Built for messaging fanatics (ergo the very apt name of Rambler), the Rambler houses a QWERTY keypad within its clamshell form factor and although the phone isn’t the best idea in a purely ergonomic sense, it is still a pleasing phone aesthetically and packs in decent features to boot. The rule is that messaging phones are sliders are boxier than this, so to hear of one that was designed as a clamshell was puzzling and interesting. These phones are oddities and rarities but the Rambler tries to make the most of this by being rectangular and stretching things out as much as it can. Head-on, it looks reasonably compact but its when you lay it on its side that you realize its girth. This makes holding it within your hand an odd affair since it ends up feeling distinctly out of place thanks to its size and QWERTY keyboard. Like many clamshells, it has a 1.6 inch external display which is colorful and shows the usual indicators such as battery  [...]

The RIM BlackBerry Curve 8330 is a great messaging device but lacks quality in other departments, so don’t look to it if you want a well-rounded device. It is thicker and heavier than its GSM counterpart owing to the 3G chip, but the extra heft in hand was barely noticeable. The Curve 8330 offers a lot of the much-loved features of a BlackBerry, including its tried and tested messaging platform, but the lack of little extras like wi-fi rankles when competing smartphones are quick to readily offer it up. The display is a standard 65k color TFT screen and a resolution of 320x240 pixels. It is equipped with a light sensor that adjusts the backlight depending on ambient light, which is a nice touch and the display is crisp and viewable, although a bit less so under direct sunlight. Like most other BlackBerry’s, this has a trackball located right below the screen and the menu and back buttons have a concave shape and aren’t  [...]

Motorola Debut i856 is the first push to talk iDEN phone in a slider form factor. The phone is pretty basic and don’t expect any high end features from it. The handset is really slim and I will easily fit in to tightest of pants pocket. I am not saying that it is the slimmest phone around but it is definitely slimmer than most of the handsets I have had in my labs for testing. On the front, there is a 2.2 inch color display which is a bit small considering other handsets especially smartphones are having bigger displays. However, this just a mid range phone so I won’t complain much about the smaller screen. There is a shortcut bar having a collection of shortcuts for the applications that you use the most on the phone. For moving through this bar, you just have to press the right and left direction buttons. Beneath the display, there is a navigation array which consists of the four way navigation toggle with OK button in the middle, two soft keys, music and Talk/End  [...]

otorola have locking often quite often these days. It all started with antenna issues of the new Apple iPhone 4. What was thought to be one of the greatest smartphones ever hasn’t enjoyed the same success in the market owing because of the antenna problem. If you have purchased the iPhone 4 already, you might be aware of this. There is problem with the call quality when you hold the phone in a specific position. Apple has been working on it but the problem still has not being fully resolved. Motorola, a rival company, is taking full advantage of the iPhone 4 crisis. Motorola is aggressively advertising the Droid X, its latest product, by saying that you can hold the phone ‘any way you like’. This has certainly got on Apples nerves and they made a video which shows that the Droid X  [...]

HTC Touch2 is not a new phone, it has been there for a while but still I am covering it here in this review since my e-mail inbox is flooded with requests for review of this gadget. HTC Touch2, when released, was one of the first smartphones to ship with Windows 6.5 OS which brought a host of new features. Hence, the new OS became an instant hit amongst the masses. Some said that is didn’t have any major updates over its predecessor but I think there were some new welcome additions. I read on the Internet that the primary reason why Microsoft released the new update was because it wanted to create a more touch friendly interface. They wanted to make it more appealing to the consumers. HTC Touch2’s Today screen is a lot like Microsoft Zune, which is really like. There is a slide bar which lets you scroll up and down through the various apps on the phone. Sliding sideways on a particular app gives you more information about the app. For instance, if you swipe the calendar  [...]

It has almost been a year since Samsung brought their first Android phone, Samsung Moment to the market. Since then, the company has been making a lot of Android phones. The display of this handset is 3.2 inches big but it is not AMOLED screen. The text seems a bit fuzzy but that is not a big issue. The phone has a responsive and smooth capacitive touch screen display and the pinch to zoom feature works really well, courtesy of Android 2.1. The gesture will be really useful when you will use the Web browser. The accelerometer is also there but you don't get it in all the applications. However, you will it for apps like photo gallery and browser. Beneath the display, there are Android sensor hot keys which are laid out in a row. They relate to search, back key, home and menu. Long press of the home button gets you the task manager and it shows you the apps that are running. You can also easily handle your multitasking work from here. But, I found that there was a lot of lag when I closed  [...]

The name of this phone is quite awkward even considering the haphazard model names that manufacturer’s are giving to their products these days. This handset is made for entry level users and the feature set is quite basic. I am not so enthusiastic about such low end handsets since I am a tech freak and yearn for high end gadgets. But I have been getting a lot of e-mails asking for the such basic phone reviews too so I am blogging here about them. There are people who don’t need a smartphone and are just looking for an entry level handset for making phone calls. PCD CDM8635 is made for such people. It is targeted more towards the senior citizens; the phone has feature inside for them. Thinking from an entry level phone users point of view, the hardware and software features of this phone are quite impressive, you get every thing that you want. The phone has a clamshell design and there is a display on the lid too. It is bigger than what you normally get on such entry  [...]

When it comes to prepaid phones, we usually assume that they are going to be simple low end handsets with barebone features. But we were pleasantly surprised when we saw the Motorola i1. This device is available with prepaid carriers. For Boost Mobile, this is the first phone based on Google Android and this is also the first Google Android phone to run on the Nextel's iDEN network. The phone has a touch screen display but it still feels pretty rugged. It is the only Android device in the market which supports push-to-talk. There are a few disappointments though, this phone is running on Android 1.5 which is an outdated version and iDEN network's speeds are not fast enough. Motorola may give software updates in the near future so things are not that bad as they look. We wont say that this is the best Anroid phone ever but you certainly won't get a better handset in the market if you are a iDEN fan. This phone costs $349.99 which is a lot of money but you don't have any contract obligations.

Alltel is the latest carrier to get HTC Snap. This handset is available from a lot of other service providers like Verizon Wireless, Sprint and T-Mobile. This phone is message centric and it also has the HTC Inner Circle feature which lets you prioritize your e-mail with just a button press. This handset also offers dual mode functionality along with world roaming capabilities. Looking at the price, we would recommend this phone as a nice alternative to BlackBerry phones from the same service provider. This phone is yours for $79.99 and you have to sign a one year service agreement after a $70 mail in rebate. Compare this to Alltel BlackBerry 8830 which costs $249.99. The manufacturer gives this phone with reference manual, software disc, audio adapter, USB cord, wired stereo headset, power adapter, and 4 international adapters. This phone has a good QWERTY keyboard and our fingers didn't feel any fatigue even after we typed on it for a lot of time. Other features worth  [...]

When Samsung came up with Blue Earth, it became one of the few manufacturers to jump on eco friendly bandwagon. It had solar panels on the back. Then the company came out with Samsung Reclaim which was partially made up of recycled materials. Restore is Reclaim's successor but with a different look. This handset is made up of 27 percent recycled material and 77 percent of its parts can be recycled, if you decide to throw it. There are no hazardous materials used in this phone, like PVC and the packaging is made up of recycled paper. Finally, the charger is Energy Star certified. Apart from those 'green' features, this is a pretty normal handset made for messaging enthusiasts. It has stereo Bluetooth, 2.0 megapixel camera, music player, EV-Do, GPS and full sized QWERTY keyboard. The cost of this phone is $49.99 and you have to sign a two year contract  [...]