Samsung releases another one of its Ultra Series Ultra-thin phones, this time tackling the high-end market with a Windows Mobile (5.0 though and not 6.0) and a Qwerty keyboard

This is the first Samsung smartphone that features 1.8Mbps high-speed downlink packet access (HSDPA). In addition, 3G UMTS, GSM/GPRS/EDGE connectivity is supported, along with Wi-Fi and Bluetooth. It also supports web applications such as podcasting and RSS Reader.

The design of the Samsung Ultra Messaging i600 is similar to 3 other popular pocket PC phone the market, the Motorola MotoQ, the T-Mobile Dash and the HP iPAQ hw6915. What is common about these 3 devices, in terms of design, is the built in QWERTY keyboard on the front. The dimensions of these pocket pcs and smart phones differ. The thinnest of all is the Motorola MotoQ but the most compact and small (both in height and weight) is the Samsung i600. The difference in thickness with the Motorola MotoQ is only a matter of 1.5 mm something which is not important at all. As you can see from the comparison table below the Samsung Blackjack has the same height as the T-Mobile Dash, has the smallest width (58 mm) and it is 5 mm thinner than the HP iPAQ hw6915 and only 1.5 mm thicker than the MotoQ.

In terms of weight, which is an important factor if you carry your mobile phone all the day with you, the Samsung SGH-i600 is the lightest of all. It weights just 99g while the Motorola MotoQ is 115g, the HP iPAQ hw6915 150g and the T-Mobile Dash is 120g.

The display of Samsung SGH-i600 is one of the disadvantages of this device. It is not a touch screen (the SGH-i600 is a smartphone and not a pocket pc phone – read below of the difference between the two versions) and its size is only 2.25 inches (diagonal). It can be consider a disadvantage because the other devices have a bigger display but this is the trade-off of having a small and compact device. The HP iPAQ hw6915 which is a huge device compared to the Samsung SGH-i600, has a diagonal display of 3.0 inches. The Motorola MotoQ has a 2.5 inch display and the T-Mobile Dash a 2.4 inch display. Nevertheless the quality of the display has nothing to be jealous off compared to the displays of the other devices. It has a resolution of 320×240 with 65k colors and it is bright enough both in text, images and videos.

The handset itself is extremely compact, measuring 11.3 x 5.9 x 1.2cm and weighing in at a very lightweight 105g. It feels robust and well made and it can certainly withstand the day-to-day bumps of a busy lifestyle - even just trying to crowbar the back cover off to put a SIM card in was a traumatic experience. The black casing has a tactile feel and provides a comfortable grip. It has a large, beautifully clear 2.3in colour screen, which offers 65,536 colours - the resolution’s 320 x 240 pixels - on a TFT LCD display. A key feature of the i600 is its micro QWERTY keyboard, which is surprisingly fat finger-friendly, unlike many of the micro keyboards found on similar devices.

Sadly, the headphone socket shares the charger connection point - which also doubles as the USB port, so you cannot charge while listening to music or using the headphones as a handsfree set. Navigating around the device is remarkably easy. Most of the main functions appear in the Start menu accessible by pressing one of the hotkeys on the left of the scroll wheel. These hotkeys offer a number of options when tapped, which change according to what’s on the screen. The Home key, as you’d expect brings you neatly back to the main window, that shows any due appointments, missed calls, emails and icons for primary applications.

There seems to be some confusion over what the difference actually is between a smart phone and PDA phone. Many manufacturers commonly interchange between the two terms with out any real consistency. Most smartphone devices have micro keyboards - but this is by no means a hard and fast rule. Typically a smartphone is a device that also features PDA functionality and runs a scaled down variation of Windows Mobile designed specifically for mobile phones. Thus they could be referred to as a phone first and a PDA second. Smartphones also generally have a longer battery life and cannot be customised quite as much. But if you primarily use only the calendar and contact features of a PDA anyway, something like the Samsung SGH-i600 is perfect.

Samsung claims up to 6.5 hours talktime purely on 2G and around 3.5 hours on 3G and an average of just over 300 hours on standby. With reasonable daily use, including logging on several times a day for roughly 30 minutes or so and listening to music on the tube journey to work, the i600 happily lasted a few days without requiring charge – which is what you’d expect from a device like this.

Windows Mobile 5.0 provided no problem in synchronising successfully with Microsoft Outlook, sharing the contact, task, and calendar data. The i600 can also synchronise email. However, constantly switching the T9 predictive text input system on and off might prove to be a pain, as most emails require a response and this makes it difficult to reply with more than a couple of lines.

Call quality was superb with more than adequate volume and, unlike many similar devices, you don’t feel like you’re talking into a pocket calculator. The i600 is a tri-band phone supporting 900, 1800 and 1900 MHz frequencies. Depending on whether your network supports HSDPA – we were using Vodafone, which does – you can also connect the i600 straight to your laptop where it will act as a broadband speed modem. Apple users will need to purchase a third-party piece of software to allow the phone to synchronise to their Mac. Naturally.

Verdict

The i600 is difficult to fault. Really. Compact and well-built, it is an ideal smartphone device. Even the tiny elastic-attached plastic covers to the different ports seem as though they might last as long as the handset itself. The micro keyboard might take some getting used to if you are unfamiliar with these types of devices and the mixture of grey and black colouring on the keyboard could cause a little confusion at first. It is a very good choice for those who want a mobile device powered with Windows Mobile 5.0 that has a design similar to the normal cell phones. It has 3G support, built-in Bluetooth and built-in Wi-Fi.

Thin and light, it won’t deform your jacket, however it does lack the touch-screen which makes Windows-mobile based phones easier to use ..

Samsung Ultra Messaging i600 Specifications:

Network: HSDPA / UMTS, GSM/GPRS/EDGE (850/900/1800/1900MHz)
Camera: 1.3 Megapixel Camera and VGA Camera for Video Telephony
Display: 65536 Color TFT Screen (2.3”,320×240)
Features: Windows Mobile 5.0 for Smartphone, Multi-Format Music & Video Support
Bluetooth Stereo Music Profile (A2DP),
Connectivity: WLAN (802.11b/g), Bluetooth v2.0 EDR / USB
Memory: ROM 128MB / RAM 64MB
External Memory: microSD
Size:112 x 58 x 13mm

Palm Introduces a new Treo based on the PalmOs

Long-term users of personal digital assistants (PDAs) who made the inevitable move to smart phones tend to be quite religious about their devices of choice. Users of the old Palm Pilot will find their faith renewed with the new Palm Treo 680. Admittedly, I wasn’t a big fan of the Palm 750V, which marked the opening of a grand alliance between Palm and Microsoft in the push email stakes as they took on their grand nemesis Research in Motion’s (RIM) BlackBerry product.

The 750V was a brave statement of intent on behalf of both companies. It was perfectly suitable as a productivity device, easily accessing contacts and calendar information and checking email and the internet on the move.

For anyone new to the Palm family and au fait with Windows, it was a marriage made in heaven. But I could readily appreciate how alien the 750V must have been for traditional Palm fans who grew up with a particular operating system (OS) since the Nineties that has changed very little since.

It can be said the PDA is officially dead. Players like Dell have killed off production, while research from Canalys shows that year-on-year market growth for converged smart phone mobiles in 2006 was 26pc. With unit shipments set to exceed 77 million by 2009 Palm clearly wants a piece of the action.

The Treo 680 is built on the same chassis as the 750V so it looks identical but the similarities end there.

The 680 is ultimately a return to form for the Palm family, boasting the same standard OS but with a few nifty embellishments.

It has a handy ‘home’ screen for the quad-band mobile phone element of the device that allows you to slip seamlessly between contacts, voicemail, email and Bluetooth.

The quad-band feature lets the device work anywhere in the world. It also comes with 64MB of storage, three times the memory of the original Treo 650 smart phone. Users can also add up to 2GB of storage with expansion cards.

The device is ultimately being positioned as a productivity device, with email on the go, and comes with the ability to view, edit and share Microsoft Word and Excel documents.

My ultimate test for new phones is how quickly and easily I can get it working with my hands-free Bluetooth car kit and in this respect setting it up was very straightforward.

The only drawback for the device is really its size and weight. The BlackBerry Pearl by comparison is slimmer and lighter but performance-wise they do the same things.

The Treo 680 is a return to form for Palm and a relief for die-hard followers. However, I am hoping that Palm is already hard at work on a slim and slinkier version.
It looks like a good upgrade path for the Treo 650 owners though

The price is around 600$ unlocked in the US - 400 to 450 with a new subscription