Considering Purchasing A Smartphone
Don’t buy until you have read our reviews of the best on the market – Oct 2008
9/10
BlackBerry Bold 9000
From £590, or Free with contract
The most advanced BlackBerry available with fast internet access, satnav and s stunningly bright and clear screen. It has an easy to use keyboard, making it the best pocket emailer on the market.
Contact: - www.blackberry.com
9/10
Apple iPhone 3G
From £350 pay-as-you-go, or Free with contract (O2)
This handset offers the best of the excellent iPod music player combined with superb mobile web technology. A beautiful handset with a huge screen. However it loses a mark for basic satnav and reportedly poor reception.
Contact: - www.apple.com/uk
9/10
Nokia Capsule N96
From £535, or Free with contract
Although this handset does not have a touch screen it beats its rivals in the camera stakes, with a great 5MP camera with flash. Other features include BBC iPlayer TV downloads and a good built in satnav. 16GB of memory ensures that there is plenty of space to store music and videos.
Contact: - www.nokia.co.uk
8/10
Nokia E71
From £330, or Free with contract
A rival to the BlackBerry the Nokia E71 is a stylish and slim qwerty keyboard phone and is packed with features, such as W-Fi, HSDPA web browsing and push email, plus satnav and an integrated 3MP camera with flash.
Contact: - www.nokia.co.uk
7/10
BlackBerry Curve 8320
£305, or Free with contract
Smaller than the Bold (see our 9/10 top pick above) but still manages to boast a full qwerty keyboard, plus satnav, Wi-Fi browsing and a great email service. However, this handset loses points for only offering a 2MP integrated camera.
Contact: - www.blackberry.com
7/10
Palm Treo Pro
£400, or Free on contract
Combines a full qwerty keyboard with a small touch screen and Windows Mobile software. Has a built in satnav but as with the BlackBerry Curve 8320 this handset loses points for only offering a 2MP camera.
6/10
BlackBerry Pearl 8120
£290, or Free with contract
This handset does not offer a qwerty keyboard, but instead offers a keyboard, which features two letters per key. This takes some time to master. The handset also loses points for offering just a 1.3MP camera, which is low res. The lack of HSDPA makes web browsing a chore.
Contact: - www.blackberry.com
6/10
Nokia E66
£328, or Free with contract
This is a sliding handset, which uses the same software as the Nokia N96 handset. It offers great web browsing, push email, satnav and a 3MP camera that flips the screen from portrait to landscape.
Contact: - www.nokia.co.uk
6/10
Samsung F480 Tocco
From £290, or Free with contract
Like the iPhone this handset offers a touch screen, but lacks the power of the Apple. The Wi-Fi lacks internal memory and to store any quantity of music or videos a separate memory card will be required.
Contact: - www.samsungmobile.com
6/10
HTC Touch Diamond
£430, or Free with contract
On the face of things this handset looks like a superb rival to the iPhone and offers a superb high-res touch screen. However, this phone loses points because once you try anything beyond making a call you are dumped into the Windows Mobile software, which requires a stylus, hence making the handset fiddly to use.
Contact: - www.htc.com/uk
5/10
Toshiba Portege G810
£350
This handset offers a touch screen, decent satnav and a surprisingly good 3MP camera. However, it has a finger unfriendly typing system thanks to its badly designed stylus on a tiny keyboard.
Contact: - www.toshiba.co.uk
4/10
Motorola Z10
From £260, or Free with contract
This phone lacks the quality of the other models, but none make it as easy to edit and upload videos onto YouTube as the Motorola Z10. There is no push email or Wi-Fi, but you can still access basic email or browse the web using HSDPA. This phone should be bought by video lovers.
Contact: - www.motorola.co.uk
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