Tracking someone’s location using GPS technology is often regarded as sneaky or underhand, but what if you’re simply a paranoid protective parent craving the security of knowing your child’s whereabouts – day or night?
Intensive care: Race Telcom’s WiGoMo One and GPS beacon
Manufacturer Race Telecom aims to allay that fear with WiGoMo – a child-friendly handset-cum-tracker that relays its coordinates over GPS to an online parental portal where guardians can monitor the phone’s movements on an atlas akin to Google Maps.
The portal also gives parents remote access to the WiGoMo, allowing them to stop incoming and outgoing calls at specific times such as school hours, plus the option to switch off the phone’s 2.2Mp rear-mounted Camera.
To do all this, the WiGoMo comes with an external GPS beacon – roughly the size of a 10p coin and attaches to the phone with a mini coaxial connector. First, register the phone with the WiGoMo site to access the portal. From here you can define the location report frequency for every 15, 30, 60 or 180 minutes. Read the rest of this entry »
Samsung’s Galaxy Portal is the Korean firm’s latest dip into Android waters and for now it’s exclusive to T-Mobile. It’s been available in Europe since last year as the Galaxy Spica but, unlike most Samsung smartphones, this is pure Android. There isn’t the slightest hint of Samsung’s TouchWiz interface, so it’s effectively a clean slate, to do with as you will. In terms of features, it’s an avowedly midrange quad band handset, with a LCD touch screen, 3.2Mp Camera, Wi-Fi and AGPS.
T-Mobile UK exclusive: Samsung’s Galaxy Portal i5700
Glossy black and slim at 115 x 57 x 13mm and 124g, the Galaxy Portal is standard Samsung touchscreen fare. Beneath the screen Samsung has crammed in no less than seven buttons in a not terribly tidy configuration: menu and back, plus call start and stop surrounding a diamond-shaped navpad, with additional buttons for home and the web nudging in at the sides.
The web button seems a bit superfluous, since you can easily access the same function from the screen, but the home button proved invaluable, since the call stop key doesn’t double up as a home key, as you might expect. Around the sides are a volume rocker and Camera shutter button. Read the rest of this entry »
Review Samsung clearly has high hopes for its latest round of Windows Mobile-powered Omnia smartphones. The Omnia II was a significant improvement over last year’s original, due in no small part to Windows Mobile 6.5, which offers a big leap in usability over previous editions of WinMo. The Omnia Pro maintains a high level of functionality, with an eye on business customers.
Split personality: Samsung’s Omnia Pro
With a 5Mp Camera, HSDPA 3G, Wi-Fi, A-GPS and Samsung’s TouchWiz interface, the Omnia Pro also features a slide-out Qwerty keyboard and an alternative interface. At 113 x 58 x 17mm and 165g, the Omnia Pro is considerably chunkier than the Omnia II, which measured up at 118 x 60 x 12 and 129g. The Pro’s additional girth and weight is offset a little by reduced length and width, making it not seem like quite the brick it might have been.
The screen has shrunk a little from 3.7in to 3.5in and beneath it are call start and stop buttons flanking an outsize menu button that forms the shape of a smile – this is meant to be the fun face of business. Above it are a VGA Camera for video calls and a light sensor, while round the sides are screen lock and Camera shutter buttons, a volume rocker and a button labelled ‘W&L’. Read the rest of this entry »
Review Nokia’s X6 smartphone is more than just another touch screen smartphone in an overcrowded market. In its 32GB form, this well-spec’d music phone will only be available with Nokia’s Comes With Music package. It’ll be hard to avoid, and is likely to benefit from aggressive subsidies.
Nokia’s X6: one of the few models currently supporting the latest Ovi Maps upgrade
Comes With Music is basically a free download subscription service, but this ‘universal jukebox’ allows you to keep the music you’ve downloaded. The cost of a year’s subscription is bundled with the phone, so it appears to be free. If after a year, you choose another CWM Nokia phone, it rolls over, and continues to be free.
Either way, the music doesn’t disappear, as it does with Rhapsody or a Spotify subscription. The only restriction is that it plays on one nominated PC and one nominated CWM phone. It’s a great sounding concept, but the public has been unimpressed so far. So the X-series represents the company’s best and possibly last hope that the CWM concept will finally catch the interest of the masses. Is the X6, and the revamped CWM enough to do it?
The X6 runs Series 60 Fifth Edition, Nokia’s stop-gap touch UI, and there are no surprises if you’re familiar with the 5800 or N97 handsets. Nokia opted to retain familiarity for users, and API compatibility for developers – Fifth Edition is really just the old S60 in a fishtank, so the interface and interaction are unchanged. Read the rest of this entry »
Review Nokia’s Symbian-driven N97 smart phone came out in the summer to rather mixed reviews, with most people praising its feature count, but finding it a bit of a pain to use. Now comes the N97 Mini, a little (but not a lot) smaller than the original N97, and with most of its feature count intact, including its 5Mp Camera, HSDPA 3G, Wi-Fi and A-GPS, though it now has a smaller screen, as well as reduced memory and battery life.
Nokia’s N97 Mini: supports the new free Ovi satnav
The original N97 measured 117 x 55 x 16mm and weighed 150g while the newbie cuts that down to 113 x 53 x 14mm and 138g. It’s still a decent handful, but where the N97 felt bloated and heavy, the mini is comparatively sleek and tactile.
Above the touch screen is a 640 x 480 Camera for video calls, while below it are touch-sensitive call start and stop buttons, plus a distinctive, offset, hard menu button. Around the sides are a volume rocker and Camera shutter button, plus micro USB power/sync slot, and screen lock switch, with power button and 3.5mm headphone jack on top. At the back is the Carl Zeiss Camera lens and dual LED flash, standing slightly proud of the rest of the casing. Read the rest of this entry »
