Samsung Makes the Galaxy Tab Official

After last weeks pre-announcement that they plan to announce the Tab, Samsung followed through with their promise and announced the Galaxy Tab at IFA 2010. The Galaxy Tab is a 7 inch tablet running Android 2.2. It’s powered by a 1GHz processor, 4,000mAh battery that’s rated for 7 hours of movie playback, a 3.0 megapixel camera, HSUPA of 5.76 Mbps / HSDPA of 7.2Mbps, and support for a/b/g/n WiFi protocols.

It’s sleek and sexy and looks an awful lot like the Galaxy S series of Smartphones that have been hitting carriers around the world as of late – except for the large 7 inch screen, of course.   CoolSmartphone is reporting that pricing for the 16GB version will be £679.99 – or about $1,000 US. While I really like what the Tab brings to the table, I’m not sure it’s worth a $1,000 – especially when the 16GB iPad with WiFi and 3G support is selling for $629 US. I don’t mind paying more, but there has to be something to justify the extra $400! Vodafone will be offering the Tab starting in October. It will be interesting to see how well it sells at that price point.

The Tab looks very cool, but I’m still partial to the Compaq Airlife 100 from HP. There’s something about having a physical keyboard available when I need it. I wonder if that will be making it’s way to North America anytime soon.

Impressions: Bell Samsung Vibrant (Galaxy S)

A very nice phone with all the bells and whistles but just a little bit uninspiring.

For the last week I have been using the Samsung Vibrant from Bell and am liking it.  I can’t say I love it, but it really is quite nice.

The Samsung Vibrant is part of the Galaxy S line with a design that looks very much like the iPhone.  Certainly, its meant to compete with the iPhone and it does a nice job at doing so.  This is really the part of this phone that is a let-down for me.  I stay away from the iPhone simply because everyone else on the planet seems to have one.  I don’t really want a phone that is a carbon copy.

Don’t tell Mike I stole one of his pictures!!

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Bell’s Samsung Galaxy S Vibrant in Pictures

Late last week Bell released their Samsung Galaxy S Vibrant smartphone. If you’re not familiar with the Vibrant, it’s very much like Samsungs Captivate offered on AT&T but with a slightly different body. Overall, the Vibrant is a thin and light powerhouse of a device. The AMOLED screen is super bright and crisp to look at. When put beside Apple’s new Retina display on the iPhone 4, the Galaxy S screen puts it to shame with brighter, more vivid pictures.

Thanks to the faithful Mobile Jaw reader, and super nice guy, Matt Reeder for letting me spend some quality time with his hot new device. I’ve snapped a number of pictures of the phone for everyone to see. If you click on the image it will open a larger version of the picture. Enjoy!

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Bell Launches Samsung Galaxy S Vibrant

Not to be left behind, Bell Canada has officially made the Galaxy S Vibrant available on their network. The Vibrant is pretty much the same – spec wise, as the AT&T Captivate, but the body of the devices are a little different. The Vibrant offers 16GB of memory that’s expandable to 32GB thanks to MicroSD support. There’s a 4-inch AMOLED screen with a 480×800 resolution, a 5 megapixel camera with LED flash, HD video recording (720p), Bluetooth 3.0, and powered by Android 2.1.

The Galaxy S Vibrant should already be in stores. In fact, we heard reports late yesterday that some stores had stock and were already showing them off to customers. The Vibrant will run you $500 without a contract, which is $50 more than Telus is asking for the Desire. If you look at the features, I think that’s $50 well spent. If you’re going to sign a contract, you can expect $450, $350, and $150 for 1, 2, and 3 year contracts.

Check out Bell’s website if you’re looking for more information about this hot new device. What are you going to pick, the Desire or the Vibrant?

Rogers is On Fire! Many New Phones Announced

Rogers is pulling out all the stops with great new devices coming out! In the last week they have announced that the following are either available or coming soon:

Apple iPhone 4 – Well, we all knew this was coming but for those that are fans, nice to see if it here. The iPhone 4 includes an all new sleeker design, very high resolution screen and a much more powerful processor.

Blackberry Torch 9800 – Just announced yesterday, the Torch is a large (huge!) Blackberry device with a slid-down qwerty and touch screen. For many this is going to be a very nice compromise allowing for a larger screen than most Blackberries (Blackberrys?) but still enjoying a nicely sized qwerty keyboard.

Curve 9300 – The Curve line of smartphones lives on with the 9300. There really isn’t a lot to write home about the 9300 other than to say it continues the line of very capable and reliable Blackberries at an affordable price point.

Motorola Flipout – Have you seen this cute little phone!? It is small and square, at least until you swing the screen around, much like the old Sidekick phones. It runs Android and uses Motorola’s Blur interface to stay in touch with friends. Very nice phone for the price for the younger smartphone user.

Galaxy S Captivate – The Juice!! The Samsung Galaxy S line of phones comes to Rogers as the Captivate, the same model as AT&T carries in the US. It’s a beautiful 4″ Super AMOLED display with a VERY thin profile, nice angles and a very fast and powerful processor. It’s a more expensive option, but with the included specs it’s worth it.

Nicely done Rogers! Keep bringing us Canadians lots of choice in phones and we will hug you!

Rogers Offers First Bada Phone: Samsung Wave

Earlier this year Samsung introduced it’s new operating system, Bada.  Their first phone is called the “Wave” for it really does look quite nice.  It is available from Rogers for $99 on contract.  Full Press Release below:

Samsung Makes a Splash with the Launch of Wave

First smartphone to feature Super AMOLED display and bada, Samsung’s open platform

MISSISSAUGA, ON, July 8 /CNW/ – Samsung Mobile, the leading mobile phone brand in Canada, today announced the availability of the Samsung Wave (model: S8500), the first smartphone to leverage bada, Samsung’s new, open smartphone platform. The Samsung Wave is the first Canadian smartphone to feature Samsung’s Super AMOLED screen technology – providing users with improved outdoor visibility, reduced power consumption and unrivalled picture clarity.

With the launch of the Wave, Samsung is actively constructing a total eco-system around the bada platform including Samsung Apps, an integrated application store. Samsung Apps will increase the premium content and applications pool through collaboration with partner companies and developers.

The availability of the Samsung bada SDK (Software Development Kit) will ensure that consumers can experience a steady stream of new applications that support bada platform.

“The Samsung Wave represents our strategy to deliver rich, exciting smartphone experiences to everyone via one of the highest quality display screens in the industry,” saidPaul Brannen, vice president, Samsung Mobile. “We also anticipate that Samsung bada will significantly expand the smartphone consumer market in Canada, which will create an ocean of opportunity for developers.”

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New Samsung B7330 Messenger Device Heading to Canada

Samsung is the king of Windows Mobile Standard based devices. Since the launch of the original BlackJack, Samsung has been improving and updating this form factor. Last year they released the B7330 in the Netherlands, and now it appears that it will make it’s way to Canada for Bell and Rogers. The B7330 is only the second Windows Mobile Standard (non-touch) device to feature the larger 320×320 screen. While it doesn’t sound like a big difference over the regular 320×240/240×320 screens we see on other devices, it does make a significant difference in the day to day usage of the device.

The device specs seem to be an exact match to the version from the Netherlands, with exception to the radio being used. This version will take advantage of the North American 3G network. There’s no pricing information that I was able to find. However, it appears that the B7330 will be available for purchase starting on April 28th (Yes, that’s today!) from Bell, and May 4th from Rogers.  You can check out the device and all it’s specifications from the Samsung Canada website.

Source = MobileSyrup

Starting Over with the Samsung Blackjack

Editor’s Note: This article was originally published way back on January 23, 2007 on my personal blog. There have been some changes since then and my personal blog is, well..  more personal focused. Mobile Jaw is where I post mobility related information. It was recently brought to my attention that a number of people that are still looking for this solution. So I decided to raise it from the dead and post it here for everyone to enjoy. So.. Enjoy!

Cingular’s hot new Smartphone – the Samsung Blackjack SGH-i607, is fast becoming the one of the best and most popular Smartphones we’ve seen in a while. It’s easily one of the best Windows Mobile devices that I have used to date.

If you’ve picked up a used device and you want to clear out all the crap from the previous owner, then you’re going to be looking to hard reset the device.  This will set it back to the factory image, removing all programs, settings and files that the previous owner might have changed or added. If the device was SIM card unlocked, a factory reset will not change this.

So how do you reset the device? There are 2 different ways to do this. The first is the more common way – Start / Settings / (more) / Security / (more) / Reset  – and enter the password.  Which should be ’1234′ – unless it’s been changed under the ‘Change Reset Password’ option in the Security menu. Using this method means you have to know the password to reset, and the device has to be able to boot. So what happens if you can’t boot the device? Well, then you need to kick in the manual hard reset method. It’s not hard to do – When the device is powered off, press and hold the up button on the control pad (joystick – circle thingy) and then turn on the device.  Keep pressing up and it should kick off a hard reset process.  When the reset is done, you’ve got a brand new device to play around with again, at least on the inside.

On a side note, make sure you have a full battery, or that it’s plugged into the wall when you’re doing a reset.  You wouldn’t want it to run out of juice in the middle of the reset!

My Favorite Windows Mobile Standard Device is…

I’ve been a big fan of non-touch smartphones for a while now. I find that they are faster to navigate around, easier to use with one hand, and all around more stable than their touch brothers. I have also been very lucky in that I have had access to many of the different models that have come out over the years. Recently I made the following comment on Twitter: I think the Samsung Propel Pro is my all-time fav Windows Mobile Standard device. Original BlackJack with scroll wheel is 2nd. I was asked to explain why I felt this way, but that’s one area where Twitter falls short. There was no way I could explain why the Propel Pro was my favorite Windows Mobile Standard device in just 140 characters. So I sat down to explain why and ended up with 850+ words on why it’s my favorite.  I can’t see how to condense this down to just 140 characters.

Without wasting any more time, here are the reasons. Please let me know your thoughts and which non-touch Windows Mobile device is your favorite.

1: Form Factor – There are 4 main form factors – A) Screen with no keyboard, B) Screen with a side-slide keyboard, C) Screen with front-facing keyboard, and D) Screen with front-facing number pad only. I like the physical keyboard as I find it provides a better experience for people that do a lot of writing on their devices. That factor alone removes half the options from the above list leaving a front-facing keyboard or a side-slide keyboard. A lot of devices have the side-slide because it offers a larger keyboard while allowing it to slide away for protection. What drove me nuts when I was using a side-slider, is having to wait for the screen to rotate. It’s just too slow. The front facing keyboard devices don’t have this problem because there is no delay in waiting for the screen to rotate. The downside is that the keyboard is now exposed all the time.  The Propel Pro from Samsung is one of the few devices, and only current device, that offers a front facing keyboard but hides it with a up-slider design. That means there is no delay in waiting for the screen to rotate when you slide out the keyboard to type a message. Perfect!

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Taking a Look Into the Samsung Omnia II at Mobility Minded

Verizon has recently launched the Samsung Omnia II smartphone powered by Windows Mobile 6.5. This is the follow up to the extremely popular Omnia which saw a CDMA release in North America along with 2 different GSM versions released in Europe and the Middle East. Mobility Minded has posted a 3 part review that takes an in-depth view of this device. Part 1 is focused on unboxing the device. Part 2 walks you through the user interface that Samsung loaded onto the Omnia II, and part 3 deals with data input on the device. Samsung has done some great work with this follow up to the Omnia.

Check out the video’s at Mobility Minded and let us know if you’re thinking of adding one of these to your holiday wish list.

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