The trendy word right now in the mobile phones world is smartphone – intelligent phones, with a lot of features, very attractive and of course, very useful. Short: the smart phones we all want, with the hope to find our ideal technological partner.
2009 was a milestone and marked the release of some of the most advanced, attractive and of course smart phones. As it was expected, manufacturers improved all aspects: more reasonable dimensions, batteries with high autonomy, generous display ( touchscreen and of course QWERTY keyboards ), photo cameras, processors, Internet and multimedia features and so on. Obviously, with the improvements of the phones also came the improvement the applications, like the operating systems. All of these culminating in the appearance of some digital assistants that we all need.
We have reviewed some of the most important and attractive smart phones took a look at their performances. Because there are a lot of things to consider in a smartphone, you will make the final choice. We have chosen some basic criteria based on which we can make recommendations to you.
Here is what we have considered;
- design
- screen (dimensions, touchscreen, resolution )
- connectivity
- photo camera
- operating system
- dimensions
- battery
- memory
Now, let’s get on with the show
BlackBerry Curve 8900
About Blackberry there only was were good things to say in the last few years and we can’t say that RIM failed with any one of their products.
BlackBerry Curve 8900 is one of the most appreciated smartphones of the company. Obviously, we have to appreciate the phone’s design, QWERTY keyboard which is elegant and thin, but also the autofocus and flash camera. A plus is the 3.5 mm jack.
But what we really have to appreciate is the quality and clarity of the 2.4 inch screen. The solid construction of the phone makes it one of the most beautiful but also useful and reliable smart phones.
As a negative, we have to mention the lack of 3G connection.
BlackBerry Curve 8900 Smart Phone
HTC Touch Diamond2
The HTC Touch Diamond2 is clearly better than the previous HTC smartphones: it has a more attractive and elegant design, a more generous display and a more advanced photo camera.
However, for a smartphone, it has one major flaw: the lack of 3G support. Not even the virtual QWERTY keyboard is not very well designed. Regarding minuses, we can also mention the fact that it has no 3.5 mm jack.
Although is more advanced that the other HTC phones, it still needs some more touch ups. For example, the back of the phone is too simple. True, the 3.2 inch screen with a 480 x 800 resolution compensates because of the clarity, brightness and attention to details. Also, the touchscreen has a pretty high response time.
Clearly, the company thought about the future with the release of Diamond2, considering the fact that the phone is Windows Mobile 6.5 operating system, which was released 8 months later.
HTC Touch Diamond2 smart phone
iPhone 3GS
If we are talking about iPhone, we should talk about the first version, the one that made all the users go crazy and modified the image of smartphones forever. Since the first version and today there were a lot of other version released, with more or less GB available, let’s talk now about the newest iPhone, the iPhone 3GS, the 32G version.
One of the most visible improvements of the latest iPhone is the speed, from applications to download. The bigger capacity of the memory is also another plus, but we still can’t use our own memory card. The battery autonomy is improved, but we still can’t change it. There are applications that can display how much your battery is going to last, for different features of the phone.
The option to edit documents is another plus, along with the video recording feature for camera and voice calls. However the photo camera still doesn’t have a flash.
iPhone 3GS smart phone
Palm Pre
Palm Pre is for people that can’t get their head around the PDA idea, keeping around the fact that PALM was an unknown manufacturer in this area until not long ago.
The Smartphone runs on the Windows Mobile operating system and it runs quite well if you have multiple applications open, it allows data syncs and it has a good display.
It’s true that the Palm Pre is not a disappointment regarding connectivity. It has 3G, Wi-Fi, BlueTooth and GPS support however we can’t say the same thing about the battery autonomy and about the Flash support. And when it comes down to expanding the memory, you should be pleased with only 4GB.
The photo camera is also not very satisfying, providing only 3 mega pixels with flash, without video recording.
About the design, we can’t say that we don’t like it. The practical but initially hidden QWERTY keyboard is one of our favorite. As a practical aspect tho, the QWERTY keyboard is a bit disappointing because the keys are much too crowded.
Palm Pre
Nokia E71
It’s clear that every Nokia product enjoys, right from the start, the company’s name, which disappointed their customers only on a few occasions.
E71 is part of the smart phone category that offers something in return for the money spent on it and it also has Nokia behind it.
It’s a robust smartphone, with 3G, Wi-Fi and Bluetooth support. The GPS seams to be a bit slow but we at least have to appreciate the fact that it’s there.
The 3.2 mega pixels photo camera is not a plus, but it’s not a minus either. Thinner and lighter than the E61 model, The Nokia E71 is a disappointment regarding the keyboard, which is a bit too crowded.
Although its a lot thinner than other phones with QWERTY keyboards, the E71 weights around 127 grams.
Nokia E71 Smart phone
Motorola Milestone
The new smartphone from Motorola was only announced, for now, and it’s expected to make its appearance very soon. The phone was presented on the background of an announcement that makes is very anxious: in 2010, Motorola will release 20 smartphones. It should be the year of Motorola, after a while that we haven’t heard anything new about this company.
Milestone is the first phone running on Android 2.0 ( Eclair ) and this is why we are so anxious. In the United States, the phone will be named Droid.
What we know so far, based on the specifications announced by Motorola, this phone will have a generous display and suitable sizes. The presence of the 3.5 mm jack is considered a plus, and this is the detail that most smart phones manufacturers tend to avoid, and this is what also makes the difference between a multimedia phone and a multimedia phone wannabe.
The 5 mega pixels photo camera with autofocus, LED Flash and image stabilizer sounds very well considering that the Milestone is a smartphone and not a multimedia phone.
The US version will have a Micro SDHC 16 GB card, the Milestone version will only have an 8GB card.
Other pluses are the 550 MHZ ARM Cortex A8 processor, the QWERTY keyboard and the price that seams to be decent.
Motorola Milestone Smart phone
Sony Ericsson Xperia 10
We wrote before about this phone a few days ago, and you can read about it here.
Now, we only want to say that the new Sony Ericsson product has an attractive 4 inch touchscreen, with a 854×480 resolution.
As a plus, we really have to mention the 8 Mega pixels camera with LED flash, Autofocus, smile detection and image stabilizer.
The phone runs on Android 1.6 also known as Donut, and the preinstalled applications are a road opener for Android Market.
Conclusions
The year 2010 will be a milestone for entry level phones, with standard equipments but also but at least intelligent smart phones if not even attractive.
We already know that Nokia will improve their classical phones package with a few models, among which we can mention the Nokia 2690, Nokia 2220, Nokia 1800, Nokia 1280, but also with Smartphones like X6 or X3.
Samsung promises Smasung S5560, Samsung S5630C and I5700 Galaxy Spica, while LG offered an image on LG GD510 and LG KM555E.
Two phones were released by Alcatel, one with touchscreen and one with QWERTY keyboard. And the list can go on and on…
The good news does not end here for users of classical and smart phones. The prices are starting to vary more and more making smartphones become more accessible.
iPhone is no longer a leader in this field, but we will always give Apple credit for being a road opening and a real imagination dare, design and usability in the mobile phones industry.
