Reader’s verdict - Smartphones

Our subject this month seeks blissful convergence. In order to keep in control of all his meetings and deadlines, he’s currently lugging around three separate handsets. Liam hasn’t yet found one device to rule them all; he relies on PDA functionality to organise his business, but he also wants a great music player and a highquality camera. Currently filling his pockets is an O2 XDA Mini S Pocket PC, a Sony Walkman camera phone and a Blackberry that he owns because... well... everyone at work has one.

We were concerned about where he finds room in his trousers for his wallet and keys, so we presented him with three of our favourite smartphones, in the hope that he’d discover his ideal device once and for all. Here are the results.

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Rim Blackberry Pearl

Liam loved the new Blackberry’s size, commenting that it looked a lot more like a phone than his current model, though he wasn’t too sure about the qwerty-style keypad. The handset takes its name from the white trackball in the middle, the sensitivity of which quickly became Liam’s favourite feature.

£314; free on £25 Vodafone contract | www.blackberrypearl.co.uk

Once he’d finished battling with predictive text, Liam was able to quickly and simply enter a meeting into the diary – though for a Blackberry, you wouldn’t expect anything less. When he logged into his Windows Live Mail account, however, the Blackberry’s web browser presented a blank screen, unable to cope with the complex scripting. The BBC’s mobile video headlines also failed to play, which he put down to the 8100’s lack of 3G technology.

Liam tried to synch his music collection via USB, but while Media Player copied a smattering of Windows Media Audio files to the internal drive, the Blackberry had no idea how to handle them. The final blow came when he took a photo using the one-megapixel camera, resulting in a rather noisy, blurred mess. Verdict: not impressed.

Sony Ericsson M600i

Liam’s first complaint was about this device’s flimsy stylus, but he soon found that he was able to do just about everything without it. And though the device felt comfortable in his hand, he thought that it was a bit large for a mobile phone.

£284; free on £35 Orange contract | www.sonyericsson.co.uk

His main gripe was with the Symbian operating system, though. He got frustrated by the sluggish navigation, with menus taking a few seconds to respond or catch up. He also complained about the number of text-only lists of options, and the lack of ‘visual cues’.

Liam got on well with the M600i’s keypad, with predictive text helping to finish words off fluidly. Web browsing was also very fast, thanks to the set’s 3G capabilities, and this time he had no problem in accessing his Windows Live Mail and playing the BBC’s headlines.

Again, though, it was the camera that let this handset down – not the poor quality this time, but the total absence of one. We were beginning to feel like we had our work cut out. Verdict: where’s the camera?

HTC Mteor

Liam liked what he saw of this Windows Mobile. He remarked on the silky finish, describing the size as ‘perfect’ and the keypad as ‘beautifully tactile’. “This doesn’t feel like it’s missing a qwerty keyboard,” he said. “Text prediction is so good, you can write just as quickly as with the Sony.”

£324.99; not yet available with contract | www.europe.htc.com/products/htcmteor.html

Liam navigated the icon-driven menus effortlessly, noting that the Start button in the bottom corner was a welcome sight.

He also liked how the Contacts button changed to a Call History button on missing a call. Despite it being 3G, the phone dawdled when browsing the web – though unlike the others, it was at least detected as a phone, with Hotmail Mobile loading in place of the full site.

The camera wasn’t much of an improvement on the Blackberry’s, but did handle the evening sun well. Liam was most impressed with the Windows Media Player synchronisation, with not only his entire music library but also the full cover art being transferred within seconds and displayed on screen. Verdict: a good all-rounder.

And our reader’s final verdict is...

HTC Mteor. Liam’s all-or-nothing approach revealed one obvious champion. “The MTeoR wins every way it counts, for me – style, text input, music and interface design,” he coos. “I’ll probably wait and see what HTC has up its sleeve next – I’d like one of these, but the only thing that’s made me think twice is the lack of a two or three megapixel camera. Still, the HTC MteoR is the closest to perfection of any device I’ve seen for a while.”

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