Nokia E7

If you've been a cell phone fan for a while, you might remember the days when the Nokia Communicator series was the status symbol of a powerful businessperson. Nokia eventually developed the line into the E series, and its latest flagship model, the Nokia E7, is available now for an unlocked price of $650. The company has done a lot to refine the design, and it's running the revamped Symbian 3 operating system. However, a lot has changed since the days of the Communicator. Does the E7 have the chops to make it in the business world?

The good: 

The Nokia E7 boasts a premium design and has a fantastic QWERTY keyboard. The smartphone's 8-megapixel camera takes excellent pictures and video. Battery life is also good.

The bad: 

The Symbian platform falls short of the competition, and the phone can be sluggish. The E7 has a lower-resolution display and doesn't have an expansion slot.

The bottom line: 

The Nokia E7 has some wonderful qualities, like great hardware and excellent battery life, but ultimately its inferior software trips up this business-oriented smartphone.

Design

The Nokia E7 takes a number of style cues from the Nokia N8, which isn't a bad thing in our view since we loved the N8's hardware. The E7 is made of the same high-quality materials--aluminum body and glass AMOLED display--giving it a very premium feel. It's slightly bigger and heavier than the N8 at 4.87 inches tall by 2.46 inches wide by 0.54 thick and 6.2 ounces, but considering that the E7 also manages to fit in a full QWERTY keyboard, it's actually pretty amazing that it's only 0.03 inch thicker and 0.1 inch longer than the N8.

he E7's glass touch screen measures 4 inches diagonally and has a 640x360-pixel resolution. In general, it's clear and bright and you'll have no problem reading what's on the screen. However, with a lower-resolution screen, you're not going to get the same sharpness or definition as on today's qHD, Super AMOLED, and retina displays. The pixels are more visible on the E7, so images and text don't look quite as smooth.

On the bright side, the touch screen is very responsive. Launching apps only required a single tap, and we were able to navigate through the various screens and menus with no problem. There are three home screens in total, which you can customize with various widgets and shortcuts, and the main menu of apps is presented in a simple grid format.

Of course, as we've stated before in our reviews of the N8 and the Nokia Astound, Symbian 3 brings a one-touch user interface that makes it much easier to navigate these phones than previous versions of the operating system. However, it still feels clunky in some parts compared with platforms like iOS, Android, and Windows Phone, so Symbian certainly isn't leapfrogging the competition.

For text entry, you get an onscreen keyboard, though in portrait mode you only get an alphanumeric keypad. It's not as big of a deal as it was on the Nokia N8, since the E7 offers a full, physical QWERTY keyboard. To access it, you simply push the screen aside. The sliding mechanism is smooth and the hinge feels sturdy. The screen securely locks into place and sits at a slight angle to make it easier to see when using the keyboard.

Nokia did a really nice job with the keyboard. The buttons are a decent size with good spacing and a comfortable layout. The space bar is centrally located and not off to the side as on the Nokia N97 Mini, so in general we were able to type at a good clip with minimal mistakes.

There are a handful of other controls on the smartphone. Just below the display, there's a menu button. The left side features a lock switch and on the right side you'll find the SIM card slot, a volume/zoom key, and a camera button. Like the N8, the E7 doesn't have a user-replaceable battery, so you insert the SIM card on the side. However, we initially had a rather difficult time pulling out the SIM card tray, and after about 20 minutes we finally pried it open with a sharp object. Also, the slider volume controls take a bit of getting used to; we found it easier to use a rocker control to adjust audio while on a call, but this is really a minor issue.

The top of the phone houses the 3.5mm headphone jack, power button, HDMI port, and Micro-USB port. Note that there is no expansion slot on the E7. Last but not least, the 8-megapixel camera and dual LED flash are on the back, and the front-facing VGA camera is located above the display in the upper left corner.

The Nokia E7 comes packaged with an AC adapter, a USB cable, a wired stereo headset, an HDMI cable, a Micro-USB-to-USB adapter, and reference material. The smartphone is available in five colors: dark gray, silver white, green, blue, and orange.

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LG Optimus C

Design and Call Quality

Physically, the LG Optimus C is identical to  LG Optimus M ($149, 4 stars). It is made mostly of silver and chrome that really pop. It measures 4.6 by 2.2 by .6 inches (HWD) and weighs a slightly heavy 5.4 ounces. This is the same weight as the Optimus M, but still nearly an ounce heavier than some other Optimus phones. The screen is a 3.2-inch, 320-by-480 pixel capacitive touch screen, which may not be on par with high-end Android devices, but still looks sharp and clear. The on-screen Swype QWERTY keyboard is a bit cramped for typing, but you get used to it quickly and it isn't a deal breaker. There are four physical function keys below the screen that light up whenever the phone is touched.

The LG Optimus C is a tri-band (850/1700/1900 MHz) EVDO Rev. A device with 802.11b/g Wi-Fi. It connected to my WPA2-encrypted Wi-Fi network without a problem. Reception was decent, but I was roaming on MetroPCS's network here in NYC, so I'm not willing to draw a conclusion about native Cricket coverage. Call quality was decent overall. Voices sounded nice and clear in the earpiece, with a slightly hollow quality. On the other end, calls made with the phone were a touch muffled with some background hiss, but still audible. Some background noise came through as well, though I was still able to hear voices above it. Calls sounded very good through an Aliph Jawbone IconBluetooth headset ($99, 4 stars) and voice dialing worked well without training. The speakerphone was also just loud enough to use outdoors. Battery life was average at 5 hours and 49 minutes of talk time.

Cricket's monthly plan for the Optimus C costs $55 for unlimited voice, data, and texting, which is a pretty terrific value for the price.

Specifications

Service Provider

Cricket

Operating System

Android OS

Screen Size

3.2 inches

Screen Details

320-by-480, 262K-color TFT LCD capacitive touch screen

Camera

Yes

Network

CDMA

Bands

850, 1900, 1700

High-Speed Data

1xRTT, EVDO Rev A

Processor Speed

600 MHz

Apps, Camera, Multimedia, and Conclusion
The Optimus C runs on a 600 MHz Qualcomm MSM7627, ARM11 processor. It runs Android 2.2, "Froyo," which gives it a significant performance boost and expanded feature set over devices still running earlier versions of the OS. There are five customizable home screens you can swipe between, which default to displaying Facebook status updates, text messages, and weather. Though I found all of these quite useful, they are easy to change. LG added one visible feature to Android, the ability to arrange your apps into folders.

Luckily, Cricket leaves the Optimus C mostly free of bloatware. The browser worked well, though the phone's CPU is too slow to support Flash. LG includes official Facebook and Twitter apps, and Google Search is preloaded and set to default on the phone's home screen. You also have access to the Android Market, which is home to more than 100,000 downloadable apps; these should all work well, given the phone's standard resolution and Android 2.2 build.

A microSD card slot is located underneath the battery cover, and the phone comes preloaded with a 2GB card; my 32GB SanDisk card worked fine as well. There's also about 170MB of free internal memory. The music player is stock Android. It was quick and responsive, and displayed album art when it available. Sound quality was excellent over both a pair of wired 3.5mm headphones, as well as Altec Lansing BackbeatBluetooth headphones ($99.99-$129.99, 3.5 stars). Video playback was also solid, and videos played smoothly in full screen, with stereo audio via wired headphones and Bluetooth.

The 3.2-megapixel camera has auto-focus but no LED flash. Photos taken were mostly good, with average detail and fairly balanced lighting. Photos taken indoors didn't look as good as those taken outside, but were still usable. Shutter speeds were average, though the auto-focus added a slight delay. Videos record at 640-by-480-pixels and 18 frames per second in good lighting, and they looked pretty decent. Overall, you wouldn't want to replace a good digital camera with the Optimus C, but it'll do in a pinch.

At the end of the day, the LG Optimus C is just like all the other Optimus phones out there on other carriers, which is a good thing; the Optimus phones are the best entry-level Android devices. Cricket's other Android option, the Huawei Ascend ($139.99, 3 stars), is currently $10 more expensive than the Optimus C, and also far less powerful. We haven't reviewed theBlackBerry Curve 8530 for Cricket, but the version we looked at for MetroPCS ($169.99, 4 stars) is a solid device for users that like to text and e-mail; it has a fantastic QWERTY keyboard and good voice quality. But the Optimus C has a better Web browsing experience, as well as a much better third-party app catalog. That, combined with its many other functions and exceptional plan pricing, make the LG Optimus C a winner.

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Posted in: Handphone,LG,LG Optimus C,LG optimus C review,LG optimus review

Samsung Galaxy S 4G

The good: The Samsung Galaxy S 4G has 4G connectivity, a front-facing camera for video calls, and a larger battery. Android 2.2 offers impressive data speeds and good call quality. Other highlights include a rich and vibrant Super AMOLED touch screen and a 5-megapixel camera with 720p HD video recording.

The bad: No camera flash. The Galaxy S 4G has less internal memory than the Vibrant. There was some slight sluggishness with some tasks.

The bottom line: The Samsung Galaxy S 4G is a fantastic Android smartphone for T-Mobile customers, delivering fast data speeds and other improvements, but Vibrant owners should be fine holding off for now.

Though it hasn't even been a year since the Samsung Vibrant was released, a successor has already come along to take its place. The Samsung Galaxy S 4G is nearly identical in design, but don't let its looks fool you, as the new smartphone brings a number of changes under the hood. It ships running Android 2.2.1; there's a front-facing camera for video calls; and, most importantly, you get 4G connectivity, with the capability of hitting theoretical download speeds of 21Mbps. Indeed, we got some impressive and zippy data speeds during our review period, improving the smartphone Web browsing and streaming experience. Throw in the preloaded entertainment extras and you've got one fast and fun device.

If you already own a Vibrant, we wouldn't say this is a necessary upgrade, especially since you're probably still on contract. However, if you're in the market for a new smartphone, the Samsung Galaxy S 4G is certainly one of our top picks. T-Mobile has two other great 4G devices, the T-Mobile MyTouch 4G and the T-Mobile G2, and it may come down to personal preference, but the Galaxy S 4G has the potential to be faster and also sports a sharper, richer display. The Samsung Galaxy S 4G is available now for $199.99 with a two-year contract and after a $50 mail-in rebate.

Design
The Samsung Galaxy S 4G isn't remarkably different from the Samsung Vibrant in design. In fact, if you were to put the two side by side, it would be difficult to tell one from the other. They're the same size at 4.82 inches tall by 2.54 inches wide by 0.39 inch thick and 4.16 ounces, and both feature attractive chrome accents and rounded corners and edges.

The Samsung Galaxy S 4G features a new finish on the back that makes it less slippery than its predecessor.

The only noticeable difference is that the Galaxy S 4G has a new "silver reflex" finish on back. It's more of a matte finish, so unlike the Vibrant, the Galaxy S 4G doesn't feel quite as slick or plasticky, which is a good thing. That said, we still prefer the more premium feel of the T-Mobile MyTouch 4G, even though it's slightly heavier and thicker than the Galaxy S 4G.

You still get the 4-inch Super AMOLED touch screen, which is eye-catching and gorgeous. The sharp display makes it easy to read text, but it really shines when you're viewing video or photos, as colors and details really come through on the vibrant screen. The touch screen is also responsive. It registered all our taps, and we were able to smoothly and quickly scroll through the menus and lists. Like the rest of the series, the Galaxy S 4G uses Samsung's TouchWiz user interface, and the smartphone ships with the Swype virtual keyboard.

The Samsung Galaxy S 4G sports the same gorgeous 4-inch Super AMOLED touch screen as the Vibrant.

There are four touch-sensitive buttons--menu, home, back, and search--below the display. On the left side is a volume rocker and on the right is a power/lock button. The top of the device features a 3.5mm headphone jack and a Micro-USB port with a sliding cover, with the camera located on back. There is, however, no flash and no dedicated camera key.

The Samsung Galaxy S 4G comes packaged with an AC adapter, a USB cable, a 16GB microSD card, a wired stereo headset, and reference material.

Features
The Samsung Galaxy S 4G is a quad-band world phone with a speakerphone, conference calling, voice dialing, text and multimedia messaging, Wi-Fi, Bluetooth, and GPS. In addition to cellular calls, you can make calls over a Wi-Fi network (there is no additional charge, but the minutes are deducted from your regular voice plan) and unlike the Samsung Vibrant, the Galaxy S 4G has a front-facing VGA camera so you can make video calls over Wi-Fi or T-Mobile's network using the preinstalled Qik application.

Again, the smartphone ships running Android 2.2.1, so in addition to the standard Google services and support for Microsoft Exchange, POP3 and IMAP accounts, and social network integration, you get the benefits of Froyo, which include the ability to save apps to SD cards, voice dialing over Bluetooth, and Flash Player 10.1 support.

The handset also comes preloaded with a number of entertainment extras. This includes a full copy of "Inception," Slacker Radio, Kindle for Android, and DoubleTwist software with AirSync, which lets you wirelessly sync and back up music, video, and other content from your phone to your PC over a Wi-Fi connection.

T-Mobile TV and Samsung's Media Hub video store are also onboard if you want to watch video on the go. The latter lets you rent or buy movies and TV shows, and Samsung and T-Mobile just announced that purchases can be charged to your monthly phone bill.

by bonnie cha

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Posted in: Handphone,Samsung,Samsung Galaxy S 4G,Samsung Galaxy S 4G review,Samsung Galaxy S 4G spec

Comparison - Motorola Atrix 4G vs LG Optimus Black

The Motorola Atrix 4G and the LG Optimus Black are similar touchscreen candybar devices. They weigh pretty much the same as each other, the Motorola Atrix 4G coming in at 135g and the LG Optimus Black weighing 109g.

The Motorola Atrix 4G does have better resolution with its 540 x 960 pixels against the 480 x 800 pixels of the LG Optimus Black. Both the screens happen to be 4-inch ones. The LG Optimus Black has a Multi-Touch LCD Touchscreen with a NOVA display.

The Motorola Atrix 4G has a better battery rating. It is rated at 1930 mAh against the 1500 mAh of the LG Optimus Black. However, the Motorola Atrix 4G needs to power a dual-core 1GHz Tegra 2 processor, while the LG Optimus Black only needs to drive a 1GHz TexasInstruments OMAP 3630 processor.

Both the Motorola Atrix 4G and the LG Optimus Black are Android OS 2.2 (Froyo) devices. This is usually upgradeable when future versions of the Android OS are made available.

Although both the Motorola Atrix 4G and the LG Optimus Black have 5-megapixel main cameras, the LG Optimus Black has a 2-megapixel secondary camera while the Motorola Atrix 4G only has a VGA 0.3-megapixel secondary camera. The Motorola Atrix 4G has 16 GB of storage in the device whereas the LG Optimus Black has 512 MB RAM and 2GB of storage available to it. Both devices can accept microSD cards of up to 32 GBs in size.

It would appear that the LG Optimus Black has a better display and front-facing camera. However, the Motorola Atrix 4G has a better battery, a dual-core processor and more storage. It would probably come down to what you need the device for and how much the Motorola Atrix 4G and the LG Optimus Black each cost at the point of time when you need to buy it.

For more comparisons, click here

Motorola Atrix 4G (announced Jan 2011 CES)

4G HSDPA + HSUPA + WiFi 802.11 b/g/n, Touchscreen Candybar, 5.0 MP Camera, 16 GB Storage + 1 GB RAM + microSD (max 32GB), Android OS 2.2 (Froyo)

Motorola has announced the Motorola Atrix 4G as an AT&T device. It will use a Motoblur interface powered by a 1GHz Tegra 2 dual-core processor.

The phone will have a 4-inch qHD 960 x 540 pixel display. It has 1 GB RAM, up to 48 GB of internal storage and dual-cameras for this device, of which the front-facing one is a VGA video-camera.

• Motorola Atrix 4G Specification
• Motorola Atrix 4G Price

LG Optimus Black (announced Jan 2011 CES)

3.5G HSDPA + HSUPA + WiFi 802.11 b/g/n, Touchscreen Candybar, 5.0 MP Camera, 1 GB Memory + microSD (max 32GB), Android OS 2.2 (Froyo)

The LG Optimus Black's NOVA display is designed to be the brightest, clearest and most readable among mobile screens with 700 nits of brightness for optimal visibility. It provides users with an easier and more natural experience when browsing the web, reading emails, or writing documents with higher levels of brightness and pure white tones that deliver true black and white colours for ideal handset viewing.

In addition to greater luminosity, the NOVA display on LG Optimus Black also radically reduces power consumption by 50 percent during general indoor use compared to a conventional LCD. Similarly, AMOLED consumes twice as much power as NOVA to display a full white screen, the most frequently used color scheme for web browsing. Combined with the 1500 mAh battery of the LG Optimus Black, users will have enough power for their daily needs, even at maximum brightness settings.

The LG Optimus Black weighs only 109g and tapers down to the world�s thinnest smartphone profile of 6.0 mm. The LG Optimus Black also introduces the world's first Wi-Fi Direct for quick and high-quality data transfer between mobile devices and adopts the world's first 2MP front-facing camera.

All LG Optimus Black features are available on the Android 2.2 Froyo platform with Android 2.3 Gingerbread upgrade capability. Utilising the 2MP front-facing camera, the LG Optimus Black allows users to utilize video telephony functions of higher quality after upgrading to Android's Gingerbread.

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HTC Sensation officially announced

HTC latest Android flagship, HTC Sensation or also known as the HTC Pyramid is officially revealed in the HTC UK launch event. The HTC Sensation shares many similarities with the HTC EVO 3D such as the 4.3-inch Super LCD with qHD (540 x 960) resolution, 1.2GHz dual-core processor and HTC Sense 3.0. Unfortunately, the HTC Sensation does not come with a glassless 3D screen as what the HTC EVO 3D has.

At a glance, HTC Sensation comes with the HTC trademark aluminum unibody construction. Plus, it has a contoured Gorilla glass along the entire edge of the screen to prevent the screen from scratches when it is faced down. It is designed in a way that is comfortable for the users to hold the smartphone. It has a dimension of 126.1mm x 65.4mm x 11.3mm and weighs 148g with battery.

Under the hood, the HTC Sensation is powered by 1.2GHz dual-core Snapdragon processor coupled with 768MB of RAM, which make running any apps without delay. It will be running on Google Android 2.3 (Gingerbread) with the latest HTC Sense 3.0.

The new HTC Sense 3.0 features the new active lockscreen, which it could display useful information such as photos from gallery, stocks, weather and social networking via widgets without the need to unlock the screen. In addition, it has four customizable shortcuts such as phone, camera, message and Facebook at the bottom of the screen, where user could just drag any of these shortcuts into the unlock ring, allowing the user to run the app without the need to unlock the screen first. This intuitive active lockscreen does share some resemblance with the Nokia Bubble Unlock.

Of course, HTC also make some improvement of the HTC Sense's UI, when you pinched out from the homescreen, you will able to experience a 3D-animation showing the preview of all 7 homescreens. Flicking across the homescreen have also added 3D feeling, which it gives you the feeling of spinning a real-time carousel. The weather widget has been upgraded, giving you more fancy weather graphics and displays temperature changes.

Unlike the HTC EVO 3D, the HTC Sensation is equipped with an 8-megapixel camera with dual LED flash. HTC touted that the HTC Sensation is able to capture instantaneous shots when the shutter touch button is pressed, eliminates the shutter lag that appears in previous HTC models. HTC has also boost up the video recording capability to 1080p full HD resolution at 30fps. For video calling, the HTC Sensation has a front-facing VGA camera.

In addition, HTC also introduces HTC Watch, an application which provides online video purchase or rental services of the latest movies and TV shows. HTC Watch uses an innovative technology that makes watching video a bliss without the need to wait for the download to finish first.

Connectivity-wise, HTC has bumped up the speed to HSDPA 14.4Mbps and has a microUSB that supports Mobile High Definition video link (MHL) or HDMI connection. Other features include WiFi 802.11 b/g/n, Bluetooth 3.0, GPS and 1520mAh battery.

The HTC Sensation has a 1GB internal storage and will be bundled with 8GB microSD card (size of microSD card bundled may vary by sales region). The HTC Sensation is scheduled to be launched in the European markets in mid-May, while the US market will be getting the 4G version of HTC Sensation this coming summer.

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