Samsung Tocco White Lite

Calendar February 1, 2010 | Posted by SearchMobile

As part of Samsung’s slick Tocco Range, The Tocco Lite is packed full of features, making it more than a match for similar models as a great start for anyone in the budget touchscreen phone market.

In terms of looks, the Tocco Lite really is a stylish handset. Measuring just 11.9mm deep by 104mm tall & 53mm wide, the slick white casing still manages to house a sizeable 3 inch colour touch screen. Boasting a resolution of 240 x 300 pixels, you’ll be able to see everything in crisp and clear high resolution. Operating on Samsung’s established Touch Wiz technology, the interface on the Tocco Lite is customisable and simple to operate. Your homepage can be adapted by adding a number of widgets such as clock, forecasts and web apps such as YouTube, MySpace and Facebook, giving you the freedom to have the information you want at your fingertips.

Samsung have been using the Touch Wiz technology for a while now, and it seems to work effortlessly on the Tocco Lite, especially when coupled with the rather handy “real” keys that let you call, send and select with ease. But these practical additions are still married alongside a great sense of style, meaning you still get all the fancy parts of a touchscreen phone when you purchase a Samsung Tocco Lite. This includes a virtual QWERTY keyboard, a built-in accelerometer which automatically rotates the screen when it is turned on its side and handwriting recognition and gesture lock.

The Tocco Lite also features a 3.2 megapixel camera, with digital zoom, auto focus and Samsung’s “Smile Shot” technology, allowing your camera to work intelligently by gauging when your subject is smiling. There are also photo editing capabilities built into the Samsung Tocco Lite, and the 50Mb memory can be expanded via a microSD card to 16GB, giving you plenty of room to store your memories alongside music and video. In terms of media playback, the Tocco Lite has a music player which supports MP3, WMA and AAC files, FM radio with RDS and video recording and MP4 playback functions. Sound is clear thanks to the Tocco Lite’s equaliser and DNSe support. It’s enough to rival some more high end mobiles, and is a credit to the Tocco Lite that it can hold its own amongst the big boys.

However, there are a few things that the Tocco Lite is lacking. Although connectivity wise you are spoilt for choice with Bluetooth, USB and GPRS functions, the Tocco Lite can be prone to jerky playback when on sites like YouTube due to it’s lack of WiFi and 3G. However, you’d be hard pressed to find a touchphone that does offers these features without having the price bumped up. And you can still browse in comfort on the Tocco Lite, with great accessibility on RSS feeds and Google services.

You also get plenty of battery time. At just 93mg, the Tocco Lite is considerably lighter than some other Samsung models, and although this impacts on the battery life, you are still looking at around 8 hours of talk time and

350 hours of standby on the Tocco Lite. And with it’s quad band network function, you can travel the world and the Tocco Lite can easily accommodate anywhere you are likely to take it.

Overall, the Samsung Tocco Lite really is the best of both worlds – a budget touchscreen phone that works incredibly hard. Although some may view it as a compromise, the truth is the Tocco Lite is anything but compromising.

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BlackBerry Curve 8900

Calendar February 1, 2010 | Posted by SearchMobile

The BlackBerry Curve 8900 marks a major play by BlackBerry to produce a handset that can work beautifully both in and out of the office. Often the first choice in business, the BlackBerry Curve 8900 stands out for its ability to play just as hard as it works.

It has a massive 2.4 inch LCD Colour Screen, with a crystal clear resolution of 480 x 360 pixels. Compared to other BlackBerrys, the BlackBerry Curve 8900 screen can be a little overwhelming, but once you get used to it, you’ll find your emails have never looked better! Matching the iPhone in resolution, we have to say, for ease of use, the BlackBerry Curve 8900 really does have the edge in terms of professionalism. And measuring 109 x 60 x 13.5 mm and weighing in at just 110g, the BlackBerry Curve 8900 is one of the smallest and lightest around, making it just as easy to fit into your jeans as your suit.

As with other BlackBerrys, the Curve 8900 features a full 35 QWERTY keyboard. The keys are a decent size, and with a little bit of practice, are fantastic in terms of usability. It also features the standard trackball, which although can be described as an acquired taste, is still pretty easy to pick up. But with Office editing features and compatibility with pretty much every email server possible, it is fair to say the BlackBerry Curve is made for emailing and texting.

But don’t be fooled into thinking the BlackBerry Curve is all substance and no style. The ergonomic design makes this a great looking phone, and once you start looking at the other features that the BlackBerry Curve 8900 offers, you’ll soon realise off duty, this phone means business.

There’s a great 3.2 megapixel camera with auto focus and flash, and video recording and playback capabilities. The player supports a wide range of video including MPEG4, DivX, XviD, H263 and WMV formats, making this a serious media player. Factor in the microphone and a great and easy to use media player which supports MP3 and has the usual features of organising your library by artists, album, genre and so on and you’ll find yourself entertained for hours on end. Sound quality is loud and proud, and there is a standard 1Gb of storage via a microSD memory card the BlackBerry Curve 8900, which can be expanded up to 16Gb, giving you ample room for some of your favourites!

And because this is a BlackBerry, the Curve 8900 obviously boasts more connectivity options than you can shake a fibre optic cable at. Wi-Fi, Bluetooth, USB and GPRS are all available, and there is even the BlackBerry maps application included. And with Quad Band technology, you can use your BlackBerry anywhere in the world – they even supply an international charger as encouragement! And the BlackBerry Curve 8900 has great staying power, with 5.5 hours of talk time and 360 hours standby.

The only quibble we would have is with the lack of 3G. Especially when you consider the screen size, it seems a shame to compromise on data transfer. But this is really splitting hairs. We are huge fans of the BlackBerry Curve 8900. It packs quite a punch, and a fair few surprises as well. Its combination of practical business thinking alongside great features and design mean that the BlackBerry Curve 8900 is one of the best phones to use – whatever your occupation.

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Sony Ericsson Satio Review

Calendar February 1, 2010 | Posted by SearchMobile

The Sony Ericsson Satio has had a lot of hype to live up to. Sony Ericsson have been accused of lagging behind in terms of touchscreens, with the Satio touted as their big response. And the Satio doesn’t disappoint… in some ways. If you like your mobile phone simple and uncomplicated, then the Satio may not be for you. But if you can handle a phone that is a little high maintenance and requires initial patience, then you could find yourself handsomely rewarded by the Satio, which in some ways is one of the best touchscreen camera phones available.

In terms of looks, the Satio is well designed. It’s a little less slick compared to some other touchscreens, and a little heavier, weighing in at 126g and boasting dimensions of 111 x 54 x 15 mm. But looks can be deceiving, and whilst other phones are more attractive, the Satio is full of hidden depths. It has a great 3.5 inch 16 million Colour Touch Screen, with an incredible resolution of 640 x 360 Pixels. In terms of resolution and viewing quality, you are going to be hard pushed to find a phone that betters the Satio.

Which is no surprise when you consider the imaging capabilities, namely an incredible 12.1 Megapixels camera. Complete with Xenon flash, digital zoom, auto focus, geo tagging functions on pictures, smile and face detection function, picture album and slide shows as well as your standard editing features, the Satio really is pushing the envelope as a credible combination of phone and digital camera. And in terms of video, the Satio similarly trounces its competitors, with video streaming, video recording, 3G video calling – and all complete with video flash.

There are your standard media playing features as well, with a player supporting MP3, AAC and MPEG4, giving you album art display, playlists and also FM Radio with an RDS function. The memory storage supplied is limited to just 128MB, but this is expandable to 16Gb with a microSD card. Battery time is also quite good on the surface, with 11 hours of talk time and 360 hours of standby.

But perhaps its the Symbian operating system that lets it down a little, which is notorious for being powerful but clunky. However, the Satio recently had a software update  to rectify some of the initial teething problems, which included a tendency for the Satio to crash unexpectedly, a slightly odd setup and sometimes unresponsive interface, which can often mean taking the long road when it comes to navigation.

However, we want to give the Satio the benefit of the doubt, and once you are comfortable with it, there are many plus points to mark this out as a phone to fall in love with. Connectivity wise, you are looking at 3G HDSPA, Bluetooth, USB, Wi-Fi (again, this can initially be a little inconvenient to set up, but once in place, works fantastically well) and also the ability to synchronise the Satio with your PC. Email is supported, although not with Windows Live. There is however GPRS and Google Maps, so you can rely on the Satio to work out where you are, and with quad band, this can be in any country in the world.

In some respects the Satio is a little difficult. But we think once you get the hang of it, it is much more rewarding than some of the more accessible touchscreens about. We reckon the Satio will often split opinion, but those that are willing to invest a little time getting to know its quirks will ultimately find themselves with a phone that really is unlike any other.

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