Samsung

Samsung Galaxy five: The Definitive Review

The Android marketplace has grown exponentially over the last year, and this onslaught has been lots attributed to the barrage of devices from hardware carriers worldwide. Samsung has secured itself as one of the important players inside the Android tool marketplace, fighting head-on with smartphone giants HTC and Motorola. With a slew of incredible premium cell products under its belt that consist of the excessive-cease Samsung Galaxy S smartphone and the 7-inch pill Samsung Galaxy Tab, the Korean electronics monolith crashes the low-give up Android party with a brand new entry-level touchscreen telephone – the Samsung Galaxy 5. This little Galaxy five runs Android OS v2.1 (Eclair). Shame that it is not the lots-anticipated Froyo yet but certainly a step up from v1.6 (Donut) being supplied through some accessible inside the market. This pits it head-on with the Motorola Citrus, Sony XPERIA X8/X10, LG GT540 Optimus, and HTC Tattoo. For a sub-USD200 (SRP: RM699) device, it packs quite a buffet of functions. This begs the question – is there the sort of element as “reasonably-priced and pleased”?

At first glance, the Galaxy five seems strikingly much like Samsung’s personal Corby, besides the additional 4 hardware shortcut buttons at the bottom. It’s tiny sufficient to fit in the palm of your hand and at a scant 102g, very light, too. The outside is smooth, plastic, and normal. The telephone does sense reasonably-priced. Having said that, it is quite high-quality and relaxed to preserve and deliver round. A three.5mm audio jack is included at the top as preferred and the facet left carries hardware quantity buttons and a miniUSB port. At the again is a 2MP digicam lens sans flash.

Samsung Galaxy five

The display is a 2.8″ QVGA TFT LCD capacitive touchscreen show supplying 240 x 320 resolution. Possibly the smallest screen on an Android cellphone, like the Sony XPERIA X10 mini. For Android fanatics, you’ll be disappointed as there is no assist for multitouch. However, it does come with Samsung’s Live wallpapers out of the field. Boo. The display screen’s quality isn’t always an awful lot to shout approximately even though it is decently sharp and vivid sufficient, and for the price, a step up from resistive touchscreens on a few competing merchandises.

Having a small screen on a touch device can be stressful, specifically regarding typing on the touchscreen keyboard. In portrait mode, the keyboard feels certainly cramped. Typing the QWERTY in portrait may be mistakes-encumbered (possibly because of my fat hands). This may be remedied in landscape mode, happily, in which the keys are better spaced out. Users can choose to use Swype for text access, which is pretty revolutionary, or the 3×4 keyboard. I find the touchscreen responsive if blunders-ridden with unintentional touches. This isn’t the smartphone’s fault in keeping with se, extra so because of some UI quirks of the Android OS.

Whether it is constructing motors or electronics, the Koreans honestly understand how to play the value recreation. The Galaxy five isn’t exceptional and is genuinely packed with capabilities. Everything you need in a telephone is quite a great deal served at the plate. A zippy 600MHz processor powers the device. You get high-velocity 2.5G (850/900/1800/1900 Mhz) & 3G access with HSDPA (as much as 7.2Mbps), Wi-Fi 802. Eleven b/g and Bluetooth v2.1, accelerometer, 2MP fixed cognizance camera supports video recording, FM radio, 170MB internal reminiscence with 2GB microSD (as much as 16GB supported) and A-GPS.

Samsung Galaxy five

The smartphone comes bundled with Samsung’s very very own TouchWiz interface and Swype (Samsung’s ultrafast textual content enter characteristic), not forgetting Samsung’s Social Hub utility first visible on its larger brother, the Galaxy S. It’s also armed with an HTML5 browser, an augmented fact app from Layar, aid for MPEG4, H.263, and H.264 video codecs, and Samsung’s AllShare platform which permits for clean sharing of media across a complete range of DLNA (Digital Living Network Alliance)-licensed Samsung devices like notebooks and TVs. You may even use the Galaxy 5 as a faraway for your Samsung TV or computer. Nifty.

Before I was given the smartphone, I backed up my contacts/calendars from my previous cell phone and Mac, then synced to Google. I set up the free doubleTwist computer app to deal with all media syncing on my Mac. DoubleTwist could be very similar to iTunes and even connects to the Android Market. Pay $1.Ninety-nine top class, and you additionally get wi-fi syncing via something called AirSync. You’ll be able to no longer simplest download unfastened and paid apps, but also podcasts (constrained, but) and purchase the song from AmazonMP3. Syncing is relatively problem-loose with doubleTwist, and it even acknowledges iTunes playlists. One of the primary things I did after I was given the phone became deploy a number of my favorite apps – Twitter, Tweetdeck, Facebook, Opera Mini, WhatsApp, Foursquare, and Angry Birds thru the bundled Android Market app. I also set up Advanced Task Killer to free up memory manually, as I anticipated the 170MB base memory’s inadequacies. Downloading and installation are seamless and hassle-unfastened.

Having used it as my primary smartphone for the beyond four days, I’ve observed the cell phone typically fine and intuitive to use, if a bit sluggish. The 600Mhz processor copes quite nicely in popularity. It’s no sprint queen for positive and may once in a while choke and lag whilst switching and walking multiple apps. Typing has an important lag, and scrolling through a long contact list may also take a while. There have been instances wherein the screen is pitch black for 15-20 seconds even as the processor tries to cope with a load of switching in between apps. Without a devoted GPU, it also struggles with some games, inclusive of Angry Birds.

One principal rant would have to be battery life. While scouring Android boards, I study users getting three days of battery existence. Very formidable, ambitious claims. No such luck with mine. With 3G on and the entirety else quite tons off, the Galaxy’s appropriate for six-7 hours tops before I want to plugin. I constantly have a cable with me simply in case. I’m not positive if this is restrained to my overview unit. However, I’m a long way from impressed. Turning off 3G and strolling best on EDGE gave me slightly extra mileage. I’ve stored walking apps to a minimal or even tweaked screen brightness, background facts (syncing), and notifications. Tasks encompass minimum voice calls, tweeting, SMS-ing, and messaging through WhatsApp and coffee check on Facebook. A penalty for multitasking? Something to reflect consideration on.

Samsung Galaxy five

Apps-clever, the whole thing you want to get began already pre-installed – Messaging, Calendar, Write and Go (text editor), Maps, Browser, Clock, Email, Music, Gmail, YouTube, Talk (IM), Calculator, Camera, and Market. Setting up domain email and Gmail debts become pretty painless. Being a very ‘social’ smartphone, contacts lists are unified along with your Facebook, Twitter, Gmail, and something no longer you’ve legal it to sync to. I respect the unified-sync-to-the-cloud-type-element and the potential to expose/now not display contacts primarily based on your preference.

Leah Leonard

Coffee expert. Troublemaker. Typical music guru. Friendly beer fanatic. Introvert. Web specialist. Uniquely-equipped for implementing bullwhips in Ocean City, NJ. Spent a year importing licorice in Hanford, CA. Have some experience licensing cigarettes for the government. Once had a dream of selling toy monkeys in Las Vegas, NV. Spent the 80's working on hula hoops in Minneapolis, MN. What gets me going now is working with action figures in the government sector.

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