Performance
Audio quality during calls is fine without any noticeable distortion or muffling during calls. The loudspeaker is equally clear, which is good when using the Orbit 2 as a sat-nav.
As we mentioned, the 3-megapixel camera is really only good enough for MMS messages and -- at a push -- small prints. There's no light source on the phone, so keep your shooting to the sunshine.
We used the GPS in a car and found it worked, although in certain areas you may find you have to wait for several minutes before picking up any satellites.
Battery life is quoted at 4 hours talk time and 450 hours on standby. We found that battery life varied dramatically depending on how much we used HSDPA, GPS and Wi-Fi, but with moderate use, the Orbit 2 lasted for over two days.
Conclusion
While it still has an air of seriousness about it in comparison to phones like the Nokia N95 8GB, we really like the O2 Xda Orbit 2. It's business as usual on the inside but the plethora of connectivity options make it a great choice if you always need to keep in touch.
Our only word of warning would be that if you're used to a mechanical Qwerty keypad, then switching to a touchscreen might come as a shock -- try before you buy.
Edited by Jason Jenkins
Additional editing by Shannon Doubleday
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User reviews4
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kwithers 9 July 2008
Good: Touchscreen response, lightweight
Bad: You can only customise the alarm tone with WAV files and I can't find a decent one!
Comment: It pretty much is a small PC in your pocket. I have really enjoyed it so far. the only down side to the phone is that you can only slide show the pictures that are kept on the harddrive and there really isn't that much space. But it is not a big deal really.
Fab phone, enjoying using it a lot
P968CS 8 June 2008
Good: Fairly copmpact and with lots of features, but .....
Bad: Impossible to read screen outdoors, crashes and locks too often
Comment: I really wanted to like this product - on paper it has everything, and the built in GPS was the icing on the cake! But the GPS is poor (trying to send you down umnade roads as the 'quickest route'!), the phone is unuseable outdoors as the screen is completely unreadable even with the backlight at max, and the whole system crashes one or twice a day needing a reset and re-boot. Out of 14 calls one day I only received 3 - the rest diverted immediately to voicemail. Once I answered a call and the system loaded the GPS then locked up hung! I never found out who had called me. For a business user this is totally unacceptable.
I guess you get the gist that its a great gadget, but is basically useless. Perhaps I just got a duff one but mine's going back for a refund.
RSmith 2 June 2008
Good: Fully featured, but.....
Bad: The touch screen is very poor in sunlight and a pain to use.
Comment: I want to like this phone, but the poor user interface (i.e. all driven via the touch screen) becomes very annoying outside of the office when you're on the go. You can't operate the phone easily with one hand (like other PDAs I've had in the past) and so if you need to write notes or refer to info, it becomes a nightmare to use. I also found the stick you use on the touch screen to be slow and ackward to use - I'll take a keyboard and a track wheel any day. Because you operate this phone via the touch screen, unless its locked, you constantly trigger unwanted programs or make unwanted calls accidently just by holding the phone. You need to use this phone as a business tool outside of the office to appreciate how poor and annoying the user interface is - it's a shame, as otherwise its got lots of functionality.
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