| Samsung V200 |
| General |
| Network | Gsm 900 / Gsm 1800 / Gsm 1900 |
| Announced | 1q, 2003 |
| Status | Available |
| Size |
| Dimensions | 91 X 47 X 23 Mm |
| Weight | 96 G |
| Display |
| Type | Tfd, 65k Colors |
| Size | 128 X 160 Pixels, 7 Lines |
| | - Second External Display (blue Lighting)
- Four Way Navigation Keys
- Downloadable Pictures And Animations |
| Ringtones |
| Type | Polyphonic (40 Channels) |
| Customization | Download, |
| Vibration | Yes |
| Memory |
| Phonebook | 500 X 10 Fields, 10 |
| Call Records | 10 Dialed, 10 Received, 10 Missed Calls |
| Card Slot | No |
| | - 100 Photos Storage
- Message Templates
- 50 Short Messages |
| Data |
| Gprs | Class 8 (4+1 Slots), 32 - 40 Kbps |
| Hscsd | No |
| Edge | No |
| 3g | No |
| Wlan | No |
| Bluetooth | No |
| Infrared Port | Yes |
| Usb | |
| Features |
| Messaging | Sms, Ems, Mms |
| Browser | Wap 1.2.1 |
| Clock | Yes |
| Alarm | Yes |
| Games | 3 |
| Colors | |
| Camera | Cif, 352 X 288 Pixels |
| | - Picture Manager
- T9
- Calendar
- To Do List
- Currency Exchange
- Speed Dial
- Menu Shortcuts
- Nokia Smart Messaging
- Picture Album |
| Battery |
| | Extended Battery, Li-ion 900 Mah |
| Stand-by | Up To 120 H - 140 H |
| Talk Time | Up To 3 H - 5 H |
|
Samsung - V200180-degree with the Samsung SGH-V200
Major features
Tri-band compatibility
Dual screen with large 65,536 colours TFT LCD internal screen
40-tone polyphonic ringtones and wallpaper support
Integrated 180-degree rotating digital camera
Multi-coloured service lights
Active folder with polyphonic sound
CSD/GPRS Class 8 data accessibility
Data cable and IR connectivity
SMS/EMS messaging with concatenation support and MMS
Basic organiser (PIM) features
Multi-number phonebook
Problems/Issues?
Cannot add words into T9 dictionary
Earpiece also used as polyphonic speaker
Sales package (should contain):
1 x Samsung SGH-V200 handset
1 x Slim Li-ion battery @ 720 mAh
1 x Standard Li-ion battery @ 900 mAh
1 x Travel adapter
1 x Battery charging cradle
1 x User manual
1 x Samsung EasyGPRS User’s Manual
1 x Data cable
1 x Samsung EasyGPRS and Wizard Software CD-ROM
1 x Ear-microphone
1 x Warranty card
Overview
Introduction
The Samsung SGH-V200 is the company’s first Australian handset to incorporate an integrated digital camera, which is also 180-degree rotate able, one of its first in the market. Also combine with a modern style look, dual screen with an internal TFT LCD screen of 65,536-colours and 40-chord polyphonic ringing tones, making the V200 a definite one-of-a-kind mobile phone that the market has yet to see so far.
Read on to see what new features Samsung has to offer this time, with their high standards for producing handsets to the telecommunications market! =)
New/outstanding features
Awakening your senses with colour and sound, the Samsung V200 features a high resolution 65,536-colour TFT internal screen to give amazing realism and vibrancy to your images and with its distinctive 40-chord polyphonic sounds, literally brings music to your ears! Being a dual screen clamshell handset, you won’t even have to open up your phone to check its status and find out what’s going on!
Being a tri-band phone, the V200 create the best improvement on convenience as you travel around the world, and with its 180-degrees rotating digital camera, it allows you to take self portraits all the easier, using your screen as the view finder in all cases, unlike some other camera phone that make you use its mirror at the back! =)
Pictures taken could also be sent off as an MMS, one of its first for Samsung phone. With its new multi-coloured service light, what more can you want with the Samsung V200 as your mobile handset?
The sales package also comes with a data cable and a CD, which allows the ability to upload ringtones and graphics onto the phone. Photos taken with the integrated digital camera can also be used to be displayed as the wallpaper in the handset.
Although most Samsung phones usually feature similar specifications, at the end of the day, how I see it is “having more choice is always better for the consumer!” =)
Physical aspects
The modern advance-look design of the Samsung V200 is truly a work of art, especially with its silver finishing of the phone, which felt light and small in my hand. The design of the 180-degrees rotating camera situation on the top left corner of the handset and the Samsung logo on the right is truly marvellous.
The curves on all edges of the phones leave a very smooth feeling and allow avoiding making the phone look so blocky. The external screen is properly faced on the top of the clamshell with a nice blue backlight colour that turns on when one of the volume buttons is pressed and holds down for a few seconds.
The service light that is found on nearly all Samsung phones is now located behind the external screen - a long bar of vibrant colours, being a multi-coloured service light. You can change up to 7 combinations of colours to be shown in the service light.
The infrared port is situated on the left side of the phone, just below the “down” volume button. The external battery of the Samsung V200 is on the back and used as the bottom side of the phone, just like most other Samsung models. Its exchangeable external antenna is on the right, at the top of the handset.
The words “Exciting Digital Camera Phone” is printed on the bottom of the top clamshell, allowing you to anticipate the excitement when opening up the phone, which sure open up to a beautiful and relaxing 40-chord polyphonic sound.
With a dimension of only 90.8 x 47.5 x 23 mm and only weighing 96 grams with the slim battery, the Samsung V200 is just one of the best handset in the market, produced with the high quality and standard by its Korean manufacturer! =)
User Interface & display
If the outer elegance appearance of the V200 doesn’t blow you away, then what’s inside the clamshell would simply explode all fishes out of the water! The 65,536-colour TFT LCD display shows off text and especially graphics with the utmost clarity, especially when compared to phones using a STN screen or displaying only 4,096 or even 256 colours.
Once you turn on the V200 for the first time, you would be greeted with the start-up “GPRS” graphic screen, which shows off how good the screen perform, especially with animation, with a butterfly flapping its wings in the air. After the standby screen comes up, the high-solution wallpaper further proves that 65,536 colours can be so much better than a 4,096 one! Also, this is thanks to the TFT LCD used.
On the outside, the V200 still uses a black-and-white sub-LCD display which provides information including caller ID, missed calls and waiting messages, the current time and date, battery and signal indicators, and other phone-related information. A blue EL backlight illuminates this sub-LCD display when the clamshell is closed or by holding down on either volume buttons until the light is activated.
As for the user interface, the V200 uses a common Samsung menu, allowing you to choose either “film” or “page” style. These two styles only affect the top-level menus, or if you want to call it, the main menu, where the “film” style shows up three different sub menus on one screen and “page” having a single menu item displayed with the previous (up) and next (down) menus displayed at the top and bottom of the screen respectively as text only.
Moving one level deeper, the V200 uses a common display format for the remainder of its menus. A list format is used where up to 6 menu functions and features are displayed. Highlighting a selection for more than a second will display the current option selected where applicable. All in all, I find most Samsung menus to be quite easy to use and get accustomed with.
Making and receiving calls
Similar to all other Samsung models, the audio quality of the V200 is crystal clear and the earpiece provides more-than-sufficient volume. The phone offers the two traditional methods of taking calls - either via the phone’s earpiece and microphone, or the included ear microphone headset accessory.
Alike most other Samsung clamshell models, the inside shaping of the V200 rests comfortably on most faces that it comes in contact with, which ultimately provides comfort during short or long phone calls.
The 40-chord polyphonic tones meant clearer and more distinct melodies pumped out by the polyphonic speaker which is also the phone’s earpiece. When compared to the older 16-chord-capable handsets, especially with older Samsung models, the V200 is able to play a variety of ringtones that includes much more detail than ever before
One primary reason for this is the ability for the phone to support and play a greater number of MIDI-based instruments simultaneously. In other words, the V200 is able to play up to 40 different instruments (tones or chords - whatever you want to call them) at the same time.
I also found that the individual instrumental sounds were more distinctive which resulted in a clearer polyphonic ringing tone than a typical 16-chord-compatible phone. This also meant the ringtones could be heard slightly better than those that simply provide minimal polyphonic tones support.
Messaging
The Samsung V200 provides all the basic requirements for text messaging, as well as the ability to attach simple graphics, sounds and animations with your text as well (EMS). If you ever receive one of these types of messages, you can also save the attached objects into the phone’s memory for your own personal use in future messages.
Also supported is MMS, which allows you to send pictures, taken with the integrated camera, or pictures saved onto the phone from a PC, to another capable MMS mobile phone. This is the first Samsung handset in the Australian market with this capability.
On-board message storage of up to 50 messages is available in addition to the SMS message memory in your SIM card. By default, all received messages are saved into the SIM card memory, and is possible to move these between the two memory locations via the OPTIONS menu whilst a single message is being read.
T9 predictive text input support is provided on the V200, but unfortunately it does not allow the addition of custom words or those that may not be found in its built-in dictionary (refer to the “Problems/issues” section for more information on this).
Connectivity
There are two ways that you can connect the V200 to your PC - either via the IR port or with the provided serial data cable that plugs into the base of the phone.
Included with the sales package is the EasyGPRS CD-ROM, which includes the base software plus necessary drivers to allow your PC to utilise the GPRS capabilities of your phone and network (where available). The base software allows the management of phone book entries, SMS messages, scheduler entries and call records (missed/received/dialled calls) that are existent on the handset. You can also import and/or export phone book entries between the V200 and the Windows Address Book application on your Windows-based PC.
For those people wondering how you can upload images and tones, the EasyGPRS software allows you to do just that. Under the “tool” menu, select either “image to phone” or “melody to phone” option to upload the respective material onto the phone.
Samsung seems to have made improvements in phone/PC connectivity as I’ve found connecting the phone to a range of PC 100% successful after installation. You will however need to manually select the COM port that the V200 is connected on.
Build quality
All Samsung phones are generally quite well-built with little or no quality issues at all. I can personally say the same for the V200, where everything - including the rigidity of the clamshell hinge, the rotatable camera, battery and solidity of the overall construction of the handset - is virtually perfect. The V200 should have no problems if it was to be mistreated in a non-intentional way, such as slamming the flip down when closing it (not that I am suggesting people to go and try!).
Battery life
On average usage, the standard battery @ 900 mAh provided me with around 4 hours talk time as well as around 5 days standby time. The slim battery @ 720mAh is around 3 hours talk time and around 4 days standby time. Of course, the more you open, close and play with the phone, the more battery you would be draining, as it’ll activate the internal 65K TFT LCD screen, and the polyphonic tone if you have this option turned on.
Also included in the pack is a battery charger, which allows you to charge your battery without having to charge it with your handset. This is really good, as it allows the user to use one and charge one at the same time. In virtually all situations, you should have the empty battery fully charged before you deplete the one currently being used by the phone.
ation support and MMS
The V200 supports both basic text (SMS) and enhanced messaging (EMS), which allows the addition of sounds, graphics and animations into a message as well as the traditional text message. Also supported is multimedia messaging (MMS), which allows photos taken with the integrated camera to be sent with a message to another MMS capable phone.
Basic organiser (PIM) features
A host of productivity applications are featured on the V200 - including a month-view calendar, to-do list, a multiple alarm feature with auto-power capability, calculator, world-time and currency converter.
Multi-number phonebook
The phone book feature of the V200 has the ability to store multiple phone numbers under a single name, as well as categorising the different types of phone numbers appropriately (that is, mobile/office/home numbers and email address). It can also assign categories to numbers stored on the SIM card too.
Problems/Issues?
Cannot add words into T9 dictionary
Despite the complaint of other reviewers, Samsung still haven’t decide to include the ability to add custom words into the T9 predictive text feature, which I believe has become a norm now for many brand of handsets that include this capability.
Although its not the end of the world that there is no custom dictionary, it does make a huge difference for us T9 users when we could have the freedom of typing those unrecognised words (not found in the default dictionary) or personal slangs without having to revert back to multi-tap (that is, standard ABC entry) mode!
Earpiece also used as polyphonic speaker
One of the issues with some clamshell phones these days is using the earpiece where you listen to calls on as the polyphonic speaker also used for ringtones. This meant that when the lid of your phone is closed, the volume of the ringing would also be decrease. Although you could also turn the vibration of the phone on when it is ringing, which allows you to feel it in your pocket, manufacturers should also be aware that some people, such as most ladies, rather have their phone in their handbag then in their pocket.
Now, if the phone is already too soft when it rings with its lid close, then what’s the chance of you being able to hear it when it is hidden deep inside your handbag or pulse, with all your other belongings and with the zipper all zipped up? This issues has open up a new market of mobile accessories which sell handbag strings, or key ring that flashes when it detect mobile radiation, such as when its ringing. What else can people come up with these days? =)
I’ve found that, however, the Samsung V200 does provide loud enough sound to its ringing tone, but in a noisy environment, it’ll still be a lot harder to know when your phone is ringing. Perhaps using an additional speaker at front or back of its clamshell will be a better idea after all!
In Summary
The Samsung V200 is simply one of the best phones I’ve ever reviewed. Over the last two weeks of my trial for the V200, I’ve found that it was a pleasurable experience to be using this beautiful and stylish phone.
Although the V200 does have some issues which could be address to make this phone even better, as with most other phones, it’s still not the end of the world to make a big deal about.
Aesthetically speaking, the V200 probably wins hands down with its modern looks and very-colourful ringing tones or melodies. Samsung has certainly included some of its latest technologies into this handset - and combining it with stylish looks, the Korean manufacturer has made it into something that you can cherish dearly.
Especially with the incorporation of the integrated digital camera, making it one of the first Samsung handset to support MMS, the V200 does seem to incorporate most of the new technologies available for mobile phones today, apart from not having Bluetooth wireless connectivity feature available, which most consumer don’t seem to really care about. You can sure have my approval for getting one of these phones for your daily usage! =) |
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