Adobe is currently developing Photoshop CS5, which is expected to be released in mid-2010. Few videos were posted by the development team showcasing what lies ahead on facebook. Adobe photoshop CS5 is poised to feature new brushes which include three dimensional brushes, better masking, enhanced detection of objects and few others. Adobe CS5 is expected to make strong use of CUDA technology on Nvidia graphics cards.

Continue reading “Adobe Photoshop CS5 – First Impressions” »

A significant jump up from 5-megapixel camera phones, Sony Ericsson’s latest beast boasts a whopping 8.1-megapixel sensor. The C905 also throws in face detection, image stabilisation and a dual flash (Xenon and LED) in a bid to become the king of camera phones. Continue reading “Sony Ericsson C905 Review” »

Tablet PCs garnered the majority of headlines in 2010, and Micro Star International (MSI) decided to start the year by launching the U130, U135 and U160, its first models based on Intel’s Pine Trail platform. However, the end of the decade saw people fall out of love with the netbook form factor that had revitalised sales for a number of OEMs and brought others into the public consciousness. Netbooks were introduced to serve a simple purpose, but were being edged towards machines that could do it all, both in terms of physical characteristics and price. MSI seems to have gone back to basics with the Wind U135, using a redesigned chassis to accommodate the new silicon from Intel. The Pine Trail platform was Intel’s Centrino-like solution for netbooks, moving the memory controller and graphics into the processor package. One of the well-documented problems with the Diamondville platform was the use of the power-hungry 945GC/GSE chipset. Continue reading “MSI Wind U135 netbook Review” »

Samsung , with its Omnia i900: a Windows Mobile smartphone with an excellent user interface and a bevy of features is looking to take some mighty smartphones down to fight arnea. The Omnia is certainly a fashion statement. The handset is finished in a metallic, mirror-style surface on the front, and the rear contrasts nicely thanks to matte black plastic. However, the surface is prone to scratches and marks; after a few days’ use our review unit looked as though it was already a few months old. While the iPhone 3G’s edges are easily scratched, the screen certainly isn’t and this is where the Omnia lets itself down.

The Omnia is controlled largely via a finger-operated touch screen, but Samsung has also included a number of other buttons. Answer and end call keys, menu button, volume controls and a camera key are all present. An unusual feature is a finger mouse: this small square acts as a mouse when you drag your finger across it and even brings up a mouse cursor on the screen when it’s activated in the settings. We preferred to have this turned off, though, as sliding your finger across or up/down means it acts as touch-sensitive navigational pad.

Key features:
Quad-band GSM support
3G with HSDPA 7.2 Mbps
Windows Mobile 6.1 Professional OS
624MHz Marvell PXA312 CPU and 128 MB RAM
3.2″ 65K-color touchscreen with resolution of 240 x 400 pixels
5 megapixel autofocus camera with wide dynamic range mode, face tracking, smile detection, geotagging
8 to 16 GB of storage memory, microSD expansion
Built-in GPS receiver with A-GPS
Wi-Fi
Stereo Bluetooth and USB connectivity
FM radio with RDS
Optical joystick with virtual mouse functionality
Built-in accelerometer for auto screen rotation and call muting
TV-out
Solid build and great finish
Slick design and slim body
Nice battery life
Fast response and performance
Excellent thumb-optimized software package
Thumbable virtual QWERTY keyboard with optional landscape mode
TouchWiz UI
DivX video support right out of the box
Above average audio quality
Headset comes with a 3.5mm audio jack

Samsung certainly deserve plaudits for the interface. While this is a Windows Mobile phone, it’s been skinned with a far more user-friendly system, dubbed TouchWIZ. This displays a line of widgets on the left edge of the home screen, and you simply press and drag icons from the panel to the main area to use that particular program or function. Additionally, the main menu consists of a 4×3 grid of labelled, colourful icons; there is also a fully customisable shortcut menu, which allows you to add your most frequently used applications. When configured and tailored to your needs, you shouldn’t need to use the regular Windows Start menu very often — a godsend considering the frustrating nature of the regular Windows Mobile interface.

Samsung i900 Omnia is equipped with a large 3.2″ 65K-color display with a resolution of 240 x 400 pixels. As with most PocketPCs, picture quality isn’t really impressive. Not that it is too bad either but we’ve seen Samsung do much better on their feature phones.

The display resolution can also be considered somewhat of a problem at times. Wide QVGA might be great for watching widescreen movies, web browsing and viewing photos but it does bring up some compatibility issues. For example, we had quite a hard time starting the iGO 2008 navigation software on the Omnia. We guess similar issues will arise with other applications too.

In terms of sunlight legibility, Samsung i900 Omnia is also far from its prime. It’s really hard to see anything on the display outdoors on a sunny day, and finding a proper angle for working with the phone is near impossible. This has a particularly negative effect on photography, as you can hardly see the viewfinder at times.
Despite Samsung’s efforts, there is certainly plenty more work to do. You are often left trying to press ridiculously small icons and buttons that were designed for a stylus. In addition, the widget system can’t be customised and it’s often troublesome to identify which widget relates to each program without making it active. Interestingly, Samsung does include a stylus in the package, but there is no place to store it on the actual handset. Instead it dangles annoyingly on the left side when attached. The general speed of the handset could also be improved; it’s reasonable considering this is a Windows Mobile handset, but it’s still slower than plenty of other smartphones with similar specifications.

A step further takes you down to Windows Mobile

Once you get past the Home screen and all the finger sweeps, all you are left with is the good old Windows Mobile. Stress here is definitely on “old”, much less so on “good”.

Samsung however have made some efforts in remedying its usability too. Some of the most used system settings, contacts management, and the messaging department have all benefited, as well as the image and web browsing.

The Start menu • viewing the standard Programs and Settings menus on Samsung Omnia

Samsung have decided to extend the touch interface to some of the Windows Mobile system settings. The options of the standard OS are usually displayed with a minute font and small checkboxes or sliders that are not really comfortable to set unless you pick up the stylus.

The Samsung Omnia Home screen gives access to the Wireless manager allowing users to turn connectivity options on and off, such as Wi-Fi or Bluetooth. You can also turn on the “Flight” and “Vibrate only” modes from here.

You further have the option to toggle the auto screen rotation and the mouse pointer on and off. The USB connectivity mode (Active Sync or Mass Storage) is also configurable from the Settings tab on the Home screen. The last thing that you can toggle on and off here is the the camera LED mode, which doubles as a flashlight.

The Phone application of the Samsung i900 Omnia offers a large dial pad but probably its most useful feature is the Smart dialing. With Smart dialing you hardly ever need to go to the Contacts list in order to dial a number – just start typing a name or a number and you get all the matching entries from both the contacts list and the calls log.

Samsung have gone so far in replicating a regular phone’s dial pad, that even a long press on the # key starts the “Vibrate only” silent ringing profile.

Text messaging is a frustrating affair. While
the on-screen keyboard has been given a facelift from the standard Windows Mobile keyboard, the touch screen isn’t as responsive as we’d have liked. We often had to resort to pressing multiple times, as well as pressing much more firmly than is usually required, in order to type efficiently.

Samsung seems to have taken inspiration from Nokia’s N-Series and thrown everything bar the kitchen sink into the Omnia. In addition to providing all the features and benefits of Windows Mobile 6.1, this unit is HSDPA capable, and features a 5-megapixel camera with LED flash, Wi-Fi, Bluetooth, and a built-in GPS receiver, and it comes with 8GB of internal memory as well as a microSD card slot (annoyingly located behind the rear cover). Unfortunately, the 16GB model is yet to hit our shores and Samsung couldn’t comment on its availability.

The Samsung Omnia is the first DivX certified Windows Mobile device, so you get DivX playback straight out of the box on the same Touch Player that is used for music playback. Now there’s some confusion roaming around that the Omnia has XviD support too, but we’ve played with a total of four different units – each at different stage of developement and XviD support was not present on any of them.

For a wider range of supported video formats however, you should pick a third-party solution. We opted for the popular commercial Core player, since the free TCPMP player didn’t run, probably due to some incompatibilities with Windows Mobile 6.1.

Samsung i900 Omnia turned out pretty good at near VGA-res XviD video playback – we played a DVD rip intended for desktop PC playback and luckily there were no skipped frames.

Furthermore, the Samsung Omnia has a widescreen display that is generally better at widescreen videos and with a slight zooming in, you get almost fullscreen playback.
FM radio is superb

The Omnia sports a built-in FM radio and it naturally requires the headset to be plugged-in.

The FM radio has an excellent interface, much like the rest of the multimedia players aboard, and is highly touch optimized. And it’s packed with pretty much every feature you would need.

There are two separate lists for stored stations – they can both store unlimited number of stations. You can also place shortcuts to six favorite radio stations on the main screen.

The Radio player can run in the background, automatically pausing during calls, and broadcasts can be easily recorded with rather acceptable audio quality at 128kbps and 44000 kH

Samsung i900 Omnia CPU is clocked at 624Mhz and it indeed pays off. The Omnia fares superbly against most of our software benchmarks and the system response is great.

Probably the most pitched feature of the i900 Omnia is its touch-optimized interface. And indeed we welcomed most of the changes and custom solutions introduced by Samsung. Although this is their first attempt at custom Windows Mobile interfaces, they have a lot of experience with full Touch UI handsets, which was obviously put to use.

Beside the thumbable interface, the Omnia offers massive embedded storage clearly stating its multimedia orientation. The iPhone was among the first devices to pack 4GB, 8GB and 16GB of onboard memory in a similar fashion to the popular Apple iPods. Windows Mobile devices are now obviously taking up and the Samsung i900 Omnia has two versions – one with 8GB, and another with 16GB worth of storage.

Windows Mobile cameraphone, now that’s a firstThe Samsung i900 Omnia packs a really nice 5 megapixel camera, which produces images with a maximum resolution of 2592 x 1944 pixels. It comes equipped with autofocus, digital image stabilizer, face recognition, smile detection, and geotagging courtesy of the built-in GPS receiver. The LED flash next to the camera lens completes the tally.
The Omnia camera shoots in landscape mode and makes use of the dedicated camera key. It’s got an intuitive user interface that makes changing settings on-the-go a breeze.

As we already pointed out, the Samsung i910 Omnia is a really capable cameraphone. It produces crisp and tack sharp images with balanced processing and precise colors. The Omnia is probably the first PocketPC we’ve seen to produce impressive camera samples and we think it’s safe to assume it’s got the best camera among PocketPCs out there.

We’ve had our share of pre-release Omnias and we saw improvement in image quality each time – especially in color rendering. Otherwise, resolution and detail have been consistently high with each unit – those can easily rival the Nokia N95 8GB.

We now finally have a retail unit in our hands but the camera performance is still not perfect. Some of our images seem to have some sort of tint or reduced contrast – especially those taken with some of the preset shooting modes.

We guess all these minor glitches should be fixed by a software update later on. For now, image quality is not perfect in all shots but it shows potential that’s not to be overlooked.
Since the Omnia display has a different aspect ratio than its camera sensor, the viewfinder doesn’t take up the whole screen estate. Thus it easily fits two columns of controls on the left and right side of the viewfinder. You can of course opt for a fullscreen viewfinder, but this would crop the live feed from the sensor to fit the display. The resulting images however have standard resolution and don’t come out cropped.

And finally, the built-in GPS receiver allows the i900 Omnia to make a nice in-car/walk-around GPS navigation unit, provided you install some software for the purpose.

So overall, with the Samsung i900 Omnia we are looking at a really nice package – full of goodies for both the high-tech and the style-conscious customers but we are yet to see how it delivers on all those fronts.

Frustratingly, the Omnia’s multimedia support is let down by Samsung’s decision to use a proprietary charger/headphone port, rather than a separate 3.5mm jack. Thankfully, an adapter is included in the sales package that allows you to use standard headphones, but the single port means you can’t charge and listen to music simultaneously.

Loaded with connectivity goodies
PocketPCs are usually known for offering great connectivity options and the Samsung i900 Omnia makes no exception – HSDPA 7.2Mpbs, Wi-Fi and stereo Bluetooth 2.0 + EDR are all on board.

Currently targeting Europe/Asia, the Omnia has quad-band GSM and HSDPA 2100 MHz support. But with eyes set on the American market, there will be a localized (American 3G) version of the handset with 850/1900MHz HSDPA support.

USB 2.0 support is also present of course, but the Samsung Omnia loses a point in its implementation for several reasons:

Also present is DLNA (Digital Living Network Alliance) compatibility. A feature that should be standard on all Samsung devices in the near future, devices equipped with this standard can network to other products, such as televisions. Samsung has demonstrated the Omnia connecting to its latest Series 9 television, allowing the handset stream multimedia to the TV wirelessly. Nokia, Motorola, Sony Ericsson and LG are other phone manufacturers that are members of the DLNA alliance.

Sales package:
Handset
Battery (BL-4U)
Charger (AC-5)
USB data cable (CA-101)
Wired stereo-headset (HS-47)
Wrist strap
Carrying case
User Guide, Software CD
2Gb microSD memory card (size may vary by market)

The E66 measures up at 107.5×49.5×13.6 mm and tips our scales at 121 grams. There are two color options available – black or white, although in either edition you’ll get a light-colored battery compartment cover, but with different patterns.

Boasting the same features as the E71 minus the QWERTY keyboard, Nokia’s E66 is aimed at users who aren’t hell-bent on large amounts of text entry. This stylish E-Series handset has the same internal characteristics as its big brother in a smaller, more pocketable form factor.

Like the E71, the E66 is one of the more stylish smartphones to hit the market. It features the same gloss metal finish as its larger counterpart but does away with the QWERTY keyboard in favour of a regular numerical keypad. Particularly impressive is the chrome rear cover, despite its tendency to attract plenty of fingerprints. Although the E66 oozes style, its build quality is somewhat questionable — the top half of the slider in our review unit didn’t feel as sturdy as we expected.

For those who lament the extra real estate that keyboards occupy, the well-designed keypad of the E66 will certainly be appreciated. Tactile feedback is excellent and the layout is simple yet effective. Unlike the E71 the keys aren’t spongy, generating a firm clicking sound when pressed. The shortcut keys — home, calendar, contacts, mail and delete — are a welcome addition, and the five-way navigational pad, selection buttons and call keys combine to create a pleasant user experience. When in standby mode, all keys except the answer and end call buttons are invisible; they only light up when the screen is active.

The E66 utilizes a 2.36-inch QVGA display (320×240 pixels, 48x36mm), capable of up to 16 million colors. It manages to output a pretty decent picture quality-wise that remains readable in various environments (it doesn’t fade away in the sun at that, all thanks to the mirror underlayer).

On balance, the E66 packs in a likable display and we are pretty much content with it. It can accommodate up to 8 text and 3 service lines (with some modes allowing for up to 14 text lines).

The display is a reasonable size considering the style of the handset, but it’s perhaps a little smaller than the screens of other smartphones. This really isn’t much of an issue as the display is excellent for almost all uses, including displaying videos and photos.

The E66 runs on the popular Symbian S60 platform, so it includes most features synonymous with smartphones. Among these are the ability to read and edit Word, PowerPoint and Excel documents and access PDF files. One of the best features of this handset is its speed — an impressive attribute that we’ve noticed in many of the latest Symbian devices. Applications open and close in a flash and despite running multiple programs we didn’t experience any lag. The default menu interface isn’t as visually appealing as other handsets, but a wealth of Symbian themes can be downloaded to smarten it up.

Enterprise users will surely appreciate the E66′s Intranet application, which comprises the settings of VPN-client. As far as office tools go, the E66 is no revolution – it has had its mail client improved, the phonebook has been tweaked here and there too, along with some other applications. Microsoft Office documents are still handled by QuickOffice, which is a pity (although many will be content with what it has to offer). Also there is a ZIP archiver and PDF reading tool. The Search 4.0 app can be linked directly on the main screen.

The E66 is the first Eseries-branded device ever to boast the Mode functionality. In a nutshell, it’s a mobile version of the latest PC craze – virtual desktops. That is, you make up a couple of screens, where various themes, pictures, applications, plug-ins and other essentials are housed/used. And then you can swap between them in one touch, so that it’s always easy to jump between your setup for work with mail and notifications brought up on the main screen and the home setup with a different theme applied (without your company’s logo or colors) and player controls lined up on the screen instead of email notifications. It takes the E66 around 6-7 seconds to jump between modes.

The major update to this department is the new version of Nokia Maps. Also, we would like to note that the application has become even speedier, the cold start time makes around 4-5 minutes, and we felt that the gears were spinning faster, so to speak. To my mind, the E66 is a tidy navigation-savvy solution, it does the job hands down. But, unfortunately, as far as battery life goes, the E66 doesn’t improve over the predecessors.

The handset utilizes a 1000 mAh Li-Pol battery (BL-4U), as opposed to the Nokia E71′s 1500 mAh cell. The E66 is rated for 7.5 hours of talk time (GSM) and 264 hours of standby. Music time – up to 14 hours.

The device comes equipped with 128 Mb of RAM, after first launch you will get around 70 Mb of free memory at your disposal, which is enough for running a dozen applications and browsing “heavy” web-pages – the word “slow-down” is definitely not in the E66′s vocabulary.

The user almost has 110 Mb of storage available, where any data can be stored.

The E66 deals with microSD memory cards (hot-swappable), the phone comes packaged with a 2Gb unit.

In terms of features, the E66 should satisfy even the most demanding user. In addition to HSDPA connectivity, Wi-Fi and Bluetooth with the A2DP profile are available. The handset works with Microsoft Exchange Server as well as e-mail accounts like Gmail and Yahoo! Mail. Setting up an e-mail account is easy; entering your name and password automatically searches for the settings required, and we were up and running in just a couple of minutes. The E66 also includes a GPS receiver along with the Nokia Maps application.

Wi-Fi. This handset comes armed with Wi-Fi (IEEE 802.11 g) support. All security standar

ds are supported, including WEP , WPA , WPA 2, with other advanced settings available. Unlike the NSeries, the E66 doesn’t support Universal PnP (UPnP). Although, it boasts the WiFi Wizard, which can search and tap into available networks in background mode.

Bluetooth. The phone comes with Bluetooth v2.0, with support for EDR. The following profiles are supported:
A2DP
AVCRP
BIP-ImagePush
DUN-GW
FT-Server
HandsFree-AG (1.0)
Headset-AG
OBEX
OPP-Client
OPP-Server
SIM Access-Server

The ESeries devices have always been worlds apart from other S60-powered devices in the way of software. Some apps and options that were tested on these phones in the first place are now becoming par for the course in the rest of the company’s portfolio, but some still remain the trademark features of the ESeries. A great feature is the ability to switch between business and personal modes. You can edit a number of settings, including enabled applications, notifications and themes. You can then toggle between the two modes — for example you could block access to your work e-mail while using the personal mode.The desktop mode has been revamped a little – now at the bottom there are three icons standing for missed calls, messages and voice mail. If there are no events at hand, the corresponding icon will vanish. Clicking on each thumbnail will make a pop-up with extra information appear on the screen.

Thanks to its, beefed up memory and a faster CPU (ARM11 running at 369 Mhz, against the E61i’s ARM9 and its 220 Mhz), the E66′s performance has almost doubled compared to the E61i. You can literally soar through all applications and menusm also the handset can have more applications running in the background at a time.

The E66 is a fair but not great device for multimedia. It has a 2.5mm headphone jack, but you’ll need to purchase an adapter in order to use a standard pair of headphones.The E66 utilizes a 3.2 Mpix CMOS camera with auto-focus. I shall say that the quality you get with the E66 is what you’d expect from this type of camera- it is fairly decent for a business-minded phone, but can’t stand comparison to today’s imaging-savvy solutions. The 3.2-megapixel camera with flash and autofocus is handy and you can save your photos to the 2GB microSD card included in the sales package.

You can go for one of the following resolutions:
Print 3M – Large
Print 2M – Large
Print/e-mail 1M – Small
Multimedia message 0.3M

The maker doesn’t provide the real image resolutions, so we take this duty in our own hands. The following resolutions are utilized in the abovementioned modes: 2048×1536, 1600×1200, 1024×768, 640×480 pixels. The picture size averages 1 Mb, 600-700 Kb, 250-300 Kb and 75-100 Kb respectively. You can’t adjust the picture quality settings with the E66.

The handset utilizes the digital zoom feature topping out at x20, moreover, there are “normal” and “enhanced” zoom – the latter allows reaching the maximum magnification, yet some artifacts slip into your pictures. When using the standard digital zoom, though, these artifacts are not all that discernible. And since you can perform just the same zoom-in in any graphics editor, using it while shooting is probably not the best idea.

For Web browsing, the Nokia browser conveniently supports flash. Navigation, despite the lack of a touch screen, is excellent. We managed to browse sites like YouTube without any major issues.

Let me tell you one thing no browser comes close to Nokia’s browser due to the various standards it supports, except for may be opera mobile, Iphone safari does’nt support flash and other few standards though the experience is fine.

Some consumers may actually face the dilemma which phone to go for – the Nokia E66 or E71. And this is especially true in view of their identically hefty price tags and same functionality. In my opinion if you aren’t sweet on emails and messaging and generally don’t need a full-featured thumbboard, then the E66 is the way to go – its rotating screen will give you the same level of comfort when viewing photos and videos anyway.

Audio & Speakers
Number of speakers – 1

Data Services – Messaging Capabilities,Email, SMS, MMS

Data Services
GSM, GPRS, WAP, EDGE, 3G, UMTS, HSDPA

Video capture
Yes

Digital Camera Effects – Normal, sepia, black & white, negative
Camera Resolution – 3.2 MP

Other Camera Features
CMOS sensor, autofocus, LED flash, Flash modes: On, off, automatic, red-eye reduction, Flash operating range: 1 m, White balance modes: automatic, sunny, incandescent, fluorescent, Centre weighted auto exposure; exposure compensation: +2 ~ -2EV at 0.7 step, Capture modes: still, sequence, self-timer, video, Scene modes: automatic, user defined, portrait, landscape, night, night portrait, Full-screen viewfinder with grid, Active toolbar, Dedicated camera key, Landscape (horizontal) orientation, Share photos with Share on Ovi

Digital Video
Digital video format – MPEG
Video resolutions – 128×96, 640×480

General
Available Colours – Black, Silver
Length (mm) – 49.5
Width (mm) – 13.6
Height (mm) – 107.5
Weight (g) – 121

Input Devices
Input Devices
5-way Navigation, Buttons

Main Display (Internal)
Display Technology – QVGA
Colour Support – 16.7M Colours
Screen size – 2.4 in
Screen Resolution – 240×320

Multimedia Features – Ringtones Type, Digitised Audio

Inbuilt Camera – Yes

Built-in Microphone ( Mobile ) – Yes

MP3 Player – Yes
Voice Recorder – Yes
Picture Viewer – Yes
Video Player – Yes
Speakerphone – Yes
Keypad lock – Yes
Profiles – Yes
Predictive text input – Yes
GPS – Yes
Handwriting Recognition – No
Modem – Yes
Vibrating Alert – Yes
Java enabled – Yes
Video calling – Yes
Organiser – Yes
Stopwatch – Yes
Alarm clock – Yes
Calculator – Yes
Calendar – Yes
Phonebook – Yes
Games – Yes
Cradle – No
Case – No
Headphones – Yes
FM tuner – Yes
Video Recorder – Yes
Text Viewer – Yes
Mass Storage – Yes
Antenna – Internal
A2DP (Advanced Audio Distribution Profile) – Yes
Phones
Form Factor – Slide
Talk Time (minutes) – 450
Standby Time (hours) – 264

Power Options
Battery Type
Rechargeable – (Li-Ion)

Software
Operating Systems – Symbian (Series 60)V3
Supported Audio File Formats – AMR NB, AAC+, AMR WB, AAC, MP3
Supported Video File Formats – MPEG-4, 3GP
Supported Picture File Formats – JPEG

Wired Connections – Wired Terminals / Ports
Headphone Jack – Number of Headphone Jack Ports 1 (2.5mm)

Wireless Connections
Wireless technology supported – WLAN 802.11 b/g, Bluetooth 2.0, HSDPA/UMTS: Tri-band 850, 1900, 2100MHz, Infrared