Flip Phones - Samsung SGH-a107

Flip Phones - Pros & Cons

Before touching into the subject I thought that it would've been nice to give you some information about the history of flip phones first + few of the good and the bad. They may not be as popular as they were but in countries like Japan for example they're still among the favorites. It is said that GT&E was behind the introduction of these devices back in as early as 1970 (well the trade-name anyway) and the name and the theme was then "copied" by many other manufactures in producing devices of their own.

One of the main advantage of using cellular flip phones is that after the opening the length is elasticated thus giving the user a better comfort while making a call thanks to the overall length. This is something most of the so called "cool latest phones" lacks these days. Anyway apart from that apparent advantage usually they include two separate screens. One on the main body (much smaller than the one inside) and the main unit which lies on the inside area which is revealed once opened.

Thanks to the design the main display is well protected. And also a "real" keyboard is always included with them too. However as mentioned earlier one of the main reasons behind their popularity within certain individuals is that you don't have to turn your head aside while making a call which can prevent many related injuries which are common among non flip phones users.

Another thing about these units is that they tends to be very short after the flipping is done and makes it really easy to carry around and can almost always easily fit in your shirts' pocket. And they're not that thick or doesn't weight that much either. However when it comes to multimedia playback they're not the best.

Anyway lets head back to our review ...

Samsung is not new in inventing these type of things and they've been doing it for a very long time. But before going any further please bear in mind that this is lacks many useful features for example, it don't even has a camera! and no display-screen on the main outer area either. Forget 3G not even Bluetooth, you can listen to few music codes but no video because there is no player for that. But considering the low cost and few other things this is not even close to be called one of the best flip phones but if all you need from it, just main basic functions such as making some decent calls then this won't be such a bad choice either.

The dimensions are as follows. The length is 3.46", width 1.7" and a depth of .78". It's really light too (74g). The screen (2") is powered by a 65K color depth and the resolution is set at 128x128 (pixels). There are few buttons for navigation and power-on-off, etc. One good thing about the keys, they were easy to push and use thanks to the roomy design. The contact utility can holds up to 500 information. There are few other common software like calculator, clock, messaging, etc. For connectivity there is WAP.

The GSM engine operates around 850/1900 MHZ frequencies. The overall clearness of the calls were good actually and the person in the other end also heard decent inputs but not as good as we could hear them. The talk time of the battery is set around 3 hours which is again low in comparison with other latest flip phones. The standby time consists of 10 days. For connectivity there is a USB port included also. The only major audio codec supported is MP3.

Anyway this is no where near the requirements of this type of an electronic device by any means. But as said before considering the low price (below $30 pre-paid) and all you need is to make some calls then this is OK, but certainly not one of the ideal latest flip phones you can find.

Blackberry Pearl Flip 8220 - A Consumer Review

"This is not the newest mobile phone introduction from Blackberry. The flip 8220 was introduced in 2008, and there are no 3Gs, but the unit has some interesting features for its kind"

In dimensions it's 3.9 inches in height, 1.97 inches in width and 0.7 inches in depth. It weight around 101-102 grams. The phone comes in two colors - black and red. Anyway as the name suggest this is a flip-type smart phone including the SureType-keyboard. Once you get used to this type (the letter alignments are different) key-pad you can get a bit of a typing speed going on. Another thing about the keypad is that the buttons are arranged in a well spaced manner which makes the typing much easier.

The external display reads as follows. Screen size is around 1.6 inches with 65k (65,536 colors) and 128 x 160 pixels resolution. It shows many information, including battery status, signal strength and date/time, missed calls info, SMS notifications, audio track info while using the media player, etc. You can preview some of your mesages (including e-mails) from this external display.

Once you flip (flipping is really smooth and robust), you're presented with a much bigger internal screen with 2.25 inches and 65k colors + a bigger resolution of 240 x 320 pixels. The graphics and text letters and numbers are brighter than the other screen and easily readable. The overall GUI is impressive thank to the OS update (4.6). You can easily re arrange the home screen with customized icons , font size adjustments and themes too.

Even though this is not a latest phone, yet in supports 16GB of external memory upgrades through microSD slot which is really high standards considering the released dates (2008). A 128MB of RAM + 256MB of another microSD card is included by default.

One of the biggest disappointment with the phone is its lack of 3G support. It comes with WiFi and you can arrange to make unlimited calls plan (around - $9.99, $19 - family plan) with in certain WiFi hots-pots.

The web browsing of Blackberry Pearl Flip 8220 with the EDGE was pretty smooth and good (not staggeringly fast in comparison with 3G enabled devices). Overall web-video playback like YouTube was reasonable but some times the videos didn't cover the screen areas properly for some strange reason. The HTML browser did a good job loading pages and confronted very few errors again in comparison with the old OS versions. The e-mail facility is also really great (as always with the Blackberry), the unit even support syncing mails with your company's mail server!. And all the main mail services like, Yahoo, G-mail, AOL, Live etc are supported.

The audio quality of the calls were excellent. But in the speakerphone sometimes produces a bit of a buzz (not a big concern anyway).

The multimedia support is again very impressive. H.263, WMV and MPEG 4 -part 2 codecs are supported and MP3, WMA, AAC/C+, eAAC, AMR-NB audio codecs are supported. The audio out put also really good. This unit can give the user a top quality multimedia experience. So another star to entertainment.

The battery comes with a four hours of continues talk time and 14 days of standby time which is again good. Not the most powerful battery in the world, again after considering its released date.

In comparison with other so called flip-type latest phones, this units performance was excellent considering many factors (mentioned above). So if you seek flip phones (this type of phones reduces the strain of the neck - because of the obvious design factors) but ready to cope with not having a 3G connection, this might be your ideal partner

* There are many contract when buying - so the overall price may differ according to your choice.