Samsung continues to push deeper and further into every conceivable tech market, including every category of mobile phone. The next big thing to be added to its hefty mobile portfolio is the Samsung Omnia i900, a Windows Mobile smart phone that packs a cornucopia of features. But is this another Samsung touchscreen phone that fails to deliver?
The Omnia is available on several networks, including Orange and Vodafone, for free on a monthly contract. You can also buy it SIM-free at eXpansys for £480.
Design
Samsung's dalliances with touchscreen phones have been hit and miss, but the Omnia looks every part the high-end touchscreen phone you want it to be. A black and silver colour scheme gives it a serious look that echoes the iPhone's casing. What it doesn't have, unfortunately, is the iPhone's quality feel.
The Samsung Omnia feels a little on the light side and that's due to its plastic casing. In our opinion, it's inspiring to hold than the glass and plastic combo on the iPhone 3G or, better still, the glass and metal combo of the original iPhone. The Omnia's plastic screen in particular lacks the quality feel of the iPhone's glass one.
Casing materials aside, the Omnia is just about the right size. It's slim enough to put in a pocket comfortably, but the screen is large enough to enjoy watching videos or browsing the Web on. The Omnia is also pretty comfortable to make phone calls with using just one hand -- and there's not a stylus in sight.
Features
While it doesn't always work, there's something admirable about Samsung's approach to features, which essentially consists of cramming as much stuff into a phone as possible. To start with the Omnia boasts both HSDPA and Wi-Fi, giving you high-speed access to your emails and the Web almost everywhere you go.
Like the HTC Touch Diamond, the Omnia comes pre-installed with Opera Mobile 9.5, which lets you browse full Web pages in a similar way to how you do on an iPhone -- allowing you to zoom in and out of pages by tapping the screen. The screen is not as responsive as the iPhone's when it comes to accurately tapping something, however.
Indeed, the Omnia's screen is a great point of contention for us, because while it isn't always as responsive as we'd like -- when scrolling, for example -- it's one of the most responsive Windows Mobile touchscreen devices out there. So while we'd like to say that it's as good as the iPhone's screen, we can't, but it is good compared to its Windows Mobile competition.
Samsung has done a superb job at making the Windows Mobile interface more finger-friendly, adding shortcut menus and large icons galore. It's fairly easy to navigate your way around, and unlike the HTC Touch Diamond's lag-inducing TouchFLO 3D interface, Samsung's additions don't seem to slow things down at all.
Given that it's Windows Mobile 6.1 Professional, you get all the Microsoft features you expect, including Exchange and Office support and the ability to edit documents -- something the iPhone can't do. You can also use Windows Messenger, which is handy if you regularly use it on a desktop and want a mobile instant-messaging solution.
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User reviews6
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bdgr 11 October 2009
Good: It looks good and 'should' be great...
Bad: not very responsive
Comment: I started off really liking this phone - not having had a touchscreen phone before I enjoyed the novelty. However....
The phone has stopped switching from portrait to landscape viewing unless its plugged into the mains.
The keyboard layout is clumsy. Letters on one page, numbers on the other - fair enough, but only the full stop and comma are set with the letters, with the apostrophe grouped (with other symbols) in with the numbers! This makes writing words like I'm, I'll that's etc a right chore (maybe I'm being picky?).
It takes an age to start up - over 1 minute from turning it on to getting to the front screen.
When the phone is locked, sometimes I can answer a call, while other times it wants me to unlock the phone to press the answer button. And doing this takes enough time for the call to go to voicemail which turns the phone into a fancy pager! I've lost count of the number calls I've missed because of this.
You get a stylus to use... with nowhere on the phone to store it! Because of this it's never used. I don't want to have to find the stylus before i can use the phone!!! Thankfully it works just as well with your finger (unless you want to use the scrolling bar on applications - its just too fiddly without the stylus).
It's a shame because the phone itself looks good, and with the windows system is easy to use due to familiarity. Plus with office included you can easily use word/excel/powerpoint and transfer to your pc.
tez12345 16 April 2009
Good: The best phone in the world
Bad: nothing to hate
Comment: It owns best phone until Microsoft phone
jampots2000 6 April 2009
Good: The Design
Bad: Software is a disaster!
Comment: Had this product for around 2weeks, on the first day camera wouldn't work and i had to reset the phone to use it, this problem still exists.Seccondly i have task manager set to open when i hold down the menu button, however this does not work. Sometimes when im trying to send texts or make phone calls the phone tells me it is not switched on (it clearly is as i am using it) this can take hours to sort out. Really not wort the money at all. i wish i never bothered to be honest.
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