Mobile phone reviews

The P526 is an affordable PDA phone that goes head-to-head with the Sony Ericsson P1i and Nokia E61i. The handset’s design is very similar to its high-end sibling, the P750. The  P526 is well-proportioned, and feels more comfortable to hold than Nokia’s E61i. The P526 doesn’t have a joystick, and completely relies on the touch screen for navigation, which isn’t very intuitive. The soft menu buttons and two dedicated buttons are in the form of a small thin strip, and are difficult to operate. The keypad is well spaced, and offers good tactile feedback.The P526 is also comes bundled with the necessary applications-Mobile Word, Excel and Powerpoint. PIM functions include a Meeting Time Planner, Remote Presenter, Voice commander, business card recognition and Java support....

The Moto Q marks Motorola’s entry into the highly-competitive PDA cell phone market. The company has earlier tried getting into this market via their A series of phones (Moto Ming), but failed to garner any footing. For the Moto Q, Motorola has gone with the tried-and-tested design for a QWERTY phone. It is wide but well proportioned,and therefore feels much better to hold when compared with Nokia’s E61/61i. Lessons learnt from the RAZR have been used to good effect on the Moto Q; the phone is slim for a PDA phone. Finished in jet black, the exterior has arubberised feel, and the body offers excellent grip. Except for the navigational D-pad, all the buttons are flat and at times difficult to press. The QWERTY keypad offers excellent tactile feedback and equals that of those on...

The ASUS P750 is top-of-the-line, 3G capable PDA phone that has every possible feature you’d ever want. The design is gorgeous, and the phone looks great in its matt black outfit. Though oriented towards executives, the P750 lacks a QWERTY keypad; it does have touch screen, which in combination with Windows Mobile 6 makes up for the lack. There are five input options available, and the XT9 option works like a charm-it can predict words better than the old T9 dictionary most other cell phones have. The 320 x 240, 2.6-inch touch screen is good; it lacks brilliance (only 65K colours) but it works. The joystick and jog dial have excellent tactile feedback, and they never jump a menu. The alpha-numeric keypad is well spaced out and works out great for typing short messages. The P750 comes...

The Treo 750 is the latest PDA phone from Palm; it promises one-handed operation (a Palm trait), though it’s a  windows Mobile based device. The phone has a lot in common with its predecessors on the design front, and it has the distinctive Palm device feel to it-nice! The new phone is tad slimmer than its predecessors; it feels lighter, and the curvaceous design helps hide the bulk. The 2.5-inch LCD screen dominates the front. It is sharp and completelylegible in direct sunlight. The navigational console (buttons) consists of a five-way rocker, two soft keys, and four additional pre-defined keys (Call, Windows key, Hang up, and OK). The dinky QWERTY thumb-board still remains one of the best we’ve seen thus far; though small and cramped, the chances of mistyping are very low....

If you are an executive in the market for a cell phone, Nokia’s E series offers the best bang for the buck. The E51 has a superb 2-inch display capable of 16 million colours. The resolution of 240 x 320 is very high for a small screen, so fonts appear sharp and crisp. In direct sunlight, the screen is completely legible-even at half the maximum  rightness! As compared to the E50, the new phone has a completely revised keypad with dedicated keys for contacts, Calendar, E-mail, and Home.This approach has its advantages: you can directly access essential information at thetouch of a button. The soft menu keys, however, are a pain to use-they are too small for comfort. The keypad is a delight to use-good tactile feedback, and the key spacing is immaculate. The rubberised keys for volume...

The N81 marks Nokia’s entry into music-related services similar to that offered by Apple (as in iTunes). Like the N73 and N95, the N81 comes in two editions-Standard and Music. The former has a memory card slot, while the latter has 8 GB of flash memory and no memory slot. The N81 is handsome-rounded edges, black lustrous finish, and you’ll notice the use of contrasting brushed silver on the edges. Build quality is excellent, and though the body has a plastic feel to it, it’s rugged, and should take the rigours of everyday life. The slider mechanism is taut, but we’ve seen better ones on Samsung phones (and lately, the Sony Ericsson W910i). The front facia is dominated bya huge,  arklingly-clear 2.4-inch display. The screen equals that on the N95 (which has the best...

As much as common sense tells us to avoid slider phones for obvious reasons as in moving parts, wear and ear-they’re hot! The E65 is red-hot (literally), and it’s available in mocha, too. The entirely matte-finished body offers good grip, and it manages to also look classy. Red-russet brown really-might not appeal to all, but the soft contours are nice. With Bluetooth, WiFi, 3G, EDGE, and more, the E65 is a business-oriented device with some artistic flair. The number keypad is well-laid-out with raised demarcations on each key, similar to the N95-but remember there’s no QWERTY. Keypad backlighting is good. The 2MP camera and the music player are pretty ordinary. Pop the hood and it’s a symbian S60 9.1 device. Quick Office has been provided, but it’s Word and...

The successor to the acclaimed N95, this new incarnation just got better all round. The navigational console has been completely revamped. The oblong buttons are easy to use, and the directional pad is much better than that on the N95. The extra chrome on the buttons could have been avoided, we think-it picks up finger smudges and is likely to peel off. The number keypad is well-laid-out, but the hard-touch keys, combined with the slightly raised surface, makes finger-pad touch-typing a pain. The music player is feature- rich-you can shuffle and repeat tracks,there’s a functional equaliser, and a visualization function too. Audio quality seems to have improved over the N95. Music quality is decent on the supplied earplugs, and this phone is just great with better earphones! Sony Ericssonstill...

The K850i is the flagship model in the Cybershot line-up from Sony-Ericsson. Based around a 5-megapixel camera, it’s pitted against Nokia’s N95 as far as the camera is concerned. The K850i comes in at a notch above the K810i.The phone sports a completely revamped design, with hardly any resemblance to earlier SE models. It is blocky, but the fit and finish are excellent. A nice, luminous green strip runs around the edge. The navigational D-pad is a squarish ring that surrounds the 2 and 5 number keys. The edges are raised for proper contact. There is no actionbutton; rather, there are touch-sensitive buttons just below the screen. They are context-sensitive and are  dynamically assigned the proper functions, similar to soft menu buttons. The touchsensitive buttons work flawlessly,...

The K810i comes from Sony Ericsson’s Cybershot series. The 3.2-megapixel camera sensor is what differentiates this phone from  the crowd and from other SE phones. The 810i is aimed at causal shutterbugs, and has some neat features that should go down well with that audience. The translucent body with steel buttons gives the phone its unique appearance. The phone is quite long, but is comfortable to hold. The back cover is finished in rubberised material, and that gives the phone excellent grip, which is good for clicking snaps. The navigational keys are similar to those on older SE phones such as the K750i. The joystick is much better, though, and well-recessed. The soft menu keys and additional shortcuts keys are small and tightly placed; this could turn out to be a problem for some....