Plemix

The all new Blackberry Storm 9500 has taken us with quite a lot of surprises. The new touch-screen only, no physical keyboard design is one big change, and the new touch-enabled operating system is very refreshing. Does it have enough to bear the Blackberry legacy?Let’s find out now.

The package is full of stuff: the phone, a battery, a travel charger, a handsfree, a CD-rom and a User’s guide. RIM is nice enough to put a simple leather case in the bundle, but I bet any serious user will go for a more functional case. Also included is a “cleaning cloth”, which is necessitated by the fingerprint-magnet surface of the Blackberry Storm 9500.

The Blackberry Storm 9500 looks a lot like the touch-screen phones on the market. The 3.25” (480 x 360) screen dominates much of the front surface, leaving just enough space for 4 physical buttons.

From left to right: answer, menu, back and reject buttons. There are times when I miss a 4-way D-pad when I was using the Blackberry – particularly so while I was navigating through the menus.

The camera has 3.2MP with auto-focus and flash, which is quite modest by today’s standard.

The metallic back cover lacks friction but since the body is quite wide it’s hard to drop the phone.

RIM knows how embarrassing it is to hear your own phone ringing in an important meeting. The top 2 hidden buttons are here to prevent such tragedy: the top left button locks the screen while the top right button changes phone profiles.

On the right side of the phone lie a 3.5mm phone jack, volume rocker and the shutter button. It seems that the Blackberry Storm 9500 is one step closer to an entertainment phone with the 3.5mm jack, full-featured music/video player and the Blackberry Media Sync (for syncing with iTunes in PC).

On the left side of the phone are the mini USB port (non-standard) and the voice dialing button.

The built-in accelerometer allows you to view the screen in portrait, clockwise landscape or anti-clockwise landscape. Changing to any of the landscape mode toggles the full QWERTY keyboard (as opposed to the 2-letter-in-1-key keyboard in the portrait mode).

The virtual QWERTY keyboard is remarkably different from those on the Apple iPhone 3G or windows mobile phones. Press the screen softly will “brighten up” the key, but it doesn’t recognize any input. Press the screen fully and you will notice a click, and the key will be lit up and input is recognized. While RIM claims that the click can help you improve accuracy, I can’t give too much credit to this statement. The keys are still too small for touch-typing. Any long-term Blackberry users will likely miss the physical QWERTY keyboard a lot, but if you are jumping from Apple iPhone 3G or Windows Mobile phones, you may feel it is pretty good already.

The on-screen dial pad is huge and easy to use but there is little space for displaying the numbers.

The Blackberry Storm 9500 leaves us something to be desired. At this price, it is hard to justify the lack of GPS and Wi-Fi. HSDPA, 3.5mm phone jack and the new interface bring this Blackberry a lot closer to an entertainment phone, but it does so by sacrificing productivity. The virtual QWERTY keyboard is far from a replacement of the physical one and the system is quite unresponsive at times. If you are not a die-hard Blackberry fans, my recommendation goes to the HTC Touch HD, which is better in almost every aspect and costs just as much. Of course if you love Blackberrys, the Blackberry Storm 9500 is hard to miss – just keep it away from the rest of Blackberry’s, they will dwarf the newcomer.

 

Blackberry Storm 9500 Video Review

The brand new LG KF900 Prada II is the latest version of the old Prada phone from LG. Still remember the old Prada Phone? I can say it is still a great phone to own which is functional and user friendly. This time Prada II has the similar looking to the old one, however, with a sliding QWERTY keyboard. Again it is the latter phone under the brand which enhanced fashion appeal, generated not only by the phone’s look, but also by the customers’ brand loyalty, which is a good personal symbol for you or those Prada’s lover. Let’s see if the LG Prada II is as good as or better than its predecessor.

To prove its classiness, the phone come with a nice-looking box, naturally pitch black as the one old Prada own. Inside, we find the complete set,including: a battery, a charger, USB cable, stereo handsfree, a leather case, a cleaning cloth, CD with software and a User's Guide.

The LG KF900 Prada II looks very similar to the original Prada phone. It is simple and sleek together with a 3 inch screen which is exactly the same as the original.

There are three buttons under the display: answer/reject and Clear. The first two are necessary, because, during conversation the display is not sensitive otherwise it would reacted by the touch of your face since it only sensed by heat.

The flat 3 inches screen is found in the front of the device. Unlike the old Prada, the new one has a slide-out with five-row QWERTY keyboard for messaging.

QWERTY keyboard layout closed up. They are color in silver... Feel so elegant~ and they are spacious enough for typing. The keyboard is generally easy to use.

5 mega pixel camera with auto focus and flash is located at the back of the phone.

The microSD cards slot is located at the top right side of the phone. Unlike the one Prada which is located under the battery lid, next to the SIM cards slot. Since the Prada II is working hard to excel its predecessor.

LG KF900 Prada II is come in a leather case which is sports the PRADA logo.

Just like its design, the phone’s interface is in the PRADA style: very simple, just in black and white without any other colors.

Prada II provides HTML/XHTML and WAP web browsing technologies. You can enjoy speedy connections and file transfers with WiFi and Bluetooth which are provided on this gorgeous handset.

Prada II just likes an upgrade of the old one. It doesn’t feature a top of the range camera feature with only 5 megapixels, however, it come with a fashion statement that the Prada II will make for those who are fashion conscious. Moreover, I am much appreciated that it is not too fussy or comes with too many technologies to confuse its user. I can say Prada II is the most elegant and the technologies are what we all look for in our mobile phones these days.

LG KF900 Prada II Video Review

 

Nokia continues to surprise us with its speed of bringing new phones to the market! The Nokia E63 is a “dumb-ed down” version of the well-acclaimed Nokia E71. Of course no body would think it can actually beat the Nokia E71, but how well does it hold up against its big brother? Let’s find out now.

The “I-mean-business” package contains just the phone, a battery, a charger, a handsfree, and a user’s guide. Unsurprisingly, there is no travel charger or an extra battery.



Metallic or plastic? I must say the plastic shell on the Nokia E63 is quite attractive and does add a few scores to the phone. If you must go for a metal shell though, you should choose the Nokia E71.



The buttons on the middle row can take you to all the usual “business features”. From left to right: Home, calendar, contact and messages. The soft keys are a tad too small, so it may take some getting-use-to.



The QWERTY keyboard is quite similar to the one used in Nokia E71. Frankly this keyboard is a love it or hate it type. The keys are so soft that you can keep typing for a long time, but the lack of feedback means you are constantly in doubt of whether you have pressed the key or not! The keys are also completely cramped together, which means typos are inevitable. That said, after some time with the phone I am sure everyone can learn to type with reasonable speed and accuracy – just don’t expect it to perform like a Blackberry.



The back cover is soft with a lot of friction, which should give you a pretty comfortable grip.



The 2MP camera has auto-focus and a flash. Nokia even added a flashlight function to allow you to use it as a torch.



The microSD slot (next to the USB slot) is protected by a hard cover. Since the slots occupy the place for volume control, there is no space for the volume buttons.



At the top of the phone there is a 3.5mm earphone jack (standard type!). I am glad that Nokia can finally see the wisdom of using a standard earphone jack, as opposed to the smaller 2.5mm jack on the Nokia E71.



Similar to the Today screen on the Windows Mobile, you can display unread messages and Calendar on the home screen. The home screen does a poor job of making the best use of the 2.36” screen since there are a lot of unused spaces on the screen, which could be occupied by larger icons and fonts.



Although there is an icon called GPS data, it doesn’t mean that the Nokia E63 has an internal GPS. Fortunately, Nokia Maps is still there to help you pinpoint your location (with the built-in keyboard).



After looking at the price tag, I think most people would agree that the low price of the Nokia E63 justifies the lack of GPS and HSDPA. If you only need it to check email, then the difference between EDGE/GPRS and HSDPA won’t be too significant. Plus you still get all other smartphone features from the Nokia E71. If you just need a business-oriented smartphone with a QWERTY keyboard, you will surely find a lot of merits in the Nokia E63.

Comparison: Nokia E71 vs E63

Nokia E63

• HSDPA: No
• GPS: No
• Camera: 2MP Auto focus
• Earphone Jack: 3.5 mm
• Shell: Plastic
• Dimension: 113 x 59 x 13 mm
• Weight: 126 g

Nokia E71

• HSDPA: Yes
• GPS: Yes
• Camera: 3.2MP Auto focus
• Earphone Jack: 2.5 mm
• Shell: Metallic
• Dimension: 114 x 57 x 10 mm
• Weight: 127 g

Nokia E63 Video Review