I was looking in the market for a PDA phone and thats the reason I recently ditched my Amazing N73 Music edition. Its not that it was a bad phone, but as days have passed by, priorities change and hence I needed a fully functional PDA.
Now why carry 2 devices then? Thats the reason I wanted to go for a PDA phone.
The obvious first choice around here is SE P990. Its A great phone. But I have used it and it was simply a turn off for me.
Then I stumbled upon this phone. Did some research on Internet and picked it up.
Now some of you must be wondering why in this world I bough a phone which was released 18 months back. Well, I will answer your queries along the way.
Lets start.
[BREAK=Whats in the box]
The package is complete. It includes everything you need except the expansion cards.
It includes following thing.
Software CD
Phone
Belt Pouch
Stereo headphones with handsfree
Charger
Usb Datacable
Manual
Spare Stylus
Battery
Quick start guide
[BREAK=Phone Specifications.]
First off, the specifications.
OS: Windows Mobile 5.0 for Pocket PC*
CPU: Texas Instruments OMAP850 200 MHz
RAM: 47.46 MB available (not used for storing data)
ROM: 44.08 MB available to a user for storing data, installing programs;
Interfaces: SD/MMC supporting SDIO, IrDA (SIR), Bluetooth 2.0, USB for recharging/synchronization/use as a modem, Wi-Fi (IEEE802.11g, the I security standard is promised);
Networks: GSM 850/900/1800/1900, GPRS class B multi-slot class 10 , EDGE
Screen: TFT 2.83" (43 x 57 mm) with the resolution of 240x320 pixels, 65K, 4 backlighting levels
Camera: 2 MP without a flash (the max resolution forms 1600x1200 pixels), records video (the max resolution is 176x144 pixels), manual macromode
Battery: removable Li-Ion , 1200 mAh
Dimensions: 108.8x59.3x18.4 mm
Weight: 148 gms
Now some of you must be wondering why there is * mark in red next to O.S?
Now this is one of the reasons I chose this phone. This phone has great homebrew support with plenty of coders creating custom ROM for this phone.
This is basically HTC Prophet OEM phone. And there are plenty of custom cooked Windows Mobile 6 ROMs available for this phone which makes it very attractive purchase. Its not that Windows Mobile 5 is bad, or this phone is crap with stock OS. This is not the case. Windows Mobile 6 is not radically different from WM5. But it has fewer memory leaks and there are ROMs available which makes this phone much better in terms of both speed and feature set.
Over the time features like A2DP, Crossbow and Touch interface has been added making this device much fun to use and also give it better interface to work with.
Its very easy to update the ROMs and just googling for it will give you all the info you need.
[BREAK=The Phone]
[BREAK=Using the Phone]
Its a windows phone. And honestly you will feel right at home. In some of the pics above you can see my custom interface.
This is custom Windows Mobile 6 rom installed on phone and according to personal choice you can select the items you want on your today screen ( basically desktop of the PDA ).
I have selected weather, clock, user info, calander and tabbed interface with shortcut application launcher which allows me to launch certain programs right from the desktop.
Almost everything is same as windows. Navigation is easy, its smooth and there are plenty of 3rd party applications available for this platform including CPU overclocking tools ( Now tell me what else would I need
)
I have at the moment loaded some freewares media player and data management tools available free of cost on net to make this phone more productive.
Camera is not great. Its standard 2MP camera. Gives decent output in daylight. Its not autofocus. But on the back the chrome ring around the lens has 2 settings. Macro and distant. Macro makes it focus nearer to the lens.
I got A2DP working fine with my friend's Motorola A2DP headset which sounded great.
With free 3rd party music apps like TCPMP, media playback is flawless and audio quality is as good as it gets on any phone I have ever used.
TCPMP has full graphic equalizer. There are many other options as well but I like this one as its small, works great and its free.
Here are some of the GUI screenshots.
[BREAK=Conclusion]
So, how is this phone?
Well its not perfect. It has weak CPU, that does not hamper its functionality much but more powerful CPU would be nice to have. But even recently launched HTC touch has exact same hardware under its hood, so its not much to complain about.
Its compact, looks decent, productivity is limited by the user's imagination only.
Great homebrew support. Runs windows mobile 6 flawlessly and in most cases better than WM5.
Battery life is decent for PDA. Easily lasts me whole day with heavy use which includes running wifi, bluetooth, video and audio files, few presentations.
Its easy to sync with Microsoft outlook.
Camera is not great but you dont expect great camera on PDA phone in this price range.
Approx Price with bill and warranty is near to 21K in Indian market from what I have inquired so far.
With bill, P990i is 19.5k.
So big question comes to mind. Is it worth it?
Coming from P990 user, it is. It does not have qwerty keyboard which is somewhat a downer for this phone, but overall on functionality and homebrew front, this is great purchase. Grey market price will be considerably lower than official price.
So if you are looking for a good windows mobile phone, this is great option for everyone.
Now why carry 2 devices then? Thats the reason I wanted to go for a PDA phone.
The obvious first choice around here is SE P990. Its A great phone. But I have used it and it was simply a turn off for me.
Then I stumbled upon this phone. Did some research on Internet and picked it up.
Now some of you must be wondering why in this world I bough a phone which was released 18 months back. Well, I will answer your queries along the way.
Lets start.
[BREAK=Whats in the box]
The package is complete. It includes everything you need except the expansion cards.
It includes following thing.
Software CD
Phone
Belt Pouch
Stereo headphones with handsfree
Charger
Usb Datacable
Manual
Spare Stylus
Battery
Quick start guide
[BREAK=Phone Specifications.]
First off, the specifications.
OS: Windows Mobile 5.0 for Pocket PC*
CPU: Texas Instruments OMAP850 200 MHz
RAM: 47.46 MB available (not used for storing data)
ROM: 44.08 MB available to a user for storing data, installing programs;
Interfaces: SD/MMC supporting SDIO, IrDA (SIR), Bluetooth 2.0, USB for recharging/synchronization/use as a modem, Wi-Fi (IEEE802.11g, the I security standard is promised);
Networks: GSM 850/900/1800/1900, GPRS class B multi-slot class 10 , EDGE
Screen: TFT 2.83" (43 x 57 mm) with the resolution of 240x320 pixels, 65K, 4 backlighting levels
Camera: 2 MP without a flash (the max resolution forms 1600x1200 pixels), records video (the max resolution is 176x144 pixels), manual macromode
Battery: removable Li-Ion , 1200 mAh
Dimensions: 108.8x59.3x18.4 mm
Weight: 148 gms
Now some of you must be wondering why there is * mark in red next to O.S?
Now this is one of the reasons I chose this phone. This phone has great homebrew support with plenty of coders creating custom ROM for this phone.
This is basically HTC Prophet OEM phone. And there are plenty of custom cooked Windows Mobile 6 ROMs available for this phone which makes it very attractive purchase. Its not that Windows Mobile 5 is bad, or this phone is crap with stock OS. This is not the case. Windows Mobile 6 is not radically different from WM5. But it has fewer memory leaks and there are ROMs available which makes this phone much better in terms of both speed and feature set.
Over the time features like A2DP, Crossbow and Touch interface has been added making this device much fun to use and also give it better interface to work with.
Its very easy to update the ROMs and just googling for it will give you all the info you need.
[BREAK=The Phone]
Now lets have a look at the phone itself.
The phone is not big, it does not feel like a brick in hand like P990. Its slick, its light enough and you can actually fit it in pocket if you want.
The package includes the belt pouch as well.
The front has Touch screen, dial, disconnect, direction, select and 4 soft keys which can be programmed.
On the right side of phone, it has irda and power buttons as well as the stylus.
On the left side, it has camera, communication manager and volume buttons.
The top of the phone has expansion slot for SD and MMC cards(hot swappable ).
Bottom has miniusb and 2.5mm stereo headphone/mic jack.
Back has the 2 MP camera, self portrait mirror and a plug to connect external antenna.
The phone is not big, it does not feel like a brick in hand like P990. Its slick, its light enough and you can actually fit it in pocket if you want.
The package includes the belt pouch as well.
The top of the phone has expansion slot for SD and MMC cards(hot swappable ).
Back has the 2 MP camera, self portrait mirror and a plug to connect external antenna.
[BREAK=Using the Phone]
Its a windows phone. And honestly you will feel right at home. In some of the pics above you can see my custom interface.
This is custom Windows Mobile 6 rom installed on phone and according to personal choice you can select the items you want on your today screen ( basically desktop of the PDA ).
I have selected weather, clock, user info, calander and tabbed interface with shortcut application launcher which allows me to launch certain programs right from the desktop.
Almost everything is same as windows. Navigation is easy, its smooth and there are plenty of 3rd party applications available for this platform including CPU overclocking tools ( Now tell me what else would I need
)I have at the moment loaded some freewares media player and data management tools available free of cost on net to make this phone more productive.
Camera is not great. Its standard 2MP camera. Gives decent output in daylight. Its not autofocus. But on the back the chrome ring around the lens has 2 settings. Macro and distant. Macro makes it focus nearer to the lens.
I got A2DP working fine with my friend's Motorola A2DP headset which sounded great.
With free 3rd party music apps like TCPMP, media playback is flawless and audio quality is as good as it gets on any phone I have ever used.
TCPMP has full graphic equalizer. There are many other options as well but I like this one as its small, works great and its free.
Here are some of the GUI screenshots.
[BREAK=Conclusion]
So, how is this phone?
Well its not perfect. It has weak CPU, that does not hamper its functionality much but more powerful CPU would be nice to have. But even recently launched HTC touch has exact same hardware under its hood, so its not much to complain about.
Its compact, looks decent, productivity is limited by the user's imagination only.
Great homebrew support. Runs windows mobile 6 flawlessly and in most cases better than WM5.
Battery life is decent for PDA. Easily lasts me whole day with heavy use which includes running wifi, bluetooth, video and audio files, few presentations.
Its easy to sync with Microsoft outlook.
Camera is not great but you dont expect great camera on PDA phone in this price range.
Approx Price with bill and warranty is near to 21K in Indian market from what I have inquired so far.
With bill, P990i is 19.5k.
So big question comes to mind. Is it worth it?
Coming from P990 user, it is. It does not have qwerty keyboard which is somewhat a downer for this phone, but overall on functionality and homebrew front, this is great purchase. Grey market price will be considerably lower than official price.
So if you are looking for a good windows mobile phone, this is great option for everyone.
