes of memory, outstandingly good music and games playing features, a superb high-res screen, 3G video calling and fast downloads, Wireless LAN, and an optional GPS module. Its camera can't match the best, and the phone feels a bit plasticky, but it's still worth considering.
Best buy: *Free* with half-price line rental from Mobiles.co.uk; or on Pay as you Go from the Carphone Warehouse at £249.95.

The Nokia N81 is a very powerful multimedia device that is in some ways like the Nokia N95's little brother. Available in a choice of Cobalt Blue or Graphite Grey, it's a really nicely designed slide phone that's chunky and heavier than the N95, but slightly slimmer. The first thing that strikes you about the N81 is the huge number of keys and buttons! In addition to the usual number keys and Navi Wheel, there are dedicated keys for playing games and accessing music & video: play/pause, rewind, forward & stop. You'll either love this or hate it. We found that the whole user interface is built on the idea of complexity, as the menus and settings can be quite overwhelming, but offer full control over every aspect of the device. The N81 is very much a hard-core SmartPhone, and if this sounds like your kind of phone, then you'll love it to bits.

There are a few areas where the N81 can't keep up with the N95. The screen is the first thing that you notice: although it's a high quality display with 16.7 million colours and 320 x 240 pixel resolution (the same as the N95), the screen is physically about 15% smaller. More seriously, the camera is a poor cousin of the N95's 5 megapixel camera: the N81's camera has just 2 megapixels and lacks autofocus. So, if camera quality is important to you, you'd definitely be better off with the N95. SatNav is missing too, although the Nokia Wireless GPS module is available as an optional extra. The Nokia Maps application is included as standard. So really the shortcomings of the N81 compared with the N95 aren't too great.

Now let's take a closer look at what the N81 does have. The first feature that really differentiates the N81 from the competition is the whopping 8 Gbytes of internal memory. This is enough to store 2,000 music tracks. The N81 has a fantastic music player that can give the iPhone a run for its money. The music player supports all common music formats including MP3, AAC and WMA, as well as Windows Media DRM. Managing playlists is a breeze, and the device can synchronise music with Windows Media Player. There's a 5-band equaliser, support for Bluetooth stereo headsets and a 3.5mm headphone jack. In addition, the RealPlayer media player supports full-screen video playback. There's also a built-in FM radio with Visual Radio support that tells you what song is playing, and other info. Music lovers have everything that they could want from the N81.

The N81's other focus is gaming. We've already mentioned the dedicated games keys on the front. Games can be played in portrait or landscape mode, making full use of the fantastic 16.7 million colour display. The N81's secret is that it includes support for Nokia's NGage series of games. The choice of games is excellent and the quality of the 3D graphics is exceptional. If you're serious about games, then this is seriously highly recommended.

The list of what the N81 can do goes on ... it's a quadband 3G phone that supports video calls with a second front-facing video camera. It's fully equipped for wirefree use with Bluetooth and Wireless LAN support, voice-independent speech recognition and voice commands, automatic answering with a compatible headset or car kit, internet calls using VoIP, ... Really there isn't much that the N81 doesn't do, and being a Symbian phone the wealth of 3rd party applications that are available for download is huge.

As always with Symbian devices there's a tendency for the N81 to be slow or to freeze if pushed too hard, although the 8 Gbytes of memory certainly helps here. To really get the most out of the N81 you'll have to have used a SmartPhone before, or be prepared to invest time learning how to use it properly. If you don't like high-tech then keep well away, but if the music and games features appeal, then you'll do well with the N81.

Features of the Nokia N81 include:

Operating system: Series 60 version 3.1, Symbian 9.2
2 megapixel camera with 20x digital zoom and flash
VGA video capture at 15 frames/second
Front-facing camera for video calls
RealPlayer Media Player
Display: 16.7 million colours, 320 x 240 pixels (2.4 inches)
Nseries music player supports MP3 (VBR), AAC, eAAC+, AAC+, WMA/M4A, WAV
Stereo FM radio with Visual Radio support
Nokia Stereo Music Headset supplied
Gaming: supports N-Gage games (Space Impact Light, Asphalt game demo, Fifa soccer 2007 demo games included)
Messaging: SMS, MMS, e-mail with support for images, videos, music and documents
Talking ringtone
Speaker independent name dialing
Voice commands
Voice recorder
Speed dialing
Integrated hands-free speaker
Automatic redial
Automatic answer with compatible headset / car kit
Internet calls (VoIP)
Nokia push to talk (PoC)
Java MIDP 2.0
Advanced contacts database with support for multiple phone and e-mail details per entry, also supports thumbnail pictures and groups
Nokia Web Browser with Mini Map
Memory: 8 Gbytes (supports microSD memory cards)
Connectivity: Bluetooth 2.0, WLAN (802.11 b/g), USB 2.0
3G (WCDMA 2100) + Quadband GSM E850/900/1800/1900MHz
Size: 102 x 50 x 18 mm
Weight: 140g
Talktime: 3 hours (3G) - 4 hours (2G)
Battery standby: up to 400 hours
Music playback time: up to 11.5 hours

Nokia N78 Review

2008-10-09T00:06:00.000-07:00

Phone rating:

In a nutshell: A very powerful smartphone with a 3.2 megapixel camera and assisted GPS, but seriously let down by a dysfunctional keypad. Choose the Nokia N95 8GB instead.
Best buy: *Free* with half-price line rental from Mobiles.co.uk; or on Pay as you Go from the Carphone Warehouse at £279.95.

The Nokia N78. A highly anticipated smartphone with many powerful features. The feature list is finger-lickin good: Series 60 smartphone with 3.6 Mbps HSDPA, WiFi, assisted GPS navigation with preloaded maps, a 3.2 megapixel camera with Carl Zeiss optics, Tessar lens, autofocus & flash, a video camera with stereo audio recording, a secondary camera for video calling, a superb MP3 player with a Navi wheel for easy access to your music, an FM radio. And all this in a compact classic design that weighs just 102g and looks great. There are even bonus features such as FM transmitter that lets you play your music on your car stereo.

On paper it's a fabulous phone. Only the lack of a 5 megapixel camera stops it from being Nokia's best smartphone ever. Yet we hate it.

Why do we hate it? Because of its keypad. Actually to say that it has a keypad is overstating things. The Nokia N78 has some numbers painted on its front and some floppy pieces of plastic that wiggle up and down if you push them hard. Maybe the number that you pushed will come up, maybe another, who knows? Maybe after a couple of frustrated minutes struggling to write a text or dial a number, you'll take a hammer to the keys and give this phone what it deserves. What on earth have Nokia done?

We had really been looking forward to this phone, but we're disappointed. It's not a phone that we can recommend. Brave souls will persevere with the keypad and may learn to tolerate it, but we would recommend the Nokia N95 8GB instead.

Initially we awarded the phone 1 star. A couple of people sent us rude email as a result. We've calmed ourselves done now and rustled up a couple more stars, but we're still angry with Nokia for messing up such a good product.

By the way, plenty of people agree with us. gsmarena says, "The knobs are way too tiny and there are no borders of any kind between keys within the same row. So far we are having quite a rough time typing on the N78." hardwarezone.com says "we found ourselves frustrated as we fumbled and encountered numerous double tapping." igadgetlife says it all: "what were you thinking Nokia?"

Features of the Nokia N78 include:

3G Symbian phone with S60 3rd Edition, Feature Pack 2
Assisted GPS navigation with preloaded regional maps
3.2 megapixel camera with Carl Zeiss optics & Tessar Lens with autofocus, 20x digital zoom, LED flash and photo editor
Video: MPEG4/3GP VGA video capture at 15 fps, AAC stereo audio with 8x digital zoom and video editor
Secondary CIF camera (352 x 288 pixels)
Display: TFT, 16 million colours, 240 x 320 pixels (2.4 inches)
Music player (MP3, AAC, AAC+, eAAC+ & WMA formats) with playlists, equaliser and album art
FM radio
Stereo speakers plus Nokia Stereo Headset HS-45/AD-54 included in sales package
FM transmitter
Messaging: SMS, MMS, email (SMTP, IMAP4, POP3) with attachment support for images, videos, music and documents
Java & Symbian applications
Advanced S60 PIM features including contacts, calendar, to-do list, notes, recorder, calculator, clock, converter
Memory: 70 Mbytes plus microSD memory card slot (2GB card included)
Connectivity: WLAN, Bluetooth 2.0, USB 2.0, 3.5mm audio connector
Internet: EGPRS class B, EDGE, HSDPA (up to 3.6 Mbps download), Nokia Web Browser with Mini Map, RSS feeds
Dual mode WCDMA 900/2100 (HSDPA) plus quadband GSM (850/900/1800/1900 MHz)
Size: 113 x 49 x 15.1 mm
Weight: 102g
Talktime: 190 minutes (3G) - 260 minutes (2G)
Battery standby: up to 320 hours

Nokia N73 Review

2008-10-08T23:58:00.000-07:00

Phone rating:

In a nutshell: A high-spec 3G smartphone with a fantastic camera, music player, FM radio, video calling and loads of memory. Compact and lightweight for a Symbian phone, the N73 brings smartphone technology into the mainstream. Early versions of the firmware were problematic, but the latest phones seem to be much more reliable.
Best buy: *Free* with half-price line rental from Mobiles.co.uk.

The Nokia N73 updates the Nokia N70 3G SmartPhone. The N73 is a lot thinner than the N70 and weighs less as well, making it one of the lightest smartphones. It has a conventional boxy design with a regular keypad very similar to the N70. The keys are a little too small for large fingers to use easily and the joystick can be fiddly too. The display is very large with an amazing 240 x 320 pixel resolution and 262,000 colours. Its one of the best displays on any smartphone.

As well as upgrading the display, Nokia have upgraded the camera in a big way. The N73 sports a 3.2 megapixel camera using the same Carl Zeiss optics and CMOS sensor that made the N70 a powerful imaging device. The camera has a built-in flash, 20x digital zoom, macro mode, plenty of optional settings and a photo editor. It doesn't perform quite as well as the best camera phones from Sony Ericsson, but it significantly outperforms its predecessor and is a very good camera. Video recording is at CIF resolution with a framerate of 15 frames per second. Usefully video can be recorded in either 3GP or MPEG4 formats. A video editor application is included. There's a second inward-facing VGA camera for making video calls.

The N73 is also a great music device. It has a music player that supports a wide range of formats including MP3, WMA and AAC, and also an FM radio with Visual Radio functionality to display information about the artist and track playing. The music player supports playlists and an equalizer lets you adjust sound quality. Sound is through dual stereo speakers or using the stereo headset supplied.

The internal memory has been expanded to 42 Mbytes and there's support for a hot-swapable miniSD card. This will provide bags of room for storing music tracks and videos, making full use of the possibility to record videos of up to 90 minutes in length. Connectivity is via Bluetooth 2.0, USB 2.0 and infrared. Battery life is very good for a 3G phone.

As always with Series 60 phones, the complexity of the software means that they are usually slow to start, slow when browsing menus, and can be prone to crash. Read through our user reviews below and you will see that the number one complaint about the N73 is the problem of the phone freezing or shutting down, often when receiving a call. This is quite a common complaint in fact, and for this reason we have deducted two stars from our overall rating. A phone that doesn't work is not acceptable, however good it may be when it actually works! You might consider the Sony Ericsson K800i as an alternative, although it's not a Symbian phone. If you want a Nokia, but have been put off the Nseries by this review, you might like the Nokia 6300, which has most of the functionality of the N73, but isn't a Smartphone and is much more reliable and user friendly.

The latest versions of the firmware do seem to be fixing the reliability problems however, and Nokia are very good at making new firmware releases available. The N73 is such a capable phone that you might want to take a risk, particularly as there are now such good offers available on new contracts.

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Features of the Nokia N73 include:

Series 60 (3rd Edition) SmartPhone (Symbian version 9.1)
3.2 megapixel camera with CMOS sensor, Carl Zeiss optics, autofocus, flash and 20x digital zoom
Video camera (up to 90 minutes) in MPEG4 or 3GP formats (352 x 288 pixels, 15 frames per second) and 4x digital zoom
VGA camera (640 x 480 pixels) for video calling
Photo editor & video editor application
Print photos directly from the phone with PictBridge printer
Display: TFT, 262,144 colours, 240 x 320 pixels
Stereo music player (MP3/AAC/eAAC/eAAC+/WMA formats) with playlists and equalizer
Stereo FM radio with Visual Radio support
Voice dialling and commands
Push to Talk
Messaging: SMS, MMS, Email (SMTP, IMAP4, POP3)
Document viewer (Word, Excel, Powerpoint & PDF formats)
Java applications
Web browser
Advanced contacts database with support for multiple device and email details per entry
Memory: 42 Mbytes plus miniSD memory card (hot swappable)
Connectivity: Bluetooth 2.0, USB 2.0, Infrared
3G data transfer (384kbps download)
Size: 110 x 49 x 19 mm
Weight: 116g
Quadband GSM plus 3G (WCDMA)
Talktime: 3.5 hours
Battery standby: up to 350 hours

Nokia E71 Review

2008-10-08T23:57:00.002-07:00

Phone rating:

In a nutshell: The Nokia E71 is Nokia's greatest challenge to BlackBerry yet. With full support for push email, attachment editing and web browsing, Nokia have definitely parked their tanks on the BlackBerry lawn. The E71 also features full multimedia capabilities, including a 3.2 megapixel camera, video calling, and a media player. HSDPA, WLAN, GPS and big battery power complete the package. It's available in a choice of Grey Steel or White Steel.
Best buy: *Free* from Dialaphone or Vodafone Business Shop.

It's the Nokia E71 vs the BlackBerry Bold for the title of best business phone of 2008! For the past couple of years, BlackBerry have been carving out a niche as the brand of choice for corporate users, with their winning combination of full or near-full QWERTY keypads and push email systems. Nokia have been steadily improving the user-friendliness and power of their E series phones too, and now it seems that both BlackBerry and Nokia have made a further leap forward and both landed up with highly polished mobile communications devices. Whether you choose the BlackBerry or the Nokia, you shouldn't go far wrong when it comes to communicating on the move.

Both the E71 and the Bold offer a full QWERTY keypad, with numeric keys situated in the centre. The Bold has a more refined styling, whilst the E71 has more buttons to push and a more techy look and feel. The E71's extra buttons are dedicated one-touch keys for Home, calendar, contacts, and email. The E71 uses a Navi™Key that works rather like the mouse pad on a a laptop and provides accelerated scrolling for moving about the screen. This is arguably a better input method than the BlackBerry trackball. The Nokia also has software aids to text input, including automatic spelling correction, auto-completion, and word candidate lists. The E71 is quite a bit narrower than the Bold, making the keys slightly smaller, but has the advantage of being much thinner. In fact, at just 10mm thickness it feels almost flat, and makes the Bold (measuring 15mm) look huge by comparison. Either way, both devices provide excellent support for text input.

Nokia have equipped the E71 with one of their best screens. Measuring 2.36 inches across, with a resolution of 240 x 320 pixels, this gives a good space for working on emails and documents, or viewing web pages, but it doesn't have as high a resolution as the Bold's screen. Nevertheless it's an excellent display, capable of displaying 16 million colours and using an active matrix LCD for good visibility and clarity, even in moderate sunlight.

The E71 can be used handsfree, with either a handsfree speaker or a Bluetooth wireless headset, combined with both speaker-dependent and speaker-independent voice dialling. You can set the phone to answer automatically when using a headset or a car kit.

Messaging is what the E71 is all about, of course, and it is well equipped for both push email and text messaging. The device supports IMAP, POP and SMTP email protocols, as well as Nokia Intellisync Wireless Email. Attachments are supported, and the Quickoffice application lets you view and edit Word, Excel and PowerPoint documents. We don't think that Nokia have caught up with BlackBerry yet, but the email system is certainly usable. The E71 is fully equipped for security, with a keypad lock, remote lock and even encryption for data stored in memory or on the memory card. Full support for Virtual Private Networks is provided.

The phone is also strong on multimedia. A 3.2 megapixel camera with autofocus and flash is included, and you can record video in MPEG4 or 3GP formats at a resolution of 640 x 480 at 22 fps or 320 x 240 (QVGA) at 30 fps. A secondary front-facing camera is used for video calling. The camera certainly beats the Bold's camera without a doubt, although you might argue that for a phone of this type, the camera is rather over-specified. The music player can handle all common formats, and there's also an FM radio with Visual Radio support. RealPlayer is used to playback video.

Like many smartphones, the Nokia includes integrated A-GPS satellite navigation, with the Nokia Maps application pre-installed.

You can also use the phone for web browsing. The built-in browser can handle XHTML, Javascript, stylesheets and Flash, so is able to display most websites correctly. You can use the Navi™Key very effectively to zoom in on web pages, a bit like the iPhone.

The E71 has excellent connectivity with support for Bluetooth 2.0 (with Enhanced Data Rate), micro USB, WLAN and even Infrared. The WLAN connection can be used to make VoIP calls. A 2.5mm Nokia headphone socket is provided, so you can plug in a compatible headset, but it would have been nice to have a universal 3.5mm jack, like the BlackBerry Bold has. The phone also features FOTA (firmware updatable over the air.) A comprehensive suite of personal organiser functions is included.

Battery life is very good, but the WLAN eats battery power quite quickly, so you won't want to go without a charger for too long if you're planning to make much use of this feature. Remember to turn off WLAN when not in use! And the GPS too! The internal memory of the phone is 110 Mbytes, plus the option to add up to 8 Gbytes of microSD card memory. Whilst many users may find this to be sufficient, we'd have preferred to see a lot more internal memory. The BlackBerry Bold comes with a 1GB or internal memory, and we feel that the Nokia is under-specified in this department.

So, which to choose: the Nokia E71 or the BlackBerry Bold? As usual, it's horses for courses. The E71 is significantly more compact than the BlackBerry, is probably better built, and has a much better camera. It holds its own when it comes to applications, connectivity and battery life. But the BlackBerry beats the Nokia when you consider the size of the display, its vastly superior memory, its ease-of-use and power when it comes to configuring email, and probably the keypad too. Don't get us wrong, the E71 is a great device, and probably Nokia's best mobile office so far, but BlackBerry still rules in the kingdom of mobile email.

Nokia E66 Review

2008-10-08T23:57:00.001-07:00

We're not sure if this phone is going to be released in the UK. At present it's only available sim free. Here are the specs, and we'll review it if it does get properly released. In the meantime, please see the user reviews below for more information.

Features of the Nokia E66 include:

S60 3.1 Edition Eseries SmartPhone, Symbian OS 9.2
Camera: 3.2 megapixels with autofocus, LED flash and 4x digital zoom
Video camera: 320 x 240 pixels, 15 fps, 4x digital video zoom plus front camera for video calling
Display: 16.7 million colours, 320 x 240 pixels (2.4")
Music player: AAC, AAC+, MP3, AMR-NB, AMR-WB file formats
FM radio 87.5-108 MHz with Visual Radio support
Ringtones: mp3, aac, 64-tone polyphonic (25 built-in tones)
Dedicated one-touch keys: Home, calendar, contacts, and email
Integrated hands-free speakerphone
Speaker dependent and speaker independent voice dialling
Messaging: SMS, MMS, Instant Messaging, email with attachments (IMAP4, Mail for Exchange, POP3, SMTP protocols)
Integrated A-GPS with Nokia Maps application
Flight mode
Memory: 110 Mbytes plus microSD card slot (up to 8GB)
Connectivity: WLAN 802.11b/g, Bluetooth 2.0 with EDR, Micro-USB connector, Infrared, 2.5 mm audio jack
Internet: WAP, GPRS, EDGE, HSDPA (3.6 Mbps), Web browser, Nokia Mini Map Browser, Flash Lite 3.0
Quad-band GSM 850/900/1800/1900 plus 3G
Size: 107.5 x 49.5 x 13.6 mm
Weight: 121g
Talktime: 3.5 hours (3G) - 7.5 hours (2G)
Battery standby: : 260 - 330 hours

Nokia E65 Review

2008-10-08T23:56:00.001-07:00

Phone rating:

Best buy: *Free* from Vodafone Business Shop.

The Nokia E65 is a 3G smartphone aimed squarely at business users. It's the nicest looking of the E series, looking remarkably like a Samsung D500, but with a different choice of colours, so no-one could mistake the two. Unlike the Samsung, it's very much targeted at the serious business user. This is a Symbian phone, so if offers a lot of scope for power users to customise the phone and install their own applications. The calendar is very flexible, and contacts are easy to manage. There's support for email with attachments, and fast access to data via EDGE or 3G networks. On the negative side, Symbian can sometimes be slow and the phone may crash or freeze from time to time.

There are some great features in this phone, but others that aren't so hot, so you'll need to make sure it's right for you. Starting with the exterior, we've mentioned the attractive design of the phone already. It's a very nicely-sized phone and not too heavy, although we'd have preferred a slightly larger keypad - what is it with Nokia and small keypads? The slide design is practical as well as smart, as it enables a large screen to be fitted to a compact phone. The screen is one of the nicest features of the E65, using Nokia's latest 16 million colour technology and a high resolution. However, the E65 does use very small fonts, so be wary of this if your close-up eyesight isn't what it used to be! On the other hand, it enables you to view a lot of information on the screen at one time.

One of the selling points of the E65 is the fact that it can make Voice over IP (VoIP) calls using the integrated wireless LAN connection. It's virtually unbeatable when it comes to connectivity in fact. Not only does it have WLAN (both 802.11b & 802.11g are supported), but it offers Bluetooth, USB and infrared too, so you ought to be able to connect it to just about anything. Onboard memory is reasonably generous at 50 Mbytes, with a slot for a MicroSD memory card too.

Although the phone features a camera and a music player, these are bonus features, not core to the phone. One obvious ommission is that there's no capability for making video calls, as there's no secondary video camera.

The battery life of the E65 is less than average, which is not surprising considering that this is a 3G phone with WLAN and Bluetooth. You can switch off any of these features to conserve battery life if they're not needed.

Overall, the E65 is a reasonable implementation of a 3G Symbian phone, although it is dogged by reliability problems and slow menus. If you don't have a need for all the high-end features, you'd be better off with something simpler, like the Nokia 6300 or Nokia 6500 Slide.

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Features of the Nokia E65 include:

Series 60 3rd Edition Symbian operating system
One Touch keys for direct access to contacts, mute/unmute, and conference calling
Java & Symbian applications
Voice over IP (VoIP) calls via integrated WLAN
Messaging: SMS, MMS, Email with attachments (POP/IMAP, SMTP, and IMAP4 protocols), Instant Messaging
Voice dialing
Voice commands for menu short cuts, keypad lock, and profiles
Voice recording
Integrated handsfree speaker
2 megapixel camera
Display: active-matrix TFT, 16 million colours, 240 x 320 pixels
Music player (MP3/AAC) and media player
Talking ringtones
Calendar with weekly view, contacts, to-do list, and notepad for short notes - all viewable while managing a phone call
Memory: 50 Mbytes plus MicroSD memory card support
Connectivity: Bluetooth 1.2, USB, Infrared, WLAN (802.11b, 802.11g)
WAP 2.0, EDGE (maximum download speeds of up to 296 kbps)
XHTML web browser
Size: 105 x 49 x 15.5 mm
Weight: 115g
Quad-band (EGSM 850/900/1800/1900) plus 3G (WCDMA 2100)
Talktime: 3-6 hours (2G) or 2.5 hours (3G) or 3 hours (VoIP)
Battery standby: up to 11 days (2G) or 5 days (3G/WLAN)

Nokia E51 Review

2008-10-08T23:55:00.000-07:00

Phone rating:

In a nutshell: The Nokia E51 is a powerful communications device equipped with email, a wealth of organiser applications, web browser, camera and media player. With 3G HSDPA and WLAN it can connect to a wide range of networks and devices. It's also a slimline and lightweight phone that looks good and is very easy to use. In our opinion, its one of the best business phones available.
Best buy: *Free* from Vodafone Business Shop.

The Nokia E51 is a business smartphone that is packed with useful features. It's a slim phone with classic looks, although with a rugged edge to its appearance too. Although it lacks the QWERTY keypad of a BlackBerry, it's still a competent email device, and unlike the very disappointing E50, the E51 really does deliver on its potential.

The E51 is available in a choice of three colours - black, silver and pink - although the front face of the phone remains black, with just the edge and back changing colour. Design-wise, this is a no-nonsense easy-to-use phone, with a classic shape, a nice conventional keypad and a 5-way navigation key for easy scrolling and selection. There are also some handy shortcut buttons for email, calendar, contacts and the active standby screen. On the right side is a mute key next to the volume keys. On the left side you'll find a Push to Talk key and a voice recorder key. An LED indicator is used to notify you of new email and messages, as well as missed calls. It's a nice-sized phone too, and very slim, at just 12mm. First impressions are excellent - the E51 looks and feels like a quality device.

The LCD display is a large 2-inch TFT screen with high resolution (240 x 320 pixels) and 16 million colours. An ambient light sensor is used to automatically adjust the brightness of the display. This is a great screen, and is ideally suited to the functionality of the phone. When not in use, the display reverts to active standby mode, where it shows a summary of the day's activities and provides quick access to common applications.

The primary functions of the E51 are to communicate and to organise, and it does both of these jobs well. Email support is comprehensive with support for POP3, IMAP4, and SMTP protocols and attachment viewers for all common file formats. Web browsing is also competent, with a fully functional web browser doing the best it can with the available screen size. The E51 is a 3G HSDPA phone, so download speeds are fast (up to 3.6 Mbps), and it also supports quadband GSM, so you should be able to use it anywhere in the world. You can connect to a PC using a WLAN connection. The WLAN connection also enables VoIP calls.

The applications supplied with the phone include:

File Manager & search function
Organiser tools: Contacts, calendar, to-do list, weather, world clocks and a currency converter
Windows Live provides mobile access to Windows Live Messenger and Windows Live Hotmail
Nokia Team Suite for organising and facilitating group conference calls, email messages, or text messages
Viewers for Excel, Word, PowerPoint & PDF documents
Active Notes for creating notes with rich text and multimedia
Yahoo! Go: get your email, news, maps, and more all from the same customised web page
ZIP file extractor
Support for Nokia Intellisync Mobile Suite with email, file synchronisation, voice, and device management
Support for Symantec, F-Secure, McAfee, and Trend Micro antivirus software

You can also download and install third-party Symbian and Java applications of course.

In addition, the E51 packs in plenty of multimedia functions. These include a 2 megapixel camera with video recording and video calling capabilities. The phone includes both a music player and an FM radio too. A standard Nokia headset supplied, which connects to the 2.5 mm headset socket, and the phone is also compatible with Bluetooth stereo headsets.

The E51 has a very generous onboard memory of 130 Mbytes to support all of the functionality, and usefully it can support microSD cards up to the new 4 Gbyte size.

Battery life isn't bad, although with slim phones there's always a compromise here. Unless you're a really heavy user you won't have a problem with the E51.

All things considered, the Nokia E51 is one of the nicest business phones that we've seen for a while. It lacks the full keypad of a BlackBerry, but apart from that limitation, this is an almost perfect implementation of a business phone. It's very easy to use, very powerful and it looks great too! Highly recommended.

Features of the Nokia E51 include:

Series 60 3rd Edition Symbian SmartPhone
2 megapixel camera with 4x digital zoom
Video camera
Display: TFT, 16 million colours, 240 x 320 pixels (2 inches)
Music Player (AAC, eAAC+, WMA formats)
FM radio with Visual Radio support
MP3 ringtones
Speakerphone
Voice memo recording
Messaging: SMS, MMS, email (POP3, IMAP4 and SMTP protocols), Instant Messaging (supports Yahoo, AOL, OMA 1.2, MSN)
Attachment viewer for Microsoft Word, PowerPoint and Excel
Symbian and Java� MIDP 2.0 applications
Contacts, calendar and to-do list: supports PC synchronisation with Microsoft Outlook and Lotus Notes via Nokia PC Suite
Internet: xHTML web browser, WAP, GPRS, EDGE, HSDPA up to 3.6 Mbps
Connectivity: Bluetooth 2.0, USB 2.0, InfraRed & WLAN (IEEE 802.11g)
Memory: 130 Mbytes plus support for microSD cards (up to 4 Gbytes)
WAP, GPRS, EDGE
Vibration alert
Quadband (850/900/1800/1900) plus 3G (WCDMA 850/2100)
Size: 115 x 46 x 12 mm
Weight: 100g
Talktime: 4.4 hours
Battery standby: 312 hours

Nokia N96 Review

2008-10-08T23:54:00.000-07:00

Phone rating:

In a nutshell: Nokia's flagship smartphone just got better! Complete with 16 GB built-in memory, GPS satellite navigation, a 5 megapixel camera with autofocus, 3G video calling, and every other gadget you can think of! On the downside it's large, battery life is poor, and the Symbian operating system is still not 100% reliable.
Best buy: *Free* from Dialaphone. Available now!

The Nokia N96 is probably the most eagerly anticipated phone release of 2008. But that's partly because we've been anticipating it for so long! Lengthy delays usually mean that the engineers struggled to deliver what the marketing boys promised, so we're going to be checking the N96 very carefully for signs that some of it may not work quite as it should.

But first of all, let's take the phone out of its box and just admire it, because it's a lovely piece of kit. It's big of course - slightly bigger even than the N95, and a touch heavier too - but it's not the heaviest phone ever. But putting that to one side, it's still a really nice phone to look at. It's smoother and curvier than the N95, and the buttons are less confusing.

Now, looking at the specs, it's hard to see why the N96 took such a long time to appear, because on paper it's not very different to the N95 8GB. The only significant differences are the upgrade of the Series 60 user interface from 3.1 to 3.2, the increase in flash memory from 8GB to 16GB, and the addition of Live TV. Yes, with an internal antenna and a DVB-H TV tuner, the Nokia N96 has been designed to let you watch telly on your phone. But unfortunately there is no DVB-H system broadcasting in the UK, so you can't! The good old BBC has made its iPlayer application compatible with the N96 however, so you can at least stream BBC TV and radio content to your phone, which is arguably more useful than watching broadcast TV anyway.

We noted above that the operating system has been upgraded. Well about time too, because we found the N95 to be slow and unreliable. The N96 seems to be a more stable platform, but it still freezes from time to time. Also, in our reviews of smartphones we always like to point out that if you're not familiar with the Symbian operating system, you'll find using a smartphone like the N96 much more of a challenge than using a mobile phone with a "dumb" OS.

The rest is the same as the N95 8GB:

Built-in GPS navigation with Nokia Maps application
5 megapixel camera with Carl Zeiss & Tessar optics
Secondary video camera for video calling
Wi-Fi wireless internet connection
2.8 inch display with 16 million colours - one of the largest and best screens available
Ultra-fast HSDPA data transfer (3.6 Mbps)

The camera is one of the best in any mobile phone. With 5 megapixels, autofocus and the Carl-Zeiss optics and Tessar lens, it can match most other phones. But already a new generation of 8 megapixel cameras has appeared (the Samsung i8510 is the first phone with 8 megapixels) and the dual LED flash is now also regarded as second best (the Nokia N82's xenon flash is more powerful), so it looks like Nokia have missed a trick here. Still, the N96 has an undeniably good camera and a front-facing video camera too, for making video calls.

We'll also mention that Nokia have improved the built-in GPS navigation system so that you can now download maps for free, instead of having to pay for a licence.

Of course the N96 has almost everything else you could think of: a music player with support for all common music formats, a stereo FM radio with RDS and Visual Radio support, integrated handsfree speaker, speaker independent voice dialling, talking ringtones, HSDPA (enabling fast downloads at up to 3.6 Mbps) and lots more! The N96 has the full range of connectivity possibilities, with support for Bluetooth 2.0, USB 2.0, Wireless LAN, TV-Out and a 3.5 mm headphone jack. The memory upgrade to 16GB and support for microSD memory cards is very welcome too, for a device of this power.

There's one area where the N96 actually underperforms its predecessor though: battery life. Anyone who's used an N95 will know that its battery life wasn't fantastic. Well, the N96 is worse. With so many gadgets to power, the battery runs out of juice pretty quickly, and many users are going to find that they have to recharge on a daily basis.

Now, to conclude, we're going to say that the N96 is definitely an improvement over the N95, which itself was a very powerful phone. The improvements worth noting are the upgraded firmware and the expanded memory. The new operating system makes the whole experience less stressful, and the increased memory is always handy. On the downside, the battery life is not too good. Overall the phone isn't exactly a giant leap forward. The Nokia N95 8GB is pretty much the same, but better value for money. The new Samsung i8510 is very similar to the Nokia N96, using the same Series 60 user interface, but with an 8 megapixel camera, and we'd recommend you seriously consider that as an alternative.