Samsung Jet S8003

[Silencer]

This review can also be found on my blog

Introduction

This is my first gadget review in years now and I have become quite rusty with my writing skills. Go easy on me ;-) Anyway, I have had the Samsung JET S8003 for the past two weeks already. This is the very same phone I won at the SM WiFi Photoblog contest a few weeks ago. Nonetheless, I have used it mainly for a week as my main phone with my SUN Cellular plan.

Overview

Samsung has lately been targeting the younger markets with their fancy, gorgeous, sleek and multimedia oriented phones. In fact a lot of my classmates in University own and use a Samsung phone. Here are my thoughts and views.

Design

At first glance, I was wooed by the aesthetics and form factor of the Samsung JET. The phone has the typical design of a full touch-screen phone. It looks similar to the Apple iPhone and the LG?s touch screen phone, however, a little bit smaller in size both in thickness and length/width. The phone only comes in one color scheme ? a sleek black coating with a sort of ?hologram? red on the back end.

Moreover, there are three buttons on the fa?ade of the Samsung Jet. These include the ?Call?, ?Menu? (Diamond shaped) and ?End/Off? button. On the left hand side there?s the volume control buttons. While on the right hand side, there?s the ?Lock?, ?Magic Cube? and the ?Camera? buttons.

The back end of the phone is mainly made from plastic and can be easily lifted to insert the SIM card, battery or microSD card.

The top part of the phone includes the microUSB/charging port and the 3.5mm headset jack.

Additionally, there?s a small camera placed in front of the phone for 3G purposes whilst a 5 megapixel is placed at the backside of the phone with two extremely bright LED flashes. Moreover, there?s a loud speaker located on the back which is mediocrePerformance and Technical Details

Performance and Technical Details

Samsung claims that the phone is running on an 800MHZ, the first of its kind. However, I am not too contented with the performance and speed of the applications on the phone. I noticed some lag and some issues with loading times.

To add on, the phone comes with a 3.1 inch WVGA AMOLED (Active-Matrix Organic Light-Emitting Diode) with a resolution of 800?480 and a fast response time. The display is exceptionally bright, large and takes up less power as other typical phone screens. The display is absolutely gorgeous and can certainly impress the ladies ;-)

The Samsung JET can go through a day?s worth of activities such as browsing the web, listening to music, composing a few dozen messages and the general tasks. Expect to charge the phone as soon as you get home. The battery life is little bit below the aUser Interfaces pretty quickly too.

User Interface

To add on the Samsung JET is using the latest user interface software called ?TOUCHWIZ 2.0? which takes advantage of the built in accelerometer, widgets and the ?Smart Unlock? feature. One can just do a few shake gestures and the phone will open or close an application. This usually works with Samsung?s in-house applications such as the music player.

The home-screen, or I would prefer to call it the desktop, allows the user to slide through three (3) working environments. For instance, each desktop allows widgets to be placed from the widget sidebar at the side. Moreover, this is beneficial to those who multi-task a lot. One desktop can be used for business needs whilst the other can be used for personal use only.

Furthermore, the main desktop screen provides four (4) shortcuts to the Keypad, the Phonebook, Messages and the Main Menu which are situated at the bottom of the screen. Additionally, the menu is impressive in terms of GUI and includes three different types of menus which can be easily navigated by sliding them (similar to the Apple iPhone). The animations and effects, however not needed, will again play an important role for those into design and aesthetics.

The Magic Cube, which can be accessed on the right hand side of the phone, allows the user to access shortcuts of applications or files by spinning around a cube. This surely shows the processing power that Samsung Jet empowers. Yet again, this can electrify those who are intoMessagingever, this didn?t impress me at all.

Messaging

Composing a new message on the phone takes some getting used to as the keypad is placed far up compared to other touch-screen phones. I had a hard time with this as I?m used to typing on a keypad which is a lot lower (Nokia E51). To add on, one can easily press the wrong key which I never grew out of. The T9 (automatic word or dictionary construction) is a help for those who want to compose messages faster.

Furthermore, there are four different methods in composing a new message. You can use the typical keypad, handwriting full screen or two other handwriting screens. On the other hand, one can rotate the phone whilst in keypad mode and be presented with a full-screen QWERTY keyboard. I had difficult time typing on the QWERTY screen as I made several mistakes pressing the wrong key.

I wasn?t too content with the general user interface and options of the Messaging function of the Samsung Jet. There was a lack of options as compared to other brand phones. To add on, messages which are kept in the Outbox folder are not automatically sent after a period of time. This is a huge disadvantage for those who always on the move and don?t have the luxury of tCameraly sending each message. A drawback indeed!

Camera

The Samsung Jet includes a 5 megapixel camera which includes 4x optical zoom and an autofocus function. The dual LED flash lights are too bright especially when shot indoors and in low light conditions. Nonetheless, the quality of the pictures is fine for a mobile phone. You can also manually change the exposure level, set the scene and the shooting mode. There areIndoors (With Flash) from.

Here are some test shots:

Indoors (Without Flash)

The Samsung Jet also incorporates a video recorder or camcorder which allows the user to record videos at 30fps at the following resolutions ? 720?480, 640?480, 320?240 and 176?144. Furthermore, there?s an option to record a video in slow motion, however, on a lower resolution. Below are a few sample videos taken on the Samsung Jet:

Media

Music Player

The phone comes with a typical MP3 user interface which changes when the phone rotates. However, I believe there?s a bug in the phone when the phone accidently enters the horizontal user interface without the user rotating the phone. Nevertheless, there?s a 5.1 audio channel which allows the user to emulate it. There are also several sound effects to choose from.

The sound quality of the headset included is appalling. A better headset should haveVideo Playerhis phone is being advertised as a ?multimedia? unit.

Video Player

The video player is definitely a wonder to those who want to watch DIVX movies on the go. Most, if not all, movies can play smoothly on the phone. The user has the option to also change the aspect ratio of the video in order to occupy the whole 3.1 inches of the OLED screen.

I am not too happy when it comes to the accelerometer of the phone as it tends to get confused and stuck when in horizontal mode. There should be an option to turn off the accelerometer as it?s briOther additions: with several applications such as Messaging and Media.

Other additions:

The Samsung Jet comes with two Google software pre-installed, Google Maps and Google Mail. However, I couldn?t operate Google Maps when using it via WiFi. There?s no 3G option for SUN Cellular users here in Cebu.

The phone comes with a built in GPS and A-GPS (Assisted Global Positioning Service). I tried this feature out and it managed to acquire four satellites. However, it couldn?t pin Positive Views:

ow are a few view points which I wrote over a span of a week:

Positive Views:

* Excellent, crystal clear voice quality

* Soundcard is top-notch

* Beautiful User Interface

* Clear and above average pNegative Views:s Video outdoors

* Gorgeous design

* Sharp OLED screen

Negative Views:

* Lack of signal strength

* User interface limitations when sending messages

* Slow operating system; Windows Mobile should have been used

* Motion/Accelerometer needs to be tweaked and reconfigured

* Slow widgets when phone is starting up

* No automatic sending of messages when items are placed in the Outbox

* Battery doesn?t lastConclusionmes widgets don?t respond

* Video is poor in low-light conditions

Conclusion

I?ll be honest with you. I am more of a Nokia fan as I have already used three of their cellphones starting from the Nokia 6610, Nokia 6288 and now the Nokia E51. My tasks revolve business activities, thus, I wouldn?t recommend the Samsung Jet for those who need a fast, robust and versatile phone. Remember time is money and the Samsung JET is wasting my time.

Moreover, you could get a better phone with the price (P20,000) of the Samsung JET. This is a multimedia phone aimed at individuals who prefer fancy user interfaces, sleek designs and aesthetics. If you?re a Mac fan or just want to be in the ?latest trend? group, go for the Samsung Jet. Otherwise, stay clear from the Samsung JET. It?s nThis review can also be found on my blog"http://www.mangochico.com/samsung-jet-s8003-review/"]This review can also be found on my blog[/url]

[Silencer]

Any comments from the world out there? ;)

[Shaun N.]

Very nice review! Long and detailed.

Good job.

[peacemf]

how about java apps? do they work properly?

on the LG arena, which is also a touchscreen phone, it causes problems.

As you dont get the inbuilt keyboard coming up, instead you just get a ROW of numbers (arranged from left to right), so you need to figure out which number represents which letter (like a normal phone), and this naturally causes problems when using say a dictionary :s

[sibot]

Great review!

My friend recently bought Samsung Omnia and he's pretty happy with it.