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Review Samsung D100

Samsung D100, live pictures

Standard kit:

Phone
Battery
User's guide
Portable handsfree

Samsung changed classification of its devices and presented some new model ranges at once, one of such products became Samsung D100. Letter D is reduction from Deluxe, thus the company positions these devices as business ones. But the first device in this model range is not similar to business phone. It's not because the phone is clamshell, as the phones of this form - factor don't yield to business ones in functionality.

The main questions are caused by the design of the device, it is original if not say unusual. The external face of the device traditionally is silver, while inside the phone the plastic is of dark blue color. The elements of the internal decoration appear outside, as the external part of the clamshell is made with big groove on each side, thanks to this it's very easy opening device with one hand. Externally the design of the device is traditional, you can see oval forms, but on closer examination you will confront with the oblique forms of the phone's side pieces. From the user's point of view the design decisions which found reflection in this model, are ambiguous.

The sizes of phone are 85х43х27 mm, the height is 103 mm (including the aerial). The phone easily holds in pocket of a shirt, or trousers, it doesn't overflow too much. The weight of the device is 88 grammes. The opening angle of the phone makes 20 degrees.

There are 2 volume keys, handsfree connector and also IR port on the left lateral surface. The interface connector is traditionally located at the bottom end face.

If to look at the external part of the device you will see the external OLED-screen, displaying up to 256 colors (24х17mm). On this screen is adjusted screen saver (analog clock), it can be activated by pressing side keys in standby mode, the screen is dark most of time. In a room the picture on the screen is rich but it fades in the street, it's very difficult to discern the picture, you have to look narrowly at the screen. There's a LED under the screen, traditionally it has some various backlight colors.

You open the device and see big internal screen, it's resolution is 128х160 pixels (28х38 mm) and displays up to 7 text lines and two service lines. The screen was with dead line in our case, please take it into account when looking at photos. The screen very alive, it's color rendering is very good, the screen is TFD.

The screen fades on the sun, but the information is visible.

The keyboard of the phone is made of plastic, there are 2 soft keys and 4-way navigation key under the screen. The alphanumerical keyboard is incorporated into blocks, they are divided by chrome plated inserts. The keys big by the size, it is convenient pressing them. The backlight of the keyboard is nonuniform, the central line of keys is more covered. Due to the size of the font all is visible even in this case.

Some words about battery, it's a lithium - ionic battery with capacity of 800 mAh. According to the manufacturer the phone can work up to 150 hours in standby mode, and up to 3 hours in talk mode. The device worked about three days at 25 minutes of talking and up to 15 minutes of using other functions. Time of full battery charge makes about 1 hour and 45 minutes.

Phonebook. You can enter a phonebook, if you press right soft-key in the standby mode. Then, you’ll see a list of menu items, first one is “Name search”. The phone allows viewing phone numbers both from SIM-card and phone memories. If you add a contact to a phone memory you can add up to 5 phone numbers (mobile, home, office, fax, other), e-mail and URL to each one. Besides, you can sort all your contacts in caller groups. Up to 5 caller groups are available (+ there is a category “Without group”), you can name them, as you like. Groups are necessary, when you send a group SMS. There is also a name search in a group. Special ringing tones, pictures and SMS tone can be assigned to some groups.

View of the contact is well realized. You can see a total list with all phone numbers and choose the necessary one to make a call. Up to 8 phone numbers can be assigned to speed dialing. Totally up to 500 phone numbers (not contacts) can be stored in the phonebook.

Messages. The phone supports EMS standard and concatenated messages (up to 918 characters each). As a result, there is a set of small pictures (up to 22) and animated images (up to 24) and a set of melodies, which can be attached to a message. Up to 50 messages can be kept in the phone memory.

The support of MMS messages is realized rather well, so you can create some slides for each message, add pictures, melodies, all is simple and easy. 700 KB of memory are allocated for MMS-messages.

Mail. The built - in mail client works with POP3/SMTP servers, the loading of letter headings is supported, small graphic files are also supported (as attachment). As a whole the realization of the mail client does not shine with luxuries, the same programs are used in the majority of competing models. There are about 1024 KB for mail in the phone.

Call lists. Nothing new here. There are lists of the last 10 missed, dialed and received calls with time and date indication. Unfortunately, total time of all calls can’t be viewed, though there are separate timers for incoming and outgoing calls.

Sound settings. Here you can choose a ringing tone (44 polyphonic melodies and animals voices). The phone supports 40-tones polyphony and a ringer is very loud.

There are several types of incoming alert: just sound, just vibrating alert and a mixed mode (firstly, vibrating alert and then a sound). One of 10 pre-installed tones can be chosen for SMS messages. You can also switch a minute minder, which works in a talking mode and set a tone that is played while connecting with the other side (subscriber).

Phone settings. All settings are ordinary. However, you can adjust contrast of both screens (external and internal). And you can choose one of the animated pictures here. After it you will feel all capabilities of the screen.

Organizer. Current month is displayed as a calendar. You can add a note (up to 40 characters) to each day. Events are not divided to types. And you can’t input 2 notes to one day. But there is a way to avoid this limit. You make a record for another day and then copy it to a necessary date, which has a note. It’s not very convenient, but works at least.

To-do list. You can add notes concerning your business, set a priority level (high, low, usual) and copy these notes to a calendar.

Date and time. You can view a world time in cities and set current local time and date.

Alarm-clock. There are two alarm-clocks here: recurrent and the one, which can ring only once. Both alarm-clocks can work when the phone is switched off.

Calculator and currency converter are simple but they make their job.

Network Services. Apart from usual network settings the phone allows a user to choose manually a current band (GSM900/1800 or GSM1900).

Funbox. There are some pre-installed games in the phone: Bowling, Mobile Chess, Fun2Link, BubbleSmile, Ultimate Golf.. There are 512 KB in the phone which can be used for installation of games.

Wap-browser (version 1.2.1) can help downloading new pictures, melodies and games (1945 KB are available for this purpose). The phone supports Java.

Impressions

The given device is almost exact copy of Samsung Е400 and provides comparable reception quality (there are no problems with this parameter). The loudness of 40-tones polyphonic ring is high, the force of vibration alert is average.
The differences of the device are in MMS support (GPRS, class 10), the built - in mail client and big memory size for separate functions. I do not presume to judge as far as all these changes allow relating the device to business segment. In my opinion, all this device is a fashion clamshell with additional functions. Samsung's release shows, that they are not in great demand in the market, remember another "business" model - Samsung S100. And here we have disputable design.
The model is worth waiting in September, the beginning of October. Cost will make about 280-300 dollars, and will smoothly reduce to 250 dollars by the end of the year. In my opinion, this phone is not worth considering as potential hit of sales, it's just an assortment model.

Here you can listen to some of the ringing tones (mp3, 367 Kb)

Eldar Murtazin ([email protected])
Translated by Andreas von Horn ([email protected])

Published — 26 August 2003

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