Review: Nokia 8800 Arte Introduction

Nokia has been playing an important role lately in the enhancement in the field of internet and mobile communication. Meeting the demands of the picky and trend-following consumer, the company put two new mobile phones on the market at the end of last year; the 8800 Arte and the 8800 Sapphire Arte. High quality materials and a classy appearance are the characteristics of these mobile phones. We will review the Nokia 8800 Arte, the black version of the two. Design, user's ease and user's fun are key words for this technological masterpiece. The 3.2 Megapixel digital camera, MP3 player, ambient light sensor and the internal memory of 1GB are just a few aspects of the promising Nokia 8800 Arte mobile phone.

Nokia 8800 Arte retail package

In addition to the Nokia 8800 Arte, the black box contains a sophisticated Bluetooth headset with corresponding manual. The manual of the mobile phone itself is included too, in two languages and besides that a USB cable, battery charger and software CD are available. A leather pouch prevents the Nokia 8800 Arte from getting damaged and whilst charging the mobile phone, it can be placed in the included solid DT-19 desk stand.The Nokia Arte is a sophisticatedly designed slider phone. The black housing is crafted from glass and metal, which explains its weight of no less than 150 grams. When you take the handset out of the package, you will instantly feel the durability. The simplicity of the design ensures a classy, timeless appearance that will appeal to younger as well as older people.

Nokia 8800 cell phone design

The navigation buttons and some quick access buttons are available on the front, and when you slide open the Nokia 8800 Arte, a full keyboard becomes available. The 2 inch OLED QVGA monitor of 320x240 pixels supports a maximum of 16 million colours and is so very clear that it is a joy to scroll through the menus or to view pictures. Moreover, the Nokia 8800 Arte has been equipped with a sensor that detects ambient light, as a result of which the clearness of the monitor is adjusted automatically to the light circumstances. The device measures 4.3 x 1.9 x 0.57 inches and is neatly finished with silver-coloured edges. According to Nokia's press release, the 8800 Arte features anti-fingerprint coating, however; personally I did not experience the use of it. The back of the mobile phone has a matte coating, but I was forced to clean the shiny front on a regular base.


Nokia 8800 Arte menu

Nokia allow the user to adjust the main menu to his or her own preference. For example, the option button in the main menu allows you to choose from four different icon reproductions: 'List', 'Roster reproduction', 'Roster reproduction with labels' and 'Tabs'. You can even change the sequence of the icons which offers faster access to your favourite options. This saves a lot of time scrolling up and down. The time, the power of the signal and battery status remain visible in every menu; even while using most functions. Unfortunately, the menus respond remarkably slower the moment the battery starts to run low.



Nokia 8800 active standby

Not only the main menu; also the standby mode can be arranged to your own preferences. The active standby lets you collect all the preference functions in the standby screen of the Nokia 8800 Arte. There is room for four sections and a choice from eight different functions, such as the quick access bar, music player, agenda and notes. The quick access bar holds a minimum of 1 and a maximum of 48 icons, which gives you easy access to every far corner of the menu. You can also change the sequence of the icons in the quick access bar. Even the way of selecting the sections of the 'active standby' is entirely up to the user.


Nokia Arte digital camera

The Nokia 8800 Arte has been equipped with a 3.2 Megapixel digital camera. The 8x digital zoom lets you get the object you want to capture, a lot closer. Still I wouldn't recommend using the zoom function frequently since the quality of the end result drops drastically due to this zoom. The pictures turn out granular and blurred and the format of the pictures decreases. The camera features an auto focus and automatic light compensation, whilst it is also possible to adjust the brightness manually through the menu. In bad light situations, the night mode can be activated which compensates for the lack of the possibility to select an ISO setting. Where the normal mode achieves a bad result in badly lit circumstances; the night mode offers a slightly better result. You will have to do without flash, and that is a vast restriction in practising mobile photography. In this case; you will have to learn to live with colour noise and underexposure as obvious factors.


Quality of the camera
In addition to setting the white balance, you can also add a few effects such as sepia or negative. The colour and contrast reproduction of the mobile phone's monitor are not representative for the true colours. You can't expect that, to be honest, since calibration is not playing a role in this segment for the time being. Mobile photography is an area that is not mature yet on the Nokia 8800 Arte. In particular the colour shifting, the limited dynamic range and the lack of a built-in flash make mobile photography with the 8800 Arte a true deed of courage. The Nokia 8800 Arte feels at home in ideal circumstances and that's when you can expect a reasonable photo quality.


Photo editing options

A picture is taken reasonably fast, for mobile concepts, since the shutter release is just 1 second. Besides that, it is quite handy the camera switches automatically to the standby mode if there is no action for a certain amount of time. This saves energy without having to turn the camera function off completely. The photo editing option lets you crop the captured pictures afterwards and adjust the contrast. Various elements can be added e.g. a text, frame or pictogram. The Nokia Arte supports photo formats in JPEG, GIF, BMP, PNG and video formats: 3GPP, H.263 and H.264.

Nokia 8800 Arte MP3 player

Just like every mobile phone nowadays, the Nokia 8800 Arte, too, features an MP3 player. It is easy to operate this function; the navigation button allows you to scroll through the songs and adjust the volume. You can switch between the themes: 'Standard' (blue tones) and 'Magnetic' (grey tones). The music menu gives access to making play lists and to the songs via genre, album and artist. The equalizer in the setting menu lets you choose the right sound to the right song. To enable you to make a better choice when selecting a genre, the ratio between the bass and high tones is visible. The speaker produces a strong clear sound. Listening to music is also very interesting with the included Bluetooth headset. Of course the stereo effect is gone when you listen with only one ear but listening wireless and having an invisible volume adjuster on the touch-sensitive part of the headset, makes you stand out from all the headset and ear-set users. Finally; the Nokia 8800 Arte features an uncomplicated voice recorder to capture voice notes.


8800 Nokia Arte additional functions

A nice and fun function of the Nokia 8800 Arte is the 'tap for time' system. If you are in a rush wanting to know the time, you don't have to slide open the phone or wait for the monitor light. Just tap on the phone twice with your finger and an analogue clock will appear on the screen telling you the correct time. The Nokia 8800 Arte also features a sensor that enables refusing an incoming call or deactivating the alarm just by turning the phone face down. The Nokia 8800 Arte has a lot more going for it than standard conversion of currency, lengths and temperatures. Taking this Nokia phone with you, will end all insecurities about foreign clothes sizes. For example; use size conversion to insert the size of your shoes and a whole list appears with every size from different countries divided in male and female sizes. The function contains information about sweaters, suits, trousers, shirts, dresses and skirts. A superb addition if you like shopping. The translation function in the application menu also looked promising; however, it turned out to be somewhat poor still. It couldn't seem to find simple words such as: dog, office and sun. And when I filled in the word 'lamp' (Dutch for lamp), the English translation said: raspberry, which made my trust in this application disappear at once. The Opera Mini browser lets you surf the Internet with the Nokia 8800 Arte.

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Samsung L310 review | Introduction

Once again, Samsung have put a ladyphone on the market that fully aims at the needs of a woman, with both appearance and functionality. The Samsung L310 Allure is chic, elegant and attractively decorated with Zirconias. There is nothing left to desire as far as functions are concerned; the phone features an FM radio, MP3 player, 2 Megapixel digital camera and rather typical; a shopping list. Samsung created the L310 to add to a luxurious lifestyle. In addition, the phone comes with an exclusive clutch, designed by makeup artist and hairstylist Leco van Zadelhoff. Our findings can be read in the following Samsung L310 review.

Samsung Allure retail sales box

The oblong, black box that holds the Samsung L310 is as elegant as the mobile phone itself. A thin carton cover with cut-out forms accentuates the patterns on the package. Inside you will find the Samsung L310, with manuals in two languages, a quick charger, a USB cable for data transfer through the USB 2.0 connection and a software CD. In addition, you will find a headset in one of the four boxes inside. Unfortunately a protecting cover is not standard included; you will have to purchase one yourself if you’re afraid of getting the phone scratched and damaged. On the other hand; Samsung do deliver a nice addition aiming especially at the target group; a clutch. The latter is an evening bag, especially designed by the successful makeup artist and hairstylist Leco van Zadelhoff. The design of this shiny, black clutch with gold-coloured details fits in seamlessly with the design of the Samsung L310. This clutch has five pockets inside and a small mirror, and will undoubtedly serve many women whilst having a night on the town.


Samsung L310 lady phone design
What else would we expect from a lady phone; the Samsung L310 has a feminine appearance and a sleek design without making use of the colour pink! The nice decoration with Zirconia stones around the camera lens, the gold-coloured stripe around the black housing and the flowery ornament around the monitor and on the back of the phone, give this clamshell model its womanly characteristics. These flower ornaments are also placed on the top lid, showing a ‘heartbeat’, flashing continuously. If you place the Samsung L310 within sight and the ‘heartbeat’ is on, it might distract you tremendously. I had to glance continually to see what was happening, and if something was happening. So if you are as easily distracted as I am, you’d better turn off this light in the settings menu. Unfortunately, this also turns off the small envelope icon that appears on the top lid when you receive an SMS text message. Upon opening the Samsung L310, the beautiful S-shape of the mechanism becomes visible. The inside of the lady phone has a gold-coloured layer and the keys are sunken into the surface of the Samsung L310.


Samsung L310 TFT monitor

The Samsung L310 Allure features a 262,144 pixel colour TFT LCD monitor. With its resolution of 176x220 pixels, the monitor seems rather small in relation to the lid. A pity not all the space was used but there had to be room for the ornaments. Other than that, the monitor is bright and detailed. If you find the numbers too small when pressing the keys to make a call, you can change the text size in display settings. The standby mode offers two options; the regular and dynamic background. The dynamic background shows a peaceful landscape with a windmill in it. During daytime, you will see birds flying through your screen at intervals, and at night, you can watch the falling stars in between the clouds and make a wish if you like. Reproduction of a missed call and receiving an SMS text message is accompanied by a colourful show of fireworks. These details increase the fun of using the Samsung L310.


Samsung Allure L310 menu

The left function button will give you access to the main menu. When scrolling through the menu, it strikes you immediately that the Samsung L310 remembers which menu you last visited. Upon opening the menu again, the last viewed submenu or the last used option is selected. I find this very convenient, when trying out an option you’re able to check the effect of a certain setting whilst still easily returning to the particular option when it is not what you thought it would be. The menu is livened up with one of the available themes; “Peach-coloured bubbles” or “Gold Ivy”. Display settings allow for choosing how the switch between the menus is displayed, in which case ‘Door’ slides open the menus, as it were, and ‘Dia’ slides the menus away to the right or to the left. Finally, you enter ‘My Menu’ upon pressing the top navigation button. Naturally, you can collect all your favourite options in one spot, for optimal user’s ease.


Samsung L310 Allure operation

The buttons of the Samsung L310 lay, as mentioned before, sunken into the surface of the phone, which adds to the design of the handset. The navigation and function buttons take up lots of space on the key panel. Personally I would have preferred the most frequently used buttons to be somewhat more compactly situated. Upon entering a phone number, a fountain pen appears and the windmill that is displayed in the dynamic standby mode becomes a postcard in the background. The Samsung L310 offers suggestions from your phone book, so when you insert a familiar number you only have to submit it partially. In order to save energy, you can opt for the setting that offers an active lightened keypad in the evening or at an adjusted time. The volume buttons on the side of the Samsung L310 allow you to adjust the volume during a call or while listening to music. In addition, you can assign desired quick links to the navigation buttons, except for the top navigation button. The latter can only be used for ‘My Menu’.


Samsung MP3 player & Radio

The Samsung L310 Allure lets you enjoy your music through the MP3 player that enables making play lists, among other things. You can also repeat songs or you can opt for ‘random’, offering a random selection of your songs to play. The navigation button serves to operate the player, it is mentioned as to which button serves for which operation. A huge plus is the built-in FM radio that the Samsung L310 features. To be able to use the radio, you have to connect the headset, which functions as antenna. The loudspeaker function lets people around you enjoy your music with you. However, because of the sound quality, I’d recommend using the headset for both the MP3 player and FM radio. Due to the fact that the loudspeaker is placed on the inside of the top lid of the phone, the sound gets muffled when you shut the cell phone. The Voice recorder in the Extras menu can be used to quickly record voice notes.

Samsung L310 ladyphone

Like previous lady phone editions of Samsung, the L310 also offers various functions that are especially interesting for women. These functions are found in the submenu Extras and are called ‘Lifestyle’. A questionnaire will help you find out what fragrance type you are. For example, if you love the deep blue sea, enjoy life and beautiful things, the Sea fragrance might be your type of fragrance. And if you’re not feeling well and you wonder why, you can use the Biorhythms function. It will tell you all about your physical, emotional and intellectual state at a certain day. With the Samsung L310 in your possession, you never again have to worry about having left your shopping list at home while standing in the shop, and you also have five shopping bags at your disposal that this lady phone offers. Besides that, you can monitor your daily activities to see how many calories you burned that day. The section lifestyle has a certain fun factor. Some function can actually come in handy, the shopping list for example, others shouldn’t be taken too seriously.

Samsung Allure with 2 Megapixel Samsung digital camera

The Samsung L310 Allure features a 2.0 Megapixel digital camera with 4x digital zoom and a CMOS sensor. The applied CMOS technique is energy-saving for this device, which adds to the battery-life. In daytime the camera takes good and reasonably sharp pictures that show surprisingly true-to-nature colours. In badly lit circumstances, the camera performs considerably worse as far as colour rendition and sharpness are concerned. The lack of the flash is cause for this and it is a real minus. Exposure correction might be the solution, however, only when a small correction is required because if a lot of compensation is needed, there’s no way of saving the picture. Increasing the ISO value might be a better option in that case. Unfortunately noise peeks around the corner when ISO is increased. It’s therefore up to the user to decide between colour quality, sharpness and noise. The shutter lag is around two seconds which I find acceptable since I don’t expect any better from a mobile phone. But I am not saying that there’s no improvement possible here, though. The possibility of setting the correct white balance is also enabled on the Samsung L310’s camera. Last but not least; you should set the viewing mode to ‘Reproduction standard ratio’. If you set this mode to ‘Full reproduction’ the composition of your end result will differ tremendously to what you see on the monitor whilst taking a picture. Even editing of pictures is possible in the Extras menu, and you can make adjustments such as adding effects, frames and emoticons.

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Review: Samsung L870

Samsung Electronics introduces the L870, a S60 embedded Smartphone designed for a life-enhancing experience. With an exquisite stainless steel body fully packed with the most-up-to-date OS applications, Samsung L870 will upgrade both style and productivity in everyday life. Like a tailored pair of suit, every millimeter of the Samsung L870 is carefully custom-designed to match the user’s lifestyle. A magnificent stainless steel body softly brushed with elegant hairline pattern, and a 13.5mm slim and sleek outline, will perfectly complement every outfit and style. A minimalistic key pad that appears when sliding up, is deliberately designed to provide enough spaces between each keys to provide convenience.

Internet access via the Samsung L870 smartphone
Leveraging the capabilities of S60 platform, Samsung L870 brings full connectivity and application that surpass expectations for a handset device. The applications and features of the S60 software are not only easy to learn and use, but also enable maximum productivity. With Full-speed internet browser and more than 6,000 open applications are also compatible with Samsung L870 to customize the device for each individual's needs.

Samsung L870 with useful pre-installed applications
Samsung L870 features many useful Samsung pre-installed applications such as an advanced task manager Checkit, PIMs (Personal information manager) homescreen, Team manager and business card recognition function. With these applications, users will experience better time and life managing experience than ever.

3 Megapixel digital camera on the Samsung L870
Samsung L870 boasts many other latest applications and interfaces. Creative user interface (UI) featuring three different themes, 2.4-inch QVGA TFT display, a 3-megapixel camera, FM radio with RDS, music player and Bluetooth v.2.0 supports are all embedded within Samsung L870 for satisfying visual and audio entertainment needs.

Samsung L860 S60 mobile
"We are happy to compliment our product portfolio with yet another appealing S60 mobile, Samsung L870 that is fully customized with style, performance and user interface," says, Jongin Kim, the Vice President of Mobile Communication Division of Samsung Electronics. "With S60, we can successfully deliver the latest mobile technology with fully customizable applications and the intuitive user interfaces."

Samsung L870 mobile phone availability
Samsung L870 will first be launched in Europe around August, then will continue to be available in all regions where GSM is available.

Samsung L870 specifications

• HSDPA (2100MHz) 3.6Mbps + EDGE/GPRS 900/1800/1900
• 2.4" QVGA 16M Color TFT display
• 3 Megapixel digital camera
• Symbian 9.3
• S60 3.2
• New Thematic UI
• Quick Office document viewer
• Push Email (Visto, Seven, Intellysync, Good)
• Advanced PIM Applications
• Music Player (MP3, AAC, AAC+, RA, AMR, WMA)
• Video Player (H.263 + AMR, MPEG4, Real One, WMV)
• FM Radio (RDS)
• Bluetooth v.2.0 EDR
• USB 2.0 (Full Speed)
• Memory : 100MB internal memory + Micro SD up to 4GB
• Size : 103.5 x 50.5 x 13.5mm

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