Samsung Epic 4G: A Killer Multimedia Phone

The Samsung Epic 4G ($250 with a two-year contract from Sprint, as of August 20, 2010) stands out from its Galaxy S siblings for a few reasons. Unlike the others, it has a physical keyboard and a front-facing camera, and it's the second phone to run on Sprint's 4G network. How does it stack up against the other 4G device, the HTC EVO 4G? And how does it compare to other mega-smartphones in the Android universe? Read on.

Design

Samsung Epic 4G keyboardIn the last week, I've reviewed three phones with hardware keyboards: the BlackBerry Torch, the Motorola Droid 2, and now the Epic 4G. Keyboard death watch? Not so much. Out of all of these phones, the Epic definitely has the best keyboard. The keys are nicely spaced and have a good clickiness to them.

If you don't feel like using the physical keyboard, you have even more options on the touchscreen. You can use the TouchWiz keyboard, the Swype keyboard, or the native Android keyboard. I found the display quite responsive, and big enough to type on comfortably.

Like the other Galaxy S phones, the Epic 4G sports a 4-inch Super AMOLED display. Samsung's Super AMOLED technology puts touch sensors on the display itself, as opposed to creating a separate layer (which Samsung's old AMOLED displays had), making it the thinnest display technology on the market. Super AMOLED is fantastic--you really have to see it in person. Colors burst out of the display, and animations appear lively and smooth. Some reviewers have noted that colors look oversaturated, but I don't really mind the effect. The display also does quite well in bright outdoor light, too, though the phone's glossy hardware sometimes reflects a killer glare.

TouchWiz 3.0 Interface

The Samsung Epic 4G runs Android 2.1 ("Eclair") with Samsung's own TouchWiz 3.0 user interface. Overall, this version of TouchWiz is a lot better than the older iteration, which we saw on phones such as the Samsung Behold II for T-Mobile (a phone that was slow and difficult to navigate).

Although this version is an improvement, I encountered some familiar issues with TouchWiz 3.0. Despite the 1GHz Hummingbird processor, the phone lagged slightly when I flipped through menus and scrolled down contact lists or Web pages. Here's hoping the Epic will get a speed boost when it receives the upgrade to Android 2.2 ("Froyo").

Like HTC and its Sense offering, Samsung has its own social media aggregator. Social Hub combines streams from your Facebook, MySpace, and Twitter accounts into a single view. It is a useful feature if you need a simple way to keep track of your networks. One random feature is Mini Diary, which lets you create blog entries with photos, weather info, text messages, and more. When I first tried Mini Diary on the European Galaxy S, I couldn't figure out how to get my entries off the device. Samsung followed up with me after my original review, thankfully, and confirmed that you can indeed post entries (though only those with photos) to various social networks or send them to friends via text. After you create an entry, you press the Menu key in the bottom-left corner, and it gives you MMS and Publish options. If you choose Publish, you can send your item to Facebook or MySpace.

My biggest problem with the TouchWiz interface is that it is overdone--so much so that the result doesn't even look or feel like an Android phone. Additionally, the skin sometimes interfered with the speediness of the Epic (see the "Performance" section below). According to Samsung, the entire Galaxy S family will be upgradable to Android 2.2.

Camera

Samsung Epic 4G photoWe put the 5-megapixel camera of the Epic 4G through a modified version of our PCWorld Labs test for point-and-shoot digital cameras, along with the iPhone 4, the Motorola Droid X, and the HTC EVO 4G. Unfortunately our test panel was not very impressed with the photo quality of the Epic, as it earned the lowest score out of the four and an overall word score of Fair. It finished ahead of the EVO 4G in exposure quality, but landed in last place in our color-accuracy, sharpness, and distortion tests.

In my own hands-on tests outdoors, I was pretty impressed with the image quality. Colors looked bright and natural, and details were sharp. Only a slight bit of graininess appeared in the shots; I had to look really closely on my monitor to see it.

On the other hand, the Epic took second place in overall video quality. Its performance skewed heavily toward good performance in bright light. According to our panel, its bright-light footage looked a bit underexposed and slightly grainy in a full-screen view, but great at smaller sizes. The autofocus searches a little before locking on to a crisp image. In low light, the footage was a touch too murky and undefined to earn a better rating. Once the Epic gets an upgrade to Android 2.2, you'll be able to use its flash as a light while capturing video. Perhaps this will fix the issue.

The handset's microphone, meanwhile, picks up audio a bit too well: On the Epic our audio clip sounded far too loud and blown out, whereas some of the other smartphones in our comparison barely picked up the audio at all.

Out of all the powerful smartphone cameras I've tested lately, those of the Galaxy S phones have the cleanest, most user-friendly interface. Unlike with the iPhone 4, here you can pick from a wide variety of shooting modes (Vintage, Smile Detection, Panorama, Continuous, and many more) and easily tweak the camera's settings according to your environment and subject.

Notably the Epic also has a front-facing camera for making video calls. Sprint has preinstalled Qik on the Epic for your video-chatting pleasure. I was able to test Qik only over 3G, and its quality was too choppy to really carry on a conversation. I suspect the quality is much better over 4G.

Multimedia

The TouchWiz music player is touch-friendly and easy to navigate. It showcases album art nicely, too, with an iTunes Cover Flow-style user interface. Sound was clean over my own earbuds, and decent via the external speakers.

One of the most intriguing features of the Captivate is the Samsung Media Hub, which will come with all of the Galaxy S phones. Media Hub is Samsung's answer to iTunes, a store for purchasing music and video. Unfortunately, Media Hub is not yet available to users right now; according to my contact at Samsung, Media Hub will launch this fall. Customers will be able to download the service via an over-the-air update.

Unlike the EVO 4G, the Epic does not ship with YouTube HQ--a big disappointment. YouTube HQ is a feature that enhances certain YouTube videos' quality tremendously. Unfortunately, without HQ, YouTube videos are almost completely unwatchable on the Epic. With such an incredible screen, this omission seems like a big oversight.

Performance

Like the other Galaxy S phones, the Epic 4G is powered by a 1GHz Hummingbird processor. For the most part the Epic was incredibly fast, but I did encounter some stalls in the user interface in one particular action. I shared one of my Gallery photos with a friend via Gmail. As the phone was delivering the message, I attempted to browse through more gallery images. The Epic began to stutter and freeze between the images. I then closed the Gallery app and tried to open another--the phone completely froze for about 20 seconds. I was able to replicate this problem a second time when I tried to send another image. My contact did receive both images, but it was disturbing to see the phone freeze up like that as I was trying to send an attachment.

One of the big deals of the Epic 4G is evident in its name: It's the second 4G-support phone on Sprint. And as with the other handset, the HTC EVO 4G, you can use the Epic 4G as a mobile 4G hotspot and connect up to five Wi-Fi-enabled devices to it. Unfortunately, we were unable to test the 4G performance on the Epic, as Sprint's WiMax network isn't switched on in the San Francisco Bay Area yet. I'll update this review once we review the Epic in a 4G-supported area.

Browsing the Web over Sprint's 3G network was sufficiently speedy, however. Call quality was also quite good, though I heard a bit of static on the line in a few calls.

Out of the Galaxy phones I've tested, the Epic 4G is definitely the best, and it's certainly one of the top Android phones available. The nicely designed physical keyboard, paired with the 4G goodness and front-facing camera, makes it hard to beat. The real question is whether it's a better choice than the HTC EVO 4G. It's a close call, but the Epic 4G slightly edges out the EVO.

As a multimedia device, the Epic wins. Although the Epic's display is smaller than the EVO's, its quality is better. The Epic also supports more video codecs, such as Xvid, DivX, and H.264 formats (the EVO doesn't). Then again, the Epic does not have an HDMI port, while the EVO does. In the camera department, the EVO's 8-megapixel snapper wins on image quality, but I like the Epic's user interface better. As for Android skins, it's really a matter of taste. And when it comes to input, the Epic definitely wins for having three software keyboards as well as a very good hardware keyboard.

Again, though, it is a close call, and the biggest difference between the two is the price: After a $100 mail-in rebate, the Epic 4G is $50 more than the $200 EVO 4G. But on top of that, as with the EVO 4G, you must buy a data plan for your Epic (Sprint's unlimited plan is $70, which is less expensive than AT&T or Verizon), as well as pay a $10 fee for 4G (even if 4G isn't supported in your area). And if you want to use the mobile hotspot, that's an additional $30 every month.

Android is Google+ Edge vs Facebook Social Network

In the race of social network in not finished over yet facebook. The search engine company expands its realms into the social networking world within the announcement of Google+ as a site which could be mistaken for facebook.

Google+ have its own version of facebook groups with Circles and easy to use privacy settings for each circle, facebook chat with Huddles including video chatting features. Possibly dethrone expert of facebook say it would be integration for Android Devices for photo upload.

Google+ appears like facebook in more ways. This obviously better than the previous releases like Google’s Buzz and Wave. Formally Google stark similar like Facebook which have 700 million users and after counting it jump to a site with many similar features. Facebook provides world’s largest sharing services, closely 100 billion photos in its system. With the inclusion of Android picture google+ have its own advantage.

There 500 thousands Android phones are activated everyday and most of May 2011. Now this time 100 million of android devices are active worldwide. Now they can able to upload photo instantly with from their devices. Imagine when all these Android devices can able to upload photos online immediately. This is by default private only for the users. Of course Google+ has its own Android app but yet the whole system is not available for the all users. Other users have to need to an invitation to sign in.

MSI Apps for Android to Control PC Overclocking Via Wi-Fi

The Overclocking is not possible for everyone. Overcloking is a process by which you can get benefits potentially equally the risk by playing around clock rate and voltage of various computers components. You can potentially fry your motherboard, processor, RAM and many more, if you don’t know what you are doing with your computer.

There is some good news for if you are using an Afterburner, Taiwan based Electronic manufacturer Micro-Star International (MSI) developing an Overclock application especially if you are an overclocking enthusiast (mostly like gamer) and have an Android Tablet or Phone. This afterburner tool currently supports MSI, NVIDIA and ATI graphics cards.

MSI has also builds a free app for Android by which you can control afterburner rights on your Android Tablet or Phone. This Android does not perform the overclocking function itself. Afterburner for Android app merely transforms your Android devices into some kind of overclocker remote control.

Afterburner programs for your desktop PC keeps all track of various types of graphics processing units (GPU) status such as voltage, temperature, fan speed etc. the same status can also be show on your Android Phones or Tablets using MSI Afterburning app for Android. You can check your GPU status during playing HD games just switch the game to afterburner app and check GPU’s stat without having to pause or stop your game.

Whenever your GPU’s temperature is increasing during mid-game, you can easily increase fan-speed of the GPU’s with the help of MSI’s afterburner app for Android. Asustek already has a similar application called RC Bluetooth which connects to your PC via Bluetooth but MSI’s app connects to your PC via your Wi-Fi network connection.

Acer Plans to Release its Own New Sliding Android Tablet

Now Acer Plan to release a Sliding Android tablet in the market. Now tablet PC’s seems to be available in all range. ASUS and Fujitsu recently announced that they plan to launch their tablet.

According to sources Acer is going to release their own Android based slider tablet in the fourth quarter of 2011. Acer will adopted the 10-inch of display in its slide tablet. This Android tablet is powered by ARM based processor which is manufactured by Compal Electronics. Compal has been pretty mum about its upcoming order from the Acer Inc. this also interesting to note that the Acer still in the middle of clearing in its notebook and tablet inventory. Acer probably being low-balling all the estimate of how many of new slide tablet needs to produce.

After the releasing Acer Iconia the last Android tablet by Acer Corp. which successfully runs in Tablet PC Market now Acer again wants to release a new full featured sliding tablet. Acer plans to launch this Android tablet in the right time in holiday season which is a huge crowd-pleasing time to release a tablet PC.

Now this time computing giant has significantly reduced their tablets Pc’s shipments in this year. Early in the market tablet PC’s companies expecting a boom in tablet market environment and counted the all over sales in 2011. Company aiming for more reachable about 22 0r 3 million units shipped as a target.

Apple’s iPad increasing competition to the Android based tablets. Still Acer also willing to breaks in the market from with risk fully propositions like its news slide tablet PC and estimate to produce over three million units.

[Review] Motorola Xoom Android tablet

 

So here it is: the Motorola Xoom is about to land on our shores. This is a review, but because this is about tablets you know that it must involve comparisons. The Xoom doesn't live alone; if it were the world's only "media tablet" (to use the phrase analysts are using to try to split this species off from all the other tablet devices out there), that would be one thing. However, it's not even close to being the first. So yes – I am going to compare it to the iPad. (Update: Harry Metcalfe, who owns a Xoom, provided some extra information, so I've updated some parts.)

And here's the one-line review: nope, not yet, Motorola/Google. The iPad still has it, by some distance. Honeycomb is nice, and the Android things that are better than iOS are still better (cough *notifications* cough), but tablets are harder than smartphones. Also, app stores really matter, and the Android Market isn't nearly there.

If you compare like-for-like storage (the Xoom starts at 32GB) then the Xoom is exactly the same price as the same-storage iPad 2 at £479 from PC World (though at Amazon it's a whopping £570 or £660 for the 3G version).

So, finally, we have an Android tablet that's the same price as Apple's and even slightly bigger in screen. Kudos to Motorola.

First impressions
In person, the Xoom has an impressively large screen: like an angler with a fish, you feel you need to spread your hands really wide to hold it. In fact, the screen is only just wider, and very slightly thinner than the iPad's; yet the overall effect of the 16:9 aspect ratio (compared to the iPad's 4:3) is that you're holding something that's designed in Cinemascope. This turns out not to work in its favour, but we'll come to that.

The shape is slightly thicker in the centre than the edges, so the edges are raised from a flat surface – good for picking up quickly.

There's not a huge weight difference compared to the iPad 2, though it looks about twice as thick when put on a surface.

Unlock & power up

Turning it on is just a matter of … where's the button? For reasons best known to themselves, the Xoom's designers have hidden the power button on the back, on the top left, recessed into the chassis. (Rory Cellan-Jones at the BBC had the same perplexed reaction.) If you need a laugh, hand one to someone who's never held one, and see how long it takes them to find it. One minute is good going, by which time they will have prodded the USB output socket, HDMI output socket, and power input socket, and volume buttons (all of which, sensibly enough, are on the side of the device).

OK, power on. And now we have Honeycomb – Google's 3.0 version of Android. It has clearly been almost completely rethought for a tablet (though there are a couple of leftover references to "phone" in the system: rather than the PIN or "draw a pattern" screen of an Android phone, you get a padlock sitting in a circle; you have to drag the padlock to the edge. (Neat, though it puzzled some people I tried it on: they pressed the padlock, they pressed the circle, they didn't find the "pull the padlock to the edge" idea self-evident.)

Update: Metcalfe points out that you can change this to a pattern, or PIN if you prefer, in the "Security" setting. The default "unlock" on an Android phone, of course, is a padlock that you "pull" across the bottom of the screen.

Home screen: arm the photon torpedoes!

The whole typography and look of Honeycomb seems to come from someone whose favourite film was JJ Abrams' version of Star Trek, with lens flare (those haloes around any light) galore and typefaces that are all wonderfully flat curves.

The default home screen on the Xoom is a deep blue background. As on the Android smartphones, there are five home screens; Honeycomb, though, arranges them in a carousel – you start in the centre, with two empty ones either side to which you can add apps when you swing them around, or use the button in the top right menu.

And also in the top right menu, there's a button with "apps", which takes you down one level into an "apps folder". How does that make sense? Why is Honeycomb giving us a pit into which apps are dumped, while also presenting you with four completely empty screens? It's not as if there are too many apps: the default installation has 24 buried in that folder, while each of the five screens can take at least 48 apps.

This is bad user interface design which reduces the chance of people using apps – and hence the tablet. Forcing the user to head down into a folder and then make apps return to the surface to use them means you're less likely to find them. Some people (because remember, some people who use computers and tablets are not that savvy) won't notice the "Apps" tag in the top right for quite some time. The most powerful setting on any computer is "default": it's what most people use most of the time. Google isn't doing itself any favours with the Honeycomb defaults.

Battery life: sufficient (with asterisks)

Much is made of the iPad's long battery life. That's because a tablet where you had to keep charging it as much as a laptop (typically an hour or two) would get very wearying. Their utility comes from the fact that you can pick them up and not have to worry whether you charged them this morning if you use them, say, an hour or two each day.

The Xoom does well – it achieved as much as the iPad. Ten hours, more or less – although note that Flash will halve that. You think you don't spend all your time watching Flash? If you open a lot of commercial web pages with adverts or (of course) watch YouTube, you're hitting Flash. More on this later.

Flash aside, the battery life is longer than a typical working day. You can tweak the life by changing how quickly the screen turns off, dimming the screen, turning off Wi-Fi, and so on.

Note though that setting the screen's off delay will mean turning it on a lot – and reaching around for that power button quickly gets tedious. In fact, that back-mounted button is my major criticism of the Xoom itself; yes, it falls under the left index finger if you pick the device up in the correct orientation, but you won't always. And if it's lying down and turns off, picking it up is a pain. Contrast having a button on the front and/or side (both, with the iPad): much easier to activate.

Email and Calendars: lookalike, work-unalike

If Apple were the sort of company that was keen on litigation over look and feel of interfaces, it would be after Google right now over the mail app: it looks almost exactly like the iPad's, but with slightly less panache. There's a left column of incoming emails, and the body of the selected email taking up exactly the same proportion of the screen as on the iPad app.

Honeycomb also doesn't bring a unified mailbox. (Update: it does, see below.) If you have multiple accounts and want to murder your email quickly, tough luck. You still have to pick from separate accounts. Odd that HTC, for example, can figure this out in the Sense UI that it puts on its Android phones, but Google itself can't. Or is it leaving a gap so franchisees can differentiate themselves?

That said, the mail program is workmanlike. There's nothing dramatically clever; it's functional. The Honeycomb calendar is good – the layout is clearer than Apple's.

Update: Metcalfe points out that you can get a unified mailbox view; you just use the Mail app. I overlooked this because the Gmail app (I use Google Mail, yup) was front and foremost in the home screen, and doesn't offer a unified view. I can't now recall if the Mail app is on the home screen or buried in the Apps folder or off on an adjacent home screen. Either way, it is confusing to have two different apps performing the same function.

Browser

Honeycomb gives you Chrome, with tabbed browsing. That makes it slightly faster to move between tabs (you can finger-scroll them along) than using the iPad metaphor, where you have to hit a button and then choose from the open pages or create a new one; the Xoom/Honeycomb also gives you up to 16 tabs (the iPad, nine).

A slight annoyance is that most sites will still recognise the browser as a mobile one – despite the screen being as big as some laptops'. You'll get served the mobile site, which in many cases isn't going to be the right experience for a tablet. No doubt in time sites will update their browser recognition. Here's hoping.

Is this a phone?

Despite all the work, Honeycomb still betrays its heritage. Some of the settings refer to "phone" settings, as does the YouTube Market app (which you'd think might be Honeycomb-aware). Is that a big thing? No. Is it a detail thing? Yes – it indicates that Google's Android team haven't quite worked out how they're presenting Honeycomb.

Flash. Gordon. Bennett.

Out of the box, the Xoom that I tested didn't come with Flash preinstalled. Browsing pages that had Flash content in this pre-lapsarian state brought empty white spaces. But the Market did alert me that there was a beta version of Flash Player 10.2, which I dutifully installed and forgot about.

Then I tried testing the Xoom against some Flash content – specifically, the Guardian's video page.

First of all, I didn't have the experience of stuttering Flash playback that some sites have reported: it played smoothly for me.

But ayayayay, watch the battery life. Every three minutes's play saw a 1% drop in the battery. Do the maths, and that suggests you'll get five hours of life if you're playing Flash all the time. And if you're doing a lot of web browsing on sites that use Flash, whether for adverts (as lots do) or for some display element (again, a surprising number do; try disabling the Flash plugin in your browser to see how much of the desktop web is Flash) then you're going to be hammering your battery in just that way. You're not going to get the enjoyable 10-hour life that makes a new tablet ("media tablet" in the analyst parlance) useful. One element makes them special, in my experience, is that you don't have to worry about the battery life, which means you don't worry about just carrying them around. Add Flash into the equation, and you subtract from that.

Complain about Apple and its refusal to include Flash all you like (and it seems some people enjoy doing so) but the reality is that its focus is on giving people the best possible user experience it can. And where different aims are incompatible – say, between having the longest possible battery life, or playing every single page including adverts on the web – there's an internal debate, which then results in what Apple thinks is optimal.

Again, you may disagree on what's optimal. In which case, here's your five-hour tablet from Motorola; and there's the 10-hour iPad. Of course, YouTube and Vimeo and BBC's iPlayer all offer HTML5-compatible versions of their video, which makes up a big chunk of UK video streaming. But again, Flash is here for you if you want it.

Consider yourself notified

Android's notification system on smartphones runs rings around that on Apple's iOS: it's more finely-grained, and a lot less intrusive, as I've previously pointed out in reviewing the Nexus S.

On Honeycomb, the notifications have moved from the top left (on phones) to the bottom right of the screen (or if you're holding the Xoom in portrait mode, along the bottom of the screen). This isn't actually an improvement, and I can't work out why the Android team did it. To make Honeycomb look different? OK, but in user interface terms it doesn't help. Your hands may obscure new notifications.

Even worse, it's quite easy while typing to hit a notification with a stray thumb and throw yourself off into the notifying program – a wormhole journey that's prone to cause a dramatic "Huh?" (or worse) moment. It's not good, but there doesn't seem to be anything we can do about it – which is worse. Love the notifications, hate the positioning.

Any USB port in a storm

I've long ago complained about the number of different USB connectors that you find on devices. There's the "nearly square" (mostly found on printers), the "loaf of bread" (lots of smartphones), the "squashed bungalow" (some newer smartphones such as the Nexus S), Apple's 30-pin connector, and what seems like many more. To which you can now add the Motorola USB connector, which is none of the above.

Why, Motorola, why? The loaf of bread or squashed bungalow wouldn't have taken up any noticeable space on the externals. And many of us have at least one of those leads hanging around at home or work already. But no, you had to go and give us yet another connector, which leads to long hunts for the one with exactly the right socket. And that's not even the power charging socket; that requires a completely separate adapter and lead. Did you notice, Motorola, how for years Apple has let you charge devices through the same port as you use to connect it to a computer? Please do that in future.

Update: OK, everyone and their kitten is saying that the connector is the micro-USB port. OK - if you have a phone or device with a micro-USB port, you've got a spare lead. Yes, the EC is going to (try to) make phone companies standardise on micro-USB (not sure how that's going to sit with Apple with its 30-pin connector). It's not non-standard. But it's not that common either if you haven't bought a phone in the past few months either. Suffice to say I've been accidentally collecting USB leads for years and very, very few of them are micro-USB.

How big is that keyboard in the window?

For me the answer to this question was always: too big, or too small. As a consequence of the Xoom's 16:9 proportions, its edges measure roughly 8.7in (22.1cm) by 4.9in (12.4cm). (Calculation: 10in screen, Pythagoras's theorem.) The iPad's are 8in (20.3 cm) and 6in (15.2cm).

When you start typing on the Xoom, you're faced with two choices. In landscape mode, each hand has to span the keys across about 11cm; compare that to the iPad, where each has to cover about 10cm. In portrait (vertical) mode, on the Xoom your hands cover 6cm; on the iPad, 7.5cm.

My experience was that on the Xoom, landscape was too wide, but portrait was too narrow. I couldn't type accurately and quickly on the narrow version - the keys were too close – but with the wide keyboard, it wasn't comfortable to hold and type. And resting it on a desk wasn't easy because of its curved back. (Motorola might want to think about covers and desk-rests as a priority add-on to help sales.) The iPad keyboard, on the other hand, had a Goldilocks feel: not too wide, not too narrow. I can type really quite quickly on an iPad, and that's not due to greater use – I got the Xoom exactly a week after beginning to try an iPad.

Update: Metcalfe says "I never really use it in portrait, but in landscape, I love it. I can type nearly as fast as on a normal computer. Perhaps just practice?" Might be, but it will depend a lot on the size of your hands. Mine aren't small, but I still found landscape too much.

Apps: unconvincing

Much is made of the app experience on Android and on iOS, and the comparative differences between the two. The Android app experience on what you might call "core" apps (for me, things like Twitter, or Facebook) isn't much different, as much as anything because the same companies tend to do them.

The differences between the platforms come into sharper relief when you wander off the beaten track. Then you discover that the iOS ecosystem (having had longer to grow) has filled up many gaps where Android is still lacking, or that the apps on Android are, frankly, limited. One of my interests is Go: on the iPad you can get an app that will show you thousands of problems, professional games with commentary, or computer play. (It's called SmartGo Kifu, since you ask.) Not cheap at £11.99, but incredibly powerful; it's the sort of app you could keep using for years and still derive benefit at any level. On Android, it isn't there; the best I could find was a free app which doesn't offer the problems or professional games, only the play-against capability, and that wasn't very satisfactory either.

Yes, this is an outlier in terms of interest, but it indicates what happens when you're trying to build an ecosystem but don't have enough financial or volume incentive – yet? – to bring in the broad sweep of developers. Sure, you can choose from a zillion free shoot-em-ups. But the world isn't likely to run short of those any time soon. It's the apps at the fringes that indicate how strong your ecosystem is. Honeycomb, and Android, aren't there at present. And I'd wager there's a risk that if Android tablets don't start to make a mark against the iPad, that problem will remain.

Music, sweet music

Honeycomb comes with its own much-improved music player, which offers you a scrolling parade of song cover artwork, or a simpler scrolling list. Fun. This doesn't quite solve the problem of how you get the music onto your Xoom: obviously you're going to have to plug it into your PC and synchronise the music.

Umm … how? There's no iTunes-like program on the PC to simplify the transfer. And with everyone have tens of gigabytes of legally-acquired music on their PCs, you're going to have to make some sort of choice if you don't want to fill your Xoom within minutes of buying it.

You can get DoubleTwist, which does have a PC/Mac incarnation as well, though it can't "see" iTunes's Smart Playlists (where you create playlists that will include any artist whose first name is "Justin", say). It can synchronise "static" playlists with iTunes effectively, and create playlists on the Xoom. But in that case, why have the Honeycomb music app? Plus DoubleTwist doesn't synchronise too well with the Honeycomb music player: when I transferred over some iTunes music, the music player saw it, but DoubleTwist didn't. (It does play AAC-encoded files from the iTunes Music Store.)

You can get Spotify, of course, or We7's Radio Plus, so you don't have to store the music on your machine. But again, this questions the point of the Honeycomb music app – unless it too is meant for a forthcoming Google Music service, as frequently hinted at, not least by Motorola's chief executive Sanjay Jha.

Video: bad, bad, bad

Know what media tablets should be good at? Playing media. Know what the Xoom is bad at? Playing video. Once you've laboriously transferred files over from your machine (you have to download drivers for Windows and Mac – that is so non-post-PC), you find that
• it will play MP4 files
• it won't play AVI files
• it won't play .VOB (decrypted DVD) files
• actually, it doesn't have a program to "play" videos at all.

It's this latter point which is the most bizarre. If you've got a device that's meant to be able to play media, then shouldn't it have an app whose purpose is to play media? Lots of forms of it?

True, the iPad won't play AVI files or .VOB files either, but it won't even transfer them in the first place. The Xoom will happily let you fill it to the brim with video files, and good luck then finding an app to play them. (VLC isn't available in the Android Market, and I tried a number which just looked at my video files – AVI and VOB – and shrugged their executable shoulders.)

The lack of any explicit app for playing videos (despite there being a folder called "Movies" and another called "Videos"), unlike the iPad where you can play videos directly in iTunes – always assuming it's a format you got onto the device - is odd.

Perhaps we're only meant to watch full-length Flash videos?

Overall: the verdict

The Xoom is a good container for Honeycomb: the device itself is pleasing to look at, not too heavy (though it is heavier than the iPad 2), and if you get rid of Flash has good battery life and a competitive price. Android's strengths (cloud synchronisation of apps across platforms such as your computer, smarthone and tablet) are to the fore, but so are its weaknesses – small user interface niggles, and particularly the dearth of apps in the broader Market.

Overall? If you're offered the experience of the iPad or the Xoom, there's no price difference, and the iPad will do many of the cloud synchronisation things (addresses, calendars, email) as well as having iTunes if you want to synchronise music and apps. Which means this loses to the iPad.

All in favour

• Competitive price against iPad with same amount of storage;
• interesting typeface and general design for menus and elements;
• some neat user interaction elements;
• flexibility of Android for adding sub-elements (eg, turning wireless on/off) to main screens

All against

• 16:9 screen dimensions mean typing can be inconvenient either way up
• inclusion of Flash halves battery life
• too easy to hit notifications by accident while typing;
• low quality of apps in Market;
• nonstandard USB and power ports
• hard to add video, few formats supported

Use Android app to Search Android Market and Save your Precious Time

Jump directly into the Android market without losing precious your time and search applications and many more which have already in mind on your smartphone. This little pretty much says it all about explained this quick tip with a bit more details.

If you want to search any item from Android market you will easily search all contents from android market. This app does not require appear within the searching process.   You do not need to wait to appear search box. If your network connection has been slow than the search box will take a long time to appear. This application help you straight jump onto the search button which saves your precious time.

Instantly jump into the Android market with pressing this hardware search button. Little by little this habit can be turned minutes to days of saved your precious time. It may goes without saying anything and pressing Menu and search button would accomplish the same thing and it does not require one more click.

This Android aap is available into the Android Market just download and use this app this will save your valuable time. This will help you to reach at Android marked in zero seconds. You can easily use this app with all data providers.

Android 3.2 Honeycomb Update for Motorola Zoom

 According to Sources Android Open Source Project Issue 16992 buried stated in a single line comment that “There should be a 3.2 update coming within days, and that should help those of you with Xoom.”

The Android 3.2 Honeycomb update coming in the very near future for Motorola Zoom. But unfortunately there is no any solid evidence is available of the back up this claim. However the Honeycomb exchange error will apparently fixed with the latest version of Android 3.2 OS.

Android users have there is no idea the possibly updates for Motorola Xoom will gets Android Ice Cream and Sandwich. Before this arrives after this year and Google wants to give surprise for all tablet owners when this latest Google’s Android OS arrives.

The 3.2 Honeycomb update for Motorola Xoom tablet within days, it was also heard about the updates of Android 3.2 supports wider range of screen sizes which also help the bridge to Android Ice Cream and Sandwich. The Android 3.2 Honeycomb was firstly mentioned alongside with Huawei’s upcoming tablet.

People would not surprise when the rumored Motorola Xoom 2 ships with the new version out of from the box. Motorola Xoom such a nice tablet which have very stylish look and design. Motorola Xoom tablet is powered by 1 GHz Dual core NVIDIA Tegra 2 processor and 1GB of DDR 2 RAM. This supports Wi-Fi and 3G networks and available from 32 GB of storage capacity. It has 10.1-inches multi-touch touch display which has 1280 x 800 pixels resolutions. This Android based tablet comes with a lot features.

Multi-touch Displays Runs on Android 46"

SKR a rather most successful company gives a lot of experience to Android. It has just come out with a novel concept big multitouch display. This recently released a prototype of upto 46-inches of multitouch display that runs on Android devices.

The prototype of 32-inch and 46-inch display for Android needs to run a regular Android terminal which is connected via USB from the touch sensor. Its HDMI displays the all digital contents right off the bat and the company seems to have hit a few more pretty spots which includes full functionality of the interfaces and environments. This display supports fully high definition videos.

SKR said about their new system that our company makes digital signs for peoples who are asking us to provide large display device which comes with multi-touch functionality like a tablet or smartphone. They first try to make it compatible with Windows 7, but they didn’t meet the requirements of customers. They also said they want crisp and fluid movement of these devices like in a smartphone but with high resolutions. But when they asked with touch panel and peripheral manufacturers they said that they don’t support the Android, then after they want work with Android in future and decided to self develop the systems.

The company has also said that we released our products from the month of September. Now we are only showing the module of our products. This also considering about the vertical display for Android Devices includes Android Smartphones. They intend to utilize apps which can be able to run on Android

Zeus banking Trojans Hits Android Devices

Zitmo Trojan Spyware app which is designed to hack people’s financial data. This application targets devices which are runs on Android operating system.

A senior antivirus analyst and researcher for Fortinet Axelle Apvrille said that “The malware posses as a banking activation application” into a blog post. This listens to all incoming messages and forwards them into the web server.

There is security issue for all those banks who send mTANs-mobile transaction authentication numbers for sending one-time password as a SMS for authentication. Zeus-botnet-using criminal gang which not only fraudulent money transfers them also verified the transactions by intercepting password.

Zitmo is not a new Android variant it used by the ZeuS gang to defeat SMS based banking into two factors authentication on popular mobile operating systems such as BlackBerry, Symbian, Windows, and more.

Truteer CEO Mickey Boodaei said that this attacks on malicious smartphone application often gets pushed by malware after it was infected a PC until visit a banking websites. At this point the infected malware kicks and asks users to download a security or authentication options on their mobile devices during login process.

FFIEC (Federal Financial Institutions Examinations Council) recommended that banks have considered about the out-of-bound authentication such as mTANs blocking malware attacks against their customers.  However banks follow the guide lines of FFIEC but attackers find new techniques for defeating the securities.

Boodaei said that the current threat from smartphones it seeking malwares relatively smalls because this time few users banking operations on their mobile phones. Android Security Architecture also not able to stop this attacks they have to beware while mobile banking will not going to take off. These attacks can be taking place via social engineering attack which installing third party apps.

Not only Android OS at the risk, some other devices also at risks including iPad, iPhone, and other iOS devices which install malicious apps.

New 3D Android Smartphones

 

The most popular mobile manufacturer companies HTC and LG introduces their new smartphone HTC EVO 3D & LG Optimus 3D both smartphones have many similar features. EVO 3D runs on Android 2.3 operating system and Optimus 3D runs on Android 2.2 operating system.

HTC EVO 3D:

You can record your 3D film with its 5 megapixel camera and watch recorder 3D videos on its 4.3-inches QHD touch screen display without using 3D glasses. This allows you to share your photos and videos to your friends who have 3D devices. This powerful device packed with Google’s Android 2.3 Gingerbread OS with 1GB RAM and 1GB internal memory. HTC EVO 3D price is approx $199.99.

HTC EVO 3D Specification:

•     Powered by 1.2 GHz dual-core processor
•     Adreno 220 GPU with Qualcomm MSM8660 chipset
•     Runs on Android v2.3 Gingerbread OS
•     5 MP rear camera with flash
•     1.3 MP front camera
•     Captures 3D videos with 1080p resolution
•     Wi-Fi 802.11 b/g/n with DLNA Wi-Fi hotspot
•     Internal memory 1GB with 1GB RAM
•     4.3” 3D LCD display
•     Battery 1730 Li-ion mAh

LG Optimus 3D:

LG Optimus is powered by dual core processor with its tri-dual architecture such as dual memory, dual core, as well as this supports dual channel. This device allows you to enjoying with latest games and apps and games. Its 3D cinematic touch display allow to watch 3D videos without 3D glasses. LG Optimus 3D powerful smartphone is packed with Android 2.2 Froyo OS with 512 MB RAM and 8 GB internal memory. LG Optimus 3D price is approx $199.99.

LG Optimus 3D Specs:

•     Powered by Dual-core 1GHz ARM Cortex-A9 proccessor
•     PowerVR SGX540 GPU with TI OMAP4430 chipset
•     Runs on Android v2.2 Froyo OS
•     5 MP rear camera with flash
•     Front camera for video calling
•     Captures 3D videos with 1080p resolution
•     Wi-Fi 802.11 b/g/n with DLNA Wi-Fi hotspot
•     Internal memory 8 GB storage with 512 MB RAM
•     4.3” 3D LCD display
•     Battery 1500 Li-ion mAh

[Review] Motorola Droid 3

The third installment of a trilogy is typically the most satisfying. The Empire Falls, Frodo destroys the ring, Cinderella goes back in time. (Okay, that's a stretch.) Our protagonist in this tale is the Droid 3, which bears an uncanny resemblance to its dad and granddad-- but Motorola's added a few new components and made some minor design tweaks in attempt to improve the overall experience.

Are these adjustments enough to save the series? The original Droid launched with much fanfare, a device that steered Motorola back onto the path of success from its post-RAZR Hades. It had a refreshing gold-laden design that oozed elegance, top-of-the-line specs for its time, and was the pioneer that helped usher Google's mobile OS into a new era. Each new iteration has received less attention than the one before, however, and the Droid 3 experienced such a quiet launch that we blinked and almost missed it. No matter, though -- as long as the phone can speak for itself, it doesn't need the confetti to accompany it. But is the third time another charm for the Droid? Or will it be buried by other heavyweights like the Droid Bionic or Samsung Galaxy S II Function? Join us after the break to find out.

Hardware

As mentioned earlier, the Droid 3 is a spitting image of its predecessors: the same large, boxy body, the lower lip extending out from the rest of the phone, as well as that full QWERTY keyboard. But upon closer inspection we found more than a few cosmetic differences. Dimensionally, the latest rendition may be the thinnest of the bunch at just a hair under 13mm (compared to 14mm and 13.7mm for the first two Droids, respectively), but it's also the largest. While the first two Droid generations had mid-sized 3.7-inch (480 x 854) LCD displays, this one steps up to a gorgeous 4-inch qHD screen. The bezels on the Droid 3 are thicker and larger on all sides, which unfortunately adds unnecessary heft.

Consequently, the device is also the heaviest of the series, weighing in at 6.49 ounces (184g) compared to 5.96 ounces and 6.0 ounces. As the Droids have always been a rather gravity-loving group, an extra half ounce amounts to a relatively minor add-on. Being as relatively heavy as it is, you may be tempted to think this is a rock-solid phone with no durability concerns at all -- and you'd be right. Motorola fashioned its latest device out of polished metal on the sides and rubberized plastic on the back to make for a more comfortable, firm grip. The screen's also covered with Gorilla Glass for scratch protection. All told, that added depth makes the Droid 3 easier to grasp, though the larger size regrettably makes it annoying to hold onto for long periods of time.

A defining feature of the three Droids is the lower lip that protrudes from the rest of the phone. This cosmetic landmark is a result of making the bottom half of the handset -- the keyboard half -- just a little longer than the top half. Not only does this contribute to the phone's elegant look and feel, it also makes room for a larger keyboard. Sadly, there isn't much else about the Droid 3 that exudes grace or luxury; gone are the gold accents adorning the original, as well as the chrome detailing and light blue tint on the second. What we are left with otherwise is a plain boxy phone with the standard keys. There's nothing new or innovative here.

Apart from that, the newest Droid has made some layout tweaks over the last version. It adds an HDMI port next to the microUSB charger on the left side, swaps the power button and 3.5mm headphone jack up top, and has a slightly retooled volume rocker on the right side. On the back we see a pop-off battery cover (which, by the way, can be substituted for an inductive wireless charging cover, if you prefer), 8 MP shooter with LED flash, and a speaker grill and mic hanging out near the bottom.

Underneath the hood lies a SIM card matching the Droid 3's international roaming capabilities, as well as a slot for the microSD. Alas, the phone doesn't come with a memory card, though Motorola at least provides us with 16GB of internal storage -- enough to hold a fair number of apps and multimedia files. If this isn't enough, the handset supports an additional 32GB of external storage, bringing the total of 48GB. This is an obvious improvement over the 8GB that came standard with the last-gen Droid 2.

Lastly, there are a few significant improvements in the internal hardware department. The Droid 3 houses a 1GHz dual-core TI OMAP4430 processor, 512MB RAM, and a 1540mAh battery (more on that later). Finally, it adds a VGA front-facing camera, while the rear camera got a bump to 8 megapixels. The only thing spec-wise that we would've really appreciated was an LTE radio for superfast broadband access. Riches and glory could be showered upon the Droid 3 as the first full QWERTY on Verizon's 4G network; without it, however, its success can't be so easily written in stone.

Having a full QWERTY device capable of working on Verizon's 4G network could potentially become a large success, given the lack of variety we've seen in Big Red's lineup thus far.

KEYBOARD

Speaking of improvements, the keyboard is the area Motorola appeared to focus on the most. The Droid 2's board, while better than the original by a country mile, still left plenty of room for improvement. Interestingly, the current model steps up by splitting the difference between those two keyboards. For instance, the keys aren't as bouncy or rubbery, but they also aren't flat. It's actually the perfect balance of give and clickiness -- the keys feel natural to type on, and we didn't experience any learning curve, making it a decided improvement over the Droid 2. The sliding mechanism's a bit stiff, though usable; if given the choice we'd rather have it err on the side of solid as opposed to flimsy.

We also applaud HelloMoto for including a row of dedicated number keys. It's a major frustration for us when companies omit this from QWERTY keyboards, since it throws off our "typing groove" -- having to stop mid-sentence to hunt down the ALT or Fn keys and manually enter each number really breaks up the flow.

Motorola also seemed to learn its lesson from the debacle that was the original Droid's direction pad, as it was retooled for the second-gen devices and remains in tact this time around. The d-pad is much smaller and relegated to the lower right corner of the keyboard, which leaves enough room to make every individual key larger and easier to press.

The keys are also backlit, which makes it a great deal easier to text and email at night or in a darkened room. This is infinitely better than being forced to use the onscreen keyboard in order to see what we're writing. With that said, however, the virtual version of the 'board is still a breeze to use. On top of the default Moto keyboard, the Droid 3 comes with Swype pre-installed as an option. We understand that many people have love-hate relationships with Swype, and much of it depends on its accuracy; on this device, however, we felt it handled our need for typing speed well, with few incorrect guesses.

CAMERA

The Droid 3's camera sounds great, right? An 8 megapixel shooter with 1080p video capture shouldn't be anything to bicker about on a high-end smartphone. Problem is, it's not all about megapixel count -- and it doesn't work in Moto's favor here.

It was disappointing to find that the dedicated camera button, proudly emblazoned on the right side of both previous Droids, has mysteriously disappeared -- much like with the Droid X2. We understand that a dedicated camera button might not work for skinnier handsets, but there's more than enough heft on the Droid 3 to allow a spot for it. Worse still, there was also no ability to manually adjust contrast or exposure to our own liking.

We also encountered issues with the camera software itself. On more than one occasion the viewfinder froze. Usually, the bug would resolve itself as soon as we switched over to video mode and back again. We even had some problems getting the camera app to initialize, which we resolved by restarting the phone. More often than not, the camera would take its sweet time focusing -- especially in low light. As a result, we weren't able to catch a whole lot of impromptu moments.

Once we were able to make it through a full photo session using the camera, the images turned out to be mediocre -- they definitely weren't up on par with comparable smartphones such as the Samsung Galaxy S II. Colors were slightly washed out in bright daylight and ill-defined under overcast conditions, with objects appearing shadowy in low light.

Software

There is much rejoicing in the recent disappearance of the MotoBlur name, and we were incredibly relieved to boot up the Droid 3 and not be required to sign in or register for Motorola's UI experience. Rather, the currently-nameless user interface on the Droid 3 was a breath of fresh air, though it, too, has some cons.

The Droid 3 received a much-needed boost to Android 2.3, a feat that the others haven't yet accomplished (officially, anyways). Motorola chose to throw in a few stock Gingerbread elements, but it's easy to spot a good deal of customization scattered layered on top of the OS. Here, you navigate the app tray by swiping left or right, and you have the option of filtering apps by groups (a long-press of an app results in the choice of sending it to the home screen or attaching it to one of those groups). Motorola also threw in its own keyboard and dialpad, but opted for the stock music player and browser.

Other than the app tray, most shortcuts remained the same, with one refreshing exception. We discovered that pressing the home button twice from the main screen panel would take us directly to an app of our choice. We were able to change it to one of several different apps just by finding the option in the settings menu.

We were greeted by the same bloatware we've come to expect with any Android device on Verizon's networks: the usual VCAST suite, as well as Let's Golf 2 (did anyone ever play the first one?), MOTOPRINT, GoToMeeting, QuickOffice, NFL Mobile, Slacker, and some proprietary social networking apps. As always, there's no way to get rid of these apps, so you just have to get to work hiding them from your usual viewing routine by grouping them together and using your own customized groups as a default.

Performance

As far as performance goes, the Droid 3 is full of hits and misses. For a dual-core CPU, it performed without any lagging, per se. However, we grew impatient of the countless animations Motorola threw into its UI, each one taking at least two to three seconds to complete before moving on to the requested task. Examples include lengthy in-and-out transitions between menus, extra time to access shortcuts (such as the home key long-press and double-press), and opening up programs like the phone and Market. We know, we know, this sounds incredibly picky, but the fact is when using the phone throughout the day, 2-3 seconds for each transition eats up a lot of unnecessary time. The phone's hardware still functions admirably, but the UI effects are somewhat frustrating. Update: the animations are turned on by default; fortunately, the phone has a setting in which the animations can be turned off, which does trim down the transition time.

In our benchmarking tests, Quadrant scored 2324; Linpack processed at 44.076 MFLOPS (single-thread) and 66.378 MFLOPS (multi-thread). Nenamark 1 came back at 46.4fps, and Neocore offered a whopping speed of 58.2fps. Sunspider results were just a smidge over 4000ms (4091, to be exact). There was just one matter of curiosity that we couldn't quite explain: whenever we attempted to run the Nenamark 2 benchmark on the Droid 3, it froze. Every. Single. Time. Restarts, master resets, and app re-installs weren't able to resolve it. We can't draw any conclusions on this, since everything else ran perfectly fine, but we're definitely stumped.

The Droid 3 comes with a 1540mAh battery, but you'll definitely want a charger if you're away from home longer than a few hours. In our standard rundown test (we start at 100 percent and loop video endlessly until the battery dies) the phone lasted for 4 hours and 15 minutes. Our everyday use tests fared better -- we got nearly 10 hours of juice out of it when pushing emails, social networking, doing a moderate amount of web browsing, and taking pictures and videos. Still, we'd like to get a full day's use out of our smartphone if possible, though at least this would be long enough to cover a standard  

Wrap-Up

Trying to live up to a good name is a heavy responsibility to take upon ourselves, and smartphones aren't any better off, either. Such is the burden of the Droid 3, being slapped with the duty of impressing the masses to the same degree as its original namesake. Sadly, it feels as though the latest rendition of this tune is more of a swan song. It's had a good run, but the Droid series seems to be fading. By no means are we suggesting this will be the last of its kind -- only Verizon and Motorola can truly answer that question -- but instead of seeing the same elegance, poise, or confidence exuded by the series' firstborn, we see yet another blocky phone. Looks aside, we enjoyed its dual-core performance, though it's somewhat inhibited by UI effects.

Given the curious timing of the Droid 3's arrival paired with the Downy-soft launch, we're left to wonder what happened to it. Was it pushed out ahead of its pre-arranged time, its marketing dollars set aside for a much more hype-worthy Motorola Droid Bionic or Samsung Function launch? The Droid 3, with its top-notch keyboard and high-end specs (save for its 3G radio), is a phone we wouldn't mind using on a regular basis, but we're sensing something grander lurking just beyond the horizon. 

Review Samsung Galaxy Ace

Introduction:
If Samsung was hiding a secret card up its sleeve, one with ambition to trump mid-range Android smartphones with a smart combination of price and features, the Samsung Galaxy Ace would be our first guess. Rather than shooting for the stars it offers the almost complete Android experience in a relatively affordable package at a retail price of around $350. Hard facts speak of an 800MHz Qualcomm chipset and 278MB of RAM under the hood here. Samsung throwed in a 5-megapixel shooter and a conveniently located microSD card slot on the side, all in a handset with a 3.5-inch screen, looking somewhat similar to the iPhone4. Will this be enough for its market success? Read on to find out.

Design:
Design is what differentiates a company in the already packed Android smartphone space, but the Galaxy Ace delivers a body with a subtle yet noticeable similarity to Apple's iPhone 4. The phone comes with an equally sized 3.5-inch TFT screen with a resolution of 320 x 480 pixels. Response to tapping and flicking is excellent, but in direct sunlight the screen is barely legible. Samsung skipped on the oleophobic coating, but hey – looking at the price we see no surprise here, right? To continue the list of similarities, the bezel around the screen almost matches the one on the iPhone 4 in terms of size, but the single large physical key on the bottom is what really jogs you into linking the Ace with Apple's iPhone. Finally, one capacitive button on each of the sides of the physical home key rounds up the fascia of the handset. The Galaxy Ace comes in two versions – a black and a white one.

Key features

-Quad-band GSM and dual-band 3G support
-7.2 Mbps HSDPA support
-3.5" 16M-color TFT LCD capacitive touchscreen of HVGA (320 x 480 pixels) resolution
-800MHz ARM 11 processor, Adreno 200 GPU, Qualcomm MSM7227 chipset; 278MB of RAM
available to the user
-Android OS v2.2 (Froyo) with TouchWiz 3.0 UI customization
-Swype text input
-5 MP autofocus camera with LED flash; Geo-tagging, face and smile detection
-QVGA@15fps video
-microSD slot (up to 32GB, 2GB in box)
-Wi-Fi 802.11 b, g, n and DLNA
-GPS with A-GPS connectivity; Digital compass
-microUSB port (charging) and stereo Bluetooth v2.1
-Standard 3.5 mm audio jack
-DNSe sound enhancement
-FM radio with RDS
-Document editor
-File manager preinstalled
-Samsung Apps brings a few nice apps for free
-Accelerometer and proximity sensor

The Samsung Galaxy Ace delivers a body with a subtle yet noticeable similarity to Apple's iPhone 4.

On the side, a silver chromed plastic line adds to the iPhone look of the phone. It holds the volume rocker on the left, the hot swappable microSD card slot located in the middle of the right side (up to 32GB of expandable memory) and accompanied by the lock key above it. On top you have a sliding door for the microUSB charging/syncing slot and 3.5 standard headset jack.

The back holds the 5-megapixel auto-focus camera which works in concert with LED flash. The only other thing you'll find on the back is the speakerphone.

While the Ace's glossy plastic has a nice solid feel, it is indeed a fingerprint magnet. Overall, the striking similarity with Apple's iPhone is what could make this phone attractive from a design standpoint. But it's only the looks, not the feel that you could try to emulate with such a handset, right?

The Samsung Galaxy Ace next to the Apple iPhone 4

Interface and Functionality:

Far from being crème de la crème, the combination of a Qualcomm MSM7227 chipset (with Adreno 200 graphics) and 278MB of RAM runs the Froyo show smoothly. Unlike the complete redesign of the main menu that we saw on the early prototype unit that we previewed, in the final Galaxy Ace the Koreans used a traditional version of TouchWiz UI. This translates into the usual garments of a black side scrollable main menu and four quick access icons on the bottom, which define the user interface.

The homescreen and the main menu of the Samsung Galaxy Ace

Unlocking the handset is done in the traditional sliding-the-lock way. From there on, the standard Froyo experience takes over. One notable addition is pinch to zoom support in each of the homescreens as well as the main menu. In both cases an overview of all the pages appears allowing you to quickly navigate between them.

On the software side, you are treated with Samsung's AllShare app which makes sharing over DLNA to a supported device like an HD TV a breeze. The inclusion of a built-in Task Manager, which you can access by holding down the single physical key or via the settings menu, allows you to view running apps and how they affect the performance of the Galaxy Ace.

Android has the best Google apps suite in the industry and this handset is no exception. The Gmail, Google Maps (version 5.2), YouTube and Google Talk applications are virtually on par with their desktop versions both in terms of functionality and speed. In addition, the full version of ThinkFree office in its document editing glory contributes to a comprehensive software package.

Camera and Multimedia:

The 5-megapixel shooter on the Galaxy Ace surprised us with its good performance and reasonable amount of options in the menu for a relatively affordable handset. We found images to be reasonably detailed, with accurate color representation and above average dynamic range. You're presented with a set of options such as different shooting modes including smile shots, continuous and panoramic shots. An array of scene selections will fine tune your picture and you can also switch the focus to macro mode. Unfortunately, there is no dedicated shuter key, but the menu offers rather intuitive on-screen settings.

Outdoor samples made with the Samsung Galaxy Ace

Strong	Medium	Low light
Indoor samples

With a relatively capable 5-megapixel shooter, we expected to see an equally good video capture, but that is simply not the case. Video is recorded in the terrible QVGA resolution at 15fps - only good for viewing on a small screen or for multimedia messaging.

Internet and Connectivity:

The Galaxy Ace has the stock Android browser, which would have been great if it came with Flash support. Was it because of the 800MHz processor or something else, Adobe Flash Player wasn't available for download from the Android Market. Except for our futile attempts to install the player, browsing was a pleasant experience with smooth scrolling and full support for multitouch actions like pinch to zoom. On the downside, we could only open up to 4 tabs, so extreme Internet multitaskers could be disappointed.

Surfing the web with the Samsung Galaxy Ace

Connectivity is well represented by 3G with download speeds of up to 7.2Mbps. You also have Wi-Fi b/g/n, bluethooth 2.1 and GPS. The handset's conveniently located microSD card slot on the side allows hot swaps of microSD cards with capacity of up to 32GB. The internal memory is only 158MB, but Samsung has included a 2GB microSD card in the package, so space shouldn't be an issue for your basic app needs.

Performance and Conclusion:

In our tests of its calling quality, though, it underwhelmed us with reverberating sounds on our end of the line. Our callers reported hearing rather unnatural digitized voices, which suggests a poor microphone performance.

The Ace comes with a 1350mAh battery, with a quoted talk time of 11 hours. In real life, the phone had no problem getting us through the day, but two days were generally a tall order, so we had to charge it every other day. If you want to squeeze the maximum of your battery for longer periods of times, check out our tips and tricks for better battery life.

The Samsung Galaxy Ace fights in the already packed mid-range Android segment, but with a screen of 3.5 inches and a relatively affordable price of just above $350 off contract, it is a notable contender. Sure, it doesn't break ground with its capabilities, but manages daily tasks with ease.

Currently, alternatives include the slightly cheaper LG Optimus One with a 3.2 inch screen and Android on board. The Samsung Wave has one of the better cameras out there and a gorgeous looking screen, but with it you have to be willing to switch to bada as your mobile operatong system. Amazingly, Nokia's current flagship, the N8, sells for approximately the same price (or even lower), but brings the best camera in smartphones on the dated UI of Symbian^3.

Finally, for a mid-range Android, the Galaxy Ace really ups the game with its 3.5-inch screen. However, it fails in two main areas – video recording and Flash support. If it were for these alone, the Galaxy Ace would still be a pretty strong contender, but the below average calling quality, is what swung the balance for us.