There is not much to say about the camera of Nokia N95. No, nobody said common-or-garden. We have talked a lot about the quality of this particular camera and if you have been keeping track, you would know that it's the best camera in a phone to date. Period. Yeah, we know that Samsung released a 10 megapixel phone in Korea a long time ago, but good luck calling your mates on it. The most obvious and important difference between the original N95 and N95 8GB is the camera lens protector. It is removed from the 8GB model, and therefore the camera is activated by pressing and holding the shutter key. The obvious drawback of having your camera lens exposed to scratches needs no further comment. The camera set up time has improved a lot over the previous model, and now the camera can be started in a little less than three seconds. This beats the Nokia N95-1 time by about a second. With Nokia N95 8GB the shot-to-shot time can also be reduced to under three seconds, if the automatic preview is turned off. However the 5-megapixel Sony Ericsson K850 is just a tad snappier than the N95 when it comes to shot-to-shot time.
The Nokia N95 is a 3G Smartphone which comes is a clever two way slider opening mechanism. The phone can be opened either way which provides the user with a keypad when the screen is moved in the up position, a set of multimedia controls when the screen is moved in the down position & when in the closed position the user can use the navigation & shortcut keys. The user can use their Nokia N95 in landscape mode which is when the screen is moved to the down position which is ideal for all multimedia purposes & accessing the Internet. The screen is 2.6 Inches in size & provides a 240 x 320 pixel screen resolution on a 16 million colour TFT display. The mobile handset weighs only 120 gram which is unbelievable considering all the built in technology & capabilities. The Nokia N95 measures 99 x 53 x 21 mm which provides the user with a useable handset which has a solid feel to it.
Key Features :
Disadvantage
The N95 comes in two versions the Nokia N95 & the Nokia N95 8GB which is an 8 Gbyte version of the popular Smartphone. The N95 comes with 160 Mbytes of internal memory & the user can expand the phones memory capabilities by adding a MicroSD™ memory card up to 2 Gbytes. The N95 comes with a 128 Mbytes MicroSD™ memory card included with the start up kit. The Nokia N95 8GB comes with 100 Mbytes of internal dynamic memory which allows the user to store their messages, images, applications & ringtones. The N95 8GB comes with 8 Gbytes of internal flash memory which allows the user to store a high volume of multimedia content including photos, music & video. The phone comes with an integrated GPS navigation feature which supports maps for more than one hundred countries. The GPS navigation system displays the maps in clear detail on the 2.6 inch colour screen & will assist the user to find their desired location. The user can enjoy their phone world wide as the N95 works over a quad band network which includes GSM 850, GSM 900, GSM 1800, GSM 1900 & the Nokia N95 supports HSDPA which provides high speed data. The user can enjoy an advanced Internet experience on their mobile phone as the phone supports XHTML & HTML Internet browsing. The Nokia N95 is a highly capable mobile handset that offers the user high quality connectivity to compatible devices & fast speed data transfer rate thanks to EDGE technology, WLAN Wi-Fi, USB cable connection, infra red Pop Port™ connection & Bluetooth™ wireless technology. The Nokia N95 comes with a fitted battery which will provide the user with up to 220 hours of standby battery time & approximately six & a half hours talk time.
Symbian
Nokia N95 runs on Symbian 9.2 OS with the Series60 3rd Edition user interface. The added feature pack 1 is no news for Nokia smartphones any more but still deserves mentioning. Demand paging is also included in this handset, although it is normally not to be expected in phones with OS prior to Symbian 9.3. This means that only the most essential parts of the program are loaded in the RAM memory with the rest of it remaining on the phone or mass memory. Then they are only loaded if their use is required. The 128MB of RAM is also an important factor to OS performance. In reality, 128MB is virtually impossible to deplete no matter how hard you try. Unless you do it intentionally, Memory Full warnings are not something you can expect on the Nokia N95 screen.5 megapixel wonder
The secondary camera can also be used for taking pictures. It is quickly accessed through the camera interface and can be used as a quick and convenient way to make self-portraits or contact images. It is also capable of recording video but it is hard to imagine that the clips it will produce will be usable in any way.
Monday, November 26, 2007
Nokai N95
Thursday, November 22, 2007
Samsung G600
What can I say about this phone ? Stylish design, combines fab looks with a superb 5 megapixel camera, the choice of colors and the metallic touch add up to some really exquisite looks. G600 Key Features :
Disadvantage
The G600's camera is a 5 megapixel beast with autofocus, LED flash and 4x digital zoom. The only previous phone with a 5 megapixel camera is the enormous Nokia N95, so there's really no comparison between the two. The closest competition in camera terms is probably Sony Ericsson's K810i with its 3.2 megapixel camera. Even though the Samsung beats the Sony in megapixel terms, the K810i can still (just) keep its crown as camera king for two reasons: better optics make for a (slightly) better quality image and the K810i's xenon flash beats the LED flash on the G600 for brightness. But still the G600 is an impressive camera phone and Samsung are now very close at Sony's heels when it comes to mobile photography. The G600 features two useful camera modes - panorama mode lets you take pictures of wide views such as landscapes, and macro mode lets you take close-up shots. There's a built-in picture editor, and direct printing to a Pictbridge-compatible printer is supported. High quality video recording at 640 x 480 pixels is also available.
After a camera, the next most important gadget in a mobile is a music player, and the G600 doesn't disappoint. It's Samsung's best music player so far. Every major format is supported (MP3, AAC, AAC+, 3-AAC+ and WMA). There's support for wireless Bluetooth stereo headsets - in fact there's support for dual headsets, which means that a friend can listen to your music at the same time if you wish. The G600 has a new music player interface with a dedicated music library. You can create playlists and organise your music by artist, album or genre. It's as easy to use as an iPod. An FM radio is also built in. Memory isn't a problem either as the G600 has built-in user memory of 40 Mbytes plus a 1 Gbyte memory card supplied in the sales package.
The phones battery provides approximately 3.5 hours of talk time or approximately 300 hours of standby battery time from a fully charged battery. The battery time is dependent on the built in features used on the mobile phone. The Samsung G600 supports Bluetooth® A2DP wireless connectivity which allows the user to transfer files between two compatible Bluetooth® devices with being tangled in wires. The phone has a USB port which allows the USB cable provided to connect their mobile phone to any USB compatible devices to download data or transfer files. The built in EDGE technology provides high speed data transfers which are approximately three times faster than GPRS. The G600 comes with a built in Web browser which allows the user to gain access to the Web & surf for their desired information or online stores.
The user can stay in contact with others with help from the built in messaging services which include an email service, text message service & a multimedia message service. The user can create, send, receive & store their messages on their Samsung G600. The multimedia message service can contain either a photo or video complete with sound & text which can be shared between any multimedia messaging compatible users. The phone comes with a phone book feature which allows the user to have a photo caller identification which allows the user to assign a photo or image to a contact in the phone book & each time the contact call the assigned photo or image will be displayed for the user to see on their screen. The phone comes with call management features which allow the user to access recent call lists. The G600 is a super stylish camera phone which will be adored by afar, unless you are the user of course.
The Samsung G600 features dynamic animated wallpaper as usual. Of course you can change that with a wallpaper of your choice. If you stick with the animated one, known in the past as Samsung uGo, it will automatically update the home screen background to display landmarks of the city or country you're in. The scenery even changes when night falls.
In standby, the up direction of the navigation key activates the proprietary Samsung My Menu. It features several user-configurable shortcuts for your convenience. As it has always been with Samsung handsets, pressing the confirm key on the pad in standby launches the web browser - a truly inconvenient solution but one gets used to that eventually.
Samsung G600 features the interface styling we first saw in Samsung E950. The G600 menu interface has an advantage over Samsung E950, as it offers lovely animation effects. There are four animation styles (slide, door, zoom, fade) to choose from and the handset deals well with all of them. We are under the impression that the G600 is equipped with a rather capable processor.
The interface supports skinning through themes. There are several presets but you can create ones of your own too. The number of the main menu icons displayed is a total of twelve. You can choose whether list menus should be available as pop-ups (Samsung old-school) that come up when you highlight a menu item, or not.
The Samsung G600 is also the first Samsung handset to actually have full-featured ringing profiles. All we used to get with previous models was the Silent and Normal ringing modes. Now there's a choice of 5 profiles, including the Offline mode.
Another new thing about the menu system is that all settings are put together in one place - phone, light, display, messages, calls, phonebook settings, etc. are all easily accessible from one place. A centralized setting for choosing the default memory for different applications is also available - you can set that for the camera, voice recorder, FM radio (with the G600 you can record FM broadcasts), Bluetooth, WAP downloads, etc - all in the same place. It's really convenient.
Overall, Samsung G600 is a great mobile phone with 5Megapixel camera but I Fear the Samsung G600 won't be able to snatch the best 5 megapixel slider recommendation off the heavyweight contenders in that form factor.
No offence, I still find the G600 pleasant to the eye and great to hold in hand. It's a genuine multimedia gadget from head to toe. Adding to the fact that it's the most compact and most affordable 5 megapixel camera phone to date, the Samsung G600 looks like a great pick for this year's holiday shopping.
Monday, November 19, 2007
Nokia N81
The camera interface looks identical to the one found in the Finnish multimedia flagship Nokia N95. The camera options are shown with small icons near the lower end of the screen. These can be hidden to make full use of the display as a viewfinder. The main camera only shoots in landscape mode which is easily explainable by the position of the dedicated camera key. Besides, it feels far more natural to take pictures this way. Camera settings are identical to the one on Nokia N95 with one nice addition - grid lines can now be added to the viewfinder. You can use them to help compose your snapshots like a pro - the photography rule-of-thirds is that you should place your main subject either along these lines or at the points where they intersect. The rule-of-thirds also applies to landscape shots. There you should have the sky occupying either one third or two thirds of the frame. The other change made goes without saying - macro mode is not present due to the lack of autofocus on Nokia N81. Luckily the customizable ISO settings, white balance and scene modes are still present. Finally we need to mention that the dedicated camera button could be a bit bigger and easier to press. As it is with this phone, you either need to look at it or spend a few seconds finding it with your fingertips. The N81 has an offline mode, switching off all transceivers but allowing the use of the other features of the device. It is the default profile if you start the handset without a SIM card. The offline mode allows full access to the functions of the phone that do not require cellular network coverage.
Remember with N-Gaged and IPhone ?? I think Nokia N81 is combination of the them. N81 Key Features :
Disadvantage
There are two versions of the handset - standard and 8GB. The standard version features a memory card slot, the other has none but offers the exciting 8GB of onboard memory. We are looking at the Nokia N81 8GB but all of it holds true for the standard Nokia N81 as well. Therefore, from now on we are going to simply call it Nokia N81.
When we speak about phones, a 2.4" inch display is well worth a praise. With N81 and the N-Gage gaming experience it offers, the 2.4" display with 16M colors and QVGA resolution seems the spot-on choice. The display on Nokia N81 has great sunlight legibility, incredible picture quality and is large enough for everyone to see. You can hardly want any more even in this price range.
The N81's other focus is gaming. Games can be played in portrait or landscape mode, making full use of the fantastic 16.7 million colour display. The N81's secret is that it includes support for Nokia's NGage series of games. The choice of games is excellent and the quality of the 3D graphics is exceptional. If you're serious about games, then this is seriously highly recommended.
Symbian
Nokia N81 is running on Symbian 9.2 OS and uses the well known S60 3rd edition graphic user interface. The improved Feature Pack 1 is no news anymore, as all recent Nokia smartphones are equipped with it. Among the strong points of the FP1 is the availability of multiple alarms, as well as the voice memo limit increase to a whole hour. Furthermore, it displays blue circles on running applications' icons to remind you to turn them off when you don't need them any more. No one wants used up RAM to slow down their smartphone. All that said, we need to mention that Nokia N81 is armed with the fastest Nokia processor to date (ARM 11, 369 MHz). The same CPU powers the Nokia 6120 Classic and Nokia 5700. Navigating the menus is very fast. All the commands are executed in an instant, which greatly contributes to the impression N81 leaves.
Camera
It's astonishing that Nokia has decided to integrate a 2 megapixel fixed focus camera into the Nokia N81, instead of trying to close the gap in the three megapixel race. But let's leave our frustration aside and continue the camera test.
The Nokia N81 & Nokia N81 8GB work over quad band technology with WCDMA which allows the user to enjoy worldwide network coverage on their new handset. The phones are 3G mobile phones which provide the user with multi tasking capabilities & the phones support WLAN technology. The user can enjoy wireless connection to compatible devices using a Bluetooth® connection between devices. The user can transfer files or data including photos, videos 7 music files using Bluetooth® Wireless technology or a USB cabled connection. The user will find their new handset provides high speed transfers with the help of the built in Edge technology. The user can enjoy a mobile Internet experience on their handset as both phones come with a Nokia browser complete with mini map. The phones come with a variety of messaging services which allow the user to stay in contact with others quickly & easily. The user can send & receive text messages, multimedia messages containing photos or video & emails complete with attachments. The messaging services are all easily accessible from the phones main menu & the user can enjoy sharing messages between all compatible messaging contacts. These phones have been designed with the user in mind & the user will fully enjoy their new mobile experience with one of these beautiful handsets as their companion.
If you are gamers and camera isn't an important thing then go ahead, N81 Is the best for you.
Sunday, November 18, 2007
Sony Ericsson W960i
That's How I thought about this phone at first. W960i Key features :
- Walkman® Touch Music Player
- Symbian OS 9.1 with UIQ 3.0
- 8 Gbytes Memory
- 2.6" 262k Touch Screen with Handwriting Recognition
- 3.2 Megapixel Camera with 3 x Digital Zoom
- Wi-Fi support
- 3G Technology
- Bluetooth® Technology
- FM radio
- Dedicated touch-sensitive player keys
- Not as impressive in life as in the promotional photos
- Slow interface response as storage gets nearly used up
- Back key location changed
- Music player cannot sort tracks by filename
- No EDGE support
The Sony Ericsson W960i is the successor of Sony Ericsson W950, which came with 4GB of integrated memory, but failed to gain popularity for the lack of camera and Wi-Fi capabilities. In fact, featurewise the W960 resembles more the Sony Ericsson P1 - they are almost identical in terms of hardware (although the P1 has an Infrared port, which lacks in W960i). The W960i features the same 208MHz processor and the same amount of RAM - 128MB. However, the W960 boasts a dedicated Walkman key, three touch-sensitive keys for controlling the music player and, finally, that all-important Walkman home screen application with fullscreen visualizations
The highly capable W960i Walkman® music phone comes in a super stylish vinyl black coloured casing which measures 109mm high by 55mm wide by 16mm deep. The music phone is a 3G capable handset which provides the user with high speed technology & the highest quality music features. The Sony Ericsson W range is a popular range which is adored by all music loving phone users & includes other 3G Walkman® music focused handsets including the Sony Ericsson W910i & the Sony Ericsson W950i. The Walkman® music phone comes with a massive 8 Gbytes of memory which allows the user to store up to eight thousand songs on their handset. The slender 3G music phone comes with a highly useable touch screen which allows the user to control their music & messaging features on the screen. The screen is large measuring 2.6 Inches & provides a screen resolution of 240 x 320 pixels which displays up to 262k colours for the user to enjoy a colourful viewing experience. The Walkman® touch player comes with a Symbian™ operating system which supports document readers & editors. The user can input text using the stylus provided on the touch screen which will be automatically transform handwritten characters into a letter from the keypad as the phone supports handwriting recognition.
The Sony Ericsson W960i offers its user the perfect music companion which comes with easy to use features. The phone comes with a built in Walkman® music player which comes with music playlists & supports album art which can be displayed on the phones large touch screen. The user can enjoy a truly portable & fun music experience on the W960i. The built in FM radio supports RDS which allows the user to enjoy listening to their favourite radio station whilst viewing information which is sent from the radio station & displayed on the large screen. The user can listen to their radio whilst reading information sent from the radio station. The music phone comes with some useful music features which include a music recognition feature known as TrackID™ which is powered by Gracenote mobile music. The TrackID™ feature is quick & easy to use which allows the user to record a few seconds worth of a song they like the sound of, which is then sent to TrackID™ which will provide the user with the name of the song , the artist or band name & the album name within a few seconds. The W960i comes with a music PlayNow™ feature which allows the user to buy or audition ringtones in three simple clicks of a key which is the fastest way for the user to download the latest ringtones onto their phone. The phone supports MP3, polyphonic & AAC ringtones which provides the user with a wide choice of sound on their handset. The user can enjoy a wireless music experience by using the Bluetooth® stereo A2DP connectivity which is available on this stylish music phone. The user can use the Mega Bass™ feature allows the user to enjoy high quality bass frequencies through the phones speakers or when using the headphones. The Sony Ericsson W960i comes complete with Disc2Phone software which allows the user to enjoy a drag & drop music transfer from their CD's to their handset.
Usability
Using the Sony Ericsson W960 in everyday scenarios like making calls, managing contacts and listening to music was a pleasant task. We do miss the side Back button, which enabled single-handed operation of the interface. There is of course a software Back key, but it's hardly usable in combination with the Jog wheel, especially for left-handed users.The keypad is comfortable to use and keys provide nice tactile feedback. That of course does not hold true for the touch-sensitive keys. All keys have a rather uneven white backlighting (it does seem bluish on the photos, though).
Symbian UIQ
The Sony Ericsson W960i interface is UIQ 3.0 - a customizable stylus-based user interface for mobile phones, based on the Symbian 9.1 OS. The interface is the same one used in previous Sony Ericsson smartphones such as the W950, the P990, and the P1. With W960i however, the Walkman functionality is on focus.
Probably the biggest update is the ability to change the well-known Today screen with a Walkman one. When the player is inactive, you have a big Walkman shortcut right in the middle of the screen. Once you get your music playlist rolling, the home screen will visualize every detail about the currently running track plus its album art. The most definite eye-catcher of all is the fullscreen visualizations.
The best thing about the new home screen is that the old one is still an option when you use your smartphone to run everyday jobs. In case you opt for it, the Today screen will display the current Calendar events, messages and emails, missed calls, general notes, etc. With the Today screen on, the four top shortcuts of the bar we mentioned earlier appear at the bottom.
A nice thing is that the smartphone has a dedicated Flight mode, which can be turned seamlessly on without restarting the phone. Starting the handset directly into Flight mode is another option, which you get prompted about every time you power it on. The main menu of the Sony Ericsson W960i allows two different views: icon grid and list view. The font throughout the user interface is rather small, except for the file manager, messaging and phonebook, where you can choose between there different font sizes. The smartphone interface is customizable through various graphic themes - unfortunately, ours had only the default Walkman one preinstalled.
The Sony Ericsson W960i is equipped with a 3.2 megapixel camera with autofocus and a dual-LED flash - again, much like the P1 and unlike the previous Walkman-enabled smartphone W950. The maximum resolution is 2048 x 1536 pixels. Pictures are taken by holding the handset in landscape mode. The camera interface is intuitive - all settings are arranged in a toolbar at the bottom of the screen.
In fact, the snappy camera interface reminds a lot of the interface of the latest Sony Ericsson phones, with its similar graphics and functions. There are three quality levels and the camera has a full automatic exposure control, while offering nice manual overexposure control accessible from the main viewfinder interface.
The autofocus settings of the camera feature a dedicated macro mode. You can even turn the autofocus off and use a fixed focal length for even faster snapshots. The camera offers automatic white balance but there are four custom white balance presets to choose from, depending on the environment. You can apply several color effects to the pictures and video, such as Black & white, Sepia, Solarization and Negative.We will refrain from much comment on the picture quality, as we're convinced that the final, retail version of the smartphone will have the camera quality improved. Our unit (being a pre-release one) produced images with very high contrast and sharpness. So we don't find our samples satisfactory, so we'll not publish full-size shots. Instead, we post some of the better images downsampled to 1024 x 768 pixels. We expect that when launched, Sony Ericsson W960i will produce images as good as the Sony Ericsson P1.
Much like previous smartphones, the Sony Ericsson W960i can capture video with a maximum resolution of 320 x 240 pixels at 15 fps. There are S60 mobile phones on the market capable of recording video in VGA resolution at 30 fps while providing full smartphone capabilities. Obviously, QVGA and the low frame rate are somewhat of a downer. Lower resolutions (such as QCIF - 176 x 144) though, allow recording at 30 fps but the picture details are far than adequate. All videos are recorded in 3GP format. The video recording times (no matter what the resolution), are limited by the available memory only.
Using the front VGA video-call camera was easy since it offers a rather intuitive interface. A nice thing is that you can use the rear main camera in video calls too, meaning you can easily show the other party your surroundings. The video-call camera also has a dedicated Night mode. Generally, when it comes to video calls, the W960 Video phone application manages well enough.
Finally, Sony Ericsson W960i a great choice for all you music fans that don't mind using both hands for operating their handset.
