SGH-A177 are one of those message centric phone made for people who need to use messaging features a lot on the go. Previously messaging features were found only on a high end smart phone, now there are dedicated phones being made for messaging. One of the pre-requisites of a messaging phone is a good QWERTY keyboard which this phone has. The prepaid phone is yours for $99.99 and there is no fuss of contract. The display of the phone is rather small, just 2.2 inch however it almost takes half of the phone’s surface. The resolution that you get is 220x176 which again is small considering what we have in market today. Don’t expect this tiny display to give you great pictures fortunately the phone display is bright. You can change the brightness, backlight time, color and font of the dialing size. You also change the look of the menu from grid to list. Below the display is the navigation array which we thought had too much buttons. The  [...]

Nokia has finally added a touch screen device to its N series line up. We often wondered why Nokia was shy of making touch screen devices, everyone is using it and it is much more convenient as compared to physical buttons. Above all, it looks sexy. We were dying to get our hands on the Nokia N97 with all the hype surrounding it and so we pounced on it as soon as it entered our test centers. The display of the screen is 3.5 inches big, supports 16.7 million colors and gives a resolution of 640X360 pixels. We were disappointed to see that the phone has a resistive and not a capacitive touch screen. Capacitive touch screens are easier to use because they don’t need a stylus. The screen is certainly not as sharp when compared to what competitors like HTC Touch Diamond2 has. The screen also doesn’t support multi touch, something that the iPhone is popular for. Multi touch interface is great for ‘pinching’ photos while zooming in and out. The huge  [...]

HTC Ozone from Verizon Wireless will directly compete with HTC Snap from Sprint and T-mobile. Both the phones have similar features however we think this phone is the winner among the three owing to the lower price. The phone also feels better in the back. The face of the phone has a cheap plastic feel but in the back the phone has a smooth soft touch finish which feels good in the hands. The QVGA display of the phone is 2.4 inch big and gives a resolution of 320X240 or 64000 colors. The handset is 4.5 inches big, 2.5 inches wide and weighs about 0.5 inches. The display of the phone could have been bigger and sharper. We will somehow compromise with the display size since this is not a touch screen phone. Below the display are two soft keys, back button, home button, and toggle button with OK key in the center. The talk button is also the shortcut key for voice recorder. The OK button could have been a bit thicker because it is a bit difficult  [...]

SGH-T749 is an entry level phone, it is made for people with stiff budgets who want touch screen phone with some modest features inside. Samsung says this phone is "touch-screen phone for the masses” and we really do agree with it. Though its set of features won’t blow you of your feet, it is a good phone for basic use. The features on this phone include a great quality camera, music player, 3G network and speakerphone. Display of the phone is three inch big and gives a resolution for 400X240 pixels, 16 million colors which we think is great for a touch screen. A larger screen gives you more space for working with messaging and web browsing features, not to mention the awesome video experience. TouchWiz interface is still there unfortunately you still cannot place your own widgets on to the bar. There are a few touch screen buttons on the bottom of the display for phone dialer, phone book, web browser and main menu button. These are  [...]

Sony Ericsson and Nokia phones are rare in US to be supplied by a US carrier, they mostly come unlocked which makes the price really high. And hence we were glad to finally get a Sony Ericsson Cyber-shot C905a from AT&T. Cyber shot means that this phone is camera centered and the W series phones from Sony Ericsson stand are walkman series which is music centered. Now, 8+ MP of camera phones are rare and mostly manufacturers proudly boast that this phone will replace their digital cameras and we find that to be quite true. Other than the superb camera, the phone also has other features like GPS, music player and Bluetooth. This version doesn’t have Wi-Fi that the US version has. The display of the phone is 2.4 inch big and it looks really gorgeous. You get a resolution of 240 x 320 pixels which is gives you enough space on the screen to work around with applications. It supports 262,000 colors and watching images and videos on this screen is a treat for your eyes. You can change  [...]

Sony Ericsson makes great multi media phones. Although they are not as good as some of the smart phones that you see in the market, it delivers great on sound quality and camera. The model number of the phone is W518a where in the W stands for walk man series. Sony Ericsson phones are as good as Nokia’s N-series when it comes to music quality. The outer screen of the phone is a monochrome display and shows you battery life, time, numeric caller ID and signal strength. You don’t get a photo caller ID and there is no date either. The text size on the lid is too small and we would have liked an option which would increase the font. The display inside the W518a is 2.25 inches big and gives a resolution of 320X240 pixels, 262,144 colors. The display was quite bright, you can read text easily and the photos are also a treat to watch. You can only change the brightness and the look of the menu, list or icons. The numeric keypad beneath the  [...]

It is raining mobile phones from Samsung. We barely finished with the review of Samsung Highlight and the company delivered this phone in our test centers. Looks like Samsung is making new phones just to cash in on the holiday season so people are tempted to spend big bucks. However this phone indeed has some features that will make you buy it, some of them include 800 MHz processor, revamped web browser and improved TouchWiz interface. The WVGA display of the screen is 3.1 inches big and gives resolution of 800X480 pixels or 16 million colors. The colors are bright, vibrant and photos look awesome on this gorgeous screen. Below the display there are short cuts for the applications you will use the most like messaging, main menu, phone book and keypad. The phone also has a built in accelerometer, though it doesn’t  [...]

T-Mobile Dash is a bit outdated we have been seeing it since 2006 and it is time that the phone was taken of the shelves now. T-Mobile thinks otherwise though and they are here with a revamped version of the device which looks promising owing to the superior finish on the outside. The QVGA display of the Dash 3G is 2.4 inch big and has a resolution of 320X240, 65000 colors. The phone isn’t touch screen but there is not much to complain. With a screen as small as this, using touch screen interface would have been very hard. RIM Blackberry Curve 8900, which is in the same range, has a 480X320 pixel resolution and the superiority of the video and images is clearly seen. This handset has a smaller screen, so you will have to scroll loads while reading messages, e-mail or web browser. Browsing is made easier with the trackball navigator which is extremely easy to use. Around the trackball there is end and talk buttons, 2 soft keys, back button and  [...]

HTC is not a new player in the mobile phone market. It has been around for a while and has been churning out great looking phones one after the other. The Android is here and HTC has jumped the bandwagon to make phones driven on those OS. Barring a few like HTC Alltel, we find all of HTCs phones very attractive. We were a bit overwhelmed to find that the home screen of the phone had seven pages for the menu. You don’t really need this much for the menu. You scroll back and forth by swiping your finger left or right. You can add shortcuts and widgets and you can change the wall paper of the home screen. There are a couple of widgets and you get more on the Android Market but we were really pleased with the widgets that were there in the phone like Twitter widget which give a live stream of tweets. We have been familiar with ‘scenes’ feature of HTC phones, it just like ‘themes’  [...]

Omnia HD is one of the phones which has those out of the box looks and makes heads turn. But the phone is unlocked which means it will be a bit costly and will burn a hole in your pocket. But if you have the money or you are a gadget enthusiast this purchase will not make your regret. To give a brief preview, the phone has HD video playback and recording, 8 MP camera, a revamped TouchWiz interface and lots of storage space. The phone has the same features of Nokia’s N97 and it will lock horn when it comes to market sales. The display of the Omnia HD is 3.7 inch big AMOLED display which has capacitive touch screen interface and you get 360X640 resolutions with 16 million colors. AMOLED is better than LCD since it consumes low power, the video/image quality is better and you get better viewing angles. The screen can also be clearly seen in bright sunlight, something which overwhelms the LCD screen. Capacitive touch screen is better than standard  [...]