Phone type Quadband
Networks GSM 850, GSM 900, GSM 1800, GSM 1900
Connectivity options EDGE, GPRS, Bluetooth, USB
Weight w/battery 93 g
Battery type(s) supported Rechargeable 800mAh battery
Max. talktime (in hours) 3.5 hours
Max. standby time (in hours) 270 hours
Additional functions PictBridge; document viewer; TV-output; uMenu; uGo; uSearch; uTrack
Samsung D900i
Sunday, January 13, 2008
M0torola RAZR2 V 9
Motorola's RAZR, or V3, appeared in late 2004, and has since has found its way into the trembling hands of over 100 million owners--including everyone's favourite hedonistic jailbird, Paris Hilton. In the years since the RAZR's launch, Motorola has released a string of V3 variations, including the V3i (and its garish golden Dolce & Gabbana cousin), the V3x and the HSDPA V3xx. While each sported a slightly enhanced specs list, the sameness of the form factor and lack of interface updates made us wonder if Motorola was resting on its design laurels.
Enter the RAZR2. Far from being another update, the sequel is a whole different kind of RAZR, with rounder edges, shiny surfaces and--somehow--a thinner silhouette. There are three models in the RAZR line-up: The GSM V8, the HSDPA V9 and the CDMA V9m. Though the Shanghai launch event put the V8 centre stage, Australia will be focusing on the V9. The handset is initially available in grey on Telstra's Next G network.
Design
Just when we were getting mighty sick of the V3 design--which looks dated and blocky in the wake of super-sleek models from other phone makers--Moto has ponied up the goods with the V9. The overall look is more streamlined and sassy--gone is the big bump at the base of the keypad, and two millimetres have been skimmed from the depth. The hinge has also been smoothed down, shined up and fashioned into an oval, making it fit better against the keypad and main display.
The 320 x 240-pixel outer display is much bigger at two inches--that's just 0.2 of an inch smaller than the main screen--and incorporates three touch-sensitive music keys at the bottom. We've seen these song-focused touch keys on phones like the Samsung A701 and Motorola's own MAXX V6. However, the RAZR2 sports a nifty upgrade--haptics technology has been employed to give a vibration response whenever a key is pressed. This itty bitty buzz will please those who have been frustrated by the intangibility of touch interfaces.
The V9 sports a shiny chrome coat, and though it does attract fingerprints, the surfaces are not quite the smudge farm found on phones like the LG Shine.
While the V9 was a good fit in our palm, people with petite hands may struggle to wrap their digits around the phone. At 53 millimetres across, it's the same width as the first RAZR.
Motorola RAZR2 V9
Enter the RAZR2. Far from being another update, the sequel is a whole different kind of RAZR, with rounder edges, shiny surfaces and--somehow--a thinner silhouette. There are three models in the RAZR line-up: The GSM V8, the HSDPA V9 and the CDMA V9m. Though the Shanghai launch event put the V8 centre stage, Australia will be focusing on the V9. The handset is initially available in grey on Telstra's Next G network.
Design
Just when we were getting mighty sick of the V3 design--which looks dated and blocky in the wake of super-sleek models from other phone makers--Moto has ponied up the goods with the V9. The overall look is more streamlined and sassy--gone is the big bump at the base of the keypad, and two millimetres have been skimmed from the depth. The hinge has also been smoothed down, shined up and fashioned into an oval, making it fit better against the keypad and main display.
The 320 x 240-pixel outer display is much bigger at two inches--that's just 0.2 of an inch smaller than the main screen--and incorporates three touch-sensitive music keys at the bottom. We've seen these song-focused touch keys on phones like the Samsung A701 and Motorola's own MAXX V6. However, the RAZR2 sports a nifty upgrade--haptics technology has been employed to give a vibration response whenever a key is pressed. This itty bitty buzz will please those who have been frustrated by the intangibility of touch interfaces.
The V9 sports a shiny chrome coat, and though it does attract fingerprints, the surfaces are not quite the smudge farm found on phones like the LG Shine.
While the V9 was a good fit in our palm, people with petite hands may struggle to wrap their digits around the phone. At 53 millimetres across, it's the same width as the first RAZR.
Motorola RAZR2 V9
Friday, January 4, 2008
S@msung M6OO
General Network GSM900 / GSM1800 / GSM1900
Introduced 2007 Q3
Status Coming soon
Form factor Slider
Antenna Internal
SAR Value 0.509 W/Kg
Size Weight 71 g (including battery)
Dimensions 92 x 46 x 15.2 mm
Display Type Graphical
Colours TFT, 65K colors
Size 120 x 160 pixels
2nd Display Present, coloured
- Second external OLED 65K colors display
Memory Numbers 500
SMS 200
Outgoing Calls 30
Received Calls 30
Lost Calls 30
Shared Memory 1.5 MB
- Photocall
Ringtones Polyphonic Yes, 16 voices
- MP3
Networking GPRS Yes, Class 10 (4+1/3+2 slots), 32 - 48 kbps
WAP Yes
Browser Yes, WAP 2.0/xHTML
Features Vibration Yes
SMS Send / Receive
MMS Send / Receive
Camera Yes, VGA, 640x480 pixels
Java Yes
Changeable Games Yes
Games Yes
Clock Yes
Alarm Yes
Calculator Yes
Voice Memo Yes
T9 Yes
Handsfree Yes
FM Radio Yes
Standard Battery Type Li-Ion
Amperage 800 mAh
Standby Time 220 hours
Talk Time 2 hours 30 minutes
Samsung M600
Introduced 2007 Q3
Status Coming soon
Form factor Slider
Antenna Internal
SAR Value 0.509 W/Kg
Size Weight 71 g (including battery)
Dimensions 92 x 46 x 15.2 mm
Display Type Graphical
Colours TFT, 65K colors
Size 120 x 160 pixels
2nd Display Present, coloured
- Second external OLED 65K colors display
Memory Numbers 500
SMS 200
Outgoing Calls 30
Received Calls 30
Lost Calls 30
Shared Memory 1.5 MB
- Photocall
Ringtones Polyphonic Yes, 16 voices
- MP3
Networking GPRS Yes, Class 10 (4+1/3+2 slots), 32 - 48 kbps
WAP Yes
Browser Yes, WAP 2.0/xHTML
Features Vibration Yes
SMS Send / Receive
MMS Send / Receive
Camera Yes, VGA, 640x480 pixels
Java Yes
Changeable Games Yes
Games Yes
Clock Yes
Alarm Yes
Calculator Yes
Voice Memo Yes
T9 Yes
Handsfree Yes
FM Radio Yes
Standard Battery Type Li-Ion
Amperage 800 mAh
Standby Time 220 hours
Talk Time 2 hours 30 minutes
Samsung M600
Nokia E 51
The E51 is the latest member to join the Eseries portfolio in mid-September. It is likely a direct replacement of the E50, though it also looks like a slimmed-down version of the chunky E90 after losing the QWERTY keyboard. But this workhorse is no slouch even with a slim figure.
Design
The beauty of candy-bar handsets is you can almost never go wrong with the design. That's exactly how we felt with the Nokia E51. At 12mm thick, the E51 is one of the leaner enterprise devices from the Finnish phone-maker, second to the E61i which is 0.5mm thinner. The E51 feels very solid in hand, something which a picture cannot deliver. Cementing the durability are the stainless steel runs on the entire edge of the front faceplate and battery cover.
To sum it up quickly, the design approach to the E51 is a very reserved and safe one. Nokia didn't conjure any fancy tricks for this enterprise device. Although we adore the slim profile, the handset looks a tad too tall due to the two-tone fascia. That said, the phone is still relatively compact and should fit comfortably in the pocket. The styling of the E51 also bears vague resemblance to a stripped-down version of the E90 Communicator without the clamshell QWERTY keyboard. Click the picture on the right to see what we mean.
The bottom half is peppered with various shortcut keys and a generous-sized keypad. Above that is a modest 2-inch QVGA display with an ambient light sensor and LED light indicator customizable to light up in the event of missed calls, incoming text/multimedia messages or emails. The screen is readable even in bright outdoor conditions, which is great. However, it's probably not suitable for prolonged Web surfing or document reading, unless you want to end up straining your vision.
Like we mentioned in our preview, Nokia has replaced the S60 swirl icon with a "roofed house" that's instantly recognizable as the Home key. It's trivial, but one that's definitely appreciated. Pressing the key from anywhere in the phone's menu brings us to the standby screen. The same can also be done with the End call control.
The * and # keys are slightly smaller than the 7 and 9 buttons due to the tapered edges of the phone, though it doesn't hinder daily use. While we like the excellent tactility of the main keys, we can't say the same for those on the sides, such as the rubberized volume, power and record buttons. They are not disastrous, don't get us wrong, but pressing them requires a little more concerted effort.
At the back is where we find a 2-megapixel camera and the onboard speakers. The glossy surface of the Rose Steel unit attracts fingerprint smudges fairly easily and may irk some users, although a few swipes usually does the trick for the rear face. The Black Steel version isn't plagued with this problem, and we feel it's the more elegant of the two.
Nokia E51
Design
The beauty of candy-bar handsets is you can almost never go wrong with the design. That's exactly how we felt with the Nokia E51. At 12mm thick, the E51 is one of the leaner enterprise devices from the Finnish phone-maker, second to the E61i which is 0.5mm thinner. The E51 feels very solid in hand, something which a picture cannot deliver. Cementing the durability are the stainless steel runs on the entire edge of the front faceplate and battery cover.
To sum it up quickly, the design approach to the E51 is a very reserved and safe one. Nokia didn't conjure any fancy tricks for this enterprise device. Although we adore the slim profile, the handset looks a tad too tall due to the two-tone fascia. That said, the phone is still relatively compact and should fit comfortably in the pocket. The styling of the E51 also bears vague resemblance to a stripped-down version of the E90 Communicator without the clamshell QWERTY keyboard. Click the picture on the right to see what we mean.
The bottom half is peppered with various shortcut keys and a generous-sized keypad. Above that is a modest 2-inch QVGA display with an ambient light sensor and LED light indicator customizable to light up in the event of missed calls, incoming text/multimedia messages or emails. The screen is readable even in bright outdoor conditions, which is great. However, it's probably not suitable for prolonged Web surfing or document reading, unless you want to end up straining your vision.
Like we mentioned in our preview, Nokia has replaced the S60 swirl icon with a "roofed house" that's instantly recognizable as the Home key. It's trivial, but one that's definitely appreciated. Pressing the key from anywhere in the phone's menu brings us to the standby screen. The same can also be done with the End call control.
The * and # keys are slightly smaller than the 7 and 9 buttons due to the tapered edges of the phone, though it doesn't hinder daily use. While we like the excellent tactility of the main keys, we can't say the same for those on the sides, such as the rubberized volume, power and record buttons. They are not disastrous, don't get us wrong, but pressing them requires a little more concerted effort.
At the back is where we find a 2-megapixel camera and the onboard speakers. The glossy surface of the Rose Steel unit attracts fingerprint smudges fairly easily and may irk some users, although a few swipes usually does the trick for the rear face. The Black Steel version isn't plagued with this problem, and we feel it's the more elegant of the two.
Nokia E51
S@msung E21O
Messaging SMS, EMS, MMS, Email
Browser WAP 2.0/xHTML
Games Yes, order now
Colors Black, Blue
Camera 1.3 MP, 1280 x 1024 pixels, video(QCIF)
- Java MIDP 2.0
- FM radio
- MP3/AAC/AAC+ player
- T9
- Organiser
- To Do list
- Built-in handsfree
- Voice memo
Samsung E210
Browser WAP 2.0/xHTML
Games Yes, order now
Colors Black, Blue
Camera 1.3 MP, 1280 x 1024 pixels, video(QCIF)
- Java MIDP 2.0
- FM radio
- MP3/AAC/AAC+ player
- T9
- Organiser
- To Do list
- Built-in handsfree
- Voice memo
Samsung E210
S@msung SPH-M61O
"Less is more" has been the philosophy of phone designers since the MOTORAZR's debut and nobody has taken the thin form factor and the Zen-look farther than Samsung. We’ve seen the ultra-thin Samsung Trace t519 candy bar phone on T-Mobile and the Samsung A900M on Sprint here in the US. Over the Pacific Ocean, Samsung offers a series of phones in their Ultra line that takes the thin trend to the limit. The Samsung M610 is the newest CDMA ultra thin phone available on Sprint’s digital networks. The minimalist design and the thin body (by flip phone standards) give the Samsung a sleek look. Under its pretty hood, you will find a good set of features including EV-DO, a 2 megapixel camera, built-in Bluetooth, a MicroSD card slot and PIM applications along with multimedia tools. Combine that with Sprint’s Power Vision connection speed and content that includes videos, music and games, you’ve got a powerful feature phone in a very attractive package. The Samsung M610 is a CDMA phone operating on 800/1900 MHz digital bands and it supports EV-DO (Power Vision in Sprint’s lingo) as well as 1xRTT for data.
Design and Ergonomics
"Smooth but textured" is in fashion – for example the Treo 750, T-Mobile Dash and the Samsung BlackJack which paved the way in the US. The Samsung M610 scores a velvet smooth surface, front and back, and it feels great in hand. Though thin, the Samsung has a good width that makes it easy to grab and comfy to hold on to. The black flip phone has a clean design: the front has a small outer display and the back has a battery door, with only the charging/audio out port and volume buttons on the sides. The hinge for the flip feels solid and operates smoothly. You will find the built-in camera sitting in the middle of the flip hinge. When you open the flip cover, you will see a large and bright screen on the top along with the speaker and the keyboard and phone controls on the bottom flip. The keyboard feels very spacious with an almost entirely flat surface. The M610 has traditional number keys (not touch sensitive but real hardware keys). That said, blind dialing (while not looking at the keyboard) might prove to be a challenge as the keyboard is very flat and the two small raised bars on the number “5” are just high enough to center your dialing fingers.
You will find the large D-pad above the number keypad and it is flanked by two menu keys, the loudspeaker button, camera quick launch button, back key and call send and end buttons. The entire keypad is backlit with milky but bright backlight. You should have no problem seeing the dial pad and menu keys in the dark. The battery lives under the battery door in the back and you can release the lever to open the door. You will find the MicroSD card slot under this door as well, but you will need to take out the battery to access the MicroSD slot as the battery blocks the slot.
Deals and Shopping
Get it from Amazon:
Phone Features and Reception
The Samsung M610 gets good signal strength in the Dallas area. It gets full bars in most places with 1-2 bars fewer when deep inside of a large building or on a stormy day. It’s about the same as the Samsung A900M in terms of reception and it beats out the Treo 700p just slightly with more consistent good reception. The M610’s voice quality isn’t as good as its reception. Both incoming and outgoing voice has a slight distortion and the incoming voice drops syllables every so often. You can also hear some loud background noise in retail store environments and other bustling places. The sound volume is very loud through both the earpiece and the speakerphone. Setting the volume to half of maximum volume will be more than adequate for most environments.
Side view of the Samsung M610 closed and open.
The Samsung M610 supports popular phone features including conference calling, call waiting, mute and speakerphone as well as Sprint services such as phone lock (for security) and roaming guard. It also has 98 speed dialing slots for you to fill from your Contacts database. The Contacts database allows you to enter up to 500 entries. Each entry can have 5 phone numbers and 1 email as well as an URL, a nickname, a memo note attached to it. You can also assign groups and unique ringtones to contacts. The M610 also comes with VoiceSignal’s Vsuite 2.1 voice recognition software. You can make calls by voice dialing using this software and give voice commands to send text messages, send email, lookup something, Go To an app or check time, battery life and more. Please note that you will still need to type the email and SMS messages after voice command launches the app and the contact. The maximum SMS characters allowed per message is 160, which is the industry standard.
Like most recent Sprint feature phones, the Samsung M610 supports Sprint’s EV-DO high-speed data network which is called Power Vision in Sprint’s lingo. The M610 comes with the Eleca Obigo v1.17 browser that supports bookmarks, cookies, cache clear, Certificate Check and supports 128 bit SSL encryption. While the Samsung can’t run the DSL report mobile tests, web pages load speedily. For mobile optimized sites such as the Sprint’s Power Vision portal, the browser displays the pages perfectly and text pages flip quite fast. Pages that are not optimized for mobile phones will show up in a single column view in the browser. Even though the browser lacks advanced features such as Javascript support, the browser handled most non-mobile web sites we’ve tested. As the phone isn’t designed for heavy enterprise use, you will get only web-based email.
Display, Gaming and Multimedia
The Samsung M610 has a gorgeous looking TFT screen that’s color saturated and very bright. The 2.2” display has 240 x 320 resolution and is a just a hair longer than the MOTORAZR V3x’s screen. Photos and videos look clear and colorful on the screen. You can set the brightness to one of five brightness settings. At the brightest setting, the screen looks so bright that it almost feels uncomfortable if you stare at it for a long time. The outer display is in smaller size at 0.79” x 0.14” and can display 1 color (blue) on the OLED LCD. You will get the usual set of data on the outer display including incoming calls, missed calls, message alerts, battery life, signal strength and more.
The Samsung M610 has 128 MB of ROM and 64 MB. The phone boots up very quickly and applications launch without any delays. Our review unit fresh out of the box had 58MB of memory available for storage. You can use the phone as storage to save contacts, images, games, themes, ringers screen savers, music videos and more. For expanded storage, you can use the MicroSD card option. Though Samsung recommends 512 MB cards, we tested the 1 GB Dane-Elec MicroSD card and it worked with the M610 just fine.
The M610 supports ringtones in MIDI, QCP, MP3, AAC, AAC+, MP4, CMX (PMD file extension) formats and comes with Qualcomm’s Media Player that can play MP4 and m4a files. While music plays smoothly videos do not. You will experience frame skipping, image blocky-ness and out-of-sync audio in your video clips on the Samsung. Music playback via the included stereo headset and the loudspeaker is poor with tinny sound. But audio through Bluetooth stereo headset is much better. Perhaps the audio chip is fine but the speaker used on the M610 is causing the poor music quality.
Java games play very well on the M610 without any delays and with perfect audio. We tested a wide array of games from Galaga and PacMan to Call of Duty 2 and Doom.
Camera
If you have an old 2-3 megapixel digital camera, you can leave it at home. The M610 has an excellent built-in 2 megapixel camera with 10x digital zoom. The camera has a CMOS sensor that takes great photos. It doesn’t have the auto-focus feature found on the Samsung a990 and the Nokia N73’s 3.2 megapixel cameras, but it takes great photos that look better than other 2 megapixel camera phones. The M610’s photos have a very natural tone without any noticeable color cast, and it deals great with low light indoor and outdoor shots with good light balance and brightness. The images have good contrast without seeming stark or monochromatic. The only hard thing for the camera to deal with is very bright sunlight, and that’s a challenge for many camera phones.
The camera takes JPG images at 1580 x 1124, 1280 x 960, 800 x 600, 640 x 480 and 320 x 240 resolutions. File sizes range from 100kb to 5kb per image. The camera utility will tell you how many photos you can still take based on available memory and allows you to set the white balance, brightness, metering options, color tone, image quality and more. The camera is capable of taking multi-shots and has self timer and self portrait modes. As with most camera phones, you can use the images taken with the phone’s camera as wallpaper, caller ID and MMS. The phone also comes with software that supports PictBridge which means you can print out the photos directly to a PictBridge compatible printer.
The M610 camera can also take videos with audio in 3g2 format. You can set the video length to video mail mode which has a 30 second limit or max which is limited only by available memory either on your phone or storage card. Max mode recording is about 15 fps and 240 x 192 resolution.
Bluetooth
The Samsung M610 has integrated Bluetooth that supports Headset, Hands-Free, DUN (Dial-up Network), Basic Printing, Object Push (for vCards), File Transfer, A2DP and AVRC profiles. You can enable the Bluetooth radio and set visibility in Settings, but if you want to pair it with headsets, computers or printers, you will need to go to Tools. The Samsung paired with all headsets and car kit we threw at it with ease, though audio quality via the headsets isn’t that stellar. When using the Cardo Scala-700 Bluetooth headset, the Samsung sounded “underwater” with muffled audio and dropped syllables. The phone faired better on the Plantronics Discovery 655 without noticeable missing syllables and the sound is clear. But it still can’t compete with most other phones when working with the same headsets. Interestingly the Samsung M610 worked better with the Plantronics Pulsar 590A stereo Bluetooth headset via A2DP. The audio quality is better in general with much clearer sound. The range between the phone and the headsets are short also. Mono Bluetooth headsets got about 8-10 feet range and the stereo headset gets about 12-15 feet. The Samsung also supports AV remote control via Bluetooth. While it works well on music playback, the video playback lost its audio connection when using the Plantronics Pulsar. You can control the video playback however, just no audio pipes through.
Side view of the M610 and Motorola RAZR
M610 and the RAZR
The M610 also supports DUN which allows you to use the phone as a modem for your computer to access the Internet via the Bluetooth connection. The connection works very well with PCs, but doesn’t work with the Intel iMac with which we tested it. Data speed and file transfer speed are both quite fast, specially if you have a PC/notebook running Bluetooth 2.0. Keeping the Bluetooth radio on doesn’t have a big impact on battery life.
Battery Life
The Samsung M610 has a rechargeable standard Li-Ion battery that’s 800 mAh in capacity. That’s decent amount of battery if you mainly use the phone to make phone calls, send messages and listen to music. The talk time should run at about 3 hours with light use of other features. If you use Sprint’s Power Vision to watch videos, download music tracks and download games, it’s a good idea to get the 1300 mAh extended battery that’s sold as separate accessory. It took 1/3 of a full charge with the standard battery to download 5 video clips, 10 music tracks and 3 games and to play these downloaded content.
Additional Software
In addition to the Contacts database, the Samsung M610 comes with full set of PIM tools including Calendar, To do (Task List), Countdown, Voice Memo, Alarm Clock and World Time in Tools folder. The calendar has a monthly view which lists your schedules, birthdays etc. at the bottom of the calendar. You can set a maximum of 9 events a day and each event allows 32 characters. Remember this 9-32 number combo as it’s implemented throughout the PIM tools. You can have a maximum of 9 tasks, 9 countdown events, 9 memo notes and so on; and each of these entries can have 32 character with an exception in memo notes which allow up to 128 character. Voice memo allows 1 minute per recording. Sprint also bundled On Demand content by Handmark where you can get quick glance at the local weather, current news, stock and sports. The content is updated every time you load it.
Conclusion
If you are a Sprint customer looking for a thin, stylish flip phone with competitive feature sets, the Samsung M610 is a good contender. You will find a balanced feature set that will attract multimedia buffs and Power Vision addicts, and it won’t break the bank as the pricing is competitive with other mid to high-end feature phones.
Pro: Stylish yet not flashy design that will turn heads. Very good 2 megapixel camera; if you are a camera phone fan you will like what you see with this camera. The EV-DO speed and web browser performs well on this phone. Multimedia download is fast compared to some competing Verizon feature phones. Rich set of PIM application and it’s very cool to have the On-Demand content bundled.
Samsung M610
Design and Ergonomics
"Smooth but textured" is in fashion – for example the Treo 750, T-Mobile Dash and the Samsung BlackJack which paved the way in the US. The Samsung M610 scores a velvet smooth surface, front and back, and it feels great in hand. Though thin, the Samsung has a good width that makes it easy to grab and comfy to hold on to. The black flip phone has a clean design: the front has a small outer display and the back has a battery door, with only the charging/audio out port and volume buttons on the sides. The hinge for the flip feels solid and operates smoothly. You will find the built-in camera sitting in the middle of the flip hinge. When you open the flip cover, you will see a large and bright screen on the top along with the speaker and the keyboard and phone controls on the bottom flip. The keyboard feels very spacious with an almost entirely flat surface. The M610 has traditional number keys (not touch sensitive but real hardware keys). That said, blind dialing (while not looking at the keyboard) might prove to be a challenge as the keyboard is very flat and the two small raised bars on the number “5” are just high enough to center your dialing fingers.
You will find the large D-pad above the number keypad and it is flanked by two menu keys, the loudspeaker button, camera quick launch button, back key and call send and end buttons. The entire keypad is backlit with milky but bright backlight. You should have no problem seeing the dial pad and menu keys in the dark. The battery lives under the battery door in the back and you can release the lever to open the door. You will find the MicroSD card slot under this door as well, but you will need to take out the battery to access the MicroSD slot as the battery blocks the slot.
Deals and Shopping
Get it from Amazon:
Phone Features and Reception
The Samsung M610 gets good signal strength in the Dallas area. It gets full bars in most places with 1-2 bars fewer when deep inside of a large building or on a stormy day. It’s about the same as the Samsung A900M in terms of reception and it beats out the Treo 700p just slightly with more consistent good reception. The M610’s voice quality isn’t as good as its reception. Both incoming and outgoing voice has a slight distortion and the incoming voice drops syllables every so often. You can also hear some loud background noise in retail store environments and other bustling places. The sound volume is very loud through both the earpiece and the speakerphone. Setting the volume to half of maximum volume will be more than adequate for most environments.
Side view of the Samsung M610 closed and open.
The Samsung M610 supports popular phone features including conference calling, call waiting, mute and speakerphone as well as Sprint services such as phone lock (for security) and roaming guard. It also has 98 speed dialing slots for you to fill from your Contacts database. The Contacts database allows you to enter up to 500 entries. Each entry can have 5 phone numbers and 1 email as well as an URL, a nickname, a memo note attached to it. You can also assign groups and unique ringtones to contacts. The M610 also comes with VoiceSignal’s Vsuite 2.1 voice recognition software. You can make calls by voice dialing using this software and give voice commands to send text messages, send email, lookup something, Go To an app or check time, battery life and more. Please note that you will still need to type the email and SMS messages after voice command launches the app and the contact. The maximum SMS characters allowed per message is 160, which is the industry standard.
Like most recent Sprint feature phones, the Samsung M610 supports Sprint’s EV-DO high-speed data network which is called Power Vision in Sprint’s lingo. The M610 comes with the Eleca Obigo v1.17 browser that supports bookmarks, cookies, cache clear, Certificate Check and supports 128 bit SSL encryption. While the Samsung can’t run the DSL report mobile tests, web pages load speedily. For mobile optimized sites such as the Sprint’s Power Vision portal, the browser displays the pages perfectly and text pages flip quite fast. Pages that are not optimized for mobile phones will show up in a single column view in the browser. Even though the browser lacks advanced features such as Javascript support, the browser handled most non-mobile web sites we’ve tested. As the phone isn’t designed for heavy enterprise use, you will get only web-based email.
Display, Gaming and Multimedia
The Samsung M610 has a gorgeous looking TFT screen that’s color saturated and very bright. The 2.2” display has 240 x 320 resolution and is a just a hair longer than the MOTORAZR V3x’s screen. Photos and videos look clear and colorful on the screen. You can set the brightness to one of five brightness settings. At the brightest setting, the screen looks so bright that it almost feels uncomfortable if you stare at it for a long time. The outer display is in smaller size at 0.79” x 0.14” and can display 1 color (blue) on the OLED LCD. You will get the usual set of data on the outer display including incoming calls, missed calls, message alerts, battery life, signal strength and more.
The Samsung M610 has 128 MB of ROM and 64 MB. The phone boots up very quickly and applications launch without any delays. Our review unit fresh out of the box had 58MB of memory available for storage. You can use the phone as storage to save contacts, images, games, themes, ringers screen savers, music videos and more. For expanded storage, you can use the MicroSD card option. Though Samsung recommends 512 MB cards, we tested the 1 GB Dane-Elec MicroSD card and it worked with the M610 just fine.
The M610 supports ringtones in MIDI, QCP, MP3, AAC, AAC+, MP4, CMX (PMD file extension) formats and comes with Qualcomm’s Media Player that can play MP4 and m4a files. While music plays smoothly videos do not. You will experience frame skipping, image blocky-ness and out-of-sync audio in your video clips on the Samsung. Music playback via the included stereo headset and the loudspeaker is poor with tinny sound. But audio through Bluetooth stereo headset is much better. Perhaps the audio chip is fine but the speaker used on the M610 is causing the poor music quality.
Java games play very well on the M610 without any delays and with perfect audio. We tested a wide array of games from Galaga and PacMan to Call of Duty 2 and Doom.
Camera
If you have an old 2-3 megapixel digital camera, you can leave it at home. The M610 has an excellent built-in 2 megapixel camera with 10x digital zoom. The camera has a CMOS sensor that takes great photos. It doesn’t have the auto-focus feature found on the Samsung a990 and the Nokia N73’s 3.2 megapixel cameras, but it takes great photos that look better than other 2 megapixel camera phones. The M610’s photos have a very natural tone without any noticeable color cast, and it deals great with low light indoor and outdoor shots with good light balance and brightness. The images have good contrast without seeming stark or monochromatic. The only hard thing for the camera to deal with is very bright sunlight, and that’s a challenge for many camera phones.
The camera takes JPG images at 1580 x 1124, 1280 x 960, 800 x 600, 640 x 480 and 320 x 240 resolutions. File sizes range from 100kb to 5kb per image. The camera utility will tell you how many photos you can still take based on available memory and allows you to set the white balance, brightness, metering options, color tone, image quality and more. The camera is capable of taking multi-shots and has self timer and self portrait modes. As with most camera phones, you can use the images taken with the phone’s camera as wallpaper, caller ID and MMS. The phone also comes with software that supports PictBridge which means you can print out the photos directly to a PictBridge compatible printer.
The M610 camera can also take videos with audio in 3g2 format. You can set the video length to video mail mode which has a 30 second limit or max which is limited only by available memory either on your phone or storage card. Max mode recording is about 15 fps and 240 x 192 resolution.
Bluetooth
The Samsung M610 has integrated Bluetooth that supports Headset, Hands-Free, DUN (Dial-up Network), Basic Printing, Object Push (for vCards), File Transfer, A2DP and AVRC profiles. You can enable the Bluetooth radio and set visibility in Settings, but if you want to pair it with headsets, computers or printers, you will need to go to Tools. The Samsung paired with all headsets and car kit we threw at it with ease, though audio quality via the headsets isn’t that stellar. When using the Cardo Scala-700 Bluetooth headset, the Samsung sounded “underwater” with muffled audio and dropped syllables. The phone faired better on the Plantronics Discovery 655 without noticeable missing syllables and the sound is clear. But it still can’t compete with most other phones when working with the same headsets. Interestingly the Samsung M610 worked better with the Plantronics Pulsar 590A stereo Bluetooth headset via A2DP. The audio quality is better in general with much clearer sound. The range between the phone and the headsets are short also. Mono Bluetooth headsets got about 8-10 feet range and the stereo headset gets about 12-15 feet. The Samsung also supports AV remote control via Bluetooth. While it works well on music playback, the video playback lost its audio connection when using the Plantronics Pulsar. You can control the video playback however, just no audio pipes through.
Side view of the M610 and Motorola RAZR
M610 and the RAZR
The M610 also supports DUN which allows you to use the phone as a modem for your computer to access the Internet via the Bluetooth connection. The connection works very well with PCs, but doesn’t work with the Intel iMac with which we tested it. Data speed and file transfer speed are both quite fast, specially if you have a PC/notebook running Bluetooth 2.0. Keeping the Bluetooth radio on doesn’t have a big impact on battery life.
Battery Life
The Samsung M610 has a rechargeable standard Li-Ion battery that’s 800 mAh in capacity. That’s decent amount of battery if you mainly use the phone to make phone calls, send messages and listen to music. The talk time should run at about 3 hours with light use of other features. If you use Sprint’s Power Vision to watch videos, download music tracks and download games, it’s a good idea to get the 1300 mAh extended battery that’s sold as separate accessory. It took 1/3 of a full charge with the standard battery to download 5 video clips, 10 music tracks and 3 games and to play these downloaded content.
Additional Software
In addition to the Contacts database, the Samsung M610 comes with full set of PIM tools including Calendar, To do (Task List), Countdown, Voice Memo, Alarm Clock and World Time in Tools folder. The calendar has a monthly view which lists your schedules, birthdays etc. at the bottom of the calendar. You can set a maximum of 9 events a day and each event allows 32 characters. Remember this 9-32 number combo as it’s implemented throughout the PIM tools. You can have a maximum of 9 tasks, 9 countdown events, 9 memo notes and so on; and each of these entries can have 32 character with an exception in memo notes which allow up to 128 character. Voice memo allows 1 minute per recording. Sprint also bundled On Demand content by Handmark where you can get quick glance at the local weather, current news, stock and sports. The content is updated every time you load it.
Conclusion
If you are a Sprint customer looking for a thin, stylish flip phone with competitive feature sets, the Samsung M610 is a good contender. You will find a balanced feature set that will attract multimedia buffs and Power Vision addicts, and it won’t break the bank as the pricing is competitive with other mid to high-end feature phones.
Pro: Stylish yet not flashy design that will turn heads. Very good 2 megapixel camera; if you are a camera phone fan you will like what you see with this camera. The EV-DO speed and web browser performs well on this phone. Multimedia download is fast compared to some competing Verizon feature phones. Rich set of PIM application and it’s very cool to have the On-Demand content bundled.
Samsung M610
S0ny Ericsson T25Oi Review
The simple design of the Sony Ericsson T250i is what catches everyone's eye, as it is a beautiful & simplistic handset. The T250i is a compact mobile phone which comes with a stunning brushed aluminium casing. The casing is simple & stylish with no fancy opening systems as the phone is a candy bar handset. The Sony Ericsson T250i comes in two colours which are an aluminium silver finish or an aluminium black colour & both finishes ooze style. The overall size or the handset is 100mm in length, 45mm in width & 13mm in depth which feels good to hold in a single hand & allows the user to operate their new mobile phone in one hand. The Sony Ericsson T250i comes with a spin effect navigation key which is a please to use. The user can use the spin effect navigation key to switch between menus & options with ease & the keypad is sleek & stylish. The mobile phone comes with a clear colour screen which provides the user with a colourful viewing display for bright picture wallpapers & screensavers. The phone comes with two Mbytes of built in memory & has a fitted battery which provides up to seven hours talk time or up to three hundred hours of standby battery time. The Sony Ericsson T250i pays resemblance to other simple & user focused mobile handsets which include Sony Ericsson J110i & the Sony Ericsson J220i.
The user will find creating & sending messages easy on their Sony Ericsson T250i as the keypad provides the user with an easy to use input method & the messaging features are easily accessible using the spin effect navigation key. The mobile phone supports SMS text messaging, SMS long text messaging & MMS multimedia messaging which come complete with the assistance of a predictive text input method if required. The MMS message can contain either a photo or video clip which can be sent complete with text & audio sound. The MMS message can be shared between all compatible MMS compatible mobile phone users or email compatible contacts & the service provides a fun way to share experiences. The predictive text facility can be useful when the user is typing a long message as the phone will anticipate & finish the word the user is typing. The Sony Ericsson T250i comes with preloaded games ready & waiting for the user to charge up their handset & enjoy a fun game instantly on their new mobile handset.
The T250i may be small & simple, but it is packed with fun & easy to use features which will keep the user entertained for hours. The built in FM radio feature provides the user with the perfect music partner complete with a stereo headset, the user can enjoy their radio where ever they are & when ever they desire. The stereo headset comes including with the mobile phone which allows the user to enjoy their favourite radio station straight away. The phone support polyphonic ringing tones which can be changed to suit the users ringing tone taste. The T250i comes with Internet access in the form of a WAP browser which is accessible using the easy to operate spin effect navigation key. The user can access the WAP browser when they need information on the move. The phone comes with an infra red connectivity option which allows the user to connect to other compatible infra red devices & the phone comes with a connection to the mobile phone charger. The Sony Ericsson T250i works on a quad band network which cover GSM 850, 900, 1800 & 1900. The quad band technology provides the user with international roaming but this is dependant on the service operator.
The phone comes with a built in digital camera complete with screen viewfinder & dedicated camera options. The camera feature allows the user to capture all those fun moments in their day which can then be saved on the handset or sent to others. The camera feature comes with interaction to the phones imaging & messaging features. The user can store their photos in the phones photo album which can be viewed at anytime on the TFT screen. The user will find the camera feature easy to use & will enjoy having a fun feature in their hand at all times. The Sony Ericsson T250i comes with easy to use call features which include a useful speaker phone feature which allows the user to take a call over the phone speakers & enjoy a handsfree call. The user can simply switch to the speaker phone option which automatically activates the phones speakers. The phone comes with an alarm facility which will either wake the user up each morning or remind the user of a meeting or important event they need to go to, the user will never have an excuse for being late ever again. The Sony Ericsson T250i is a mobile handset which will be enjoyed by its user & appreciated for its simple design & easy to use features.
Sony Ericsson T250i
The user will find creating & sending messages easy on their Sony Ericsson T250i as the keypad provides the user with an easy to use input method & the messaging features are easily accessible using the spin effect navigation key. The mobile phone supports SMS text messaging, SMS long text messaging & MMS multimedia messaging which come complete with the assistance of a predictive text input method if required. The MMS message can contain either a photo or video clip which can be sent complete with text & audio sound. The MMS message can be shared between all compatible MMS compatible mobile phone users or email compatible contacts & the service provides a fun way to share experiences. The predictive text facility can be useful when the user is typing a long message as the phone will anticipate & finish the word the user is typing. The Sony Ericsson T250i comes with preloaded games ready & waiting for the user to charge up their handset & enjoy a fun game instantly on their new mobile handset.
The T250i may be small & simple, but it is packed with fun & easy to use features which will keep the user entertained for hours. The built in FM radio feature provides the user with the perfect music partner complete with a stereo headset, the user can enjoy their radio where ever they are & when ever they desire. The stereo headset comes including with the mobile phone which allows the user to enjoy their favourite radio station straight away. The phone support polyphonic ringing tones which can be changed to suit the users ringing tone taste. The T250i comes with Internet access in the form of a WAP browser which is accessible using the easy to operate spin effect navigation key. The user can access the WAP browser when they need information on the move. The phone comes with an infra red connectivity option which allows the user to connect to other compatible infra red devices & the phone comes with a connection to the mobile phone charger. The Sony Ericsson T250i works on a quad band network which cover GSM 850, 900, 1800 & 1900. The quad band technology provides the user with international roaming but this is dependant on the service operator.
The phone comes with a built in digital camera complete with screen viewfinder & dedicated camera options. The camera feature allows the user to capture all those fun moments in their day which can then be saved on the handset or sent to others. The camera feature comes with interaction to the phones imaging & messaging features. The user can store their photos in the phones photo album which can be viewed at anytime on the TFT screen. The user will find the camera feature easy to use & will enjoy having a fun feature in their hand at all times. The Sony Ericsson T250i comes with easy to use call features which include a useful speaker phone feature which allows the user to take a call over the phone speakers & enjoy a handsfree call. The user can simply switch to the speaker phone option which automatically activates the phones speakers. The phone comes with an alarm facility which will either wake the user up each morning or remind the user of a meeting or important event they need to go to, the user will never have an excuse for being late ever again. The Sony Ericsson T250i is a mobile handset which will be enjoyed by its user & appreciated for its simple design & easy to use features.
Sony Ericsson T250i
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