PDA Reviews

Hearsay has it that Nokia, the founding father and earth mother of the mobile world is almost on a knife-edge with the fate of this long-forgotten king of mobile depending highly on the triumph of their latest flagship handset, the Nokia Lumia 800. While we too can take a bit of melodrama like others, this kind of speculation looks a wee bit exaggerated. Sure, the Finnish manufacturer had their own ups and downs in the recent past, and of course there seems to be a little bit pressure on the Lumia 800’s 3.7-inch shoulders. Nevertheless, with Stephen Elop, Nokia’s CEO, all set to take the company’s reins in his hands, there are all chances of Lady Luck smiling on the company. Well, we can’t agree anymore especially with Elop’s motivational “Burning Platform” speech (with Symbian being the burning platform). Now that Nokia has decided to start all over with the Lumia 800, there is no looking back.  It obviously has to get past all the ifs and buts alright, but with all the faithful hardcore Nokia fans out there, the question remains as to how many would prefer jumping in the fire with MeeGo as against choosing the freezing waters (Windows Phone, we mean)? You might want to take a look at the CEO’s speech to understand this better!

The Lumia 800 Phone supposedly looks kind of rushed into the market, as the built and design happened in a gap of 6 months’ time. Looks like the Finnish manufacturer took the design cues from the orphaned N9, threw in a Windows Phone Mango together and out came a slab of 3.7-inch polycarbonate Windows wonder adorned by a clear black AMOLED display called the Lumia 800. So what remains a mystery is – did that delightful breeze from the Nokianvirta River manage to cast its magic spell? Does the Lumia 800 feel rushed? Is it just another Windows phone? Well, if these are the kind of questions that is lingering in your head right now, join the band and read on, we will tell you what we think!

Unboxing the Lumia 800

Right from boxing to the contents, it is pretty much a deja-vu feel if you are someone who has handled the N9. Content-wise, there is a rubber case that is pretty much the same colour as your phone. And on putting it on, it doesn’t really change the look of the handset; well it gets thicker though, and protects your handset better without compromising on the looks of your phone. But for that, no other surprises here. Beneath the usual set of manuals lies a compact charger that comes in an odd shape though, yet good-looking one, connecting the microUSB and aids in charging your handset. Again, the single-piece headset also looks of nice quality.

Overview Design and Feel

As per Elop’s on record claim, the handset is a “refinement” of the N9. Now, that is not a real smart statement as every single hardware disparity between the two phones leaves a worse impression on the Lumia 800. For starters, it is devoid of the jet-setting pentaband 3G, meaning no AWS support. Again, the LED notification and front-facing camera seems to have vanished with the screen getting a bit small, thanks to the intruding Windows Phone buttons. The 1GB RAM has been replaced by 512MB with the on-board storage maxing out at 16GB as against the 64GB we saw in the N9. NFC has also been puzzlingly ditched in the Lumia 800, meaning neither can you pair the handset with any Nokia accessories nor can you expect it to keep pace with any future innovations that Nokia claims to be working on for Apollo (the other name for Windows Phone 8).

On the flip side, there are a couple of nice features from the N9 that has managed to get through like the machined polycarbonate shell radiating pretty much the same premium feel. Measuring about 116.5 x 61.2 x 12.1mm and weighing around 142g, the Lumia 800 sure does cut quite a slim profile with a light, but reassuring weight. Thanks to the uniform shape of the handset, it doesn’t demand much real estate in close-fitting pockets. The physical appearance of this phone is a real a dream to watch and handle with the smooth curves sitting snug on the hands irrespective of the protective case. That said, if you are someone who handles the current trend of super slim phones, then you might actually find the Lumia 800 a wee bit on the chunkier side, thanks to its weight. Well, it might not be the slimmest of the lot, but it claims to be the most beautiful though. Again, with the body looking fairly sturdy, the phone can take a couple of knocks and yet show no traces of it. With the phone being crafted from a solid piece of polycarbonate, a kind of plastic that is coloured as against being painted, there is no peeling or scratching issues to worry about here. Speaking of which, the phone is available in Cyan, Black and Magenta.

So getting to the convex Gorilla Glass, it sure does flaunt of some incredible workmanship that you would have never witnessed in a mobile device together with a perfect fit making it impossible for even a speck of dust to make its way through the frame. With the light and proximity sensors neatly concealed behind the glass, the front face of the handset has been kept bare and left wholly undisturbed, shared by just the Nokia logo, earpiece and Windows Phone symbols.  Beneath the screen are the conventional touch-sensitive Windows Phone keys – Back / Menu / Search that light up with the screen getting on in white. All the three keys almost look to be a portion of the screen itself, thanks to the BLACK AMOLED. Again, the left side has been left blank with the Power / Lock buttons, volume rocker and Camera button all housed on the right side – all in metal and not plastic. The handset sure does carry a sturdy and premium feel despite the use of plastic and Nokia also claims that the plastic casing acts favorable with the handset’s reception. Getting back, towards the bottom is the speaker grill that is neatly grilled, that houses the mic too. There would not be any muffling issues with the loudspeaker with placing the phone on a table, but the grill greedily attracts dust. On the top is where you would find the 3.5-mm jack with a flap next to it for the microUSB that needs to be pushed on one side for it to open.  Note that the flap will have to be open for you to slide and pop the microSIM.

The tour of the phone gets complete upon getting to the rear of the handset where you are greeted by an 8Mp camera lens that has been placed pretty much low in comparison to the other handsets. The bright side of this being you will not have to worry about your hands covering the lens while clicking a snap and just comfortably snap away to your hearts content, cool huh? Speaking of lens, the lens of this handset comes with a Carl Zeiss certification which gets more apparent with a strip of metal proudly announcing the same.

It comes with a f/2.2 aperture, which as per Nokia allows an excess of 75% extra light. Now it is not just the lens that is special, the special tag is also shared by the sensor which boasts of 8.7 million pixels working in 2 modes giving you the choice of 4:3 8Mp or 16:9 7.1 Mp photos. In contrast to other 8Mp cameras that practically drops down to 6Mp while shooting 16:9, this sure looks to be an achievement in the widescreen mode. It shares typically the same camera as the N9, nevertheless there is a little bit of difference in the way it has been tuned.  The dual LED flash that you see below in the picture is supposedly 20% more bright than the other LED units from Nokia regardless of it being small. Again, you will not see the red glow during a video record like the N9 did.

While we appreciate Nokia’s hard efforts on working on the unibody design with top-mounting flaps covering the ports and slots, accessing the battery seems to be a disappointment. Again, we are extremely fascinated with a microSIM here that is becoming a fashion statement on today’s smartphones, but it is equally annoying to find the battery being inaccessible. It wasn’t an easy option when it comes to battery removal with the Nokia E7 or N8 either was it? The option of switching out the battery would have been appreciated (as with the Lumia 710) particularly with the charge lasting no more than one day.

Well, the annoyance doesn’t stop here though – the trendy microSIM has its downsides too as you cannot have your old Nokia handset for a backup as the SIM is of a different size. Now if you are thinking of SIM card adaptors, you might want to reconsider it because you will have to use them at your own risk, as they tend to cram in some phones. Adding to that agony, are couple of operators who charge for the microSIM while on a standard contract. Speaking of contracts, the Lumia 800 is actually fairly reasonable when it comes to pricing and would cost you a simple £26 on the Vodafone or Orange with Carphone Warehouse as against the £31 pm for the HTC Titan with Vodafone and £36 pm with Orange.

While we really admire the handset for its beauty, it does have some failings too, and a few of which gets you really frustrated.  Like the fragility of the plastic flap covering the microUSB port. You might want to handle the device carefully if you have decided on buying this handset. Well, luckily the flap is replaceable, but we foresee long queues for spares.  Again, we do not appreciate the missing LED notification. While the N9 displayed a faint always on clock together with an area for notifications on the screen, that seems to have vanished here. Aside from the fact that the phone needs to be switched on to have a glimpse of your notifications, there is yet another hitch – with the phone totally drained of power, it barely has enough energy to even notify you if it is charging on being plugged. You will have to live on pure guesswork at this point as to if and when your phone will be ready for use again.

Display

Mango meets AMOLED, well, this might not be the first handset to see this kind of pairing, but it sure is a powerful union; nonetheless, especially if you are a first-timer with AMOLEDs, then you are in for a nice treat. As mentioned above, while the Corning Gorilla glass safeguards the display against scratches, the polarizing filter beneath this tough cover minimizes reflections together with enhancing the quality of images. The screen is a 3-7-inch AMOLED of WVGA resolution boasting of 480 x 800 pixels.

The display is perhaps one strong selling point of the Lumia 800 with the blacks being deepest and truest of blacks. Though Nokia might have their own name for this kind of effect – ClearBlack – in reality it is pretty much the same technology as witnessed in Samsung’s SuperAMOLED and is awesome.  While LCD panels can get gloomily grey, especially with tweaking the brightness, it messes the contrast because of the simple reason that the grey in the background gets increasingly lighter. But that is not the case with AMOLEDs, where the blacks remain obdurately perfect regardless of how much the brightness is pushed bringing about a level of contrast that can literally makes eyes throb if the settings, are messed with indoors.

The AMOLED display of the Lumia 800 performs amazingly well outdoors with the brightness penetrating through the reflections and smudges of the Gorilla glass, even as it manages to deliver a fairly dominant color saturation. The live and bold tiles of the Windows look almost custom-built to suit the Lumia 800′s display and we would obviously choose it over an LCD display in broad daylight. But then, on getting indoors, it is a totally different story. For the kind of savvy player that Nokia is when it comes to Smartphones, they have opted for the slightly cheap PenTile matrix with each pixel boasting of 2 subpixels instead of 3. It smartly manages to get unnoticed by most users thanks to the high 251 ppi pixel density.  While a couple of users have issues with this technology (for the simple reason that it reduces the subpixel count thus impacting the colour rendition owing to the excessive green subpixels), the green tinge isn’t really that terrible in the Lumia 800. Well, the strange pixelation could prove to be distracting and seem like a gaudy grid or mesh sitting atop an otherwise hi-res display.

Getting to the touchscreen of the Lumia 800, it is pretty responsive with a convex glass covering it while the display is flat. As we are all aware that using a Windows phones involve more of sideway swipes, it is easy for your finger to glide side-to-side. Moving on to the brightness of the screen, as always with infinite contrast, reflection is practically some high number and the low reflectivity of this handset is so much more imposing.  Unfortunately, in terms of brightness, the Lumia 800 fails to be as impressive as the N9 that was supposedly the brightest beating even the SuperAMOLEDs hands down. At its brightest setting, it is barely at a 50% of the N9’s brightness.

Long story short – it is fairly comfy to wrap your hands around the curved sides of the Lumia 800. The polycarbonate shell sure does feel nice to touch, but beware it is a magnet for fingerprints. Well if it makes you feel any better, the phone feels solid, but not too heavy, the controls can be reached effortlessly and though it might not boast of being the slimmest phone ever, the beveled edges smartly makes its way through most pockets. Hmm, so if this part of the review gives you a déjà vu feel, then wait until we explore the other segments of the handset. Read on to know if there will be any twist in the tale …oops twist in the specs we mean!

Processor / OS / Memory and Speed

The processor ticking beneath the Nokia Lumia 800 is a Qualcomm 1.4GHz MSM8255 Snapdragon that ropes in an Adreno 205 GPU. It also boasts of 512MB of RAM and 512MB of ROM for you to explore with. It offers a memory of 16GB that comes in handy with storing photos, music, apps and videos. Though the above specs might seem a bit subdued in comparison to a Samsung Galaxy S2 or a iPhone 4S, it still is one of the fluid and fastest handset that one can lay their eyes on.  This could perhaps be due to the moderate demands placed by the Microsoft OS on the hardware. Again, Windows handsets make use of hardware acceleration when it comes to zooming and scrolling and to obtain the required effects from 3D menus. Exactly the reason for the phone’s boisterous attitude and energetic pace with rapid opening and jumping between apps along with instant rendering of web pages.

Getting on to the interface, it runs on WP 7.5 and is due for an update to Windows Phone Tango, sometime later this year.  This is both the plus and minus point of the handset as it looks completely different when compared to Android, iPhone or Symbian for that matter as the the application grid concept is something unique.  The WP7.5 uses Live Tiles in a 2 x 4 grid fitting (as against the conventional Home Screen or Start Screen) that scroll vertically to display as many tiles as you wish to see or add. Pushing the unlock button exposes the Lock Screen displaying the current date and time together with displaying calendar events, missed calls and emails, seems more like the Homescreen widgets. Swipe the lock screen up to unlock the phone and it goes on to divulge the live-tile Metro UI, a fairly fluid grid of tiles arranged vertically displaying one or two tiles arranged in brick styling. You are allowed to reorganize these in the order of your choice or place just about anything in the grid by simply holding your fingers over it and choosing the Pin to start. It is a pretty neat and straightforward interface with the Live tiles acting fairly rapid and offering more info. For instance, the Picture and Group tile, while the former displays an animated slideshow of your images, the latter that is an exclusive Mango feature that lists out your buddies’ updates. The virtual Search button in the app list helps with finding apps particularly for those of you with many apps. Getting to the multitasking feature of the Mango, it is not really the OS that does the multitasking, just that it is done in the iOS way. Though the apps missing in the foreground get suspended, the OS takes care of them in its own way by carrying out tasks for them. Again, if you are looking at switching between apps, it requires long pressing the Back key. Apps that take the form of thumbnail snapshots are arranged from left to right in a chronological order with the app switcher itself looking more similar to WesOS or Symbian. Now for those of you who are used to horizontal scrolling of apps, that is possible too and all it takes is a tap to get it back the same way as you left it. Generally, abut 5 to 6 apps that you used last would be here and there is no way to kill it, because it is more like a history of the apps that you used recently. Eventually with opening more and more apps the old ones get dropped out of the list. But then, once an app is gone it has to be launched again the conventional way that has the downside of starting it all over again. Lastly, apps with active background tasks like the online streaming radio goes on working. There is also the list of apps that have been installed that supports multitasking. Lastly, if you are looking at saving some battery life, you might want to disable multitasking.

The Settings Menu is further divided into two – Apps and System. While the former allows for configuration of individual settings for every app that you install on the phone like the Maps, People hub and more, the latter covers almost any setting that you can think of like Wi-Fi, Sound and Colour theme, Accounts, Bluetooth etc.

Last but not least, you can control this Windows phone via voice only feature too, like say dictate something and have the handset read out the reply or instigate searches, so on and so forth. Well other OSes are trying it too, but voice commands look to be a strongly touted one and a strong point of the iOS that the WP happily brag about.

Camera / Video / Media

One big disappointment in the Lumia 800 is that it lacks a front facing camera which comes as a big surprise as most of the Nokia handsets boast of one with the N9 too having one onboard towards the bottom corner. This absence gets further aggravated by the recent acquisition made by Microsoft of Skype that provides a great link with video calling.  But looks like Nokia isn’t really much bothered about the absence of this feature and the best explanation that they could think of was majority of the production turnaround time of WP7 devices was spent on focusing mainly on their proposed user-base with the audience using video chat being very scant. With expanding range, they promise that these kind of features will soon return on their future products.  And true to their promise, guess they have decided to incorporate a front-facing camera on their upcoming Lumia 900 that is supposedly boasting of a 1.3 CMOS camera which both the Lumia 800 and 710 lacks.

The 8Mp snapper on the rear of the handset sports almost the similar specs of the HTC Titan with a f/2.2 lens and dual LED flash that allows for HD video recording up to 720p. It definitely seems more advanced that its older Symbian brothers with touch-based focusing methods and capture features similar to that of an iPhone which gives better control on subjects focused. There are the standard settings for controlling scenes, then there is Exposure Value, White Balance, Focus, ISO, Contrast, Effects, Resolution together with a new mode called the Metering Mode that helps the snapper to control exposure depend on the lighting conditions across images.
One nice feature that is pretty impressive and proves it to be a next gen Smartphone would be the way it allows for transition directly between the shots and videos captured and the camera with just a single tap of the soft arrow icon or a swipe towards the hard button bar. And if you want to get back to the camera, all it requires is to swipe away from the same hard button bar again. While in the image viewer, the options galore by way of sharing in Facebook, add to favourites, use as wallpaper, autofix or delete. Well, the autofix looks to be a nice feature to toy with, the only hitch being it fails to remove the red-eye, for which you might require a third-party app. Again, if you choose the share on Facebook option, it is nice to see the auto face recoginition feature kick in upon clicking the tag icon seen on the upload screen – comes in fairly handy with tagging or naming of images prior to uploading.

Video recording needs to improvisation

The video interface is pretty much similar to that of the still cam with abundant features here too like using scenes, calibration of sharpness, contrast or saturation, editing exposure compensation or the white balance together with allowing to add image effects. Again, the LED toggles up as lighting for videos too. Then again, while Windows is still looking at breaking the 1080p barrier, looks like the Lumia 800 isn’t really the right handset to help this cause. It is pretty much limited to 720p only, but then we are only interested in quality and not quantity here!

With the continuous auto-focus being available here, the Lumia 800 Smartphone is only too very engrossed in hunting to focus. But this kind of proves to be annoying with constant action on scene and the handset starting to refocus every other second. Unfortunately, the focus cannot be locked and the camera always looks at focusing from the beginning of the video despite forcing it to focus prior to commencing the recording.  Again, akin to any Smartphone or even the N9 for example, the frame rates vary with shooting videos. Generally, it is anywhere between 25 to 30 fps in dark and well-lit scenes respectively and based on the frame rate it opts for, the videos come out either smooth or kind of choppy.  The handset looks to be more appropriate to shoot scenes that aren’t too fast paced, but sadly this doesn’t really justify the price tag that it comes with. Then again, there is nothing much to complain of the quality of videos here with a good amount of detail expected from a 720p shooter. The images are devoid of artifacts or noise and are fairly crisp. Again, videos are shot at a bit rate of 15Mbps that is way better than the N9 and many other 1080p shooters, with the only hitch being stereo sound happens at a low bitrate of around 50Kbps.  If only Nokia manages to resolve the auto-focus issue and augment the audio bit rate a wee bit, there would be absolutely nothing to complain of about the video recording.

Music

In terms of music playback it is pretty much the usual standard via headphones, but the same on speakers seems dishearteningly tinny in comparison to its older siblings. If you are looking at choosing stuff to listen to, the handset serves you Nokia Music together with Video and Music default group. Check out this nice touch, courtesy the music playback, an overlay bar gets created sliding down over the apps, upon pressing the volume keys and provides the Play / Pause / Rewind and Forward functions upon being tapped regardless of your location on the phone.

The number of tracks saved on your phone gets displayed by the Nokia Music with a quick tap opening the list from A-Z sorting it by Alum / Artist / Song / Playlist or Genre. Again, if you are looking at accessing the Mix Radio you need to swipe left from the main screen of Nokia Music. Fortunately, with the playlists being refreshed on a weekly basis, there is a wide range of genres to choose from which can either be listened over air or downloaded on to your handset to be listened offline. Yet another swipe brings up the MP3 store that helps you with purchasing tracks with a final swipe transitioning to a list of local gigs, which could prove to be interesting, provided you have a fetish for seeing artists Live.

Moving on to Videos and Music there is a standard WP app grouping that consolidates Podcasts, Vidoes, Music, Radio and treats. While tapping on Podcasts brings up a swipeable screen that lists all audio or video podcasts, tapping on music pops up a similar interface together with the Zune Smart DJ feature that searches for similar artists creating a playlist of similar tracks. Again tapping on Radio brings about the conventional and simple FM radio supporting station favourites and tapping on Marketplace gives access for purchasing of tracks from the Microsoft store.  Well, the one thing that is missing here would be audiobooks. as it isn’t supported.

Connectivity

When it comes to connectivity, the Lumia supports quad-band GPRS/GSM/EDGE together with quad-band 3G with HSPA 5.76Mbps for the uplink and 14.4Mbps for the downlink. There is a USB to micro-USB cable to aid with charging together with a physical connection that helps with data transfer and synchronisation. In terms of hard connectivity, it supports Wi-Fi 802.11b/g/n and Bluetooth v2.1 +EDR with the conventional methods of WPA, WPA2 and WEP that are available. Then again, Bluetooth has its own limitations, for starters it doesn’t support file transfer. Initially upon connecting the handset with a PC the conventional automatic driver setup happens that is followed by a request to have the Microsoft Zune software installed that is obviously Microsoft’s reaction to iTunes that gives you access and enables sync of video and music between the handset and the PC. Syncing with a PC happens via the Zune computer app and is your only option for transferring files between your WP and PC, as it lacks a mass storage mode. Again you can sync files using Zune both via Wi-Fi or a USB cable with a Mac version of the same available too (WP 7 connector). With no additional SD storage available on WP, the Lumia doesn’t offer one too. Yet another option for syncing would be Cloud.  This is a free offering from Microsoft (SkyDrive) which offers you a Cloud storage of 25GB. In fact, you are also allowed to upload your photos soon after you shoot them. Again, there is Wi-Fi hotspot functionality too, all it takes is an active SIM with data connection, and you are good to go.

Bing / Web browser / Marketplace

Bing on WP 7.5
Searching while on Bing, one significant offer that you might stumble upon would be an app from Marketplace; for instance if you are looking for travel, then you will be offered a travel tool app and this feature is known as the App connect. There are also two new search modes on offer here – Barcode Scanner and Song Recognition. Though these features are pretty famous with apps, these are inherent in Windows Phone and are a part of the OS offerings. The Camera Scanner is also capable of snapping an image of text, translating it to other language or performing OCR. Additionally Bing is also capable of a regular web search/images along with hunting for nearby places.

Web browser that manages without Flash

With the WP being updated to the all the new 7.5 version, it definitely has improved the UI. Even as the URL bar is visible always, the status gets auto-hidden sitting at the top of the screen (saving some real estate) with the refresh button sitting next to the bar. As always, the extended settings can be popped out, if you are looking at advanced options. Again, the URL bar also toggles up as the Search bar, a nice handy shortcut for looking up stuff, especially if you are unsure of the site that you are on the look out for. The Browser interface has been kept simple and straightforward with just the URL bar towards the bottom and a reload icon on its left. Swipe the bar up to uncover the shortcuts for favourites, tabs, add to favourites, recent, page share, settings and pin to start. In the settings menu lie the standard options like delete history, location, allow cookies together with a very smart option that allows you to opt for global preference for phone/desktop site version. The controls in the webpages of the browser is pretty much similar to their equivalents on the native apps, making a web app look exactly similar to its native app, thus saving some time and effort for the designers.

Again, the six tab ceiling is missing here and so is the text reflow. Then again, there is a visible change in the performance with the new browser depending on the acceleration from hardware graphics that brings about smoother video, animation and graphics along with JavaScript engine tweaked as well.  Microsoft is so very assertive that they have gone ahead and set up a page specifically to test the performance of the handset, both graphics and Javascript. Go ahead and pit your handset even against a desktop browser, but beware that the tests are fairly challenging and would require you have the most recent version on your PC, else don’t be surprised to see your system break a sweat.

Marketplace trying to keep pace

Here we see the WP Marketplace trying to keep pace with the Android market and the iStore.  With around 38,000 apps currently being available, it is neatly stacked up into 3 sections namely Games, Apps and Music. There is yet another section named Updates that pops up with any of your installed app receiving an update and all that needs to be done is to press an “Update All” button that saves you the hassle of updating apps individually. Now every app has been listed with a short description, user review, rating and a couple of screenshots. The Marketplace cautions you immediately if it senses an app trying to breach your privacy by way of sharing some personal info. Though it is not as far-reaching as the Android Market, it sure does cautions you about all vital stuff. Now Jumbo downloads, anything beyond 40MB, requires a Wi-Fi for it to work or the same can be done via the Zune software.

The Application fragment starts of with a featured app, moving on to categories that includes free and paid, that is followed suit by top apps, then comes the listing of new ones and finally a lengthier list of featured apps. Essentially, the Music section is the Zune Marketplace which is pretty much similar to the Application fragment featuring artist of the week, then a couple of more artists, followed by New releases, Top tracks and Genres. Again, Genres are divided into sections themselves – latest release and top Albums, Artists, Playlists and Songs. There is a 30-second preview for each track, akin to iTunes and if you posses a Zune pass, you are allowed to stream an entire track similar to what you do on a Zune Player.

Accessing the Marketplace can be done via your WP handset or the windows phone.com website or the Zune software on your PC. The Search option is pretty much on offer for the Marketplace, but then it pulls out results from almost all sections, apps and games alike.  Finally, looks like Microsoft have managed to fix this issue for songs that also used to frustratingly get mixed up with the search.

There is a preloaded app in the Lumia 800 that is called the App Highlights that provides you with an assortment of apps of various kinds of which the first category is named the Starter kit, that consists of key apps, all your NetFlix, YouTube etc go here, then comes the  Addictive, which has the gaming stuff, and there is something for the fitness fanatics and foodies too.  With the app being accelerometer-enabled the apps get reshuffled with shaking the phone, a cool way to dig out new apps huh?? Additionally, the tiling of apps also changes every now and then just to grab your attention and for advertising couple of apps recommended by it.

Well the Games Section is categorized into New, Xbox Live, Featured and Genres. One neat thing about Games in the WP is the trial option that is available for majority of both apps and games that gives you the option to trial prior to purchasing a game. The Featured and New sections come in handy with Hot reference and What is new.

Gaming on the Lumia 800

Xbox Live proves to be the heart of the Lumia’s Games hub carrying a lot of features from the Xbox right from your avtars to your accomplishments to your scores. There the Spotlight feature on offer here too displaying info on new stuff together with showing Requests like invites from your buddies. With the games being arranged in the Collection section, the installed games takes the form of a square grid with a shortcut for Get more that in turn launches Marketplace. Again, not all games are supported by Xbox LIVE and it is easy to spot the ones that do which are in the corresponding section of Marketplace. As for the ones that support like Angry birds, and Need for speed, for instance, runs without any issues and the Lumia’s Adreno 205 GPU and 1.4GHz processor is only too very happy to handle such complex graphics.

Maps and Apps

Guiding you the Bing Way

WP 7.5 has Bing Maps as their basic mapping solution with the driving/pedestrian navigation that come for free. Unfortunately, they don’t really fit Nokia’s custom-made apps (we’ll get to that shortly). Well, this is how it works. You cannot really call it a voice-guided navigation – first you will have to set up a route and take your first instruction and by the time its time for the next instruction, the phone beeps and glows. But you will have to tap it for it to read it out to you. There are big white letter fonts on a black background used for the map app, which sure does make reading easy. You’ll anyways have to take you eyes off the road and doesn’t really beat the other SatNav’s out there. There is real-time traffic onboard too.

That is not all, the Bing Maps also manages to hunt nearby POIs with a feature called Local Scout that even manages to show you the indoor maps of malls. It has a tabbed interface that sorts out various locations like what to eat, where to go, what to see, shopping places, and few other highlights. There is a handy “I care about” list that guides you to the relevant options quickly and easily. Again, check out this yet another cool feature of Local Scout, it allows you to pin places on your Homescreen. For instance, you’d like to check out on a mall every now and then, get reviews, check what is new or what is on sale, well it is right there on the Homescreen, ready with all info.

Nokia Maps / Drive

The GPS lock on the Lumia happens in less than a minute and this can further be accelerated with having a data connection for the A-GPS. But then if you are looking at only a rough position, then the Cell ID positioning and Wi-Fi is onboard too. Looks like Nokia Maps doesn’t really come preinstalled in the Lumia and you are only guided by way of Map screenshots and links to the Marketplace to obtain the same. Looks to be a fairly simple installation and it is just matter of time before you start using it.

The Nokia Maps in an alternative to the Bing Maps and allows for maps to be viewed in 3 modes namely Satellite, Map and Public transport. There is pinch zoom for navigation purposes together with old-school zoom. There is also panning that is fairly rapid and smooth. Unfortunately, there is only 2D mode in Nokia Maps unlike 3D mode that the Google maps boast of. Again as maps are pulled from the internet, you will need an internet connection to use the same.

Moving on to the Nokia Drive, here you can use downloaded maps and don’t really require a live internet connection and Nokia Drive allows for easy download of maps of any country around the world for offline usage, free of course. You can also split maps of bigger countries so as to save on your internal memory and not clutter it maps that you would never use. Then again, maps are really not that big, while the whole of UK map is 274MB, US maps occupt 1.9GB and the 16GB memory onboard is more than enough to take care of any lengthy trip that you plan on doing. Especially with the options to delete surplus maps and download fresh ones on the go via Wi-Fi, storage never looks to be the issue.

Well, there is one annoyance with Drive though, it doesn’t allow you to plan routes while in the offline mode. You are only allowed to browse maps and not plan routes. Well, looks like Nokia is coming up with a fix for this sooner or later. On the flip side, it supports 3D view unlike maps along with providing support for 3D landmark for a couple of big cities. There is anyways the 2D mode too, but in 3D there is always the option to see further down, ain’t it? Other than the 2D/3D stuff other settings look to be pretty scant. It allows for toggling between night and day colour schemes, opt for landmarks to be displayed or not and opt for a voice for navigation (there are many voices available in different languages for a free download)

While we would have appreciated little more options by way of calculating the shortest and fastest route of avoiding busy roads, well no such thing happens here. Once the destination is set, you are provided an option to review the planned route prior to leaving, hit start and you are good to go. During navigation, you are allowed to zoom in or out based on your decision to view more details or more of the road. While the top of screen warns you of the forthcoming big turn in chunky and easy to read blue letters in a white backdrop with a huge icon notifying of the turn, the screen’s bottom flashes readings on your current speed and how much more before you reach your destination. Again, these are pushed onto the left side while in the portrait mode.

While some might be fans of the Nokia Drive’s distraction-free navigation approach, others might appreciate having a little more control over the route chosen. We definitely liked to see a couple of other options too like the Symbian version that sure did look to be feature-rich. On the flip side, the Lumia 800 offers something that no other WP device does and the free voice-guided navigation might be convincing enough for a few others to opt for the Lumia 800 in comparison to the other WP devices, well in that price range at least.

Battery life

There is a 1450mAh non-removable battery ticking inside the Lumia 800 is claimed to hold on for 335 hours in 3G and 265 hours in 2G in standby with the talk times being 9 hours and 30 minutes and 13 hours respectively. Again, it should last for seven hours of video and 55 hours of music playback before it breathes its last. It is very unfortunate to note that the Lumia 800 doesn’t share the reputation of strong battery life like its older siblings. At the max you might be lucky to stretch to a day before it requires a recharge, which is actually neither worse nor better in comparison to other Smartphones.

Now charging of the handset is done via the microUSB connector with the charge happening via either a PC USB or the mains adaptor. A nice touch here by Nokia worth mentioning would be the offset hinge rocker that makes opening of the cover a lot more easy than its older siblings. Thankfully no more poking your nails under tiny ridges, instead just press on the raised mound lying next to the headphone and watch the other end pop out easily.  There is also a option in the handset that aids in managing your battery better – the Batter Saver – which can be turned on automatically with the battery level dipping down the preset levels, that automatically switches off a couple of services like the apps in the backdrop or the automatic email retrieval.

Performance

Now it is a global fact that no one need to teach Nokia to design phones, so call quality and reception both looks to be fairly decent. Even though at times callers on the other end seem to sound slightly less audible, listeners on the other end nevertheless seem to have no issues listening to users hearing them crisp and clear. So though things doesn’t look perfect, there is nothing drastic either to report of.  The handset is devoid of HSPA+, but on the contrary it is rapid in establishing a HSDPA or 3G connection wherever available. Unfortunately, internet tethering doesn’t happen on the Lumia 800, be it cable or Wi-Fi.

The loudspeaker looks to perform really well delivering clear and audible sound when it comes to both media and calls. We are also impressed at the location of the loudspeaker at the bottom of the handset, such that even with the phone lying down there is nothing to disturb the clarity of the conversation or music for that matter as there is practically nothing masking the speaker.

Mango sure does seem to be a proficient OS and handsets like the HTC Radar are living examples of it with their stunning performance with a sheer 1GHz processor. So, it doesn’t really come as a big surprise to see the Lumia’s Snapdragon 1.4Ghz processor blaze through tasks. The phone refuses to stutter or slowdown at any point in time regardless of overdosing on apps or continuously using the phone for extensive periods.

We liked

• Robust and classy design
• OS is novel and fun to use
• Smart interface
• Blazing browser
• Astute Contact linking
• Xbox Live steals the show

We Disliked

• Lacks front-facing camera
• 8Mp snapper average
• Marketplace needs improvisation
• Prevailing battery issues
• Camcorder fails to impress
• Browser lacks Flash

To conclude

The Nokia Lumia 800 is a chic and sturdy handset and is nice blend of hardware and WP OS. Check out the following things prior to deciding if it is the phone for you.

• First and foremost are you the kind of person that enjoys a Windows phone. Now if you are someone that fancies, Hi-res screens, perfect snapper, huge storage space, dual-core processors, so and so forth then you are better off looking at other Android options. On the contrary if you are contented with a carefully hewn simple and straightforward device, then look no further.
• Then again, you might want to understand the plus and minuses of the phone fairly well before favouring this rather pricey handset. For starters, it might take sometime before you get used to the unwieldy Start Screen and you will start getting comfortable with it as soon as it dawns on you that it is all about being minimalist and intuitive. On the flip side, the polycarbonate curvy shell and the smooth beveled edges of the Gorilla glass is a sure treat for sore and envious eyes.
• The display is awesome too, but for the rare low level brightness levels, still it is your best bet among other Window Phones out there.  Again with chunky Start screen icons there is just no way you will end up with wrong icon selection. Also the dial pad screen is modest in having just the stuff it needs to initiate a call.
• Let us not forget the alphabetical listing of the apps, yet another simple and humble way to hunt apps.

Now the very fact that you are reading this review, goes on to mean that you have set your heart on a Windows Phone ignoring the Androids and iPhones out there. The Lumia 800 is a perfect entry phone to get yourselves acquainted with a WP handset. Well, it sure won’t dethrone the other Smartphone giants, but will it rescue the Finnish manufacturer from the burning platform? Time will only tell……..

Nokia Lumia 800 Smartphone – Technical Specification Table

Manufacturer	Nokia
Model Name	Lumia 800
Dimensions (H x W x D)	116.5 x 61.2 x 12.1 mm
Weight	142 g
Colours available	Black, Cyan Blue, Magenta and White
Keys and Input Methods	Dedicated Hardware Keys – Power, Camera and Volume keys
Display size	3.7 inches
Display technology	Corning Gorilla Glass ClearBlack AMOLED Curved glass Pixel Density: 252 ppi
Display resolution	480 x 800 pixels
Display Features	Touchscreen: Capacitive/Multi-touch Light Sensor Proximity Sensor Scratch-resistant glass
Operating System	Windows Phone – Mango
Hardware	System Chip: Qualcomm MSM8255 Processor: Single core, 1400MHz, Scorpion Graphics Processor System Memory: 512MB RAM Built Storage: 16GB
Browsing and Internet	XHTML DOM Level 3 CSS3 DOM Level 1 and 2 Internet Explorer 9 Mobile SVG Hardware Graphic Acceleration
Camera	8Mp shooter
Camera features	Flash: Dual LED Aperture size: f/2.2 Carl Zeiss optics Features: Exposure control, autofocus, touch to foucs, Geotagging, White balance Digital Zoom, Fast one click photo sharing
Camcorder	1280 x 720 (720p HD / 30fps)
Music and Audio	Supported codecs: MPEG-4 AAC. eAAC, eAAC+ WMA 9, WMA voice 9, WMA Loseless 9 DRM Playready WMA Professional 9 and 10
Supported Audio formats	AAC, AAC+, MP3, MP4, WAV, WMA
Multimedia	FM Stereo
Messaging	SMS(threaded view), MMS, predictive text input
Browser	HTML
Connectivity	Bluetooth v2.1 Wi-Fi: 802.11 b/g/n USB: v2.0 Connector: microUSB Features: USB charging, computer sync, OTA sync
GPS and Navigation	A-GPS, GPS, Wi-Fi positioning, Cell ID
Navigation Features	3D Accelerometer Nokia Maps and Drive
Special Features	Nokia Music Compass/Magnetometer sensor MicroSIM 3D accelerometer Nokia Maps Flight Mode Nokia Drive 2 microphones Application Highlights Bing maps Nokia contacts transfer
Battery	Standard battery, Li-Ion 1450 mAh
Battery life	Stand by: Up to 265 h (2G) / Up to 335 h (3G) Talktime: Up to 13 h (2G) / Up to 9 h 30 min (3G)
Warranty	One year for parts and labour

One of the most popular brands of PDAs in world, BlackBerry is the fifth largest mobile phone industry in the world. With a share of almost 15 percent of mobile phones and PDAs in the world, the BlackBerry is a great sensation in the mobile communication world. Though all of its models are sensational and have had a great reputation, the Curve series of phone, in particular, have gained a lot of public attraction of late. The way these phones look, or operate has amused many a user and hence they have attained quite a lot of success in the recent past. We are now going to talk about one such PDA from this stalwart producer of mobile phones, who has of late gained a name for its QWERTY keypad phones. The BlackBerry Curve 8520 Smartphone is a beauty is its own manner. It has got everything in it to be a perfect partner for any business professional on any given day. It is now a revamped version of any Smartphone on earth since it has come out with some new features and provisions which are going to add quite a few feathers to its cap. Let us dive into more details as we unfold the Curve 8520 and its components.

Design:

Embrace the curves:
The name says it all. The Curve 8520 is such an attraction when it comes to design. It has got some nice curves and is a pleasure to the eye. Though almost all the mobile phones and PDAs from BlackBerry are quite curvy in their own manner, displaying the trademark designs of BlackBerry, the Curve series phone are curvier than any of their previous counterparts. The edges of the Curve 8520, for example, are very smooth and the device is perfectly engineered to give it a very enticing look. Now, let us have a look at the dimensions of the device.

The Curve 8520 measures about 4.29 inches high, 2.36 inches wide and 0.55 inches deep. In other words, the device is about 14 mm deep, which means that it is pretty slim, slimmer than you will normally see anywhere in the PDA market. This obviously makes the device very light and it consequently measures about 105 grams (3.70 ounces). These factors indeed give the Curve 8520 a pretty rich look and its shiny exterior appearance also does a world of good to its design. The Curve 8520 is available in as many as five colours, so there is some sort of diversity out there. And since all the colours are metallic in nature, you do not see them fading away as days pass by and the mobile stays looking fresh every single day. Though black is the business’ favourite colour, you can still try out the rich variety of colours that are available. Hence, regarding the design part of the device, the Blackberry Curve 8520 Smartphone deserves full marks.

Display:

BlackBerry phones are always associated with a high resolution display and the Curve 8520 PDA Smartphone is not an exception at all. Given the small screen it sports, the Curve 8520 comes with a 320 x 240 pixel resolution and also has colour display, if this surprises you by any means. But the more interesting features are that the screen is light sensitive and hence the brightness of the screen and the keypad changes with the available daylight. When you are between four walls, the brightness automatically increases and when you go outdoors, the light automatically dims, saving you a lot of battery. At nights, the brightness increases by a considerable amount. It is also one commendable feature since otherwise you will have to manually change the brightness of the screen each and every time there is a change in the brightness outside. This feature sets the brightness all by itself. Another nice feature in here is that there is an option for you to select the screen font size. Many a time, people with different disorders related to eyesight, find it quite difficult to cope up with the font sizes on their main screens. Hence, it would be tough to encounter the device and utilize its features completely. Hence, this feature is introduced by BlackBerry, with a view to increase comfort of the users.

Features:

Here comes the most important aspect of all when it comes any electronic device, let alone a PDA. Of late, we have been seeing lots of new stuff and unique features from all manufacturers. Maybe this is a sign of competitiveness among them, but at the end of the day, it is the user who is receiving all the benefits. In order to sustain the competition and live up to the expectations of a common man, these companies have to provide more and more of new and interesting features, an more importantly, for a reasonable rate. While we will be dealing with the pricing of the device a little later, we shall now see if this trend regarding features is being followed by the BlackBerry Curve 8520 Smartphone.

Processor:

Since the processor might prove to be a vital feature on any device, you should examine it twice before moving on. Now, as expected, BlackBerry has come up with its own processor again, but this time around, with a much better one. The Curve 8520 Smartphone sports a 512 MHz processor, manufactured by BlackBerry itself. And no, this is not the fastest thing going around and there are certainly processors with greater capabilities, better durability and better functioning. But having said that the device is only pertained to business people and it does not sport all the features in the world, this processor can be considered to work well. And by this we do not mean you will be having a great speed or response time, it is just the fact that your device does not get stuck or overloaded with too many applications. Since it is BlackBerry who has come up with this processor, things must have already been tested under all conditions. Hence there is not much to worry about the processor.

Operating System:

The Curve 8520 Smartphone is so smart since it comes with a BlackBerry operating system. Though any man on the street knows this is not the best operating system in the business, it still is the best suitable one for this device and for that matter, any device manufactured by BlackBerry. Since they are the manufacturers, they are the ones who will know of their features better than anyone else. Hence, BlackBerry has decided to feature an operating system of their own instead of borrowing from the likes of Microsoft Windows or Android. Yes, even we understand that an Android would look much cooler and would serve much better. But, we have got used to the BlackBerry OS on BlackBerry phones and PDA devices and things are starting to be more comfortable now. You too, as a user, will find this OS a more user friendly one and easy to understand. There are not many difficult operations on this OS. Everything is simple and straightforward. So, this could the perfect device if you wish to gift it to someone elder. They will not be having any sort of issues while using it.

Memory:

These days, memory has become a vital part of any electronic gadget and particularly any PDA. Now since you are going to buy a personal digital assistant, it means that you will need to store lots of information and files. You will obviously need lots of space on your device because, after all when you are purchasing a device, you would want to serve multiple purposes. And when there are features like camera, video recorder, music player, Bluetooth, etc., it means that you will have quite a large number of files to store. This is the reason the BlackBerry phones always come with very good memory. When it comes to the Curve 8520 Smartphone, the device comes with an onboard memory of either 256MB or 1GB. And in most cases, this should be enough for you. This is because you can practically store unlimited phone contacts, photo contacts, with unlimited fields. But if is not enough and you think you need more space on your device, then you always have the option to upgrade or increase the memory of your card, up to 32 GB. And it is worth noting the fact that the device supports only SD cards and SD memory cards are available in stores and you need to purchase separately.

QWERTY Keypad:

Yes, this is one of the most obvious and also interesting aspects of the device. Lots of new devices are coming up with this feature given the fact that people and especially the youth are into social networking these days. Chatting has become a viral phenomenon and wherever people go, they still want to maintain contact with their dear ones. And the best and fastest way to access the internet, chat with friends, type documents, and do a lot of similar stuff, is by using a QWERTY keypad. We know of many customers who look forward to buy a phone or a PDA that comes with only a QWERT keypad. Normal keypads, the slide types, the touch screen, all are kicked aside by this new idea. QWERTY is the order of the day and if you do not believe, just have a look at the increase in the production and at the same time, the sales of QWERTY phones over the last couple of years or so. It is also an easy transition between chatting on the computer and texting on the phone. It is much easier, faster and more effective. Hence, it is obviously preferred over other similar forms of keypad.

Camera and Video Recording:

It would always be nice to have a camera in hand whenever you are out with friends or on a tour. And it is a fact that these days, there is no mobile phone in this world that comes without a camera at all. Starting from VGA cameras to high definition cameras, you see different phones and PDA devices coming with different cameras. The BlackBerry Curve 8520 comes with a 2 megapixel camera and though you already know that this is not the end of the world and there are much better cameras featured on some other mobile phones and PDAs, this still is a decent feature and particularly under plenty of lighting, you will get good quality pictures without noise at all. And these days when we have picture modification software tools, the quality of the camera may not bother us that much. The camera has 5 x digital zoom feature so that you get some pretty good zoomed pictures. And things just do not end here. The camera also allows video recording and you again get some decent pictures when under daylight or plenty of artificial lighting. Since it is not the highest quality camera going around, it comes with a fixed focus and you will have to change or vary the focus in case you think it is needed.

Bluetooth:

Bluetooth is indeed one of the major features on the BlackBerry Curve 8520 Phone, and it is also considered pretty important for any PDA device. Since you will be having the need to chare things like documents and files at office, Bluetooth will be a ready in hand option for you to do so. The device comes with Bluetooth version 2.0 and though version 3.0 has already featured in a couple of devices this year, the older version is still not so obsolete. It is moreover better than predecessor and will be giving you better outputs like faster searching of devices, stronger connectivity, and greater security. Along with the Bluetooth version 2.0, you will also be provided a few other important features like Bluetooth Headset profile, Bluetooth Handset Profile, phone book access profile, secure simple pairing profile, serial port profile, address book integration using AT commands and using object push or OBEX feature, stereo audio (A2DP or AVRCP) and dial up networking (DUN). All these features are obviously very essential for those in business field and since this device is especially designed for people like them, it has in it everything that they look out for.

Media Player:

Who does not love entertainment? On any given day, one would want a device that would also provide them some entertaining stuff while they are on the go or when boredom surrounds them. Given the fact that most of today’s PDAs have become mini television sets that fit into our hands and keep on chattering wherever we go, the doctor’s order is that the Curve 8520 should have a good media player. And thankfully, we have got some nice multimedia features for you. The media player sported on the Curve 8520 supports a large number of audio and video formats and this certainly is good news for those of you who love to watch videos or to listen to music while travelling. Here is a list of video and audio formats supported by the device: Video formats: H.263, WMV9, MPEG4, H.264,; Audio formats: MP3, AAC-LC, AMR-WB, AMR-NB, e AAC+, QCELP EVRC, AAC+, WMA9, Windows Media 10 Standard/Professional. Now that is quite a good list of supported formats and this means that there is no need of converting the media into different formats before actually loading them on to the device. Hence playing music and videos on this media player is fun, entertaining and easy too. This could also prove to be a vital feature and would certainly please many users and critics.

Wi-Fi:

It is a well known fact that Wi-Fi has become an integral part of almost all electronic goods during the last couple of years. And PDAs are the one of the first gadgets to have featured Wi-Fi. What happens when you have Wi-Fi is, even when you have a cable that connects you to the internet, you can still not use it and still get connected to the internet. This way, your device will become more mobile and you can surf the web sitting anywhere in your house. This could save you from a lot of discomfort too. And whenever you visit places like Airports, cafes, corporate offices, universities and so on, you can gain access to the internet with ease. Like all BlackBerry mobile phones and PDAs, the Curve 8520 Smartphone comes with the far famed 802.11 b/g Wi-Fi in association with WPA / WPA 2 Personal and Enterprise both. This is certified by Cisco CCX and hence it is guaranteed that everything works smoothly without any sorts of errors. Some of the other additional features regarding Wi-Fi on the device are: Wi-Fi® access to BlackBerry® Enterprise Server, Wi-Fi access to BlackBerry® Internet Bundle, Support for UMA (carrier-dependent). This is hence a great option for you to pull out the best from your Curve 8520 Smartphone and utilize its ability to the fullest.

Social Networking:

It is needless to say that social networking has become the top priority among people from all walks of life. It is the current trend and wherever you go, you see this phenomenon pretty predominant. People from every nook and corner of the globe are now able to contact one another through social networking. And of late, Social networking is also the sole reason behind the introduction of social commerce. Lots of businesses are being established every day and Social networking has been the driving force for all such businesses. Websites like Viigo, Foursquare, Twitter are now household names all over the world. Now this is the reason why the Blackberry Curve 8520 Smartphone comes with special featured apps for the above stated websites. Just one push of a button and you will be directed to those threesome websites. This way, you can quit living like a recluse since you will always be in contact with your pals, share your views, contacts, pictures, videos and stuff. Entertainment will always be with you if you have the Curve 8520. We have also liked the way the device provides you a link to such websites. Provision of shortcut buttons is also a nice way of connecting you to your pals and also a nicer way of saving your valuable time.

Security:

These days, one of the main problems regarding the PDA devices is that personal security is at stake. Many devices are coming without the option for you to lock or hide your personal data and stuff. Everything is being open to access for all and this is the reason people still go for buying laptops instead of a PDA. But one has got no such complaints regarding the BlackBerry Curve 8520 PDA phone. It is quite smart in all aspects and hence it comes with robust security features. As expected, there is keyboard lock along with password protection. This feature helps you in preventing others from opening your device and also from accessing its data. There is also a security mode called the sleep mode which locks the device temporarily. Other important features include AES or Triple DES encryption with BlackBerry Enterprise Server, Optional support for S/MIME, and FIPS validation. These small but important features add a lot of value to your device and also help you in protecting your all important data. These sort of features set an example to the other makers of PDAs, and BlackBerry outscores its competitors in this aspect.

Modem:

The internet has become a part and parcel of our lives and more and more people are onto the internet day by day. And is not it cool to have a modem for your device so that you can connect to the internet and surf the web whenever you wish to? It would be an even better idea because, after all the modem is provided by RIM and this means that only your device can be connected through the modem to the internet. No one else can access your modem since there will be a security key provided. The modem is also a wireless type and this means you can access Wi-Fi at home or wherever you go. There is also tethered modem capability for the device and hence it would be an added advantage for you when you choose the Curve 8520. Both these will be provided along with the device and you could be browsing the internet without any extra price. This is also another positive aspect regarding the mobile phones and PDAs from BlackBerry. You will always have something extra for the same price.

Connectivity:

The device comes with a mini USB port and a cable for connection and this allows you to connect it to your computer, sync them and exchange data between them. It is an easy method, compared to the likes of Bluetooth and Infrared, to send and receive data like documents, files, music, videos and so on. You can also charge your phone just by connecting to your computer using this mini USB cable. And just for the record, there is also an SD memory card slot available, as discussed earlier. So, you can even transfer files through the memory card. Either way, the connectivity of the device is pretty good.

So that ends a pretty good list of features, and we are happy that BlackBerry has been following the latest trends in the market and hence has been providing the right features. Though there are a few minor drawbacks regarding some of the features, the device is pretty good overall. But let us also see if this trend continues and if the performance of the device complements its features well or not.

Performance:

While the features on the device are so great and so appealing that you would have already had a soft corner for the Blackberry Curve 8520 Mobile Phone, the performance of the device, may not be as appealing. And the reasons include a less powerful processor. Well, there is no problem with the processor itself and it works fine when you run an application or two. But when multitasking is frequent and too many applications are open and being run simultaneously, the device may not have the caliber to perform at a good pace and the processor should experience an overload. This leads to deteriorated performance of the system and is this happens for a long time, the device may get damaged. But the situation is not so serious as it seems since more often than not one would not want to use too many applications simultaneously.

The operating system and the rest of the features perform very well and they complement the device so well that you get a commendable performance from the Curve 8520 Smartphone. There are quite a few utilities in the bag for you and if you get used to using then in the right way, you will then start loving your device and will also start appreciating the real potential of the device. Connectivity of the device has also been quite good during the tests and there are no major issues or errors reported. This could well be a decider, the performance of the device on the whole, since it is the single most important aspect of the device. And we are happy that this would not be the reason behind your rejection. The overall performance is pretty good, and in fact better than what was expected at the start, especially after knowing about the processor of the device. Hence, you can actually count on the performance of the device since it will always be there for you whenever you need and it will also not pose you frequent problems.

Battery:

Since there are quite a few features seen on the device, there is a chance of multitasking. And multitasking means more operations at a time and this eventually means more battery drain. This is the reason one would expect a pretty solid battery performance from their device.  One must not worry about the battery life while on the go and also must be able to confidently make video calls or do some extravagant stuff. But all this needs a good battery. Therefore, the Curve 8520 comes with a 1150 mAh removable/rechargeable lithium-ion battery that stays longer than usual. With the new revamped battery performance, the device can provide you a talk time of up to 4.5 hours (approx) and a standby time of up to 17 days or 408 hours (approx). Now this is something big. You have now got something really great from BlackBerry. You can now talk for more hours on the go, and also can quit worrying because you have not charged your device for some time. This sort of quality is expected from someone like BlackBerry and it has lived up to our expectations totally.

Warranty:

The BlackBerry Curve 8520 Smartphone comes with a parts and labour warranty for a period of about one year from the original date of purchase.

Verdict:

If you were waiting for one last opinion of us on this Smartphone, we would like to tell you that you have encountered a really good device that helps you in all spheres of your life, office, home, family, friends, network, entertainment, and the list goes on. The features are great and the performance is better than what we expected. The battery life is quite commendable and the device also has pretty good connectivity options. The pricing is also not as high as expected and is quite reasonable, to be honest with you. Hence, with all the positive signs in front of us, all we can say is, if you are diehard fan of BlackBerry and if you are looking for more than a decent PDA device, then we would recommend the BlackBerry Curve 8520 Smartphone to you. It would be a nice companion to you and to your business. Even if your decision is negative regarding the device, or if this not what you are looking for, there is nothing to worry as we have got plenty of other top notch and competitive PDAs for you. You can read their reviews, look at their ratings and prices on this website itself.

BlackBerry Curve 8520 Smartphone – Technical Specification Table

Manufacturer	BlackBerry
Model Name	Curve 8520
Type	PDA
Series	Curve Series
Dimensions  (H x W x D)	4.29 x 2.36 x 0.55 inches
Weight	106 g
Colours available	Glossy Black and white
Display type	TFT, 65K colors, 2.46 inches
Resolution	320 x 240 pixels
Internal memory	256MB
Supported capacity	Up to 32GB
Memory card type	SD card
Bluetooth	Yes, version 2.0
Security	Yes
Weight	3.70 ounces
Keyboard	QWERTY
Processor	512 MHz
Clock speed	2.44 – 3.32 GHz max.
Wi-Fi	802.11 b/g
Video Support	MPEG4, H.263, H.264, WMV9
Audio Support	MP3, AMR-NB, AMR-WB, QCELP EVRC, AAC-LC, AAC+, e AAC+, WMA9, Windows Media 10 Standard/Professional
Built-in speakers	Yes
CPU	512MHz processor
Operating system	BlackBerry OS
Camera	2 MP, 1600×1200 pixels
Social Networking	Viigo, Foursquare, Twitter
Data	GPRS EDGE 3G WLAN Bluetooth USB
Features	Messaging: SMS (threaded view), MMS, Email, IM HTML Browser GPS Java
Networking	Modem, Wireless networking
Battery	Standard battery, Li-Ion 1150 mAh
Battery life	Talk time of up to 4.5 hours (approx) and a standby time of up to 17 days or 408 hours (approx)
Warranty	1 year

The original Dell Streak came down with a bit of identity crisis; as the 5″ device did not belong either to the tablet family or its Smartphone cousins, and ended up in the hands of very few consumers. However, its big brother, the Streak 7 has escaped this issue; it is a tablet that is meant to be doing all things tablet such as reading ebooks, video playbacks as well as surfing the web.

Though the Dell Streak 7 might just look like a magnified Streak 5, but do not judge it by its outer cover as it differs in more than just the size, with a powerful 1GHz dual core Tegra T20 processor, 4G HSPA connectivity, a 5mp lens on the rear and 1.3mp front facing camera, and a 16GB of internal memory. As far as software is concerned, it is powered by Android 2.2 and the User Interface is Dell’s Stage, which the company promises to upgrade to Honeycomb as soon as it is ready. With the sounds of the features, it looks like one of the most complete 7” tablets in the current market. Unfortunately, there are a few factors that might keep its consumers from taking out the cash, find out what are they.

Design:

An enlarged original Streak:

Irrespective of the angle at which the Streak 7 Tablet PC is looked at, it still looks very much like an enlarged version of its 5″ predecessor. And this might not actually be a thing to complain about as the original’s tapered edges and quite rugged and durable plastic build is adorable. It is quite obvious that Dell is trying to have some identical design fashions throughout the Streak series, but it seems to be having some cues from the relatives of Venue Pro and Venue too. The style borrowing is evident in the rear that has similar textured diamond pattern. The feel of the device in hands is pretty good, and unlike that of the Streak 5, its rear does not have a removable battery, which is an absolute disappointment, the reason, you will find in the battery life section of the review.

Low-resolution woes:

While not in use, the display of the Streak 7 looked simply identical to that of the Galaxy Tab, as both of them seem to be pretty glossy with their 7″ Gorilla Glass display that feels pretty smooth to be touched. But that thought will change immediately as soon as it is turned on. When compared to the 1024 x 600 pixels resolution display of the Galaxy Tab, Streak 7’s 800 x 480 pixels panel looked simply cheap, and this will be very much obvious while browsing, reading , viewing images or just while watching a HD video clip. In side by side comparison, the Streak 7 looked lack lustre and if you are particular about the pixel numbers, just stop reading here and look at the alternative options available.

Disappointment with Display:

Getting back to the display, the most drastic difference is with how much brighter Galaxy’s version turned out to be. Flatly, Samsung’s panel is better than Dell’s in every way and will prove to be big difference as the complete tablet experience revolves around the display. The quality is also affected with the viewing angles; when held horizontally about 45 degrees, the colours just fade away to black. However, the vertical viewing angle is better when compared to that of the display of Galaxy Tab, which can be seen in pretty much any angle, but remember, you will not be able to get that supreme quality at any cost. Thought the quality of viewing on the display is not up to the mark, this capacitive display is very responsive and this is helped a great deal by the Tegra 2 processor. The accelerometer was also pretty snappy, but we just wished for an easy way to switch off the feature than to go through the settings menu of the display.

The handy 7″:

Though most of the Tablet manufacturers look towards the 10” form factor, the portability factor offered by the 7” models; some of our friends are wishing for a 7” iPad. Similar to that of the Archos 7 and the Galaxy Tab, the Streak 7 too is good with single hand using than the other 10” tablets we had tested. This 0.48” Streak 7 is comfy to be held while reading an ebook on bed or just wrapping both the hand around this 0.9 pounds tablet and just use the thumbs to type on it.

Buttons and slots:

The Dell Streak 7  Android Table is quite clean and all it has is three capacitive buttons for home, menu as well as back, the camera on the front of the device and mic. The SD card and SIM card slots have been hidden inside a plastic latch on its right edge, which can become quite hard to be opened if you do not have long nails. On the top, there is the volume rocker and power button. You will find a 3.5mm headphone jack on the left edge. Unfortunately, Dell has not offered any HDMI op on the tablet, but does provide a separate dock that is to be attached to a PDMI port beneath the unit. If you are wondering about the PDMI port, it is same as the one found in the original, and again as there is not even a USB port on the device, keep the cord in hands always if you wish to recharge or connect it to any other gadget. Charging is not done through USB and it has to be plugged into the wall with the help of its AC adaptor. Yes, it is absolutely annoying.

Features:

Software:

Most of the tablets that were announced this year in the Consumer Electronics Show are waiting for the release of Google’s Android 3.0 Honeycomb, which has been programmed especially for Tablets. But Dell alone had no patience whatsoever and released the Streak 7 with the Android 2.2, and it really feels rushed too and this fact is just stressed with Dell not taking any effort in addition to what the OS had to offer. You will find the software experience to be same as that of the original Streak and Venue, which had Stage UI with Dell’s full screen widgets along with the launcher. The widgets actually seem to be pretty useful and, on clicking over Home, you get the recently used apps and the local weather details as well. What is more, you get to see the all important Facebook and Twitter feed, gallery of locally stored pictures, and a Web search bar with thumbnails of your bookmarks. If you are not too keen about these widgets, they can always be deleted and just go on to customise it with regular Android Widgets and apps. Quick access to the mail app, app tray and browser is provided by the launcher at the base. Customisation of the launcher will just kill your time.

Music player:

The ordinary and boring looking stock Android music player, stresses more that Dell has rushed the Streak 7 into the market. This player is the one that you will find in any Android phone. Though it is quite functional, in heavy bass tones, the audio is rather lacking and glaringly still in the loudest setting. You also do not get any sort of visualisations or equaliser setting to enhance the experience.

The apps:

Taking about apps, none of them, not even the mail and some of the other native apps like messaging and calendar apps have not even got any sort of upgrades that can take advantage of the additional display real estate. It is shocking that Dell has not even bothered to optimise the Gmail experience. We cannot help appreciating Samsung in this regard, as they had done heaps of retooling. We think Dell thought that since the Streak 7 had the same resolution as that of the original, it did not have the need.
Being a tablet, the messaging experience can turn out to be a little challenging as there are specific ways in which it has to be held and also considering the size of on-screen keys. The additional apps available include BrainPOP which is an educational game for the kids, Kindle, a magazine app called as Zinio, Blockbuster, Let’s Golf and a Slacker Radio. You get Swype too, but this large device does not ask for regular thumb typing. T-Mobile has done its part by including the T-Mobile TV and Qik Video Chat apps. Overall, as far as the software package is concerned, it is simply an oversized smartphone. A couple of months back, that was acceptable, but with the Honeycomb around the corner, it is all about to change.

Camera:

A quick video chat with our friend was good with the Qik Video Chat app, using the front facing 1.3mp camera in Dell Streak 7. Though that app on its own does not provide you with good quality video, we have to mention that it is better on WiFi than what you can get expect from 4G, still do not expect it to be desktop grade for the sake of video calling. The stills taken with the lens on the front is pretty good and obviously, the 5mp camera on the rear turned out with better snaps that were crisper, but a little washed out. That said, taking pictures with a 7” viewfinder makes it all the more awkward. But the auto-focus is quicker and the flash is pretty handy in low-lit conditions. Dell has not provided any panorama or continuous shooting option like the one found on the Galaxy Tab, but to make up for it, the Streak 7 has the capability to take 720p video. Though you get smooth motion capture, the footage seemed to be pretty grainy and oversaturated.

Performance:

Dell’s Streak 7 is one of the first tablets that we had tested, sporting NVIDIS’s 1GHz dual-core Tegra 2 T20 processor. It is odd that the processor has been down-clocked to 800MHz and Dell gives the reason to be “saving power”. But the down-clocking has not had any kind of effect on the performance of the Tablet and most of the time, it seems to be snappier than the Galaxy Tab. Operations such as scrolling through the web pages, opening the apps and flicking through the pictures is done in a breeze. The games were pretty good too. Apart from the fast performance, the processor also offers full HD playback and this Dell product does exactly that. One 1080p clip played without any stuttering or lag and this is just pointless when you consider that the screen is pretty much awful. If you wish to get any value out of the HD video, the HDMI op cable comes handy. The YouTube videos were impressive and the general flash performance seemed to be pretty decent. Video clips loaded in a few seconds and we were good to go.

Battery life:

Unfortunately, ‘good performance’ is not the case with Battery life, and it is seriously disappointing. The maximum you can get out of the Streak 7 is about six hours. With about 5 hours of use on 4G network, like checking emails, twitter feeds, surfing and google maps, Streak 7 just died. With the WiFi On, you can get about 6 hours. Its life is almost half of that of Galaxy Tab; though this can be expected with the larger 4000mAh cell on the Tab, this low life cannot be ignored for a highly mobile device such as this one. It is true that having the HSPA+ or 4G network is always going to eat away the battery life, but that is the feature offering quick browsing. As you can imagine, you will not be able to make calls with the Streak 7, but can always send messages.

Package:

The package contents of the Dell Streak 7 includes USB cable, Hands-free  headset, a wall charger, a quick start guide with terms and conditions.

Warranty:

Dell offers its Streak 7 one year warranty for parts and labour.

Verdict:

Though the Dell Streak 7 has better set of specifications than the original Streak, its experience has not taken any big leap. This is mainly because it runs the same software and in spite of having a bigger display, the low resolution does not enhance its usefulness. And, it does not even make any calls. The Streak 7 just needed some more love from Dell and it would have been a great device. We do not think this was the right time or form to bring the Tablet into the market. Its price tag is pretty competitive and HSPA+ gives it the power of speed, but the low resolution display, soon to be out-dated Operating System and poor battery life, makes it hard for us to recommend the product even though it is budget friendly.

Dell Streak 7 Android Tablet PC – Technical Specification Table

Manufacturer	Dell
Model Name	Dell Streak 7
Dimensions (W x H x D)	199.9 x 119.8 x 12,4 mm
Weight	450g
Colours available	Black
Display Size	7 inch
Type	WVGA Capacitive Multi-Touch Screen with Corning Gorilla Glass
Display Resolution	Display Resolution
Display features	Multi-touch Light sensor Proximity Sensor Scratch-resistant glass
Touch Screen	Yes
Camera resolution	Front: 1.3MP Fixed Focus Rear: 5MP Auto Focus with Flash
Video	Yes
Camera features	Auto focus, Digital zoom, Geo tagging, Night mode, White balance, Effects, Scenes
Card slot	SD, MMC, SDHC memory card slot
Memory	16GB of Internal Storage with support for up to 32GB additional storage
Processor	NVIDIA® Tegra 2 mobile processor
Messaging	Email, IM and Video Chat on all models SMS & MMS on 3G models only
Browser	Full HTML WebKit browser, Adobe Flash 10.1 (Froyo)
Supported Digital Audio Formats	MP3, WMA, AAC, AAC+, eAAC+, AMR, MIDI, WAV
Supported Digital video Formats	H.263/H.264, 3GP, MPEG4, WMV
YouTube player	Yes
GSM	850, 900, 1800, 1900
UMTS	850, 1700/2100, 1900, 2100
3D Graphics hardware accelerator	Yes
Built-in online services support	Facebook, YouTube (upload), Flickr, Twitter
WiFi	Wi-Fi 802.11b/g/n
Bluetooth	Bluetooth 2.1 + EDR
GPS	Yes
GPS features	Turn-by-turn navigation, Voice navigation
Battery	2780 mAh
Battery life	6 hrs
Warranty	One year

Samsung’s initial attempt with their very own OS, Bada, – Samsung Wave – had too many first’s to it making it an instant hit among users, thin aluminum chassis, a 1GHZ Hummingbird handset, for the first time ever Super AMOLED screen, were some of the “firsts” to name a few, making their debut. The Wave 723 is the fourth Bada handset that follows suit of the Wave 2 and Wave 2 Pro. Well for a change, the Korean manufacturer decides to democratize the smartphone making it accessible to people from almost all walks of life giving everyone a taste of remarkable smartphone experience. So let us see how this “not so” high-end phone, priced at around £200 right in the middle of the crowded smartphone market finds its way to the top? With its rather unusual feature of an attached leather, covering the touchscreen which gives it both a positive and negative rating, does the Samsung Wave 723 counter weigh for shedding its high-end chipset or the brilliant Super AMOLED like the ones found in the existing Wave? Read on to find out!

Overview:

Well! With some changes done here and there, what we have here is a low-res LCD that takes the place of the Super AMOLED of the S8500 with the 720p video recording missing too. But on a positive note, the excellent connectivity of the Samsung Wave 723 Smartphone is beyond comparison, particularly the Wi-Fi/USB tethering, not something that you can see in every other phone and would be welcomed especially by corporate users with a data plan. Also worth mentioning would be the Bluetooth 3.0 and Wi-Fi 802.11n, yet another rare feature. Beyond doubts, the Wave 723 is sure to hit the search result page of latest phones with budget and specs as the criteria. The immense free game options along with the 5MP camera pack quite a punch. Well, as mentioned above, the detachable leathery plastic flap at the bottom of the device along with enhancing the looks also safeguards the phone from users with butter fingers, who are well known for dropping the device every now and then. And for those of you who find it rather annoying, there is always the option of detaching it.

Design and Feel:

The Samsung  Wave 723 measures 109.5 x 53.9 x 11.8 mm sans the flap categorising it into a relatively compact handset. With the flap on, it weighs around 113.8 g adding about 2.5mm to the thickness. With a small screen of about 3.2 inches, the pixel count is at 240 x 400, which is on the low side. While the backplate is made of sturdy metal, the rest of the body is made of plastic with a shiny front fascia. The faux leather texture finish in the front along with the brushed aluminium feel at the back sure does give users a literal feel of high-end opulence. The metal casing is any day a treat for the hands with its tough and solid feel. Though it cannot be compared to the S8500, it is quite a looker nonetheless.

Getting around the 723:

Below the display is where the hardware keys are housed namely – Call, Menu and End buttons. There is nothing more in terms of hardware control on the front panel with all controls hefty and solid, designed to fit hands of any size. While pressing the End key stops any current running app taking you to the home screen, press-holding the Menu key initiates the task switcher. Above the display stands the loner, the earpiece. Towards the left side is the thin volume rocker sitting low, something not really comfortable to be accessed at all times. Towards the right is where one can find the Power/Lock key along with the Camera Key, rather tiny buttons with an easy to use shutter key perched a little above them. Well it was pretty impressive to watch the camera launch instantly, almost at all times. The microUSB port sits on top hidden under a plastic lid, sliding in and out seamlessly along with the uncovered 3.5mm audio jack. The above mentioned leather flap sits at the bottom, guarding the screen from rough users that can be fixed by detaching the chassis’ back section at the bottom and sliding the screen back to place.

Moving on, towards the back is where we find the conventional 5MP camera, LED flash equipped along with the loudspeaker. The inset attribute of the camera lens safeguards it from scratches. The SIM card slot is right above the battery with the microSD slot sitting below.

Well, there is nothing much to complain about the 723 both in terms of quality or build. Yeah! The Super AMOLED screen was a great miss though.

User Interface:

Based on TouchWiz and Android, the Bada interface is not something that is too hard to tame, for both patron and non-patrons of the Samsung family. So, starting with the homescreen (the basic attraction of the Bada interface) has several panes to its credit that holds as many widgets you would like it to hold. In the landscape mode, the 723 allows editing of these widgets by adding, removing or even rearranging panes, with the current pane being displayed on the top via circled numbers. Tapping on the same takes you directly to that particular screen. Widgets can be pulled out or placed back on the tray at the foot of the screen when unused. Then again, the low-res screen of the 723 does not really help with handling too many widgets per pane. There is a thin notification bar on top of the screen that displays info such as Wi-Fi, Bluetooth, battery, time, and Music player controls, provided it is running in the background. Long pressing the centre key launches the Task Manger that helps you toggle between active apps or terminating them. Furthermore, the System Manager is more for the techies and consists of four tabs with the first tab showing info on the device like model number, MAC addresses and firmware update, the second tab provides info on the battery, while the last two tab updates you on the memory and CPU usage. It also displays the current running app enabling you to launch the Task manager. Turning the phone landscape while in the edit mode allows you to add and delete pages, akin to the homescreen. With the screen scrolling being looped, do not bother sweeping all the way back to reach the last one.

Phonebook/Call Quality:

Samsung have always been famous for their opulent functionality and literally unrestricted capacity when it comes to Phonebook. The Samsung Wave 723 Bada OS Phone continues that legacy by assimilating social networking with contacts. Contacts can be pulled in from Facebook or Twitter, provided you are logged in. In fact, you can formulate an up-to-date and detailed contact list with pulling contacts from Twitter and Facebook along with adding some from the SIM too. Searching for entries is possible by either doing an alphabet scroll that is available on the side of the screen or flick scrolling the list. Then again, typing for the search entry is there always. Despite having the option to assign numerous info fields to the contacts everything remains flawlessly organised. Trying clicking on a + sign located on the right in the contact list, this allows a new field to be added for a contact. Again by clicking on a minus sign you can get rid of any unnecessary field. Yet another cool feature similar to the Galaxy S is, swiping right on the main contact list dials instantly the number of a contact and with swiping left you are allowed to send a SMS to that contact. The side swiping feature works with other lists too in case of numbers or names being involved. Majority of the functions are pretty much Android-y.

During calls, accessing the mute button or the speaker phone is very much possible, but what was annoying was having to press-hold the On/Off lock keys located on the side that in turn takes you to the menu. There are options to make or take video calls, but then again with no front-facing camera, you might have to use the camera on the back to send your videos.

The call quality of the Wave 723 can be categorised as fair, as it was not that loud despite the max sound setting. With the absence of the proximity sensor, manual unlocking of the phone needs to be done in order to use some features amidst a call. The Smart dialing feature also was not really impressive, as it searches only with numbers and not names. We found it a bit weird, because we are more prone to forgetting numbers than names and that is exactly why a Name Search would be appreciated better. The call receiver key populates the call log showing all of the received, dialed and missed calls/messages all in the same list. There is also the option of different tabs that sorts history better.

Messaging:

Samsung has been very innovative in terms of Messaging with an array of options on offer. Well it starts with the standard, SMS, MMS, and voice mail along with Facebook and Twitter. This is just to begin with; the main menu offers an app named My Accounts. On opening that, you get to set up various email accounts. While corporate users find Exchange ActiveSync feature fairly handy, others might be happy to have their hands full with Gmail, Windows Live, Yahoo etc. MySpace is also on offer on the social networking front.

Creating messages has been kept simple and straightforward. While the capacitive touchscreen makes life easier with being spontaneous and receptive, the keyboard is no less effective by way of offering dedicated keys for symbols like @ and ‘.com’. Perched conveniently above the keyboard are three menu buttons, “Recent, Contact, Groups” which acts quickly in adding a recipient/group of recipients in a message. The Recent button also comes in pretty handy. While sending message, the predictive text offers you alternative words and the same can be availed of by pulling it down and clicking on the arrow towards the right of the box. If you find the keyboard a bit small in the tall mode try switching to wide mode to gain more space.

Typing speed in the Wave 723 was not an issue until the built-in dictionary comes in your way. Similar to its brothers, the 723 follows the same painful process with new words – coining a new word is possible only after entering the same in the dictionary, which means you might spend an eternity keying in all your buddies’ nicknames in the dictionary, unless you turn that option off. Yet another feature worth mentioning in the Samsung’s Bada is that majority of the screens display three small dotted icons at the bottom of the screen, which pops a context-sensitive menu, which is extremely handy. For eg, with messaging it allows you to easily add attachments and multimedia to your messages. Maximum attachment size is 5MB for both incoming and outgoing mails.

Check this cool feature that the Wave 723 has to offer. The SMS editor offers two tabbed folders – view and conversation. While the former displays all your folders at the bottom of the screen as tabs, the latter groups your messages. Yet another remarkable option would be the “Scheduled message” – this takes care of scheduling a composed message to be sent automatically on a specified time and date.

Multimedia:

Face Tagging-Enabled Gallery:

The Samsung Wave 723’s Media Browser can be categorized as basic with clips and images displayed together in the thumb format. The selected file can be viewed in both the landscape and portrait mode. As the phone is multi-touch supported, Pinch-Zooming is also offered and double tapping the screen allows for a zoom in and zoom out. Well it appears that Samsung needs to improvise on the zooming feature, as it appears less responsive. Organizing files via the Media Browser is done by tag, date, view favorites and the best of all View By Person. This would mean upon tagging a contact’s face, you will be allowed to view all photos pertaining to that contact.

Not so impressive Video player:

The Wave 723 does not match up to the expectations in terms of video player in comparison to the first Wave. High resolution videos and codecs appear to be a no-no with the Wave 723. While the .3GP and .MP4 files seem to work (with less resolution though) there seemed to be some resistance against DivX and XviD encoded .AVI files. Again, it did not seem to have anything against .WMV files. Well, as these files are no longer largely in use, there is nothing much to complain here. Check out this cool feature, Mosaic Search. This is how it works – clips are broken down into various parts displaying each clip’s first frame helping you fish out the scene that you are hunting for.

Decent Music player:

We have to admit that the music player experience in the Wave 723 was nowhere near the video player. Tracks get organized by artists, albums, composers and genres, with the option to hide the same while not in use. Sound Effects along with Equalizer Presets are also on offer along with Samsung’s own DNSe sound enhancement technology giving you the choice of Music Clarity, Wide, Bass enhancement and Externalization, Concert Hall and 5.1 channel virtualization too. With the music player on, the notification panel displays info on the track being played along with playback controls. Also included is Samsung’s conventional music recognition feature that allows recording a few seconds of the currently played track ultimately providing you info on the name of the artist and the track being played. Yet another similar feature is “Find similar” that uses an online service to find similar tracks to the one currently being played. This also allows for tracks to be added to the wish list.

FM on board:

The Samsung Wave 723 PDA Smartphone  is loaded with FM radio along with RDS. It allows as much as 6 stations to be stored as favorites with the All Channels Menu retaining the rest. Recording of FM audio is also possible with the possibility to store the recorded music in your music folder in a MP3 format.

Audio output Quality:

Moving forward, the audio output quality leaves you with mixed feeling and is kind of hard to comment on the same. For eg., while the handset fares well with being plugged to an external amplifier, the same is just  average with plugging to the headphones.

Camera:

The Samsung Wave 723 Mobile Phone comes with 5MP camera that is LED flash and auto-focus supported and it sure does match our expectations in terms of still shooting. It also feature smile detection along with geo tagging. There are several scene modes namely Party/Indoor, Dawn, Sports, Fireworks, Night, Candlelight and Text. Also available are options like Continuous Mode and Panorama Mode together with Smile Shot, so have fun exploring your shoot skills. The touch optimized interface is fairly comfortable with almost all available options by way of vertical bars on each side of the viewfinder. The settings menu allow for toggling between white balance, ISO, auto contrast and effects. Also available is the macro mode along with Scene presets. In short, the Wave 723 shoots decent photos that can be expected from a 5MP camera with great attention being paid to resolved detail while also taking care of noise levels

Connectivity And Web Browser:

The connectivity factor of the 723 is way ahead for a phone that is categorized in the mid-range level. Along with the customary quad-band GPRS/EDGE/GSM there is also dual-band 3G with 7.2Mbps HSDPA on offer. Furthermore, it is loaded with the best local wireless connectivity – b/g/n variants of Wi-Fi along with Bluetooth v3.0. In terms of mass storage, there is the microUSB port, DRM Media, internet sharing and Samsung Kies. Speaking of Internet Sharing, check out the 723 turn into a wireless router (thanks to Mobile AP) connecting to as much as three Wi-Fi clients using the HSDPA connection to access the net. Wi-Fi also pairs with WPS – well for the non-techies out there WPS or Wi-Fi Protected Setup  is a secure way that helps connecting your secured network with a wireless device (that is, if your router supports the feature). Press the dedicated button and Voila watch it pairing up with your Wave 723.

The Wave 723 comes loaded with a Webkit-based browser, Dolphin 2.0 that opens multiple pages simultaneously along with Flash support also on board. The Pinch-Zoom feature works like a breeze especially with the screen being multi-touch enabled. But then again, it is fairly annoying to note the absence of text reflow that eventually leads to additional swiping in an attempt to read the zoomed stuff. Nevertheless, the Auto-complete option sure does save you some energy with entering site addresses if you have frequented the site before. Other notable features of the browser are the Find-on-Page and Translate option. Again, the volume rocker mounted on the left can be toggled to act as scroller as well, especially for those accustomed to single-handed browsing. The context-sensitive menu located in the browser page comes in very handy with sending URLs via SMS/email. So there again, the browser has its own pros and cons and sure does need a little tweaking here and there that Samsung needs to take care of.

Organiser:

The 723’s Organizer is a relatively handy app. There is also this Home screen widget displaying all impending appointments – a lifesaver really. So all those anniversaries, birthdays and meetings are just a tap away, in order to avoid any dicey scenarios. Also on board is the latest Picsel Viewer that works like a charm when it comes to Pinch- Zooming. It works perfectly well for PowerPoint docs, Excel, PDFs and Word. The 723 also comes loaded with the conventional organizer functions like the World Clock, Countdown timer, Alarm, Stopwatch etc. Another feature worth mentioning would be My Files – an efficient and simple to use file manager that also does the role of an image gallery. It also aids in copying, moving, locking and renaming bulk files and sending the same over Bluetooth.

App store:

Nothing much to be mentioned about the Samsung App store, it lags far behind in comparison to Android or Apple. While the apps are divided into categories, some have very few entries with the Social Networking having 7 to its credit and the Productivity having just 19. Well if it is just apps that you are interested in, then it would be ideal to look for options.

SatNav/GPS Navigation:

The Wave 723 comes with a dedicated Sat Nav along with the Samsung Mobile Navigator. Though the maps give out an outdated look, it is rich in features with nothing to complain about. It is also voice-guided along with a whole host of additional features, but obviously at an extra cost.

Battery Life:

Yet another disappointing feature of the 723 is its battery life. With just a meager usage, the battery dies within three days. With heavy usage, it drains rapidly requiring an almost everyday charge to continue breathing. And if you are the kind of person that listens to music a good amount of time, then be warned to do an everyday charge to avoid being appalled with a sudden battery drain. On the other hand, if you are the prudent kind, then you can expect anywhere from a day or two or maybe three, before the 723 dies out on you.

Hits:

• Solid design
• Context-sensitive app menus
• Expanding home screens with addition of widgets
• Pull down controls taking the shape of notification panel.
• Wi-Fi settings.
• Neat camera.
• Leather casing
• Integration of Facebook and Twitter contacts.

Misses:

• Not well designed app store
• Lack of text reflow.
• Low display resolution.
• Disappointing video playback

To Conclude:

The Korean manufacturer has indeed devised a mid-range compelling Bada handset that sure does steal the show in the smartphone market, but is yet to work on some rough edges like its OS, app store, and screen resolution etc. But the question still remains as to who would prefer the Bada over a Froyo or a Sense? Guess the £200 mark is after all not enough to survive the smartphone crusade, unless Samsung decides to refine the Bada big time!

Samsung Wave 723 Mobile Phone – Technical Specification Table

Manufacturer	Samsung
Model Name	Samsung Wave 723
Phone Type	Smartphone
Form Factor	Full touch
Dimensions (H x W x D)	4.31 x 2.12 x 0.46 cm
2G Network	GSM 850 / 900 / 1800 / 1900
3G Network	HSDPA 900 / 2100
Release Date	August 2010
Colour	Black
Weight	3.53oz (100 g)
Operating System	BADA 1.1
Display	TFT Capacitive touchscreen
Display size	3.2 inches
Screen resolution	240 x 400 pixels, 256K colours
Personal Information Management	To Do, Calendar, Scheduler, World time, Clock, Calculator, Memo, Stopwatch, Count down timer
Internet Browser Support	Dolphin 2.0 HTML
Built-in Service Support	Facebook, MySpace, Twitter
Messaging options	SMS, MMS, IM, RSS, Predictive text input T9, Email, Cell broadcast, Vcard/Vcalendar
E-Mail	IMAP, POP3, SMTP, Microsoft Exchange
Call Functions	Speaker Phone, Caller ID, Dialled/Missed/Received calls, Multi Party, Call Cost, Call Time.
Memory	User memory 100MB SMS Memory 1300 Phonebook Entries – Unlimited Memory External Memory – MicroSD up to 16GB
Phonebook Features	Caller groups, Multiple numbers per contact, Search by first and last names, Picture ID, Ring ID
Messaging	SMS, MMS (vCard/vCalendar), Predictive Text Input T9, IM
Business & Office	Document Viewer, Mobile Printing, Offline Mode, Voice Memo/Voice Mail
Audio Compatibility	MP3, Music Recognition
Video Playback	MPEG4, H.263, H.264
Fun & Entertainment	Embedded JAVA games, Embedded wallpaper, FM Radio
Music & Sound	Music Player, Poly ringtones, MP3 Ringtone, DRM, Music Library, 3D Sound technology
Connectivity	Bluetooth, WAP, Wi-Fi, SyncML (DS/DM), USB, A-GPS, PC Sync Application, internet HTML browser, USB File Transfer
Memory Slot Type	microSD, microSDHC
Special Features	Touch Phone, Mobile Tracker
Camera	5 Mp Auto Focus
Battery	Standard battery, Li-Ion 1200 mAh
Warranty	One year