Mini Review: Spb Mobile Shell 3.0

Well, this isn’t really a review, more of an opinion piece.

After seeing the initial information about Spb’s Mobile Shell 3.0 I was very impressed and wanted to take a closer look. I started by taking a look at an in depth review from Remo at MobilityMinded.com. Take a look at his review when you get a chance.

In the past I have actually tried a lot of shell type applications and have just not been overly impressed. I like the idea of putting a new face on the today screen, and that has been pretty much been all that most shells are capable of. I generally just play around with a trial version and then get rid of it within short order. I am slightly manic (is that possible?) about keeping my gear running as quickly as possible and have mostly seen these kinds of applications as wasteful resource hogs.

Spb’s Mobile Shell 3.0 has been a wonderful exception! It doesn’t seem to affect system performance at all and is so fluid. It is certainly finger friendly and it is quite obvious that a lot of time and effort was put into its design.

Mobile Shell 3.0 actually goes fairly deep. It doesn’t make UI changes, simply includes a lot of functionality for commonly used actions. It really covers off some of the things you do with your smartphone everyday, such as looking at your schedule, looking up contacts, seeing mail, text and phone messages on one screen and a lot more.

Spb has really made Mobile Shell 3.0 VERY customizable. You can change the colour (theme) and select contacts for a quick view screen. Most impressively, there is a “today” screen for both professional and personal set up. The default is the professional one, but with the personal one it is kind of 3 screens together. You can place widgets on any of the 3 screens and change the background image. I am actually using this screen all the time and you can have it show all the info on the professional screen, but with the added benefit of being able to add to the 2 other screens. If none of that made sense, look at Remo’s review again. J

One of the things I really wanted to see was how this shell would run on my HTC Touch. The Touch is a slower processor than the latest WinMo devices and if it was laggy at all I would probably not be using it. I am happy to say and am impressed with how fluidly Mobile Shell 3.0 runs on my hardware. It is finger friendly and scrolls very well. It really made my Touch seem like an all new device!

The only negative I would say is that there is a noticeable delay in switching to Landscape and back. SPB knows all about this and is probably working on it. I think in their latest beta build it is better, but I haven’t tried that.

The price of Spb Mobile Shell 3.0 is $29.95, which I think is a little bit high for a mobile app, but they had done so much with this that I don’t blame them! As long as you aren’t digging change out of your sofa to buy diapers for your triplets you can probably afford the price and will feel good about it. Mobile Shell 3.0 is worth it.

Unboxing the Samsung Jack at Mobility Minded

Johan van Mierlo was able to get his hands on the new AT&T Samsung Jack smartphone and has filmed an unboxing video showing off the device in all of it’s glory. The Jack sports a similar keyboard to that of the Motorola Q9, but as the picture below shows, the Jack’s keyboard is a smaller due to the overall device being smaller. Samsung will be releasing a Windows Mobile 6.5 upgrade to the Jack later this year. Samsung and AT&T recently released the Propel Pro smartphone, which is similar to the Jack but the keyboard slides up and underneath the screen. Check out the full unboxing videos over at MobilityMinded.com (Part 1, and Part 2) and let us know your thoughts on this device. Is there a Samsung Jack in your future?