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Samsung Galaxy Note. First Look
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Review of Samsung C3510TV GSM phoneLive photos of Samsung C3510TV
Contents:
Package:
PositioningSamsung already has got the experience of transforming Star into Star TV – one of the company's first touchscreen phones with analog TV. The success of such models is predetermined by the Asian markets where TV in phones is commonplace. However, this phone was successful in Europe as well. And the price markup for the TV receiver is higher than in standard models making it more profitable for the manufacturer. So, from any point of view, these products are profitable, do not require aggressive promotion – they sell on their own though remain in their niche.  The expansion of the TV series proceeded with the budget C3510 (Corby Pop on some markets). The phone now features an analog receiver – and that is the only thing that has changed. Same color, higher price – a phone for those who need it. At the start of sales this model will be in the same price range as Star TV (S5233 TV) and the latter has better functionality and looks more interesting. Apparently, many retailers will not be offering both Star TV and C3510 TV so the inbuilt TV receiver will remain the main feature. Other major manufacturers do not offer this feature so C3510 TV gets its own market niche. Whether you want this phone you should solely decide based on whether you need a TV receiver – it is a very specific product. Design, Size, ControlsThe main material is plastic – it is inexpensive, glossy and looks good though it catches fingerprints. The phone is available only in black, the rear panel features a hardly distinguishable pattern. The assembly quality is fine – no wobbling or creaking.   The phone's dimensions - 106,4 x 55,9 x 13,2mm (4.2x2.2x0.52in), weight – 99gr (3.5oz). The phone is rather plum and feels solid in hand, but, most importantly, it does remind of other similar phones. I positively like the "tear drop" design of the button. On the left side there is a volume rocker and the interface slot (Samsung standard – another detail saying it is a budget phone – there is no microUSB). On the right side there is the lock button and the camera button. Also there – microSD memory card slot and an extendable antenna.   Back to the table of contents >>> DisplayThe phone uses the good old screen from S3650, the official specs claim a different color palette but it is not discernible. It is a resistive 2.8" TFT screen with the resolution of 240x320 displaying 262 000 colors. Samsung phones use the VibeZ technology – a button press triggers a vibration response confirming the action. The screen can display up to 8 lines of text and up to 3 system tray lines. In the message reading mode the screen can display up to 16 lines depending on the size of the font. You may adjust the font and its size in the settings, though they do not differ a lot. But the font size on this phone, unlike many other models, is really huge and it is easily readable from any distance – it is a big advantage. The screen fades out under direct sunlight – it is a significant drawback of the phone. The phone features Gesture Lock function – when the phone is in standby mode you can draw a letter on the screen to dial a specific number or launch a function (up to 9 shortcuts, any letter from the alphabet you wish). A nice touch that allows you to quickly launch applications. Back to the table of contents >>> BatteryThe phone uses a 1000mAh Li-Ion battery. The manufactures provides the following lifetime numbers: 4 hours of voice calls and up to 400 hours of standby. Within the Moscow networks the battery lifetime equaled about 2 days with an hour of voice calls, a few SMS, just a bit of emailing and an hour of music playback. If you use email and the web extensively you will only get one day on battery. All in all, you should expect one or two days on battery – it is the phone's limit. Charging time until full is about 2 hours. The maximum TV playback is about 7.5 hours.  Back to the table of contents >>> USB, Bluetooth, Communication featuresBluetooth. The phone supports several profiles: Headset, Handsfree, Serial Port, Dial Up Networking, File Transfer, Object Push, Basic Printing, A2DP. Bluetooth version 2.1, EDR supported. It works fine with headsets – no problems at all. USB connection. You may choose one of the three modes: Media, Mass Storage, Samsung KIES. There is no modem mode in this phone but you can easily use this function via KIES or by installing the necessary driver.
In the USB Mass Storage mode the phone is immediately recognized without any additional drivers. The USB version is 2.0, data transfer rate is about 2 Mb/s. When connected to a PC the phone cannot operate through USB and Bluetooth simultaneously – the phone asks you to turn the Bluetooth off disregarding the current status (whether you have or have not a connection or data transfer) – this is really inconvenient. When connected via USB the battery is charging. The phone supports EDGE class 10 for GSM networks. Back to the table of contents >>> Memory and Memory CardsThe phone has 75 MB of inbuilt memory and practically all of it is available to the user. The memory card is displayed separately, you may also view all the folders (from the inner memory and the memory card). There is a file manager that allows you to copy files from and to the memory card. The phone supports hot swap for memory cards. We have tested 8 GB microSD cards and they worked fine. Back to the table of contents >>> CameraA regular 1.3 MP module with a fixed focus. The camera interface is horizontal, you select all the options by simply pressing on the icons - they are big and make using the camera easy.   The following resolutions are supported:
 Modes:
White balance:
Effects:
Sample camera shots:
Video shooting For the maximum resolution video recording the phone supports the mpeg4 format, you can also specify in the settings whether you want the mic on or off during the shoot. The settings are similar to those for photo mode but the resolution is different and there are also effects available for video. The maximum resolution is 320x240 (15 frames per second) – the quality is mediocre. Back to the table of contents >>> TV ReceiverThe difference from the regular C3510 is that this phone has an extendable antenna that enhances the quality of TV reception. In the application you may set up any channel – in Moscow the phone could find 15 channels (both federal and decimetric). The reception quality is so-so, in some buildings I could hardly get anything, in others the reception was very noisy but watchable. On the street the reception is rather good. The engineers were probably very well aware of the quality of reception (due to the sensitivity of the receiver) so you may turn the TV picture off if you wish – you may want to just listen to the Samsung's TV. I was pleasantly surprised by this option – you may just listen to the news without being distracted by the picture. I am not saying that this is how it should be, but it is a very good alternative.    Another phone's perk is that you can save and store your favorite TV shows in the phone (mpeg format). See sample TV recordings below:
All in all this phone is not better or worse than its Chinese successors, but it has better service functions for TV.     Menu, InterfaceThis model is almost an exact copy of S3650 so if you have read the latter's review you may skip this section. While in standby mode the screen displays a line of three icons: dial a number, contacts and the menu. To the left you may see an arrow that hides the icon line. Once the line is viewed you may add any application from Widget. You may arrange the order of the icons as you wish and the phone will remember it. It is better to know measure and not create a mess of icons but rather keep just a few of them. Let us have a look at other home screen functions:
You may adjust Samsung Widgets to suit yourself anyway you like it. Unfortunately, there is an issue of the screen size, I would like to see more icons simultaneously. But event as of today it is the most flexible solution, way better than Nokia's Active Standby. Currently there are almost twenty widgets available in this model and there is a download manager that allows you to download new widgets from the Samsung website – you see the name of the widget, its description and the size. No other manufacturer offers anything quite like it for the standby screen – it is a very flexible and attractive solution. There may be up to three screens for widgets, you may scroll through the screens. You may conveniently set the preinstalled wallpapers for all the three screens at once. You may go to the home screen by pressing the icon at the bottom of the screen. The home screen feature an icon 3x4 matrix. Working with this touchscreen is easy. By pressing once you choose an element, for the text bar – one click to select the bar, two to open the key pad.
 The key pad you use to type is typically the same cell phone key pad – every key has got several characters and you have to press a key several times to type the character you want: this phone does not have a virtual QWERTY key pad.
There is, however, T9 predictive typing – you may turn this feature on in with a single click. The phone suggests different words, recognizes them and allows you to select the right variant with a single click. All menus have a bottom bar that feature context keys i.e. their functions and number (up to three) change depending on the current menu. Back to the table of contents >>> Phone BookYou may view contacts by pressing an icon on the quick launch bar at the bottom of the screen – you will see a list containing all the entries both from the phone memory and the SIM. To the left there is a magnifying glass icon – quick scroll to the needed letter. You may choose contacts, groups or favorites from the drop-down list. The list displays only names, to the right of them are the call and the SMS buttons (usually the phone uses the default phone number). You cannot view photos or the number in the common list – you have to select a contact and choose in the number you want in the card.
You may assign any picture format file for a contact as well as your photos and videos. A may add up to five different phone numbers (mobile, office, home, fax etc.) to a contact one of which will be the main (the one entered first by default). The fields are not fixed. You may also add information in the additional fields e.g. e-mail, address and so on. There are two fields for the name and the surname (the search only works with the first field), both fields are joined when displayed – first goes the Name field. Example: John Citizen. Each field can take up to 20 characters of any of the supported languages. You may also use different languages when filling in the name. The entries in different languages are arranged in the following order: first come all the contacts in the local language (e.g. Russian) and then all the entries in English. It is convenient and familiar by PC applications. Take into account the quick switch between the languages in the search and you will see that entries in different languages pose no problem at all in this phone. You can also arrange your contacts by the first or second name. Back to creating a contact: besides the phone number you can also add an email (or several emails) and a short text note. You can assign any sound file to a contact including mp3 songs. You can easily create groups, assign a ringtone to each of them, add a picture (by default there are three groups and no group categories). You can also assign a tone for SMS.
You can store up to 1000 contacts with all the fields filled in. If you skip certain fields the number of available contacts space will still remain exactly one thousand. In the settings you may choose the location you want new contacts to be saved to by default. You may transfer contacts from your SIM and to your SIM. The developers decided that the best way to sync is the PC, or MS Outlook, to be precise. You can quickly send any contact to another device as an SMS/MMS, email or via Bluetooth. It all works smoothly – a phone book entry is sent to another device and is recognized without any problems. You may create your visit card – its format matches exactly a regular phone book entry. You may have up to 8 numbers in the quick dial list – you can assign different numbers of one and the same contact. The keys view a name tag or a picture but not the phone number type. You may create any number of contacts groups you wish. Toy can assign a tune and a picture to every group. A group may consist of up to 20 contacts. During an incoming call you see the contact's picture half the size of the screen – it is easily readable.  Back to the table of contents >>> Call LogEach log displays up to 30 phone numbers. There is a common log for recent calls, recent SMS, email (90 entries in total), an icon shows the type of event. In my opinion, the inclusion of email addresses is rather a burden on the log. I receive about a hundred letters an hour and they shift down all the other events and the log becomes less informative. You may quickly jump between the logs. Detailed view of each entry has the time and date of the call. Similar calls are grouped and have the date next to the phone number. As usual, in this menu you can see the total call time and their cost (if you have this service). You may black mark certain numbers that will be rejected automatically. There is also a log of sent messages. Back to the table of contents >>> MessagingAs well as other manufacturers Samsung no longer discriminates between SMS and MMS – you create a message and then depending on its contents it becomes either an SMS or an MMS. In the settings you may still manually create an MMS (e.g. you need to send text only to an email to avoiding the mail client). The phone stores up to 300 messages and supports the EMS standard, compatible with Nokia Smart Messaging. You may choose the recipient from the phone book or from the recents or from the groups. As usual, you can create a black list to automatically delete all the messages received from the specified numbers. You can transfer messages to any folder you create.
There is a chat type called Conversation that displays your correspondence with a contact in form of a dialogue. Bluetooth-÷àò, ïîçâîëÿåò ïîñûëàòü ñîîáùåíèÿ è ôàéëû íà äðóãîé òåëåôîí ñ òàêèì ïðèëîæåíèåì. The Bluetooth chat allows you to send messages and files to another phone with this application. There an MMS size limit of 295KB – the size of incoming messages is not limited. Among the additional settings it is worth mentioning the automatic rejection of ad messages, type of message reception in roaming and in home network. The messages are stored in the common dynamic memory as well as emails. There is also a useful function of SOS messages. If you turn it on then in an emergency situation after pressing four time the volume rocker the message «I am in emergency. Please help me» will be automatically sent to the specified contacts and the incoming calls from these numbers will be accepted automatically. You can specify the contacts' numbers (up to 5) and the number of redials but you cannot edit the text in the message.
 Back to the table of contents >>> OrganizerThe phone memory can store up to 1000 events, thee several types of events: meeting, anniversary, holiday, important and personal. For every entry you specify the time, date and the expiration time. You can assign a alarm tone and an interval it must go off before the event; there are repetitive events (you can adjust the time, specify exceptions – very convenient). The calendar view both for a month and for a week is very handy – every event type marked with a different color – everything is clear. Unfortunately, you cannot quickly create an event by pressing a date in the calendar, the screen only fits two events for a single day.
Notes – regular text notes.
 Tasks – up to a hundred tasks with adjustable priority.  World time. Time for specified cities – simple and handy. There is now a map on which you can choose the time zone you need.
Calculator – a basic calculator.  Converter – A very handy solution of currency conversion – you can see the whole list on the screen.
Back to the table of contents >>> AppsFM Radio. You can save up to 99 radio stations in the phone memory, the available frequency range is from 87.5MHz to 108MHz. there is an automatic search but you cannot assign a name for some channels – they are always displayed as a frequency. The radio can work via the loudspeaker. The radio, in general, is ok, the phone cannot get good reception of some stations but all in all it is ok. The radio can work in the background. You can also record radio shows. The RDS function displays only the radio station name in the general list at the top – it does not have any other applications here.
Dictaphone. You may have several hours of voice notes, the number of recordings is not limited. You can set the time limit for a recording e.g. 1 hour. All the recordings are stored in a separate folder in the phone. The quality of recordings of lectures, meeting is acceptable, the voice is discernable. The phone can to some extent replace a digital dictaphone.
 The stopwatch and the countdown timer are quite regular.
Bluetooth. This applications looks unusual: you can view the map of devices like some desktop managers do, you can switch to a regular list of devices. It supports all the functions, there are no limitations.
There is no multitasking for Java applications. The number of preinstalled games may vary depending on the market. The maximum size of an application is 500KB.
 Browser –we will look into it in the Google section. Communities (known as Share Pix earlier) – An application that will become standard for Samsung phones. You can select one of the web services, enter your account information and the phone will automatically upload your photos along with your tags. If there is no Wi-Fi connection the data are transferred via the carriers network – this makes this application rather expensive.
Google. This is the Google search, an actual browser and a Gmail client and there is a full version og Google Maps. Let us start with the end. The maps are absolutely ordinary, but thanks to the screen size viewing and scrolling through maps with fingers is convenient. All the controls are on the screen, you can view satellite or map images. I found the satellite images rather crude, the picture look better on other phones, this is, probably, due to the low resolution with the large size of the screen. Geo location by the ground stations works fine. The phone feature version 2.0 web browser (NetFront 3.5), the page display has been enhanced as well as the rendering speed. As compared to the Windows Mobile browser this one has less features, there is no visual history. The browser supports JavaScript, font scaling (three types of text), Smart-Fit (single column sites view), full screen picture view (hide all the elements), page caching and there is now a mouse prototype – a virtual pointer. Similar to Nokia S60 products and Opera Mini there is now page view with navigation mini window. The functionality of the browser is ok and will satisfy most users.
Back to the table of contents >>> Alarm ClockYou can set alarm clocks in a single click and turn on and off the ones you have already set. Each alarm clock is set by week days, repeat time and similar aspects. Naturally, you can assign your own tune.
Back to the table of contents >>> File Manager (My files)From here you can view all your files: music, pictures, videos, sounds. All downloaded content can be also viewed from here. The drawbacks are: sometimes a file is not viewed immediately and you have to close the application and open it again. You can view your files both as a list and as icons. You can select one or multiple files from the list. You can copy, delete and transfer (to the phone memory or the memory card) files. You can arrange files by date and time, type, name or size. By default the common list displays files from both locations.
   
Back to the table of contents >>> SettingsAs usual, you can password protect any directory of the phone. You can adjust the screen brightness and the backlight time. There are no any special or unusual settings for this phone. You can choose from a set of wallpapers. There are different profiles you can use to quickly change the phone's settings.
Of course, you can adjust the font size for the number dial, its color and style. You can also adjust the vibration strength for VibeZ.
Mobile Tracker – You specify a phone number that will receive a notification every time you change your SIM. The message contains your current SIM card number. You can only enable this option by entering the password – this prevents turning off the notification without the password. Once a new SIM cars is inserted a single notification is sent, every change of the SIM card invokes a new message. An interesting option that raises the chances of finding your phone in case it is stolen.
Back to the table of contents >>> ÌÐ3 playerA regular Samsung player. It supports random, consecutive and cyclic playback. You can send mp3 file to the phone directly via Bluetooth or via the sync application or Windows Media Player. Files may contain any titles and tags, including Cyrillic names – the phone recognizes them. The bitrate of files is also irrelevant – the phone works fine with all popular formats. It also supports WMA, AAC, eAAC, eAAC+. During playback you can see the title of the current track and the total number of tracks. The volume has 14 gauges. You can create your own play lists. The player can operate in the background, in which case you can see the track title and a controls prompt. The loudspeaker is somewhat noisy, lacks power but the volume is average – not too quiet.
Back to the table of contents >>> Bottom LineThe connection quality is on a par with other Samsung phones – there are no problems, it is comparable with other models in this class. The ringtone volume is average or a bit lower – clothes sometimes muffle it. The vibration alert strength is average – no dramatic improvements here. The phone costs less than ˆ150. Compare to Star TV which cost same or a bit less. The original model C3510 costs about ˆ110. The difference is significant and is determined by the TV receiver. This phone is nothing more but an expansion of assortment of the model range. Just another phone with an extra feature that some people will like. Do you want to talk about this? Please, go to our Forum and let your opinion be known to the author and everybody else. Back to the table of contents >>> Eldar Murtazin ([email protected]) Published — 08 March 2011 Have something to add?! Write us... [email protected]
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