Feb 06, 2006 09:02 PM
3836 Views
(Updated Feb 06, 2006 09:17 PM)
O2 Mini Black – limited edition is a beautiful gizmo, if you please. It comes with the full suite of Microsoft applications, a free 256 MB SD memory stick and 1.3 MP camera. It’s a GSM Tri - band GSM / GPRS phone. This phone as been with me for over 2 months now and it is perhaps the right time to write about it after having experienced it.
Looks:
Very neat, trendy with powder-coated finish. The limited edition black looks better than the original silver-colored version. It has an integrated phone-active indicator LED at the top and volume control, camera and voice-recorder button on the left-hand-side. Right side of the phone houses the power-on & stand-by button (one button for both).
Tech – Specs:
You can see the site “ http://www.seeo2.com/product/XdaIImini/template/XdaIIminiProductInfo.vm” for details; however quick details – Windows Mobile 2003 Pocket PC 2nd edition. It runs on Intel PXA 272 CPU (416 MHz). RAM is 64 MB. 64k colors make it quite a nice thing to see pictures and video. Touch screen is helpful, but using a stylus is better as it gets difficult to use if your fingers are big!
Audio:
It’s nice to hear; however, one wishes that the speakers were louder. If you are in traffic or in the open with noises around, you will end up seeing missed calls later even if you have enabled the vibrator option.
Ring tones are not compatible with MP3, though MP3s can be played well with the media player. Ring tones have to be either WMA or Midi tones.
With headphones, music sounds terrific; however, they could have done better on the headphones - they don't fit in well and your ears start paining after some time not because of the sound, but because of the ungainly design of the earplugs of the headphone. Wish they had a jack for regular headphones - one could then use a headphone of his/her choice instead of what it shipped with!
Video:
Pretty good, but doesn’t support some versions of video that MS media player doesn’t.
Battery:
Great, especially on long journeys as it doesn’t consume too much battery while you play music. An hour of usage brings the battery levels to about 45% from 100%. Of course, if you play video, it will drain as it needs to keep the LCD screen glowing!
Normal usage of the phone (around 1 hr on phone a day) will use around 50-55% of the battery. I normally charge once in 2 days as I spend around ½ hr per day on phone but use the phone more for its Outlook feature like calendar (big one!), tasks and contacts.
Limitations:
Two-hands phone – if you are used to a single-hand phone and upgrade to O2, be prepared to start using both your hands. You need to shift in your approach from a phone to a PDA-phone. This device is not designed to be a phone; but a Pocket PC first and THEN, a phone.
Save to memory – this is a big one. I still haven’t been able to figure out if one can save data directly in to the SD Card memory using ActiveSync. I have found a work-around by which one can save it. You do this by choosing ‘Mobile Device’ from your computer after connecting via the USB cable and explore it to find ‘Storage Card’ and then choose the destination folder.
Deleting media files used – you have to first open some other media file using the player before you attempt to delete
Background pictures – if the picture size is larger (excess of 40 kb approx) and you choose it as wallpaper, O2 won’t confirm if it has used the picture as the wallpaper. Further, when such a thing happens, no other picture will be displayed in the picture-viewer. You need to reset the system and then attempt to view pictures.
Freeze – I have heard from many other users that this phone freezes often; I have personally not experienced much, though. However, if you open too many applications, it might – don’t forget, it is just a 416 MHz processor and not a 3 GHz processor designed for multi-tasking & multi-threading!
Screen-alignment – another complaint I have heard but yet to experience (hope not to) is that one has to keep doing screen alignment every other day. I haven’t had the necessity to do so in months.
The belt-clip is flimsy for a phone of this caliber – it broke after I dashed (mildly) to a workstation in my office. Thankfully, nothing happened to the phone.
Wish the phone had come with a rubberized column to protect it from shocks. Imagine the O2 falling down (unlike a rugged Nokia). Disaster!!!!
Should have had wireless for this kind of cost (but the next generation of O2, the Atom has it).
No FM Radio :((
Pricing:
Feel it can be lower, with the market price at Rs.29000. However, you can get a discount and if you know a distributor, it can fall a couple of thousands low ;)
Verdict:
If you are a gizmo freak, love to use a device that lets you sync Outlook and are constantly on the move, this is THE PDA phone for you. Else, go for a pure-play phone (a Nokia or Sony Ericsson) that lets you use just one hand and gives you the comfort of time-tested user-friendliness!
