Acer Stream Review

October 30th, 2010 | Acer, Mobile Phone Reviews, Touchscreen

Loaded with an HDMI port for easy television hook-up, customized Android user interface and a large AMOLED touch-screen, the Acer Stream has made nothing but a big impression.  The Acer Stream is definitely Acer’s best-looking handset to date, with a very slim 11 mm thick package, combined with a dark aluminium and black, high gloss finish on the front.

The huge 3.7-inch AMOLED touch-screen is the best way for this phone to show off its incredibly vivid colours, featuring astonishingly deep levels of black, combined with a beautiful bright contrast.  The high WVGA resolution guarantees photos and web pages alike are seen very sharply, even when using the pinch-to-groom, multi-touch zoom feature to quickly navigate in and out between maps and web pages.

The home-screen displays eight permanent shortcut applications on its single screen, which has been divided into two parts.  This is different from the usual multi-page Android screen.  Upgraded to a 1 GHz Snapdragon processor with 512 MB of Ram, applications load ultra-fast and make the Acer Stream one of the fastest smartphones on the market today.

Equipped with a Nemo media player, users can make use of the built-in 5-megapixel camera, enjoy listening to music, viewing photos and watching video playback.  The phone comes with 2 GB of built-in flash memory as well as with an additional 8 GB microSD memory card (in the box) and can be upgraded to hold an additional 32 GB of memory if needed.  This model is very easy to use and is definitely Acer’s best hands free phone to date.  Acer Stream deals can be found on the internet.

Add a Comment

Mobile Phone Reviews – Samsung Highlight T749

October 27th, 2010 | Mobile Phone Reviews, Samsung Mobile Phones

Let’s face it; the iPhone is the current king of the touch screen phone. That being said, there are still new mobile phones out there that offer a full touch screen interface experience that are worth taking a look at. One of them from the Samsung mobile phones range is the Samsung Highlight, currently on offer exclusively through T-Mobile.

The Highlight is a solid-looking and feeling phone that comes with more-than-decent features and specifications.  The touch screen offers a 240 x 400 pixel resolution on a 16 million colour, three-inch display. The unit is 1.37cm deep by 10.8cm high by 5.4cm width. There are two colours on offer: ice and fire. The ice combines black and turquoise while fire provides a more vibrant combination of orange and red.

The interface is Samsung’s TouchWiz OS – which means you’ll either love it or hate it. Interaction is fairly easy and the desktop works similar to Windows 7 or Mac, which means it can be customised it to suit.

Web browsing is via 3G, there is no Wi-Fi on this phone. What this means is that you have to be in a T-Mobile area to surf and you won’t be able to network your phone when at your office or home. A built-in accelerometer provides landscape functionality, and for fast emails, etc. a keyboard automatically appears when you rotate the screen. Overall, the Highlight T749 is a fairly good handset, but as far as new mobile phones go, it still doesn’t rival the iPhone.

Add a Comment

Motorola Backflip Overview

October 24th, 2010 | Mobile Phone Reviews, Motorola, Touchscreen

The Motorola Backflip is Motorola’s first Android mobile phone, first released in 2010. Android mobile phones are open source phones that allow users to create and share their own applications. The technology was developed by Android Inc. and Google.

The Motorola Backflip measures at 4.25 by 2.09 by 0.6 inches. It weighs 4.69 ounces. Its range of features includes 5.83 hours of battery life for talk time and 13 days of battery life for standby time. The main display screen has 320 x 480 pixels, is capacitive and measures at 3.10 inches.

The Motorola Backflip’s inbuilt camera has 5 megapixels resolution and has LED flash, auto focus, digital zoom, geo tagging and white balance. The inbuilt multimedia features are a video playback supporting MPEG4, H.263, H.264 and 3GP files and a music player supporting MP3, AAC, AAC+, eAAC+, WAV and AMR files. The inbuilt memory is 256 MB.

The Motorola Backflip has the Android 1.5 operating software, also known as Cupcake, has a full QWERTY keyboard, HTML internet browsing, Wi-Fi, 2.0 stereo Bluetooth, A-GPS and GPS.

The Motorola Backflip’s major point is the novelty of its keyboard, which is accessed by a literal back-flip of the touch-screen. The keyboard, though, can be hard to use as the keys tend to be on the small side. A common drawback of many touch-screen phones is that the battery can run down relatively quickly with intensive use. The Motorola Backflip has great applications for social media, including Facebook and Twitter.

Add a Comment

Nokia 5230 Overview

October 20th, 2010 | Mobile Phone Reviews, Nokia, Touchscreen

Nokia mobile phones continue to be the market leaders in the industry, and the Nokia 5230 shows why. It ticks all the right boxes – squarely in the cheap mobile phones bracket, you can pick it up for around £78 on a pay as you go deal or free on a £15-a-month contract. As contract mobile phones go, this is exceptionally reasonable and there are plenty of punters out there looking for precisely this kind of deal. But it’s not just the price tag which is appealing.

The touch screen is generously large at 3.2 inches, and the resolution is pretty darned good at 640×360 pixels. Not quite the same size as the iPhone – but you get more pixels on the 5230. Although the touch screen is resistive rather than capacitative, it’s creditably responsive and you get a stylus thrown in to make life easier. There are a few pluses and minuses to consider – whilst the phone does have 3G, it doesn’t have Wi-Fi and although it has an A-GPS receiver, the feeble 2 megapixel camera is, well, pants. But the positives on this entry-level phone outweigh the negatives: it comes with Bluetooth and USB connectivity, and you’ll get download speeds of around 3.6 Mbps with the high-speed HSDPA.

The 5230 doesn’t have stereo speakers, and Nokia have been careful not to brand it as an XpressMusic phone. But you will find an FM player, a 3.5 mm audio jack for ordinary headphones, and a passable music player. You can also expand the phone’s 70 MB memory to 16 GB with a micro-SD card, and the battery life is outstanding. Not quite A star, but definitely above B+.

Add a Comment

LG Viewty Review

October 17th, 2010 | LG, Mobile Phone Reviews

The LG Viewty serves as the 3G upgrade to the KE850 Prada. The key difference between the two devices is that the Viewty now supports HSDPA data, at rates as high as 3.6 Megabits per second.  This mobile device is a clear and direct upgrade from previous technology, and therefore offers improved functionality, but little new innovation.

While the Viewty manages to do many things correctly, unfortunately it’s difficult to say that it manages to stand out in any profound way. As a whole, the device manages solid performance all across the board, with unit size, display size, display resolution, battery life, and every other vital technical specification.  The Viewty manages to do most things quite well, providing a useful touch screen that is easy to use, and well responsive to even light touches.  That said, the most notable feature of the Viewty is its camera, with five Megapixel resolution, auto focus, bright flash, digital zoom, white balance, and other features.  Even so, most stand alone cameras support this and more, leaving the Viewty less than stellar in most areas.

For many people the LG Viewty may work just fine, however with no specialty in any one area, it’s hard to indicate the sort of people this mobile handset would be best for.  In addition, with no access to the Android Marketplaces and all the apps available there, there’s little reason to consider this device special in any way.  While it’s not a bad phone, it’s still very difficult to recommend to anyone based on these few grievances. Comparing mobile phone reviews online should be your next step in finding a suitable solution for your needs.

Add a Comment

World of Broadband

October 13th, 2010 | Broadband

Broadband deals and special offers abound in a broadband world of cutthroat competition where getting new customers to sign on the dotted line is the primary objective.  As a result, it is best to take a look through the introductory freebies and special discounts for new customers, and broadband comparison websites are very useful here.  They trawl through broadband deals like whales through plankton to find the best deals to suit your requirements.

Do not just select the cheapest package without first checking exactly what you will be receiving.  Internet users fall into distinct categories depending on their occasional, average or heavy usage.  There is no point in paying for innovative security and 24-hour engineer support if all you will be doing is checking a few emails each day.  Equally, a business will probably place a lot of value on security and support to ensure its continuing integrity and efficiency.

Introductory offers range from unlimited talk time to free modems, fixed-term discounts and other freebies, but it’s the general level of annual service you should be looking at, however tempting the promotions are.

Broadband UK has great advantages over dial-up, such as much faster download speeds and independence of PC and telephone lines.  Fixed-rate monthly packages are very cheap and certainly competitive with dial-up, which varies according to usage and where most of your time seems to be spent in getting online in the first place.

Try a few broadband comparison websites to narrow the choice down, and then obtain some final quotes before making your final selection.

Add a Comment

Sony Ericsson Xperia X1 Overview

October 9th, 2010 | Camera Phones, Mobile Phone Reviews, Sony Ericsson, Touchscreen

The Sony Ericsson Xperia X1 takes aim at the BlackBerry with both 3G and Wi-Fi connectivity as well as a full QWERTY keyboard.

Pros
The body of the Xperia X1 feels substantial and able to handle a fall or two.  The 3-inch touch-screen is large and vibrant.  The metallic accents give the handset a luxurious appearance.

The distinctive panel-based interface gives the X1 an impressive visual impact.  App shortcuts are accessed via the traditional grid layout or a rotating set up that can be activated with one touch of the X Panel key located right on the handset.  The panel system allows users to side-step the notoriously tiny Windows Mobile menu icons.

Cons
Initial set up takes a long time, a rather low-tech and sluggish experience if one were to compare mobile phones from other brands with similar features. 

The camera is positioned on the back of the handset, which is foolish because holding the phone in landscape position to compose an email means that the user’s fingers completely cover the camera lens.

Though the X1 has a QWERTY keyboard, the keys are entirely too small and flush with the handset face.  Fast or frequent typing is exceedingly difficult and frustrating.  The touch-screen is surprisingly unresponsive, and Windows Mobile requires the use of a stylus – never ideal for those who rely on their phones for business communication.

Conclusion
The solid build and stylish looks of the Xperia X1 are unfortunately not enough to overcome its underwhelming performance.  Business users would be better served seeking out other mobile phone deals.

Add a Comment

Nokia E55 Review

October 5th, 2010 | Mobile Phone Reviews, Nokia

The Nokia E55 is a super thin little smartphone (its frame coming in at just 9.9 millimetres thick) and has a rather controversial QUERTY keyboard design which we will come back to in a moment.

Queer QWERTY issues aside, this is a neat little machine that comes with all the smartphone whistles and bells you might expect, including Office Editing (emails, memos, presentations, spreadsheets etc), strong internet connectivity including Wi-FI, Bluetooth Stereo and assisted GPS.  The touch-screen is 2.4 inches in size with a resolution of 16M, and there is also the standard 3.2 megapixel camera which comes with LED flash and fixed focus.

The quirky QWERTY keyboard design – essentially split in two – is perhaps the biggest innovation on show here, and it is bound to cause a little bit of heated debate among supporters and detractors.  Certainly, in our opinion, it takes a little bit of getting used to when most people have been brought up on the standard QWERTY keyboard.

The 3.5 millimetre audio jack for headphones is an improvement on previous E-series phones, allowing you to use your personal phones rather than just the ones supplied, whereas previously the 2.5 millimetre jack left users little choice but to use the phone’s own headphones whether they really wanted to or not.

All in all, the Nokia E55 offers reasonable value for money, though some may be disappointed by the poor video recording facilities offered (maxing out at just 15fps) or put off by the peculiar split keyboard design.

Add a Comment

Samsung F480 Tocco Review

October 3rd, 2010 | Mobile Phone Reviews, Samsung Mobile Phones, Touchscreen

The word Tocco originates from the Italian for touch and Samsung certainly is on a winner with this phone.  It’s not a new baby, being two years old now, but it still is a serious contender for the mobile purchaser.  It’s very similar to the Samsung Nerva – so what is the best buy?

The F480 Tocco is available in black, silver or pink and is a smart, stylish phone.  The Nerva is an eye-catcher as well.  They are both touch screen, which looks cool but texting is slower on a touch screen compared to a traditional QWERTY keyboard.

The Tocco comes with the standard QVGA resolution screen, size 2.8 inches, as opposed to the long screen, 3.2 inches, used by the Nerva.  Both the Tocco and the Nerva are ultra slim but the Tocco is just a smidgen slimmer at 11.6 mm.

The two phones have similar cameras and are pretty fabulous, coming with five megapixels, digital zoom, smile detector, auto focus and LED flash.

The music system is good and plays the majority of standard formats and beats the Nerva in that an FM radio is included.  There’s also loads of memory, enough for thousands of your favourite tracks, 240 megabytes with the option of adding another eight GB.  The phone also supports Shazam, a facility that identifies the track that you’re currently playing.

The Tocco disappoints in that it drops calls and the voice quality can be poor.  So the Tocco has better features but the Nerva is more reliable.

Add a Comment

Motorola Deft Review

September 30th, 2010 | Google Android, Mobile Phone Reviews, Motorola, Touchscreen

A new Android smartphone designed to fit snugly into your pocket, the Motorola Defy is the latest in the line of new mobile phones from the Motorola mobile phones range.

The Motorola Defy is being heavily promoted as being resistant to dust, scratches, rust and water and Motorola Mobility Senior Vice President of Device Product Management Alain Mutricy says it is “designed to handle everything that life throws your way… a design that withstands the challenges of everyday life.”

Sounds good, doesn’t it?  More to the point, the Motorola Defy is also a pretty good little smartphone on its own terms as well, even without the “resistant to life” gimmickry.  The screen is a healthy 3.7 inches and the phone also has excellent features including a Connected Music Player, an Adobe Flash Lite enabled browser, and a camera with five megapixels, flash, digital zoom and auto focus.  The Defy is also able to share, stream and store content from game consoles, PCs and HDTVs in your home that are also enabled with the Digital Living Network Alliance (DLNA).

As with the Motorola Milestone 2, the Defy uses Motorola’s own user interface, known as MotoBlur, and while it is not as powerful as the Motorola Milestone 2 (for one thing, it can’t shoot video in 720p), providing this is reasonably and sensibly priced (don’t expect it to be one of the cheaper contract mobile phones around, however) this will likely be a very good phone for the mid-range market.

Add a Comment

« Previous Entries   Next Entries »