The Samsung Gravity 2 is anticipated to arrive sometime in August and pricing info is forthcoming.

DALLAS and BELLEVUE, WASH. — July 22, 2009 — Samsung Telecommunications America (Samsung Mobile) and T-Mobile USA, Inc. today announced their latest text-friendly messaging phones, the Samsung Comeback™ (SGH-t559) and Samsung Gravity™ 2 (SGH-t469).

Complete with full QWERTY keyboards, T9® predictive text and auto word completion, the Comeback and Gravity 2 are available exclusively through T-Mobile USA. Powered by T-Mobile’s high-speed 3G network, the new phones also offer fast downloads and quick access to the Web to stay up-to-date on the latest news, weather and entertainment.

The Samsung Comeback™ is a stylish messaging phone with a unique side-flip that reveals a full QWERTY keyboard. Available in pearl white plum or frost silver cherry, the Comeback takes messaging to the extreme with access to E-mail and text, picture, video and instant messaging. A built-in 2-megapixel camera with digital zoom and T-Mobile’s 3G network allows customers to easily take and send pictures to friends and family or upload images to their favorite social networking sites. The Comeback also features a MP3 player and support for up to 16 GB of expandable memory.

Following the popular Samsung Gravity that launched last year, the Samsung Gravity™ 2 also features a horizontal, slide-out QWERTY keyboard and boasts a thinner, sleeker design. The Gravity 2 offers a pair of fun color options – berry mauve and metallic pumpkin, multiple messaging capabilities, a 2-megapixel camera and camcorder, a built-in MP3 player and expandable memory up to 16GB.

With a rich Web experience through T-Mobile’s web2goSM service, both the Comeback and Gravity 2 can access the entire Web, optimized for their phone  with a personalized home page for easy one-click access to favorite Web sites, fast and easy search results with Yahoo OneSearch, live news feeds with the web2go widget, and a plethora of T-Mobile services including the latest ringtones, games, wallpapers and applications.

“Our customers send and receive a lot of text messages, therefore it’s important that we offer phones that compliment the way our customers communicate,” said Wendy Piñero-DePencier, vice president, brand and calendar marketing, T-Mobile USA.  “We’re excited to be working with Samsung on these two new messaging phones, the Samsung Comeback and Samsung Gravity 2.”

The Comeback and Gravity 2 complement T-Mobile’s existing line-up of text-friendly Samsung handsets including the Samsung t349 (SGH-t349), a bar-style messaging phone featuring a 20-key, partial QWERTY keypad.  The t349 offers access to E-mail, Instant Messaging and picture, video and text messaging, as well as several multimedia features.

“Samsung’s new messaging phones are fun and easy to use to match the needs of our customers,” said Paul Golden, Chief Marketing Officer for Samsung Mobile. “The Comeback, Gravity 2 and t349 offer the best in messaging, fun color options and access to customers’ favorite multimedia features.”

The Comeback is available in T-Mobile stores starting today for $129.99 with a two-year service agreement, the Gravity 2 is anticipated to be available in August and the t349 is available now for $14.99 with a two-year service agreement*. For more information about the Samsung Comeback, Gravity 2 and t349, please visit www.samsung.com/newsroom or www.t-mobile.com.

For information where T-Mobile 3G service is available or to see T-Mobile’s Personal Coverage Check tool, please visit http://www.T-Mobile.com/Coverage.

* Pricing is subject to credit approval, subject to change, may include mail-in rebate and may require data plan.  Some features and services incur separate, additional charges.

About Samsung Telecommunications America

Samsung Telecommunications America, LLC, a Dallas-based subsidiary of Samsung Electronics Co., Ltd., researches, develops and markets wireless handsets and telecommunications products throughout North America. For more information, please visit www.samsungmobileusa.com.

We just got the Comeback today, so we’ll be putting it through some testing’s before writing up a full review.  Make sure to check back in a few days.  Meanwhile, enjoy the unboxing / hands-on video.

Samsung Comeback unboxing and hands-on demo video:

DALLAS and BELLEVUE, WASH. — July 22, 2009 — Samsung Telecommunications America (Samsung Mobile) and T-Mobile USA, Inc. today announced their latest text-friendly messaging phones, the Samsung Comeback™ (SGH-t559) and Samsung Gravity™ 2 (SGH-t469).

Complete with full QWERTY keyboards, T9® predictive text and auto word completion, the Comeback and Gravity 2 are available exclusively through T-Mobile USA. Powered by T-Mobile’s high-speed 3G network, the new phones also offer fast downloads and quick access to the Web to stay up-to-date on the latest news, weather and entertainment.

The Samsung Comeback™ is a stylish messaging phone with a unique side-flip that reveals a full QWERTY keyboard. Available in pearl white plum or frost silver cherry, the Comeback takes messaging to the extreme with access to E-mail and text, picture, video and instant messaging. A built-in 2-megapixel camera with digital zoom and T-Mobile’s 3G network allows customers to easily take and send pictures to friends and family or upload images to their favorite social networking sites. The Comeback also features a MP3 player and support for up to 16 GB of expandable memory.

Following the popular Samsung Gravity that launched last year, the Samsung Gravity™ 2 also features a horizontal, slide-out QWERTY keyboard and boasts a thinner, sleeker design. The Gravity 2 offers a pair of fun color options – berry mauve and metallic pumpkin, multiple messaging capabilities, a 2-megapixel camera and camcorder, a built-in MP3 player and expandable memory up to 16GB.

With a rich Web experience through T-Mobile’s web2goSM service, both the Comeback and Gravity 2 can access the entire Web, optimized for their phone  with a personalized home page for easy one-click access to favorite Web sites, fast and easy search results with Yahoo OneSearch, live news feeds with the web2go widget, and a plethora of T-Mobile services including the latest ringtones, games, wallpapers and applications.

“Our customers send and receive a lot of text messages, therefore it’s important that we offer phones that compliment the way our customers communicate,” said Wendy Piñero-DePencier, vice president, brand and calendar marketing, T-Mobile USA.  “We’re excited to be working with Samsung on these two new messaging phones, the Samsung Comeback and Samsung Gravity 2.”

The Comeback and Gravity 2 complement T-Mobile’s existing line-up of text-friendly Samsung handsets including the Samsung t349 (SGH-t349), a bar-style messaging phone featuring a 20-key, partial QWERTY keypad.  The t349 offers access to E-mail, Instant Messaging and picture, video and text messaging, as well as several multimedia features.

“Samsung’s new messaging phones are fun and easy to use to match the needs of our customers,” said Paul Golden, Chief Marketing Officer for Samsung Mobile. “The Comeback, Gravity 2 and t349 offer the best in messaging, fun color options and access to customers’ favorite multimedia features.”

The Comeback is available in T-Mobile stores starting today for $129.99 with a two-year service agreement, the Gravity 2 is anticipated to be available in August and the t349 is available now for $14.99 with a two-year service agreement*. For more information about the Samsung Comeback, Gravity 2 and t349, please visit www.samsung.com/newsroom or www.t-mobile.com.

For information where T-Mobile 3G service is available or to see T-Mobile’s Personal Coverage Check tool, please visit http://www.T-Mobile.com/Coverage.

* Pricing is subject to credit approval, subject to change, may include mail-in rebate and may require data plan.  Some features and services incur separate, additional charges.

About Samsung Telecommunications America

Samsung Telecommunications America, LLC, a Dallas-based subsidiary of Samsung Electronics Co., Ltd., researches, develops and markets wireless handsets and telecommunications products throughout North America. For more information, please visit www.samsungmobileusa.com.

The Highlight features a full touch-screen display, Web browsing over T-Mobile’s 3G network, and numerous multimedia features including a 3-megapixel camera with video capture, music player and a microSD slot for up to 16 GB of removable memory.

According to T-Mobile, web2go is the richest web experience to date (hmm), the Highlight offer web access with a personalized home page for easy one-click access to favorite Web sites, fast search results with Yahoo OneSearch, access to live news feeds with the web2go widget, and access to a number of T-Mobile downloads including the latest ringtones, games, wallpapers and applications.

It’s definitely lightweight and fits nicely in the palm of your hand and has neat features to offer to consumers. I’m just really concerned about the price of $150 after a $50 MIR for an entry-level touch-screen phone. For now, I’m going to hold my judgments or at least compare it to other phones in the same category/price range. Make sure to check back in a few days for a full review.

Unboxing Samsung Highlight and walkthrough:

Samsung Highlight Features & Specs:

• Touch-screen display, thin-profile design
• 3-megapixel camera with 3x digital zoom and video capture
• Stereo Bluetooth
• microSD slot for up to 16 GB of optional removable memory
• Music player supports MP3, WMA, AAC, AAC+ and eAAC+
• Support for SMS, MMS, instant messaging (IM) and e-mail
  • IM support: AIM, Windows Live Messenger, Yahoo! Messenger
  • E-mail support: AOL, Yahoo!, additional POP3 accounts
• Complete Web access through T-Mobile web2go
• A-GPS with TeleNav
• Quad-band GSM world phone (850/900/1800/1900 MHz)
• UMTS/HSDPA-capable (1700/2100 – AWS Band IV)
• Display: 1.61 x 2.64 inches, 240 x 400 pixels, 262k TFT display
• 4.27 x 2.11 x 0.54 inches; 3.7 ounces

First impressions are good. In the box there’s a slipcase with belt-clip, an AC adapter, USB charging/sync cable, wired stereo headset and the battery. The phone itself is smaller than the Bold at 4.4 x 2.4 x 0.6 inches, though a little heavier than the Curve. Up front there’s a gloriously crisp, bright and high-resolution 2.4-inch 480 x 360 display and a backlit QWERTY keyboard; in-between there’s a familiar RIM trackball and the usual call-handling and menu keys.

Down the left-hand side of the phone there’s the voice-control trigger button, while the right-hand side has a 3.5mm headphone socket (which we wish was up top or on the bottom), volume keys, microUSB port and a camera shortcut key. The base of the phone is blank, while there are two keys – for locking and muting – on the top.

BlackBerry handsets are judged in no small part by their keyboards, and the Tour obviously arrives bearing that in mind. The closely packed keys use the same curved bezels as on the Bold, which do a great job of guiding your fingertips or thumbs into place. There’s obviously slightly less room than on the Bold – which is 0.2-inches wider – but it seems a reasonable sacrifice for a more pocket-friendly device. As with the Bold key-feel is excellent, quiet but tactile.

That’s good, because much of the Tour’s strength lies in its messaging abilities. RIM is known for its email client, and that’s no different here: as well as Microsoft Exchange support there’s POP and IMAP account functionality, together with instant messaging for the popular formats.

Elsewhere it’s the same old BlackBerry OS, which means a serviceable if not exactly outstanding browser, fair media player and Office file viewing and editing via Documents To Go. There’s also access to the BlackBerry App World, though you can only install software to the Tour’s 256MB of internal storage, not to a microSD card. There are far fewer titles on offer than in Apple’s App Store, but more than you’ll find in Palm’s version. Happily the OS supports multitasking, which means you, can have audio from the onboard PMP app (or streaming via Pandora) in the background while browsing or checking email.

The browser, though capable of visiting mobile and full HTML sites, pales in comparison to its counterparts on the iPhone, Pre or other platforms. Thanks to the high-resolution display you can fit plenty of page on-screen at any one time; the flip side is that you’ll do plenty of zooming in order to actually read the text. Here, the iPhone 3GS storms ahead, drawing and re-drawing pages far quicker than the Tour can manage. You’ll be accessing all this over Verizon’s EVDO Rev.A network, too, as there’s no WiFi provision on the Tour. Verizon make strong claims about the extent of their coverage, but there are still times we’d rather use faster or more accessible WiFi networks in preference to 3G.

On the back of the Tour there’s a 3.2-megapixel camera with video recording, which we found delivered mixed results. Still images are strong, with reasonable color reproduction; the LED light, like most of its kind, has a narrow sweet spot of effectiveness, outside which it’s either underpowered or prone to washing out detail. The 15fps video the Tour records, however, struggles with fast-moving scenes; that’s a common flaw for phone cameras.

Though we wish it had been fitted somewhere else on the Tour’s body, the 3.5mm headphone socket is a useful touch for anybody planning to make the smartphone their PMP. Tracks can be loaded directly via a microSD card or copied over with a USB connection. There’s also Verizon’s own V Cast Music Store, which charges a significant $1.99 per song; a 4GB memory card is in the box. The Tour is also comparable with Rhapsody, offering unlimited tracks for a $14.99 subscription. Audio quality is good, especially when you ditch the cheap included headset and replace it with your own. We were pleasantly surprised by the integrated speaker, which manages to produce loud and – until you reach the top end of the volume range – mainly crackle-free sound.

That’s handy, as Verizon offer their VZ Navigator GPS app pre-loaded on the Tour, and one of its more appealing features is voice-guidance. VZ Navigator is exactly the same here as it is on other Verizon phones, though the Tour does a decent job of finding – and keeping track of – a GPS signal. After the initial cold fix was past, the Tour could generally re-acquire a lock in under twenty seconds.

The business users that are drawn to BlackBerry devices prize their voice call ability, and the Tour can hold its head up here, too. Whether with a Bluetooth headset (which paired with no problems) or otherwise, sound quality at both ends was very high. Since the Tour offers global roaming, courtesy of an integrated GSM radio and SIM card, you can also use it when abroad; be aware, though, that Verizon’s per-minute fees for this are on the costly side, as is data roaming.

RIM rate the Tour as good for five hours talktime or up to 14 days standby. With heavy use during our initial testing we blasted through more than three-quarters of the indicated charge; more typical use will likely see the Tour go two days without needing attention.

There are a few obvious flaws with the BlackBerry Tour. The absence of WiFi may be mitigated somewhat by the prevalence and speed of Verizon’s EVDO Rev.A network, but it’s still an omission that feels miserly. RIM’s OS, too, may look the best it has in years, but newer rivals such as Palm’s webOS do show it up somewhat. Finally, the browser is reasonable but nothing special, and again other smartphones edge ahead with their Webkit-based apps.

Having looked through Verizon’s call-cost list, we’re a little surprised (and not in a good way) about the cost of international roaming. We suppose we should be grateful that an ostensibly CDMA device has any GSM capabilities whatsoever, but we can’t help thinking that frequent travelers would be better served with an unlocked device and a wallet full of pre-pay SIM cards.

Nonetheless, we won’t level that carrier criticism against the Tour. It does – noted exceptions aside – pretty much everything you ask of it, and in a sturdy, attractive and usable form-factor. The slimmed casing and rock-solid email functionality are a great combination to business-people and messaging-obsessed personal users, to which decent multimedia functionality is the icing on the cake. If a hardware keyboard is a must, then the BlackBerry Tour may just be Verizon’s best device.

BlackBerry Tour for Verizon hands-on demo:

Design-wise, the Dash 3G is relatively sober with a plain black and red color scheme. The left side of the handset has the volume rocker, which is usefully broader than on other models from the company. However unlike most HTC smartphones the charging/headset port is on the right-hand side of the handset, not the bottom. This makes no real difference when recharging, but does get in the way somewhat when using the supplied hands-free headset. T-Mobile also include a headset adapter in the box with the Dash 3G, so that you can use your own headphones; it’s a nice addition, but it does protrude significantly from the side of the smartphone making the whole thing unwieldy.

Up front, there’s a 2.4-inch 65k color LCD display, running at QVGA 320 x 240 resolution. It’s a bright panel, certainly, but compared not only to other Windows Mobile devices but to rival platforms it looks small and light on pixels. Happily the trackball makes navigation relatively speedy, but we did find ourselves wishing for at least a 480 x 320 panel.

The QWERTY keyboard takes up the lower half of the Dash 3G, and here the phone really shines. The keys are hard rubber and domed so as to increase the feeling of space between them, and manage to be both quiet in operation and yet offer plenty of tactile feedback. Backlighting is bright and even, and there are some useful shortcuts along the bottom row for the camera, messaging and silent mode, among other things.

HTC equip the Dash 3G with a microSD card slot, which is a good thing as onboard memory is just 256MB. To access it you have to remove the back cover, but happily you don’t need to remove the battery. Also on the back is the 2-megapixel fixed-focus camera with no flash.

To say Windows Mobile 6.1 is looking old-in-the-tooth is an understatement; it looked that way six months ago, now it’s holding on by a thread. The UI is the same as has always been featured on non-touchscreen “Standard” devices, and loses HTC’s InnerCircle modifications. That feature, introduced on the Snap, allowed you to nominate key contacts and have their communications – such as emails – prioritized to the top of your inbox. Given the relatively pokey display, we wish T-Mobile had left the feature in place.

Still, the Microsoft OS supports Exchange email with push, POP3 and IMAP accounts, and includes a useful wizard to make setting up those accounts straightforward. T-Mobile deliver the Dash 3G pre-loaded with AIM, Windows Live, GTalk, and Yahoo! and MySpace IM clients, and you also get the carrier’s MyFaves app to prioritize certain contacts. As with any other smartphone using Windows Mobile there’s a basic media player with audio and video support; audio quality through the supplied headphones is reasonable, but plugging in your own set shows the Dash 3G is capable of decent sound. Similarly, using Bluetooth A2DP with wireless stereo headphones presented no problems. As with other HTC devices we’ve seen lately, there’s also a dedicated YouTube client which goes some way to making up for the lack of Flash support in the smartphone’s browser.

Our expectations for the 2-megapixel camera were low, but the results were surprisingly good. Lacking a flash and autofocus this is the very definition of point-and-shoot, and obviously benefits from plenty of natural light, but colors are generally accurate and there’s reasonable detail. Video recording is less impressive, with blurring and smudging in all but the stillest scenes. As with other Windows Mobile phones you can quickly send images or short clips as MMS messages or emails, but T-Mobile also throw in access to their own T-Mobile Album.

Performance from the new 528MHz Qualcomm MSM7225 processor presented no issues, with the smartphone proving snappy in navigating between apps and loading pages. Battery life is rated at 8.5hrs GSM talktime (5hrs 3G) or up to 15 days GSM standby (20 days 3G); we’re still putting the battery through its paces, but so far the Dash 3G seems to be easily capable of lasting a couple of days even with push-email turned on.

In terms of wireless connectivity, as well as T-Mobile’s 3G connection there’s also WiFi b/g and Bluetooth 2.0+EDR. Oddly lacking is support for UMA, meaning the Dash 3G won’t work with T-Mobile’s Hotspot@Home unlimited VoIP service. We’re also left in the dark as to whether the carrier will be offering upgrades to Windows Mobile 6.5 when the new OS is released; locking yourself into a two-year agreement with a device that might be significantly outdated in a few months doesn’t seem like a great idea to us.

GPS was quick to find a fix, aided by the QuickGPS satellite-caching app, and worked both in Google Maps and TeleNav Navigation. The latter offers turn-by-turn directions and works well, but it’s worth noting that T-Mobile only includes a fourteen-day trial of the service; beyond that it’s subscription-based.

Still, our feelings about the T-Mobile Dash 3G are positive, even with an aging OS, missing VoIP support and miserly TeleNav trial. That’s in no small part down to the excellent keyboard and what looks to be stellar battery life; the Dash 3G makes no real pretence at being a multimedia maven – though obviously it will do the A/V basics – but instead takes everything good about the original Dash and makes it better. Faster data and a slicker casing join sturdy build quality and add up to a highly usable business phone. Anyone who prizes keyboard feel above all else should definitely have it on their shortlist.

T-Mobile Dash 3G unboxing and hands-on video:

Starting from the left is the Send key, followed by the Left Soft key and Home key. On the right hand side of the trackball is the Previous Screen/Back key, Right Soft key End key. The Charger/Headset Jack resides on the top right hand side and the Volume keys are on the left hand side of the Dash 3G.It has a 2-megapixel camera with digital zoom on the back. Unfortunately, HTC forgot to add a flash of any kind. Positioned immediately above the camera is the speakerphone, and yes voice-activated dialing is possible.

Under the hood is T-Mobile’s high-speed 3G network and Wi-Fi supporting Dual-band UMTS/HSDPA (AWS Band IV and Band I). The Dash 3G is by all means a worldphone thanks to quad-band GSM/GPRS/EDGE (850/900/1800/1900 MHz). There’s also assisted GPS with location base services by Telenav. Taking off the back cover reveals a 1500 mAh battery, SIM slot and microSD card slot right below it. In fact, the only place you’ll find HTC branding on the Dash 3G is on top of the battery. Battery life is yet to be determined and we’ll report results in the review.

While a full review is forthcoming, my overall initial impression of the Dash 3G is – wow, love at first sight. It feels great, has an exceptionally awesome QWERTY keyboard and as a big bonus, Windows Mobile 6.1 is speedy. Seeing the new Dash 3G brought back oodles of memories I’d shared with the first Dash.

It has been too long since I was this excited about a “smartphone” powered by Windows Mobile.

T-Mobile Dash 3G unboxing and hands-on video:

Saying that anticipation has been high for the Nokia N97 is an understatement. The handset’s spec sheet reads like a must-have list: 5-megapixel camera, triband HSPA, WiFi and Bluetooth, plus a 3.5-inch touchscreen, hardware keyboard and 32GB of standard storage, all features which are just as relevant to flagship smartphones today as they were when the N97 was first announced.

First, the good parts. The design of the N97 may be relatively sober, but build-quality is very high; the matte-finish plastics are tough but surprisingly light, and the hinge is sturdy and reassuring. Anybody who regularly switches devices or wants to use their own peripherals won’t be disappointed: the standardized connectors like mini-USB, 3.5mm headphone jack and microSD mean you won’t be carrying a bundle of proprietary leads and accessories. Nokia haven’t forgotten that a smartphone is, at its core, a phone, either; call performance is as good as we’ve come to expect from the company, with the full-bodied earpiece and well balanced microphone meaning that those on each end of the call have a decent audio experience. The speakerphone isn’t, perhaps, the loudest we’ve heard, but it does rate highly as one of the clearest.

That phone performance continues when it comes to connectivity, with the N97 proving tenacious with a 3G signal and offering speedy browsing speeds. Using AT&T’s network we had no problems with lag or premature disconnects, and it was rare to see anything but full or almost-full bars on the signal meter. Battery life is also decent, though you’d expect nothing less from a 1,500mAh Li-Ion pack. Nokia quote up to 360 minutes of WCDMA talktime (up to 570 of GSM) or 400 hours of WCDMA standby (up to 430 hours GSM); our testing found that they’re reasonable estimates, with the N97 easily capable of lasting a couple of days with moderate use.

Unfortunately, over those days the areas in which the N97 drops the ball will become all too obvious. That hinge may be well put-together, but it’s limited to a single angle; unfortunately, the angle Nokia have picked is not quite right for our tastes. For table-top use, it could do with being slightly more horizontal, unless you’re content to use the phone at arms-length. Either way, you’re faced with a QWERTY keyboard that’s frustratingly lacking in tactile response or finger feedback. Our first-impression was that their shallow travel might be an issue, and that’s turned out to be something of an understatement.

After the promise of such a broad, well-spaced keyboard, the end result is incredibly disappointing. The hard rubber keys themselves are pretty tactile, but their singular lack of travel drains away both accuracy and appeal. It’s a shortcoming shared by the D-pad, too, which means that not only is text-entry impaired but non-touch navigation. We recognize that Nokia had to make some compromises to accommodate the sliding form-factor, but it’s a similar situation in the HTC Touch Pro2 or even the T-Mobile Sidekick and we’d choose their keyboards in a heartbeat. Ironically, the one aspect we thought would present a problem – the offset spacebar – was the easiest thing to get used to.

Bizarrely, having made such a big deal of the text-entry options, Nokia don’t really give much opportunity to use them out of the box. There’s a Facebook client with a homepage widget and support for messaging, but other than that there’s no IM client and no threaded SMS or MMS. The Facebook app works well, and the homescreen widget shows real-time updates rather than just acting as a shortcut, but right now the Ovi download store is looking relatively barren of similarly well-coded software.

The camera offers 5-megapixels, autofocus and an LED flash, but falls a little short of some of Nokia’s more photography-centric devices. It’s certainly sufficient for taking outdoor shots, though the LED flash demonstrates the usual minute sweet-spot outside of which subjects are either washed out or hopelessly dark. Still, colors are generally well preserved and the autofocus is quick to lock on, and only indoor noise really shows the limits of the optics.

Video recording is also possible, either in widescreen 640 x 360 to fit the letterbox display or in more standard 640 x 480 VGA resolution. You can also upload content directly to online galleries from the handset, which is a neat trick, though it doesn’t seem possible to do this automatically. Video quality falls short of the iPhone 3GS, showing periodic blocking and smears when panned quickly or attempting to capture fast-moving subjects, though at least the capacious memory means you can store plenty of footage.

That’s if, of course, you’re not using the N97 as a media player. Audio quality is strong, and aided by the fact that you’re free to use your own headphones with the standard 3.5mm jack. The N97 not only has an FM radio but a transmitter as well, meaning you can pipe audio from the smartphone out through a nearby tuner. This is particularly useful in the car, though it’s worth noting that sound quality takes a significant dive as with any FM transmitter. There’s also Bluetooth 2.0 A2DP, which worked with no problems with the test headset we tried.

Files can be transferred quickly over the USB 2.0 connection, but the range of supported file types isn’t all that comprehensive. MP3, AAC, eAAC+ and WMA audio files can be played, but only MPEG4 or 3GP video files are supported. That’s a shame, as the N97’s decent screen quality would make it a neat companion for impromptu DivX or H.264 films. We’re also distinctly underwhelmed by the media apps, which lack any of the visual appeal of rival devices. Buttons are large and displays clear, and there’s a handy homescreen widget for audio control, but it all feels like the basic PMP functionality you’d get on an entry-level handset, not something with 32GB or more of capacity and an eye on taking out your iPod.

It’s S60 5th Edition that provides perhaps the biggest usability frustration, though. Nokia’s OS is, in the face of attractive and modern platforms like that the iPhone or Palm’s webOS, looking a little visually tired, and the touch enabling they’ve done feel half-hearted. Not only is there little in the way of visual gloss that users have come to expect, such as screen transitions or animations, but the way touch has been implemented seems an afterthought. There are no gestures or similar controls, instead buttons have merely been made chunkier and menus larger. There’s also a slight graininess, which is visible from some angles, which mars an otherwise decent LCD panel with high resolution.

One of the most obvious areas where touch on the N97 falls short is in the browser. Rendering remains speedy, but Nokia have unfathomably removed the full-page preview map, which used to pop up in the corner and show whereabouts you are on the page. Since there’s no multitouch, zooming uses a slider control or a double-tap. On the plus side, the presence of Flash Lite 3.0 means that YouTube videos can be watched from the browser itself, generally playing smoothly. However, while Internet browsing on full touchscreen devices is usually an effortless, straightforward affair, there’s nothing really in the N97 where the technology puts it any further ahead than the company’s own non-touchscreen phones.

To sum up, our disappointment in the touch-amendments to S60 5th Edition for the Nokia 5800 XpressMusic pretty much all applies to the N97. Nokia have made no noticeable improvements to how touch is handled, and while that was frustrating but perhaps bearable on the 5800 it’s simply not good enough on the N97. This isn’t about resistive or capacitive; it’s about fundamental usability that goes beyond replacing a D-pad with a finger. RIM had the good grace to listen to criticism about the first-gen Storm and seemingly address it for the upcoming second-gen version; we can only assume that the N97 has been so long in development that it predates any significant work on S60 that may be going on.

In our first-impressions, we described the Nokia N97 as a serious, business-like phone. That remains our lasting impression, despite the multimedia features on offer. Unfortunately, usability issues like the less than mediocre touch functionality and lackluster QWERTY keyboard are likely to prove just as annoying to business users as they do to everyone else. There are certainly some strong points to the N97, and its performance as a phone continues to impress, but at $650 unlocked and contract-free it’s an expensive way to make clear calls. Perhaps the months of anticipation have worked against it, but we’d struggle to recommend the Nokia N97 over its smartphone rivals.

Nokia N97 unboxing video:

In addition to deep integration of Google services and the latest Android software, T-Mobile has done a number of things to create a unique and individualized experience with this phone.  With the ability to richly customize menus, wallpapers, icons and more, thousands of Android Market applications to choose from, plus themes and skins that lets customers express their style on the inside and outside, myTouch can evolve to become a virtual extension of oneself.  Through the power of location and social discovery, T-Mobile is also working closely with Google and developers such as Geodelic to create unique experiences for customers.

myTouch will be available to pre-order for current T-Mobile customers starting July 8^th for $199.99 with a two-year agreement and national retail availability for myTouch is planned for early August.

T-Mobile USA Unveils the T-Mobile myTouch 3G with Google
Featuring Personalization Front and Center

T-Mobile and Google^™ Partner Again to Deliver a New Android-Powered Wireless Experience;
T-Mobile USA Customers Can Pre-Order Beginning July 8

BELLEVUE, Wash. – June 22, 2009 – T-Mobile USA, Inc. today announced the upcoming availability of the T-Mobile^® myTouch^™ 3G, the highly anticipated follow-up to the T-Mobile G1^™, the world’s first Android^™ powered device. T-Mobile myTouch 3G boasts a sleek look and contoured feel, plus an array of new features that builds on its popular predecessor. A touch-screen display with virtual keyboard is built into a slim, smooth and lightweight design.

myTouch empowers users to simply create a unique, individualized wireless phone and experience. With the ability to richly customize menus, wallpapers, icons and more, thousands of Android Market™ applications to choose from, plus themes and skins that let customers express their style on the inside and outside, myTouch can evolve to become a virtual extension of oneself. Adding to its refined aesthetics and customization options, myTouch will come in three colors — black, white and a distinctive merlot.

“T-Mobile myTouch 3G puts you first, so you can create a mobile experience that is truly your own,” said Denny Marie Post, chief marketing officer, T-Mobile USA. “There’s no cookie-cutter approach to myTouch.  Inside and out, there are boundless possibilities for personalization so you can put your personal touch on the phone and make it uniquely yours.”

In addition to the virtually endless ways to personalize myTouch, plus its deep integration of Google services and the latest Android software, T-Mobile myTouch customers will enjoy access to new applications that enhance their mobile lives. One such application, and at the heart of myTouch, is Sherpa^™. Created by Geodelic, Sherpa features GENIE (Geodelic ENgine for Interest Evaluation), a learning engine that automatically customizes itself to the user’s preferences. Through behavior and user feedback, the application learns a person’s likes and dislikes, prioritizing recommended retailers, restaurants and attractions. Seamlessly blending behavior recognition, a recommendation engine and location relevant information, this combination of learning is exclusive to Sherpa and unlike any experience currently on the market.

“Now more than ever, customers are regularly accessing mobile applications that enhance their personal interests. Through the power of location and social discovery, T-Mobile is working closely with Google and developers like Geodelic to create experiences that are as unique as each person using it,” said Cole Brodman, chief technology and innovation officer, T-Mobile USA. “So wherever you are and whatever your passion — music, marathons, movies and more — myTouch is the phone for you.”

Today, thousands of applications are available on Android Market ranging from games to location-based social networks to on-the-go shopping. Whether it’s a marathon runner who downloads the Cardio Trainer application or a music buff who lives by his or her Imeem application, myTouch customers can find and download unique applications to expand and personalize their phone to fit their precise interests and lifestyle.

“The G1 was highly successful and captured the imagination of thousands of developers as the first Android-powered phone,” said Andy Rubin, vice president, mobile platforms at Google. “With myTouch, T-Mobile is poised to capture the imagination of consumers everywhere, and by expanding the availability and appeal of Android-based devices, they’re giving developers a bigger market for the next wave of killer Android applications.”

Designed by HTC, myTouch features a 3.2-inch HVGA touch-screen display and virtual keyboard, which orients automatically from portrait to landscape mode in most applications. It also features a 3.2-megapixel camera, a music player with a pre-installed 4GB microSD memory card, and enhanced video capabilities to make it easy for users to record and share pictures and videos, whether via e-mail, MMS or one-click upload to sites such as YouTube^™ and Picasa^™. The device’s powerful mobile Web experience is supported by fast data speeds via Wi-Fi and T-Mobile’s 3G network.

“With myTouch, HTC and T-Mobile are delivering not just a new phone, but the ability to create a uniquely personal product experience on top of a remarkably strong feature set,” said Jason Mackenzie, vice president of HTC America.

myTouch features multitasking capabilities and one-touch access to the Google services that millions use every day including Google Search^™ by voice, Google Maps^™ with Street View, YouTube^™ and Picasa^™.  It also provides easy access to both personal and corporate e-mail, including support for Exchange, Gmail^™ and most other POP3 and IMAP e-mail services as well as synchronization with Google contacts and calendars. It also combines instant messaging support for Google Talk^™, as well as AOL^®, Yahoo! Messenger^® and Windows Live Messenger. In addition, users can pull down the windowshade notification bar by dragging their finger down from the top of the screen, easily displaying message previews and other convenient at-a-glance notifications depending on the personalized applications users download.

Pricing and Availability

myTouch will be available to pre-order for current T-Mobile customers starting July 8 for $199.99 with a two-year agreement^*; additional product features and details will be available at that time. Devices sold through pre-sale will begin shipping in late July, and national retail availability for myTouch is planned for early August.  Customers can visit http://www.T-MobilemyTouch.com for more information.

Apple are keen to remind us that the “S” here stands for Speed, and our initial experience with the iPhone 3G S certainly bears that out.  Not only do applications – both native and third-party – load more quickly, but graphics in visually-intensive games show a marked improvement in the few titles we’ve already downloaded.  More useful day-to-day, perhaps, is the way the iPhone 3G S now whips through email-stuffed inboxes and contact-loaded address books.  This was always one of our key frustrations with the original iPhone and iPhone 3G, and together with the storage boost is arguably worth the $100 premium over the newly-discounted iPhone 3G 8GB.

The camera – now 3-megapixels with autofocus and video recording – still lacks manual settings, and the white balance and exposure remains over-enthusiastic, but we’re enjoying the touch-focus and straightforward clip trimming tools.  We’d enjoy it all the more if we could edit copies of individual clips, rather than irreversibly edit the originals, though.

The last two significant hardware changes are the new digital compass, which now means the iPhone can tell in which direction you’re facing, and the prolonged battery life.  The former will probably only come into its own once third-party turn-by-turn PND apps arrive, but the latter we’re hoping to see the effect of even sooner.  It’s obviously too early to make any particular judgments on runtime, but we’ll be watching closely to see if the iPhone 3G S really does last longer than the iPhone 3G.

Two big questions remain: is the iPhone 3G S worth upgrading to, and is it the best smartphone on the market?  You’ll have to wait until our full iPhone 3G S review next week to hear the answers, but until then check out our full first-impressions post over at SlashGear.

With CyberShot branding, it’s no surprise that Sony Ericsson are pushing the C510’s imaging capabilities before anything else. The 12.5mm-thick body hides a 3.2-megapixel autofocus camera with an dual-LED flash, and onto that the company have heaped Smile Shutter and Face Detection. These work reasonably well, but there’s more delay than we’d like in-between hitting the dedicated shutter release button and the shot actually taking. As for the LED flash, it suffers the usual problem of having a very narrow sweet-spot: it’s all too easy to get too close, and wash out the subject, or be too far away and not have enough light.

Once taken, photos can be viewed in portrait or landscape orientation, with the C510 flipping between them automatically, and Sony Ericsson load a few editing tools – including an automatic correction for light balance, brightness and contrast – to tweak shots on-device. These can sometimes eke a little more crispness out of a frame, but aren’t really comparable with even the most basic of Photoshop fondling. Happily the 2.2-inch QVGA 320 x 240 display does a decent job of displaying both images and video, the latter of which is recorded at 30fps.

There are a clutch of photo tools on offer, including a panorama mode which helps you line up your panned shots with translucent edge-previews, but it’s undermined by only working in VGA mode. Similarly, attempt to zoom in and the C510 won’t allow it, unless you’re down to just VGA quality. Internal storage is 100MB, with a Memory Stick Micro M2 slot taking cards up to 8GB.

Sony Ericsson preload Google Maps onto the C510, but with no true GPS it’s not something you’d want to rely on for everyday navigation. The C510 instead uses cell-tower triangulation to pinpoint your position, something that works better in densely-populated areas as they tend to have more active towers. Don’t expect accuracy to more than a few streets, however.

More successful is the YouTube client, and though you wouldn’t choose it over a desktop computer were one available, it’s certainly good enough for a casual distraction while out and about. The C510’s UMTS/HSPA 2100MHz support makes for speedy viewing, and the browser and RSS have neat integration with the phone’s homepage, new RSS feeds popping up in a discrete ticker.

Media playback is unchanged from most other non-smartphone Sony Ericsson handsets, with sound quality through the supplied headphones a little better than the average set. That’s good, because the company insists on using its own proprietary connector, rather than offering a standard 3.5mm headphone jack. Album art shows up and the TrackID song-title identification service is a neat addition, albeit one you may not actually use all that often, but Sony Ericsson’s confusing and sluggish PC sync software lets the side down.

Call quality, happily, is clear and strong, both through the earpiece and the speakerphone, and the C510 proved tenacious with a signal. The chassis feels sturdy and well put together, with little creaking or flex, and though the blue LED lighting might edge toward cliché it does stay just on the right side of tasteful. Battery life is quoted at 400hrs of standby or 10hrs of GSM talktime (or 4hrs 3G talktime); regular camera use will impact that the most, but if long battery life and ease of use are your top priorities then the C510 should appeal.

Overall, the C510 is a serviceable handset and slots neatly in among the ranks of budget devices. Its appearance – soberly well-judged, rather than glamorous or over-designed – make it a sensible choice, though the specifications don’t particularly stand out in the crowd and the CyberShot branding promises, perhaps, more than it can deliver.

Specification highlights include a 5-megapixel autofocus camera with Carl Zeiss optics, 32GB of storage, A-GPS and Bluetooth.  There’s also WiFi b/g and USB 2.0 connectivity, plus both an FM radio and FM transmitter for piping your audio through a car stereo.  Up front, controls are minimal, though there’s a dedicated camera shutter button, and the N97 also supports TV out and microSD cards up to 16GB.

The display is bright and clear, but Nokia’s insistence on resistive rather than capacitive touch technology does make it less responsive than, say, that of the iPhone or Palm Pre.  S60 5th edition is also a little frustrating in how it handles touch, for instance in requiring two presses – one to select, one to actually activate – controls such as app shortcuts.  Meanwhile the QWERTY buttons suffer a little from their shallow depth, lacking the tactile feel you’d get on a BlackBerry for instance.  The lined-up layout may be easy on the eye, but it makes hunt-and-peck typing tricker than a more traditional offset arrangement.

It’s early days with the software possibilities, but Nokia have high expectations both for their out-of-the-box app experience and for future changes as third-party developers start to release more apps through their Ovi distribution platform.  Preloaded there are widgets for Facebook, AccuWeather and others, which have homescreen plugins for at-a-glance information; the N97 also supports various types of email and IM, with the latest news being upfront on the homescreen.

Our first impression of the Nokia N97 is that it’s a more serious, business-like device than, say, the Palm Pre or iPhone, though the company themselves are at pains to highlight its entertainment and multimedia functionality.  We’ll cover all of that in our full review; until then, enjoy the unboxing video and gallery below.

Nokia N97 unboxing video:

Considering HTC’s big-name devices – the Touch Diamond2, the Touch Pro2 and the Magic – are all known about and, almost, on the market, we’re not sure what smartphone might be left to unveil.  The HTC Snap, which was announced back in April, could be the topic, but it doesn’t seem quite as headline-grabbing to demonstrate it almost two months after the smartphone was first shown.

We may just have to wait until the 24th to find out the truth, but rest assured the PhoneMag team will be on hand to bring you all the details.  What do you think HTC might have planned?  Let us know in the comments.