The music player supports MP3, AAC, AAC+ and WMA files and comes with an equalizer with 11 clearly distinct presets, and a 5.1 virtual surround option. Yet, this setting seems to have the effect of compressing the music more, rather than opening it out. You can browse your music's cover art in the iPhone's CoverFlow style in landscape mode and choose from a selection of onscreen visualisations.
Speed kills: battery merely lasts a day
The FM radio can save dozens of presets and includes station ID info. You can record tunes direct to your phone's memory at three different quality settings and also search for track info, Shazam-style. There's a 3.5mm headphone jack for upgrading the supplied headphones but they're not actually too bad – a little bass-light perhaps and a tendency to sibilance in the higher register, but better than many supplied 'phones we've tried. Call and reception quality was fine too.
The 2GB of memory on board is a good start, but you can increase the Jet's storage capacity with Micro SD cards – you'll need to remove the back cover to get to it, but not the battery. Considering it's got an energy-saving OLED screen, we were disappointed with the battery life of the Jet. Perhaps the powerful processor puts some extra drain on the juice, but the promised 180 minutes of talk time and 250 hours' standby translated into a barely a day of moderate use.
Verdict
The Samsung S8000 Jet isn't a do-everything phone but it's still a very attractive handset, and certainly seems to deliver on its core offerings: speed and ease of use. The OLED screen is a gem and though we would have liked it to have been a smidgeon more touch-sensitive, it's great for viewing videos and web browsing. Our only real problem was the battery life, which didn't quite come up to expectations.
All in all, it's a slick little media phone that delivers the fun stuff with style and flair. ®
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Samsung S8000 Jet
COMMENTS
Screen life
I know this doesn't affect people who upgrade their phone/car/partner/life every year, but my experience of two small OLED displays is that they deteriorate quite quickly. I think it is significant that Kodak had a camera with one a year or two back, and now they don't...
I own one.
...and it's not so bad. But, because we all like to slate products - here's it's bad points:
My phone freaks out and tells me the inbox is full when it reaches 200 text messages (instead of the 500 the specifications promise). In fact, I had nearer to 300 texts combined between my Sent Items and Inbox when it told me it was full - but the 'Memory Status' read as 200/500. Bug-tastic!
One bad thing is that it makes you pick a wifi network / data connection in the settings of each app instead of being intuitive and either letting you pick the connection you wish to use as you connect, or it should automatically 'guess' which one you want to use (ie, trying for wifi first, and then using data).
The default web browser is shite. Thank god for Opera Mini (though even Opera Mini will cause problems with people with fat fingers on this screen. Fatties, maybe carry a makeshift stylus?).
The camera is pretty good - shame it takes at the aspect ratio it does, and not the nicer 6x4 size a 'proper' camera would - but other than this, there's a wealth of useful settings. The flash is a bit harsh on just about everything, but there are enough settings to take a good photo - you just need to know what to do with them.
Widgets are nice, some pointless, but quite a lot of the ones you hope will be good are just bookmarks. Lame. What's more they have a widget to download more widgets that just takes you to a website once you've found the widget you want to download. Also lame (and hard to navigate when it's so small). I've looked into developing my own widgets and there doesn't seem to be an obvious way to submit them so others can download them ala an 'App Store'.
I can't scrobble my music from the default player to Last.fm. :(
There are, however, many things that this phone can do that are nice ideas that, say, the iPhone can't. Being able to shake the phone to get rid of the app you're using, tapping the phone (anywhere - not just the screen!) to stop and start music, the camera hardware, the tactile feedback, to name but a few.
£330
For a phone?! Is this some sort of joke? I don't think I'd pay more than about £15 for that sort of thing. What the hell can it possibly do that makes it worth over three HUNDRED quid?
bad knockoffs
It is my fondest hope, that some day, phoneset makers will realize that a good phone is defined by the craftsmanship of the design and the responsiveness of the UI, not on 'how close we can make it look like an iPhone until someone tries to use it'. Sidekick (RIP) and Android got this. Why must we have so many also-rans that don't?
If someone wants an iPhone, they'd be buying it (or waiting until the exclusivity expires). If they don't want an iPhone, they won't be buying something that looks like what they don't want.
How quick
How quick, for example, does it take to turn on?
How quick, for example, does it take to get into camera mode and ready to take a picture?
How quickly can I start going in to my address book from hitting the power key.
All of these things I care about. And yet, I still have no idea how quick this "jet" is.
Apart from their lousy advert, did you see their attempted vile viral campaign they tried to promote through B3ta. Utterly poor.
