Samsung E350 review

These days we don't see many handsets without Bluetooth, but the E350 is an example. There is infrared, so sharing data with other devices is possible, but if you want to be serious about it, synchronising the E350's calendar and contact book with your PC, for example, you shouldn't be looking at this handset unless you want to invest in a separate PC link cable and software. Even then, note that the 30MB of internal memory is all you get -- there are no expansion slots for flash memory cards.

The E350's music player outputs to the handset's speaker and to the provided stereo headset, with fairly good volume and quality. There's no equaliser, but you can create a playlist.

The E350's music player spits its sound from the bundled earbuds at a decent volume and quality

There are enough buttons on the front of the casing to make it possible to both make and receive calls without exposing the number pad. The right SoftKey button allows you to access recent calls and your contact list; the left one takes you to the main menu, where you can get to every aspect of the handset, including its built-in calendar, messaging, Web browser and camera.

There's an easier way to start the camera though -- hit the button on the right edge of the casing. Annoyingly, this button only works when the handset is not in standby mode, and to get out of this you first have to press the two SoftKey buttons in turn -- so you need to make three key presses to get the camera rolling.

Once in action, though, you can take a snap by pressing the button in the middle of the navigation pad and then delete, MMS, email or save an image as a caller ID or as wallpaper, all without opening the slider.

There are bizarre plinky-plonky sound effects to accompany using the zoom and fiddling with brightness, and when you apply visual effects like black and white, emboss, sepia and sketch, they appear as you frame the image, rather than after you've shot it. It's all very positive and easy to use, the only real downside being that the camera is VGA. Think of it as a device for quick snaps and MMS pics, rather than as your main camera.

The range of additional software provided is reasonable, but not expansive. There are plenty of ringtones, four colour themes, the ability to use photos as wallpaper and a range of other ways in which you can customise how the phone looks and sounds.

Performance
As a voice handset, the E350 performed well, delivering good quality calls and not dropping any connections during the testing phase. We'd have liked more volume on occasions, and that goes for the ringer too.

As a music player, performance is okay rather than outstanding -- and if you are keen on tunes you should steer clear, because you will run out of memory very quickly.

Battery life was a let-down. With just three hours talk suggested by Samsung, we never felt happy unless we were going out with a fully charged cell. And you never know when you'll need to while away a half hour or so of travel time with some battery-diminishing music.

Edited by Mary Lojkine
Additional editing by Nick Hide