Samsung Jack – AT&T – a fully loaded messaging phone
Sum and Substance:
Thumbs Up:
A great revamped phone with great improvements over the previous BlackJack, superb call quality, fast processor, good camera. Other goodies include Bluetooth, 3G, Wi-fi and GPS.
Thumbs Down:
The body of the phone is slippery; presence of proprietary port for power/headset is a disappointment on a powerful phone like this.
Inside the Trunk:
Technology: WCDMA (UMTS) / GSM
Band: WCDMA (UMTS) / GSM 850/900/1800/1900
Phone design: Candy bar
Caller ID: Yes
Other features: Camera, Bluetooth, 3G, EDGE, Wi-Fi.
The Whiz Kid Speaks:
The display of the phone is 2.4 inch big, has a display resolution of 320X240 pixels, 65k colors, supported audio formats are MIDI, WMA, WAV, QCP, MP3, MMF, AAC. Video formats recognize by the device are MPEG-4, WMV, 3gp. Connections on the handset include USB port and proprietary headset jack. The 1480 mAH phone battery of the phone has a talk time of 420 minutes and standby time of 288 hours. The handset has 3.2 mega pixels camera on the back of the phone and a VGA camera in the front for video calls.
Application software on the handset includes Microsoft Office Outlook Mobile, Windows Media Player 10 Mobile, Microsoft Voice Command, Microsoft Office Mobile, Windows Live Messenger, Microsoft Direct Push, AOL Instant Messenger, Currency Converter, Yahoo! Messenger XpressMail , Calculator, Adobe Flash Lite, ActiveSync, Worldtime, Stopwatch, Scheduler, Bluetooth, Calendar, Clock, Alarm.
The operating system of the Jack is Microsoft Windows Mobile 6.1, for messaging the phone comes preloaded with Windows Live Messenger (MSN Messenger), AOL Instant Messenger Service (AIM), Yahoo! Messenger. There is support for IMAP4 and POP3.
Razzle Dazzle:
Samsung Jack, though belonging to the BlackJack series is a lot different from that family when it comes to looks. The handset is 2.4 inches wide, 4.4 inches tall, 0.5 inches thick and weighs 3.5 ounces. We liked the rounded corners that the phone had, giving it a cute look. The phone has mirror chrome exterior which is shiny and will sure turn heads when you flaunt the phone on the streets.
Inside Dope:
Samsung Jack is the successor to Samsung BlackJack and the Jack is already famous with rock star Ozzy Osbourne flaunting it on your TVs during commercials. The new handset has some improvements compared to the previous one; it has a better camera and faster processor. This is a messaging phone, so care has been taken by Samsung to ensure that all your messaging requirements are fulfilled. The Jack is your for $99.99 with a two year contract and will lock horns with AT&T’s other ace, the Nokia E71x. We were equally impressed with both the phones. However, if you ask us to choose one, we will go for the Nokia because it has better keyboard whereas Jack has some downsides like slippery exteriors and a proprietary jack for charger and headset.
The display of the phone is 2.4 inch big has 65k colors with resolution of 320X240 pixels. We thought the display was a bit small but it is bright and clear so text and pictures are clear. The home screen can be customized with themes, background images, etc.
The Jack doesn’t have a touch screen display; we will thank Samsung for this, because touch screen interface on such a small screen would have been miserable. On the navigation bar, there is a four way navigation button, talk and end keys, back button, home shortcut key and 2 soft keys. The speakerphone gets activated when you long press the talk key and the handset gets locked with the long press of the end key. There is Turbo Scroll feature – when you long press the down key the page moves fast. If you want to move slower, you tap the down key.
The QWERTY keyboard is not as comfortable to type as E71x because it seems crowded with the keys placed too close to each other. But once you get the hang of it you will be able to type easily because the size of the keys is big. It is not oval as other Samsung keyboards but rectangular ones.
On the sides of the phone, there is a volume rocker and a power key. Presence of a proprietary port for headset and power charger is definitely a turn off and maybe also a deal breaker. You refrained from using a standard 3.5 mm headphone and you can use only one peripheral at a time.
The card slot is located behind the battery cover which means you will have to dig a bit. This is not all; the exterior is so slippery that your fingers will slip a lot while trying to take of the cover.
The handset comes with headset adapter, USB cord, software disc, AC adapter and reference manual. Features on this handset include multimedia messaging, threaded text messaging, voice commands, conference calling, three-way calling, speed dialing, speaker phone and quad band world roaming.
The differences between this handset and Blackjack II are the camera, memory and processor speed. Jack has upgraded all these features to give you a better experience. The phone has a 3.2 camera which doesn’t take good indoor shots but bright light photos look great. Video quality was miserable, they looked dark and blurry. The device also lets you make video calls to a compatible device. The phone also has Bluetooth 2.0 with stereo and mono Bluetooth headsets, object push profile, personal area networking and hands-free kits. You can use the phone to connect to the internet on your laptop
The phone has 3G which is quite fast but that depends on where you are located. We tested the phone for 3G by streaming video occasionally it suddenly dropped to EDGE which made the video quality look awful. 3G isn’t available everywhere so you will have to use Wi-fi at some places. Connecting the handset to a Wi-Fi point was fast we were greeted with a “Coming soon..” message when we tried to use the feature. For browsing the internet, there is Internet Explorer Mobile browser, which in spite of loads of improvements, has never been able to compete with Safari.
Samsung Jack also has A-GPS/GPS and support for AT&T Navigator both Global Edition and domestic version. With this service you can get voice guided directions, real time tracking and lots of other tools for navigation. The service is free for 30 days after which you will be charged $9.99 unless you cancel the service. The Global Edition further costs $19.98 a month.
The phone was finally tested for call quality and we were delighted with what the phone had to offer. Voice was crystal clear, we absolutely had no problems talking and our friends too had high praises for the phone call quality. The volume was loud enough so we had no problems talking in places with too much noise. Pairing the phone with Bluetooth was fast and the quality was great.
The phone is powered by 1,480mAh lithium ion battery which has a rated talk time for seven hours and standby time is of 12 days.
This power full handset is powered by 528 MHz processor with 256 MB RAM and 256 MB ROM. The internal memory is 96 MB and you can further expand it to 16 GB through microSD card.
Nitty Gritty:
Samsung Jack is a good messaging phone, it would have been the best ever had it not been for the slippery surface and the proprietary port. Get the phone if you don’t mind the two drawbacks. Otherwise get E71x with better design and same great features.
