closeAuthor: Ernest Doku Name: Ernest Doku
Email: ernest.doku@omio.com
Site: http://blog.omio.com
About: I like gadgets, loads! I like talking about them, writing about them, using them, watching other people use them though binoculars… Some would say it was an unhealthy fascination, but then I’d be all like, “Shh…,” and go back to doing gadget-related things. Hit me up on Xbox Live or PSN, I’m EJStyleS. I promise to give you a good match as well as talk about things that aren’t gadgets. A bit.See Authors Posts (1307)

Just as we were wondering what on Earth (or in space, ha!) happened to the Samsung Spica, the other Android handset available from the Korean phone maker, it’s popped up on T-Mobile’s UK site as the Samsung Galaxy Portal.

Available for free from £23 per month on an 18 month contract, the Galaxy Portal offers a 3.2 megapixel autofocus camera, media player with support for DivX and Mp3 formats, 16GB of storage (via microSD), as well as access to the Android Market and over 20,000 apps.

Unfortunately the Portal is still sporting the v1.5 ‘Cupcake’ build meaning that it doesn’t pack some of the impressive features of later Android phones, but Samsung has promised to issue software upgrades to both the Galaxy and the i5700/Galaxy Portal next month, making this Google-powered blower a bit of a bargain!

So if you want to make a tentative step into another dimension – namely one filled with customisable homescreens, decent mobile internet and e-mail connectivity – then the Samsung Galaxy Portal is the phone to take you there.

The Acer Liquid, a supercharged Snapdragon Android device with 5-megapixel camera, expansive 3.5-inch screen and imposing form factor was on our radar as a SIM-free phone back in December, but has piqued our interest with a pay monthly release.

The Acer Liquid A1 ships in an icy white exterior, with the white Acer Liquid available first, with red and black models to ship in Q1 2010.

Social networking status notifications are at the hub as usual, with support for Facebook, Twitter, Youtube and Flickr out of the box, and a custom application for streaming media to the device, as well as auto-uploading of content.

An interesting feature called Acer Sync allows the Liquid to pair with any Windows PC over the same Wi-Fi network, enabling quick and easy transfer of data between the two – always handy!

The Acer Liquid A1 white is available now, with pay monthly contracts starting from £25 per month on an 18 month tariff.

Wow, this was a surprise! The impressive Toshiba TG01 with 4.1-inch display, Windows Mobile 6.5 and superfast Snapdragon processor is now available to buy on prepay!

The previous mobile phone deals available were all pay monthly, but the super smartphone is an Orange exclusive and can now be snapped up for a mere £149.

Promising ‘a mobile revolution,’ the TG01 is a Windows Mobile powered-handset offering a jazzed-up user interface on top in the vein of the Samsung Omnia or the HTC Touch HD’s TouchFLO 3D.

Actually, the TG01 has a lot in common with HTC’s latest, offering a slender 4.1″ wide handset that is a mere 9.9″ thick.

The VGA screen takes up most of that real estate on the front of the screen, whilst the new Qualcomm Snapdragon chip inside offers the kind of processing grunt to make the TG01 more than a match for the iPhone…on paper at least!

Med Jeewoth, Toshiba’s country manager for UK and Ireland, did the honours, claiming the company have taken their expertise in TV and applied it to mobiles, and they also “listened to what users want – great speed, and the interaction of a touchscreen, but more importantly you want it to look really slick, very slim and very sexy.”

3G connectivity and built-in GPS are all standard, as as support for both Flash and DivX for all your multimedia needs!

The Samsung S7070 Diva is a cute revamp of the hugely successful Tocco Lite, sporting a Hollywood-gnasher white finish and luxurious quilted rear cover. Specifications are also reminiscent of the multi-million selling phone with a 3.2-inch resistve touch screen, 3 megapixel camera, FM radio with RDS and the familiar TouchWiz interface.

Where the S7070 earns its diva status is in its social networking functionality, with a gem-shaped option key, the ability to receive live notifications from social networks like Facebook, MySpace and Twitter (all about the ‘pull’ updates, I told you so!) and the always impressive ability to silence a call by turning the handset onto its face.

How boujis!

The 3MP camera on the Samsung S7070 Diva has tweakable settings to turn those snaps into profile-worthy portraits, with Beauty effect (which makes you beautiful, natch) and Lomo effect, which seems to be the digital equivalent of smearing Vaseline onto a fisheye lens.

The Samsung S5150 Diva folder is a rare clamshell handset from the Korean manufacturer, with a mirrored cover housing an external screen to display the time and incoming messages.

Hinging on arresting looks as opposed to cutting-edge features, the S5150 eschews a touchscreen and rocks an understated yet functional user interface, giving an old-school feel reminiscent of early Sony Ericsson phones…hardly a bad thing.

These fancy phones should be sashaying into stores from early next year, and we’re sure that their entrance will be overstated and showy, like the Divas they are…SSamsung Diva

The Nokia 6700 Slide is for those who like to be noticed, arriving in six bright and bold colourways. Fronted by a relatively staid aluminium model, alluring pastel blue, green, red and purple and pink variants available.

The 6700 Slide isn’t just a style statement however, it is one of the new breed of Nokia phones packed to the rafters with impressive features.

Equipped with 2GB of memory and a microSD card slot supporting up to 16GB means plenty of space for music, which is just as well because the battery is good for as much as 29 hours of uninterrupted playback! The 6700 does have a 2.5mm audio jack, though, so an adaptor is needed for those favourite headphones…

A 2.2-inch QVGA display and 5 megapixel Carl Zeiss camera with dual-LED flash help you to view and capture every moment, as well as briskly upload it to your favourite social networking site, thanks to image editing software as well as swift 3G connectivity.

Nokia Messaging on board ensures mail and texting is covered, whilst the diminutive frame, price (a snip at €160/£145) and arresting paintwork are sure to make the Nokia 6700 Slide a favourite amongst fashionistas in the first quarter of next year.

The Nokia 7230 was also unveiled today, a more affordable device but a pocket dynamo for Facebook addicts!

The 7230 is a Symbian S40 phone, a rung below some of the bells and whistles that the 6700 Slide can boast, but making this cute 3G-packing slider no less appealing a prospect.

Weighing only 100 grams, the combination of a curved two-tone frame (available in graphite or hot pink), a 3.2 megapixel camera, 2GB of onboard memory and support for Flickr and Facebook out of the box all make the Nokia 7230 an ideal social mobile.

In terms of multimedia, the 7230 may surprise with a 3.5mm headphone jack, and an epic 27 hours of music playback from a battery.

Best of all, the Nokia 7230 comes packed with a suite of games including Snake III, and we all know how much Omio enjoys a bit of retro gaming…

Also due for a 2010 release, the sleek 7230 is pegged for a bargain price point of €100 (£90) a great price for some decidedly mid-range specs, and a decent form factor to boot.

Check out the full Nokia 6700 Slide features and Nokia 7230 specifications on the site, and watch below to sneak an early peek at them in their social snapping element!

After reaching the dizzy heights of contract phone chart stardom, the Sony Ericsson W995 Walkman phone has now made a bid for success in the competitive prepay industry!

Taking cues from earlier W-series phones and bringing them kicking and screaming into the 21st Century, the W995 is a brilliant example of Sony Ericsson’s convergent strategy by boasting an 8 megapixel camera, 8GB of memory and a 3.5mm headphone jack on top of excellent Walkman music functionality.

The sleek slider design makes for a compact device, and one that rightly received high marks in our Sony Ericsson W995 review.

Pay-As-You-Go W995 deals start from £199.95 from Dial-A-Phone, get one now and become part of the music revolution!

This is a fact that Nokia realises and is a major contributing factor to why they are still number one – by releasing plenty of great entry level devices that are attainable to those struggling to make ends meet.

These four new mobiles from the Finnish manufacturer announced today (five, if you include the £17 Nokia 1280) show that fun and functional phones needn’t cost the earth.

The Nokia 1616 is a torch-waving dual band handset with a 3.5 mm headphone jack, FM radio, colour screen and the usual suite of basic Nokia functionality.

With a choice of colours and a price of only €24 (£21), the 1616 could shine on prepay after its Q1 2010 release.

The Nokia 1800 differs in form but remains familiar in function to the 1616, another compact dual band device with a colour display, 3.5mm audio jack and FM radio.

It can also outlast even the chattiest of folks, with a 8.5 hour talk-time and a fantastic 22 days of standby, and at a price of €24 (£21) we’re sure that it won’t stay on shelves for long next year.

Amazing what the absence of wi-fi, Bluetooth, GPS tagging or toastie maker can do to a phone’s battery lifespan, isn’t it?

The Nokia 2220 Slide is far more flamboyant, a two-tone slider available in a range of colours including hot pink, which immediately got us interested!

In all honesty the 2220 is a step up from the above two phones, incorporating MMS, Bluetooth, GPRS support, a VGA camera and Ovi e-mail support.

The Nokia 2690 is a candybar version of the 2220 slide that looks pretty nice and contains the majority of features, with the addition of EDGE and MicroSD support for cards up to 8GB.

At a price of €45 (£40) and €54 (£48) accordingly, it is amazing to see how far mobile phones have actually come, and what savvy folks can get for their money.

The HTC HD2 is the first handset to be released after the Taiwanese company’s high profile rebranding exercise, and we can think of no better posterchild to show off the new ‘quietly brilliant’ tagline than this Windows Mobile 6.5 powerhouse.

The 1GHz Snapdragon processor is the iron fist to the intuitive velvet glove of HTC Sense user interface, with the HD2’s 4.3″ capacitive touch display enabling quick access between e-mails, messaging and all that personal data at the flick of a finger.

HTC HD2 deals see the handset firmly pitched as a smartphone solution, with O2 offering 600 minutes and unlimited texts on a 24 month contract for only £30 per month. The phone itself costs £39.99 on top of that, a small price to pay for some bleeding-edge tech on a decent tariff.

18 month offers are ideal for those with commitment issues, but the price is substantially higher. The same 600 mins x unlimited texts deal costs £35 per month, and the handset cost for the HD2 also increases to £79.99.

Both are great options, and the HTC HD2 offers arguably the best Windows experience on a mobile today. Enjoy the cinematic experience, and embrace something quietly brilliant!

Without further ado, here are the big winners of the Mobile Choice Awards:

Most Stylish Phone

LG New Chocolate BL40 – None can argue that the striking stylings of this fashion phone were anything less than catwalk quality. A marriage of unorthodox looks with a 21:9 display, and a classic minimalist black finish had the Chocolate head and shoulders above the rest.

Runners-up:

HTC Touch Diamond2

Apple iPhone 3GS

Nokia 8800 Carbon Arte

Samsung i8910HD

—————

Best Multimedia Phone

Samsung i8910HD – 3.7″ AMOLED display? HD video recording? 8.1 megapixel camera? Yes.

Runners-up:

LG Chocolate BL40

Sony Ericsson Satio

Nokia N97

Apple iPhone 3GS

————————

Best Camera Phone

Samsung Pixon 12 – For once, the numbers aren’t just for bragging rights as the first 12 megapixel camera phone also proved to be the best, with a suite of features commonly found on dedicated gadgets.

Runners-up:

LG Viewty Smart GC900

Nokia N86 8MP

Sony Ericsson C905 +

—————

Best Social Networking Handset

INQ1

3’s ‘little handset that could’ takes down the bevy of smart phone beauties by being a pocket dynamo in the social stakes. Liaising happily with Windows Live and Skype, the coup de grace is the merged contact list formed by hooking up with Facebook. Profiles, status and images all sync perfectly, leaving you with a perfect phone for popular folks that doesn’t dent the bank, let alone break it.

Runners-up:

HTC Hero

Nokia N97

LG GW520

BlackBerry Curve 8520

—————–

Phone Of The Year

The HTC Hero ticks all of the boxes as far as a strong handset is concerned. Embracing the new Android operating system, HTC’s Sense UI manages to offer a fun, intuitive, slick and (above all else) practical interface, without choosing to ape Apple’s groundbreaking device.

The form factor might be a little divisive in terms of people’s tastes, but each design choice is clear, justifiable and makes for a striking phone to look at.

A deserving winner.

Runners-up:

Samsung i8910HD

HTC Touch Diamond2

Nokia N97

Sony Ericsson Satio

Apple iPhone 3GS

LG Viewty Smart GC900

LG Chocolate BL40

Samsung Tocco Ultra Edition

INQ1

Samsung

Samsung have a wide range of phones, encompassing all form factors and price points in an aim to get the Windows phone party started.

Samsung Omnia LITE

The flagship “Windows phone” for Carphone Warehouse, the Omnia Lite is a great cheap and cheerful option, sporting a 3″ display, 3.15 megapixel lens and 3G connectivity in a compact candybar frame.

Windows Mobile 6.5 is on board enabling a full suite of multimedia, productivity and web functionality, whilst Wi-Fi and A-GPS round out a smart phone featureset at almost a feature phone price.

Samsung Omnia Lite deals are already available from a number of retailers.

Samsung Omnia 2

The handset that Phones4U have pinned their Windows phone hopes on, the Samsung Omnia 2 beefs up the specs of the Lite to make for a stronger smart phone contender. A 5 megapixel camera and dual LED compliments the 3.7″ AMOLED resistive touchscreen to make for a strong multimedia device, whilst Windows Mobile 6.5 is overlaid with the widget-based TouchWiz UI to make for a more intuitive handset.

Samsung Omnia 2 deals were unveiled as of yesterday, in sync with the launch of Microsoft’s mobile platform.

Samsung Omnia PRO

This QWERTY slider offers a slightly more business-like frame for Windows Mobile 6.5, allowing fans of physical typing and texting to hop aboard the 6.5 train.

Omnia PRO features include a 5 megapixel camera, 3.5″ touchscreen, not to mention that 4-row keyboard which is equally perfect for writing Word documents in Pocket Office as sending a message to a loved one.

HTC

HTC Touch2

The Taiwanese manufacturer’s first WinMo 6.5 phone is a solid effort, the HTC Touch2 is firmly in their comfort zone as far as stats and form factor are concerned.

The stylish design of the device is a bit of a headturner, whilst the silky TouchFLO overlay keeps the essential contacts, messaging and mail information at the forefront of the device, whilst the 3.15 megapixel camera and robust media player make easy work of entertainment.

The 3G and Wi-Fi connectivity are all top-notch, and a good example of the device that might not wow at first impressions, but is strong throughout.

HTC HD2 (HTC “Leo”)

A handset that has taken on an almost mythical status since the initial unveiling, the HTC HD2 is a flagship phone in every respect. The sliver of black metal and plastic is home to a 4.3″ TFT capacitive display – a world first.

Bringing multitouch to Windows Mobile, the HD2 also is the first phone to use the ‘Sense’ user interface, a beautiful and customisable evolution of TouchFLO that was previously only seen on Android devices.

The HD2 has a 1Ghz processor purring under the hood, providing a lightning quick responsive touch ecxperience and the ability to run multiple applications without breaking a sweat. The Sense UI brings the things that we use most – mail, messaging, contacts and even Twitter – to the fore with an array of shortcuts from the homepage.

Toshiba TG01

The Toshiba TG01 was an impressve Windows-powered handset in a lot of ways, not least the huge 4.1″ touch display and interesting ‘Blinds’ interface improving the complex user experience often associated with smart phones.

However, the manufacturer believes that Windows Mobile 6.5 upgrade will be so substantial that it turns the handset into an entirely new mobile.

The Toshiba TG01 Windows Phone will be released day and date with Windows Mobile 6.5, on October 6th. In terms of hardware, the new TG01 will be identical, but will have the update pre-installed out of the box.

Were you one of the early adopters to buy Toshiba TG01? If so, worry not.

Toshiba pledges that existing owners will be eligible for a free upgrade to the latest Windows software by going to their site upon its release. How nice.

LG

LG GM750

The LG GM750 is a sleek new touch-driven device, expected to launch day and date with the new packing Windows Mobile 6.5 software update on October 6th.

Seemingly a Vodafone exclusive, the GM750 plays host to a myriad of features and services in a sleek form. The device offers access to personal and work e-mail accounts, calendar synchronization and faster Internet browsing via Vodafone’s high-speed mobile broadband network or Wi-Fi.

With a 3″ full touchscreen facilitating enhanced navigation capability while browsing the Internet, writing text messages and memos, GPS and a 5 megapixel camera, the GM750 offers a powerful all-in-one device.

With support for downloadable applications from the Windows Marketplace, the LG GM750 marries the popular S-Class user interface with a suite of productivity features.